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. It's like, look, I'm not interested in God or anybody. I just need to know what I gotta do here. It's just all about me.
He's so selfish, this man. He didn't care. What others felt, Samuel comes up. Why are you disturbing me? He says, I don't care about disturbing you.
I got a problem. I don't care that you're disturbed. 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. 1 Samuel 28 is the text Pastor Rick will be teaching from today on this edition of Cross-Reference Radio. When they say to you, seek those who are mediums and wizards. Who whisper and mutter Should not a people seek their God? Should they seek the dead on behalf of the living?
I said, this doesn't make any sense. God is speaking to them, God is saying this through the prophet. Seek, you know, tell those who are dipping and dabbing in seances and trying to contact the. Dead world. Tell them.
This is useless and wrong. And he says, Seek Samuel, bring up Samuel for me. It's always about him. Verse 12. When the woman saw Samuel, she cried out with a loud voice.
And the woman spoke to Saul, saying, Why have you deceived me? For you are Saul.
Well, I don't know exactly what triggered that, but I do know this: her shock and her fear at the sight of Samuel, who she doesn't really know it's Samuel yet. Indicates That she never experienced an appearance from somebody she was supposed to be calling up from the dead, or else, why be shocked? I mean, if she was used to this, oh yeah, Samuel or somebody. God, not the witch. Granted.
this request of Saul And God did what the witch could never do. God has every right, and He exercises that right from time to time to overrule where He is not permitted to rule. And aren't we glad? That's called sovereignty. God has the prerogative to interfere with anything he wants.
Joshua 24 tells a story about Balaam. Balaam tried to curse the Jews, but God kept interfering. But I would not listen to Balaam, God said. Therefore, He continued to bless you, so I delivered you out of his hands. Pharaoh's magicians, they brought up the frogs.
to the land They had this power because God allowed it. Exodus 8, verse 7. And the magicians did so with their enchantments and brought up frogs. On the land of Egypt. Why?
Why did God let them do this? To dramatize the superiority of Moses God in the next few moves. Satan has power. That's what God is saying. But he does not have almighty power.
is subject. There are real forces. In the unseen world, they are, I mean, the evil that takes place on earth. Satan is behind it. Exodus 8, verse 18, the duel continues to show down between Moses and the magicians.
Now, the magicians so worked with their enchantments to bring forth lice, but they could not.
So they relies on man and beast. Those are those biting bugs. And there's the point. God let them. Do a little bit, and then he shut it down, and that enhanced the victory.
It was supposed to, in the minds of the Jews. And it worked for Caleb and it worked for Joshua because they knew what God was capable of, and they didn't back down when they saw the giants. Plenty of football teams have not backed down when they've seen the Giants. Yeah, yeah. people who employ the spiritism Imagine that they are talking to the departed ones when they are really talking to demons.
Hell is very serious about this. And 1 Corinthians, Paul says, Rather, the things that the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God.
Now, sacrifice is not limiting it to a blood offering. It means their religion, their practices, it's encompassing. He says, and I do not want you to have fellowship with demons. That means you can. You can make contact with the demon world.
You just can't close it back up. They don't just leave. They're the rude guests. They just take over your house when you're still in it. That's what demon possession is.
Demon oppression. It's the next step, the preliminary step. Paul says, You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the Lord's table and the table of demons. Hell, it influences.
Very active again, again, amongst church going. Born-again Christians too, active. 1 Timothy chapter 4. Verse 1.
Now the Spirit. expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith. They were in the faith and they left the faith. That is what that means. And I don't care what your theology is, you can't undo that statement.
The word is apostasy. It's to fall away from.
Well, you can't fall away from that which you were not at, or with, or there. You have to be there to fall from it. And so, I mean, can you get fired from a job you didn't have? No, you cannot. He says, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons.
They teach, they're active, they influence. You don't have to know it's them. People don't wake up in the morning. I think I'm going to find out what demons would like me to think. What they do is they just start stepping away from God into the world.
Until finally they bump into the wrong group. And Paul is saying, I'm telling you this. God is telling me this. This is going to happen, and it's happening. The church is more apostate now, I think, than any time in history.
And the internet is the one driving. I'm not saying the internet is all bad. I mean, you get some good deals on the internet. can't be bad. There's also that evil side.
Verse 13, we got a ways to go. Better speed it up. It's amazing how slowly you can talk with an ear clogged. And the king said to her, Do not be afraid, what did you see? And the woman said to Saul, I saw a spirit ascending out of the earth.
So she doesn't say, Oh, that's Samuel. She doesn't recognize him. And she's not doing very well at her job. But she's going to get paid anyway. She's actually a nice person, she really is.
Uh but she's going to hell. And they're going to be actually nice people in hell because they aren't nice people with God. That's what it comes down to. You know, you can see people nice with pets and mean with humans. And that's just like, man, this is not right.
So I saw one bumper sticker today. My child has four paw paws.
Well, that's kind of creepy, lady. I wanted to say. That child was switched at birth. Yeah. Where'd you give birth at the veterinary anyway?
I mean, I'm sure she's just loving pets, and here I come with my criticisms. That's why people don't like me after a while. They won't shut up. Anyway, she's fear-stricken. Yeah.
It is so here here's Fear stricken Saul, telling her not to be afraid. He supposes that he can just deactivate God's law without consequence. She says, I saw a spirit descending out of the earth. The Hebrew term here, again, to translate this could have given us a little help, but nobody would be confusing here if they had. Been too literal.
The Hebrew word for spirit, I saw a spirit, is Elohim. Elsewhere translated God. Context is essential. We're now in the age of texting. If someone says, I can't, B, C, and we know they're saying because.
We know they're not referring to the birth of Christ because of the context, unless they say, Uh Christ has been here since, you know. Uh one B C The context means a lot. We practice it all the time.
So here it is the case, too. The use of the word Elohim. The idea is that she saw a divine to her. The spirit that came up was divine in authority, in appearance. It had that effect, and that's what she says.
I saw a divine come up. That's her testimony. Doesn't mean it's accurate. I like the people. What did you see when you died on the operating day?
I saw a bright light.
Well, I didn't die and I saw a bright light. You don't have to be so dramatic to see a light. I mean, you could just, okay, I don't accept their testimony. Yeah, they saw what they saw. That doesn't mean.
That somehow God was speaking to them. We don't see them turning to Christ and preaching the word of God. We see them going on interviews why, you know, they. Saw what they saw when they Felt they were dead on the operating table. Anyhow, God owns everything.
He rules everything. Isaiah 44. Verse 24: Thus says Yahweh, your Redeemer, and he who formed you from the womb. I don't want to make you feel loved. I'm serious.
And one who bought you back. I am Yahweh who makes all things, who stretches out the heavens all alone, who spreads abroad the earth by myself, who frustrates the signs of the babblers and drives diviners mad. Who turns wise men backward and makes their knowledge foolishness. You gotta love Isaiah, it is so intelligent in his writings. He talks about places and details, geography, science.
He just was a very intelligent prophet. Not that the other ones were dummies or anything like that, but he just had a broad vocabulary and understanding. And to hear it come out here, God using it, is quite remarkable. Isaiah 44:24 is what I was reading from. He continues in Samuel chapter 28, now, verse 14.
So he said to her, What is his form? And she said, An old man is coming up, and he is covered with a mantle. And Saul perceived that it was Samuel, and he stooped with his face to the ground and bowed down. Samuel is allowed by God, granted by God, to appear in his old form so that Saul can recognize him because Samuel is going to preach to him in a minute. I mean, he doesn't show up when Samuel was like 19.
I mean they would have been like who is that? And he's got the cloak on, evidently, you know, it's like the hood and the cape with a hood on it. Probably as he was older to keep warm, he kept this cloak close by.
So God can bring up someone at any stage in their life. The transfiguration of Moses and Elijah on Mount Carmel, I mean, they weren't nine years old. They were Adam, when God created Adam, He didn't create him, you know, a five-year-old. He created him as a grown man. He had, you know, I don't know if he had his wisdom teeth or not, but he had adult teeth.
So, this is the thing about creation. You look at, you know, when God created the universe, He created trees at a thousand years old if He wanted to. I mean you cut them up, look all those rings. He just made this yesterday. I mean, he's got moves.
Uh God can create something in a matured state. I don't have any problem with that. Again, if you have a problem with Genesis 1:1, it all falls apart for you, and you become like Saul.
So anyway, this shows that Uh to us, the living. that death is not an unconscious state. Jesus gave a parable. The participants in the parable were dead and gone, yet they were very much in dialogue. And we read of several of these in Scripture.
One, at the resurrection of Christ, Matthew 27, and the graves were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the graves after his resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many.
Well, again, they had to appear in a state that they would be recognized by those who knew them, or else the whole thing falls apart. Saul, here he bows only because he wants something. It's very insulting coming from him. Verse 15, Now Samuel said to Saul, Why have you disturbed me by bringing me up? And 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. It's like, look, I'm not interested in God or anybody. I just need to know what I got to do here. It's just all about me. He's so selfish, this man.
He didn't care. What others felt, Samuel comes up. Why are you disturbing me? He says, I don't care about disturbing you. I got a problem.
I don't care that you're disturbed. It's all about me, Samuel. Didn't you figure that out when you were living? God Here he is, not barred from speaking through these practices that he forbids. That's his overruling.
I'm forbidding witchcraft. But I'm gonna grant it on this occasion. I'm gonna I'm going to hijack it. I don't know if that's right. Not hijack.
I'm just going to take it over. How about that one?
So God forbids such practices. He's not restricted from them. I mean, the devil can't meet and say, Don't let God hear this. I mean if Satan is having a counsel with God he knows everything.
So it be just he rules everything and every part of everything. but they are the dead in a conscious state. And again, when Jesus used the parable to tell the truth, about after life with Lazarus and the rich man, He used the name Lazarus, a real person. And the purpose of a parable is to illustrate truth.
Well, you don't illustrate truth by using a lie and still have yourself marked down in the righteous column. And so when the Lord used that parable to illustrate his truth, It was a true story. That's the point. Here in verse. 15.
God has departed from me and does not answer me any more. Oh, again, we pity a man who's lost his sight or lost his health or his hearing. in one year. But what do we think about a man who's lost his God? You can't read the story without feeling some pity for Saul.
But then you say, wait a minute, what about his victims? And and then you quickly you you know see, well, that's you know. He no one put a gun to his head or a sword. Why have you disturbed me by bringing me up? This is interesting.
It indicates to me That the righteous dead. Want nothing more to do with this life. It's not like, wow, how's everybody been? It's like, I missed this place. Is that a new shirt?
He's just totally not interested. Like when Elijah and Moses on Mount Carmel, I mean, they didn't say, wow, this is the promised land. Moses didn't say, this is the promised land. He didn't. He didn't even look over at the guys.
Who are they? They just talk to the Lord about the coming crucifixion in such a way that the apostles would not forget and that added to their faith and service. Anyway, Samuel does not know the reason. Why is he summons? This indicates that the dead are not monitoring us, and I am very happy about that.
I mean, I don't look up, Mom, did you see that? I mean, no, she didn't see that. She doesn't care.
So I cringe whenever I hear a professed Christian say or hint. That they have dialogue with the dead. They should know better. I know it's tough. I know you lose a loved one.
I've been there. And it's just the draw is so powerful, but you gotta hang tough. Just redirect those to the Lord. Talk to Him instead. That's your defense.
The Lord is your shield and your buckler. Anyway, verse 16: Then Samuel said, So why do you ask me, seeing Yahweh has departed from you and has become your enemy? There it is.
Well, what? He says, why don't you get out of my face? Because you're now the enemy of God. And I don't want to be seen talking to you. This is I mean, who does the Bible say this to?
You mean God can say this to people? You are now an enemy. Yes.
Now there are pathetic souls that are not there. But there are others that are there. And this is being told to us by the Attendance, so the combination of witnesses, the witch and Saul's London. assistants, they're telling this story because Saul's going to be dead the next day. Verse seventeen.
And Yahweh has done for himself as he spoke by me, for Yahweh has torn the kingdom out of your hand and given it to your neighbor David. Nothing new that was told in 1 Samuel 15. Saul, in many ways, is a type of Satan. parallels us just right there. He had been endowed with a great honor, Israel's first king.
He lost his position by opposing God. And he sought to hold his influence by using force. In spite of God. That's what Satan did. is doing.
He's the god of this age, trying to retain power. And that's what Saul had done. And uh well we can Continue with many verses. Verse 18: Because you did not obey the voice of Yahweh, nor execute his fierce wrath upon Amalek. Therefore, Yahweh has done this thing to you this day.
And so there's more reasons. Just heaping the reasons on, including the one found in 1 Chronicles, is just more reasons why he has rejected. Your inability to listen to God. Saul felt obeying God was just overrated. He did.
Verse nineteen: Moreover, Yahweh will also deliver Israel. With you into the hand of the Philistines, and tomorrow you and your sons will be with me. Yahweh will also deliver the army of Israel into the hand of the Philistines. You'll be dead tomorrow. That's what he is telling him.
You'll be in Sheol, that is the abode of the dead, before the. crucifixion and Ascension of Christ to liberating the captives, as we read about, for example, in Ephesians 4. Uh Samuel does not Say which compartment is not for him to say. He said, You'll be dead tomorrow, you'll be in shield, the underworld. But he does not say whether he's going to be in righteous shield or unrighteous shield.
It's too general of a statement. And so, um, Ecclesiastes 3.
Solomon writes, All go to one place. All are from the dust. and all return to the dust. As a general statement, he says, Everybody dies. Of course, there are a couple of exceptions.
But the idea is that Samuel is not being specific. He is being general enough. At the very least you'll be dead to morrow. What did Saul get? from contacting the dead.
Death. That's what he got. He reaped what he sowed. Verse, I mean, the lessons are just amazing. Verse 20: Immediately Saul fell full length on the ground and was dreadfully afraid because of the words of Samuel, and there was no strength in him, for he had eaten no food all that day or night.
So he collapses because he's not ready. He's not ready to stand face to face with God, with eternity, with judgment. Amos 4, verse 12, Therefore, thus I will do to you, O Israel, because I will do this to you. Prepare to meet your God, O Israel. Comes a day of reckoning.
He's sick with dread. He collapses on the ground. He'll still be on the ground when we get to verse 23. He's not eating all day because he's sick with fear and dread. And this from wasted years of hunting a righteous man.
We never read of him repenting. We read of him being sorry, but not repenting before God. Oops, David, sorry, I shouldn't have done that to you. But he doesn't go to God and say, Lord, forgive me. Verse twenty one, neither did Judas Iscariot.
The woman came to Saul and saw that he was severely troubled, and said to him, Look, your maidservant will obey your voice, and I have put my life in my hands, and heeded the words which You spoke to me. Verse twenty-two.
Now therefore please heed also the voice of your maidservant, and let me set a piece of bread before you and eat, that you may have strength when you go on your way.
So here's the occultist with a kind heart. Her soul is lost, but she's still a nice person. Just because you're born again doesn't mean you're automatically going to be a nice person. We've got to fight for everything. We have to press into righteousness.
The flesh is not going to cooperate with you. Everything is a Fist fight down here. Verse 23. That's why Samuel wasn't interested. He's not interested in coming back.
Why did you disturb me? No fist fighting here. Verse 23, but he refused and said, I will not eat.
So his servants, together with the woman, urged him, and he heated their voice.
Okay, well, what is for dinner? And then he arose from the ground and sat on the bed.
Now the woman had a fatted calf in the house, and she hastened to kill it, and she took flour and kneaded it, and baked unleavened bread from it.
Well, there's no time to leaven the bread, that's why, you know, this is going to take a while. They didn't have refrigerators, of course, so they kept the animals alive, the the the you know, the calves and Other little animals, big ones too, but they could slaughter them. Abraham did this when he had visitors.
So The unleavened bread was the appetizer and the calf was the meal. It says the woman had a fatted calf. as I mentioned, lambs and kids and they slaughtered and s Served.
So that took time. He was in the house a while. You know, having a Poro Meat party. Verse 25.
So she brought it before Saul and his servants, and they ate. Then they rose and went away that night.
So the witch at Endor remains an example to us. of one who while doing good through human kindness, none the less did evil in defying God. She wasn't supposed to do this. She knew she wasn't supposed to do it. She admitted, You're trying to get me killed?
Saul's put these people out of it, you know. And yet She's doing it anyway.
So her defiance is against God, no matter how she treats humans. And she is remembered as the one who chose to be an accomplice. to him and his personal disobedience to God by seeking the underworld. The last The last recorded meal of Saul was in the kitchen of a witch. Let's pray.
How father? Again, we are So privileged to consider so many lessons. You have preserved this big book, the Bible. For us. to study and to be made stronger.
To avoid the influences from hell. and to be subject to the influences from heaven. And may we do a better job every single day of our lives because of your Holy Spirit. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen.
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 crossreference radio.com. Here, you can also listen to interviews with Pastor Rick to learn more about his life and ministry.
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