Abounding Grace

Guest (Male): God delivers us out of the enemies hands. We'll hear a great example of that next on Abounding Grace.

Guest (Male): Hello friend, glad to have you on board as we dig deeper into 1st Samuel on Abounding Grace with Pastor Ed Taylor. David was described as a man after God's own heart, but that doesn't mean he didn't fail from time to time. Today, we'll look at some of his poor decisions and the consequences that followed. Pastor Ed will also recall the rescuing power of God. Allow it to encourage your heart that no matter how messed up your life has been, God can still forgive, restore, and go on to use you greatly. Here is Pastor Ed in 1st Samuel 29.

Pastor Ed Taylor: When we fall into sin or we make man, we affect so many. Just in our personal lives, but also as leaders, we affect so many. Our lives, you know, David had everything. It wasn't just his life that would be destroyed, but it would affect the nation. Those seemingly little, insignificant, no one knows types of decisions. Listen, they have very open and public consequences. Let me repeat that for you, leader or not. Those little, seemingly little, insignificant, no one knows types of decisions that you're making have very open and public consequences. I'm reminding even in my own life the messes that I've made with decisions and how God reigns.

He doesn't abandon me. He doesn't condemn me. He also doesn't always take away the consequences. He allows them to be lived out in my life. He allows me to remember them. He allows me to deal with them. He uses them as a reminder to to avoid that in the future. Sometimes he does remove the consequences. I'm always grateful for that. But I find so to so often he'll step up and he'll move in. Why? Well, not only because he's gracious, but because he owns me. I belong to him. He has my best interests in heart.

He wants me to succeed. He wants you to make it. He wants you to live in victory. He wants you to live as a conquering hero. He wants you to follow Jesus who always leads you in victory. He wants you to remember that he's in control. He he has our best interests at heart. He's not some some cosmic kill joy, you know, and and developing a pattern in our lives so we would just be miserable. It's quite the opposite. He intervenes and leads us in our lives so that he might we might live the life that will most glorify him, which will be the life that we most enjoy.

The joy the joy of our lives come when we glorify and please him even in failure. I mean, let me show you this. Turn over to 2nd Timothy, please. 2nd Timothy chapter 2. God will often step up. He will often move in. He will often save and rescue. And this one's a really cool passage. 2nd Timothy chapter 2. We'll pick up in verse 11, really in verse 10 as Paul is writing to young Timothy. Timothy's a pastor. He has an older man in his life, Paul, who's discipling him and teaching him and training him in the ministry.

It's known as one of the pastoral epistles, 1st Timothy, 2nd Timothy, Titus. And I'm going to add when I mention pastoral epistles, 2nd Corinthians. Because those of you that are with us when we study through 2nd Corinthians, you'll remember that it is the most pastoral epistle that Paul ever wrote because he just exposed his heart as a man that serves the Lord. So, notice this in verse 10. Therefore, Paul writes, I endure all things for the sake of the elect that they might also obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. This is a faithful saying.

Okay, Paul, I believe you. This is faithful. You can rely upon this. It's trustworthy. This this is what he's about to say can change your life. You can trust it that much. If we died with him, we'll live with him. If we endure, we'll reign with him. If we deny him, he'll deny us. And then notice this. If we are faithless, he remains faithful. Because he can't deny himself. Remind them of these things, charging them before the Lord not to argue about nonsense and so and so he goes on. Man, even when I'm faithless, he remains faithful.

You know, I found in my life that I trust God not because I'm so mature as a believer. And I trust God not because I've been walking with him for so many years or I have some position or title in his church. I don't trust God because you know, I'm I'm as strong as I can be or because I've got it all together, because I'm smarter than I was when I was a new believer or because I know how to read the Bible or because of the amount of time I pray. Listen, I trust God because he's proven himself trustworthy in my life.

I trust God because he's exploded on my life in times revealing himself trustworthy when I didn't trust him. He revealed himself as faithful even when I was faithless. And when you think of the word trustworthy, think of this. God is trustworthy. You know what that word means? God is worthy of your trust. How many times has he proven that over and over again in your life? You can have mile marker after my everybody's everybody's testimony wants to get done talking about their past, which should be very brief. And even in talking about their past, I'm sure you can find times when go when you were rebellious against God and how God saved you, took care of you, blessed you.

You didn't die in that car accident. Uh you didn't you know, whatever whatever it might be. I mean, I just mentioned that you go, hey, die in that car accident. Yeah, that's what came to my mind because I still remember. I still have a bum knee because of a car accident that we were in because we were drinking and partying and we hit a concrete light pole at 60 mph. None of us should have walked away. But out of the four that walked away, two are walking with the Lord today. And out of the four that walked away, that one is pastoring a church today.

And of the four that walk away, we're still praying for the other two. Because God is gracious. I'm sure you have some kind of stories like that, maybe not that crazy. I'm I'm not crazy like you, Ed. Praise God. You didn't live my life. It was horrible. Consequential. But that was the first thing that came to my mind. I mean, I can remember it like it was yesterday. I can remember how it smelled. I remember seeing it. I remember walking away. I remember it like it was yesterday. And the Lord just like, you know, don't don't forget Ed, when you're remembering that how faithful I've been to you.

Make sure you smell that one, buddy. Make sure you remember that. Don't just walk away thinking of the apartment building it was there and all the people that came out and the sirens and all of that. Don't don't don't you forget that not only did you walk away, but you didn't kill anyone. Not only did you walk away, but you could go home to your girlfriend at the time and your son. Don't forget that that day that you could your life could have ended. Your life was spared. And he could probably remind me of a hundred times of that.

Man, my God is trustworthy. He's worthy of trust and he gets my life. It belongs to him. And as you're sharing your testimony, what is your testimony? It's not of all the great triumphs that you have. Your testimony is all about the faithfulness of God. It's all about his goodness. Some may look at David's life today. Some might look at David's messed up life and the rescuing power of God and the faithfulness of God to intervene and rescue him and come to the wrong conclusion. You Ed, what do you mean? Well, the thinking sounds a lot a little bit like this.

Well, Ed, if I mess up my life, then God will rescue me and save me. And if he's going to rescue and save me anyway, then why don't I just choose to live a messed up life and do what I want to do? I mean, if God's going to intervene anyway, then why don't I just go for it? What's the real cost? I mean, really what's the real cost if if God's just going to rescue me? I mean, look at David. What a knucklehead that guy is. I'm not even close to being like that. And if God's going to let him be king, then surely why don't I just do that?

Now, it's actually described differently in the New Testament. Uh in the New Testament, Paul describes it this way. Listen. Let me just read it to you. Let it soak in. Paul says this. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one man's obedience many will be will be made righteous. Moreover, the law entered that the offense might abound, but where sin abounded, grace abounded much more. So that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through our righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. So the conclusion might be from this passage, if sin abounded and where sin abounded, grace abounded much more, hey, why don't I just send more and I'll experience more abounding grace.

You know, people think that way. They misunderstand the grace of God, the goodness of God, the patience of God. They misunderstand it. They they misunderstand because a sin isn't immediately you know, you're not caught immediately that somehow that means God approved of what you did in secret. Because after all, I mean, if God really didn't want, you know, if God really wanted to deal with me in sin, he'd deal with me right then and there. He'd just bust me right then and there. But we've seen in the pattern of David's life that's not the case.

God's very gracious, very patient. I think of Achan in the book of Joshua who was told specifically along with the nation of Israel that when you take the city, all the spoils belong to the Lord. Everything belongs to the Lord. But he sees a few Babylonian garments, the Bible says. He takes them for himself and he goes to hide them under his tent. And then he thought he got away with it. They're hidden under the tent. Nobody knows. Like like something's hidden in your room right now. Nobody knows. Well, read about Achan, would you? It's like nobody knows.

Yeah, maybe no human being knows. But number one, we learned from Achan's life God knew. And number two, he told the leaders. And then the leader Joshua calls everyone out and he divides everybody. He takes the whole nation out and God just begins to divide. And every time he gives the people a chance, they get smaller and smaller by family by family by family to finally Achan is exposed for the liar that he is. And and he says, oh yeah yeah, it was me. And he went in and he had to go expose him. What does he do?

He loses his life and his family. But not only that, people died in that battle because of his sin. And so the conclusion in David's life can never be. And the conclusion of the teaching of grace can never be. And the conclusion of the faithfulness of God can never be. And the conclusion of how God loves and intervenes and loves to rescue can never be. I'm going to willfully deliberately sin so I can see more of the grace of God in my life. You go, Ed, you just making that up. I'm not. Listen. Romans chapter 6 verse 1.

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not. Shall we who died to sin How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? So if the question comes up that what we've learned so far leads us to this strong emphatic answer. So should we continue in sin? I mean, look at David and look at other failures in the scriptures. Look at your own failure, Ed. Look at what you did. I mean, even as we're raising our kids and being very open with what God's done in our life and showing with them not only what God has done, but what we live through and just being age-appropriate honest with our kids all the way through into adulthood.

We're very very much emphatic in their lives. Don't make the choices we made. Don't do it. Yeah, but look Dad, look we got a home and we're living you love the Lord and you know, if it all worked out for you man, those were hard years. They were hard years, the consequences of sin. There were pains and injuries and scars that don't quickly heal. The consequences of sin are never worth never worth it. Paul says certainly not. The NIV says by no means. The New Living Translation says of course not. The Old King James says God forbid to live in sin so that grace may abound.

The grace of God is not and never will be God's permission to live a life that's disobedient and rebellious. Now, turn over to 1st Peter. If you're still not convinced, let me take you to 1st Peter chapter 2 verse 16. It's not God's heart for you to throw your life away. It's not God 's heart for you to take things into your own hands. It's God's heart for you to submit yourself to the ownership of God who sent his son Jesus Christ to purchase you with his own blood. The grace of God is no longer is not permission to sin against God, but rather the love of God leads a person to repentance.

Notice what Peter says. 1st Peter chapter 2 verse 16. Well, let's go for the um the sentence begins in verse 15. For this is the will of God that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men as free, yet not using your liberty as a cloak for vice. Or another way of translating that a paraphrase is not using your freedom in Christ or the grace of God as a covering for sin. So it's well, man, brother you're I I think what you're doing the Bible prohibits and you go, well, hey, brother you can't judge me, man.

I'm free in Christ, but not to sin. It's not if that's not why God is is trust entrusted to his life and freedom. But notice as servants of God, honor all people, love the brotherhood, fear God, fear God, and honor the king. Freedom is not to be used as an excuse to satisfy ourselves. The freedoms of God are used to serve others. The freedoms of God are not to be used in as an excuse for our sin, but the freedoms that we have in God are to be used as an example to others. We're actually to learn in our maturity to say no to more things for the sake of the gospel, to reach more people as we mature and grow in our grace, grow in our relationship with God, you're going to find yourself wanting to do far less with your freedoms for the sake of the weaker brethren.

For the sake of people that are looking to you for hope and help and example, how am I supposed to live this life? What am I supposed to do now? What do I do with this addiction? How about this pornography? All I do is play video games all night. What do you do? Well, I'm a believer for 20 years and you know, I I just play video games all night. Well, you're wasting your time. Get out of your basement and go share the gospel with somebody. Give yourself wholly over to God. You go, Ed, are you against video games?

I'm not against video games, but I am against throwing your life away. I am against throwing your life away because you can do something. Listen, mark this, write it down. Don't forget it. Just because you can doesn't mean you should. Just because you can doesn't mean you should. So use your freedoms in a way that will glorify God. I am not against hobbies or video games or any of that, but I can tell you this. Some people right now were very provoked and might even be mad at me right now for what I said. You know why?

Because they understand. They understand. God is calling you to a much higher calling to use your freedoms to glorify God because your life's going to go past. It's going to go away. It's going to be just like a vapor. You going to look back and go where did all the time go? And for some of you, you're going to be able to say, man, all the time went serving the Lord. And some of you are going to look back and go, man, I don't know. And although we have this tremendous freedom in Jesus Christ, it 's not a freedom that we can use to sin, to hurt or to harm people.

It's not a freedom to rebel or resist God. It's not a freedom we exercise in order to express our own personal desires without any thought or concern for other people. Freedom exercise properly thinks of more highly like Paul said to the Philippians to think more highly of others than we do ourselves. Freedom is so costly and so valuable. You think of the own freedom of how many lives have been lost in battle over the years for the freedoms just of our own country that we enjoy and and experience today. How much was sacrificed? How many lives paid the price for the freedoms that you exercised today just within the country that we live?

And yet at the same time, the far more valuable blood was shed for the spiritual freedoms that you and I have. And they're not for ourselves. There's such a movement. It's nothing new because it's in the New Testament. It's nothing new, but we see it today where the generations that come up before us are always emphasizing their freedoms to exert to make excuses for their behaviors that are not reflective of the love of God, not reflective of care and concern for anyone else. As a matter of fact, so so often I'll find young people that have grown up in our church start to exercise freedoms and they just become evil company corrupting other good habits of other people.

And it's not God's heart. It's not God's desire. It's not God's desire for you to grow up in the things of the Lord and then exercise your freedoms in such a way where now, you know, we talked about it this last weekend where you know, fellowship is you know, you call it fellowship, but there's no fellowship at all. It's nothing about the Lord. You're getting into this little thing over here, this little freedom over there, this little thing over there and and before you know, you're not talking about the things of the Lord. You're not praying for people that are around you.

You're getting into other things that are popular in our culture. And we see them come and go, come and go. So don't misunderstand David here or his life. Because although God was gracious with him, all these decisions have consequences.

Guest (Male): You're listening to Abounding Grace with Pastor Ed Taylor. Don't go away. Ed will be right back with more. You can catch a replay when you visit aboundinggraceradio.com or wherever you catch your podcasts and at oneplace.com. Here in the month of October, we picked out an excellent book written by Jim Simbala titled Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire. If your desire is to live at the center of God's will and purposes, this excellent book will point the way to spiritual vitality not only in the church, but in your own life. Now, I know you'll be encouraged as you read of how God moves in life changing ways.

And we'll send you a copy with our thanks for a gift of $25 or more to Abounding Grace. Please remember it's through your financial support that we're able to come to you day by day on this station and others like it. Your gift, whatever the size, would be greatly appreciated and put to good use. Request your book today by calling us toll free at 877-30 Grace. 877-30 Grace. You can also order the book online at Calvaryco.store. And if you'd rather not have the book, but still want to make a donation that can be done rather easily at aboundinggraceradio.com.

We'd like to hear from you before the day is done. Say hello. Tell us what God is up to in your life when you visit aboundinggraceradio.com. Then click on contact us. Now, let's get back to 1st Samuel chapter 29.

Pastor Ed Taylor: Now, as we close with verse 8, it says David said to Achan, but what have I done? And to this day, what have you found in your servant as long as I've been with you, that I may not go and fight against the enemies of my Lord, the king? And Achan answered and said to David, I know that you're a good in my sight as an angel of God. Nevertheless, the princes of the Philistines have said he shall not go up with us to battle. Now, therefore, rise early in the morning with your master servants who have come up with you.

And as soon as you are early in the morning and have light to part. So David and his men rose early to depart in the morning to return to the land of the Philistines. And the Philistines went up to Jezreel. There's a couple things. One, David, why don't you just get it the first time? You know, why are you Well, hey, wait a minute. What have you seen? You know, he's more worried about his reputation than than he's going to go fight against the people of Israel. But one of the things I see here, and we don't have time to get into it, but just something maybe you can think about in your own life, do your own Bible study, of all the guys that are with him, why didn't any of his guys say this?

He's got 600 people with him. Why didn't anybody say we're not do going to the land of the enemy? We're not going. We're not fighting against Israel. I mean, I mean, we're on the run and this is bad, but David we're not going to fight with the enemy. We're we're not. Why I don't see any of his men stepping up and going, are you crazy? What are you doing? And how often we need to speak up for the truth even in a group of even when someone that we respect is going in the wrong direction, we need to stand for what is right.

And none of his people, none of the guys that are with him because David's hitting a new low in his life. And yet the next time we see David, God doing a restorative work in his life. It's it's an amazing thing. I just think as we close up the chapter that to me, I'm really blessed that when we're reading the scriptures that we learn about the whole man that God uses. Because we can get in our minds that the men of God in the scriptures, pastors perhaps, you have that tendency perhaps to put people on pedestals and think, well, you know, Billy Graham must be something special.

You know, God used him in a special way, but Billy Graham's just a man like you and me. And his wife just a woman like you and me. What makes them different perhaps is the amount of yielding they did to the Holy Spirit and God's anointing in their life, but they're no different. They're no different. David no different. He's just like us. And why do we know that or how do we know that? Because we're learning about the whole man and the whole woman that God uses. That we learn about the good, the bad, and the ugly.

And I believe if they God didn't give us the low lights of David's life, if the Bible only gave us the highlights, his victories, his strong faith, his trust in God, we would think, wow, isn't it great to be David? But I could never be David because I look at my life, there are some great highs, but there's also some really bad lows. And to think of reading a Bible, can you imagine reading the Bible and never reading of a man of God struggle, never reading of a woman of God struggling and with worry and fear and anxiety?

Can you imagine a Bible without the Psalms of all the emotion that's elicited by David in his life and the other Psalmist where yeah, he had great highs, but he also had great lows. So you look at if if God only gave us the highs of people, we would look at them and we'd say, you know what, that's awesome what God can do with David, but I know God can't use me. And I go, why? And you would say something like, well, I'm weak. I've lied in my past. I've failed. I've run away. I've got into this.

I've used my freedom some other way and there's times when I've been afraid. There's times when I've been worried about my kids. There's times when I've just been freaking out and and so man, if if we only had the highlights of David's life, we'd never and never have the low lights and we would be so discouraged. But we don't. We have all his life. I mean, at least the episodes that God reserved, some really great highs and some really significant lows. You see being weak, stumbling along at times, failing doesn't disqualify me. Doesn't disqualify you.

You see, if I yield my life to God, I repent of my sin, I ask for God's forgiveness and strength. He meets me there. God will use me. He'll use you as an instrument in his hands to do his work on the earth. You may have sunk very deep down darkly into that pit. I don't know that you've ever sunk as low as David. I mean, you may have some real struggles right now, but I don't know that you've ever gotten as deep down as David has. And yet with David, we're going to find the same thing is true with David, the same thing is true with you and me especially in the New Covenant.

And yet God's nature is the same in both that God is forgiving. God is merciful. And if you just seek his face, he'll restore you. God will use you to do his work.

Guest (Male): Next time on Abounding Grace, we'll spotlight what God can do in a human life that's drifted a bit. It's an encouraging lesson you don't want to miss.

Guest (Female): Oh Jesus I sing for all that you've done for me.

Guest (Male): Abounding Grace is brought to you by Calvary Church Colorado here in Aurora.