FOUNDATIONS FOR PEACE

December 20,21 – 2008
2 Samuel 7:8-16
4th Sunday in Advent
Pastor Don Sutton

2 Samuel 7:8-16
“Now then, tell my servant David, ‘This is what the LORD Almighty says: I took you from the pasture and from following the flock to be ruler over my people Israel. 9) I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have cut off all your enemies from before you. Now I will make your name great, like the names of the greatest men of the earth. 10) And I will provide a place for my people Israel and will plant them so that they can have a home of their own and no longer be disturbed. Wicked people will not oppress them anymore, as they did at the beginning 11) and have done ever since the time I appointed leaders over my people Israel. I will also give you rest from all your enemies. ” ‘The LORD declares to you that the LORD himself will establish a house for you: 12) When your days are over and you rest with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom. 13) He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. 14) I will be his father, and he will be my son. When he does wrong, I will punish him with the rod of men, with floggings inflicted by men. 15) But my love will never be taken away from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed from before you. 16) Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever.’ “

Introduction
A fairly substantial snowfall…Winds of 15 to 30 miles per hour with gusts up to 40 miles per hour. Temperatures dropping to the teens below zero … a blizzard watch and blizzard conditions.

You probably read or heard reports on these weather conditions. What was your reaction? Maybe, “Best place to be in weather like that is safe at home?” Today we think about being safe at home. Based on 2 Samuel 7:8-16 we focus on being “SAFE IN THE HOUSE OF DAVID.” As we do we will focus on 1) in an everlasting kingdom and 2) with an everlasting king.

1. In an Everlasting Kingdom
As God spoke to his servant David, David literally was settled safely in his new house. King David has moved into his new palace in the new capitol of his kingdom. Hiram, king of Tyre, had helped him build the palace providing cedar logs, carpenters and stonemasons. You can bet the palace was nice with the beautiful masonry as well as the look and smell of cedar.

Not only was David’s new home nice, but the conditions in David’s kingdom were peaceful. God’s Word tells us, “After the king was settled in his palace and the Lord had given him rest from all his enemies around him ….” It’s interesting that prior to this time David seemed to be in constant turmoil fighting wars against his nation’s enemies, watching out for the threats of king Saul who at times wanted to kill David, and even running and hiding from the king like a hunted wild animal.

David recognized God’s wonderful blessing and wanted to bless God in return. He said to the prophet Nathan, “’Here I am, living in a palace of cedar, while the ark of God remains in a tent.’ Nathan replied to the king, ‘Whatever you have in mind, do it, for the Lord is with you.” David must have thought, “Great. I’m going to build the best house I can for the Lord. What a blessing for me and for God!”

What a lesson there is for us in this! God is blesses us with so much, in so many ways, and so faithfully. Are any of us hungry this morning? If so, it’s not because of the lack of food but rather the neglect of breakfast? Were any of us out in the cold last night? Did any of us have a problem finding warm clothes to wear today? Maybe we had to dig to the back of the closet or the drawer for the wools stuff or the “longies,” but we have clothes. Then think of the faith we have, the forgiveness we enjoy, the eternal life that’s ours, the presence of God and his power put to work in our behalf. We are blessed! But do we seek to bless God back, living for him, worshipping him and supporting the ministry of the gospel? David serves as a wonderful example of blessing God in response to his blessing us.

God’s response to David was “NO!” Why? God didn’t want a temple built at that time. While God fills the whole universe, he adequately made his presence known with the tent-like tabernacle the Jews had used for over 400 years. God said that if he had wanted the temple built, he would have said so. Besides, as 1 Chronicles 28 reveals, when God would decide to have a temple built, he would have someone other than a warrior like David to build the temple. So David wanted God to bless David with the privilege of building God a temple, but that was not the Lord’s plan. God had another blessing for David.

It’s interesting, isn’t it, how we may have plans, but our plans are not God’s plans? So God displaces our plans and replaces them with his. But that’s what we pray for when we pray, “Your will be done.”

While God didn’t will that David build a temple, God planned to bless David in other ways – “Now then, tell my servant David, ‘This is what the Lord Almighty says: I took you from the pasture and from following the flock to be ruler over my people Israel. I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have cut off all your enemies from behind you. Now I will make your name great, like the names of the greatest men on the earth. And I will provide a place for my people Israel and plant them so that they can have a home of their own and no longer be disturbed. Wicked people will not oppress them anymore, as they did at the beginning and have done ever since the time I appointed leaders over my people Israel. I will give you rest from all your enemies (v.8-11).’”

God told David that he would make David’s name great. God did. How many people are known, remembered, and renowned 3000 years later? David is. God gave him such a name. But God also would give him a “house,” a kingdom. This would be a place where David would experience peace and a place where his people would have prosperity and safety – a physical kingdom, a kind of physical house.

But this would symbolize a greater house, a greater kingdom that God was establishing for David – an everlasting kingdom. God told David – “Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever.”

This is a kingdom in which you and I and every true believer lives and dwells in this kingdom. This is a kingdom where her citizens are not immune to sickness or invulnerable to hardship. Citizens of this kingdom struggle to stretch paychecks to cover expenses. They struggle with the influence of sin that infiltrates their lives through the media and society that gets a buy-in from their sinful nature. People physically die and before that, they often physically digress in this kingdom.

Yet, this is a kingdom, this house of David, where we are safe – safe with the love and peace of God in us, the power of God at work for us, and the protection of God over us. In this house we are safe from the curse of sin we deserve. While the devil may tempt us, he cannot snatch us out of God’s hand because God holds us safe in his powerful hands. This is a house, a kingdom that is everlasting.

An ancient history scholar observed that here were 74 distinct ancient civilizations and the average life of each civilization was 349 years. The longest was the Aksumite Empire of Ethopia that lasted 1100 years followed by the Vedic period of India that lasted a thousand years. Only the house of David is eternal. And that means that we all have an eternal future – life that is everlasting. This is not everlasting hum-drum, everlasting hardship or everlasting hope that tomorrow will be better. This is everlasting happiness and everlasting joy and everlasting peace. This is because in this kingdom with an everlasting king.

2. With an Everlasting King
Nathan the prophet announced to David a blessing that God had stored in his bag of best blessings. “The Lord declares to you that the Lord himself will establish a house for you: When your days are over and you rest with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be his father, and he will be my son. When he does wrong, I will punish him with the rod of men. But my love will never be taken away from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed before you. Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever.’”(v.11-16)

This promise of blessing has an intermediate or partial fulfillment, and an ultimate fulfillment. The intermediate fulfillment is that David’s son Solomon would succeed him as king. He would rule over a kingdom with fame that spread through the world. Solomon would build a magnificent temple for God. When Solomon sinned, marrying pagan wives and worshipping pagan gods, God would punish Solomon allowing his kingdom to split. Yet, through Solomon David’s dynasty would continue for a long time in Judah, the southern part of Israel. Even though God chastised his people, God would not forsake them.

This was a blessing that God thought best for David.

But there was an ultimate fulfillment for David. This would come in David’s descendent Jesus. As to his divine nature Jesus is the son of God; as to his human nature, of the house and line of David. He would build a house for God’s name, not a temple like that which Solomon built, but a human temple – the temple of all true believers. God’s Son, Jesus, never did wrong. He had no sin of his own. But he had plenty of sin to take care of – our sin with which we were born and that of which we are guilty every day – doubt concerning God’s love and faithfulness, complaints about God’s timing or his allowance of trouble in our lives, our wanting to take God’s place and be able to bless and be blessed as we want. Jesus had no sin of his own but he took ours and that of all people. As Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2Cor.5:21).” Jesus even fulfilled the statement, “When he does wrong, I will punish him, with floggings inflicted with men (v.15).” God punished Jesus with more than the floggings of men. He punished him with separation from God and death that we deserved. But God never withdrew his love, but rather raised Jesus from the dead. So Jesus has established the throne and kingdom of David as he has removed the curse of sin, overcome death and devil, and now lives and rules eternally.

Isaiah prophesied, “Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom … forever (9:7).” The angel Gabriel told Mary that the son to be born to her would sit on the throne of David and rule over the house of Jacob, and his kingdom would never end (Luke 1:32,33)

As a result of this ultimate blessing of David, we are blessed. We have a Savior. Our sins are forgiven and this forgiveness is our through faith. We have a living Lord who loves us and rules over all things for our good, blessing us with the best. We are part of an everlasting kingdom and enjoy everlasting life, partially now but fully in eternity. Amen. DRS

DECEMBER 13th-15th, 2008
1 THESSALONIANS 5:16—24
3rd Sunday in Advent
Pastor Tim Smth

1 THESSALONIANS 5:16—24
16 Be joyful always; 17 pray continually; 18 give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. 19 Do not put out the Spirit’s fire; 20 do not treat prophecies with contempt. 21 Test everything. Hold on to the good. 22 Avoid every kind of evil.

In the last two years my family has been blessed with the companionship of three cats. Giacomo, Maximelian and Spartacus—that is Jack, Max and Sport. They are brothers, from two consecutive litters. We got the older ones, Jack and Max, first. They were timid, they were small, and they liked to hide in my son Peter’s sock drawer.

Then last winter we lost one. Some workmen came to our house last January, and while my wife was away at Bible Class the workmen came and went and kept leaving our door open, and Max got away. Many of you children saw the poster our son made up at school. My wife and I searched with flashlights and cans of tuna fish in the darkness whenever we could in some of the bitterest cold nights of last winter, but we couldn’t find him. Hour after hour night after night we called and called, up and down streets and alleys, through back yards of unoccupied houses. We even set live traps but all we caught were other cats and a lot of disappointment. We even took out his twin brother on a leash, but Jack slipped out of his leash and it was miraculous that we caught him again and brought him home.

Then Max turned up, more than a mile across town, at the barn where he was born. He had gone home to his mother. No amount of coaxing, chasing, begging calling bribing or sitting perfectly still worked. With almost 40 cats on the premises, a trap was not the solution, and invitations didn’t work. He’s still there.

We got another kitty a month or two ago. Sport was spending a little time in our bathroom whole undergoing medication, and he actually pulled up the floor vent and got into our hot air duct that leads back to the furnace. He spent a whole day running under the floorboards and we had no idea how to get him back, but finally my wife and I unscrewed some small access plates in the ductwork and put out some food and some flashing Christmas lights and a 2×4 so he could climb down, and he did—or else he fell. But we’ve got him back again.

With some patience and some love—and duct tape on that floor vent—we’re gradually winning our way into Sport’s heart.

For those of you who may not be cat lovers, just appreciate that the six of us in my family are. We want these cats to love us and let us take care of them. And that’s what God wants to do for you.

When we wander away from God, because someone who should have known better left a door wide open for us to scoot out into the wide world, God has gone looking for us, calling in the alleys and streets and the bitter cold, calling us by name. He has sacrificed his time, his love, and the blood and life of his own Son calling us back to him.

Our own sins separate us from God. Do you have one bothering you today? A sin that makes you squirm; a sin that makes you ashamed, a sin that makes you worry and maybe even lose sleep?

As if that weren’t enough, the sin that we’re just born with is barrier enough for each one of us to deserve an eternity in hell. But God calls us with a message that’s like a banquet to a starving man.

There are times when God puts out all kinds of blinking lights and food and has made openings in our paths so that we will come back to him, and he draws us to him with his Word, his promise of forgiveness.

I’m going to ask you to picture our newest kitty, Sport, just one more time. He’s the one who got into the pipes and whose back again. How would you hope he would behave? Do you have a mental picture of a loving, purring, affectionate year-old kitty who is gentle and playful with our children and a good companion to my wife and me?

He’s not quite there yet. And you know what? Neither are we. Neither are you or I toward our God. When we think about our loving, forgiving God who has done so much for us; do we remember to think about how our God wants us to behave? Paul gives us a list of things that are excellent things to do. In case we didn’t know it, these are things God looks for in Christians, in those he has called back to him like kittens out of the hot air vent that leads one-way into the furnace.

God wants us to know we are forgiven—and we are. And God wants us to show our faith and our thankfulness. And listen to the kinds of things Paul lists: 16 Be joyful always; 17 pray continually; 18 give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. 19 Do not put out the Spirit’s fire; 20 do not treat prophecies with contempt. 21 Test everything. Hold on to the good. 22 Avoid every kind of evil.

I want to just talk about one off these before we go on the to the hard part of the text. First, Paul says “Pray continually.” The Greek word Paul uses (???????????) means to do something with leaving any gaps. It’s what a housepainter does with spackling. He smoothes over all the cracks and all the little holes—my knees still remember all the hours I spent as a apprentice puttying nails holes in closets and along baseboards. When you have a moment with nothing to do, why not fill up at least a little part of it with prayer?

I say that because it needs to become a habit with us. To pray when we get a moment. So that when the moment comes and we really need to pray, we won’t wonder what to say when the storm comes along. Prayer should be like a familiar piece of clothing. Like your favorite coat. You can pick it out even in the dark without seeing which one it is—you know. And when the dark days come into our lives, prayer should be something we slip into without a moment’s thought.

Now—for the tricky part.
Following a blessing, Paul says “May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless…” This passage has made people wonder, do people have both a soul and a spirit?

There are at least six possible explanations for this “hard” saying of Paul’s (as Peter would call it).

(1) Is Paul is a “trichotomist”? That is, does Paul believe that a person has a body, a soul and a spirit, and that somehow spirit and soul are different things? This doesn’t seem likely. Everywhere else in his writings, Paul is a “dichotomist,” or a person who speaks of humans as having body and soul (or, body and spirit). See, for example, Romans 8:10, where he says “If Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.”

(2) Are Paul’s readers in Thessalonica “trichotomists,” and is Paul “speaking their language”? This doesn’t seem likely. Paul never otherwise adapts his doctrine, in fact he fiercely opposes anything contrary to God’s word, just as we should.

(3) Is Paul saying “spirit and soul” the way we would say “heart and soul”? But this isn’t very likely, either. The phrase “spirit and soul” isn’t an expression that anybody ever uses in Greek.

(4) Does Paul mean the Holy Spirit, to which he adds “and your soul and body.” But this explanation raises too many other questions—and we certainly don’t cooperate with the Holy Spirit in any way in our salvation.

(5) Is Paul looking at the non-body part of humans from two perspectives, God’s and man’s? The spirit is the part of us that desires to worship God and which receives unseen blessings from God. From our perspective, this same unseen part of us is our soul, the seat of affections, desires, and so forth. Paul simply adds “and body” to this. This is awkward, but better than the previous four ideas.

(6) Is “Spirit” a way of talking about the complete person, and “body and soul” the Biblical and traditional view of how we are made up? This seems most likely, it doesn’t contradict anything in the Bible, it’s the simplest way to take the passage. And that makes this the best way to understand Paul’s words: May your whole ‘spirit,’ that is your whole self, which is both body and soul, be kept blameless at the coming or Advent of our Lord Jesus.

The basics of our faith are here for us. Grace. Faith. A reminder that we will go to heaven both body and soul—all of us. And we grow in our faith every day by being faithful, being fruitful, and remembering that we are forgiven. After all, the one who calls you is faithful—and he will do all these things. Jesus is our Savior.

These are the basics of our faith, and more.