CALL TO CONFESSION

Isaiah 1:16-17

16 Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean;

    remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes;

cease to do evil,

17  learn to do good; 

seek justice, correct oppression;

bring justice to the fatherless,

    plead the widow's cause.

PRAYER OF CONFESSION

Holy God, we are people who cannot wash ourselves or make ourselves clean. Even as your children, we love evil and resist what you have said is good. We demand justice for ourselves, but fail to pursue it vigorously on behalf of others. We are indignant about the oppression we read of in faraway lands, yet blind to the oppression taking place right here before our eyes in our families, homes, and work places. We feel good when we give money to feed orphans in foreign countries, but we often don't know or care about the widows and orphans who need your love right around us. Father, forgive us.

Redeeming God, we praise you that you have washed us clean in the blood of your Son. You placed all our evil on him so that it could be removed from your sight forever. Jesus suffered profound injustice for our lukewarm apathy, and was fatally oppressed for our continuing failure to love and help the oppressed, here and abroad. He bore the sin of our careless disregard for the fatherless and widows in our towns. We crucified your precious Son, and instead of hating us, you have given us his perfect goodness and welcomed us to your feast. We are left undone by your extravagant love and complete salvation.

We ask you to wash our minds and hearts clean, moment by moment. Make our hearts good so that works of kindness and mercy flow from us to the needy people you have placed in our lives. May we love them as you have loved us in our great need. Cause us to love justice and, like your Son, to suffer joyfully great injustice on behalf of others. Help us to love extravagantly, as we have been loved by you. Amen.

“Take a few moments to personally confess your sins to the Lord.”

ASSURANCE OF PARDON

“Hear these words of comfort and assurance.” 

1 Corinthians 6:9-11

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

• The Christian life is warfare.
• That’s not a metaphor the NT uses occasionally, it’s the framework Scripture gives us for understanding everything that happens between conversion and glory. 
• Paul wrote that we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the forces of evil in the heavenly places. (Eph 6)
• Scripture is clear, the Christian life is not a playground but a battlefield. 
• We are not only born into a world in cosmic conflict, the moment we come to Christ we are thrust into spiritual warfare.
• And it is helpful to see the Christian's warfare against the background of actual warfare in the Old Testament.
• In. Chapter 11 of 1 Samuel, we'll see a very graphic depiction of OT warfare that will give us insight into the spiritual warfare we face. 
• Just as Israel faced a physical enemy, you face a spiritual enemy: sin, the flesh, and the devil. 
• And just as Israel could not deliver themselves by their own might, you cannot win this war in your own strength. 
• We will be reminded today that salvation is of the Lord, and that he alone can deliver us in every battle we fight as a believer. 

1 Samuel 11:1-3

Then Nahash the Ammonite went up and besieged Jabesh-gilead, and all the men of Jabesh said to Nahash, “Make a treaty with us, and we will serve you.” 2 But Nahash the Ammonite said to them, “On this condition I will make a treaty with you, that I gouge out all your right eyes, and thus bring disgrace on all Israel.” 3 The elders of Jabesh said to him, “Give us seven days' respite that we may send messengers through all the territory of Israel. Then, if there is no one to save us, we will give ourselves up to you.”

• The Ammonites were one of Israel’s oldest enemies, descendants of Lot, who occupied territory east of the Jordan, and were a constant thorn in Israel’s side since the wilderness wanderings. 
• Jabesh-Gilead was on the very outskirts of where Israel settled in the land of Canaan. 
• It was a frontier-town close to Ammonite territory and far from the other tribes. 
• This left them vulnerable and exposed. 

• Because the tribes were scattered and there was no central government or standing national army, a threat like this one was difficult to counter. 
• Saul had been anointed as Israel’s leader but he didn’t seek to centralize the kingdom; he returned to his home. 
• And some people didn’t think he could do anything for Israel, they doubted his abilities and despised him saying, “How can this man save us?” 
• Israel was still in effect, leaderless. 

• And because of that, Nahash the Ammonite lays siege to Jabesh-gilead. 
• The name Nahash, is the Hebrew word for “serpent.” 
• From Genesis 3 onward, the serpent is the symbol of the enemy of God’s people. 
• And now we have this serpent-king laying siege upon God’s covenant people. 

THE TREATY PROPOSED

• The people were terrified and desperate. 
• They attempt to negotiate the terms of surrender. 
• All the people of Israel had just asked for a king like all the nations. A king who would go out before them and fight their battles. 
• They got a leader whom the Lord anointed through Samuel, to be the one to deliver Israel from their enemies. 
• And they don’t even call upon him.

• Nahash has a counter-proposal. He didn’t just want to subjugate them, he didn’t merely want to seize their territory and resources, he wanted to abuse and humiliate them. 
• Gouging out the right eyes of every fighting male would basically render them useless in battle. 
• What Nahash wanted was a total and permanent mutilation that says to every Israelite, “This is what Israel has become. Helpless. Humiliated. Defeated. Disgraced.”

• This is the strategy of our enemy. 
• The devil doesn’t just want to defeat the saints of God, he wants to disgrace them as well. 
• He wants to bring disgrace upon the name of Christ by making God’s people look defeated and blind. 
• He wants the Christian marriage that falls apart to be shamed publicly. 
• He wants the pastor who sins to go down in scandal to bring reproach upon the Church. 
• He wants the young person who was raised in the church to walk away mocking the faith. 
• He wants to spiritually gouge out the right eye of believers and say to the watching world, “This is the people of God. Useless. Worthless. They can’t even fight.” 

• Revelation discloses that Satan, the devil, is the ancient serpent, he is the deceiver of the whole world and the accuser of God’s people. (Rev 12:9-10)
• Peter tells us, “Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” (1 Peter 5:8)
• There is no negotiating with an enemy who wants to see you completely defeated and disgraced. 
• Nashah didn’t want a quick victory, he wanted a permanent monument to Israel’s defeat. 
• The devil works the same way. He doesn’t just want you to fall, he wants your fall to bring disgrace upon the name of Christ. He wants your fall to preach. 

• Nahash wanted to bring disgrace to “all Israel.” When one believer falls in scandal, the whole church bears the reproach. 
• This is why holiness matters not just of your own life but for the watching world. 
• Your private faithfulness is part of the church’s public witness. 

1 Samuel 11:4-5

4 When the messengers came to Gibeah of Saul, they reported the matter in the ears of the people, and all the people wept aloud. 5 Now, behold, Saul was coming from the field behind the oxen. And Saul said, “What is wrong with the people, that they are weeping?” So they told him the news of the men of Jabesh. 

• The messengers of Jabesh make their way to Gibeah and they bring the news of the critical situation. 
• And when the people of Gibeah heard the news, they wept loudly. 
• They wept because they knew they could not save Jabesh. 
• This is Saul’s hometown. This is the one whom the people acclaimed as their king. 
• And yet, they don’t call for him. They don’t even think to send for him. 
• Even worse, they don’t call upon the Lord. 

• We need to remember that in our own strength, we’re powerless to defeat the enemy and to battle sin. 
• We have to come to the end of ourselves and recognize our own inability. 
• We must weep before we fight. We must call out to the Lord. 
• The first weapon of the besieged saint is not a sword but prayer. 
• We can pour our heart out to the Lord. We can cry out to him in our distress. 
• We can call on him when we feel we are being assailed by the enemy and struggling with sin.  
• Jesus told a parable about a persistent widow and he promised, “Will not God give justice to his elect, who cry to him day and night?” (Luke 18:7)
• This is our God. He hears and he answers. 
• There’s a difference between weeping over your circumstances and crying out to God about them. 
• Weeping can be self-pity dressed up in tears. Crying out to God is faith refusing to be silent. 
• It’s taking our battle to the King who can do something about it! 

• Picture this, Israel has a national crisis, an enemy at the gates, there’s weeping in the streets. 
• And the leader God anointed to deliver them is in a field behind a pair of oxen. 
• Nobody sent for him. Nobody thought to seek him out. He has to ask what’s going on. 
• That’s a portrait of a people who had a deliverer they had forgotten to call upon. 
• Some of you have a Deliverer you’ve also forgotten how to call upon! 

1 Samuel 11:6-11

6 And the Spirit of God rushed upon Saul when he heard these words, and his anger was greatly kindled. 7 He took a yoke of oxen and cut them in pieces and sent them throughout all the territory of Israel by the hand of the messengers, saying, “Whoever does not come out after Saul and Samuel, so shall it be done to his oxen!” Then the dread of the Lord fell upon the people, and they came out as one man. 8 When he mustered them at Bezek, the people of Israel were three hundred thousand, and the men of Judah thirty thousand. 9 And they said to the messengers who had come, “Thus shall you say to the men of Jabesh-gilead: ‘Tomorrow, by the time the sun is hot, you shall have salvation.’” When the messengers came and told the men of Jabesh, they were glad. 10 Therefore the men of Jabesh said, “Tomorrow we will give ourselves up to you, and you may do to us whatever seems good to you.” 11 And the next day Saul put the people in three companies. And they came into the midst of the camp in the morning watch and struck down the Ammonites until the heat of the day. And those who survived were scattered, so that no two of them were left together.

THE SPIRIT OF GOD

• The Spirit of God rushed upon Saul when he heard the news of Jabesh’s situation. 
• We saw this phrase first when the Spirit of the God rushed upon Saul when he came upon the company of the prophets and he began to prophesy. 
• The verb “rushed” is the same word used when the Spirit empowered the judges like Samson and also David. It means a sudden, powerful, divine empowerment for a task no man can accomplish in his own strength. 
• If Jabesh is going to be helped it will not come from human ability, military strength, or emotional zeal.  It will come from the Spirit of God! 
• Two things happened. 
• First, Saul’s anger was greatly kindled. This is righteous indignation against evil.
• Second, the Spirit unites a divided people. 

THE CALL TO ARMS

• Look at v7, Saul takes a yoke of oxen, the oxen he was using to plow a few moments before, and he cuts them in pieces, and sends them throughout the territory of Israel with a message. 
• The message is this, “whoever doesn’t come out to fight after Saul and Samuel will have the same thing done to their oxen!”
• Saul’s action is deliberate. 
• Back in Judges 19, a Levite had cut up his concubine and sent her pieces throughout Israel to rally the tribes to civil war against Benjamin. 
• And here, Saul the Benjaminite, uses that dark and shameful memory for another purpose; to rally them for a holy war of deliverance.
• And what happens? The dread of the Lord fell upon the people and they came out as one man. 
• Not the dread of Saul but the dread of the Lord. 
• The unity of the army is a work of God. 

• The fear of the Lord should also grip our hearts as we remember that God is greater than our enemy.
• We cannot fight sin by sheer willpower alone, by emotional motivation or external pressure. 
• We fight by the power of the Holy Spirit working within us. 
• It is by the Spirit that we can put to death the deeds of the flesh. (Romans 8:13)
• We do not fight in our own strength but in the strength of our King! 
• A King upon whom the Spirit has come without measure. 
• Isaiah 11 says of the Messiah, that the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, a Spirit of wisdom and might. (Isaiah 11:2)
• At the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry, when he was baptized in the Jordan, the Spirit descended upon him and he was driven into the wilderness to fight the serpent.  And he won!
• Paul writes that the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead now lives in every believer. (Romans 8:11)
• Ephesians 6 exhorts us to “be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.” 
• Paul describes the armor that the Christian is to equip themselves with for battle. The belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of faith, the sword of the Spirit.
• All given to us for the fight and none of that is ours but his!
• You are not fighting FOR victory—you are fighting FROM victory! 
• Our King has already won. 
• You are fighting FROM the victory that Christ has already secured. 

• Saul’s call to action produced Spirit-wrought unity. 
• We need to remember that we fight together. 
• We are not isolated soldiers. Many Christians live in defeat because they isolate themselves from other believers and the church. 
• One of the keys to walking in Christ’s victory in the Christian life is partaking fully in the fellowship of the saints. 
• A lone ranger Christian, who isolates themselves, who is only marginally connected to God’s people, is an easy target for the enemy. 

THE BATTLE

• Saul musters the unified army at Bezek on the other side of the Jordan from Jabesh. 
• He tells the messengers, “Let Jabesh-gilead know, before the sun is hot, they will have salvation.”
• The following day, during the morning watch, between 2AM and 6AM, the vast Israelite army crosses the Jordan, comes into the Ammonite camp while they’re sleeping, and strikes them down. 
• The battle was decisive. The enemy was defeated. 
• God’s deliverance is complete and undeniable. 

1 Samuel 11:12-15 

12 Then the people said to Samuel, “Who is it that said, ‘Shall Saul reign over us?’ Bring the men, that we may put them to death.” 13 But Saul said, “Not a man shall be put to death this day, for today the Lord has worked salvation in Israel.” 14 Then Samuel said to the people, “Come, let us go to Gilgal and there renew the kingdom.” 15 So all the people went to Gilgal, and there they made Saul king before the Lord in Gilgal. There they sacrificed peace offerings before the Lord, and there Saul and all the men of Israel rejoiced greatly.

• After the great victory, the people want the blood of those who denied Saul's ability to save them.
• And Saul, in his finest moment says, “No. The day belongs to the Lord. For today the Lord has worked salvation in Israel.” 
• Saul shows remarkable grace. 
• Saul recognizes he didn’t win the victory. He says, “Today the Lord has worked salvation.” 
• And because of that, the day is too sacred and holy to be spent settling scores. 
• Grace does not seek vengeance. Grace always points to the fact that it is the Lord alone who saves.

• Sadly, this is the best we’re going to see from Saul. Soon we’ll see a king who is suspicious, jealous, and murderous. 
• This is why we need a better King. One who on the day of his victory did not come seeking the blood of his enemies but offered his own blood for them. 
• On the very day that our King won his victory over sin and death, he looked down from the bloodied cross at the ones who were mocking him and said, “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34)

THE KINGDOM RENEWED

• Samuel gathers the people at Gilgal for the purpose of renewing the kingdom.
• Why Gilgal? Because Gilgal was covenant ground. 
• Gilgal was where Israel first camped after crossing the Jordan; it was where Joshua set up twelve memorial stones, where the men of Israel received the covenant sign of circumcision, and where they kept the first Passover in the land. 
• Samuel is bringing them back to renew the kingdom on covenant ground. 

• What we see at Gilgal is a beautiful moment of worship and celebration. 
• Victory leads to worship. Salvation leads to joy in the presence of the Lord. 
• The people had rejected the Lord as their king wanting a king like all the nations. 
• God provided them a deliverer in Saul, but the Lord had not relinquished his kingship over his covenant people. 
• Here at Gilgal, Saul was made king, “before the Lord.”  He was not made a king like all the nations have, but he was made king before the presence of the King of kings! 
• The renewal of the kingdom was to set Saul’s kingdom in its proper relation to the Lord’s kingdom. 

• Every spiritual battle in the Christian life must end with worship. 
• God secured the victory for us in Christ. 
• Every temptation, trial, assault from the enemy that God brings us through must lead us to worship. 
• If we fight battles and God gives us victory, and we just go back to what we were doing before, without lifting our eyes and hands to the King who won the battle for us, we have missed the entire point. 
• Notice the geography. The battle was fought in Jabesh but the worship happened at Gilgal. 
• Some are still standing on the battlefield, recounting the fight and replaying the wounds. 
• God didn’t deliver you so you could just talk about the battle, he delivered you so you could worship him and give him the glory he is due! 
• Every answered prayer should drive us to worship. 
• Every temptation resisted should drive us to worship. 
• Because God is a saving God, his people are a worshiping people. 

CONCLUSION

• We are living in a culture that is like Nahash. It wants to put out your right eye. 
• It wants you disgraced. It wants you to believe that following Jesus is weakness and that the Bible is a fairy tale. 
• Do not negotiate with the serpent. 

• Parents, you are in a spiritual battle for your children every day. The culture is loud and relentless.
• Cry out to your King on behalf of your children. Keep being faithful in the small things. Opening the Bible together, praying, bringing them to the house of the Lord, modeling repentance.
• Trust that God is at work even when you cannot see it.

• Some of you carry the disgrace of past failures or you’re trapped in a besetting sin that has dimmed your spiritual sight. 
• Come to Christ for cleansing and forgiveness.
• He bore your disgrace on the cross so you could walk in the freedom of his grace.

• Some of you feel under siege on every front.
• You’re weary. You feel helpless. 
• Know that your King sees you. He fights for you. He meets his people in their ordinary faithfulness. 

• The story we’ve read today is not just Israel’s story. It’s the testimony of every follower of Christ. 
• The serpent has been crushed. Our King is victorious! The decisive battle is over! 
• So go from this place, not as a people under siege, but as a people delivered. 
• Not fighting FOR victory but fighting FROM victory. 
• And in every battle that remains, may you say with Saul on his finest day, “Today the Lord has worked salvation for us!” 

APPLICATION AND REFLECTION

In light of today's message....

• What did I learn about the gospel?
• How can I apply what I learned about the gospel to my life?
• With whom can I share the gospel this week?