Heart Series: How to Be a Difficult Dad |1 Samuel 18:17–29

You're listening to the Bridgetown Church Podcast with

Pastor Casey Kendall, where our vision is Jesus, our mission is

people, and our cause is love. Thanks for tuning in.

Let's dive in. So First Samuel chapter 18, if

1 Samuel 18 · chapter mention

you have your Bible handy, we've been in a series entitled Heart

and this is for us, where man, the Bible says that man looks at

the outward appearance, but God looks at your heart.

And so Father's happy Father's Day to you.

If there's a dad sitting around you, you just welcome him.

Let's tell him happy Father's Day, Happy Father's Day.

Sergio, sell someone, happy Father's Day all around you.

Amen. First Samuel chapter 18 we've

1 Samuel 18 · chapter mention

entitled this message how to be a difficult dad how to be a

difficult dad. I, I don't think that takes a

lot of hard work, but being a good dad does take a lot of

focus, intentionality. And, but we wanted to send out,

I pray today my, my vision for today is that it would both be

encouraging and challenging, that it would encourage you as a

dad, but it will also challenge us as dads.

This is the long road of failing for me.

This has been the long lessons that I've needed to learn.

And now at 50 years old, I feel like I'm really starting to grow

that crazy. I really do believe I was

growing. But man, in the last five years

of my life, I've just seen God do some amazing things in my

heart. And I just want to talk to you

out of my own failures and link that to the life of Saul in

first Samuel chapter 18. And so if you have your Bible

1 Samuel 18 · chapter mention

handy, if you can turn to first Samuel again, chapter 18.

But I'm just going to look at verse 29, and then we're going

to rewind and go back all the way back to verse 17 and go

through the whole chapter together from there.

But First Samuel chapter 18, beginning in verse 29, the Bible

1 Samuel 18 · chapter mention

says, and Saul was still more afraid of David, and so Saul

became David's enemy continually.

I want to read that again. Stamped over Saul's life was

this verse in 29. And Saul was still more afraid

of David. And so Saul became David's enemy

continually. Lord, we pray and ask that today

would be, that it would be uplifting.

It would be us stretching forward to be more like Jesus.

That today would be for us a day where we get to celebrate

fathers. And Lord also, by your power and

your spirit, break chains in our lives that have held us back.

We do ask and pray that we would take up our responsibility, the

right that you've given to us, to lead and to serve and to grow

and to shepherd and to moving away in our lives to bring you

honor and glory. So Lord, we pray that you would

draw men and women to yourself and that through this time there

would be both the encouragement of your spirit and the

conviction of your Holy Spirit and the transformation of your

Spirit as we're brought back to the cross.

And so, Lord, we ask and pray that you would be glorified in

this place in Jesus name, Amen. If you have someone sitting next

to you as we always do, it's a tradition here.

If you would just look at them and say neighbor, my neighbor, I

see you. Yep.

Just tell them again, I see you, I see you.

Truth be told, there is a crime that is continually being

committed in our country. Every year it has diverted, it

has deceived and defrauded this important distinction of being

called one of the greatest names in my life, and that is that.

I don't know if you've ever found yourself there, but it's

on this Father's Day. I believe it gets cheated

compared to Mother's Day. Not half as money is spent on

Father's Day compared to Mother's Day.

In fact, Hallmark states that more money is spent on cards on

Saint Patrick's Day rather than on Father's Day.

I believe there is a crime that is being committed in our midst.

Even if you walk into the store today.

Father's Father's Day is always teamed up with graduate

recognition. We don't even get our own aisle

in the supermarket. I think that Father's Day has

actually been cheated. You can actually go get

breakfast or brunch or lunch right after church and you can

actually get into the restaurant.

Some of you, you weren't even going to a restaurant.

You're actually going to the BBQ that you bought with the food

that you bought, washing the dishes that you paid for with

the water that you worked so hard to bring to your family as

they sit and watch you labor over the smoker.

I think often times in our lives the significance of the role as

dad in fatherhood has lost its worth.

Can I tell you dads today we see you?

Can I tell you dads today that we are thankful for you?

Can I tell you dads today that we honor you today?

Can I tell you that we actually support you?

Because your example today has become our experience for

tomorrow. The hard days and the long

nights that you have labored. We see you for the way that you

got up early and the way that you stayed somewhere late so

your kids could do something good.

We honor you for that. In which you have gotten up

every morning to drive hours just to lay your life down on

the line so we can live out our lives for Jesus.

We just want to say today that we are thankful for you, Dad,

that you come into this room and I do not want you to minimize

the power of your presence and the prominence of your position.

We actually see you and we're actually thankful for you.

Not with a golf clap, but with a resounding yes.

That dad, you mean more than you will ever know in this life.

And it doesn't matter if you're all your father was

irresponsible or ignorant or inconsistent or not involved.

You know today that you're going to be intentional, purposeful,

and powerful in all that Christ has called you to do, filled

with this Spirit and fulfilling the mission that God has set

you. I was talking to a younger man

in his 30s who had found himself with me over lunch, and he told

me these words. He said finally, my dad and my

grandfather are trying to get involved back in my life, but he

said it's too late. It's too late.

I already have my own kids. I'm already leading my own life,

he said. It's too late with a wounded

heart and broken trust. And this is what I want to

encourage you to do today, men, do what you can, where you can,

how you can, and with who you can.

I want to encourage you. John Tyson wrote a book called

The Intentional Father. He said these words.

Let's not be a generation of fathers who push the crisis off

to the next generation. Let's be fathers who release

blessing and not brokenness, favor and not curses.

Resolve in your spirit to do this with intentionality and

with focus. If there ever was a man in

Scripture that lost focus, it was the man that we will be

looking at today, King Saul. King Saul's life was lived in

convenience of his flesh rather than obedience to the Lord.

He actually forsook the word that God had given to him, and

in forsaking the word that God had given to him.

This was stamped over Saul's life for Samuel chapter 15 verse

22, when God told him to wipe out all the Amalekites.

This is what Saul's life was stamped with.

Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices,

as in obeying the voice of the Lord?

Behold, Samuel said, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to

heed than the fat of Rams. Saul became not just miserable

in His Majesty, but he became a very difficult dad to be around.

He became angry, he became abusive, he became absent and

antagonistic to the will of God. And I wonder today, as we've

come into this place, how many of you dads still use an alarm

clock, You still use your phone to wake you up in the morning.

Some of you've been getting up so early for so long that you

automatically get up at 5:00 AM. You know the first chirping of

the birds that that is your time to get up.

For others of us, we're still using our phone and that sound

in the morning rattles you from slumber and brings you out of

something that is comfortable into something that is

uncomfortable and that is waking up at that moment.

For some of you, you didn't even work out the night before, but

your body hurts just like you did.

For some of you, it is still hard for you to get out of bed.

I'm praying that this message is like an alarm clock.

Not a lullaby to push you to sleep this morning, but an alarm

clock to arouse our sleepy souls to be the men that Christ has

called us to be. And I want to give you some

warnings about Saul's life that we can not live out and be the

difficult dad that is in the house.

You see, we're called to build our homes, men not allowing our

family to walk around our presence like they're walking on

egg shells. And it's important that we

realize this because this is God's call over our life.

So how did Saul live? I want to give you some things

that we could do as dads to become very difficult.

How many of you want to be a difficult dad?

None of us. But how many of our testimonies

would become that? We have become that without even

seeing it ourselves. Can I give you something that

from the chapter here in Saul's life, if you take note, Saul

became #1 vacillating out of insecurity.

Vacillating out of insecurity. If we were to hit pause, rewind,

and go back in the tape of the life of David, we know that

David is just beat Goliath. We know that David walked into

the valley of Elah in the same valley where Saul should have

been fighting the giant. In walks a shepherd boy, not

even 20 years old, and he takes care of the giant in the name of

God and for the glory of God. He wasn't going for Goliath's

head. He was going for the glory of

God and thus he defeats Goliath with all the Philistines are

routed and pushed back towards their own land.

And now we find ourselves that now David comes to the palace

with Goliaths head in his hand, and Saul becomes very jealous of

Davids victories. And in this moment now he had

promised already that whoever defeats Goliath would get riches

from the king, and they would also get to marry Saul's

daughter. Now let's pick it up in verse

17. Then Saul said to David, These

were the words of Saul to David. Here is my older daughter Merab,

which means increase abundance. I will give her to you as a

wife. Only be valiant for me and fight

the Lord's battles. But notice this for Saul

thought, let my hand not be against him, but let the hand to

the Philistines be against them. And then the Bible says, so

David said to Saul, who am I and what is my life or my father's

family in Israel, that I should be son-in-law to the king?

But it happened at the time when Mehrab, Saul's daughter, should

have been given to David, that she was given to a drill, the

Mahala fight as a wife. And now Michael, Saul's

daughter, loved David, and they told Saul, and the thing pleased

him. So Saul said, I'll give her to

him, that she may be a snare to him, and that the hand of the

Philistines may be against him. Therefore Saul said to David a

second time, You shall be my son-in-law.

Today notice the vacillating aspect of Saul's life.

He promises to David one daughter, which is the eldest

daughter. He ends up giving Mareb to

another man. And then he gives Michael who is

names mean, who is like God to David.

And he says, well you're not my son-in-law now, but now you will

be my son-in-law. Now notice what happens.

Saul is not looking for a specific wedding date.

He's looking for David's death date.

The reason why we know that is the text is clear.

Saul thought, let not my hand be against him, but let the hand of

the Philistines be against him. Notice Saul wasn't seeking a

celebration, he was actually seeking a funeral.

You might say, where's that at? Verse 21?

I will give her to him, that she may be a snare to him and that

the hand of the Philistines may be against him.

No, no, notice if you would. Saul's vacillating from his own

insecurity. The word vacillating, if you're

taking note, means that Saul is torn between two opinions.

At one time he says you're going to be my son-in-law.

At another time he says that you will not.

But no, wait, wait now, verse 21.

You'll be my son-in-law. Today.

Saul has become, if you take note, indecisive because of his

own insecurity. Saul has become inconsistent

because of his own insecurity. And notice this, he now leads to

instability because of his own insecurity.

The vacillator will always be torn between 2 views and doesn't

keep their word and then he blames it on everybody else

around him. I was struck with this question

as I was studying. Someone wrote.

Did anyone else's dad make his bad mood everybody else's

problem? Can I read that question again?

Did anyone else's dad make his bad mood everybody else's

problem? And this is what someone

answered? Of course he did.

It was always about him, his feelings, his wants, his needs.

And you were punished if you didn't make him happy.

I feel the person wrote like we were all raised to be his cheer

section rather than his children.

That is a perfect time for you to answer the call to own your

own responsibility. Your attitude is your own

responsibility. Your own fear is your own

responsibility. Your own anger is your own

responsibility. Your own frustration is your own

responsibility. It is not dependent upon what

type of house you walk into or leave from.

What we have to understand as dads is that we come to a place

where we will own what God has called us to own and understand

that we cannot fulfill our role as a father in the name of Jesus

unless we own our own responsibilities by the power of

Jesus. DC Saul's response to David was

not because he beat Goliath. Saul's response to David was

because Saul disobeyed God. It was because Saul's way was

better than God's way, and thus he loses every way to make a

difference in the Kingdom, and he loses the opportunity to make

a difference in his family. The seesaw, if we were to take

note, cared more about his career then he did his calling

to his own family. He cared more about his own

career than he did in obeying the command of God to follow

after what the Lord had told him already through the prophet

Samuel. And then if there's anything

that we often get wrong, we live within an insecure place.

Thus, we make very poor decisions in our lives that now

impact everybody else else around me.

I remember listening to a message by a pastor in Fort

Lauderdale. It was this whole marriage

series, and I gathered together all his, at the time, his C DS.

I actually sat in my Acura Integra in my garage in

Victorville, and I put in the first CD, which was actually the

third CD, and that was my wife's responsibility in our marriage.

I took everything that she was supposed to do rather than

focusing on what God had called me to do in the moment.

And because of that, I didn't own my own responsibility.

And I left horrible cracks in my family, so much so that as a

pastor at a church doing the work of the ministry, my 15 year

old son would tell me these words.

You're winning the world, but you're losing me.

But I'm travelling, I'm speaking, I'm behind the pulpit,

I'm sharing God's word, I'm doing everything that I think is

good. And here I am doing all of that

at the expense of not reaching my first calling, which was my

wife and my children. And in that moment, I, my eyes

were open to see that I have a choice to make, and that was

this. That my worth would not be found

behind this pulpit. That everywhere I spoke next or

everything I did next meant how valuable I actually was.

No. My friend told me he said these

words, if your church plant doesn't really work out, he says

will you be OK selling paint? And I said absolutely not.

He said you need to start being OK with that because that is a

big flaw in your life. He said because all of your

identity is wrapped up in what you do rather than who God has

made you to be. And now I come and share this

painful reality with you so you don't have to walk down this

road filled with insecurity and vacillating and leading your

family down the wrong path because you just didn't show up.

I love what Mark Batterson writes in his book.

He said pride is a byproduct of insecurity, and the more

insecure a person is, the more monuments they need to build.

There is a fine line between thy Kingdom come and my Kingdom

come. If you cross the line, your

relationship with God is self-serving.

You are not serving God, you're actually using God.

You aren't building altars to God, you are building monuments

to yourself. Vacillating out of insecurity

always leads people to be consumed with themselves.

They always communicate only about themselves.

They carry themselves as a competer against other people

rather than a completer in the Kingdom of God.

So how does this manifest itself in being a difficult dad, in

vacillating an insecurity? I want to give you some things

that Saul was notice if you would, and maybe I might not be

speaking to any man in here, but maybe it hit someone at the top

of your heart. This is how it manifests itself

in insecurity and vacillating. You're bothered.

I mean you are bothered all the time.

You go to the store, you're bothered.

You go to the gym, you're bothered.

You're on the freeway, you're bothered.

You go now into your home, you're bothered.

You're bothered by the wife that you prayed for and the kids that

you asked God to provide for. You've become so bothered that

you are stewing inside everywhere you go because you

don't measure up. No one else will measure up

around you. This is the second way it

manifests itself. You begin to boil.

Now this is something that is not just bothered, but now

you're boiling on the inside. You're angry at your own

decisions and what you're doing, and you're projecting that

around people that are around you.

Your heat spills over onto people that you say you love and

you're boiling inside. You haven't even communicated

anything yet. But because you're so bothered,

now you're just boiling and it's simmering and your family's

like, Dad, you OK? Damn.

OK, Dad. Dad, you seem a little.

No, no, no, I'm not. Are you?

No, no, no. Listen, It goes from bothered to

boiling. Now notice this blaming.

If I didn't have that job, if I didn't have that boss, if I

didn't have that wife, if I didn't have those kids, if I had

a different car. You never own this.

Thus, you miss the opportunities to truly love people around you.

This is what I want to encourage you to do.

ACT according to God's way rather than reacting according

to your way. And in that moment, fathers, as

we own our own responsibility. I remember having to sit down

with my kids and ask them without any defense, have I done

anything as your father to offend you?

And I sat there and I listen to things that I didn't even see

about my own life that God needed to heal only if I was

willing to confess and repent of.

And so Saul comes to this place where he is living in

vacillating out of his own insecurity.

The second thing, warning, Dad, I want to give you as an alarm,

stop living out of secrecy, out of your own anxiety.

This is Saul's life. Look at verse 22.

And Saul commanded his servants communicate with David secretly.

OK, let's, let's do this secretly.

The the word secretly there means that it's covered and that

it's covert and that it's not out in public and say, look, the

king has delight in you and all his servants love you.

They're buttering David up. We would say now therefore

become the King's son-in-law. So Saul's servant spoke those

words in the hearing of David, and David said this Does it seem

to you a light thing to be a King's son-in-law?

Seen, I'm a poor and lightly esteemed man.

Don't you love David? His approach in verse 23?

Look at his approach in verse 18.

So David said to Saul, who am I and what is my life or my

father's family in Israel, that I should be son-in-law to the

king? Notice Davis''s humility and

notice Saul's anxiety. Look at the difference if you

would. And notice this in verse verse

24. And the servants of Saul told

him, saying in this manner, David spoke.

And then Saul said, Thus you shall say to David, the king

does not desire any dowry, but 100 foreskins of the

Philistines. Ouch.

That's really fighting a battle out of Saul's anxiety, he says.

Let's take it another step further in mutilation out of his

anxiety. Foreskins that I'm not even

We'll, we'll talk about that another time to take vengeance

on the King's enemies. But Saul thought to make David

fall by the hand of the Philistines.

Do you see, out of anxiety, many times people get full of

tactics, but not full of truth. So he wants not to elevate

David, but he wants to remove David.

So when his servants told David these words, it pleased, it

pleased David well to become the King's son-in-law.

Now the days had not expired. Therefore David arose and went

and his men and killed 200 men of the Philistines.

Saul asked for 100 foreskins. David says brought their

foreskins, 200 of them, and he gave them in full count to the

king, that he might become the King's son-in-law.

Then Saul gave him Michael, his daughter as a wife.

Notice this. Saul is living in secrecy.

He's living in this place of I'm going to do this in secret

behind David's back so I could actually ruin his heart and his

life. He is living what we would call

a double life. The scripture says that he did

this in secrecy. Now, double lives aren't just

for spies. A double life is you portray one

person in public as a father or as a person, but you live a

whole nother way in private. Nothing is worse to a family

unit than a leader of a family having the language of a life,

but not the proof of that life. Nothing is more damaging to our

children and to our wives in the homes that we get to lead.

Listen then, living out all of the language of Christ and

Christianity and following Him but not living the proof filled

life that when the rubber hits the road you choose to be

righteous. You see, You don't have to fear

being caught if we make decisions out of Christ like

character did. You see that doesn't start when

we have kids. It started when we were kids and

we claim to follow Jesus Christ. Well, I'll be this when I have

my own family. You ever say that I when I get

married, I will never when I have children, I'll never talk

to them like my dad did. I'll never put them on

discipline like my dad did. And now years have gone by and

you have your own children and you have found within your own

self traits that you picked up and that you live by that you

actually said you would never do.

Do you see what's happening? Character is formed on the

decisions that we make and I often believe this is true about

my own life and father's is this character just doesn't appear

like $1,000,000 in your checking account.

Character is daily investments that you've made because I think

sometimes as dads, we are seeking to withdraw something

that we've never invested. Now we want the time, but you

never gave the time before. Now we want the attention, but

you never gave the attention before.

Now we want after all of these years where we have gone in the

red in the checking account over and over again, now we want to

withdraw out of this family something that we've never

invested into that family. DC.

The motto of our life is that we will reap what we sow.

That does not mean that God can't redeem those things in

those years. But understand that now is the

time. And I think dads, if there ever

was a time to live with urgency, it's right now.

If there's ever a time that we live with some some some guts

for the glory of God, it is right now that we find ourselves

in a place where we're willing to make deposits now in our

children, in our wives and our friends and in our community.

And we will reap the benefit of that.

But I think a lot like Saul, this didn't start in First

Samuel 18, that this started way back in Saul's life.

He's called to be king. Samuel's on the hunt for him in

First Samuel chapter 10. And the Bible says this in verse

1 Samuel 10 · chapter mention

22. There he is hiding among the

baggage. And sometimes as men, we are

found hiding among the baggage, caught in our old ways, in our

old habits. And we continue to do and live

in this vicious cycle, in this dance where God deals with my

sin, but he also gives me the power to deal with my baggage.

And that is where we're often finding ourselves.

And I want you to hear what God said to Adam.

Where are you? Come out, I'm Naked.

And God says this. Even though you're naked and

ashamed, I will sacrifice and clothe you.

And this is what the Lord does, is He brings us from a double

life into a single focus. Listen, come out of the baggage,

filled with anxiety and secrecy. Come out of that baggage.

Listen, come out of the baggage. We can praise Jesus with our

lips on Sunday, and on Monday our mouth could be filled with

cussing. Come out of the baggage, confess

it is sin. Listen, you could cuss people

out on Monday and praise Jesus on Sunday.

That's not what God's called us to be.

We we can claim to be faithful, but we will not break off from a

secret romantic relationship. We continue to live a double

life where we might flirt while you're married and covenant to

somebody. Listen, we we want to guard what

our kids watch, but we're older and more mature, so we don't

guard what we watch. I think it's important that we

understand. We often think that we can

handle it. You can send illicit text

messages and still proclaim the powerful name of Jesus.

You can live a life that is double, but it always will lead

to a level of trouble in your life.

Double lives always come from double vision.

Double vision is I'm trying to live like King Saul for what I

want, but yet at the same time I'm hearing what God actually

wants. Listen, living a double life at

the very end, it doesn't look like James Bond.

It doesn't look like Mission Impossible, it doesn't look like

Jason Bourne. Living a double life, at the

very end it always looks like this.

Hearts are always broken, dreams are always shattered and

children are always ruined. And my trust is always cancelled

in the lives that I have torn apart.

So Saul, his whole motive was what he could gain, not the

glory of what God could do. And secrecy will always lead to

anxiety because you're always anxiously looking behind your

shoulder wondering who is going to find out.

Your example is somebody else's experience.

I was reading the story in Intentional Father, he writes.

Imagine a farmer walk down a Backcountry road and saw another

farmer repairing the fence. His young sons were helping him,

and he said these words. Why are you letting your sons

help you? The first farmer asked.

It's going to take five times as long.

You should do it yourself. Oh, but the farmer said, you've

made a mistake. You think I'm repairing a fence?

I'm not. I'm raising sons.

Your example is somebody else's experience and you could choose

to live in secrecy and anxiety, but it will always end in

destruction. Notice the last thing that

happens to King Saul. That how I could be a difficult

dad and that is this. Notice this the Bible says in

verse 28. Then Saul saw and knew that the

Lord was with David, and that Michael, Saul's daughter, loved

him. Notice what Saul realized is

that the Lord was with David, and somebody else loved David.

Notice jealousy, and Saul was still more afraid.

Notice this word of David. So Saul became David's enemy

continually. Then the Princess of the

Philistines went out to war. And so it was whenever they went

out that David behaved more wisely than all the servants of

Saul, so that his name became highly esteemed.

No, no, notice, Notice this. Saul lives now, if you're taking

note #3 he has so much fear now. Everybody becomes the enemy.

Everyone becomes the enemy. Everyone around Saul becomes the

enemy. The one who has helped saw saw,

saw was David. But now because of David's

victory with Goliath and his name becoming popular, he now

hates him. He becomes his enemy.

But look at what happened to David.

The Lord is with him, Michael loves him, and God esteemed him.

So notice Saul hates him. He's jealous of him.

He wants to get rid of him. Fear.

He's frightened by him, the enemy.

Now he fights with him. No, no, notice this.

He used all of his energy to engage David as an enemy rather

than surrendering himself to the Almighty God.

Can I just say this to us as men?

And I say this to myself, the most secure men are the most

surrendered men. And I'll tell you something that

I've had to learn over and over again, and that's this as a dad,

as a husband, less vigilant, more vibrant.

And what I mean by that is we are called to be protectors.

We are called to be leaders. We are called to run towards the

fight or whatever it might be. But listen, not everybody is

your enemy. Not everybody's out to get you.

How about in that moment that we stay aware, that we also stay

vibrant, that we're bringing life into the room?

My wife looked at me at dinner and she said, what?

What's what's wrong with you? I said I got to sit on this side

right here because I got to see who's coming through that door,

she said. But I'm here, she said, you're

more concerned with who's coming through the door rather than me

sitting at the table in front of you.

And I think many times in our lives, what we have faced, what

we go through, can lead us to a place where we have become more

vigilant than we have vibrant. And everybody becomes the enemy.

Not everybody's your enemy. Listen, moralism will tell us to

look at the behavior of David. Gospel transformation would tell

us to look through the life of David.

Because the life of David points me to another king.

There are three kings that are presented in the book of First

Samuel. The first king is King Saul.

The second king is King David. The third king is the son of

David, Jesus Christ. And notice what the Bible says

about David, that he behaved more wisely than all the

servants of Saul, so that his name became highly asteemed.

Does that sound familiar? That sounds like what Paul would

say of Jesus the King, that his name is above every other name,

that in his name every knee will bow and every tongue will

confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.

As a follower of Jesus Christ, I now look through David to the

Son of David, to one whose name is high above every other name,

and that is Jesus. And it is Jesus who allows me to

be the person that he's called me to be, redeemed by his blood,

saved by his grace, and empowered by his Spirit.

To live out, not just speak. To live out, to lay down my life

for people. We hope you enjoyed this message

and we'd love for you to join us in person every Sunday at 10:30

AM. For more information and

updates, visit wearebridgetown.com.

Thanks for tuning in and we'll see you next week.