A couple of housekeeping things before we move forward with the Word, which
I'm very excited about. We have an opportunity
today, if you have a 5th grade child going into the 6th
grade, moving up here in about a week, we have a
meet and greet for you, for your— the parents, for the child,
immediately following this gathering. If you will make your way upstairs
with the youth, We are going to just let you get to know
us a little bit and introduce your child to that space,
to some of the people. And we would love for you to join us. And
if you do not know how to get up there, we will have somebody posted
there, correct? We'll be yelling, hey you, over here! You
know, just wave and we'll make it very obvious. But take your teen
and let them be introduced to the youth department.
Oh, ooh, it sounds ominous when you say it that way, huh?
We're excited about that. Next week we begin the
service change, the time changes. So
if you come at 11, you will have missed worship, or at least part of
it, and you don't wanna do that. So it'll begin at 10:30 next
week. God is so faithful. I'm excited about that. And I'm excited about the
Wednesday night as we press into the Word on the following week as we
begin our midweek gatherings again, but we begin them on Wednesday night.
And the final thing I wanted to share with you, you know, I have been
in this house Since the 1900s.
Wow. I know. Hey, you're on staff. You can't say that
like that. You—
ow, et tu, Brute?
Since 1992. And what I have seen in these
decades is the faithfulness of God in the ministries in this house.
When I came here, we had Pastor Margaret for the longest time. What
a blessing to our children. We had Pastor Kim,
a blessing to our children's ministry. And we have had Pastor Shari
O'Day, who has been a blessing to our children's ministry.
And one of the things that Pastor Kevin and Pastor Shari have both done
so amazingly is that they created teams in this house
so that there was no lack. And so while many of us
are not surprised, it is— Pastor Shari
will be operating— ooh, that sounds ominous. Pastor Shari
will be moving We're believing with Pastor Kevin as they sow into a season
at LCA. Pastor Kevin and Pastor Shari, for as long as I
have known them, have ministered as a team, and that's
something that the Lord has anointed them to do. And so I'm excited
for their opportunity in sowing into LCA. And with
that, there has been no lack left in this house because you guys
know, Christa— I mean, Come on, Krista.
Amen. We have
such a dynamic team, and if I do this, I'm gonna do what I did
when I forgot to list all the pastors' names. But there are about 8
of them that I could name, and every time I mentioned their names, you would
go, oh, absolutely, absolutely. Because Pastor Kevin and Pastor
Shari were so mindful in creating teams that could serve this
house so that, like all of us, And I know that all of us, every
single one of us, when the Lord says, now I want you to shift into
something else, we leave no lack in the house. So I'm excited
about what God has for children's ministry in this time. And I ask that you
continue to pray for Pastor Kevin and Pastor Shari as they step
into a new season in their lives. And now, as if he has
not done enough this morning, we're gonna invite Pastor
Jonathan back because he didn't sing and dance enough. And
he's gonna bring the Word. So thank you, Pastor Jonathan.
Thank you. Ah, this guy again,
so soon. Thank
you.
Let's pray. Holy
Spirit, would you help us to
open our eyes, open our ears, open our hearts To your
word, Lord. We
exist as a fellowship that has come to hear from
you, Lord, that has come to exalt
you, Lord. I thank you that you've given
us the calling and the gift to be
image bearers of Christ to the world.
And I pray, Lord, pray Holy Spirit, that you would help us to do so.
Amen. joyfully, carefully, and
compassionately. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
So Pastor Barbie asked me if I would close our Worship Anyways series
this week on the very well-known story of David dancing before
the Ark of the Covenant and saying, I will become even more
undignified than this. I will be humiliated or humble
in my own eyes. And that verse sits near the very end of one of
my all-time favorite passages or chapters in scripture,
2 Samuel 6. So if you brought your Bible, go ahead and turn there
today. We're going to spend a lot of time there. And getting
to that verse of, I have become even, or will become even more
undignified than this, is our destination. But every destination
has a journey we must take to get there. And this journey for the people
of God is exactly what makes this one of my all-time favorite
stories. in scripture. It's important for them then, and
it's important for us today. The context is that
David has officially been appointed king of Israel. His
first act as king was to take back the city of Jerusalem, which
he does so successfully, and then it is renamed the City
of David in his honor. Now, many powerful
leaders all throughout time, all throughout history, even in modern day,
When they officially take that seat of power, that position
of power, they will begin often making changes that make sure,
to make sure that everybody knows exactly who is in charge. They
might put up monuments and memorials to themselves.
However, King David is very different in this
regard. 2 Samuel 5 tells us that although
David, by all external accounts, is becoming
visibly greater and greater, the city was fortified and growing.
An allied king sends these resources and these artisans to build
him a house. There is a moment that happens in verses 11 and
12 that paints a beautiful picture of David witnessing
all this gain around him, and this is what it says. David realized
that the Lord had established him as king
over Israel, and that God had exalted his kingdom
for the sake of his people Israel. That word realize is the
word yada, which means to perceive or know in your mind,
in your heart, in a different way than you had, in a
way that you hadn't seen before. So this moment of appointment
for King David is nearly 20 years after he was
first anointed by Samuel to become king, and he is now
witnessing that word unfold in his life.
And we remember that David went through some really challenging
things in that period of time. We, of course, we remember Goliath, but he
was also figuring out what it means to serve faithfully under this
leader who is actively trying to hunt him down and have him killed
at the same time. Um, all of that can be really
crushing to a person, but we know through all of that, he had this
relationship with the Lord. He is a man after God's own
heart, but at this moment, he's perceiving something
different. That God, through all of that, was actually leading him
holding him and forming him through every
trial, every suffering for a
purpose. And I wonder, has anyone in here ever gone through
something where the challenge surrounding it
were so great, the sufferings that you went through were so great that when you
got to the other side and you looked back in whatever,
uh, uh, in whatever kind of fashion you were in, whether you were
standing or you just made it through, you're crawling through, you look to the other
side and you look back and you go, the only reason reason I'm here is
because I was being held together by the grace of God.
Amen. Something like that appears to be happening in King
David's heart and mind at this moment. He's realizing
all these blessings, all this gain, his home, his
kingdom, his kingship, it's all been established
not by him in his own strength, not by his own understanding, but by
God alone. for the purposes of
God. And that leads David into
a lower place of humility, a deeper
place of worship, and for the very
important decision to bring the Ark of the Covenant into the City of David
to be the spiritual center of the kingdom. And the Ark
of the Covenant in the Old Testament represented the manifest presence
and power of God dwelling among his people. It's where his people
would go and receive mercy. For me, it is an Old
Testament picture of he must
increase, I must decrease. It's what David's
doing here. David came to realize what Paul would later proclaim about
Christ, that all things are from him, through
him, and for him. Jesus is not only our source
of power, Jesus is our life.
Jesus is the reason we have life. And
Jesus— exalting Jesus is the purpose of our life. Can
you imagine what that would look like if the
church, the believers, really took hold of that and we were
so moved by God that we
would be moved to just exalt him in everything, all of our
conversations, Let's
read what making that decision looks like for us. 2 Samuel
6:1-5. David again gathered
all the chosen men of Israel, 30,000. And David arose and went with all
the people who were with him from Baale-Judah to bring up from
there the Ark of God, which is called by the name of the Lord of
hosts, who sits enthroned on the cherubim.
And they carried the Ark of God on a new cart. And I want you
to remember that, highlight it, circle it, underline it. On
a new cart, brought it out of the house of Abinadab, which was on the
hill. And Uzzah and Ahio, the sons of Abinadab, were
driving the new cart. There it is again with the Ark of God. And Ahio
went before the Ark, and David and all the house of Israel
were celebrating before the Lord with songs, lyres, harps,
tambourines, castanets, and cymbals. This was a rocking praise service.
Yeah. This is a joyful moment for the people
of God because this is a restoration of his presence among
them. This is a restoration of the fullness of joy
that's found in his presence. I say a restoration because
1 Chronicles 13:3 says that before this
moment, the Ark was not sought in the
days of King Saul. who was David's predecessor.
Can we just stop and think about that for a
moment? The manifest presence of God
in our midst, nearby,
within reach, but never sought
after. The people never moved to move in
closer.
I hope that breaks our collective heart to the point where we
are prompted to ask the same question: how
did God's people get to the point of such
irreverence and indifference to his
presence? And I think we
find that answer by understanding just how the
ark wound up there in Abinadab's house in the first place. 1 Samuel
details a battle between the Israelites and the Philistines where the Israelites
just get demolished. They get their tails handed to them,
and they go back, they regroup, they lick their wounds, and they try to figure
out what, what went wrong here. And they're thinking about the stories of old, and
they go, I got it. You know, the problem is, is we didn't have the
presence, and where there is no presence, there is no
power. So let's go get the Ark of the Covenant.
and we'll bring it before us in battle and we'll show these guys
who, who the boss is. And they go and do that and something
miraculous happens. They go into battle and they get their tails
handed to them again. God allows them
to be defeated, and even worse, the Philistines take the Ark as
their prize, but they start to pass
it around among their villages, and everywhere
the Ark goes, they wake up the next day and their idols are broken
in the presence of the Ark. It's
catastrophic, so catastrophic for the Philistines that they go,
we gotta send it back. We can't deal
with this. So they fashion a cart and they put
the Ark of the Covenant on a cart, and they have the cart pulled by
2 cows who have never been yoked before. And this was kind of a setup
for the Lord, because cows that have not been yoked, not trained, would
not be able to get that cart back to where it needed to be. But
the Lord guides it exactly where it needs to be, and
it's clear that the Lord has been involved in all of this
the whole time. Based on those
stories, one possible out— uh, answer to the
question of how God's people find themselves in that place of
indifference, for his presence is that they care more
about the presence or the power of his presence than they do about
cultivating real relationship with his presence.
They care more about what they could get from God rather than what they could
give of themselves to God. And that
is a condition of the heart that I see
in relationships all over society.
Spouses, children, friends, whatever it is. We enjoy
the fruit and the spoils of intimate relationship,
but we don't often love the responsibility of self-sacrifice
that comes along with it. The responsibility
of self-sacrifice that is required to be truly present, setting
aside my plan, setting aside my agenda, giving my full heart,
giving my attention. I love my
kids. I want to be present for my kids. And when they ask
me to play outside—
I don't need to say anything else. Okay. They want
me to get down in the dirt with them. They
want me to see their faces and pretend with them. And my
go-to is, why don't you guys go play outside? We'll, we'll keep the
screen door open so that I can hear your voices.
That's the illusion of presence. That is not being truly
present. As Pastor Wayne would say, that is proximity, not
intimacy. And when I'm in proximity
to my children like that, something fascinating
happens. I can hear that they are saying
words. I can hear that they are speaking, but I'm
not close enough to hear What they are
saying. I can't hear the
fine details of their voice. The same is true in our relationship
with God and his word. If we love him and his word, but we spend
no time with him or his word, then we can both know
without a doubt that he has spoken, but we will have no idea what he
has said. So David is
declaring in this moment God's presence will no longer be
an afterthought for his people. God's people will
no longer be content with just knowing his presence is around if
we ever need him. God will be the joy of his
people, and his people will be diligent and purposeful to exalt
him in everything that we do, because that is the glory and honor
and praise that he deserves. Amen.
Our undivided attention, our full worship.
Let's continue to read, uh, verses 6 through 11. And
when they came to the threshing floor of Nacon, Uzzah
put out his hand to the Ark of God and took hold of it, for
the oxen stumbled. And the anger of the Lord was kindled against
Uzzah, and God struck him down there because of his error, and he died there
beside the Ark of God. And David was angry because the Lord had broken
out against Uzzah, and that place is called Perez Uzzah to this day.
And David was afraid of the Lord that day, and he said, how
can the ark of the Lord come to me? So David was not willing
to take the ark of the Lord into the City of David, but instead took
it aside to the house of Obed-Edom. And the ark of the Lord remained in
the house of Obed-Edom for 3 months, and the Lord blessed
Obed-Edom and all of his household. And I'm just blown away by
that, because as a father with 2 small children, if someone comes to
my house and dropped something off that just took out a man because he
touched it, I'd be like, get that thing out of here!
I, I won't be able to keep them alive in that instance.
Oh, but Edom has control of his household, let me tell you that.
Hello. And later on in scripture, he's actually elevated into full-time
Levitical ministry to minister to the Ark
there. So The start
of the journey, joyful, celebratory. The Ark was at the top
of the hill, and it's all gone downhill rather quickly.
What happened? David gives us more detail in 1 Chronicles
15:13, which is kind of a parallel telling of this
story. It was because of you, the Levites,
did not bring it up the first time that the Lord our God broke out
in anger against us. We did not inquire of him
about how to do it, in the prescribed way.
They just didn't ask. Numbers 4:15
says this. This is the prescribed way. When Aaron and his sons have
finished covering the holy objects and all the furnishings of the sanctuary,
when the camp is to set out, after the sons of Kohath
shall come to carry them by the poles so that they
will not touch the holy objects and die. These are
the things in the tent of meeting that the sons of Kohath are to
carry. So we remember from earlier, the Philistines
brought the Ark of the Covenant back on a cart, and David and the
people are now attempting to move the Ark of the Covenant on
a cart. How many of us know that the church is not
called or created to carry presents using
the methods of the world? Amen. Amen.
And this tragedy happens at the threshing
floor. This is a place where separation
happens. Separation of the wheat from the chaff,
separation of the fruitful from the unfruitful, the godly from
the worldly. And this is, this is
a hard lesson for King David. Of course, it's a hard lesson for
us. The presence of God is not simply a privilege
to enjoy, but it's also a
holy responsibility to carry.
And we should carry his presence carefully.
We have been indwelled with the Holy Spirit. We have been given the gift and
responsibility of reflecting Christ in the world
in the way the word of God says. Not with our best
ideas, not with the world's best ideas, but with
his. Yet we see the church
often attempting to carry his presence on these Philistine carts
time and time again. It can look like clever marketing.
Uh-oh. It can look like catchy songs. It can look like softening
truth. Why do we do
this? I find that
we yield faster results. We can get there quicker, but
maybe in a superficial way. It requires less faith.
It requires less dependence on God. So the problem
is not the methods themselves, it's just the heart
posture behind them. Have we actually gone to God
to say, God, what do you want us to do in this? Have
we gone to his word? It's not necessarily malicious.
We often have the best intentions of reaching people and exalting
Christ. That's what it's all about. When, uh, but our best intentions
do not replace God's instruction. Come on. They are
meant to form our best intentions. His ways
are not our ways, and his ways are better. And I'm
sure that this is personally humbling to David as a
leader, but he specifically says
We did not inquire of him the prescribed way.
Yeah. And there's something to be said about our collective responsibility
as a fellowship, collective responsibility to
carefully and be word-friendly
carriers of God's presence. That's the idea of iron sharpening
iron. So rather than place full blame on King David as a leader, I'm
not gonna go there because he doesn't go there. He says we, so
I'm gonna look at kind of all the characters involved in that, which I think
shows us something important. Uzzah, who touched the ark and died,
was the son of Abinadab, where the presence— where
the ark, uh, was in his house all those years. He grew up
in this house. King
David is actually known as someone who has good
communication with the Lord. He's not known as someone that doesn't talk to the
Lord. So there is a sense here that they collectively
represent seasoned believers who should know
better, but just get a little careless
here. And that perspective gives me some nuance that's very
identifiable for me personally, and it's instructive for me. And
I wanna show you this, uh, 2 Samuel 5:17-25.
The Philistines come to fight David in the Valley of Rephaim
twice, and each time David goes
to the Lord and asks, should I go fight? And the Lord tells
him yes each time, but he gives him different
instructions both times. First time, go in
head-on. Second time, go around the back.
That speaks to me because I believe We are the most prone
to ask God for help and direction when we are facing
battles. Our natural instinct when there is uncertainty
in front of us. However, we are usually the most likely
to move forward in our own wisdom when we have this mix
of good intention and this mix of experience of
witnessing God moving in a certain way over a length of
time, and we just get comfortable. It would be a
disservice to you guys if we have an amazing worship service
and I think, wow, those 5 songs really worked in that
order. I don't do that.
I have to go to the Lord and say, Lord, what this week? What
do you have? And the Philistines getting
the Ark of the Covenant back is enough to tell me that just because God
allows something to happen doesn't mean his blessing is on it.
Sometimes that's just his kindness, allowing his people another chance to seek
him, another chance to depend on him, another chance to
walk in his will for our lives.
There were some first-time visitors who were visiting our church
a couple of years ago. And anyone who knows me knows I have a
terrible history with first-time visitors, because when I get in
conversations with people for the first time, it's as if I've never spoken a
day in my life. To a person. So,
uh, and I think it was a setup because somebody very, uh, somebody wanted
me to be the one that met them. So I go out into the foyer
before service and we introduce ourselves to each other, and they tell me in
transparency, they go, uh, it was a husband and wife and they
had just gotten out of a recovery program. And they said what
was very important to them was to find a church that had an
altar time at the end where they could pray with elders.
Springhouse has a rich history of doing that here. For 15
years, it's happened quite a bit. That's how long I've been
attending. So I'm thinking, okay, this is good. We keep talking, but
they didn't know that we were at the tail end of a 4
to 6 week series on the Holy Spirit. And each series
was either like, uh, gifts of the Spirit or fruit of the Spirit. And every
single week in this series, We had incredible altar
times, not only during worship, but at the end of service,
multiple times, both services. So I'm
thinking, oh yeah, you want altar calls?
We got them. We got 4 or 5 a day, you know.
In my mind, I'm thinking this. Not only that, but this particular
service was titled Holy Spirit.
My expectations were at an all-time high.
So now, have you ever said something and when it left your mouth you're like,
I wish I could put that right back? This is what I
said. I promise you
there will be a time at the end of service for you to pray with
somebody. Praise the
Lord, I didn't actually have to come out for the last song. I was standing
right back there behind that curtain when one of our pastors got
up to close the service, which would've been the altar time. And this
pastor, I'm not gonna name who they are, but they are known
for having a prophetic gifting and hearing from the Lord with
accuracy. And she has the
audacity.
She has the audacity to get up here and
say, the Lord's telling me We're gonna do something different today. And
I was like, of course we are! You know? This is
crazy! I'm back there, I'm just going, oh my gosh.
Oh my gosh. She said,
the Lord's showing me something different today. I feel like we should just sit in
our seats instead of our prayer time and just
Sit in the presence of the Holy Spirit. So that next week,
miraculously, that couple is back at our church in
a foyer. And as I'm walking up to them to apologize,
they are literally laughing at me.
Literally laughing at me. And they said, don't worry about it.
The Lord really used that. We were in tears the whole time.
And I said, well, I was too, but for a different reason.
Only the Lord can use a situation or orchestrate a
situation that can both heal somebody and correct a different person at
the same time.
That's why his ways are better. Amen. We have
no chance to come up with something like that.
I have been doing this long enough, and my theology was well-formed enough for
me to know I cannot guarantee what
is only for the Holy Spirit to offer.
I had taken what God had been doing in previous weeks, mixed it
with my good intentions that I wanted for these people.
Assumed he would do it in exactly the same way.
And I say that to say it can happen that quickly
if we're not careful.
Help me, Lord. Let's
see how David and the people put this into action.
We'll continue reading verses 12 through 15. And it was told
King David that the Lord had blessed the household of Obed-Edom
and all that belongs to him because of the ark of God. So David
went and brought up the ark of God from the house of Obed-Edom to the
City of David with rejoicing. And when those who bore the
ark of the Lord had gone 6 steps, he
sacrificed an ox and a fattened animal, and David danced before the Lord with all
his might. So we can see now They're bearing
the Ark of the Covenant on their shoulders. 1 Chronicles 15
tells us that David had actually pulled together the correct, correct
Levitical families to carry the Ark. So evidently
they took that 3-month period to do a Bible study.
Hello. Before they made their decision, before they made their next
steps. Can we just agree that it's a good thing
to slow down? And do some Bible
study. Yes. They are finally
understanding the weight and
the feeling of the weight of the calling they have been given.
They're carrying his presence now, not only joyfully but
carefully. And I love so much that it says
they made sacrifices after 6 steps.
That tells me we cannot allow ourselves to get too far along
in our day, too far along in our decision-making, so focused
on our goals that we forget the one whose presence
empowers us to make them.
As King David and the people are finally bringing the Ark into the city,
David is dancing with all of his might. He's taken off his kingly garments.
He's wearing a linen ephod with, um, that
more closely resembles what a priest would wear. This is the Old Testament
type and shadow of our High Priest and King
Jesus, who would empty himself and humble
himself in obedience to the point of death.
And David begins blessing the people and distributing food to them because
When we have truly tasted and seen the goodness of
God, that is something that we are prompted to
share. What a blessing.
David was unaware that when he was coming into the city, his
wife Michal was watching from a window, and it
says that she despised him in her heart.
Which brings us to this final exchange in our text today.
When David returned home to bless his household, Michal daughter of Saul
came out to meet him and said, how the king of Israel
has distinguished himself today, going around half naked
in full view of the slave girls of his servants, as any vulgar
fellow would. David said to
Michal, it was before the Lord who chose me rather than
your father. Or anyone from his house when he appointed me ruler
over the Lord's people Israel. I will celebrate before the Lord. I will
become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in
my own eyes. But by these slave girls you spoke of, I will be held
in honor. And Michal, daughter of Saul, had no children
to the day of her death.
It seems like there's bitterness there. I've heard
some teachers simply say, simply describe her
as a jealous woman, just unwilling to enter into
worship. Sometimes I'm prone to come to scripture
and go and just look for the black and white, the right and wrong, the
good and bad, but that doesn't really do
justice to the nuance of life. To
the nuance, nuance of the human heart.
So I began to ask, like, what— is there more to that story
there that reveal— that would reveal something a little bit
deeper? And I kind of went back in the scriptures, 1
Samuel, just to see, you know, their life together. And this is 1
Samuel 18. Listen to, uh, 20 through 23. Listen to how
important these first words are. Now Michal, Saul's daughter,
loved David. So something
traumatic has happened there. How can she go
from loving him to despising him?
And it goes on to say, when they told Saul that she loved
David, the thing was agreeable to him. Saul thought, I will give her to him
that she may become a snare to him, and that by the hand of the
Philistines And, and the hand of the Philistines will be against him. Therefore
Saul said to David for a second time, you may be my son-in-law today.
Then Saul commanded his servants, speak to David secretly, saying,
behold, the king delights in you, and all the servants love you. Now therefore
become the king's son-in-law. And David says, is it trivial in your
sight to become the king's son-in-law? I am a poor man
and lightly esteemed. So that word in the Hebrew,
lightly esteemed, is the same as undignified.
So that means Michal once
loved David for the very thing she now despises him
for.
This is what I see through their story.
Her dad Saul used her as a
pawn in the game, in his game.
That's hard stuff. Later on, scriptures
tell us that when her dad was coming to have David killed, she helped him
escape. And then her father married
her off to another man. That's really difficult.
And when David finally becomes king, he Demands that she be
brought to him. And we learn as she's being brought, her husband is
actually following her and crying.
Worship team, you can come out. When I see all
that context—
let me say this about context. Context is so important for us. Yes.
When there's a groove in a song, in a worship song that hits just
right, it gets a little something going in me.
And if you didn't know anything about me, you might look at me and go,
that's really distracting that he's up there doing that, or trying to—
what? It's not called dancing, I guess.
Or it could be encouraging. Some of you might not know
that I have a scar on the back of my neck. That's
about this thick. Oh
yeah. From a car accident.
And the surgeon who went in said that I was
centimeters from being paralyzed.
So with that context,
this becomes a miracle Yeah. Regardless
of how it looks. Context
is important here because I don't see her simply
as a jealous woman that should just get over it
and worship anyway. And
that's not what we've said during this whole time. We're not saying worship anyway
and be dismissive of anything. We're saying,
see the greater glory, the bigger picture in
Jesus. I see the heart of a person that has been
dealt a very difficult hand, and when her suffering is brought
into view, it allows me to have compassion that I
didn't have before. And
compassion is important for the image bearers of Christ
to have, because it was compassion that moved
Jesus To minister to those 5,000 hungry
souls, and his compassion that will move us
to minister to the lost, to minister to the brokenhearted.
And I believe that is what moves and ministers to
the heart of God and glorifies him, which is our goal.
Could I have a few Would 2 people come up that would be willing to
pray since I can make that decision today?
Suffering and bitterness is not just something that we're going
to help others get through.
Suffering and bitterness was— will test us as believers as
well. Suffering was in David's life, but it led
him to humility. And the danger
of bitterness that I see revealed in this text is this: when I see
Michal despising David for the very thing she used to love
and not even acknowledging the presence of God at all— she
can't see it— that tells me that bitterness can cloud
our vision from what is true and pull our focus
away from Christ. When I see her hiding
behind that window, I see A heart that has created
a hardened but fragile wall of separation,
an image of herself that must be maintained so that she does not
have to be hurt again. And maintaining that
image is exactly what is keeping her from
the grace of God that's in her midst.
So King David, in shedding of his kingly garments in
this undignified way, is teaching us Any
image that we have taken on that does not reflect Christ or
pulls our focus from Christ or restricts our worship is not worth
maintaining and must be surrendered.
Ephesians 4:31-32. Let all bitterness
and wrath and anger and clamour and slander be put away from
you, along with malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted,
forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.
The way we come overcome the great
trauma of suffering and bitterness is we look to the
greater glory and forgiveness given in Christ.
And I imagine during a service here on any given week,
we have a picture, that same picture of hearts
Here, hearts that are overflowing with praise like David,
and hearts that are fighting to get there
as well. There is room
for both here to worship
anyway, in any way you can, with all your might.
Worshiping with all your might doesn't have to look
externally the same as it did for David.
It is not measured externally. It is measured through obedience and
surrendering. For Jacob, who was at the end of his life,
worshiping with all his might looked like bowing on his staff.
For the woman who struggled with the issue of blood, worshiping with all of her
might looked like fighting through the crowd just to To touch
the garment of the one who could heal her.
For the widow, worshiping with all of her might looked like bringing the last 2
coins that she had as an offering.
So this morning, if you need prayer, please come.
If you want to take time to kneel in the altar and surrender to
Jesus what has been restricting your worship, please come. Amen. Come on.
Let's spend some time these last few moments
just exalting Jesus, because Jesus
is the only one with the power, power
to make a sorrowful heart always rejoicing.
Amen. Let's worship. Would you stand, please?