2 Samuel Chapter 16:1-9

Be careful about belief in bad news about others. It's amazing how quick we are sometimes to believe when somebody tells us bad news or bad attitudes or bad behavior or whatever comes to our ears. You know, there's just part of our flesh that's like, oh, I knew something wasn't right.

I knew that Phil, he didn't look quite right. You know, there's just something and there's a perverted, homeless joy at the struggle and the bad news of somebody else. Welcome to Cross the Bridge with David McGee, the senior pastor of the Bridge in Kernersville, North Carolina. Today in the studio, we have one of David's associate pastors, DA Brown.

Welcome, brother. Hey, Bob, I want to take a minute to pray for some of our stations and cities in the listening audience. Pray with me, if you don't mind.

Sitka, Alaska, Black Canyon City, Bullhead City, Camp Verde, Clifton, Globe and Phoenix, Groom Creek and Prescott, Arizona. God, we thank you for these cities. We pray that many people would tune in and listen to your word today. God, if there are some dealing with sickness in the area, we pray that you would please heal them. God, we pray that some would put their trust in you today and receive your gift of salvation. God, we pray for revival in these cities, that people would be stirred up to follow you and to return to your word. And Lord, we pray for the churches and the pastors in the area. We pray that you give the pastors wisdom and discernment and that the congregations would just explode with your love. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen, brother.

That's awesome. Well, DA, what's the teaching going to be covering today? Today in 2 Samuel 16, we're going to be talking about not believing bad news about others. We're so quick to respond when we hear anything and make a judgment call before we even talk to the person. It's important not to jump to those conclusions, Bob. It sounds like you've been on Facebook.

That's definitely a trap sometimes, isn't it, buddy? Yeah, we don't want to be throwing stones at others, that's for sure. Awesome. Well, let's listen as David McGee teaches verse by verse through 2 Samuel 16. Turn with me to 2 Samuel 16. We're continuing our verse by verse study.

Let's jump in. Verse one. When David was a little past the top of the mountain, there was Zeba, the servant of Mephibosheth, who met him with a couple of saddle donkeys and on them 200 loaves of bread, 100 clusters of raisins, 100 summer fruits, and a skin of wine. And the king said to Zeba, what do you mean to do with these? And so Zeba said, the donkeys are for the king's household to ride on, the bread and summer fruit for the young men to eat, and the wine for those who are faint in the wilderness to drink.

And then the king said, and where is your master's son? And Zeba said to the king, indeed he is staying in Jerusalem for he said, today the house of Israel will restore the kingdom of my father to me. Verse four, so the king said to Zeba, here, all that belongs to Mephibosheth is yours.

And Zeba said, I humbly bow before you that I may find favor in your sight, my Lord, O king. It's talking about Zeba and Mephibosheth. So let's recall who Mephibosheth is.

Bring up a couple of scriptures. Second Samuel chapter four, verse four says this, Jonathan, Saul's son had a son who was lame in his feet and he was five years old when the news about Saul and Jonathan came from Jezreel and his nurse took him up and fled. And it happened as she made haste to flee that he fell and became lame. And his name was Mephibosheth. So Mephibosheth was the son of Jonathan. And you might recall that Jonathan and David had an incredible close friendship. And you know, David was grieving when Jonathan was killed in this battle.

In second Samuel chapter nine, verse one, it says, now David said, is there still anyone who is left of the house of Saul that I may show him kindness for Jonathan's sake? And second Samuel nine 13 says, so Mephibosheth dwelt in Jerusalem for he ate continually at the King's table and he was laying in both his feet. Now, when we looked at this earlier, we just saw a picture of Jesus because Mephibosheth technically was an enemy of David because he was of Saul's family. And so he had some claim to the throne and David with all his rights and, you know, and Kings used to do this when they would come into power, they would wipe everybody out that had any sort of claim to the throne or through to authority. But David doesn't do that.

He actually brings Mephibosheth into his court and allows him to sit at the King's table. And it's such a picture of grace. Now, maybe you heard that and you go, okay, well, I don't, I don't see what that has to do with us and Jesus. The Bible says that before we came to the Lord, that we were enemies of God before we came to Jesus and said, Jesus, please forgive me of my sins. We weren't just not walking with the Lord. We were enemies with the Lord. And the reality is even after you come to Jesus, there's still that war kind of going on in a sense, but Jesus, instead of destroying all the enemies and the people who had sinned against God, he doesn't do that.

He gives us grace and mercy when we come to him. So we saw that beautiful picture. And according to the words of Ziba, now that's all falling apart because Mephibosheth is making us power lunge at the throne. But what we're going to find out is Ziba's lying. Now we're not going to find out this chapter and I hate to do the spoiler thing, but we're going to find out later if you haven't read ahead, that Ziba's lying about Mephibosheth.

Now this is interesting. David is in a bad place. He's on the run. Absalom is making this lunge at the throne. That's David's son.

He's hurt. And he's decided instead of having the civil war battle in Jerusalem, he's going to leave. He's going to pray. He's going to just seek the Lord's face. So he's in a bad place. And as he's leaving, this guy comes up and goes, Oh yeah, this guy that you've shown grace to and has really been kind to.

Yeah, he's wanting your throne now. And David in his moment of weakness believes Ziba and brings us to our first life lesson. Be careful about believing bad news about others. Be careful about believing bad news about others. It's amazing how quick we are sometimes to believe, you know, when somebody tells us bad news or bad attitudes or bad behavior or whatever comes to our ears, you know, there's just part of our flesh. It's like, Oh, I knew something wasn't right. I knew that fell.

He didn't look quite right. You know, there's just something and there's a perverted, almost joy at the struggle and the bad news of somebody else. It's really sad seeing who we follow and Jesus who never did that, but how much better, more spiritual our lives would be if we chose next time a Ziba came to us that we didn't believe what the Ziba said. Cause friend, you got a Ziba out there.

You got a bunch of them. You got Zibas that come to you, that mess with you, that gnaw on your ear and you listen to it and friend, your life would be a whole lot better if you didn't listen to it. Now, does that mean you shut it down? Yeah.

It means you shut it down. I've been before. I've almost been to the point of being rude with people sometimes when they start, I'm saying, you know, I don't want to hear this. No, this conversation is over. We're not talking about this. Why?

Because I don't want a Ziba to cheer on me. Let me ask you a question. Have you ever in your life had somebody tell you something about somebody else or a situation, and then you acted on that information and then you found out later that information was incorrect. Anybody in here ever I've done this. I'll raise my hand. Anybody else ever done this?

Okay. We're going to pray for the rest of you to discover honesty. Be delivered from that spirit of lying. But we've all done this. Maybe God's just so completely healed that memory from you. You don't remember, but every one of us has done that. We've heard something.

We acted in a certain way and then we found out later it wasn't true. And David takes action on what Ziba said and check this out. He turns around and says, Ziba, you take all of Mephibosheth stuff. Now this is interesting because Ziba is supposed to be Mephibosheth's servant under his authority.

And yet what he's doing is carrying tales about this man whose authority he's supposed to be under and literally taking his stuff and receiving it from David. Here's the convicting thing. I said that we all have Ziba's out there. We do.

That's true. But do you realize that we all can be Ziba's? We can. There's something in our human nature, our fallen human nature. When we hear something that's bad or questionable that we want to repeat it.

Can't wait to get home, get online, email people, call people. Hey, do you hear about this? Do you hear about this? And you know, human nature is you can be walking down the hall and hear somebody say, Hey, did you hear? And all of a sudden you're like, what, what hear what?

We're prone to that. You ever have a conversation and after the conversation, you walk away and you feel like you have been slimed. I don't remember what movie that was.

It's probably a bad, I'd never saw it. No, no. And you know, you just feel slimed. What was that?

Ghostbusters? Somebody told me about it. And so you, you just feel slimed when you walk away from the conversation. What do you do about that?

You don't participate in the conversation. Here's what the Bible says. And these are challenging scriptures. Ephesians chapter four, verse 29 says, let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification that it may impart grace to the hearers.

Wow. Let no corrupt communication, corrupt word proceed out of your mouth. I guess we all have to repent now, huh? Because we all do this, but God says, you know what? That's not my plan. Because when you do that, people get hurt. You get hurt. The person you're talking to gets hurt. The person you're talking about gets hurt. And you have probably had the experience of having somebody talk about you and hearing about that and how painful that is.

Remember that pain next time you're tempted to speak of somebody else. Another verse Philippians chapter four, verse eight says this finally brother, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy meditate on these things, focus on the good things. This is what the Lord is saying in this verse focus on those things that are true, noble, just, pure, lovely of good report. Focus on those things. Now this could apply to everything in our lives. How different our lives would be no corrupt communication, focusing on the good, applying it to our job, our house, our church could change our life. Now that's what the Bible says to focus on those things, which are basically positive. Now this is not to say that there's nothing ever negative that we have to deal with. The Bible points out and that Ephesians 4 29 talks about necessary for edification.

We do have to challenge and sometimes have to say things, but you know we want to focus on those things that are good and give our time and our attention to those things. Now again, Ziba is supposed to be serving Mephibosheth and he's selling Mephibosheth out and lying to David about this and we're going to find out that in that two chapters, but he's lying to David about Mephibosheth and based on that information, David makes a decision when he's beaten up, when he's despondent, when he's feeling down. You know, depression is a very real thing and sometimes I struggle with the labels and I certainly have a problem with the medication and the overmedication and the whole concept of a chemical imbalance when they can't prove it scientifically.

If you're going to email me about that, do the research before you email, please. But the thing is there is a real thing of depression and you see in the life of David, sometimes he's really excited and sometimes he's really bummed out. Man, he is hurting in this point.

He is hurting at this point. And then this low point, he gets this bad news and he makes a decision. And guys, here's the next life lesson. Don't make decisions when you are upset if at all possible. Don't make decisions when you're upset if at all possible because you will very likely make the wrong one. Something happens in the brain when you get upset and your judgment is clouded.

Something happens when you get hurt physically or you're hurt emotionally. Your decision making ability is impaired. And if at all possible, if you can wait until you're more sound mind, if you will, to make the decision, everybody around you will be better off. And certainly we've all made decisions in the spur of the moment when we were upset, that was the wrong one. And here we see David, one of the wisest people who ever lived and he makes a bad decision because he made the decision at the wrong time. So be careful about making a decision at the wrong time. Proverbs 18, 13 says this, he who answers a matter before he hears it, it is a folly and a shame to him. It's a great scripture.

He who answers a matter before he hears it is a folly and a shame to him. You're listening to Pastor David McGee on Cross the Bridge. He'll be back with more in just a moment. But first, if you haven't been to our website at crossthebridge.com yet, what are you waiting for? Go to crossthebridge.com to learn more about how listeners like you are helping get the life changing truth of God's word to more people through the radio, internet and mobile technologies. At crossthebridge.com, you can also check out our broadcast schedule, listen to more teaching from Pastor David and sign up for Pastor David's free daily devotional. And there's more there too.

So visit crossthebridge.com today. Now, here's Pastor David as he continues sharing verse by verse. Verse five, Now when King David came to Bahram, there was a man from the family of the house of Saul, whose name was Shumiah, the son of Gerah, coming from there.

He came out cursing continuously as he came. Verse six, and he threw stones at David and at all the servants of King David and all the people and all the mighty men were on his right hand and on his left. What we're going to see is this guy's upset and it's going to tell us why he's upset, but he's kind of been waiting for David to make a mistake and now he's got the opportunity to vent this, but I want you to notice something. Look at this at the end of verse six and all the people and all the mighty men were on his right hand and on his left. Notice the phrase and all the people and all the mighty man, not one of the mighty men were not with David.

This is huge. I think the Hebrew word for mighty men is Gerahim. These guys are with David.

Let me ask you a question. How long have the mighty men been with David for a long time? As a matter of fact, they joined him when he was, had been anointed King, but was not yet King when he was running around the wilderness. They joined up with him. They were hanging out with David in the caves. Some of them were the guys who, you know, when Saul, they found him asleep and they said, David, take him out.

Here's your shot. And he didn't do it, but they were with him. They watched David win these battles. They watched David do all these things. They watched David go across the border and pretend like he was a madman in front of a foreign King and they were still with him. They were with David when he actually thought about or was presented with the opportunity to fight against Israel and Saul. They watched him make a good decision. Then they followed him into the kingdom where he was made King. And they followed him through Bathsheba, through Uriah and through Nathan coming in David and saying, you're the man. And they're still with him. And when Absalom was making his leap at the throne and had a lot of people with him.

And at this point, folks, it folks, it looks like Absalom is going to win. They're still with David. Hey, we might, we might lose David, but we're with you. You may have made some mistakes, but we're with you.

That's a beautiful thing. You know, I feel like that's part of maybe what's missing in the modern day church. A lot of times when somebody messes up is when we turn away from them. Now, admittedly, it, it is inconvenient to have a relationship with somebody that is stumbling or just flat fallen and maybe even flat fallen in Waller and in it, but that's what we're called to do.

See these mighty men had been with David through good times and bad. Here's the next life lesson, protect and support your Godly relationships and friendships protect and support your Godly relationships and friendships. Now, the reason I put the Godly relationships and friendships is when you come to Jesus and all your priorities begin to change and your life begins to change your old friends, you just don't see things the same way. And thankfully God gives you new friends and, and there is a painful separation and anxiety that happens because friend, if it doesn't happen to a certain degree, then you're going to stumble.

Your old friends know you and they know how to push your buttons and you'll end up messing up, but in your Godly relationships, protect those, preserve those. And I think the body of Christ, we can do a better job, I believe, of presenting clearly the gospel because a lot of people think it's, you know, hip, hip, hooray, try a little bit harder and God will honor, you know, you, you try and harder jumping a little higher, run a little faster. And that's, that's not the gospel. The other thing is, is standing by one another when we mess up. Notice I said, when we mess up, I'd say, if we mess up, let me go ahead and tell you that, you know, I expect awesome things from you guys. I mean, every week when we see people stepping forward to serve and we get to hear a little bit about their testimony and some of the things they say, we just, I mean, it's awesome. We're really blessed.

We're really encouraged. But one thing that I do not expect from any of you is perfection. And if you expect perfection from me, it's only a matter of time. Might be years.

No, it's just, it's going to be like hours. If you hang around, there's only a matter of time before I'd somehow fail you in that. A lot of times I think people look for their pastor to be perfect and then they never find their pastor, but we need to walk through these things and stand by one another. When we mess up, sometimes somebody can do something or say something. And we're the first one to pick up stones like this guy and throw them. There's a story. And I love this story. These, these two guys grew up with one another, went to like elementary, junior high and senior high. And then they went to war in Vietnam and they were fighting together. And the guy's buddy was out on the field. He was in the Fox hole. He was out on the field and his friend got shot. He turned to his captain. He says, I got to go get him. And captain said, you're not going to get him. Your friend has been gut shot. He's going to die.

There's nothing you can do. And you know what? I don't need another dead soldier. Captain turned his head, got popped out of the Fox hole, went out to his friend, picked his friend up, brought him back, jumped back into the Fox hole. And he had been shot two or three times. And the captain looked at him and he said, you know, I told you because by that time the friend had died. He said, I told you your friend was going to die. I told you that you were going to die. You went out there and now you're both, he's dead and you're dying.

You know, was that, was that worth it? The dying man looked at him and said, yeah, it was because when I bent over to pick him up out on the field, his eyes met mine. And he said, I knew you'd come.

I knew you'd come. That's the way Christianity is supposed to be. That's the way followers of Jesus are supposed to join together. But sadly, often that's not the case. We look at somebody that gets shot and we go, Oh, you, well, you know what you did wrong. You know, you shouldn't have been out there. You shouldn't have died. A lot of us know that.

And I love pastor Chuck's analogy. He said, you know, a lot of times we think that we're the ministry where the policemen that show up on the scene trying to figure out who's guilty and not where the emergency medical technicians who show up to treat the wounded, not to figure out who the guilty are. You ever see an EMT or an ambulance guy get on the scene and go, wait, man, now what happened?

Were you speeding with it? No, no, no. He was just there to care for the wounded. See, the reality is we're all guilty.

We don't need to come on the scene and figure out who's guilty. We're all guilty, but we need to help the wounded. And we see these guys standing with David and it's just such a powerful, powerful thing because they've seen David at his worst. They've seen him so weak and, and, and weeping and crying and on the run from Saul, they seen him weak with Bathsheba and Uriah, but they're still with him.

It's an amazing testimony. Verse seven. Also Shemaiah said to us when he cursed, come out, come out, you bloodthirsty man, you rogue. The Lord has brought upon you all the blood of the house of Saul and whose place you have rained. And the Lord has delivered the kingdom into the hand of Absalom, your son. So now you are caught in your own evil because you are a blood thirsty man. Then Abishai, the son of Uriah said to the king, why should this dead dog curse my Lord the king?

Please let me go over and take off his head. Abishai, he's a warrior, man. You know, Abishai was one of the guys when, when, when they came on King Saul, David could have killed him. Abishai in one situation was like, kill it, kill it.

That's it. Go for it. You know, David didn't do it. Understand you've got friends like that in your life that will give you the wrong advice at the wrong time. And Abishai says, you want me to take him out? I cut off his head. I'm sure David appreciated Abishai saying that, but it wasn't the thing to do. Now, this is interesting because as I looked at this accusation that Shemaiah is throwing out, there's a little bit of truth in it, but not a whole lot. Because when you read this, you may assume, well, he's talking about the Bathsheba and the Uriah thing. I don't think so.

I don't think so for a couple of reasons, because look at what he said. Verse eight, the Lord has brought upon you all the blood of the house of Saul and whose place you have reigned. What he's accusing David of, that doesn't mention Bathsheba or Uriah. He's talking that David is reigning instead of King Saul.

Let me ask you a question. Who put David into the kingship of Israel? God did.

God alone. The timing of it was God's. David was waiting patiently on the ward to do what he was going to do with Saul. And maybe this man's accusing him of taking Saul and his sons out. But if you remember, David wasn't around. David was on the run when that happened.

And this is the way accusations always work like this, or usually work like this, and that there's a little bit of truth, but there's a spin on it. Yet it's true that King David is now reigning. It is true that King Saul used to reign. It is true that God moved King Saul out and moved King David in, but the accusation that the man is making is not valid. He might be talking about the deaths of Abner and Ishmael, but I'm not sure, but he's making the accusation that David unfairly unjustly came to the kingship and that is not accurate. Has David made mistakes?

Absolutely. Every leader, every spiritual leader that has ever lived has made mistakes, except Jesus. And I think sometimes our expectations, while it's great to encourage one another and have high expectations, the book of Proverbs says that a righteous man will fall seven times, but he gets back up. Friend, do you know for sure that your sins have been forgiven?

You can know right now. I want to lead you in a short, simple prayer, simply telling God you're sorry and asking Him to help you to live for Him. Now God wants you to pray this prayer so much that He died to give you the opportunity and the ability to ask Him to forgive you.

Please pray this prayer with me out loud right now. Dear Jesus, I believe you died for me that I could be forgiven. And I believe you were raised from the dead that I could have a new life. And I've done wrong things. I have sinned.

And I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things. Please give me the power to live for you all of my days. In Jesus' name.

Amen. Friend, if you prayed that prayer, according to the Bible, you've been forgiven. You've been born again. Jesus said He would not turn anybody away who comes to Him. And He came for those people who knew they needed forgiveness, those who were sick, not the righteous. So congratulations, friend.

You just made the greatest decision that you will ever make. God bless you. If you prayed that prayer with David for the first time, we'd love to hear from you. You can visit crossthebridge.com to receive our First Steps package with helpful resources to help you begin your walk with Christ. Or you can write to Cross the Bridge at PO Box 12515, Winston-Salem, North Carolina 27117, and share how God is working in your life.

Well, DA, before we go, what are some ways that we can bless our listeners? If you're not able to make it to your home church this Sunday, why not join us for our live stream at 10 a.m. Eastern time, or on Thursday nights at 7 p.m. Eastern time? Just visit crossthebridge.com and click on our live stream link. There, you'll experience a live service from David's Home Church, The Bridge in North Carolina.

Again, that website is crossthebridge.com. That sounds good, Pastor DA, and again, it's been great to have you with us on the program today. But tell us, what else can our listeners find on crossthebridge.com? Each day, you can wake up with encouragement from Pastor David through the Word of God with his email devotional, life lessons to consider, a daily reading plan, and a thought to meditate on throughout your day from the heart of David McGee.

Those are terrific, and it's easy and it's free. So folks, sign up today at crossthebridge.com. And thank you for listening. We hope you'll join us again next time as we continue studying verse by verse through Second Samuel.