2 Samuel 9

So we study through books of the Bible here at the Village Chapel.

We've got extra copies.

If you didn't bring one with you and you'd like one to follow along, we're studying an ancient text depicting uh events that happened 3,000 years ago.

So it's interesting just from a historical perspective, if nothing else, and uh certainly all the more so when we uh start to see some of the the timeless truths that uh jump off this uh text out of this out of these pages.

These 66 books we call the Bible, it's like a library.

It's got a lot of different uh literary genres in it.

There's poetry, there's historical narrative, there are letters to individuals, letters to churches and groups of churches, that sort of thing.

So we're just uh as we go along, uh here we are in 2 Samuel, and we are studying what we're calling the story of unlikely redemption, reminding ourselves all along the way that uh uh this God of the Bible is uh kind of unusual and that uh God continues to choose those no one else would choose and use those no one else would use.

And uh here we sit as living proof of that ourselves, and uh as well, it really helps us to learn as we uh read back through these pages and see this grand narrative that runs throughout that God really has been um working throughout history to call out a people that he could call his own, um, that would belong to him uh in a in a relational way, in a deeply reconciled and redeemed way, and made that all possible uh through faith in Christ.

And so we're very excited to point all of that along uh out as we go along.

The uh speaking of long, the the deepest longing of our hearts is belonging as human persons, whether you think about these things or not.

I I'm kind of a geek for for philosophy and studying things like theology and philosophy together.

Um and and I would argue that our deepest longing is belonging, and that we really do want to belong.

That's why we're uh loneliness is such an epidemic.

Why?

Well, because people really need to belong.

And uh loneliness is sort of the opposite of belonging.

There's a sense in which we've been abandoned, a sense in which we're isolated and alone.

And our deepest longing is actually, I would argue, to belong to and be in right relationship with the one who made us.

And I think that's what this Bible is really, really all about.

It continues to show us how God has worked hard to uh not only reveal himself to us, but to extend an invitation to us.

And we're gonna see that really uh clearly here in uh chapter 9.

If you want to turn there in 2 Samuel chapter 9 in your Bibles.

2 Samuel 9 · chapter mention

Uh, I don't know what page that is on your Bible, in my Bible, it's page 315.

So whichever uh English translation you have, it's gonna be somewhere around there.

And uh you should be able to find 2 Samuel uh chapter 9.

It's a narrative that moves from being uh really uh it's been all about the kingdom, uh the kingdom of the nation of Israel and the uniting of the kingdom under David.

This is again a thousand uh roughly a thousand BC, so three thousand years ago.

And um and the kingdom had been divided, Ishbesh had been the king, the king in the north, and David in the south, and the tribe of Judah.

And now uh the kingdom is united, David is the king, it's become established a little bit better as we saw last week, and uh as he secured the borders around the kingdom and made relationships with some of the bordering nations as well that have been quite uh quite good and everything's working fine.

And now it gets really personal.

The camera lens moves from, you know, sort of the storyline moves from this real big picture of a nation to a couple of people, individuals.

Uh, and that's great because in our own day and time too, but I hear people all the time, I don't know if you listen to podcasts or any of that sort of thing, but I hear people all the time, some sometimes other Bible teachers, and some of them will really emphasize the kingdom as sort of a communal thing.

Others might just talk about, you know, personal salvation uh and a very individualistic approach.

And um, I guess what I would argue is that it's not either or, it's both and.

Uh I'm a I I belong to we belong to God as individuals.

Uh we stand before him individually, but we also belong to one another and to a community of faith.

And that's a really good thing, why?

Because it it meets so many of our deepest longings to belong not only to the one who made us, but to belong also to his community and his family.

And uh, this is a beautiful thing, actually.

So we're gonna pick up there in um uh chapter uh nine, if you'll look there with me.

And David, who's the king now, he says, Is there yet anyone left in the house of Saul that I'm gonna show kindness for Jonathan's sake?

Now, typically back in that time, back in their era, uh, if a newly established king uh is taken over, they wouldn't be saying this kind of thing.

They'd be saying, Is there anyone left in Saul's house so that I can wipe him out?

Because what they would want to do is secure from all potential rivals, secure the throne from anybody that would make a claim to the throne.

And so this is met with some suspicion, uh, as we'll see.

But at the same time, uh, I really believe David's being pretty honest.

And I think chapter nine is actually, to me, it's like the it's like the fulcrum of David's character.

It's just gonna be two chapters, by the way, before he just crashes and burns big time.

And, you know, and I know, I mean, we're gonna get there and we're gonna see the the reality.

This man is not, you know, you know, perfect and not a hero, just like guess who?

Us.

And that's good news to me.

It ought to be good news to you as well.

Um, not that we delight in anyone else's demise, but that we delight in the God who redeems and and and saves people from their foolishness.

And I'm I'm really glad for that myself, because I'm super fool up here.

So um David said, Is there yet anyone left of the house of Saul that I must show kindness?

The word is Hesed, C-H-E-S-E-D, or some of your Bible translations might have it in the margin as H-E-S-E-D.

Hebrew word means it's very complex.

You can't just say it means uh love or just kindness.

It's complex.

It's it's faithful, steadfast love.

It's love that's way beyond just how I feel about you.

It's way more, I am committed to you 100%, no matter what.

Doesn't matter how you behave, doesn't matter what your condition is, I will love you.

Now that's that's a rare kind of love.

We live in a very veneer love sort of era right now.

It's I love you as long as it's convenient, I love you because you got this stuff, or I love you because you make me feel this way, or I love you because you look this way.

And instead of an if love or a because love, here's the God of the Bible, the God of all heaven, saying, I love you because my heart is to love you.

That's what I do with my heart.

I love even people who are sinners and who are lost.

And this Kesed is uh he's gonna reference that in just a second.

Now I promise not to stop at every verse quite that much.

There was a servant of the house of Saul.

David is looking for someone he can show kindness to.

It was a servant of the house of Saul whose name was Zeba.

They called to him to David, and the king, David, said to him, Are you Zeba?

He said, I am your servant.

Or a lot of your translations will just say, Your servant.

You know.

Um the king said to him, Is there not yet anyone of the house of Saul?

You know, there's from the line of Saul, to whom I can show the kindness, now he says, of God, the Hesed of God.

I want to show loving kindness to uh someone from that house of Saul.

And then he also wants to do it for the sake of Jonathan, whom he, this Jonathan was David's very best friend, even though Jonathan's father Saul considered David to be an enemy and tried to kill David over and over.

Eleven times we read as we studied uh 1 Samuel that eleven different times Saul tried to kill David.

David had an opportunity to kill Saul but didn't do it.

And and so David is, again, this is kind of a high spot for his character, uh, a high point in his character and his development.

But he's asking this person, Zeba, who had been a servant in the house of Saul, is there anyone left that I can show kindness of God to?

And Zeba said to the king, there is still a son of Jonathan who is crippled in both feet.

And that's interesting the way he introduces this son.

This is not, he doesn't give his name.

He just says, Well, he's he's a son of Jonathan, but he's the he's the disabled one.

He's he's the crippled one, and he's crippled in both feet.

We heard about this one in 2 Samuel 4, 4, which we've already studied.

You can go back and listen to it if you want, but I'll tell you basically what happened when Jonathan and Saul were killed by the Philistines in a battle.

The nanny at their house grabbed Jonathan's five-year-old son up and tried to flee, was going to run to safety because the Philistines surely were going to come and wipe out the household of Saul after this battle.

And so she picks up the five-year-old and begins to run.

And in verse 4 of chapter 4, what we read there is that she dropped the young boy.

And when she dropped the young boy, he was hurt so bad that he becomes crippled in his feet for the rest of his life.

And now we're reading about that right here, and it's become, it'll become important, uh, you'll see, in lots of different ways as we go along.

Verse 4.

So the king responds, David says, Where is he?

And Zeba says to the king, Behold, he's in the house of Mekhir, the son of Emil, in Lodabar.

Look at all these live-body details, by the way.

Names, places.

This isn't just a fairy book or a fantasy book.

You know, somewhere a long time ago in a country far away.

No, there's names here.

This is why, this is how you can tell it's history.

When there's actually names, places, you know.

Lodebar, the name, the name actually means no pasture.

So what that means is no food.

Okay.

Okay.

No pasture.

It means you can't grow anything there.

Some of you have, who has that garden?

Somebody has that garden.

I can't grow a thing in my garden, that kind of thing.

It's that kind of place.

It's like I've been over to Israel five times.

It's like this is a desert wilderness, barren wasteland.

And that's where this young man now, uh, who is the son of Jonathan, has been living in hiding, I'm going to suggest.

Because remember, back in those days, the new king in town would wipe out the old king's family.

And so he has run away.

And is in hiding, even though he's crippled.

He hasn't run himself, but somebody's carried him away.

And he's in hiding.

And he's in the house of a specific person, Mekir, the son of Amiel, just in case there's another Mekir who might be the son of someone else.

Again, live body detail, in Lodibar, which I think, from best thing we can tell from our archaeological research and those who you who like to study those sort of things, we think it's Transjordan, about six miles south of the Sea of Galilee, is you know, the Jordan River runs down to the Dead Sea.

And on the other side of the Jordan, about six miles in, is where they think Lodabar, this barren wasteland, this place where there's no pasture, is that's where that is.

Verse 5, then King David sent and brought him the son from house of Mekir, the son of Amiel, from Lodebar.

So David sends and brings him.

What's he thinking on the way?

I'm about to lose my head, literally.

My feet have been crippled all my life.

I'm about to lose my head.

This king, the new king in town, has taken over and he wants to do away with me.

I mean, what is he thinking?

I don't I don't know what he's thinking.

It doesn't tell us what he's told.

It just it's it just he's being brought.

Mephibosheth is his name, verse six tells us.

And I know what you're thinking, a lot of you.

A lot of you almost said, God bless you, because it sounded like I sneezed, right?

It's kind of like a puppy sneeze.

How many of you have dogs and your dogs have ever sneezed?

Does it seem like they wind up and then they go, Mephibosheth, like that?

And you just want to go, God bless you, you know.

My um my computer even made fun of this name.

How's that?

Well, how many of you have how many of you have a spell check that's ever done something weird?

Okay, you know what Mephibosheth comes out in mind with the spell check when I'm doing the voice thing?

I'm doing the reading into it and it's typing it out?

My favorite chef.

Mephibosheth is my favorite chef.

Okay, what do you like?

Oh, just give me something with lots of feta cheese in it.

I don't know.

You know, I mean, what do you what do you but that's what it kept coming up?

So Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, who was the son of Saul, okay, came to David and he this is interesting.

He fell on his face and prostrated himself, which he's already crippled, he's already needing to be carried in anyway.

But he shows this fealty, this loyalty, this humility.

And he literally falls forward, probably out of what would be an ancient version of a uh either a cot that he's a stretcher that he's carried on, or uh some kind of a chair.

And he he falls on his face and prostrated himself before David.

And uh and and this is really powerful.

David says to him, I love this, he says his name.

He's uh been reading up or talking to people about him, and he knows his name.

And I love it that God knows my name, and I love it that God knows your name too.

I love it that the king of the entire universe, creator of everything that exists, in his infinitude, and remember, we have no clue what infinity really is like.

Why?

Because we're finite, and finite creatures cannot comprehend infinity.

But here's what I know there's about 300 or so people in this room, about 1200 people call themselves the village chapel.

I can't keep track of everybody's name.

How many of you don't know everybody's name?

You don't even know the name of some of the people sitting in your row.

But if God is truly infinite and all-knowing and all-wise, he knows Mephibosheth's name and he knows your name, and he knows my name too.

And I, for one, am glad about that because of the kind of God he is.

Um, so David knows his name, this kid, and he says Mephibosheth, and he said, Here is your servant.

And David said to him, Do not fear.

And by the way, I'll point that out over and over again do not fear is the most often repeated command in the Bible.

Uh, especially if you're looking at negative commands, the most often repeated positive command is sing.

Isn't that beautiful?

By the way, I love to listen to, I just leaned over to Kim a minute ago when y'all are singing, and I went, I cannot wait for Advent, because you're going to be singing Christmas carols like this, you know, like the way you sing, and you all sing so well, and that band plays so beautifully.

And can you imagine this place?

I mean, I can because I've been here so many years, but it's awesome at Advent time when we start singing Christmas carols.

You sound incredible.

I feel like I'm in near heaven, some sort of foretaste of what it must be like.

But the the most often repeated negative command is do not fear.

And I love it that David employs that right here with Mephibosheth.

In other words, and by the way, he wouldn't have said that if all the other stuff I said before wasn't true.

That is, that he had every reason to fear.

Because he would likely have been killed.

Because he's a threat in the sense that he could be a rival to the throne.

And David could have wanted to kill him, but he didn't.

And so he says, Don't be afraid.

Most often repeated command in the Bible.

God of the Bible doesn't want you to be afraid.

When you have a healthy fear of God, you don't need to have an unhealthy fear of anything else.

Why?

Because he can raise the dead.

He can create everything out of nothing.

If he can do that, he can handle my life.

He can handle your life, he can handle the suffering we go through.

He can handle this world and all of its chaos and darkness.

He can handle me and my mood swings and my crazy, you know, confused thinking and all that, and my arrogance, all that.

He can handle every bit of me.

Why?

Because he's infinite and he doesn't want me to be afraid, and he's invited me to come near.

That's the same thing David's doing here with Mephibosheth.

Don't fear, I will surely show you, and there it is again for the third time in this chapter, kindness.

You've got to circle that word kindness, even if you have a pew Bible.

Go ahead and do it.

It's a great word, Hesed.

I want to show kindness.

I will surely show kindness to you for the sake of your father Jonathan.

I will restore to you all the land of your grandfather Saul, and you'll eat at my table regularly.

You see, the land that had belonged to Saul had fallen to David now because David's the new king in town.

And what he's saying is, Mephibosheth, not only are you not gonna die so I can eliminate my rivals, but you're gonna live, and you've been living in no pasture, but now you're getting all that good land back that belonged to your granddad and to your father.

And now it's yours again.

That's beautiful.

He's restoring to him that.

Again, you he prostrated himself, uh Mephibosheth did before David.

What is your servant that you should regard a dead dog like me?

In other words, I'm nothing.

You know, I'm nothing.

And why are you being so kind?

Have you have you ever sort of thought something was too good to be true?

Have you ever have you ever gone to something at Bridgetone and somebody out front's like giving away their free extra ticket?

And you go, no, no, stay away from me.

I don't want, you know, it's like it's free, something's gotta be wrong with it, right?

And you just find yourself, this I'm gonna go to jail if I take this ticket.

They're gonna, it's gonna, the lights are gonna go on when I walk through the you know, the reader, the the the security, and all that sort of thing.

Something seems to be wrong with something that's so free, so good, couldn't be true.

And yet, what this is kind of what he's saying when he says this, what is your servant?

You should regard a dead dog like me.

The king called Saul's servant Zebah, and he said to him, All that belong to Saul, to all his house I've given to your master's grandson.

That would be his master was Saul, and the grandson was Mephibosheth.

And he says to Zeba, you and your sons and your servants will cultivate the land for him.

You'll bring in the produce so that your master's grandson can have food.

Nevertheless, Mephibosheth, your master's grandson, will eat at my table regularly.

In other words, he's good.

Mephibosheth, David is making sure that Mephibosheth gets his cake and gets to eat it too.

Isn't that awesome?

Isn't that I mean, you know, that's like winning the lottery or something like that.

You went from worst to first.

Your name, which by the way, his name means from the mouth of shame.

Mephibosheth.

Wow.

And he lived in Lodabar, no pasture.

From the mouth of shame, no pasture, no hope, despair only.

Disabled in both feet all his life, couldn't play with the other kids.

Probably public ridicule, scorn, mockery, helpless, couldn't work, couldn't do anything.

And then one day, out of the clear blue, he hadn't been writing letters.

Dear whoever's the king in Jerusalem, could you please send me some help?

He's not doing that.

There's no record of any of that sort of thing.

David intrudes.

David intervenes just the way God does when he intervenes and intrudes in our lives and brings us, shows, showers us, uh, seizes us with his great affection and showers us with his grace.

It's an awesome thing, and it's a great picture of it.

But now you're going to eat at my table.

Zeba had 15 sons and 20 servants.

That's quite a staff.

Man, that's that's bigger than our church staff.

Zeba said to the king, according to all that my Lord the king commands his servant, so your servant will do.

So Mephibosheth ate at David's table as one of the king's sons, verse 11 tells us.

See, this is huge.

You should underline that too in your Bible.

As one of the king's sons.

Why?

Because it's a picture of exactly what happens to us when we all of a sudden belong to the kingdom of heaven.

We're not just part of God's possession, but we're actually part of God's family at that point.

What does God own in the entire universe?

Everything.

Why?

Well, by right of creation, he's the owner.

He created it, he owns it.

But he wants more than just ownership with you and with me.

That's what our Bible, that's this narrative throughout the Bible.

He actually wants us to be his sons and daughters.

He actually wants us to be in a relationship with him.

And he makes that possible by adopting us as his children.

We've run the other way, I've run the other way, you've run the other way.

All of us have run the other way.

And yet he makes it possible.

I've been hiding in the wilderness where there's no pasture.

I've been hiding in my own shame.

You've been doing the same.

Some of you would admit it, you know it, you you recognize it.

And yet he comes for us.

Not only does he come for us, he brings us in.

Not as he bring us in, he invites us to sit at his table like one of his children.

Wow.

That's amazing restoration.

Verse 12, and we'll finish up here.

And I'll just make three short points.

Mephibosheth had a young son, his name was Micah, and all who lived in the house of Ziba were servants to Mephibosheth.

So Mephibosheth, my favorite chef, lived in Jerusalem.

For he ate at the king's table regularly.

Now he was lame in both feet, the narrator says.

Wow, this is really powerful.

Again, so many ways that we could address, you know, what are the lessons to be learned in an ancient text like this?

These are real people.

Need to remind ourselves of that.

They're not living in our time, but we're trying to go back to their time.

And that's what history, doing the work of history is really all about.

So often when people are doing the work of history, they run it all through the filters of their modern or postmodern world and philosophy.

We shouldn't do that.

If we really want to know what happened on back then, we've got to think about the way that what was going on back then and understand.

That's why we give some attention to some of the historical and cultural norms.

But there are lessons here that we could learn from David, what his response, uh, Zeba, uh, even McKeir, I think there are probably some lessons we could draw from what we read about McKeir and him hosting Mephibosheth for all this time.

But since it's such a beautiful picture of the way the gospel works, I'm going to focus in on Mephibosheth and just see if I can't draw three things from this text here.

First thing I learned was that like Mephibosheth, we all need a king who will help those who cannot help themselves.

Um I know we've all heard, you know, God helps those who help themselves.

And he he does, that's that's true.

But it's better than that.

Um because God helps those who cannot help themselves too.

And Mephibosheth couldn't help himself.

Um He was crippled on both feet.

He was literally discarded in his time, uh, other than somebody just kind of keeping him alive.

Uh but but loss of dignity uh went from being a prince in the house of King Saul, can't you know Jonathan would have been next to be the king uh if things had gone the normal way, and then and then Methibish, an heir to the throne himself.

He went from prince to paralyzed with no hope in sight of any kind, really, you know, and and some of us can think our own lives and see in our own lives that it it has gone that way for some of us in some different categories.

Um like I say, think of him growing up as a kid, how he must have thought how unfair life had been to him.

He must have thought at some point life wasn't even worth living.

And some of us, I mean, that happens so often in our own day and time, sadly.

I mean, just this week.

You know, such a young, young soul.

In so many places, really, really all over the place.

But young souls asking the question, is my life meaningful at all?

And if they come up with the wrong answer, see, if they come up with the answer, no, it's not.

You don't measure up.

No, it's not.

Nobody cares about you.

No, it's not.

You're not of any value.

If they come up with the wrong answer, what great despair that leads them to.

We have the answer here.

You know, this is a beautiful picture of God reaching into someone's condition who's lost, who's hopeless, who's helpless, who's despairing.

And and there's no answer on this, no worldly answer on the on the horizon for this kid.

And yet here comes God working through David, and God helping those who really cannot help themselves.

Uh, that's huge.

He's a king, uh, David, who would help those who couldn't help themselves, who'd be eager to show some kind of kindness.

Um, and and I guess it leads me to the question, is there is there a king for us like that?

And I don't mean politically.

I don't I'm I'm I'm not talking about that.

I don't think the solution is political.

I think the solution for the longing in my heart is not about who's in the state house or the White House or any of that sort of thing.

The longing, the deepest longing in our hearts is to belong to the one who made us.

How's that gonna happen?

How can we, how can that reconciliation happen when we know that we're sinners, when we know that we've even preferred low to bar, some of us.

We'll take the no pasture land because we're in charge.

Uh and we're impervious to shame.

We don't care what anybody else thinks, you know?

And we get that way sometimes, so obstinate and stubborn when it comes to God.

And I guess what the point here would be is no matter how lost you are, no matter how you got there, and no matter what kind of lost you are, guess who's coming?

Yeah, the hound of heaven.

He's in search of a people he can call his own.

And that call may be coming your way very soon if it hasn't already happened.

I love the way Red Path puts it.

It's a tremendous thing that God, infinitely righteous and absolutely holy, is able, while upholding the justice of all his created universe, to reach down to the depths of human need and say, are there any here to whom I may show kindness in spite of their treatment of me?

Can you get inside of that?

Do you see what Red Path is saying there?

That God's grace, his love, his mercy, his forgiveness is not contingent on your performance.

He's just eager to show his kindness.

And the question then just becomes Am I ready to receive it?

King David's greater son, the greater King, Jesus of Nazareth, and he is in the line of King David.

He is a descendant of David.

We read that in Matthew's gospel, we read it in Luke's.

Um He's the King, I think, that we're all looking for, because King Jesus knows about our guilt and shame, but he's loved us just the same.

Loved us enough to go to the cross to pay the price for my sin and my shame.

King Jesus knows all about what a struggle our real life is, and he's promised to never leave us or forsake us, even in the struggle.

He didn't cause the disciples to avoid the stormy sea.

He rode in the boat with them to the stormy sea.

And when they were out on the stormy sea without him in their boat, he came walking out on the water to them.

You see?

And he's constantly doing that kind of thing.

He's that kind of a faithful king.

King Jesus knows what it's like to be rejected by others, abused by others, scorned by others.

But he has offered us the courage of faith to trust in him and hope in him.

King Jesus even knows what it means to have a face, uh, to have to face death and die for the sake of others.

Since Jesus Christ rose up from the grave, we can have confidence in his power to save us, to raise us from the dead to eternal life in his name.

And that's why Paul and Silas can sing in the prison cell in the New Testament.

Because even if they die, even if they do have to give their lives for their faith, they trust in King Jesus.

They trust in a God who can raise the dead.

What does the New Testament say?

It says, fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of your faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross.

What was the joy set before Jesus that made him endure the cross?

You.

Me.

You gotta be kidding.

We're dead dogs.

We should join Mephibosheth and say, why shouldn't you be kind to us, God?

That's what should be blowing our minds.

Not how come there's only one way?

I think our minds ought to be blown because there even is one way.

Tell me, raise your hand if you think you deserve one way.

I don't deserve one way.

I don't deserve any way.

I'm flabbergasted that there's one way.

If there were one way to cure the common cold, if there was one way to cure cancer, if there was one, wouldn't you take it?

Wouldn't you accept the gift?

Who's gonna say, I refuse to take it because I don't believe in there only being one cure for my arthritis?

I'm just not interested obstinately against it because there's just one cure.

Nobody will do that.

Why would we do that when it comes to this free offer of salvation from God?

Grace and mercy received and truly perceived will issue in grace and mercy shared.

And that means all that means is this is that we're not meant to be a little huddle of people that gather together on Sunday and congratulate ourselves on our worship, on our music, on our preaching, on our Bible study, on our Bible knowledge, on how holy we are.

No.

This is meant to flow through us.

And that's what we see in chapter 9.

David, eager to show kindness.

And we're told in one verse in particular, to show the kindness of God.

How about you?

Is that what marks us as believers in Jesus and followers of Christ?

Is that what most people out there think about Christians?

That we're eager to show kindness?

And I realize there's some people that are casting our image for us.

But let's silence the miscast image.

Let's silence that with our eager kindness.

Let's overflow.

Let's run to the rescue.

Let's help those that are needy.

Let's show the love of God in ways that just silences all the critics of Christianity or the gospel.

Let's do that.

John Stott says, Grace is God's free and unmerited favor, loving the unlovable, seeking the fugitive, rescuing the hopeless, lifting the beggar from the dunghill to make him sit among princes.

Let's do some of that.

How about you?

Amen.

It was Jesus who said, Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

That's in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapter 5, in Luke chapter 6.

Matthew 5 · chapter mention Luke 6 · chapter mention

Be merciful just as your father is merciful.

If you recognize that God has been merciful to you, have you given thought to how you're doing with showing mercy to others?

It's really the only conditional clause of the Lord's prayer up there.

Forgive us our trespasses.

And then what do we say?

As we forgive those who trespass against us.

Everything else is, there's nothing not much conditional about anything else.

Everything's communal, our Father who art in heaven, us our daily.

Everything's communal.

We're all together.

Right?

We all belong to Him, we belong to each other.

And if I belong to Him, I belong to everybody else who belongs to Him.

Okay?

That's good.

But the only conditional clause is forgive us our debts or our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.

So how about how's that going?

How's that going?

Anybody holding unforgiveness in their heart, don't raise your hand.

But feel convicted if that's you.

If you're harboring unforgiveness, you're drinking rat poison and thinking that the rat might die.

But you're the one that's dying.

Because unforgiveness in your heart is rat poison for the human soul.

Go home, take care of business, forgive.

Well, you don't know how they offended me.

Yes, I do.

I've been offended many times.

And sadly, I've offended others many times.

I've let others down.

You've let others down as well.

But here's what I know my father in heaven has been merciful to me.

And if he is gracious with a sinner such as I am, who in the world do I think I am to withhold grace to others?

See?

See how different you start to think when this when you start to take this all seriously?

Um some people say rich religion is bad for society, and I'd say bad religion is bad for society.

But I'd say if we took Christ seriously and began to act a little more like Jesus, that would actually be good for our society.

We'd be blessing our city.

We'd be blessing those who who don't like us, and we'd be showering them with kindness in ways that would blow their minds.

Thirdly and finally, I've got to get I've got to move fast.

We have an invitation to dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

Mephibosheth got to got to sit at that table with David in the palace in Jerusalem, the newly established center of Israel, you know, the capital city of Israel.

And um and the palace that David had built for himself was grand, and the table had to be awesome.

And to be able to not only know that the land that you've gotten back that you lost is being worked by Ziba and his 15 sons and his 20 servants or whatever it was there, that crew is working that for you, you know, building your wealth and building your portfolio and all that sort of thing.

But at the same time, you get a free lunch at the table of the king.

That's pretty awesome.

That's pretty amazing.

And you're restored to the status of a son.

It's not just a job, you're actually restored to the status of a son.

That's what we're told here, that he was just like one of David's sons.

And the Lord has been doing that exact same thing, turning us, we strangers who have run off to Lodabar, we folks who have been filled with shame, we folks who want it our way all the time and might even be belligerently resisting him, and yet he's got an offer for us, an invitation for us.

See, the gospel, it is, I say this all the time, I draw the distinction between human discovery of God and divine revelation from God.

And I and I try to make the point that we can't really discover God honestly on our own, because it'll always be a God that kind of looks just like us and acts just like us and happens to like who we like and doesn't happen to like who we don't like and all that.

All of a sudden we've created God in our own image.

And so there is a need for us to have divine revelation from God, and that's true.

But the gospel's more than even that.

It's actually a divine invitation.

So it's God revealing himself, but revealing the content of his revelation is come unto me.

Let's be in a relationship.

I want to know you.

I want you to be my sons and my daughters, and I want you to come and dwell in the house of the Lord forever, and that's really awesome.

That's one of the reasons why village chapel works as it does, this church works as it does, to pass that grace along forward.

That's why when we were talking about the fires and we're talking about different natural disasters, that's why, because of your generosity, we can step up and respond to these needs like we can.

That's why when someone of our own has a need, we can respond to those needs as well.

Uh and so God pouring his grace through his people, and his generosity through his people is really a wonderful thing.

The economics of grace are kind of upside down for us.

We got this invitation to dwell in the house of the Lord forever, but it you can't buy your way in.

Okay?

Why?

Well, because grace is opposed to earning.

It's not opposed to effort, but it's opposed to earning.

So everything from God, nothing from me, that's the economics of grace.

And it feels like an unnatural arrangement because it is.

It's a supernatural arrangement.

Okay?

We find it difficult to come with nothing, and we find it even harder to receive everything.

It gets in our, it sort of gets at our pride a little bit.

We want God to be impressed with us, and therefore we earn our way in, you know, or therefore we we feel like he owes us an interest.

And that's that's not what grace is.

Grace is come unto me.

All of you, you've been laboring hard out there, you've been working really hard, trying to make it on your own, trying to do it your own, trying to figure it all out yourself, and you know what a failure you are.

God knows what a failure.

This is the beauty of the Christian gospel.

He knows us fully and he loves us completely.

See?

So no matter where you are, whether you're in Lodabar or halfway to Lodabar, no matter whether your name is Mephibosheth and you're really just right out of the mouth of shame, or you're just flirting with things that you later will become ashamed of, but no matter where you are, the invitation is to come to his table.

The invitation is to come and dine with him.

And if God has offered such a wonderful gift to us, why in the world will we hesitate to receive it?

Who wouldn't want that?

Who wouldn't want to be invited in by God like this?

Don't try to get your life together and then come to God.

Um, Titus 3 tells us God already knows what sinners we are.

And that God remains eager to lavish us with his loving kindness, his mercy, and his grace.

And every generation, as Tozer has said, the people who found them who have found God have been those who have come to the end of themselves.

Recognizing their hopelessness, they've been ready to throw themselves on the mercy and grace of a forgiving God.

So the question today for all of us is, are we eager to receive the eager kindness of God's grace through Christ?

And then as his people, are we ready to surrender everything to him and to begin reflecting that grace and that mercy out to others as well?

Are we ready to trade in our orphaned souls and receive our status as his children, sons and daughters all, you know, belonging to him?

Are we ready to receive this invitation to sit at table with him?

We'll come to the table next week as we do each and every month, uh, on the first Sunday of the month, the communion table, or the Eucharist, as some churches will call it.

It means thanksgiving.

So we'll come to the table to say thank you to God for his gifts that he offers to his people for free, based on the finished work of Christ on the cross, not based on something that we've done.

This is a merciful, gracious, forgiving, and loving God.

Are you ready to take your seat and join the feast at the great table of the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords for the rest of eternity?

I hope you are.

Let's pray.

Lord, thank you for this passage, all that it has stirred us to remember, to think of, to ponder on, to delight in.

I pray, Lord, that uh uh for each and every one of us, you just remove the scales of performance-based uh relationship that we're so used to.

Just remove that from our eyes that we might see that you love us just because of your heart and the kind of God you are, not because we've earned it, not because we've done something to impress you, not because we've been good little Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts, but just because of who you are.

You love your people.

And so we're grateful for that, each and every one of us.

Uh give us the courage to trust you in that.

And Lord, grant us the faith that would lead us to walk on the freedom of grace.

We pray this in Jesus' name, amen.

And amen.