Hope From the Word

Guest (Male): Perspective is absolutely needed to help us maintain our bearings. Here to provide some is Pastor Bill Luebkemann.

Bill Luebkemann: We're just passing through and I don't know how long I'll last, but I'm 52 now and probably will not be around for 52 more years. I wouldn't mind being called middle-aged if I knew more people who were 104. We're just passing through just like those that went before. Our days on earth are like a shadow without hope.

We have hope because of Jesus Christ. But apart from him, there is no hope. There's nothing on the earth that gives us hope. We can amass all the money there is in the world, be the richest person on the planet, but when our time is up and God calls us home, it'll still end.

Guest (Male): A little perspective goes a long way. Eternity with the Lord will be so glorious. It makes the temporary sufferings unable to stop us from perceiving this glory. Today on Hope From the Word, we will be given the right perspective as we're reminded of the glory of God. It will only take a glimpse.

We take you now to 1 Chronicles chapter 29, verse 11. It's there we find King David reminding Solomon of the greatness of God. Let's join Pastor Bill Luebkemann as he reminds us that our almighty God is much more believable than anything else.

Bill Luebkemann: People today say religion is just invented by man. That's not true. God created the heavens and the earth. In the beginning, the Bible says God created them. We don't believe God created them? Then you have more faith than I do because you believe they were created by nothing.

It's easier to believe somebody created it. It's much harder to believe that it just came into existence by itself. That requires way more faith. Tell your atheist friends they have way more faith than you do. Tell them, "I don't have enough faith to be an atheist." I can't imagine how much faith it would take to believe that we just got here by accident.

That is a greater degree. They act like what they believe is proven and what we believe is all fairy tales and stuff. But the truth of the matter is, they're the ones who have the far-out belief system, if you look at it logically. Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heaven and earth is yours.

He has all these things. Kings and rulers like to have all these things. You go to the White House, wherever the rulers of the world live in their own different houses, castles, 10 Downing Street, or at the Kremlin. You see pomp and circumstance and fancy, ornate things and people dressed up real fancy.

We've achieved this high level of power. We're the king, premier, prime minister, president, or whatever. We're something important and we're so great and we have all this power. But he says here, "Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power." Anything else pales in comparison to that.

You see the president get off the plane, everybody salutes him and they're all lined up shaking his hand. You watch similar in other countries. The ruler is some great person that has some great amount of power, but the truth is that God has all the power. Even as he was nailed to the cross, he had all the power inside of him and he chose not to do anything about it.

That's a huge amount of power. Because if somebody did that to me, I'd be calling them every name in the book and I'd make up a few more names that aren't in the book. I would have said, "I am and you were," poof, you're out of here. That serves them right, just blow them all up.

Remember Jesus' disciples said, "Should we call down fire from heaven?" If it was up to them, they would have toasted the whole countryside wherever they go. Call fire down, there would have been nobody left, just the 12 of them. But God has the greatness and the power. He has the glory and the majesty and the splendor.

The glory, he's the one and only God. The majesty, majestic. If we were to confront him face-to-face, I have no doubt we would fall to our knees and fall down to the ground and pass out and probably remain passed out for a few years before we were able to get up and just open up one eye and take a look at what God's majesty is.

Somehow he's going to have to give us new eyes as part of our new body. I think if our own eyes looked at him now, they might just pop out of our sockets. Like if you ever plug a light into the wrong voltage and it just blows out like that? Well, that's probably what would happen to us if we looked on God.

His glory and majesty and the splendor is so great. For everything in heaven and earth is yours. So here's David acknowledging to God, it's all yours anyway. We're giving you all this stuff, but it's yours anyway. You just loaned it to us temporarily. If we think what we have is ours, stay away from it, we are sadly mistaken.

We miss a very important point. When we give back to God the firstfruits of what he gives us, we're just acknowledging to God, "Look, we know this is all yours. We know you gave it to us. We're giving you back some of the firstfruits to show that we know that it all came from you."

David said, "Who is willing to consecrate himself today to the Lord?" This required action on their part. This wasn't just words; they did it with actions. "Yours, O Lord," he said, "is the kingdom. You are exalted as head over all." It all comes back to you. You've got the kingdom, you're the head of it all, and you're exalted over all of it.

Wealth and honor come from you. Whatever you have in your possession, they all come from you. I remember years ago I was on a board at a nonprofit organization and they were trying to raise money. Somebody said, "Well, we have to do such-and-such to keep these people. These people who give money are wealthy and they spent a whole life amassing their wealth."

"And they're smart. That's how they got that way, they're smart. They got this wealth and now we have to show them how smart we're going to be at using it so that they want to give it to us." And I said, "Oh, I guess I'm wrong because I thought they got the wealth from God. I didn't know they got it because they were so smart."

If they got their wealth because they were so smart, tell them to keep it. I'd rather not have it. I didn't make a lot of friends at that time. But it all comes from him, and we need to acknowledge that. If you're wealthy and you've got a lot of money in the bank, it's because God has blessed you.

It's not because you are so smart and you are God's gift to mankind. It doesn't matter how many degrees you have or any other kind of thing like that. It's because God has blessed you. For everybody that has college degrees and is wealthy, there's another one that has college degrees and is not wealthy.

It has nothing to do with how smart you are. It has to do with how God has blessed you. Wealth comes from him and honor comes from him also. He's the ruler of all things, it says. And all things in the Hebrew here means all things. He's the ruler of everything.

In your hands are strength and power to exalt and give strength to all. He can do it all. He's the one that provides for all. He's the one that gives to all. He has the strength and the power to do what he says. "And now our God, we give you thanks and praise your glorious name." It all comes back to him.

We see David giving thanks to his Father God in heaven here. "But who am I, verse 14? But who am I, and who are my people, that we should be able to give as generously as this? Everything comes from you and we have given you only what comes from your hand."

In other words, I think what David is saying here is, why do we get to be so blessed? Who are we that you allow us to do this? Why are you allowing us to do this? I wonder this sometimes too. We don't have a real big church here, but we sure are able to put the gospel out in a lot of ways through our radio station.

I was out in Harrisburg last week driving around listening to Hope FM. I thought, this is really cool. And Baltimore, listening to Hope FM. And I drove from Baltimore all the way up across the top of Baltimore and all the way up I-95 listening to Hope FM the whole way until I got just about into Delaware.

Who are we that we should get to have so much fun putting the gospel out in so many places? Why has God blessed us? Is it because we're so smart? The day we start to think that will be the day that we are no longer allowed to be successful by him. King David is saying, "I don't get it. Why do we get to do this stuff?"

"Who am I, and who are my people, that we should be able to give this generously? You had to give us the money so we could give it back to you." The only reason David could give all this gold and silver and other stuff is because God gave it to him. He didn't go out and drum it up himself.

Everything comes from you and we have given you only what comes from your hand. We're just giving you back what you gave us to begin with. I remember an old Baptist preacher I knew years ago. I don't even know if he's still alive. I haven't gotten a Christmas card from him in the last couple years.

He was pretty old, really good guy. His wife was sick and she passed away many years ago. He was going to see a doctor and I don't know if the doctor was a Mennonite or what. He was a believer, though. The doctor had a sign in his office: "We carry no malpractice insurance. It is better to trust in God than to trust in man."

I thought, that's pretty cool. He went in and was talking to the doctor. Every time he brought his wife there, he'd like to debate different things. One day he said, "I'm a Baptist and we believe in tithing. Do you people believe in tithing?" And the guy said, "Oh no, we don't tithe."

He said, "I got him! I got him! They don't believe in tithing." And then the doctor told him, "We believe in giving everything to God. We just keep the barest minimum that we can get by on and we give all the rest of it to him." Look, I'm not telling you to do that.

I'm just saying here, everything we have comes from him. Anything we can possibly give him is just something he gave us to begin with. It's not something we are entitled to or we earned or that we got because we're so great. We are aliens and strangers in your sight, as were all our forefathers.

Our days on earth are like a shadow without hope. O Lord our God, as for all this abundance that we have provided for building you a temple for your holy name, it comes from your hand and all of it belongs to you. He says here, "Look, we're just passing through. We haven't been there that long and we're not going to be here that much longer."

When you think about it, I was born in 1957. I don't know how long I'll last, but I'm 52 now and probably will not be around for 52 more years. I wouldn't mind being called middle-aged if I knew more people who were 104. We're aliens and we're strangers and we're just passing through, it says, just like those that went before.

Our days on earth are like a shadow without hope. We have hope because of Jesus Christ. But apart from him, there is no hope. There's nothing on the earth that gives us hope. We can amass all the money there is in the world, be the richest person on the planet, and get some grave disease.

We may have all the money that we can go and just buy the entire Mayo Clinic and just have everyone there just working on our case. But when our time is up and God calls us home, it'll still end. O Lord our God, as for all this abundance that we have provided for building you a temple for your holy name, it comes from your hand and all of it belongs to you.

We're just giving you back what you're entitled to, O Lord. I know, my God, that you test the heart and are pleased with integrity. All these things have I given willingly and with honest intent. And now I have seen with joy how willingly your people who are here have given to you.

He's saying here, "You know my heart, Lord, and I know that you're pleased with integrity. You know that I've given all this stuff honestly and willingly. I'm not going to take it back later. It's not like the case of Ananias and Sapphira who sold the land and they brought the money to the apostles and laid it at their feet and said, 'This is all of it.'"

I heard a teaching on another Christian radio station a few years back. This preacher was trying to say that the story of Ananias and Sapphira was about tithing. He said the problem was they weren't tithing. He was trying to drum up his congregation to give more money.

There's nothing in that story about tithing at all. It doesn't have the slightest thing to do with tithing. This guy had some kind of Bible college seminary degree. My degree's in electrical engineering and even I could tell that's not what the story's about. It was not about tithing; it was about lying.

They sold the land, they brought the money, and they said, "We sold the land. Here's all the money. Aren't we so great?" Peter told them afterwards, "That land was yours to keep. You didn't have to sell it. And when you did sell it, you didn't have to give all the money. You could have said, 'Hey, we sold the land. We got 500 bucks. We're going to give 250 to you and we're going to put the other 250 in our 401(k).'"

That would have been fine. But they sold the land for 500 bucks, gave 250 and said, "Hey, we sold it for 250. This is the full price." They didn't have to sell it. They didn't have to give the money and they could have done whatever they wanted to do. They lied because they wanted to get honor and glory and praise from the other people who were watching.

They wanted the other people to say, "Oh, look at them. They're something. Ring a bell, let's put their name on television. They are something. We're going to put a brick in our new building with their name on it because they've given so much." They wanted the accolades that come from man and they were not concerned about what comes from God.

David's saying here, "I know, my God, that you test the heart and are pleased with integrity. All these things have I given willingly and with honest intent. And now I have seen with joy how willingly your people who are here have given to you." He's happy to be able to give and he's happy to see how much everybody else has given also.

O Lord, God of our fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He understands that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are with the Lord somehow in Abraham's bosom here in the Old Testament times before the gates of hell were broken down by Jesus Christ.

But God was not previously the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel. He was currently the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, and Jesus made this same point himself. "O Lord God of our fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, keep this desire in the hearts of your people forever and keep their hearts loyal to you."

Help your people to want to serve you always and to want to give to you always. May their hearts always be loyal to you and always want to put you first. "And give my son Solomon the wholehearted devotion to keep your commands, requirements, and decrees and to do everything to build the palatial structure for which I have provided."

Keep my son Solomon in your good graces as well. Give him this wholehearted devotion. He recognizes that God can form and shape the heart of man. He's praying that the Lord would keep Solomon devoted to the commands of God, to the requirements and the decrees, and that he would do the work for which David has provided.

David did provide in a big way. David didn't get to build this house for God, this temple, but he got to provide a huge amount towards the construction of it. He did a large amount of work to make it easier for Solomon when Solomon took over. Then David said to the whole assembly, "Praise the Lord your God."

So they all praised the Lord, the God of their fathers. They bowed low and fell prostrate before the Lord and the king. Again, not just with words, we see actions there. They bowed down, they fell prostrate, they recognized their smallness next to the bigness of God.

They recognized how insignificant they were next to who God is. We are significant in his sight because he's made us so. Because he died for us, because he laid down his life for us, we are significant in his sight because he cares about us and he loves us. But he is, after all, bigger than the universe.

When we consider the size of the universe, when we look at the pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope... I saw an email with some of the best pictures, these big circle things. One of them looked like a monster that was going to bite you.

But it was 60 gazillion trillion billion miles across. It was a whole galaxy. If you were inside of it, you wouldn't even know the dimensions of space. If you even think about them, they are so enormous. We can't even process that in our wee little minds.

I think maybe God gave us those dimensions of space maybe just as kind of like a little deposit so we could realize how big he is. Say, "Man, God is big enough to create all this." The next day they made sacrifices to the Lord and presented burnt offerings to him: a thousand bulls, a thousand rams, and a thousand male lambs, together with their drink offerings and other sacrifices in abundance for all Israel.

They ate and drank with great joy in the presence of the Lord that day. They made these offerings to God and they partook of them. So it was kind of like a giant Texas barbecue here. They were having this great celebration there in front of the presence of God, eating and drinking with great joy in the presence of the Lord that day.

Then they acknowledged Solomon son of David as king a second time, anointing him before the Lord to be ruler and Zadok to be priest. So Solomon sat on the throne of the Lord as king in place of his father David. He prospered and all Israel obeyed him.

All the officers and mighty men, as well as all of King David's sons, pledged their submission to King Solomon. The Lord highly exalted Solomon in the sight of all Israel and bestowed on him royal splendor such as no king over Israel ever had before.

There's only two kings before him, right? Saul and David. Solomon here, a greater amount of splendor than any king ever before. And it all came from the Lord God. Look, we see that they made Solomon here—it says they acknowledged Solomon son of David king a second time.

Remember the first time was when word came to David that Adonijah was off with his buddies declaring himself king? Bathsheba went into David, who was probably sick in bed, and said, "By the way, Dave, do you realize what Adonijah's doing?"

So David real quickly set up a thing there where he made Solomon the king that day and that broke up Adonijah's party. Now at some later point, there's much debate over whether what I just read to you happened before David died or after.

Even though in 1 Chronicles chapter 29 the death of David comes after these events, some people feel like this whole anointing of Solomon as king a second time might have happened after David died. Certainly there are things in the Bible that are not in chronological order, so that could certainly be the case.

Solomon was made king, was anointed before the Lord this second time. He was going to be ruler, Zadok was going to be the priest, and he sat on the throne in place of his father David. He prospered because he followed the Lord. At least he did early in his career.

He prospered because he followed the Lord and all of Israel obeyed him. All the officers, the mighty men, and all of David's sons pledged their submission to him. He was exalted beyond any other king that ever had been. Verse 26. David son of Jesse was king over all Israel.

He ruled over Israel 40 years, seven in Hebron and 33 in Jerusalem. He died at a good old age, having enjoyed long life, wealth, and honor. His son Solomon succeeded him as king. As for the events of King David's reign from beginning to end, they are written in the records of Samuel the seer, the records of Nathan the prophet, and the records of Gad the seer.

Together with the details of his reign and power and the circumstances that surrounded him and Israel and the kingdoms of all the other lands. So here he is, the end of David's life. We come to the end of 1 Chronicles and David has passed away.

He died at a good old age. He had a long life. He had wealth and honor beyond imagination. He turned a huge amount of it over for the building of the temple. I guess he left his son Solomon a little bit to get started. Not that Solomon needed anything, because he acquired his own huge amount of wealth.

Solomon taking over as king. Very interesting. The son of Bathsheba. That affair that started out as a whole sordid affair: David sleeping with a married woman and then getting her pregnant and then arranging for her husband to get killed and then taking her as his wife.

Then God says, "Uh, hello? You think I didn't notice?" And that baby died. But yet it's interesting to me that it is from that relationship of David and Bathsheba that Solomon was born and the kingdom was continued. It's puzzling as you look at the genealogy of Jesus.

It's puzzling, the sordid affairs and different things that happened along the way and somehow God saw fit to use all of them for his purposes. These other events are written in the records of Samuel. That would be 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel.

The records of Nathan and Gad—those are lost to time—together with the details of his reign and power and the circumstances that surrounded him and Israel and the kingdoms of all the other lands. There's a lot recorded there. We know a lot of it. It's in the Bible.

There's a lot of it we don't know. Some of those records have been lost. Maybe we'll find out someday. But we see here that David turning over to Solomon reigns as king, but being certain at every step of the way to point out that this is all about the Lord God.

He's praising the Lord and saying, "We're putting you first and we're doing these things because of you." He's calling his son Solomon to be strong and do the work and do these things also. And he's calling the rest of his kingdom to also do those things as well.

Guest (Male): You've been listening to Hope From the Word. If you'd like to hear this message again, you have several options. Visit our website at ccmarlton.org, download the Hope FM app to your smartphone or tablet, or look for us wherever you find podcasts.

If you've been thinking about visiting Calvary Chapel of Marlton where Bill serves as pastor, we'd love to have you. Our service times are on Sunday mornings at 10:00. We also meet midweek on Wednesdays at 7:00 PM.

You can also livestream from home when you visit our YouTube channel at Calvary Chapel of Marlton. For more information, go to ccmarlton.org. We hope to see you soon. Before the day is done, we'd like to connect with you.

Share a praise report, prayer request, or what you're learning from this series. You can easily email us at our website ccmarlton.org or just call us at 856-983-1662. Well, we've made it through 1 Chronicles and tomorrow we'll turn a page and begin a series in 2 Chronicles. Join us again tomorrow for Hope From the Word with Pastor Bill Luebkemann.