His sons were probably the ones extorting the people, but Eli was eating what they extorted.
So the greatest tragedy his day was not the loss of the Ark, but what it meant. It meant there was no fellowship with God, that the people had lost their relationship to their God. And all of this bloodshed was unnecessary and it was their fault fault. And God cannot be carried into battle for victory. That's relic worship.
God carries us into battle, but we can't carry Him into battle. If you can carry God, you're not carrying God. Yeah. You're listening to Cross-Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher, Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel, Mechanicsville.
Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of 1 Samuel. Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about cross-reference radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. And now here's Pastor Rick in 1 Samuel chapter 4 with today's edition of Cross-Reference Radio.
So they say, what's up with that? And they send out scouts, and now they're terrified. This is the same, well verse 7.
So the Philistines were afraid. For they said, God has come into the camp, and they said, Woe to us, for such a thing has never happened before. Oh, don't worry, mister Philistine. This is all bark. These guys have no bite.
They departed Yahweh a long time ago. And he's not going to be with them. How shameful!
So you can have Christians that have all this excitement. But no ability to communicate the word of God. That's where the battle is, and sharing our faith.
So The fruit of obedience oftentimes creates a respect, a reverence. 2 Chronicles. I have. My computer doing things up here. There we go.
All right. Second Chronicles chapter seventeen. Mm verse I'll take verse 9. This is a very beautiful passage.
So they taught in Judah and had the book of the law of Yahweh with them, And they went throughout all the cities of Judah and taught the people. And the fear of Yahweh fell on all the kingdoms of the lands that were around Judah, so that they did not make war against Jehoshaphat. Isn't that not a beautiful ideal? Give the people the word, make them strong in their faith, and the enemies will have the fear. But when you turn it into a circus, it all goes away.
You say, well, that's the Old Testament. We come to the New Testament and they continued steadfastly. Fastly in the Apostles doctrine, the teaching, the Word, again paramount. And fellowship. Yeah.
What good is the word of God if you never get around people? It's it's like having, you know, a nice new outfit and no mirror. I mean, you just can't even enjoy.
Well, certainly much more than that, but. You get the point. It's like, what a waste. Anyway, they continued in fellowship. You've got to be around other believers.
That's a commandment of God. Don't be A-W-O-L. Don't be out of formation. Beware the action is. In breaking of bread, they they ate together.
We celebrate the communion. And in prayers, okay, that's what the early church was doing right at the beginning. Peter, incidentally, we find Peter such a man of prayer. Every time he shows up in the book of Acts praying, he meets every time of prayer of the Jew. I don't know, 9 a.m., 12 a.m., 3 p.m.
The Holy Spirit's making a statement with that, that Peter became a real man of prayer.
Well, that has nothing to do with our story tonight. Verse 43, though, continues in Acts chapter 2. Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done throughout. uh through the the apostles. And so here in the New Testament, we have the Holy Spirit saying to us, Listen, when my word is honored, my people follow the word, I bless.
And the enemy starts thinking twice about being the enemy. We have it almost here. It almost happens here. Oh, they got the Ark of the Covenant, but they don't know. This is just.
It's a false alarm. We look at Israel today, and you just have to say, are they crazy as the people? We see the Jews so often voting into power people that hate them. Deuteronomy twenty eight, twenty eight may answer that for us. Yahweh will strike you with madness.
and blindness and confusion of heart, He will strike you with insanity. That's what it says. If they turn from him and that's what they're doing, they just don't want to hear it. And you're just you know, you're just at a loss, you can't explain it. the mystery of lawlessness.
Says here in verse 7, for they said, God. For they said, God has has come into The camp. Again, no real cause to worry if they knew what we knew because This is a great opportunity that is going to be lost. Verse 8, woe to us who will deliver us from the hand of These mighty gods, these are the gods who struck the Egyptians with all the plagues in the wilderness.
So they knew the story just like Rahab knew the story of the Jews. And they believed it was a battle between the gods. You say, how did they find this out?
Well, today, how many documentaries are there from wars past of you get the enemy side of the story. And it just is not uncommon. As the years rolled by, people lived together, they'd tell their side of the story, and Samuel picked it up and it became published. And God, of course, the author of at all. But the unbelievers, they remembered God's Victories And even if the believers did not cherish them, they feared them, but this was all going to be lost.
and uh to this tragedy. Because uh The basics were forsaken. Verse 9.
So this is now now this is very important. This is the Philistine commanders telling their troops what we're supposed to be telling our troops. Be strong and conduct yourselves like men, you Philistines. that you do not become servants of the Hebrews, As they have been to you, conduct yourselves like men and fight. That's what your flesh says.
Don't give in to the Spirit, fight it. What about Israel? What is their comeback to this?
Well In Deuteronomy twenty, God Gave the Jews A manual on how to approach war, and he says this: So it shall be when you are on the verge of battle. That the priest shall approach and speak to the people and say to them, Hear, O Israel, today. You are on the verge of battle with your enemies. Do not let your heart faint. Do not be afraid.
Do not tremble or be terrified because of them. For Yahweh your God is He who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies, to save you. See, the spirit has its moves too. How come we don't read of Hophni and Phineas doing this? Because they don't believe it.
This was nothing to them. God was a trinket. And so the enemy, he advances to the conflict with the words of their leaders ringing in their ears. But the Jews have nothing at this point. That's why we love when David gives his speech to Goliath.
And first he gives it to Saul. Who is this Philistine who so dares blaspheme the Lord? And then he goes and said, yeah, the buzz is going to eat you, buddy. I mean, you come at me with a spear and a sword. Watch what happens to you.
and Goliath, of course, lost his head.
So But David found it. Yeah. What a lesson for us. You know, if you're reading this and you say, you know, the enemy's got their moves too, and this is the proper speech to give. I don't know if it was Patton, I don't remember.
I remember when it was in a gymnasium in the Marine Corps. to give your enemy the best chance possible to give his life for his country. And I like that. I didn't want to give my life for anything. If I could avoid it.
I wanted to give the other guy a chance. This is just generous.
Well, anyway. What about the New Testament? Pastor to the congregation. 1 Corinthians 16, verse 13, watch, stand fast in the faith. Be like men, be strong.
That's what Paul says. It's usually translated, be brave, but it's in the masculine tense. Because of that, we on we all on we all get that, we all understand that. And If the world is ready to spend its blood, the blood of their youth on the battlefields of the world for their causes, we are supposed to be ready to spend ours for Christ against the work of the devil. How much more, and the church has over history.
We talk about so many problems in the church, don't we? What people do wrong, you know, give me the music, not the word, but. There's also a lot of good. And that's why we quote the martyrs and we refer to many of the reformers who had just a a tremendous enemy against them that they came out of.
Well, Samuel, in the seventh chapter, when we get to Samuel, listen to his words. To the people, because he's going to deal with the shame in Israel and get things closer to where they need to be. Then Samuel spoke to all the house of Israel, saying, If you return to Yahweh with all your heart, Then put away the foreign gods and the Ashtareths from among you. Pause there. See, Samuel is telling us.
Through his speech to the people, what they were doing at the time they lost this was 20 years later, he's talking to them, but still. The Asharettes, the paganism is is they're infested with this stuff. And he is the one that's going to start addressing it. And so he says, Prepare your hearts for Yahweh and serve him only. He will deliver you from the hand of the Philistines.
So the children of Israel put away the Baals and the Ashtareths and served. Yahweh only. And you say, well, why did they have them in the first place?
Well, the main part of the story is that they got rid of them. Verse 10.
So the Philistines fought, And Israel was defeated, and every man fled to his tent. There was a very great slaughter. And there fell of Israel 30,000 foot soldiers. This is a core. I mean, this is just a tremendous amount of blood.
Being shed. Many of them were farmers that rallied for war and never went home again. The Philistines fought like men obedient to their gods. And Around the ark. Of the covenant that was there, the ground must have.
had heaps of corpses all over the place, This is what it looks like when People name God but aren't serious about it, and having no regard for Him. Looking back at 1 Samuel 3, now the boy Samuel ministered to Yahweh before Eli, and the word of Yahweh was rare in those days. There was no widespread revelation, and this is the fruit. This is the outcome of this. You can go into places of this world where there is no true Christianity, and you can say, oof, man, look at the outcome of that.
Verse 11.
Well, you know, when you really get to see the outcome of no Christianity is when Antichrist is in power, but we won't get to see it. Verse 11.
Also, the ark of God was captured, and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phineas, died, as prophesied in chapter 2. Member of the Sam No, that's the unnamed prophet that first came and told Eli what was going to happen. Anyway, The Ark likely never returned to Shiloh. After this, We have some scripture later from Jeremiah's age. Jeremiah 7.
But go now to my place, which was in Shiloh, where I set my name at the first, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of my people Israel.
So again, God is saying they were wicked on this day, when they were battling it, they were wicked, his people. Jeremiah is using this event to say to the people in his age: listen, you're going around saying the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord is this, but God is saying, I don't need a temple. That's to help you. But if you don't appreciate it, I'll just leave it. Ezekiel gives us the departure of the Shekinah from the temple and how reluctant God was to leave, but he left.
And so 1 Samuel chapter 2, looking back again, and you will see my enemy in my dwelling place, despite all the good which God does for Israel. God is saying, They're going to defile it. It's happened twice, three times. It will happen when the Antichrist is in power. And the Jews think that he is the world's great peacemaker, and find out he's a monster.
So You shall see the affliction of the temple is another rendering of the Hebrew. Uh instead of uh this uh the Ark of the Covenant was captured here.
Well, uh sorry, in 1 Samuel 232. When you see the enemy in my dwelling place, you could translate it. And you see the affliction of my dwelling place. Verse 12, then a man of Benjamin ran from the battle line the same day and came to Shiloh with his clothes torn and dirt on his head.
Well, this unnamed messenger with ill tidings, of course, is shamed by it all, and as he's approaching, everybody knows it's like having a siren that this is not good news. with the dust enclosed torn. Verse 13, now when he came, there was Eli. sitting on a seat by the wayside, watching. For his heart trembled for the ark of God, And when the man came into the city and told it, All the city cried out, Well, we'll find out when we get to verse 18 that Eli is more concerned with the ark than he is his two sons.
He's ninety-eight years old now. Let's uh go on verse fourteen. When Eli heard the noise of the outcry, he said, What does the sound of this tumult mean? And the man came quickly and told Eli, So he tells the city folk dwellers first, or the village people, and then he goes, Eli inquires and What he was dreading is now taking hold of him. Verse 15: Eli was 98 years old, and his eyes were so dim that he could not see.
And so of course he was blind. Um being blind um Well, verse 16. Then the man said to Eli, I am he who came from the battlefield, and I fled. Today, from the battle line, and he said, What happened, my son? What happened is, I saw people slaughtered, and he's telling the story, verse 17.
So the messenger answered and said, Israel has fled before the Philistines. And there has been a great slaughter among the people. Also, your two sons, Haphni and Phineas, are dead. and the Ark of God has been captured. Where do you begin with bad news like this?
Which is worse. It's a very bad day. Israel flees? Israel is defeated. Thirty four hundred men are killed in the war.
More battles. And Israel gained 3,400 widows. Thereabout. Hofni and Phineas dead. The ark is no longer in possession of God's people.
It is in possession of the of the enemy. Second Timothy you know, the no nonsense of God. 2 Timothy 10 and 11. We get to this in Mark when we cover the unpardonable sin. Because here is illustrated for us.
This is Paul talking about how it's going to be when Antichrist comes. He says, And with all unrighteous deception among those who perish. Because they did not receive the love of the truth. that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion that they should believe the lie.
It's very powerful stuff. It should stir us to Pray whenever we can. for lost souls.
Souls that we know. Verse 18. Then it happened when he made mention of the ark of God that Eli fell off the seat backward. By the side of the gate And his neck was broken, and he died The man was old and heavy, and he had judged Israel forty years. The glory departed That was a human tragedy for Israel.
This was prophesied again in chapter 2 of 1 Samuel. The prophet said to Eli, Why do you kick at my sacrifice and my offering, which I have commanded in my dwelling place, and honor your sons more than me? Make yourselves fat. With the best of the offerings of Israel, my people.
Well, Eli is fat. I mean, he's saying it here. He got that way, as according to the prophet, from eating more than his share of what the people were bringing to offer. His sons were probably the ones extorting the people, but Eli was eating what they extorted.
So the greatest tragedy of his day was not the loss of the Ark, but what it meant. It meant there was no fellowship with God, that the people had lost their relationship to their God. And all of this bloodshed was unnecessary and it was their fault fault. And God cannot be carried into battle for victory. That's relic worship.
God carries us into battle, but we can't carry Him into battle. If you can carry God, you're not carrying God. First I like the references. You know, you get to hit them on the parts of the Bible. Ring in on this.
It's like the, you know, the angels in heaven saying, Amen, amen. When you get these cross references, when they line up so easily, then David said to the Philistine, You come at me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin. But I come to you in the name of Yahweh of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. And um Jeremiah seventeen The irony here of Eli breaking his neck, the high priest. It is symbolic.
It is a message in it. But they did not obey, nor incline their ear, but made their necks stiff. that they might not hear nor receive instruction.
Well, my pastor used to say, Blessed are the flexible, they shall not easily be broken, and he was right. Verse 19.
Now his daughter in law, Phineas' wife, was with child due to be delivered. And when she heard the news that the Ark of God was captured, and that her father in law, and her husband were dead, she bowed herself and gave birth. for her labor pains came upon her, Certainly the bad news, just uh and brought about a premature delivery, not too premature of a dentist. She was close to close to it anyway, verse 20. and about the time of her death the women who stood by her said to her, Do not fear, for you have borne a son.
But she did not answer, nor did she regard it. I'm smirking because whenever I talk about women and labor, I know the women are judging me. I know, you better get this right. You better not say the wrong thing about us giving birth. I just feel, I don't know that you're doing that, but I feel that, and I find it comical.
Anyway, or humorous, I should say. Uh This is terrible. Here she gets this news, and she's. About to die. And the ladies around her say, don't worry, it's a son.
Like, okay, this is still a blessing. What if it was a little girl? It would have not been a they wouldn't have said anything to her because that's how it was in those days. Everybody wanted a son to go make him work in the field and provide and protect. Verse 21.
They spoke those words to comfort her. They did something similar to Rachel. Verse 21. Then she named the child Ichabod. Saying the glory has departed from Israel.
because the Ark of God had been captured, and because of her father-in-law and her husband. Of course, Ichabod means inglorious. The glory is departed, it's gone. And so she's on her deathbed. She can hardly speak.
They tell her it's a boy, she doesn't acknowledge them. And then she just says Ichabod. She's just a commentary on everything that's going on around her as she's leaving this life. And the news about the temple, I mean the ark being taken, she appears to have been a godly woman. And Just like that.
She gets it all right. What everybody else seems to be missing, what Eli was missing, what Hopni and Phineas were missing, she gets it. We will read briefly one more time of Ichabod in chapter 14, but it's his brother, Ahitub. It says Ichabod's brother, and So I don't. That's all we get about him.
We don't know what happened. But what a terrible thing to name a child, you know. On the day you were born, or every birthday that comes around, just remember. Ugh. That you know, that's why Jacob changed the name of Benjamin, you know, son of my right hand, not son of sorrow.
Just don't put that on the kid. And you know, some parents can name some doozies on you. I think it was Guatemala. The government had to get involved. They were naming kids these outrageous sentences.
You know, things like, you know, my kid is much better than all the other kids in the neighborhood. That's what they were naming their kids, things like that. Hell, anyway.
Well, that's why you come to church Wednesday nights. You can hear little things like that, and then go Google it. And the gold, hmm, he's right again. Verse 22. And she said The glory has departed from Israel, for the Ark of God has been captured.
That's all we hear from her, and that's enough. Reluctantly, he departed, as Ezekiel 10 and Ezekiel tells us.
So the psalmists, not forgetting these things, is such an impact, you would think that over the ages that. You know, this the this would produce more righteousness. In so many. We who are born again, we love this stuff. Because we know it's true.
And we know God will remember that we love His Word because we love Him. That it's not meaningless, it's not being reduced to this, you know, we just love the story. But we connect it with Him. And the realities behind these things. And we try to apply it to our lives to bring Him glory.
The psalmist was doing the same thing when he, in the psalm, writes about this. He says, so that he, God, forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh. The tent He had placed among men. That speaks volumes. It's the dwelling place.
The tabernacle is the dwelling place of God that he put around sinners. That's what he's telling us. And then he continues: and delivered his strength into captivity. That is the ark, which was the emblem of his strength. and his glory into the enemy's hands.
He also gave his people over to the sword and was furious with his inheritance.
So this was the judgment. All that we've been reading about happening this day was a judgment of God. It continues in Psalm seventy eight, verse sixty three, The fire consumed their young men. And their maidens were not given in marriage, the priest fell by the sword. and their widows made no lamentation.
It's terrible. And so, if you are Jewish and you're reading this, you're supposed to say to yourself, what is my role? In This life to make sure I'm not on the receiving end of judgments. But then I'm on the giving end of blessings for God. And the Christian comes along, just as we'll do the same thing.
Both are supposed to tie it into Jesus Christ. Uh Thanks for joining us for today's edition of Cross-Reference Radio. This is the daily radio ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel, Mechanicsville, in Virginia. Currently, Pastor Rick is in the book of 1 Samuel. If you'd like to listen again to this or other messages or share it with someone you know, please visit crossreference radio.com.
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