Sermon Tone Analysis

A life is a terrible thing to waste.

In his life saving book, Don't Waste Your Life, John Piper recounts a story his father often told in his days as a fiery Baptist evangelist.

It is the story of a man who came to saving faith in Jesus Christ near the end of his earthly existence.

Piper writes:

The church had prayed for this man for decades.

He was hard and resistant.

But this time, for some reason, he showed up when my father was preaching.

At the end of the service, during a hymn, to everyone's amazement he came and took my father's hand.

They sat down together on the front pew of the church as the people were dismissed.

God opened his heart to the Gospel of Christ, and he was saved from his sins and given eternal life.

But that did not stop him from sobbing and saying, as the tears ran down his wrinkled face—"I've wasted it!

I've wasted it!"

By the grace of God, even a life that is almost totally wasted can still be redeemed.

As the Scottish theologian Thomas Boston once said, our present existence is only "a short preface to a long eternity."

If that is true, then the man's life was not wasted after all; he was only just beginning an eternal life of endless praise.

But why wait even a moment longer before starting to serve Jesus?

You have only one life to live.

Don't waste it by living for yourself when you can use it instead for the glory of God.

DAVID SERVED HIS GENERATION BECAUSE HE WAS SAVED.

Saved people serve.

How do we know that David was saved?

DAVID’S SALVATION IS REVEALED IN GOD’S CHOICE.

It is most crucial at the outset to establish the fact that David was not by nature a man after God’s heart.

RIGHTEOUSNESS IS NOT INHERENT BUT IMPUTED.

He did not possess some inherent goodness which made God choose him.

Every person who is converted recognizes that there is nothing in himself which commended him to God.

By nature we all are sinners, in rebellion against God.

We all are self-willed and self-seeking rather than seeking after God

No one deserves anything but judgment from God.

David was not made right before God by his own good deeds.

So we would be off on the wrong track from the start if we assumed that God chose David because of his own will power and effort to be a man after God’s heart.

Conversion is God’s work, and He had performed that work in David’s heart.

David didn’t choose God; God chose David

While 1 Samuel 16 has reference to David’s anointing as king, not to his conversion, the clear point of the incident applies to God’s ways in salvation, namely, that God chooses those whom the world often overlooks or rejects.

Samuel would have picked David’s older brothers, not David.

David’s father didn’t consider his youngest son enough of a candidate even to bring him in from the fields.David was God’s choice.

Even so, God chooses for salvation those whom the world would reject, so that none can boast before God

DAVID’S SALVATION IS REFLECTED IN HIS CHARACTER.

It’s enlightening to compare David and Saul on the matter of conversion.

Whether Saul was genuinely converted or not is subject to debate, and perhaps we can never know for sure.

He strikes me as an example of the seed sown on the thorny ground, which got choked out and did not bear fruit unto eternal life.

But even so, Saul had some sort of dramatic spiritual experience in which “God changed his heart,” the Spirit of God came on him mightily, and he prophesied

If David had a similar dramatic experience, it is not recorded in Scripture.

Perhaps, like many who are converted in childhood, David could not put his finger on a date or describe a dramatic change.

But the subsequent lives of the two men lead in opposite directions.

David followed the Lord; Saul’s course was marked by self-seeking and partial obedience under a veneer of spirituality (1 Sam.

13:8-14; 15:10-35).

Although David had his share of sins, he always confessed and turned from them, whereas Saul compromised and made excuses.

David was honored by God, but Saul ended his life in disgrace.

Genuine conversion may or may not be accompanied by some dramatic or emotional experience.

Sometimes a person comes to Christ in a dramatic encounter, such as Paul on the Damascus Road.

But at other times, a person cannot put his finger on the moment at which he was converted.

Rather, he comes to a gradual awareness that God has done a work in his heart.

But in every case, genuine conversion is a work of God in the human heart in which He imparts new life and a right standing before Him based on the work of Christ on the cross.

It is not based upon human will power, but on the sovereign, unmerited favor and choice of God.

So how do you know if you’re truly converted?

Paul exhorts,

1 John gives 8 tests of whether faith is legitimate or illegitimate.

Walking in the Light - 1 John 1:5-7

Confession of Sin - 1 John 1:8-10

Obedience - 1 John 2:3-4

Love for the Brethren - 1 John 2:9-11

Hatred for the World - 1 John 2:15-17

Perseverance in Doctrine - 1 John 2:24-25

Righteousness - 1 John 3:10

Spirit’s Testimony - 1 John 4:13

DAVID SERVED HIS GENERATION BECAUSE HE WAS SPIRIT-FILLED.

In 1 Samuel 16:13 the Spirit of God did not permanently indwell all believers as He does in the present age of grace.

Rather, He came upon certain ones to enable them to perform certain roles or tasks.

He also could and did leave those who did not walk uprightly (1 Sam.

16:14; Ps. 51:11).

When Samuel anointed David for the throne, the Holy Spirit came upon him mightily from that day forward.

David was a markedly different young man because of the Holy Spirit.

HE WAS A MAN OF WORSHIP.

HE WAS A MAN OF WORTH.

HE WAS A MAN OF WAR.

HE WAS A MAN OF WORDS.

THE LORD WAS WITH HIM.

DAVID SERVES US STILL.

HE REMINDS US THAT GOD IS IN CONTROL.

God will provide for His people when everything is coming undone.

The true king never loses control of His kingdom.

He is never perplexed by the latest emergency in His realm.

The key word/root in the chapter provides its theme.

The Lord’s words introduce this theme in

The verb is rā’āh, which in this case carries the sense of “provide” (as in Gen. 22:8, 14).

This root occurs nine times in this chapter, not readily visible in English translation.

It appears as a verb meaning “provide” (vv. 1, 17) or “see, look at” (vv.

6, 7 [three times], 18) and as nouns meaning “appearance” (vv.

7, 12).

The ideas of looking and providing in this root contrast with the “not chosen” (negative +bāḥar) in verses 8, 9, and 10.

Therefore, the one the Lord looks to and provides will be his chosen one.

That is the theme of chapter 16—The Lord’s choice.

Let us now develop the main lines of the teaching of this text.

1 Samuel reminds us that man’s choice more often than not brings disaster.

The Lord was gracious and did not allow there decision to destroy them.

“I have rejected him” saves Israel from destruction.

1 Samuel reminds us that established and eradicates politicians for His divine purposes.

HE REINFORCES WHAT TRULY MATTERS TO GOD.

HE REVEALS TO US GOD’S HEART.

SERVE THOSE WHO LOVE AND HATE YOU

We might ponder David’s ministry of consolation to Saul.