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Well, thank you for your good singing tonight.

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Let's open our Bibles together to 1 Samuel chapter 22.

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I'm going to talk tonight about a tale of two kings.

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So David departed from there and escaped to the cave of Adulam.

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And when his brothers and all his father's household heard of it, they went down there

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to him.

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And everyone who was in distress, and everyone who was in debt, and everyone who was discontented

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—you say that sounds like our neighborhood, well, maybe so—those who were in distress,

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in debt, and discontented gathered to him, and he became captain over them.

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Now there were about four hundred men with him.

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David went from there to Mizpah of Moab, and he said to the king of Moab, Please let my

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father and my mother come and stay with you until I know what God will do for me.

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Then he left them with the king of Moab, and they stayed with him all the time that David

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was in the stronghold.

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And the prophet Gad said to David, Do not stay in the stronghold.

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Depart and go into the land of Judah.

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So David departed and went into the forest of Hereth.

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The cave of Adulam is located about ten miles from Gath, not very far from the little town

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of Bethlehem of which we have just sung.

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The hills in that region are honeycombed with caves, so this fugitive of the Lord, David,

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apparently made one of them his headquarters for a period of time.

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While he was there, his family joined him, undoubtedly because of their concern that

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their lives were not worth much with Saul and the mood that he was in.

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In addition to David's family, there joined him four hundred or so discontents, people

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who were in trouble, who were in debt, and who, for some reason or another, were under

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duress.

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This was David's band of fighting men as they were gathered together.

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We notice in verse three David's loving care.

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Come in.

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A lot of creaking and groaning tonight.

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I think the temperature change outside is doing that.

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The roof is up there to stay.

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Don't worry about it.

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We notice in verse three David's love and concern for his parents.

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He took them to Moab and asked the king of Moab to care for them until his future became

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a little more clear, until he knew what God's timing would be regarding his future.

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Now, some might ask the question as to why he chose Moab, and the answer to that is not

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too hard to find if you read the book of Ruth.

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For Ruth was David's great grandmother, and she was a Moabite.

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And therefore, essentially, he was taking his parents to the home of their ancestor,

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Ruth.

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I think that David's concern for his parents is a good example for all of us.

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There is a tendency among some people these days to discard elderly people, even one's

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own parents, when they have become aged and perhaps a bit infirmed.

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I have seen examples of that, and I'm sure that many of you have as well.

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And it is always a tragedy to me of unspeakable proportion when a child treats a parent by

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isolating him or her somewhere where they're not a bother and they're out of the way.

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Even though David was not going to be with his parents, that was not his concern.

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His actual concern was for their safety, and that's why he took them where he did.

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I don't know what's going to happen in our future with Jeannette's parents or my parents,

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but somehow God giving us the enablement, we're going to care for them.

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Should the Lord leave them with us to the point that they need that?

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And I believe that most of you here tonight would share that commitment if your parents

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are still with you.

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David then left the cave because the prophet had a word from God that he should do so.

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He seems to at this point begin roaming from place to place.

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He went to the forest of Herath, a wilderness area, and there he camped out something like

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an ancient Robin Hood, I suppose.

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Not doing the deeds of Robin Hood, but living there off of the land.

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As we observe David in this whole setting, not just as we read it in the text here, but

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as we back away from that and look at it even more broadly, it seems to me that there is

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an analogy between two kings.

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There is an analogy between David's situation and that of our Lord Jesus Christ.

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I'd like tonight to draw with you four parallels of truth regarding these two kings, King David

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and then his seed, according to the flesh, King Jesus.

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The first parallel is this.

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A condemned king reigns on the throne.

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David had been anointed king by Samuel at the order of the Lord, and yet another king

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actually possessed the throne, and that of course was Saul.

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Saul was finished.

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He was simply waiting for his end.

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He knew that, and that led him to some of the frustration that he vented on David and

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on Jonathan, his own son.

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Israel had desired a king, and God, in answer to their prayer, gave them a king.

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Now you say, was it God's will that they have a king?

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Well, apparently it was, but not in the way that the people wanted it, nor at the time

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that they wanted it.

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Yet God relented and gave them a king how and when they desired, and that king was Saul.

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He seemed at first to be well qualified to be king, and yet it was not long before his

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inner man showed flaws that his outer man did not.

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He ran ahead of the Lord on a couple of occasions.

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He was a man given to only partial obedience, which is really the same thing as disobedience.

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For if we don't follow through into all that the Lord tells us, we might as well do none.

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Partial obedience is no better than complete in obedience.

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And because of these occasions when he was unfaithful to the Lord, Saul was rejected

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as being king, and God said, I'm going to put a man after my own heart on the throne.

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The kingdom is taken away from you.

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And so his disobedience caused Saul to forfeit his rights as king.

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The sentence was pronounced on him, and he was simply waiting for the execution of the

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judgment of God.

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A condemned king reigned on the throne.

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May I say to you that there is a parallel in our world today.

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For over this world there is a prince of sorts who reigns, one called Satan.

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And while he was once exalted, even guarding the very throne of God, he is now cast down

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because sin was found in him.

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His pride caused him to fall.

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And today he has the throne of the world system as his own.

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And he reigns on that throne.

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This is his hour.

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And yet he is a king who is condemned.

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His doom is sure, just as sure as was Saul's.

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This rejected king who reigns on the throne now fought with God's anointed king to try

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to keep him from his purpose in the world and his ultimate enthronement.

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Just as Saul cast a javelin at David in order to try to kill him and pin him to the wall,

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so Satan cast, as it were, javelins at the Lord Jesus Christ in order to attempt a short

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circuit of God's plan at the temptation in the wilderness, on the Sea of Galilee when

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he attempted to kill him, in the Garden of Gethsemane when the pressure became great

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upon the Lord Jesus Christ, and undoubtedly numerous other times the rejected king attempted

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to keep the anointed king from his throne.

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But he did not do it.

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The Lord Jesus Christ is today in heaven victorious.

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Satan cannot now attack the anointed king directly, so he does it through his body,

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the church.

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The way that he gets at Jesus is through you and me.

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There are times when he seeks to destroy our lives.

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Does Satan desire something more than that?

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Satan's primary goal is not to kill us, but rather it is to disgrace us.

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It is to render us impotent spiritually by causing us to fall into carelessness and sin.

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And to the extent that he is able to do that to me or to you, he has struck out against

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the Lord Jesus Christ and is satisfied.

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But I want to repeat again that as surely as Saul ultimately fell by the plan of God

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on Mount Gilboa, so Satan will one day ultimately be cast into the lake of fire, and his judgment

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which has been pronounced will be fully executed.

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A condemned king reigns on the throne even of this present world, but not for long.

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There is a second parallel truth that I see between these two kings.

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The anointed king reigns over a hidden kingdom.

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David was anointed as king and reigned over just a small group of people, a fraction of

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the nation.

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He reigned over a kingdom that was hidden, it was concealed in caves, in forests, in

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valleys.

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He was cast out and rejected.

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He was persecuted and forsaken.

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But nonetheless he reigned in secret over those who came to him and joined his band.

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And so our Lord Jesus Christ was rejected, forsaken, crucified, and buried.

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And out of the world's sight he was raised from the dead, ascended to heaven, and reigns

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today likewise over a hidden kingdom, a heart kingdom.

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And we who have recognized our debt in sin, our distress to transgression, our discontent

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and wickedness have gathered to him in faith because we have found in him alone salvation.

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And he today is reigning over us.

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He is the one who unites us as brothers and sisters in the family of God, yes, as fellow

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citizens of the kingdom of God.

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You and I today who trust in the Lord Jesus Christ follow the anointed king who reigns

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over a hidden kingdom.

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F. B. Meyer wrote, The day is not far distant when the Lord, who is hidden until the time

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of restitution of all things, shall be manifested with his saints and take to himself his great

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power and reign.

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The pearl which he won from the ocean caves shall be worn on his brow.

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The treasure for which he bought the field of the world shall be spread forth for the

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admiration of the universe.

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The army which he has constituted from such unpromising materials shall follow him on

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white horses in radiant array.

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In the meanwhile, his kingdom is in mystery.

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So just as King David reigned over a hidden kingdom, so the Lord Jesus Christ today reigns

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over a real, yet hidden to the world kingdom.

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Here's a third parallel of truth that I see in David's situation with that of our Lord

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Jesus Christ.

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The anointed king and his followers are considered undesirable and are persecuted.

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David was not a desired person.

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He was excluded from the affairs of the nation.

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His counsel was not sought in the decisions that were to be made.

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He had no part in Saul's society.

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The politics of the kingdom were not his to determine.

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He was an outcast, and those who followed him likewise were outcasts.

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They were sought.

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They were hunted like animals.

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They were persecuted.

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It was the desire of King Saul to put an end to all of them.

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Likewise, today Christ and his subjects are considered, for the most part, by the world

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undesired.

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There is really little room in society for those who wish to follow the Lord Jesus Christ

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in truth.

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There is always room for the compromising one.

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There is always the room who desires to follow the Lord Jesus Christ superficially and in

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word only.

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But let a man or woman stand up for God against the trends and the movements of society, and

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he will be considered undesirable and will, in fact, at some point suffer persecution.

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You see, God has called together as his own what the world considers foolish, weak, base,

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despised, nothings, according to 1 Corinthians.

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Those are the ones that God has purposely chosen to be his own.

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Those that are considered by the world to be zeros.

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And yet God chooses to work through that kind of person.

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There are not many who are noble, wise, who are called.

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The world looks at the band of Jesus followers and mocks.

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It says, of what difference does this crowd make?

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And yet that crowd is making all of the difference in the world.

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There are places in our world today where Jesus followers are considered so undesirable

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that they are severely persecuted.

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Just this last week I read some information that was sent to us from Pastor Georgie Vins,

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a Baptist pastor who was exiled from Russia a few years ago.

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Today in exile he heads a group of dissident, independent Baptists in the land of Russia.

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And in the paper that he sent he told several stories of men and women, of young people,

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some in their late teens, who have been taken away from their homes and thrust into prisons

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and work camps for no more reason than the desire to follow Jesus Christ.

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He told of one family of six or eight children, I've forgotten that detail, who with the mother

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went to the prison camp to pick up the father who had been in prison, as I recall, for three

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years at that point.

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They had not seen him for several months and had no communication.

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When they got there he wasn't at the prison.

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You can imagine the eagerness with which those small children, some of whom were six, seven,

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eight years old, you can imagine the eagerness with which they went to the prison to pick

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up their father and what the disappointment must have been not to find him there.

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And when they inquired they discovered that the state had trumped up some more charges

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against this man who was a pastor.

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And they were trying him again, desiring to throw him into prison for several more years,

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isolated from his family, growing up without him in great need.

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You and I take for granted the privileges that we have, the freedoms that we enjoy,

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how we need to thank God for them and employ them to the full.

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I think Satan has been much more clever in this part of the world, for instead of outright

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persecution he lulls us to sleep.

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He puts us in a cradle and rocks us until we forget in our dreams why we are actually

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here as followers of Jesus Christ.

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There are some of us who are more concerned about being accepted by society, our school

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friends, the people at work.

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And we are about confronting them and giving to them the gospel of Jesus Christ and setting

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before them a standard of righteousness.

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There are some of us more concerned about receiving the applause of the world than we

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are of accomplishing our purpose here as the subjects of the anointed King.

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I would call all of us tonight to not shun his purpose for us, nor to fear persecution.

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And let us awaken out of our drowsiness, awaken because the time is short for us in this world.

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Our opportunities are coming to an end and soon we will be with our Lord.

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So whatever we do now, whatever we sacrifice, whatever we give now, we will be well worth

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it shortly when we see him face to face.

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In the meantime, let us recognize that all of those who will live godly in Christ Jesus,

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and that means they choose to live godly in Christ Jesus, will suffer persecution.

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And yet we follow him gladly, I trust.

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As the book of Hebrews says, we go to him outside the camp.

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An interesting thought there in that 13th chapter of the book.

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For it says that the Lord Jesus Christ died outside the gate.

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That is true historically, that his cross was outside the walls of Jerusalem.

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But there was a spiritual significance in that, which is found in the book of Leviticus,

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where we are reminded that the remains of the sin offering, after the blood had been

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shed the remains of the sin offering had to be taken away from the camp and disposed of

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by burning.

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And when it says that Jesus died outside the gate, the symbolic, the spiritual symbolism

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involved is that he was the sin offering for you and for me, and died outside the camp.

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And the writer goes on to say, and let us go to him there, outside the camp.

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For we do not have a city here, but we seek one which is to come.

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And his thought in writing to those Hebrew professing believers was, let's leave behind

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the camp of Judaism and join him who has been rejected, let's bear his reproach with him.

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And I call upon us today to leave our camp, as it were, our world, and go to him and bear

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his reproach, whatever the cost may be involved.

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Because we know that if we suffer with him, we shall also reign with him.

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And then there is a fourth parallel truth that I see in David's situation and that of

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the Lord Jesus.

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It is that the anointed king is submissive to God's perfect timing.

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You see, David could have ended Saul's reign at several points.

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He could have killed Saul, as we shall see, on a number of occasions.

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But David refused to touch the Lord's anointed.

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You see, even though he knew that Saul had been rejected and he knew that he, David,

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had been anointed to be the next king, David said, I will not touch him.

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He is God's anointed.

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You see, he was waiting for God to make the transition.

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He waited upon the Lord as he writes a number of times in the Psalms, my soul, wait thou

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only upon God.

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Wait upon the Lord.

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My expectation is from him.

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Likewise, the anointed king that you and I follow, Jesus Christ, waits in perfect patience

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for the timing of the Father, for his glory to be manifested.

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And we should wait with perfect patience also.

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He is today at the right hand of God the Father, there waiting until his enemies be made his

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footstool, a picture that we explained, I think, last week.

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It is taken from the book of Joshua when Joshua put his feet upon the necks of the deposed

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kings of Canaan, symbolizing his victory over them, that they had been conquered.

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And so our Lord Jesus Christ is waiting until that day when, as it were, he will place his

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foot upon the necks of those his enemies.

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And he is waiting in patience because the Father has his time and his way in bringing

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that to pass.

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Just fear, God has his time and way in your life as well.

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Do you ever become impatient with God?

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You say, Lord, why this time?

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Why this way?

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We just received word this afternoon that some dear friends of ours, some of you would

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know the Wearsby's, Mrs. Wearsby's parents were both killed in a head-on crash this last

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week in Kansas.

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Why this time?

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Why that way?

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Can we trust God's perfect timing in these things?

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Can we be patient?

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I trust we can.

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For the Lord Jesus Christ, our King, is exercising perfect patience as he waits for God's time

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and way.

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Today all of creation waits, the manifestation of the sons of God and of Jesus.

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All of creation groans from within.

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It seems to emit, as it were, a sound desiring earnestly for its deliverance from the bondage

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to sin.

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And as all of creation waits for that and longs for it, so we who are the subjects of

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the anointed King long and we wait for the manifestation of his glory.

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It is good to remember that our enemy who now fights us so fiercely will one day come

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to an end.

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His judgment will be poured out at God's perfect timing.

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I like what Paul writes to the Romans when he said, and the God of peace will soon crush

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Satan under your feet.

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You may feel as though your battle is to the point that you cannot go on.

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May I say to you that you can in the patience of Jesus Christ.

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You can draw upon the patience that he will provide you to go on in your struggle, to

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face your enemy, to persevere in your search for the will of God.

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You can draw upon his patience, knowing that God in his perfect timing will bring about

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the answer to your situation.

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So we see some wonderful truths and parallels to what David was going through and where

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our Lord Jesus is today in his reign as the anointed King.

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And we see some practical application to our lives.

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God help us to be his loyal, faithful, and patient subjects until he comes and glorifies

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himself and us with him.

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Let's bow together in prayer.

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I don't know what struggle you're facing.

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I can't get inside your heart just at this moment and see what the battle, the struggle

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may be, but God knows.

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Will you write where you are, say to the King,

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Give me your patience.

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Enable me to wait for the Father's perfect timing, for his way.

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Father, I pray that as we understand your word and see how it applies to the Lord Jesus

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and to us, that we may be encouraged and strengthened to go on in our walk with you, and may we

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be loyal and faithful subjects of your kingdom.

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I pray that we will stand in contrast to the kingdom of this world.

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I pray that we will make a difference where we live, where we work, where we study.

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And Father, especially help us when we are tempted to be like some other Christians who

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profess but who compromise and who seek the world's acclaim and approval.

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Lord I pray that we will be faithful to you and will seek only one approval, and that

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is your approval.

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Deliver us from seeking the approval of men.

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May we seek to please you and you alone.

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And we pray this in Jesus' name.