KING DAVID (pt. 1)

1. Beware the Surface
Humans look at the outward, but God looks at the heart.

2. Power of the Pasture
Being faithful in the pasture is only half the story; the real change happens when God’s selection becomes reality.

3. Weight of the Oil
Do I feel the weight of the oil?”

We rely on the power of the Holy Spirit because we cannot do it without Him.

God doesn’t check our resumes; he knows our hearts.

"Lord, I’m in this pasture today. Train my heart and my hands for whatever You have next."

Transcript

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You're listening to the New Beginnings Church podcast from Delaware, Ohio. To learn more about New Beginnings Church, visit us online at DelawareNewBeginnings.com. Today's message is from Pastor David Horse.

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King David, the shepherd who would become a king. Didn't happen overnight, and that's what we're going to be talking about for the first few weeks, and then we'll talk about a few things that happened while he was king. But over the next six weeks, we're going to look at key moments in David's life and discover how God uses both the mess and the faithfulness. In other words, we're going to witness some of the ways David was prepared and tested, as well as being faithful and unfaithful. But here's what we hope that you get over these next six weeks is that God didn't check David's resume. God didn't look at his past. He didn't look at anything he had done. He knew his heart. And that's the same for us. God doesn't hold on to our past, he looks at our hearts. This is why the Psalms are so beautiful when you know the story of David, like we read in Psalm 139, that God knows him intimately. God knows you intimately as well. Our hope is that David's story teaches and inspires us that it isn't about our past. It's not about the resume, it's not about what we did, but what our hearts and where our hearts are, that God knows our hearts, and it is our hearts that every day God wants to make new. I love an underdog story. Anybody else? Underdog movies and stories and whatever, those those are the ones that get the best ratings because everybody likes an underdog story. How many of you have heard of Andrew Carnegie? Couple? How about Dolly Parton? Just about everybody, right? Well, Andrew Carnegie, uh he immigrated at 12 years old from Scotland in 1848. At 12. At 13, guess what he was doing? Working full-time in a cotton factory to help his parents make money. Would that be allowed today? No. But he did what he had to do. They did what they had to do in order to survive. And he guess how much he was paid?$1.20 a week.$1.20 a week. By 1892, so 45 years later, he had a steel company that was outproducing all of Great Britain. How amazing is that? And by 1901, his worth was uh$450 million. And today's dollars that would be$15 billion. And by the end of his life, that$450 million he made, over 90% of that he gave away for schools and education. From nothing to pioneer. A lot of us know the story of Dolly Parton. Lived in Appalachia. One of 12 kids, dirt floor, didn't even have wood on the floor, just walls and a roof. One of 12 dirty, uh ripped clothes, whatever it would be. And we know what happened with Dolly. Dolly became an entertainer, a philanthropist, everything. Her worth today is over$500 million, and she has given away over$500 million of dollars throughout her career. Now I wonder what I would have thought if I was in Manhattan at that time, um, maybe not rich, but survivable, and I see this 12-year-old boy in her family getting off a boat from Scotland. I wonder what I would think of Carnegie's family. Or if I ran into Dolly and her family with dirty ripped clothes. I wonder if maybe I thought would think, can any good really come from somebody so poor? You ever thought that? It's okay. If you have or you haven't, I think it's crossed our mind going not in a bad way, but what good can come out of that situation? In one sense, that's kind of the beginning of David's story because here we have a shepherd, a young shepherd. He was about 15 years old, just a just a shepherd. But God didn't check David's resume, he didn't see what he had done in order to fulfill or become a king. He knew his heart. Not only would the shepherd become a king, but he's also the line of who? Jesus. This is the line of Jesus. So let's set this up a little bit. Um, children of Israel, God, they had a theocracy, which means God was the king, they had no manly king. You know, God was everything like he should be. Well, children of Israel were sick of it and they wanted a monarchy. They wanted a human ruler. And here's what God said in 1 Samuel 8. I just want you to hear the words that he says here. He says, Do everything, because they asked Samuel, go ask God. Let us have a king. And he said, Do everything they say to you, for they are rejecting me, not you. They don't want me to be their king any longer. Ever since I brought them from Egypt, they have continually abandoned me and followed other gods. And now they are giving you the same treatment. Do as they ask, but solemnly warn them about the way a king will reign over them. And basically, what he's saying is uh warn them that a human king is not gonna be as just, as righteous, as merciful, as smart, as as wise as me. That's what God was saying. Just a warning. Tell them be careful. Or as Dad you say, watch what you ask for. Watch what you ask for, because it's gonna bite you. And so that's what happens. And we're not gonna talk a lot about Saul, but Saul became the first king. Uh, he was this tall, strong, he looked everything, he looked the role. He's everything that you would want in a king, and he started out really well, but then he started to fade. His decisions began to disobey God, even in the smallest of ways, and he began doing things his own way. He began to choose himself the way he wanted to rule over the way that God had called him to rule. And so we have Samuel, who was both a prophet and a judge. Since they were going into becoming a monarchy, uh, he was no longer going to be a prophet, but become this judge of Israel, because now you got to have a court, right? Uh, and God tells Samuel that he needs to go and talk to Saul. God actually says, I regret making Saul a king. And so he tells Samuel to go and tell Saul that he has been rejected as king, and that a new one has been chosen who will eventually lead Israel. And so that's where we get to today. Samuel is mourning this because he loves Saul, he loves God. I I can just imagine on how torn Samuel is, just hoping and praying this was all gonna happen. But God warned him. This is what happens when you put man in charge, when you allow men to make decisions when they're not depending and following God. So let's read the first seven verses of 1 Samuel 16. Now the Lord said to Samuel, You have mourned long enough for Saul. I have rejected him as king of Israel. Now I want you to hear this. God doesn't reject him as a person, he rejects him as king. Later on in David's story, and and even a little bit in today, we're going to start to understand that Saul takes it pretty personally. I think like a lot of us would. But he says, I've I have rejected him as king of Israel, so fill your flask with olive oil and go to Bethlehem. Find a man named Jesse who lives there, for I have selected one of his sons to be my king. Notice he doesn't name who it is, just one of his sons. But Samuel asked, How can I do that? If Saul hears about it, he will kill me. There's our first hint that Saul's taken this pretty personally. Take a heifer with you, the Lord replied, and say that you have come to make a sacrifice to the Lord. Invite Jesse to the sacrifice, and I will show you which of his sons to anoint for me. So Samuel did as the Lord instructed. When he arrived at Bethlehem, this this is kind of funny, really, when you think about it. When he arrived at Bethlehem, the elders of the town came trembling to meet him, because who is Samuel? Prophet and judge. Usually they come with not always good news. And so they say, What's wrong? It always reminds me when dad comes home. Mom's like, wait till dad gets home. She's probably laughing right now at home, listening to this. What's wrong? They asked. Do you come in peace? Yes, said Samuel. And they probably went, Oh, good. Yes, I have come to sacrifice to the Lord. Now purify yourselves, which means go get cleaned up. Purify yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice. Then Samuel performed a purification right for Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice too. When they arrived, Samuel took one look at Eliab and thought, Surely this is the Lord's anointed. But the Lord said to Samuel, Don't judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. Not him as a person, rejected him as king. The Lord doesn't see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the, you say, Heart. All right, let's let's talk about this a second. Beware of the surface. That's our first point. Beware of the surface. Beware of the surface level of people. Don't judge a book by its cover. Right? Don't judge a book by its cover. I've I've looked at books, saw the cover, read the backbone. Oh, this is gonna be good. And by the second chapter, it was in the bin. Amen. Don't ever judge a book by its cover. We don't judge people. So we have Samuel, this great prophet, this great prophet of God, and he is wowed by Eliab. Eliab is it has the height, Eliab has the appearance. It's what we call the Saul model. All right, don't we fall for that? We want things to appeal to us. We think people should have a special look or a special demeanor for them to be successful. If you're gonna be successful in this place, I mean all you gotta do is look at the reality series and see this. Even the voice competitions, they don't just judge by the voice. At one time or another, they go by the looks too. They want the charisma, they want everything. And we do that. Think of it with athletes. Um athletes want them with certain height and a certain build with certain speed because they want the best of the best. They want this perfect model. In fact, churches have fallen into this temptation. Everybody wants a 26-year-old pastor with 40 years' experience and five kids that are perfect. And y'all got me. Don't we fall into that, Lord? Help me not lose my voice. Uh, don't we all just fall into that in some way or another that we want this perfect model, that we had this perfect idea that this is the only way that it can be successful in one way or another? This is what they do, this is consumerism, this is what they do to us with sales. Appearance is everything. I mean, this is just a a clothing store. If that was messy, would you shop there? I would say most of us know. When I worked in um retail, when I when I was a teenager and I worked in the grocery store, that was the one thing the manager always presses, it's got to look good. And we never had uh you guys, some of you will know what I'm talking about, the white cans, the white label with the black words that just said beans. Those never sold. But the big name with all the picture of the beans sold all the time, it didn't matter that it was 20 cents more expensive, because they understood that appearance matters. That's why packaging looks so good. If you get something that's just in the plain box, you right away you kind of go, Oh, I hope this is okay. But then you get the big name boxes, and you're like, oh, they put money into their packaging. But what we know is that on the inside it's not always that good. They may we tend to make appearance be more glamorous than what's on the inside. It's imperative that we stop disqualifying ourselves and other people because there isn't the look, or they don't have the status or the qualities that we think need to be successful because we think we know more than God. Sometimes we think that, hey, it's okay, God, you can take today off. I've I I've I've got this. I can make this decision on my own. And so back to the story. This is Samuel's like Eliot. Oh, yeah, that's this is it. God gently but firmly rebukes Samuel. He says, You're not see, you don't see things the way I see things. In fact, he says, you know, you humans look at the outward, but I, God, God looks at the heart. In our Wesleyan tradition, the heart is our central spiritual factor, if you will, of all of our will and all of our affections. Our heart is what drives our actions. I mean, think about it. If there's something that you're not really totally into, how much effort do you put into it? If any at all. But if there's something that really grabs a hold of you, and you're like, oh, I'm all in on this. Well, in our Wesleyan tradition, we want us, our hearts, all of us, to be all in in Jesus, because when it's all in and Jesus, Jesus then drives our actions. This is why we talk about inward transformation rather than just outward actions. It's both and Psalm 4, verse 23. Guard your hearts above all else. Why? For it determines the course of your life. Whatever you love, you're gonna hold on to and you're gonna do more than the things you don't love or don't love as much. If we if we can stop looking at the surface, like Samuel was looking at the surface of Eliab, then we need to start looking at where the real work happens. And that's in the places that no one else sees. And this is what I call the power of the pasture. We're gonna talk about the power of the pasture here, but first let's read verses 8 through 12. Then Jesse told his son Abinadab to step forward. So this is the next son, and walk in front of Samuel. But Samuel said, This is not the one the Lord has chosen. Next, Jesse summoned Shemiah, but Samuel said, Neither is this the one the Lord has chosen. In the same way, all seven of Jesse's sons were presented to Samuel. But Samuel said to Jesse, The Lord has not chosen any of these. Imagine what's going on in Samuel's mind, because God said, Go there, go to Jesse, and there's a son. So then Samuel asked, Are these all the sons you have? Is this it? They're still the youngest, Jesse replied. But he's out in the fields watching the sheep and goats. Send for him at once, Samuel said. We will not sit down and eat. What a threat. Right, guys? We're not gonna sit down and eat until you get your homework done. We're not gonna sit down and eat until he arrives. So Jesse sent for him. He was dark and handsome with beautiful eyes. And the Lord said, This is the one. Anoint him. You can argue because the author added that he was dark and beautiful with beautiful eyes. You know, there was some good to that. But let's not let that deviate. That it was also about the heart. Because David wasn't even invited to the party. He was shepherding, he was doing the everyday, he was doing the dirty work, he was keeping all the danger away from the flock, from from everything that needed to be done with the family. Friends, the pasture is where our preparation happens. It's in life, is where our preparation happens. This is the power of the pasture. The pasture wasn't a punishment because David was younger. It wasn't awful because David was the youngest son. It was David's training ground for what was to come. And we're going to hear about that more, especially next week with Goliath and in some other ways. But so many times we feel that our waiting or that someone saying no is punishment. And sometimes we take it so personally that we want to leave the pasture. Because we think that we know enough or we're ready enough. There was a time when I was I wasn't in ministry yet. I was still full time. This was five years after I heard the call of the min, call into ministry, and there was this position I prayed about, and I thought that I I thought I was perfect for. All of our life is a ministry opportunity by God. It's placed in front of us and it's preparing us for what's next to come. 1 Samuel 16, verse 13, the last one. So as David stood there among his brothers, Samuel took the flask of olive oil he had brought and anointed David with the oil. And the spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon David from that day on. What happens when the oil hits David's head? Does that remind you of anything? When we believe in Jesus, what are we promised? I want us to just to notice the order here. God chose the heart, and then he empowered the person. God chose the heart. And then he empowered the person. What was David's role? Obedience. Now, as Wesleyan's again, we emphasize that God's call comes with God's enablement. He doesn't always call the qualified, but God, through his spirit, always qualifies the called. He doesn't just give David the title. He's not King David right away. But what does he give him? His spirit. David doesn't even become king for 15 more years. He's about 30 years old when David finally got the reins, if you will, of the kingdom. Friends, we bear the weight of the oil too. We do. We bear the weight of the oil through Jesus. Jesus said in John 14, he says, I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate who will never leave you. He is the Holy Spirit who leads you into all truth. That's the weight of the oil. That's the weight of God's Spirit. Peter preaches about this on that day of Pentecost in Acts chapter 2, verse 38. He says, Each of you must repent of your sins and turn to God and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. Then you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus has chosen. Jesus has chosen the whole world to be saved. And it is up to us to say yes, to be obedient to that. Jesus chooses all hearts. But we must be obedient and repent. When you are called to a task, whether that's serving in the church, serving in a small group, serving out in the community, or even living life, trying to figure out how to forgive that family member that hurt you so bad, or that friend that hurt you so bad, or that neighbor that keeps messing with your yard. Don't ask, do I have the strength? Don't ask, do I have the gifts? Because last I checked when we received the Holy Spirit, we receive all kinds of gifts. We like to disqualify ourselves right away, sometimes as an excuse to escape it. Instead, we must ask, am I standing under the oil? Am I feeling the weight of the Spirit of God on my heart so much that I can't help but do what Jesus does and did? Am I feeling the weight of grace so much that my heart can't help but be changed? We rely on the power of the Holy Spirit because I don't know about you, I can't do it without Him. We rely on the Holy Spirit because we can't do it without him. God doesn't check our resumes, he knows our hearts. God doesn't check your past, he already knows it, but he also knows your heart. Take a moment, imagine how David's brothers felt, maybe a little overlooked. Some of us, maybe in our lives, have felt like we've been passed over. Others, maybe we have felt that we have been stuck in this same pasture for years. The king of kings and lord of lords, who is also a shepherd, the world overlooked him too. And for 30 years, he was in the pasture waiting to do his ministry, his earthly ministry for three years, being prepared. And this shepherd died for you, and he defeated sin and death for you. And this shepherd loves you. Jesus isn't impressed with your resume, he wants your heart. And be covenantally connected and connected to him for the rest of your life through all eternity. This is this is what we're gonna see in David's life, even in the mess. David just wanted a relationship with God. He's a man after God's own heart. So I want you to take a moment on the back of your bulletin if you have one, but there's something where we have the weekly study if you use it, but at the end there's always a daily question, and this is on there. Um, but I want you to just take a moment right now. I want you to think about, or if you have a pen you want to write it down, uh you can do that too. One area of your life that just feels so small, one area of your life that just seems so unseen, one area of your life where you feel like you're just in the pasture waiting for God to tell you what to do. And this week I want you to pray this 10-second prayer every morning. Oh, it's on the screen. It says this it says, Lord, I'm in this pasture today. Train my heart and my hands for whatever you have next. That's it. You can add it into your prayers or just take some time. You know, maybe, maybe you're you're you're in a point in your life and you're like, God, I don't know what to do. I don't feel like I'm growing. I don't feel like anybody notices me. Lord, I'm in this pasture today. Or I'm still in this pasture. Train my heart, change my heart and my hands for whatever you have next. Friends, let's trust that the same God who knew David, who knew his heart, who found David in the pasture knows you, and he knows the pasture you're in, and he is preparing you for whatever's next in this world and the next.

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Thanks for listening to the New Beginnings Church podcast. For all our messages, sermon notes, and the latest updates, visit Delaware New Beginnings.com. We'll see you next week.