[0:00] 1 Samuel 30, starting in verse 7, going to the end of that chapter, which gets us to verse 31. So 1 Samuel 30, verses 7 through 31.
[0:11] We'll go ahead and open up in a word of prayer, and then we'll get ourselves back in context to where it's at, and then we'll pick it up, so let's pray together. Lord, I thank you so much for this day, and so thankful for the opportunity we have of gathering together, and Lord, just rejoicing in this midweek service where we can come together to be encouraged by your word, to be encouraged by fellowship with brothers and sisters in Christ.
[0:36] And Lord, we pray that you would speak to our hearts and minds this evening. We pray that the truth of scripture would resonate. Lord, that we would come to a greater understanding of you, a greater understanding of the word of God, and that that understanding would bring a direct application in our lives for your glory.
[0:52] Lord, we pray that the truths that we read tonight would be so much more than just a collecting of information, but Lord, that it would be a molding and shaping of our lives, and we ask it all in Jesus' name.
[1:03] Amen. Okay, we're at the point in the 30th chapter of 1 Samuel where David and his men, if you remember, David and his men had kind of found themselves in a fix, in that they had to go to at least the beginning of the battle with the Philistines, that they're camping out in the land of the Philistines.
[1:27] David said to himself, it tells us in the 27th chapter, that there's nothing better for me to do than to go into the land of Gath and live among the Philistines, or that Saul's going to take my life. David got himself in a fix.
[1:39] He's there in the land of the Philistines, and then we find in the 29th chapter that the battle was building, and the king says, surely you know you will go to battle with me. So he does. That's actually in the beginning of the 28th.
[1:50] And in the 29th, the leaders of the Philistine army shows up and says, what is David doing here? David and his men shouldn't be here, so they send them back, and it's almost like David's going, oh, okay, I barely dodged the bullet on that one.
[2:03] Problem is, when we get into the 30th chapter, the first six verses, we looked at last Wednesday when we were together, David and his men travel three days to get back to Ziklag, which is in the land of the Philistines.
[2:15] It's given to David and his men. It becomes a part of the Jewish territory from that point on, belonging to the kings. But always remember, the Philistine is enemy territory, right? That's the enemy of the people of God.
[2:27] So they're hanging out in enemy territory. They get back to Ziklag, and they get there, and it's been razed. It's been attacked, right? The people that were left behind are gone, all their wives, their sons, and their daughters, because through David's leadership, it's really a poor demonstration of leadership, when he said to himself, let's hang out in a place we shouldn't hang out, they ended up having to do things they should have never done, and they left the innocent behind.
[2:53] So they get there, and everybody's wives, everybody's sons and daughters, and everybody's possessions, everything is gone. The people have come. They've raided the land. And David's men are mad at him.
[3:04] They're really upset. This is in the first six verses. As a matter of fact, they're speaking of stoning David because of their sorrow. It tells us, and we don't want to separate this from what we read in the rest of the chapter, that they wept until they no longer had any strength to weep.
[3:19] I mean, they're broken, right? And they're upset. And they're upset at David because he's the leader. So David's mighty men and the others that are with him, his 600, they're no longer his big supporters.
[3:32] Now they're kind of his adversaries because they're suffering such great loss. And then there's that one verse there in the sixth verse of the 30th chapter that David strengthened himself in the Lord.
[3:47] That even though everything was falling apart, everything was awry, that his men were turning against him, David strengthened himself in the Lord. That's why we left it, right?
[4:00] Before he did anything else, he went to the Lord his God. And it's amazing. He was reaping the rewards of his own failures, his own mistakes.
[4:12] He had walked in his own wisdom. He was suffering loss. He was being kind of looked down upon by his men.
[4:25] And yet where he had no one else to turn to, he turned to the Lord his God. And he strengthened himself there. And then we pick up because it's only after he does that that we get to, he takes his personal time.
[4:38] He goes on his own. There's no priest, anything else there. We're about to meet the priest in the seventh verse. But Abiathar is there. But he doesn't go to anyone else. He just goes personally, boldly into the presence of the Lord his God.
[4:51] And if you remember, it was because we used the covenantal name of God there, that he knew he had a relationship with this God. He could run to him even though no one else wanted him around.
[5:02] Everybody else was upset. He ran to the presence of God. As the book of Hebrews tells us, you go boldly into the throne room of heaven. We go through the blood of the Lamb. David had the anointing.
[5:14] He could go into the presence of God. We go through the anointing of the blood of Jesus Christ. And we go into the presence. And yet he finds himself there and he strengthens himself.
[5:24] And after strengthening himself, then we pick it up in verse 7. Now still, at this point, wives, the sons, their daughters, all their possessions are gone.
[5:36] All right. Ziglag has been raised. It's been burned. The people that they had defeated now have come back and defeated them. This is the first loss that we find of David and his men.
[5:49] We don't know how they're going to move forward. Every other battle they've went into, they've won. But there's a common theme with every other battle. They've also asked the Lord's guidance every other time.
[6:00] So David has repented here now. He's went into the presence of God. He's strengthened himself. And then we pick it up in verse 7. Then David said to Abiathar the priest, the son of Ahimelech, Please bring me the ephod.
[6:15] So Abiathar brought the ephod to David. And David inquired of the Lord, saying, Shall I pursue this band? Shall I overtake them? And he said to him, Pursue, for you will surely overtake them, and you will surely rescue all.
[6:28] So David went, he and the 600 men who were with him, and came to the brook Besser, where those left behind remained.
[6:38] But David pursued. He and 400 men for 200 were too exhausted to cross the brook Besser, remained behind. Now they found an Egyptian in the field and brought him to David and gave him bread, and he ate, and they provided him water to drink.
[6:54] And they gave him a piece of fig cake and two clusters of raisins, and he ate. Then his spirit revived, for he had not eaten bread or drunk water for three days and three nights.
[7:04] And David said to him, To whom do you belong, and where are you from? And he said, I am a young man of Egypt, a servant of an Amalekite. And my master left me behind when I fell sick three days ago.
[7:16] We made a raid on the Negev and on the Cherethites, and on that which belongs to Judah, and on the Negev of Caleb, and we burned Ziklag with fire. Then David said to him, Will you bring me down to this band?
[7:28] And he said, Swear to me by God that you will not kill me or deliver me into the hands of my master, and I will bring you down to this band. And when he had brought him down, behold, they were spread over all the land, eating and drinking and dancing because of all the great spoil which they had taken from the land of the Philistines and from the land of Judah.
[7:48] David slaughtered them from the twilight until the evening of the next day, and not a man of them escaped except 400 young men who rode on camels and fled. So David recovered all that the Amalekites had taken and rescued his two wives, but nothing of theirs was missing, whether small or great, sons or daughters, spoil or anything that they had taken for themselves.
[8:12] David brought it all back. So David had captured all the sheep and the cattle which the people drove ahead of the other livestock, and they said, This is David's spoil.
[8:23] When David came to the 200 men who were too exhausted to follow David, who had also been left at the Brook Besser, and they went out to meet David and to meet the people who were with him, then David approached the people and greeted them.
[8:35] Then all the wicked and worthless men among those who went with David said, Because they did not go with us, we will not give them any of the spoil that we have recovered, except to every man his wife and his children, that they may lead them away and depart.
[8:51] Then David said, You must not do so, my brothers, with what the Lord has given us, who has kept us and delivered into our hand the band that came against us. And who will listen to you in this matter?
[9:03] For as his share is who goes down to the battle, so shall his share be who stays by the baggage, and they shall share alike. So it has been from that day forward that he made a statue and an ordinance for Israel to this day.
[9:18] Now when David came to Ziklag, he sent some of the spoil to the elders of Judah, to his friends, saying, Behold, a gift for you from the spoil of the enemies of the Lord, to those who were in Bethel, to those who were in Ramoth and the Negev, and to those who were in Jeter, and to those who were in Aurora, and to those who were in Sifmoth, and to those who were in Eshtimoah, and to those who were in Rascal, and to those who were in the cities of the Jeremilites, and to those who were in the city of the Kenites, and to those who were in Hormah, and to those who were in Borashen, and to those who were in Athic, and to those who were in Hebron, and to all the places where David himself and his men were accustomed to go.
[9:58] 1 Samuel chapter 30, verses 7 through 31. I want you to see this evening, fighting from a place of victory. Fighting from a place of victory. We see David and his men suffering loss for the first time.
[10:13] Suffering loss is a direct result of a bad choice made by David. We have to go all the way back to see the last time that David spared the man Saul, where he went down into the camp, he took the spear and the jug of water, and you can remember all that, and the second time he spared the life of Saul.
[10:29] David said to himself, now there is nothing better for me to do. He began to think and to reason among himself, he never sought the Lord, he never sought the Lord's guidance, and it is never God's intention that we move into enemy territory.
[10:43] It is not that God is defined to a locale, or to a place, or to a region of the world, but when we read the Old Testament, when the people of God begin to move outside the land of God, and they begin to walk outside the will of God, they begin to suffer loss.
[10:56] David says to himself, and he goes back to the land, that the last time he was there, he had a feigned insanity to get out of there. He goes into Gath, which happens to be the hometown of Goliath.
[11:08] This time he goes with his men, he doesn't go by himself, he sees the king, and the king gives him Ziklag, he lives there. All these things bring us to this place, this place where now David and his men have suffered loss, and they're in this really low valley.
[11:24] His men have not strengthened themselves, so when we come to this, when David asks for a Beathar and a priest to bring forth the ephod, so that he may determine the will of God. David has strengthened himself in the Lord, but his men are not.
[11:39] His men are still down, they've been weeping and mourning until they had no strength left within them. They're still speaking of stoning David. They still have all these things, they're still angry, they're still bitter, they're still upset.
[11:50] I mean, you have to keep in mind, we know that David had his mighty men, but do you remember the way they described the men who gathered around David when he was in the cave? It was the outcast, right?
[12:04] It was not the cream of the crop of society. Here we find it says, even the worthless men who were among him. They were great soldiers, they were great battlers, and they followed David, but they were the outcast of society who were disappointed with the leadership of Saul, who were kind of, many people believe they were probably some who owed debts, and people who were just trying to get away.
[12:27] And these are the people that are upset at David, these are the people that are mad at David because of the situation that they now find themselves after following his leadership. David asked for Abiathar to come, he consults the will of God, which is an amazing thing, which he should have done to begin with.
[12:44] He's done the right thing, now he's repented, he's come back into fellowship with the Lord his God, and he asked a question. Shall I move forward? Shall I pursue them? Now, this is telling because naturally we would think if I show up, my wife, in David's case his wives, my wife, my children are not there, that I'm going to go and pursue and go find.
[13:08] David pauses, he realizes that he's here because he did not consult the Lord, and now he consults the Lord, shall I pursue? Now, he moves forward, and I keep reminding myself in this, this communion between the Lord and David is a, Abiathar is present, but the rest of them are not.
[13:31] He's going to lead this band of men who are speaking of stoning him to go fight a battle. But what's amazing is before David fights the battle, before they even move forward, he is assured of victory.
[13:49] And it's a lot easier to fight from a place of victory than to fight from a place of desperation. Because now David is no longer dependent upon his men.
[14:03] We'll see that as it goes along. He's no longer dependent upon his own strength. He's no longer dependent upon his circumstances because God declares to him, pursue them, you will overtake them, and you will deliver all the spoil.
[14:22] He is assured of victory before he ever takes the first step. And so when he goes after the Malachites that are described as being spread across the valley, he pursues them from a place of victory.
[14:38] And there's a number of things that that assurance of victory does for us. Now this has application to us because we are told that when we fight an enemy of the Lord, we're fighting against spiritual forces of darkness for we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against the powers and principalities of the air and spiritual forces of darkness.
[14:58] And we're called to push against the gates of hell. That's what the Bible tells us, that the gates of hell will not be able to withstand the church as it moves forward. We are moving forward from a place of victory, not a place of desperation.
[15:10] Because the church is victorious. We are assured of that. We know the end outcome, right? We can read the end results.
[15:22] We see it all throughout Scripture. We see it in the book of Revelation. We know what happens at the end. We are assured of victory just as much as David was assured of victory because the victory assurance that we possess is the declared word of God.
[15:38] The victory assurance that David possesses is the declared word of God. And it changes how we fight. It absolutely changes how we do it.
[15:49] The first thing we notice is that David has the conviction to press forward. Because he is assured of victory, he now has a conviction to press forward.
[16:00] It says, so David pursued. Very simple. But think about it for just a moment. The one that was being spoken of, we're going to stone you.
[16:11] The one who has wept and mourned and cried until he had no strength within himself. The one who now has no one stands up and says, let's go. So David pursued.
[16:22] So he went. Why? Because he asked a question. God gave an answer, gave a definite answer. We don't know how. Even it could have been the casting of the lights. It could have been a dream. It could have been a vision.
[16:33] We don't know. We're not told that. It's okay. But God declares to him, yes, go. Pursue them, for you will overtake them and you will deliver all that's been taken captive. God gives him a sure word and that sure word gives him the conviction to move forward.
[16:47] Because how do we in any moment of weakness, moment of desperation, moment of sorrow, moment of realization that by our own choices we have put ourselves in this position, how do we ever move forward and stand in victory other than being convinced and convicted of the reality that God says we will be victorious.
[17:10] And that's absolutely what David does. He doesn't think, well, I need to go win this battle. He doesn't think, well, I need to go do this. He has a conviction that they will win because God has declared it to them and this conviction is what is used to press them forward.
[17:27] When we move forward in our own Christian walk, in our own, we put this in our own daily application. We face the attacks of Satan. We know the armor of God and the fiery darts of Satan that's coming at us.
[17:40] We can really approach Satan one of two ways. We can say, well, I hope today that I can overcome the enemy and that I hope today that my abilities and my strength and my power and my prayer life, I hope today that I have the ability to overcome everything Satan throws at me.
[17:57] And we're walking in a lot of eyes there, a lot of self-assurance, self-confidence, rather than going, you know, the Lord today, the one who is greater in me is greater than he who is in the world.
[18:08] And God has declared that he will raise us over those things as long as we trust in him. David wasn't relying on his men.
[18:19] David wasn't relying on his ability. David wasn't relying on his military strength. Even though all those things come into application, David was relying upon the reality that God says he will win the battle.
[18:32] And upon that assurance, he moves forward. But that assurance also brings us to this because as you move forward, there will always be disappointment. So fighting from a place of victory, number one, gives us conviction to press forward.
[18:44] Number two, it gives us confidence in moments of disappointment. It gives us confidence in moments of disappointment. Now it had taken them three days to get to Ziklag.
[18:56] We don't know how far the Amalekites had got from them. But we do know that when they set out, they're weak. They're a weak man because it says they mourned and wept until no one had any strength in them.
[19:07] David has strengthened himself. He has a declared word from God and upon that word of God, he moves forward and he tells the 600 men to go with him. And then they get to the Besser, which is just a dry wadi, which is a riverbed that dries up most of the year.
[19:20] And when you get to this dry wadi, 200 of them stay behind. And this had to be very disappointing because David knows that they're going to win the battle.
[19:34] But the reality is, is that 200 of them are too exhausted to go any further. And you only have 600 men, so when 200 of them stop, that means you're losing a third of your army.
[19:49] My math isn't great, but I know that it takes three groups of 200 to make 600. So you're losing a third of your manpower. And when a third of your people stop, it has to be disappointing.
[20:07] Because David is about to fight literally for everything he has. But again, here's where the confidence comes from. The Lord did not declare to David, you and your 600 men will win the battle.
[20:24] The Lord had declared that he would win the battle. There were no stipulations, no, if everybody's present. Because what we find in this is this, is just Passover so quickly in Scripture that they get to the Bessert and some stay behind.
[20:41] And then we're told in the next verse that 200 of them stay behind because they were too exhausted to move forward. But then we read this phrase, but David pressed on. But David pressed on.
[20:55] One of the realities that we find in a Christian walk is that when we're fighting spiritual battles and we're fighting and wrestling because we are in the Lord's army and we're moving forward in victory and we're moving forward with the things that God has called us to do and commanded us to do, we're following the Lord Jesus Christ and wrestling against those dark places that too often there will be people who have to stop.
[21:17] And they will have to, they'll be too exhausted to move forward and it's not that we go on and say, oh well forget about them because this story is going to come all the way back around. We'll notice it in just a minute. But we realize that the confidence doesn't rest in numbers, confidence rests in promises.
[21:34] Right? Confidence doesn't rest in the reality that there's a whole bunch. confidence rests in the reality that God has so said, thus saith the Lord.
[21:47] You know, we're reminded of the verse I shared Sunday morning when the choir got here. God is not constrained or restrained to deliver by many or by few.
[21:59] He can work however he wants to. But he has declared that the church pushes forward not in the multitude of numbers but in the confidence of his words.
[22:11] So this gives confidence in moments of disappointment. David is here. He's pressing forward. He knows they're going to win the battle. Yet a third of them stop.
[22:23] We don't see David getting upset. We don't see it ruffling his feathers. It says, David, pursuit. Why? Because he was convicted of the reality that he was going to win the battle.
[22:35] We begin to trust in numbers. We begin to trust in people. We begin to trust in those around us more than we're trusting in the Lord who leads us. We get disappointed. David was confident because God had said.
[22:50] Third thing we see, which is so important, is when we fight from a place of victory, it allows us to have compassion for the vulnerable. It allows us to be compassionate towards the vulnerable.
[23:05] David wasn't out for vengeance. He was moving forward according to the word of God. They find an Egyptian in the wilderness.
[23:16] They bring it to David. They bring him to David. They give him something to drink. They give him something to eat. They give him more to eat. This man, young man, who three days prior to this had been left behind because he was sick, hadn't had anything to eat and drink for three days, finds compassion not with his master but finds compassion with the one whom his master attacked.
[23:42] And David and his men literally says they revived him. And they did all that before they ever asked him where he was from. You say, oh, well, the only reason they did that is because they thought maybe he could help them.
[23:57] Well, they didn't ask him who he was and where he was from until they helped him. Well, maybe that was their motive all along. Maybe it was.
[24:07] Maybe it wasn't. We know they found a man in a desperate need and a desperate situation and even though they were pursuing to get their wives and their children and their possessions back, they still took time to stop and be compassionate because here's someone in need.
[24:29] I think God honors that compassion because then they ask him, who are you? And he says, I'm an Egyptian. I'm a slave and a Malachite leader.
[24:39] He left me behind. Ah, now, is there something we can do? Can you take us there? They exercise and demonstrate compassion long before they realize who this is.
[24:57] Now, we know the story. This young man takes them down, shows them Malachites that go down there and David is victorious. We don't need to hang out on here a lot because the Bible is very clear. It says, so David, they were spread out over the land.
[25:09] The Malachites are there. They're dancing and rejoicing and partying because they've just went on this great raid party, right? And all these cities they've destroyed and they've got all this plunder in front of them and they have plunder upon plunder upon plunder and they're all celebrating this and it says, so David went down into the camp and he destroyed them right from twilight to the dawning of the next day all the way until the next day.
[25:27] He was just, he had a great time. Him and his 400 men. You say, wow, that's kind of, isn't God meaning that? No, these are the enemies of the people of God.
[25:39] They were the ones that God had commanded and commissioned his people to be instruments of judgment upon them 400 years prior to this. There appeared to the judges where they failed to do that.
[25:53] But David and his men, they go there and they win and we're not through with the compassion yet because you remember those 200 guys who stayed behind. The ones I'm sure that it was a time of disappointment because a third of the army was not strong enough and able enough or willing enough to move forward.
[26:09] Maybe they weren't as sure of the victory as the others were but they were just too exhausted. So David goes back and comes back with all this spoil. He has, everybody has their own possessions and it says, then there was this other stuff, all the sheep that went before and they said, this is David's spoil.
[26:25] That's his stuff. That's on top of what they had taken from Ziklag because remember the Malachites had been to all these other cities too and all these other regions so this is above and beyond what David and his men had lost and they're coming back with all this plunder.
[26:39] It says, and they get back to the 200 men that are at the Brookbesser and those worthless fellows among them said, just take what's yours and go. You didn't go fight with us. Right?
[26:50] You just take your wives, you take your children and you go home because you didn't fight with us but this is where we still see David's compassion. David says, you can't do that. David was, David's the leader of these people but he wasn't upset at them.
[27:03] He wasn't mad at them. He wasn't, maybe he was let down a little bit disappointed but he didn't hold over them because he realized that his confidence and his assurance didn't rest in these 200 men so he didn't take anything out on them.
[27:18] Notice that? Because his trust was in the Lord not in man. We get angry at people because we feel like they let us down and the reason we feel like they let us down is because we feel like they are our hope.
[27:31] They're the ones we're trusting in. The reality, at some point or another every one of us let someone down because we are mankind.
[27:42] We get too exhausted. Deliverance is not of man but of the Lord. But David's compassion is saying where he says you can't do that because so is his share who goes to battle as the one who stays with the baggage and he makes this new statute in all of Israel.
[27:58] But he does it because he declares we didn't get this by our own strength. He made this declaration and he says can we not share with them what the Lord has given to us?
[28:13] Those worthless fellows said well we fought the battle we got the plunder. David who had the word of God realized that it was not their efforts that assured the victory but it was the declared word of God that assured the victory therefore the spoil and the plunder wasn't theirs it was the Lord's because he was the one who gave them victory.
[28:34] which enabled them to be compassionate to those who didn't even go fight. There's a fourth thing that we see that fighting from a place for victory brings us.
[28:46] Not only does it give us conviction to move forward not only does it give us confidence in spite of disappointments not only does it give us compassion for the vulnerable because those who are too exhausted they were just as vulnerable as that Egyptian in the wilderness. The fourth and final thing is there's the capability to bless others.
[29:02] We are enriched with the capability to bless others. David does what many people say is probably one of the greatest political moves he could have ever done even though I don't think that David was doing with political motives.
[29:17] It turns out it's wonderful. I don't think that's his intentions because if we do that then we would find David conniving and just really not according to his character.
[29:31] And that is when he gets back to Ziklag he's got all this plunder all this spoil his men are taken care of he's taken care of he sends to the inhabitants of Judah the region of Judah some of the spoil.
[29:45] And it lists the cities for us. David sends to them and says you know he says now when David came to Ziklag he sent to some of the spoil to the elders of Judah to his friends saying behold a gift for you from the spoil of the enemies of the Lord.
[30:00] And it tells us the reason he does this is because these were all the places where David himself and his men were accustomed to go. So what David did is he blessed those people who stood beside him.
[30:13] Right? These are the regions where when David was fleeing from Saul when he was hiding out in the cave when he was in the wilderness these are the regions that David stayed in and he blessed them with the spoil of the Lord because he is able to do it now because God has assured him and given him victory God had brought him to a place of victory and he sends it.
[30:32] Now the reason we say this is one of the greatest political moves he could have ever made is because after Saul's death David becomes king in Hebron for seven years before he's ever named king in all the land of Israel and over all the land of Israel.
[30:45] These people that he sends some of this spoil to are the first ones to declare that David is their king. I don't think that he's conniving and tricking and trying to manipulate the people and trying to persuade them that he is their true king because David is sure that someday God will appoint him a king.
[31:02] He knows that. He has spared the life of Saul and he has said I'm not going to take the life of Saul because I know that at some point I will be king. He's not trying to manipulate his way into the throne.
[31:14] He's not doing any of those things. At any given moment he could have taken it by force. He chose not to. What he's doing is he's just blessing the people that he's been around. And he has the ability to bless them because he took God at his word where God said pursue David pursued.
[31:32] Because see the reality is is that when we believe the word of God and we follow the word of God we get to be a blessing to others. We get to be a blessing to others.
[31:44] That may not always be financial it may not always be physical sometimes it's just a spiritual blessing but we become a blessing to others by following the word of God. David took God at his word moved forward on what God declared got everything back and became a blessing to others.
[32:08] Why? Because he fought from a place of victory. he wasn't fighting from a place of vengeance he wasn't fighting from a place of retaliation he was fighting from a place of victory.
[32:22] Again you don't give away what you think you earned all on your own but when you realize the victory is the Lord's this is the Lord's blessings these are the Lord's provisions then I can share that it's living open handedly right?
[32:41] That whatever I have God has put in my hands for my use and other people's blessings. It's a beautiful place to be when we're fighting from a place of victory and we realize that God has given us that ability.
[32:55] 1 Samuel chapter 30 verses 7 through 31. Thank you my brother. Okay. We're going to take some time this evening and go over our prayer list and have some things we need to add in.
[34:10] Thank you.
[34:40] Thank you.
[35:10] Thank you.
[35:40] Thank you.
[36:10] Thank you.
[36:40] Thank you.