6/25/23 1 Samuel 15:34-16:13 “The Perfect Model”

23 Jun 6/25/23 1 Samuel 15:34-16:13 “The Perfect Model”

6/25/23     1 Samuel 15:34-16:13       “The Perfect Model”

I remember a few years ago, Sharon and I drove to southern Minnesota to visit an old friend of mine who wasn’t all that healthy.  We also drove around trying to find some of the sights that used to be there. The first thing that I noticed as I returned to the Mankato area was that things sure change if you really haven’t been back to a place in 40 years.  Trees do grow up.  Another thing I noticed was that the person these old friends of mine knew was gone.  That would be me.  He doesn’t exist anymore.  And this is a good thing because that person wasn’t all that nice anyway.  We had a couple of wonderful visits even though this other person was always dragged up.  I think that the biggest thing I appreciate about this visit and God, is how much He can change us.  He does this in the blink of an eye or during a lifetime.  Today, we are going to take a look at the anointing of David and some of the qualities God saw in him in the beginning.  I think it might be interesting to see if we have it right or if God has it right.

I would like to begin with a question.  Have you ever misjudged someone?  Have you ever looked at a person’s brand new Cadillac or their mansion type home or their expensive designer clothes and thought that these people must really be something?  We have a tendency to judge people by their possessions.  Or maybe you become envious of the basketball player or football player who has all the talent?  Maybe you envy the person who invented Microsoft or some other big company.  You probably think that this person has the world by the tail.  We judge many people by what they do.  Maybe you look at someone with envy because they seem to have all the friends they need and more.  Or maybe, just maybe you look up to the person who is totally not famous for any of these things but they seem to always be doing the right thing.  They have such good character that they are worthy of envy.  If we look to God as our example, then we shouldn’t need to look at anyone with envy.  But the last person I mentioned here like in our story, the one with good character, has a characteristic that God is looking for in all of us.

The first thing I would like us to notice today is that Samuel and Saul part company and they will never see each other again until the day Samuel died.  This is important because Saul is the king and Samuel is his prophet.  Samuel would have been one of the main advisors to the king.  In today’s world we don’t see many relationships like this because we don’t really have many Godly leaders.  Up until this point, Saul had done many things that were against the will of God.  As a matter of fact, God had rejected Saul as the king.  I think that the problem here is that Saul and Samuel had developed a relationship over the years.  They kind of liked each other and they were friends.  It tells us that Samuel mourned for his friend Saul.

Then God asks Samuel, “How long will you mourn for Saul, since I have rejected him as king over Israel?”  I want you to notice that God is very gentle here.  This is an honest question.  This is a question that we need to ask ourselves sometimes when we are in mourning.  God is perfectly ok with us mourning.  However, God doesn’t want us to mourn in excess.  As a matter of fact, God doesn’t want any of us doing things in excess unless it is loving Him.  So when it comes to mourning, there comes a time to move ahead.

This is so hard for us to do.  Many times we lose track of where a loved one is going.  We think in our finite human terms of how we will miss them.  We forget that heaven is a place that we cannot comprehend.  It is so great that we don’t understand how wonderful it can be because we are only human.

A few years ago, a friend of mine from my school in Kansas City who was preaching in South Dakota, lost his wife due to an unexpected illness.  These two people were soul mates and you could tell how much they loved each other just by looking at them.  At Annual Conference that year was the first time I’ve had to visit with him since this happened.  He had grieved and he missed her but he said he cannot be bitter or unhappy because of the place where she is.  He understands that God is taking care of his wife and the only thing he can do is move on with his new church.  This is what God is telling Samuel about his friend Saul.

I think we all remember and know today’s story but to recap it a little, Israel demanded a king because everyone else had one.  That reason alone should tell us that they were in for trouble.  Well, Saul was chosen because he was a big, brawny man and good soldier.  He looked like a king.  But he failed miserably and God finally rejects him.  Now God sends Samuel to find a new king.

God sends Samuel to the house of Jesse to find the new king.  Jesse has 7 of his sons come and see Samuel.  Now I’m going to paraphrase here a little so we get the point.  Please remember that Samuel is a human just like his peers and us.  He sees these young men the way we would.  The first one comes and he is tall and handsome.  The second is tall, dark and handsome.  The third one is all of these things plus he is smart.  The fourth one is everything plus he commands a presence.  The fifth one is a natural leader.  The sixth one is dressed like a king and the 7^th one is a super business man.  All of these sons were fit to be a king.  They all had the qualities to make them great kings in the eyes of Samuel.  And I believe that we would have thought the same thing.

As a matter of fact, I think that we do this every four years.  We elect people to be President of the United States because they can give good speeches or look good.  We elect presidents because they have lots of money.  I think that we have all elected people or at least voted for people to run our government for all the wrong reasons.  I did something a little different in our last election.  I told people that I was voting for certain things because they were the right way to do things.  I didn’t vote because things would help my pocket book or my future.  I tried to vote for right and not for wrong.  You wouldn’t believe the looks and comments that I got because I would waste my vote by voting for what is right.  I have to wonder just how far we have sunk in this country.  We should always be voting for things that are right.

Anyway, none of these boys were right for the job and God rejects them all.  So Samuel asks if there are any more sons and there is one.  He is the youngest boy and he is tending the sheep.  So David comes and stands before Samuel.  We can almost hear Samuel think, “Can this puny little runt be the next king?”  Many of the commentaries on this make David to be 14 or 15 years old but others say that he could have easily been only 10.  He was just a little kid.  God must be making some sort of mistake here.  But we have to remember that God doesn’t make mistakes.

If you remember God chose a stutterer when He chose Moses.  No one in their right mind would have chosen Moses.  God chose the judge Deborah.  I mean that God must have been kidding when He chose a woman to lead in those days, right?  The father of Judaism was far too old when God chose him to father the nation.  Jacob was nothing but a liar.  And these are just a few of the band of misfits that God chose before He chose this runt of the litter, David.  We could continue to name just about every hero of the Bible.  They were all unworthy.  We are all unworthy.  People are always asking me, “Why do all the bad things happen to good people?”  This is an honest and good question.  I don’t have an answer but here is my guess.  Show me a good person!!  There are none.  We all sin and fall short of the glory of God.  But God still loves us.  There must be something about us that makes God love us so much.  The same thing holds true for David.  What in the world did God see in the young boy that He liked so much?

I’m just going to name a few things that David had that we don’t read about in our story.  We have to remember that God knows everything about us so if He chooses David, then David must have things that Saul didn’t.  The first thing I would like to bring up here is that David had a desire to be dependent on God.

David did a lot of things wrong that we read about in his stories.  Just as a little sidebar, David is the most talked about character of the Old Testament.  One of things that I have always admired about David, was that no matter what he did, right or wrong, he would always at some point end up on his knees before God.  This happened over and over again in the story of David.  This has made me love his story.  He depended on God.

Part of the problem in our modern world is that there are so few people who are dependent on God.  And when we try to be dependent on God, then people laugh and make fun of us because everyone worships money or our government or something else of this world thinking these things are the only real god we have.  These are the sources of real power, not God.  If the end of the world came today, right now, there would be millions and millions and millions of Americans who would end up in the wrong place because they are dependent on something other than our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Another thing that David did that goes along with dependence on God was that he was obedient to God.  David not only always went to God at some point, but he would then do as God told him to do.  He would attack others on God’s command.  He would not attack on God’s command.  He would stray from God, repent and come back to God, just like God has told all of us to do.

Dependence on God!  This is where freedom begins!  You can have no freedom apart from Jesus Christ!  For many this is a foreign idea.  We try to do things that are right in God’s eyes and we get laughed at by the people of our own local community.  We are not immune from this haranguing.  Many people of this area will go along with God and try to obey God unless it affects their pocketbooks.  If we were obedient to God, our churches would have absolutely no money problems.  Our biggest problem would be how to spend it to further God’s world.

Along with this, David had the heart of a servant.  He was a king that did things for his people in the name of God.  He spared the life of Saul at least twice because he knew to hurt him would be against the ways of God.  He didn’t build a temple because God told him not to do it.  This is one area where we do have some people.  We have people who look for ways to be a servant of God.

I just want to mention one other good quality of David and that is integrity.  Now David did lapse a couple of times but he always came back to God.  Integrity is what we do when we are by ourselves.  It is what we do when no one is looking.  Integrity is something that our country as a whole doesn’t have much of anymore.  As far as I’m concerned there isn’t much integrity in a written contract but there is a lot of integrity in a handshake.  When David made a promise, it was kept.  Can you say the same?

We don’t know much about David before he was anointed.  I would guess that this anointing was a life changing experience for him as was God’s anointing in my life and in the lives of many of you.  Remember this life change as you go ahead with your life.  Billy Graham, one of my favorite preachers, once said, “We’re suffering from only one disease in the world. Our basic problem is not a race problem. Our basic problem is not a poverty problem. Our basic problem is not a war problem. Our basic problem is a heart problem. We need to get the heart changed, the heart transformed.” David’s heart was transformed and he changed the world.  This still happens today as Jesus changes hearts.  Let’s help Jesus to transform the world and change hearts.  Who knows?  Maybe you can change the world with your changed heart!

Every year we celebrate Father’s Day and Mother’s Day.  David was a father and it kind of sounds like he was a good father considering that he was also a king.  Today, we have many good fathers in our midst.  I salute you.  I salute the mothers too.  The politically correct people would say that we shouldn’t even mention fathers or mothers because we might hurt someone’s feelings.  The reason is that they didn’t have good fathers or mothers.  I totally disagree with this and I feel really bad for anyone who has not had good parents.  But this is part of our human condition.  We have bad fathers, bad mothers and also bad sisters and bad brothers.  We are all a broken people living in a broken world.

One of the things that God does is that he shows us the perfect way to love and to be a good father or good mother or sister or brother or just a good person.  Unfortunately, most people reject this and say they can’t live with rules like this.  Well, I’m here to tell you that there are no rules.  There are no rules but only the perfect example.  The perfect example of Jesus Christ.

God wants you to have the best life possible.  David made mistakes but he would always try to rectify them by coming to God.  Jesus wants you to always come to Him.  When you start to do this on a regular basis, you will start to be much better fathers, mothers, and people.  Your hurts will begin to be left behind.  So, no matter what your situation today, give it all to Jesus because Jesus wants you to have a happy and good life.  This is just a very minor part of the love that He has for each and every one of you.  Go to Him today and go to Him often.  And thank you, Jesus, for first loving us. Let’s pray.