You know, when the Bible says, do not grow weary in doing good, it's saying, you know, Satan's going to try to. Give you battle fatigue.
Well, you get tired of resisting. This is why some of the parents just roll over to their kids, they get tired. This is why we see Otherwise, decent people in government have a stalwart stance against the absurd, and the next thing you know, they're just drinking the Kool-Aid with everybody else. Who has got the nerve? to stand and guard their bean field To the end.
Yeah. This is 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.
But for now, let's join Pastor Rick in the book of 1 Samuel chapter 16 with today's edition of Cross-Reference Radio. 1 Samuel chapter 16 will take We'll begin in verse 14 to the end of the chapter. David meets Saul. I hope I'm not overly confident. But I feel like I know this guy saw so well.
And you may feel the same way. Um not that I'm overly confident that you know him too. And uh There are other characters in the Scripture you could at a glance you know them. will come to them, Absalom being being one of them. But as we look at Saul, I don't know how useful such a study is going to be because we're going to be talking about the.
evil spirits that are harassing him, and it is all his own doing. There are those people in life that we meet and in the beginning we have such hopes of a great relationship.
So many good things to come out of it, especially with God as Christians. Only to find out that you turn out to be enemies. Or potential enemies. And that is the story this evening because David's going to enter the court of Saul thinking this is going to be just a wonderful time. And it it will turn out he will be fighting for his life.
and uh he had already stood before one great and good man, Samuel, and was anointed And any y a man can be great and not good. History has many of such characters. I think Mark Twain was a was a great man in his field. He wasn't a good man, in that he was a blasphemer.
Now David's going to stand before a man that's not so good and that is not so great.
Some 10 verse 4 The wicked is proud. in his countenance, does not seek God. God is in none of his thoughts, and that's where Saul ends up. God is just an obstacle, something to overcome. God is something that Godly people bring in, and you have to try to sidestep it to get what you want done.
And those kind of people end up having God turning them over to their own passions, their own sin. And now we look at verse fourteen. But the spirit of Yahweh departed from Saul, and a distressing spirit. from Yahweh troubled him, Well, the writer, be it Samuel or other contributors who ever put this together, this is deliberate. Verse fourteen is connected to verse thirteen, where we read, Then Samuel took the horn of oil And anointed him, that is David, in the midst of his brothers, and the Spirit of Yahweh came upon David from that day forward.
So Samuel arose and went to Ramah.
Well, again, verse 14 is in contrast to that. The spirit of Yahweh departs. From King Saul, after God had put so much into him, invested so much in this man, A question for Saul. How can God bless where God is not honoured?
So are you not honoring? God I mean, if you were his friend which he probably had no close friends. But if you were his friend, and you say, Saul, how can God honor your life, even though he's called you to such a great work, if you're not honoring him? At what point does God become insulted? He probably would just dismiss the question, wouldn't even care about it, and go on to do whatever he was going to do, because that's how chaps like him do business.
Saul made it impossible for God to bless him. But you can't You can't beat the Lord. There is just no way. No longer can God give Saul the victories and the successes that he already enjoyed. Yet evidences of God blessing him on the battlefield.
I mean, it doesn't get any more intense than that. One of the most. Dramatic experiences in in humanity is combat. 1 Samuel 14, verse 48, and he gathered an army. and attacked the Amalekites, and delivered Israel from the hands of those who plundered him.
And in that section he went on to tell about other exploits of Saul. But now that's all going away because God's Spirit is departing from him.
Now he becomes irrational. Senseless? Devilish. When Paul wrote to the Galatians, he says, Oh senseless Galatians They'd not yet become devilish maybe they never did. We don't have any more of the story, but it would be the first step.
Towards heightened demonic activity in human lives to be exposed to such righteous deeds of God. only to end up spitting on them. In practice, in fact, Indeed?
So Satan now will become the dominant influence in Saul's life. And anyone under the canopy of influence of Saul will suffer. Whatever he touches turns to pain. That's one of the great lessons of the Bible is holding up before us, that when we walk away from such a consideration as this, be it in a in church sitting or in our private time, we walk away and those those these things get into our head so that they stay with us through life as guardrails. and opportunities to rescue others.
Maybe you know a Saul. Maybe it's an early stage and you could still get to them. Or maybe they're in the advanced stages of this type of behavior, and there's nothing you or God or anyone can do for them.
So he lost his special benefit of having power with God, which again allowed him to subdue his enemies for the sake of the nation, which he was called to he was called to this position for the people. And not only was there no longer any joy in his light, but there was darkness now. He wasn't just a sour puss. At darkness was If I can say it this way. Flashing out.
Darkness really doesn't move, does it? Light moves. Evil lurked. and therefore it matured in him. Again, these are the early stages.
By the time we get to chapter 18, it just goes, it takes off down the runway. He begins trying to kill a godly man for no other reason than He didn't like that the godly man was godly and God was blessing him. In Luke chapter 22, verse 3, we read: Then Satan entered Judas, surnamed Iscariot. who was numbered among the twelve. Here is Saul numbered among Those who had great opportunity by the hand of God numbered among those anointed by great the great Samuel.
Only for him. to have Satan harass him and influence him to the point where Saul became a devil himself.
So it only worsens for him And poor Jonathan, his son, the crowned prince, such a godly man, stuck with this father. Where could he go? Where could John? There's nothing he could do. He could not.
And when it when things start getting really out of hand, he can't side with David. The culture, the society, the days that he lived in, would not have permitted that, not without awful consequence. And so he went down with the ship, That's what happened to Jonathan. But he went up to heaven. In 1 Samuel chapter 18, we will read.
Now Saul was afraid of David because Yahweh was with him, but had departed from Saul. And there it is again. Instead of going to God and saying, Lord, can I have some of this? He turns against those whom God has given himself to. Going so far as Soliciting.
employing, paying for The powers of Satan, that all the Jews knew was Satanic. To go to a witch and ask her the future was evil on its highest level, and yet he does it. In fact, he was the one that outlawed the witches in the land to begin with. Deuteronomy, they sacrifice to demons, not to God. To gods they did not know, to new gods, new arrivals that your fathers did not fear.
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had no respect for the fake gods around them. These Johnny come lately's that were being created by people they had zero respect for. And the Jews were to carry that also in their hearts, of zero re tolerance and respect for fake gods. And then we, but Saul knew this, it was ingrained in him. as it would be have been with all the Jews.
1 Samuel twenty eight, fifteen.
Now Samuel said to Saul, Why have you disturbed me, bringing me up? We'll get to that whole story when we get to chapter 18. It's going to be exciting. Uh but anyway Now Saul answered, I am deeply distressed, for the Philistines make war against me, and God has departed from me, and does not answer me any more. Neither by prophets nor by dreams, therefore I have called you, that you may reveal to me what I should do.
Okay, here's what you should do. First off, what you shouldn't have done. is go to the witch. But God wouldn't answer you, so you're going to sidestep God. Because you're gonna get what you want for you.
This is what made this man so evil. It wasn't he didn't care what God wanted. He wanted what he wanted. He'd use God to do that if it would work. If it didn't work, well, we'd go to Plan B.
And we see Christians do this, people, these professed Christians, under pressure. They will turn. Uh you know, working on another topical. I don't know if it'll happen. but I'm going to spill some of the beans.
I'd noticed. that a lot of parents who become strong in the faith. end up being corrupted by their own children. They're whining and complaining about God and restrictions and holiness and righteousness and being separate from the world, and they complain and whine till the parents begin to say, Oh, I see you have a good point. The only point they have is on their head.
It's a horn growing. There is no point. They go off to the universities and they come back and they convert their parents to what? And we're supposed to be good with this. And they keep pecking and pecking, and the parents don't shut them down, and they become converts.
It is a perversity. A parent needs to learn to draw a line in the sand and say, as for me in my house. Regardless of what the others in my house may do, as for me, I am not taking one step away from the Lord. As much as I love you, I will not. Turn on God.
That kind of stuff elevates some children. And in time. hopefully will draw the others back, but to appease them It is perversity, and have seen it over the years more times than I care to number. They'll even, sometimes the child will even go to a goofball church and then draw the parents off with them too. Such is life.
It says a distressing spirit from Yahweh troubled him, a demon, a demonic spirit. Menaced Saul From all from what we can tell. from the outside, not from the inside. He does not appear to be demonically possessed, but he is most definitely harassed. That does not mean he is saved.
There is no scriptural evidence. That a demon indwells all we know that they cannot dwell believers. There the Holy Spirit takes up residence. But we can be harassed by Devils, and we can be harassed by people who have devils. We can be harassed by simply carnal people.
We can be harassed by Christians with kind of dim wits. Yeah. We can be harassed by ourselves because we're dealing with sometimes too.
Well, you you, uh not me, you you understand that. The Holy Spirit. Having withdrawn from Saul, Left him without the necessary defenses a human being has to have. When Paul said we don't wrestle against flesh and blood, he wasn't just suggesting this. I'll get to a quote from Colossians along these lines as we move through.
This chapter There are several New Testament occasions where God turned over. People who professed to be saved He turned them over to the devil, to demons. For judgment, for correction, hopefully. Acts chapter 5. But when a certain man named Ananias and Sapphire with his wife sold a possession and kept back part of the proceeds, his wife also being aware of it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the apostles' feet.
Okay, so we pause there.
So so Ananias and Sapphire said, we're going to sell this land, we're going to give all the money to the church. Then they get the money in their hands.
Well, you know what? We're going to give half. But everybody going to think we're going to you know, we're really these big big time Believers But Peter Of course now Peter has this discernment from the Holy Spirit. Peter said, Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit to keep back part of the price of the land for yourself? And the consequences were We're capital.
And there are the The God in the fledgling stages of the Church would not tolerate such behavior. And we like to remark, if God still struck Liars in church dead, there'd be few people in churches. For a lot of reasons. One, we'd be too afraid to go. First Timothy chapter one.
This charge I commit to you, O son Timothy. according to the prophecies previously made concerning you. that by them you may wage the good warfare. Don't be distracted from that. War is out there, but this is the good one, the one for the gospel.
He continues, having faith and a good conscience. which some having rejected concerning the faith have suffered shipwreck.
Now Saul was this type. Saul's conscience was eating at him at times, which would account for some of his outbursts of violence. There was more going on, but that was part of it. Paul Probably not even thinking of Saul while he's writing this, is saying that having faith and of good conscience, some have rejected. Concerning the faith, and they suffered shipwreck as a consequence for that.
And he goes on because it's spiritual now. It's not changing like baseball teams. You know, I used to be a Dodgers fan, but now I dodge that team, and I like this team. All right. Just want to see if you're awake.
So, anyway, this is Not Like changing teams in the world. This is spiritual. And then Paul adds: after the shipwork wreck comment, immediately after, he says, of whom are Hymeneus? And Alexander. whom I delivered to Satan, that they may learn not to blaspheme.
It cut em off, fine. No more prayers for you, no more attention. Let Satan have you because that's what you want.
Okay, go with him. And maybe Maybe there's the hope of you realizing The folly of your decision. You come back.
So he turns them over. He talks about widows who are in the faith and need to marry the younger ones. And he says, For some, in 1 Timothy chapter 5 now, have already turned aside after Satan.
Well, he's seducing them. He's luring them away with something. Using their flesh.
So for Saul henceforth severe bouts of depression, Irrationale. Anger. Violence, paranoia, delusion, full blown delusion. This spirit again will flash out against David in an attempt to kill him. Either David was really that bad of a musician.
Which he was not. For Saul was that delusional, Again, 1 Samuel 18, verse 11, Saul cast the spear, for he said, I will pin David to the wall. But David escaped his presence twice. It's a little we don't it is it either.
Somewhere between fourteen and twenty four times Saul tried to kill David. Depends on how you count the events. Crazy, David doesn't know he's in for this. At the time, at this section here, where they're discovering how depressed Saul is. With the spirit.
David's out in the field with the sheep. And Life is, you know, not so bad there. Anyway, this spirit would initiate and aggravate Saul to the point of Violence and these other actions that went with it. I suspect there may have been alcohol that helped trigger these things, though it's not explicitly stated. Or implied, but we know how.
People did business then. We know how they do business today. And that would not be. Outside of it. Not that alcohol is the culprit, but There are things that certainly Aggravated the situation in the settings that they were in, like Saul's tent in his court.
There would be Of course those uh opportunities to have your cup filled with wine throughout the evening. Anyway. The world would diagnose Saul as a manic, depressive. Individual that was insane. God scoffs at that.
God says no, he has a demon. messing with him, Messing with his mind and his head, and you can't x-ray and find it, you can't take a blood test and discern it. It's there. You look at his actions, you listen to what he says. If it goes against what I say.
Both in action and word. You've got some serious problems. Again, that's the whole thing behind Ephesians 6. When Paul says we don't wrestle against flesh and blood, he's not saying it's only Christians, he's saying humanity. Has to wrestle with these demonic forces, whether they know it or not, believe it or not.
Satan doesn't ask, do you believe me? Because if you don't believe me, I'll leave you alone. He harasses everybody. He hates the believer and the unbeliever alike, although he hates the believer even more. And so with little remaining to prevent Satan From Attacking Everything that was godlike in this man and around this man, and that's what it comes down to.
We'll find as we move through the man, the life of Saul, anything connected with God, he went against. And that's just not normal. There's demonic activity there. This is a It was so in the final days of Judas Iscariot. God gave Christ gave him years to get that corrected, and he didn't take it.
This is the case in Romans chapter 1. Thrice, three times, we hear Paul say. God also gave them up to uncleanness. God gave them up to vile passions. God gave them over to a debased mind.
He gave them over. Fine, if this is what you want, here you go. We're looking at it in Washington, D.C. We have a whole house that's white and God has given them over to their vile passions. A few doors down is a couple of other buildings which is going on the same thing is going on.
You know, when the Bible says, do not grow weary in doing good, it's saying, you know, Satan's going to try to. Give you battle fatigue.
Well, you get tired of resisting. This is why some of the parents just roll over to their kids, they get tired. This is why we see Otherwise, decent people in government have a stalwart stance against the absurd, and the next thing you know, they're just drinking the Kool-Aid with everybody else. Who has got the nerve? to stand and guard their bean field To the end.
Those who have the Word of God so attached to their hand that they can't let it go. and one of the great stories of The Book of Kings and Chronicles. Question When God departs from the heart, That he invested in. What is left? What happens?
There's a vacancy there. There's a void. And the answer is this here again in verse fourteen. And a distressing spirit from Yahweh troubled him. That's what happens when God invests in you and you trample it.
I don't mean struggle with it. David struggled with obedience. He struggled with. obeying God from time to time. But he never, ever wanted it to be that way.
If you could have just given him the power over the flesh that none of us have in full. David never would have committed those things. I mean, just read the sixteenth Psalm and you just get another insight into how this man thought, David, how he thought.
Now you look at Saul's Psalm. Oh wait. He doesn't have one. He's so disconnected from God, who had time for him to sit down and express any passion for God.
Well Anyway, the distressing spirit From the Lord. The Old Testament is notorious. for presenting God's sovereignty in this way, that what God permits He is often said to do, but it's not his will, his direct will. There's God's permissive will, there is his perfect will. His perfect will can't be touched.
I don't care what you do, you're not going to pray to God to get him to keep the sun from rising the next day. That is his perfect will, and no anyone going to do anything about that. But there are other things that God will just allow for various reasons. They're all over the board. And this is one where he says, fine.
And the reason why it's worded this way is to tell us God is sovereign. This is not a master stroke of Satan on Saul. God is in control. And these things will behave the way He permits them to behave for His divine purposes. It has to be this way if He is to extract from humanity people who genuinely want Him versus those who really can't be bothered.
or don't want him on his terms. Isaiah 64.
So I will choose their delusions. And bring their fears on them. Because when I called no one answered, and when I spoke they did not hear but they did evil before my eyes, and chose that which I do not delight. Who did this, God? The people that were claiming Yahweh as their God.
They really weren't interested. I don't mean struggling. They just weren't interested. They say they were. And so to those under the government of God, They are protected.
And Satan is not able to break free from his sovereignty, though he tries. And if he cannot... Break free from God's sovereignty, He will try to convince you that He can. And the result is Confusion, perplexity, and where there is confusion, there is weakness. Yeah.
Um 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 crossreferenceradio.com. Here, you can also listen to interviews with Pastor Rick to learn more about his life and ministry.
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