Intro to 1 Samuel - The Christ

He is the offspring of Eve. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and David, destroys Satan, is full of the spirit, blesses the nations, and sets captives free from their sins by suffering for them, and eternally reigns over the entire universe in peace and justice.

The following message was recorded at King's Tree Church. May the spirit use it to help you see, savor, and sing the beauty of God in the crucified and risen Jesus Christ.

And a little word of warning. I would not follow along with all the passages we're gonna hit this morning. We'll be going through many, many, many, but you have those on your notes. I would write them down, however, and remember them because they are they are key to what we're understanding, and they're very valuable. So if you try to flip there, you'll be flipping.

I'll be reading it, and then I'll be done explaining it, and you'll be reading it, and then we'll be on to the next one. It won't work out too well. So just feel free to relax and listen. Now we're gonna start a new series. I'm gonna start a new series this morning, a new book of the bible.

It'll be unlike anything we've done in Kingstree Kingstree before, not because it'll be heretical, but because I'll be preaching from a book of a different genre than we have studied before. The book that we're gonna look at for the next who knows how long is a narrative. It's a story. So pastor Christopher has preached through Isaiah as a prophetic genre. Of course, there's certain ways of interpreting and processing the message of a prophetic genre, and we did that.

And then we've gone through first Peter and Colossians and first Corinthians. We're going through first John. These are all epistles. They are letters written for specific purpose and occasion with specific teachings in mind, and there's ways to preach through those. That's a genre.

And then we've even done revelation, the apocalyptic genre, apocalyptic literature. Pastor Christopher has preached through that, and, course, it has its own unique way of being taught and interpreted. But as I said, this morning will begin will introduce the beginning of first and second Samuel. Those are the books we'll be in, and they are indeed a story or a narrative. Now don't be mistaken, just because it is a story does not mean the author is failing to teach.

The author of Samuel has curated and compiled accounts, which he includes specifically in the book that leads his readers to a certain direction, to teach something. The author will emphasize certain people, certain events, certain prayers, works of God, all these things to draw our attention specifically to something God is doing throughout the book. Like all good stories, Samuel has a message. And by comparison and contrast, irony, mystery, emotions, surprise, and other literary features, the author subtly directs his audience towards the message, which is that God will establish his Christ as king. Now don't misunderstand me.

When I say story, I'm not saying fairy tale or something that's fake. This is true. This is a historic book. Everything we're going to read in this book is absolutely true. It is an accurate history, historical account of the rise of Israel's kingship in the Davidic dynasty.

It's just as real as the American war for independence. But though the book is historical, it is not a history book. A history book simply exists to record history. And though Samuel does accurately record history, as I said, it is written with a purpose, with purposeful teachings in mind about God's sovereign kingship over everything and teachings about God establishing his Christ in the Davidic dynasty. The Holy Spirit has orchestrated not only the historic events that take place in the book, but also the author's own writing out of these events, and it's for our teaching, our instruction, and our hope.

So how are we going to get the most out of first and second Samuel? What are some things that we can be looking for or aspects that we can notice? One thing to keep in mind is something Paul tells us in first Corinthians 10 and Romans 14. He says in both those places that the Old Testament is written for our instruction, and Paul will take various examples. In fact, he uses the word example specifically from the Old Testament and apply them to us today.

So no doubt there is history. No doubt there is one main point of the books of first and second Samuel, but there's also many smaller lessons instructions to be learned. We don't want to lose sight of the trees by looking at the entire forest. And so this good instruction is in the book, what is wise and what is foolish, what is good, what is evil, what God loves, what he hates, what we should strive for, what we should avoid. We'll see all those things in Samuel, and sometimes our sermons are just going to deal with this kind of wholesome and common instruction which takes place in the book.

But also something even more important to remember about the book of Samuel is that it is the words of God written through man, written through man, but infallibly breathed out by God. And being so, the main point of Samuel is the main point of the rest of the scripture, and that is Jesus Christ. In fact, Samuel plays a crucial role in the gospel of Jesus Christ such that there would be no confessing that Jesus is the Christ if the book of Samuel were cut out of the bible. The the statement that is the bedrock of our salvation, Jesus is Christ, you couldn't say it if it weren't for first and second Samuel. How can I make that claim?

Well, we'll see that point as we progressively go through the book, but just to put it briefly, the book of Samuel is the first place in scripture we hear or see the word Christ or Messiah with reference to God's anointed one. It's where that's established, and as we'll see, it is a central focus throughout the entire book. So I want you to think of the category of Christ or the Christ as like a giant oak tree. And we've seen through a number of pastor Christopher's sermons in Revelation and in first John, we've seen Jesus as the Christ in the full blown maturity, the full blown growth of that oak tree. Jesus as the one who embodies the coming of Yahweh as king over all the universe at the end of the age.

We've seen that full and final revelation from God, which binds together and fulfills all the biblical categories associated with Christ. We're we're used to seeing that. We hear that quite a bit. But in Samuel, what we're going to see is the little sapling of that Christ oak tree. What we're going to see is even the planting of the acorn and the sprouting of the first little sapling of the Christ within the first two chapters of Samuel.

What Samuel does for us is it establishes the origin of Christ, and that's going to give us depth in a more robust meaning and more robust understanding behind that statement, which is the backbone of our very faith that Jesus is the Christ. Now understanding that Jesus is the Christ specifically from books of the Old Testament like Samuel is a remarkably important thing for the the Christian to know, remarkably important for our faith. In fact, this seemed to be the main objective of Jesus when he rose from the dead. Before ascending to heaven, he wanted to ensure that the early church understood from their scriptures that he was the Christ. He wanted to get this clear in the minds of those who would teach and write scripture before they started doing so.

It's the first message we see him preach upon his resurrection in the book of Luke. Luke twenty four twenty five, he's talking to some disciples on the road to Emmaus. And this is what Jesus says, Oh, foolish ones and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them all the scriptures, the things concerning himself.

He showed them how that was talking about him. Appearing to his disciples for the first time, he wants to make sure they understand the scripture before they go and write scripture. And this is what he says to them in the same chapter, verse 45. Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures and said to them, thus it is written that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all the nations. And once they got this, guess what the first message of the early church was?

The first message they ever preached at Pentecost, preached by Peter, he says this, Acts two twenty nine. Brothers, I may say to you with confidence about the patriarch David, who we'll be reading about, that he both died and was buried and his tomb is with us this day. Being therefore a prophet and knowing God had sworn with an oath to him that he would set one of his descendants on his throne, he foresaw and spoke of the resurrection of Christ. Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified. So the first message Jesus preaches upon his resurrection is the first message the church preaches at Pentecost and that is displaying that Jesus is the Christ according to the Old Testament.

Books like Samuel. And this goes on and on demonstrating a correct understanding of the Old Testament, namely that Jesus is the Christ. That's a main goal throughout the apostles' teaching. Let me give you some examples here. Acts three eighteen.

But what God foretold by the mouth of all the prophets that his Christ would suffer, he thus fulfilled. Repent therefore and turn back that your sins may be blotted out, that he may send the Christ appointed for you. Jesus. Acts five four. And every day in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching that the Christ is Jesus.

Acts nine twenty two. And Paul went as was his custom, and on three Sabbath days, he reasoned with them from scriptures explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and raise from the dead saying, this Jesus whom I proclaim to you is the Christ. Acts eighteen twenty nine. This is talking about Apollos' ministry. It says he powerfully refuted the Jews in public showing by the scriptures that the Christ was Jesus.

Acts twenty six twenty two, when Paul is before King Agrippa, he's making his defense. He says this, I stand here testifying both to small and great saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said would come to pass, that the Christ must suffer and that being the first to raise from the dead, he would proclaim light to both our people and the Gentiles. Many examples of this. What does John say at the end of the book of John in twenty thirty one? But these things are written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God, and that by believing you may have eternal life in his name.

You see that then over and over preached by Jesus, preached by the apostles in the early church, we see this message that points to the old testament and says, the Christ is Jesus. Now I give you those references to to convince you and to elevate also your your intrigue and hopefully to spark your interest about this. Hopefully, this has helped you to see just how central it is to know from the scripture that Jesus is the Christ. But notice something was kind of missing here. All those references, there's no actual definition for the word Christ, was there?

It was just assumed that the audience would know what Paul was saying. Paul worked to prove that Jesus was the Christ, but he didn't have to do any work to tell people what Christ meant. That's because the ones he was teaching and preaching to were already familiar with Christ from their old testament. They knew it very well. Maybe we're not as familiar, however, of what they were thinking and where Paul was teaching from.

Maybe some of you were thinking, okay, we we get that this scripture testifies that Jesus is the Christ. We get that that was central to the apostles teaching, but we still haven't heard what Christ means yet, at least not in this sermon. So just what do we declare when we say that Jesus is the Christ? This is what we're going to do this morning. It'll give away spoiler in Samuel, but it's also going to help to equip us to see the essential theme throughout Samuel that the Lord upholds is Christ.

I want you to picture a box in your head, and that box is labeled Christ. Now what the word Christ means is going to be determined by what is inside that box. We've been going through Revelation and first John, so we already have that box somewhat filled. We open up the box Christ and we know, well, Jesus is in there. Jesus is the Christ.

We also see in there, there Jesus is the the Christ is the royal son, the eschatological presence of God himself, this one who has conquered through being slain for his peoples. We know that. We need to know those things for salvation, but there's still plenty of room in that box. And so what I want to do here this morning is we're going to put a few more categories in there to help fill out our definition of what the bible means when it says Christ. What we're going to do then is going to give you a nice clean chain of textual connections through scripture, all of which help us understand this category, Christ.

By the end of the sermon, my goal is that we'd all have the the same box. We have the same things inside. We'd have a a more mature, thorough understanding of what Christ means, and we'd be ready to enter into Samuel and see how the idea of Christ uniquely unfolds, matures, and develops there. So to begin, got our box and the first thing we want to put in there is anointed. It may already be in there for some of you, but put the word anointed in there.

That's what Christ means. Christ means someone who has been anointed. Anointed for special service, usually anointed as king. Of the word christening. When a king becomes a king, is christened.

Well, the word Christ is right there. And right next to anointed, put the word messiah because messiah, anointed, and Christ, they're all the same word. Messiah is the Hebrew and Christ is the Greek. So we've got anointed. We got Messiah in there.

That's good. There's still plenty more room. What we're going to do now then is jump back to a verse we talked about earlier from Acts three eighteen. This reveals some key textual links for understanding what the Bible means by Christ. And I read it for you.

But what God foretold by the mouth of all the prophets that his Christ would suffer, he thus fulfilled. Repent therefore and turn back that your sins may be blotted out, that he may send the Christ appointed for you, Jesus. I'll pick up in '24. And all the prophets who have spoken from Samuel, that's our guy, and those who came after him also proclaim these days. You are the sons of the prophets and the covenant that God made with your father saying to Abraham, and in your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed.

God having raised up his servant sent him to you first to bless you by turning every one of you from his wickedness. Mark this passage in your bible, underline it because this is like a decoder ring for the Old Testament. Because here we see that the Old Testament categories of Christ, offspring of Abraham, and servant are all speaking of the same person. They're all speaking of Jesus. What is true of the offspring is true of Christ.

What is true of the servant of the Lord is true of Christ, and of course, the Christ is Jesus. This means that the offspring of Abraham who's going to bless the families of the earth is Jesus. It means that the servant who God raised up is Jesus. So now in our box labeled Christ, we now have offspring and we have servant put in there. A servant of the Lord, specifically the prophet's use of that term.

Now it's always good to check your work. It's quick and easy to do with one of these. If I think about Galatians three sixteen, I'm gonna read it says, now the prophets now the promise were the promises were made to Abraham and his offspring. It does not say offsprings, referring to many, but referring to one and to your offspring who is Christ. Right?

So that double confirms that we have this Old Testament term offspring in our Christ box, doesn't it? But this is where the fun begins. Because as soon as you say offspring and servant belong in that Christ box, you're now set off on a Bible wide Easter egg hunt, looking for other times these terms are referenced. Every time we see them, we can grab them in their context and put them in our Christ box. And again, that helps to fulfill our understanding of what the Bible means from the Old Testament when it says the word Christ.

So we're going to do that just in brief this morning. Let's start with offspring. If I go through the bible looking for offspring referring to Christ, the first place I'm gonna see that is early in Genesis. Genesis three fifteen. Now the context here is that man has sinned against God.

We've rebelled against God. We're by the serpent. A serpent has convinced us to rebel against God and to all of mankind to commit suicide through sin. This would be a completely hopeless situation, but for the words of God spoken to the serpent. This is what God says.

I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring. He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel. Here is the very first declaration of the Gospel of Christ. This offspring who will be a human born of Eve. We don't know he's going to be fully God yet.

Right now, we know he's going to be born of Eve. And he's going to bruise or crush the head of the serpent. Now we hear an echo, a a retelling of the same promise again to Abraham in Genesis twenty two eighteen when Abraham has just been tested, does he trust God enough to be willing to sacrifice his son Isaac? He is willing to. He does not have to.

And so as a blessing to him, God restates the same promise applying it to him. Listen to what the Lord says, and your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies and in your earth be blessed because you have obeyed my voice. This makes perfect sense to put these in our Christ box, doesn't it? Jesus certainly did crush the head of the serpent, Genesis three fifteen. Jesus certainly is a blessing to all the nations of the earth, both the Jew and the Gentile, delivering us from sin.

So we put both those in our box. That same promise given to Abraham is passed down to his son, Isaac. God says to Isaac, I will establish the oath that I swore to Abraham, your father. I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and will give to your offspring all these lands. And in your offspring, all the nations of the earth will be blessed.

And again, to his son, it is passed on the same promise now given to Jacob later on. And in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed. So we have a nice neat chain here starting in acts leading us back to Genesis three fifteen and forward in the book of Genesis through 26 or 22, 26, 28. We can go further into thirty five and forty nine, but we'll choose to pause there. So in our box then labeled Christ, which helps us know what the Bible means when it says Christ, we have added anointed, we've added messiah, we have servant of God in there, and we have offspring.

And alongside offspring came an entire range of promises associated with that title, crushing Satan's head, blessing to the nations inheriting the earth. Now let's keep working, but from the different angle here from Acts, let's follow the idea of this servant whom God raises up, who we also know is the Christ. As we follow these Easter eggs, it's gonna lead us to Isaiah very often. Isaiah fifty two thirteen is where I'll read from. Behold, my servant shall act wisely.

He shall be high and lifted up and shall be exalted. But later on in 53, speaking of the same servant, but he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities upon him was a chastisement that brought us peace with his wounds, we are healed. The servant, who is Christ raised up by God, will apparently suffer for his people's sins. There's another one here in Isaiah.

It says, behold my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom my soul delights. I have put my spirit on him. He will bring forth justice to the nations. He will not grow faint or be discouraged till he has established justice on earth. Alright.

There's some things to add to our box there. Along with servant that we know is already in there in our box, we have to add someone who suffers for the sins of his people to deliver them from sin, and we have to add someone who's given the holy spirit in an especially powerful measure through which he judges the earth and brings justice. And put those in there associated with servant. Now here's the thing. The more definitions we put in our box, the more Easter eggs we get to look for.

Since we have a clear textual connection from Christ to servant, from servant to spirit filled one, it'd be nice. We could maybe expect to see somewhere that it's prophesied that this person who is especially filled with the spirit is the Christ, the anointed one. That would be very confirming if we could find that. Indeed, we do. And Isaiah sixty one one says this, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.

He has sent me to the blind and brokenhearted to proclaim liberty to the captives. Right there, we've got another good connection. The servant prophesied to have the spirit of the Lord rest upon him is indeed the Christ, the anointed one. And in addition to blessing humanity, defeating Satan, taking sins of his people, he is going to set captives free. Now quickly, we are seeing the richness and the complexity of the word Christ here, aren't we?

He put all these connections together, and this is an extremely tall order to fill. Someone could do all these things. And that's all we've done is put these connections together. We've started from Acts three twenty four that led us to offspring. Offspring took us to someone who would bless the world and defeat Satan, and then we followed the servant path that led us to someone who suffers for sins and is anointed with the spirit in a special way such that he will bring justice and set captives free.

But stick with me here because there's a new batch of Easter eggs we're going to follow through the scripture stemming from this understanding of the Christ, the servant is one who is especially filled with the spirit. That is another old testament category that we can follow. We see that mentioned earlier in Isaiah eleven one through four and it says this, there shall come forth from a shoot from the stump of Jesse and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit And the spear of the Lord shall rest upon him and the spear of wisdom and the spear of counsel and might and the spear of knowledge and the fear of the Lord and his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see or decide with disputes by what his ears hear, but with righteousness, he shall judge the poor and decide with equity the meek of the earth. Alright.

What do we have here? Oh, we've got some terms we recognize, and we've got a couple that we we don't recognize. We clearly see this person anointed with the spirit of the Lord performing judging and ruling functions. Right? That's clear there.

Judging the poor, bring equity to the earth. This definitely lines up with what we heard in Isaiah 61. The spirit rests upon him and he brings good news to the poor. And it perfectly lines up with what we just heard in Isaiah 42. The servant of God has a spirit on him such that he can judge nations.

So we got a really strong connection here. We can box, but because the the Christ we know is the servant, the servant has the spirit and judges the nations, and right here, we see someone who has a spirit and judges the nations. But there's another title that goes in when we put this into our Christ box, isn't there a new title? It seems like this verse is calling the spirit filled Christ, the servant of God, calling him the stump of Jesse and the branch. What is that all about?

We have not heard that yet. Well, as you may or may not know, Jesse is the father of King David. And the idea of the shoot or the branch coming from Jesse, just like we talk about it today, it's talking about someone who comes from his family tree. So if we're making our connections right here, if we're following these verses correctly, it's telling us the Christ, the servant of God upon whom the spirit rests to bring justice to the nations, is not only the offspring of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, but also that he comes from the family tree of Jesse and of David, from the tribe of Judah. It sounds like this messiah as Christ is going to come from a royal line.

And so we're gonna then add that terminology of branch. We're gonna put the branch inside of our Christ box because it's so closely associated with what we've seen thus far. I wonder if we could find a branch somewhere in the scripture that would confirm what we've been saying this morning. Indeed, we do. Jeremiah twenty three five says this, Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will rise up for David, a righteous branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.

Now that really fills the bill, doesn't it? We see here the branch of David, who we know is the spirit filled servant fulfilling the same roles we've heard that Christ would be fulfilling. He's going to rule. He's going to reign. He's going to deal wisely, execute justice and righteousness.

If it was maybe hinted at before, it's certainly shouted now that the Christ is most definitely going to be a king. A king coming from David, a king who rules in justice, a king who is filled with the spirit, a king who is the offspring of Abraham and who blesses all the families of the earth, and yet a king who is a servant rejected by his people and who suffers for their sins. These are some of our findings, some titles, and some verses we've been able to add to our Christ box, again, simply by following the connections that have stemmed out from acts three back into the old testament. But let's add one more, maybe the most important. It's the spoiler from second Samuel, but we won't get there for a while.

Anyway, listen to what God promises to David about this branch, which God will raise up from David. It's a promise that applies to Solomon in the short term, but in the long term, this is speaking of Jesus Christ. Second Samuel seven twelve. God says this. He's speaking to David now.

I will raise up your offspring after you who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be to him a father. He shall be to me a son. Hear that?

I've got this person coming from David who will reign forever, who will be a king from David and who will be called the son of God. And now and this is the part that that gives me chills every time because it's so amazing. Listen how the angel Gabriel announces to Mary that at long last, the Christ is going to come through her. This is what Gabriel says. He will be called son of the most high, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever.

Of his kingdom, there will be no end. That's from the beginning of the book of Luke. It's exactly the same promise given to David restated to Mary just before she conceives the Lord by the Holy Spirit. Son of God sitting on the throne of David reigning forever. How amazing is that?

And so now our definition of Christ, this this box into which we've been placing various titles and verses connected to who Christ is, though by no means full, is hopefully more full than when the message began. I've only followed some of the main connections here and only those with overlapping linguistic references, but there are many, many more. But hopefully this helps you to get a good idea of what the bible means when it says that Jesus is the Christ leading up into the New Testament. He is the offspring of Eve, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and David who destroys Satan is full of the spirit, blesses the nations and sets captives free from their sins by suffering for them and eternally reigns over the entire universe in peace and justice. That's just coming from the text.

Knowing that men, having that huge picture in our mind, fit into all this. Remember when we start the story of Samuel, not all these prophecies have even been written yet. In fact, the idea of an anointed ruler over Israel, a Christ, that that idea isn't even there yet either. We do have the promises of the offspring given to Abraham. Those were in Genesis.

So we have those leading into Samuel. And though there have been maybe some hints that this offspring is going to be a royal figure, that's all they've been so far as hints. And we're gonna pick up our narrative with Israel, and they're in kind of a half baked position. It's been about four hundred and fifty years since they were delivered from Egypt. Moses brought them out of Egypt, took them to covenant with God at Mount Sinai.

God calls them his people, gives them good laws to live by, and they've done a really bad job of following those laws and and living for the Lord. In fact, the land that God gave them, that land filling with milk and honey, it's been about four hundred years, and they haven't even moved in yet. If you read Joshua and Judges, you're gonna see some early indicators that Israel gets off to a rocky start as God has taken them to the promised land. They're supposed to completely destroy the demonic hordes of Jebusites and Canaanites and others, but they didn't. In fact, they intermarried with them, which God said over and over again not to do.

And as a result, they've led themselves into idolatry on a societal scale. So as we begin our narrative of Samuel, we have Israel scattered and intermixed with the people of the land God gave to them. They're being taken advantage of by various tribes and various kings. There's no capital. There's no centralized authority for the people of Israel at this time.

There's no great unity. Israel has managed to get by for a couple hundred years with people called judges. They would deliver Israel from their enemies and try to lead them in the repentance, but that never lasted that long. And if you read the book of Judges, you'll find that these judges were not great people in the first place. So that system really wasn't working.

And if you do read Judges with a critical eye, you'll notice the refrain towards the end of the book. In those days, there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes. In fact, just for emphasis, that is the very last sentence in the book of Judges as you are led into Samuel. And you're thinking, well, sounds like Israel might need a king here.

And so as we move them into Samuel, we find Israel in an extremely weak position, politically and spiritually. We're wondering in our minds whether or not we're gonna see anything more of that offspring promised to Abraham back in Genesis. We haven't heard about that for a while. And we're pretty sure that Israel is going to need some kind of a king to unify them and to lead them back to God rather than doing what is right in their own eyes. So that sets the table.

That's what we're gonna be entering into next time when I start our series in first Samuel. Let me pray for us. Lord, we are astonished, amazed, grateful, humbled that all the history of all the world is about Jesus Christ, who's our who's our savior, who lives inside of us, who loves us, who attends to us daily, who we know, who knows us, that all of the Bible, but all of reality is for Christ. To declare Christ. It's a name we can declare.

It's a person we can know. We thank you for that. Lord, always deepen our knowledge of our love for our obedience to this Jesus Christ. We read about throughout all the scripture. Let us know you more, and we pray for your mercy on us because it's your mercy that's the foundation for anything anything we can do pleasing to you.

Thank you, God, that you are merciful. You've proven that so much on the cross and the resurrection. Lord, let us live in a way that pleases you. We pray in Jesus name. Amen.

Thank you for listening to this message from King's Tree Church in Sabina, Ohio. To see more of the beauty of God in the crucified and risen Jesus Christ, come worship with us on Sundays at 10AM or visit our website at kingstreechurch.org.