Flawed People Seeking God's Heart- 8/9/2026

Good morning.

It's great to see you all.

In uh 2020, Emmanuel Cafferty, he was a utility worker down in San Diego.

He was sitting in his work truck minding his own business.

Um, and out of habit, he cracked his knuckles.

Unbeknownst to him, somebody took a picture of him cracking his knuckles, posted it on social media suggesting that he was making a white power hand gesture.

And that post went viral.

Emmanuel lost his job, had a difficult time finding a job after that.

There was absolutely no evidence whatsoever that he was doing anything other than cracking his knuckles.

And we've all probably heard many horror stories of what some would call cancel culture gone wrong, where shame is used as a weapon, oftentimes against innocent people.

But there are some within the culture who have been shamed who probably deserve it.

I mean, with names like Harvey Weinstein and Bill Cosby come to mind, there's plenty of others that you could add to that list, right?

Those who have been in some prominent uh position of power or influence and they have misused it and they have abused people under them to their own self-gratification.

And I think it's safe to say that our society is better off without them having that power anymore.

Okay.

So when we come to our study in looking at David's life, it is a fair question to ask: why does David have the influence he still has?

It's a hard thing to balance between understanding that David is described as a man after God's heart.

We saw that back in 1 Samuel 13, when David is chosen over Saul to be the next king.

That in contrast to Saul, David truly desired to obey God, truly desired to trust God, truly desired to honor God.

So he's a man after God's heart.

And even the Apostle Paul in Acts 13 in the sermon confirmed that.

From a bird's eye view, David was truly a man after God's heart, and yet we know he was also a man of great moral failure.

He took advantage of a vulnerable woman, committed adultery with her, got her pregnant, and even went so far as to have her husband killed in battle in order to try to cover up that sin.

And we're left this dilemma of how do we we balance this paradox that he is a man of God's own heart and a man of great failure all at the same time.

As our worship leader this morning would say when he was three years old, for those of you who don't know, Keegan is my son, and it's a real privilege uh serving with him this morning in this way.

When he was three years old, we'd ask him a question, and he would say, It's complicated.

Um it's really complicated.

And I don't have a perfect answer to satisfy the tension that we might have in our hearts when we think about David's life from that perspective.

But the scriptures do present David ultimately, when we look at his legacy, we look from the big picture, he was truly still a man after God's own heart.

So if there's anything that we can learn from David's life, considering that, understanding that a man after God's own heart and yet a man of great moral failure.

When we look at our own flawed lives, there is a reminder there that even with our past failures and sins, that we can still truly be people who seek God's heart, that we can truly be people who seek to trust, obey, and honor God, even with the failures that we've experienced.

So our big idea this morning is this that in spite of our past failures and sins, we can and we should seek after God's heart.

In spite of our past failures and sins, we can and we should seek after God's heart.

Now it's really important to understand the background and context of our passage this morning.

We're looking at 2 Samuel 23, uh verses 8 through 39.

And on the surface, as we uh let me back up there, uh we need to understand, we, as we've seen the last several weeks, that we're in the epilogue of 2 Samuel.

So we're getting more of a bird's eye view of David's life.

What how do we define David's legacy as a whole?

Right?

And as you come to our the passage that we're looking at this morning, on the surface, it seems extremely random.

Like here, all of a sudden, there's this list and descriptions of what are known as David's mighty warriors, these men who fought for David.

Okay?

And it just seems to be plopped in the middle of the narrative for absolutely no reason at all.

What's really important for us to understand is that this passage this morning is actually meant to be a parallel passage to one that Pastor Wyatt preached on a few weeks ago in chapter 21, verses 15 through 22.

Pastor Wyatt showed us then that David went from being this young shepherd boy who was the only one in all of Israel who had faith enough to face Goliath.

And God gave him victory in that battle.

But now in his old age, he's too old to fight the Goliath at all.

In fact, he's a liability on the battlefield.

But God has raised through him, God has raised up multiple warriors who will fight the Goliath for him.

That's what we saw in chapter 21.

So in our passage this morning, we're just getting more detail, more description of some of these men who fought around David, the highest level of warriors who fought around David.

We're getting a more detail on them.

I'm not, we're not gonna read, we're not gonna read all of the uh all of the passages morning.

It's too much of way too many names.

Um I'll let you read a lot of that on your own.

Just a quick overview.

This this group that is described in these verses is broken down into two distinct groups.

Okay, this is David's special forces.

This is the special forces of David's military.

This is the SEAL team six, this is the Delta Force of David's military.

And the the first group is the very top echelon, that's the three.

And the second, just below that, is the thirty.

I know, like really creative names, right?

But that's what they were known as.

And like I said, I there's a lot of really interesting and amazing uh uh heroics of that these men performed.

I'll let you read that on your own.

And uh the end of uh the the most of the 30 group is just a list of names.

Uh it's not even we're not even given a description of them.

So I will definitely, for the sake of not making a fool of myself, let you read those names on your own.

Um I do not want to read them for you this morning, if I'm honest.

So we if we were to look and study each and every one of these men, especially the ones that we have more detail on, we would we would be able to learn plenty of lessons about bravery and devotion.

Um but I want to focus on verses 13 through 17.

And in these verses, we see this amazing heroic act of three unnamed men from the 30 group who go on the special mission.

The special mission to get David a drink of water.

Okay.

To get David a drink of water.

And again, we would we could learn much from their bravery and their devotion, but but I also think this passage, when we see David's response to these men, we see a glimpse into David's heart.

So starting in verse 13, it says three of the leading warriors went down at harvest time and came to David at the cave of Adalem.

While a company of Philistines was camping in Riphaim valley.

At that time David was in the stronghold in the Philistine garrison, it was at Bethlehem.

David was extremely thirsty and said, If only someone would bring me water to drink from the well at the city gate of Bethlehem.

So three of the warriors broke through the Philistine line camp and drew water from the well at the gate of Bethlehem.

They brought it back to David, but he refused to drink it.

Instead he poured it out to the Lord.

David said, Lord, I would never do such a thing.

Is this not the blood of the men who risked their lives?

So he refused to drink it.

Such were the exploits of the three warriors.

So can remembering that scripture describes David as a man after God's heart, but also being fully aware of David's moral failure.

I think when we look at this passage, there's three things that we can learn, even in spite of our past failures and sins, that there are three things we can learn to still seek after God's heart.

The first one is that a heart that seeks after people after God, excuse me, is a heart for people.

A heart that seeks after God is a heart for people.

If there's anything we see in this whole passage is that these men being described here are extremely loyal to David.

They fight valiantly, but I don't think that they're fighting valiantly just for the sake of fighting valiantly.

I think they saw David as someone who was truly worth fighting for and risking their lives for.

We especially see in these verses that I just read.

David is holed up in this cave out in the desert.

He's thirsty, which makes sense.

And he just makes a passing thought.

He says, I wish I could have a drink from my childhood well.

That's what he's essentially saying.

David grew up, he lived in Bethlehem.

Okay, so what he's saying is, I wish someone would go to the well that's by the city gate at Bethlehem, my childhood well, and give me a drink of water.

It wasn't a command.

It wasn't even really a suggestion.

It was just a wish.

This time of year, my wife and I, Shannon and I, will say at one point or another, almost every year, I wish I could have a Palisade peach right now.

I'm from Grand Junction, Colorado.

That's my hometown, which is on the western side of Colorado, about 30 miles from the Utah border.

It's in a big valley called the Grand Valley.

On the east end of the valley is a little town called Palisade, surrounded by peach orchards and vineyards as well, but surrounded by peach orchards, and they grow the biggest, juiciest peaches you've ever had in your life.

I swear to you, I warn you, if you ever have one, it will ruin store-bought peaches for your life.

Okay, we never buy store-bought peaches.

Now, if our son, I wouldn't expect our sons, if they heard us say that, to jump in our car, drive a thousand miles, find a fruit stand in Grand Junction area, and come back and bring me a couple boxes of peaches.

In fact, they wouldn't be very happy with the price of gas right now, right?

Those would be really expensive peaches.

I wouldn't expect that.

It's just a wish.

It was just, oh, it would be so nice.

Once in a while we get back there at this time of year and we we get to have them, but uh oftentimes we just wish is all we have.

That's what's happening here.

David's not asking anybody to get this water for them, but these men hear him say that, say that, and they are so devoted to him, they are so loyal to them, they say, Let's go.

Just to get him a drink of water.

And they break through the Philistine line, they find the well, they get him a jug of water.

And then it doesn't say in the passage, but I assume they had to fight their way back through the Philistine line to get back to David as well, and they give the water to him.

Incredibly loyal.

I would suggest to us this morning that the one main reason that these men were so loyal to David was because he was incredibly loyal to them.

David showed them that he had a heart for them.

Especially when this uh this group began.

I believe that the the three and the thirty plus other units as well started uh back in 1 Samuel 22.

This is before David is even king yet.

He's on the run from Saul, and ironically, he's holed up in the same cave again at that point as well, time as well.

And but David is uh David is famous at this point.

You know, he the saying was already out that Saul killed his thousands, but David he killed his ten thousands.

Okay.

Let me let me read in verse one.

It says, So David left Gath and took refuge in the cave of Adalam.

When David's brothers and his father's whole family heard, they went down and joined him there.

In addition, every man who was desperate, in debt, or discontented rallied around him, and he became their leader.

About four hundred men were with him.

Okay.

So David is famous.

Uh, it very well has been passed round, rumored, that David was actually anointed to be the next king, that God had chosen David to be the next king, but at this point he's still running from Saul.

But these outcasts of society, they're like, this is our opportunity.

We can go rally around our fellow outcast.

So they go and they rally around David, and it makes sense that it would be a group of outcasts, a group of ragtag men.

As we look through the the 30, the names in the 30, actually, several of them weren't even Jews.

Some of them were foreigners and they're rallying around David.

Okay, these aren't West Point men.

Okay?

This is a ragtag group of men that are rallying around David.

And it makes sense since David himself is an outcast.

But what really sets David apart is that when David becomes king, he keeps them around.

He doesn't dis he didn't discard them for more prestigious uh uh soldiers.

He keeps them around.

David didn't care about pedigree, he didn't care about status.

If you were loyal to David and you could prove your own on the battlefield, he kept you around.

And not only did he keep them around, but I believe that David trained them.

I don't I think it would be naive for us to assume that uh that they all these men, these 400 men come to rally around David, that all of them were just perfectly trained warriors already.

They became these who we see now, these mighty warriors rallying around David.

So David was kept them around, he was loyal to them, and he trained them.

And it doesn't not necessarily one-on-one for each one of them, that would probably be impossible, but it at the very least, he created an environment where they could succeed.

Okay, it was a bait uh it was uh an environment where it was based solely on your ability to prove yourself.

If you're loyal to David and you could prove your own on the battlefield, you got you stuck around.

And these men, think about it, these men were outcasts.

And they probably knew very clearly in their minds that if they had not made that decision to follow after David when he was down in that cave, they would still be outcasts.

Now here they are.

They're the mighty warriors of the king of Israel.

They were fully aware of that.

David kept them around, he was loyal to them, and then their response to David was loyalty back to him.

They fought valiantly for David because he was so incredibly loyal to them.

The question for us is what about us?

Do we truly find joy in helping others grow and succeed?

Do we truly find joy in that?

And doing anything it takes to help people around us succeed.

Or are we so focused on our own agenda and our own goals that we just don't have time for that?

Or even worse, maybe we're even a little intimidated by the success of others around us.

Another thing kind of popped in my head as I was studying this passage of past, especially in light of what Pastor Wyatt talked about last week.

Pastor Wyatt talked about how, you know, the about the people that we influence and and and um take advantage of that influence for for Christ.

When we think about the people that we influence, if we're in a state where we're constantly frustrated by the response of people we're trying to influence, I'm not saying this is 100% all the time, but it could be, just consider for a moment, it could be that maybe they're not sensing from us that we have a heart for them.

Maybe we haven't proven to them that we are truly loyal to them, that we truly want the best for them.

If we haven't done that, if we haven't proven that to them, we can't really expect much loyalty back from them.

David proved himself.

He proved that he was loyal to them, he had a heart for these men, and they responded with incredible loyalty in return.

The next thing that we see from this passage is that a heart that seeks after God is a heart for worship.

Now, when we you you on the surface, when you look at David's response to these men bringing this water, it seems kind of callous, right?

Like, the least you could do is take a little sip of the water that they would they would risk so much to bring this water to you.

Uh, it'd be like if my sons did bring these peaches back from Colorado for me, and I just let them sit on the counter and rob.

Okay, that's what it feels like.

That's what it seems like on the surface.

But that's not what's happening.

That's exactly the opposite of what's going on here.

David is so overwhelmed by their act of bravery and devotion that he all he could think to do was pour it out as an act of worship to God.

I think essentially, ultimately, what David is saying is I am not worthy of this kind of devotion.

Only God could be worthy of this kind of devotion, to risk their lives to do such a brave act simply to get me a drink of water.

That's crazy devotion.

Only God deserves that kind of devotion.

It reminds me of another in John 12, we meet, uh we see another act of sacrifice and devotion and something being poured out as an act of worship.

Uh it's important to remember in John 11, Jesus raises a man named Lazarus from the dead.

Remember, his family and friends came to Jesus a few days before saying he's gravely ill.

If you come now, you can heal him and he won't die.

Jesus waits until he does die, but then Jesus goes and he raises him from the dead.

Now in John 12, Jesus is in Mary, Martha, and Lazarus' house, and they're talking to Jesus.

And Mary feels compelled, probably absolutely overwhelmed by by what she just saw, that Jesus raised her brother from the dead.

Overwhelmed by that, overwhelmed by everything she knows about Jesus, who Jesus is, but the only thing she could think to do was to get up and grab that vase of expensive perfume.

Now, considering she was probably poor, it very well could have been that this jar of perfume in her house was a family heirloom that had been passed down from generation to generation.

And the only thing she could think to do when she's so overwhelmed by who Jesus is and what uh what he has done was to get that vase and to and to pour the perfume all over Christ.

And the disciples are outraged, how it could be so how she could she be so wasteful, and Jesus says rebukes them and says, No, she knows what she's doing.

It's an act of worship.

She's preparing my body for for my burial, which would happen in just about a week's time.

Okay.

But notice the similarities between David and Mary.

David receives this water and is so overwhelmed that God would provide such devoted men to him that his only thing he could think to do was to pour it on ground as an act of worship.

He's not worthy of it.

I have to give it to God.

Mary realizes she's in the very presence of God who could raise the dead.

And the only thing that she could think to do was take the most expensive thing she had, the most expensive thing her whole family had for generations, and pour it on Jesus.

And Jesus rebukes the disciples and receives that worship because he is acknowledging he is the one and the only who is worthy of that.

That's what David is saying here.

He's pouring out the water.

He's not being callous, he's saying, I don't deserve this.

It really shows us that Mary and David both show us that a heart for worship is truly sensitive to the what God is worthy of and is devoted to him getting that glory, even if it means great sacrifice for themselves.

Now, if you go beyond the narrative of David's life and just see all the aspects of how he've influenced Scripture, what we see of him, we see, for one thing, he we know he wrote 72 of the Psalms in the book of Psalms.

72 out of 150.

But some of them are considered, he he probably at least wrote half of the book of Psalms.

Israel's hymn book.

Okay.

Chris Tomlin, the Gettys, they have nothing on Chris Tomlin, or they have nothing on David.

Sorry, I misspoke there.

They have nothing on David.

Incredible heart for worship.

But obviously, worship goes beyond music, and I'm not suggesting worship is only music.

And as we say that here, that David doesn't break out into a song.

He pours out the water as an act of sacrifice.

But when we look in the Psalms, what we what we see and what we see in this passage especially is that it was David's gut reaction to worship.

That was his gut reaction.

That was the first thing he could think to do was to worship.

And we will do look in the Psalms, we see that David worshiped in every aspect of life.

He didn't just worship God when things were going great.

He worshiped in every aspect of life, all the ups and downs of life.

Yes.

He worshiped God when God gave him great victory.

But he also worshiped God when God when he suffered great loss and wrote psalms of lament.

And in light of mentioning David's failure, the psalm that really jumps out to me is Psalm 51.

David even worshiped in his shame.

When David was confronted by the prophet Nathan about his adultery, David truly repented, and he wrote Psalm 51.

Starting in verse 13, he says, Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.

You do not want a sacrifice, or I would give it.

You are not pleased with the burnt offering.

The sacrifice pleasing to God is a broken spirit.

You will not despise a broken and humble heart.

David's gut reaction was to worship.

And that begs the question for us.

What's our gut reaction?

When a child is born, or when we lose a loved one.

When we get the dream job, we get the pink slip.

When we get the clean bill of health, when we get that surprise diagnosis.

What's our gut reaction?

It's not going to be 100% of the time.

It wasn't 100% of the time for David.

We're told that when he did commit adultery of Bathsheba, he went a whole year without repenting.

I don't think there was a whole lot of worshiping going on during that year.

He wasn't 100% all it wasn't 100% all the time.

But David, from the big picture, David's gut reaction was to worship, and that's a great challenge to us.

The last thing we see in this passage is that a heart that seeks after God is a heart of gratitude.

It's a heart of gratitude.

When we see David's response to these men, it was simultaneously an act of worship and also an act of gratitude.

He's so overwhelmed from God to that God would provide such faithful, devoted men to serve him.

Because obviously, he's also incredibly thankful to these men for their uh their passion for him.

As you said in verse 17, is this not the blood of the men who risked their lives?

To David, this water wasn't just water.

That's why he had to felt like he had to pour it on the ground.

It was such an act of devotion.

This water to David was a symbol, a precious, valuable symbol of their devotion to him.

And all he could do was pour it on the ground as an act of worship, but also an act of gratitude.

And we saw, you know, uh Pastor Wyatt took us through 2 Samuel 22 just a couple of weeks ago, um, showing that part of his his hymn of worship was gratitude.

Therefore, I will give thanks to you among the nations, Lord.

If you look through the, you look through the Psalms, there's many Psalms of gratitude for God's protection, for his provision, um just every aspect of life he was grateful for.

He expressed gratitude.

But again, David wasn't always grateful.

He wasn't 100% in his response.

Uh he had a pattern of gratitude, but he didn't always perfectly uh respond to every situation.

In Psalm 32, he gives us a glimpse into his heart when during a time of dryness, during a time when he is turned away from the Lord, a time of unrepentance.

Um very well could have been referring to that year in between when when he was not repentant of his sin with with Bathsheba.

He's referring to that time and he said uh the um the CSB that we often use says that he his bones were brittle.

Other versions say I tend to prefer, uh he says that my bones were wasting away.

When I wasn't, David's saying when I wasn't worshiping, when I was turned away from the Lord, I wasn't worshiping, I wasn't grateful, I wasn't focused on him, I was dying inside.

So in a roundabout way, I think we're actually seeing David's heart for God there.

He's saying, I have a heart for God, but I have I have experienced times when I haven't been on the right track with the Lord, when I've been turned away from him.

But because I had a heart from God, I felt it.

My life was completely off-kilter.

I was dying inside because of that.

And we could get in that, we can get in that that mode as well when when we just get bad news after bad news.

It's so easy to get uh consumed with bitterness and anger and discouragement.

And it can it can mount up.

And we can get to that point where when we're not thankful, we can get to the point where we feel like we're dying inside, too.

We're just feel like it's just taking over our lives.

Perhaps you've been there before.

It truly does take a conscious effort to have a pattern of gratitude like we see from David.

Um, some of us had the the uh the privilege of going to family camp a few weeks ago.

For those of you who don't know, uh every July we we have one week up at Warm Beach.

Uh our family camp is a great time of fellowship and enjoying God's nature.

But for those of us who've gotten to go to family camp on a on a regular basis, family camp becomes this annual reminder of God's incredible goodness to our families.

These families come in, uh say a family comes in with a newborn baby and it's in a stroller.

The baby's in the stroller.

And the next few years later, they're on a tricycle.

And then the next year is on a little strider bike.

Where are those things when my boys were little?

Those were cool.

And then a real bike, a little one, but still a real bike.

They got their balance going.

And then big the bikes get bigger and bigger every year until you get to the point that uh the stage of that my family's in, where uh we had to take two cars, and so one of my youngest son is driving one of the cars for us back and forth from camp.

And then the last stage is that that those kids are bringing their kids, and their it's the whole process starts all over again.

Just this annual reminder, God has been so good to us.

We need to stop and remember that.

We need to establish a pattern of gratitude, and the heart that seeks after God is a heart of gratitude.

So I just want to finish with uh two questions this morning.

First of all, do we want to be people who seek after God's heart?

Do we want to be people who truly want to obey him and everything, trust him and everything, to honor him and everything?

It's not automatic.

When we place our faith in Christ, it doesn't mean that we automatically have these things.

It's something that grows as we as we daily choose to follow Him, it grows in us.

Do we truly want to be people who seek after Him?

But I want to finish with this question.

Maybe this is somewhere one that we all need to hear in one way or another.

Is that do we truly truly believe that we can be people who seek after God's own heart, even in spite of our sins and failures?

Do we truly believe that we can be people who seek God's heart in spite of our past sins and failures?

God doesn't operate like the world.

He's not trying to cancel us, he's not trying to shame us into oblivion.

If God's given us air in our lungs, that means he is calling us to seek after him today.

Perhaps some of us are here, we've never truly received forgiveness from the start.

God is offering you forgiveness through Christ's death on the cross for you.

And you can receive that gift through faith and you can start seeking him today.

But for many of us who have we're here, we've truly placed our faith in Christ, but we're struggling to let go of shame that is holding us back from truly following him consistently.

God is calling you to follow him today.

Even if we have treated people poorly, we can have a heart for people today.

Even if we've neglected worship for a long time or ever, if we've ever worshiped God, we can bow down before Him today.

Even if our hearts have been filled with bitterness and anger for a long time, God can truly soften our hearts today and fill it with gratitude.

Let's pray.

Lord, we just uh we are so thankful for you.

We thought we're so thankful for your grace.

We're so thankful that you have a heart and a love for flawed people, Lord, because we're all there.

In one way or another.

We may not have sinned like David's, but we have sin and we have failures.

We're so incredibly grateful that you truly want to forgive us, that you have forgiven us.

And that we can seek after you no matter what those failures might be.

Lord, I pray that you would uh convince us of these things and help us to follow you today.

In Jesus' name, amen.