Pastor, author, and Bible teacher, Alan Wright. Absalom, Absalom, would that I had died in your place. Oh, Absalom, Absalom. Oh, Alan, Alan. Oh, beloved. Oh, beloved.
Oh, oh, world, that I would die in your place. And Jesus did. That's Pastor Alan Wright. Welcome to another message of good news that will help you see your life in a whole new light. I'm Daniel Britt, excited for you to hear the teaching today in the series Son of David as presented at Rinaldin Church in North Carolina. If you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program today, I want to make sure you know how to get our special resource right now. It can be yours for your donation this month to Alan Wright Ministries. As you listen to today's message, go deeper as we send you today's special offer. Contact us at PastorAlan.org. That's PastorAlan.org or call 877-544-4860. Now more on this later in the program, but now let's get started with today's teaching.
Here is Alan Wright. As the kingdom stand still, he asked the question on a father's heart. It's like all the rest of the world stood still. It's as if all of the kingdoms and all of the wealth and all of the accolades and all of the exaltation and everything else that goes with being coronated a king, all of it mattered not because at this moment only one question was on that man's heart. Is Absalom well?
Is there shalom for Absalom? This is what I wish the whole world could know about God. His primary question this morning as it has always been.
Are my people OK? It is so astounding to think that in the midst of such wickedness that the king could say such a thing. But the point is that in that moment where time stands still and you look into the deepest part of David's soul, you see what it is that matters to him. And this is simply because David's own happiness is completely wrapped up in his longing for the well-being of his son Absalom. What I'm saying here is mind-bending but it is surely true that this father's love trumps the son's sin. What manner of love is this? That the preoccupation of the king's heart is actually the preoccupation of a father's heart and he loves him. He is tied up with him. You can't rebel more than this son rebelled. You can't sin in your life in a whole lifetime anymore than this son Absalom sinned against King David and King David loved him. He loved him so much that the pressing question is is he safe?
It is the preoccupation of God's heart. These people that I made in my image, are they safe? Are you OK?
That's God. When I talk to my son who is in his first year of college and I haven't seen him for a while and we are talking, texting, you know my first question is not did you make a good grade on that last test? And it's not even are you being a good boy? What I care about most is is it well with you?
Because if it's well with you, if you're safe, if you're OK, everything else is fine. I make a point. I find an excuse at least once a year to read these words from J. I. Packer in his classic Knowing God. He writes, We have in previous chapters made the point that God's end in all things is his own glory, that he should be manifested, known, admired, adored.
The statement is true, but it is incomplete. It needs to be balanced by a recognition that through setting his love on men, God has voluntarily bound up his own final happiness with theirs. It follows from the very nature of these relationships that God's happiness will not be complete to all his beloved ones are finally out of trouble. God was happy without man before man was made. He would have continued happy had he simply destroyed man after man had sent. But as it is, he has set his love upon particular centers, and this means that by his own free voluntary choice, he will not know perfect and unmixed happiness again till he has brought every one of them to heaven. He has in effect resolved that henceforth for all eternity his happiness shall be conditional upon ours. Thus God saves not only for his glory but also for his gladness. And this goes far to explain why it is that there is joy God's own joy in the presence of the angels when a sinner repents and why there will be exceeding joy when God sets us faultless at the last day in his own holy presence. The thought passes understanding and almost beggars belief, but there is no doubt that according to scripture, such is the love of God. Because our Bible is true and affirms that there is for those who choose it, for those who choose to resist and reject the love of God, there is eternal separation from God. But I want the whole world to know that God weeps. He weeps not over merely the offense of humanity against him, but he weeps because he has the heart of a father. And oh, that none would perish. Is the young man safe? Is it shalom with ab shalom?
But it was not. And though the messenger gives it to him in a veiled way, David knows that his son has died. And the next words out of his mouth are equally staggering to the first question. And that is, he says, Absalom, Absalom, my son, my son. In groans that are too deep for words, he can only find really two words, the name of his son, Absalom, Absalom, and the position of the man who had died, my son, my son.
Again, I want you to notice what he does not say. He does not say, Oh, Absalom, Absalom, you murderous traitor. Oh, Absalom, Absalom, you rebellious sinner. Oh, Absalom, Absalom, my disowned, disinherited, unworthy child.
No, when you strip away everything in this timeless moment, you see the heart of the king. That though you cannot be more rebellious than Absalom was, he is still my son, my son. Let me tell you what's so good about the good news, is that when you accept Christ, you become a son, a daughter of God. And that therefore has implications for the rest of your life and for all eternity, because it means that your position has changed. Though Jesus came into his own, his own received him not, but to those who did receive him, he gave the right to become children of God, children born not of natural descent or human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. You were born not of your own power. You were recreated. You were adopted. And because you were adopted, this initiative and this action came from God who is love. The regenerating force, the power that made you born again, all of this originated in and was fueled by and only possible by the action of God. He claimed you and he gave you a new birth.
He adopted you so that you would be his child. Therefore, your position as a child of God never hinged upon any of your own righteousness, but hinged completely solely upon the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ and the redemptive work of Jesus on the cross and your behalf. So much so that God wants you, once you have accepted Christ to never ever doubt that you're a child of God, but instead he wants you to be assured and wake up in the morning every day and remind yourself and see it in the word and revel in it though it might beggar your belief. The God of the universe who is sinless and holy and perfect made it possible through Jesus Christ for you to be his own heir. And if you are a child of God, then you are not only an heir, but you are a co-heir with Christ himself.
This is such extraordinary news because what it means is that you cannot be disowned or disinherited and it changes therefore the motivation of your life. Why is it that we would want to live a holy and righteous life? Why is it that we would live out our destiny? Is it because we are afraid that God would disown us? No, it is because we are empowered by the hope that is guaranteed to us and we listen to the Holy Spirit who is whispering to our spirits, you're a child of God. When you get ready to fall into your besetting sin, it is not that God comes to you and says you're a murderous traitor. He says you're a child of God. You're made for more than this.
That's Alan Wright and we'll have more teaching in a moment from today's important series. Got some giants to slay? Need some encouragement in the midst of a trial?
Wondering if God really cares? Meet David. Who can compare to him? He was the ruddy, handsome, youth-tending sheep riding psalms and worshiping God in the humble Bethlehem fields. He was the lone Israelite brave enough to decapitate Goliath and the sole warrior adept enough to cut off the scourge of the Philistines.
He was the stately king who established peace, expanded the borders and reigned in prosperity for 40 years. Who else could be a gentle shepherd, a glorious hero and a noble king? Would there ever be another leader like David? Yes, the son of David. His name is Jesus and he is a better David than David could ever be. He came to be your shepherd, your hero and your king. In a 12-message audio series, Alan Wright takes you on a thrilling adventure with David in order to point you to the answer for your every need, the son of David. Discover how Christ enables you to face your biggest obstacles, deal with your fiercest persecution and live as an heir of grace. It's an audio series from Alan Wright. As our thanks for your donation, we'll be delighted to send you Pastor Alan's audio messages in either a digital download or a CD album format.
Son of David, shepherd, hero, king. The gospel is shared when you give to Alan Wright Ministries. When you give today, we will send you today's special offer. We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Alan Wright Ministries. Now we are in our final days of offering this special product. Call us at 877-544-4860.
That's 877-544-4860 or come to our website, PastorAlan.org. Today's teaching now continues. Here once again is Alan Wright. It is the definition of who we are. If you want to see the heart of God, you see the heart of God in Jesus, who when He comes to the edge of Jerusalem and He looks out over the city that will persecute Him and flog Him and reject Him just as it has the prophets of old. What does Jesus do? Does He look down over it and say, you murderers, traitors, you fools, you disinherited.
No. He said, oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Yerushalom, Yerushalom. Oh how I have longed to gather you under my wings as a hen would gather her little chicks to bring her into the safety. In another place, the Bible says simply, He looked at Jerusalem and He wept and He said, oh that you would have known what makes for peace. He weeps because these are His own. The way in which we're transformed is by believing what God has said about us. We are His beloved children forever and forever and no amount of sin can ever pluck you from His hand. You might wander off to a faraway land.
You could squander your inheritance with prostitutes and pigs and I'm telling you, the moment you turn your face towards the Father, He runs to meet you and you might say, I'm not worthy to be called your son but He's going to throw the robe on your shoulders and say, my son, my son, He was dead and He's alive. Such is the love of God. And then David says, what is most passionate?
Absalom. Would that I had died instead of you. Every step of the way, David has been painting for us a portrait of the gospel and now we come to the moment of His deepest agony.
And do you see what he's saying? I wish that I could die so that Absalom could live. I wish I could die so that the traitor could live. But he could not. It could not be because here is the dilemma and this is an excellent vivid portrait of the dilemma of human sin and the holiness of God. If David were to die and Absalom were to live, Absalom would take the throne and this wicked liar would be on the throne. If Absalom were to take the throne and David were to die, there would be no justice that would be done. The story would be just as sad. But if David is going to live, then it becomes apparent Absalom is going to die.
You see it plainly. Somebody's going to die. The wages of sin is death. This great bitterness, this great hatred, this great seething unforgiveness, all of this, it has generated so much sin that somebody's going to die.
And so there is a huge dilemma. His father would like to die in his son's place but he cannot because he is the king and his son is wicked. And so we have the yearning heart of a father.
I wish there could be another way. He weeps for what could have been. He weeps for what didn't have to be. He weeps for the entanglement of sin. He weeps for all of the folly and all of the pain. He weeps for the future and he weeps and he says, oh that I would have died in your place. And I don't know what the conversation in heaven is at moments like this. But I just envision it this way. That the son of God turns to the father, the first person of the triune God, and the second person, the son of the triune God says to his father, I hear David weeping and saying that he wishes that he could have died instead of Absalom.
Is there nothing that can be done? And the father turns to the son and said there will one day. And he says, David, this king, he longed to die for those who betrayed him, but he could not. But there will be a day, son.
There will be a day. And so it was a thousand years later in the fullness of time, a baby was born in Bethlehem, the city of David. And he came to be a shepherd who would love with a shepherd's heart, who would feed the poor and minister to the helpless. And he came as a hero who would fight the unseen Goliath. And by the finger of God would cast out evil. And he came as a king. But he would approach Jerusalem and he would look out over that city and he would weep just like David. And he would go to that same mount of olives amongst those gnarled old trees, the same trees that David had wept by. And there he would sweat blood. And he would say, father, could this cup pass from me? This cup of suffering, the cup of sin and poison, the cup that contained the fuming foaming vile sin of Amnon and the wicked bitterness of Absalom and all of the murderous instincts and all the betrayal and every unclean thing and that cup of wickedness, could this cup pass from me, father?
But not my will, yours be done. And he set his face resolutely towards the cross. And the reason that Jesus took the cross is because Jesus is the son of David. And when David wept and said, would that I had died in Absalom place, Jesus, he sweat blood and Gethsemane and he said, not my will, but yours be done.
Father, let it be that I would die in their place. And this time he hung on the tree, not by accident, not by beautiful hair, but by the beauty of his holiness. And there he was pierced in the side and the blood flowed so freely because he had chosen this moment. Oh, Absalom, Absalom, oh, that I had died in your place. Oh, Absalom, Absalom, oh, Allen, Allen, oh, beloved, oh, beloved, oh, oh, world that I would die in your place. And Jesus did.
And this story, our ultimate story, our big story has a completely different ending. Whereas Absalom died that day, we who were dead in our transgressions through the death of Jesus, we have been made alive because God who is rich in mercy has forgiven us by reckoning the death of Jesus to be our own death and by reckoning the righteousness of Jesus to be our own righteousness so that the love of God that never ends and that has longed for all eternity to have you close to home would be shed abroad in your heart forever. Such is the love of God. And that's the gospel.
Allen Wright. And today's teaching, Oh, Absalom, Discovering the Father's Love. Want some giants to slay? Need some encouragement in the midst of a trial?
Wondering if God really cares? Meet David. Who can compare to him? He was the ruddy, handsome, youth-tending sheep, writing psalms and worshiping God in the humble Bethlehem fields. He was the lone Israelite brave enough to decapitate Goliath and the sole warrior adept enough to cut off the scourge of the Philistines.
He was the stately king who established peace, expanded the borders and reigned in prosperity for 40 years. Who else could be a gentle shepherd, a glorious hero and a noble king? Would there ever be another leader like David? Yes, the son of David. His name is Jesus and he is a better David than David could ever be. He came to be your shepherd, your hero and your king. In a 12-message audio series, Allen Wright takes you on a thrilling adventure with David in order to point you to the answer for your every need, the son of David.
Discover how Christ enables you to face your biggest obstacles, deal with your fiercest persecution and live as an heir of grace. It's an audio series from Allen Wright. As our thanks for your donation, we'll be delighted to send you Pastor Alan's audio messages in either a digital download or a CD album format.
Son of David, shepherd, hero, king. The gospel is shared when you give to Allen Wright Ministries. This broadcast is only possible because of listener financial support. We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Allen Wright Ministries. We are in our final days of offering this special product. Call us at 877-544-4860. That's 877-544-4860.
Or come to our website, pastorallen.org. Someone's listening right now and they say, but Allen, you don't know. I've blown it big time. I've gone so far.
I've gone too far. What would you say in light of today's teaching? If you can see David and watch his love for Absalom, who Absalom had lied, was traitorous, was murderous, would have wanted to destroy David and his kingdom and take it over, and you watch David weep, you watch David's heart, you watch him say, I would have died in your place. If you can get a picture in your mind of that, you have come to the edge of the gospel wherein you can see the heart of Father God.
He's the one who said, would that I could die in your place, and he did. There is no distance from God that is too great for his love. His love reaches farther than we can imagine. Yield to his love. Let him love you and let him fill you because God's love is a father's love and it never goes away. Today's good news message is a listener supported production of Allen Wright Ministries.
