Latest / Sasquatch & Sourdough / S 2 Ep. 5 | King David Is Emo | The Haunted Palace of Saul, Prophecy & the Witch of Endor

Transcript

S 2 Ep. 5 | King David Is Emo | The Haunted Palace of Saul, Prophecy & the Witch of Endor · Sasquatch & Sourdough

0:09
SPEAKER_00: Well, welcome back to Stash Watch and Sourdough.
0:11
SPEAKER_00: I am your host, Christina, and guys, welcome to the holiday.
0:17
SPEAKER_00: It is the first week of November, and basically we are ushering in the holiday season.
0:23
SPEAKER_00: I don't know about you, but I'm super excited.
0:25
SPEAKER_00: I get to do a lot of cool things at church and basically build a new Christmas show.
0:31
SPEAKER_00: So I am already in Christmas since September.
0:34
SPEAKER_00: So that being said, welcome to the holidays.
0:37
SPEAKER_00: Guys, I thank you so much for tuning in.
0:39
SPEAKER_00: Um, if you're new here, uh the best way to get in touch is gonna be Instagram.
0:44
SPEAKER_00: Uh, you can find us on Instagram and send me a DM or send me an email.
0:48
SPEAKER_00: I've been getting a lot of emails lately and it's been really cool.
0:51
SPEAKER_00: So Sasquatch and Sourdough at gmail.com is the best way.
0:56
SPEAKER_00: I am so excited about this episode.
0:58
SPEAKER_00: So I'm not gonna spend a lot of time on the front end.
1:01
SPEAKER_00: Let's dive in.
1:05
SPEAKER_00: So recently this week, I went to First Wednesday prayer with something on my heart.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to create, I wanted to take pictures.
1:13
SPEAKER_00: God has given me a new, fresh love of photography again, and I was really excited to capture the worship experience.
1:23
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to just kind of feel the atmosphere in the room and run around and take pictures, and I was really excited about that.
1:30
SPEAKER_00: But God had something else for me to do that night.
1:33
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I would ordinarily just kind of run the pro presenter computer with joy and expectancy, but that night was very different.
1:47
SPEAKER_00: Something happened that I couldn't do what I had planned to do, and I became very bitter.
1:52
SPEAKER_00: It's a strange thing.
1:54
SPEAKER_00: Standing in a room full of people worshiping God and suddenly realizing that your own heart isn't in the right place.
2:01
SPEAKER_00: I was still serving, I was still doing what needed to be done, but I was so caught up in what I wanted to accomplish that I had begun to miss what was happening around me.
2:12
SPEAKER_00: And then I noticed a woman.
2:14
SPEAKER_00: I could see that she was wrestling with something during worship.
2:18
SPEAKER_00: There was something happening in her heart that I could possibly not understand, but God knew.
2:23
SPEAKER_00: And I felt the Lord asking me a question.
2:27
SPEAKER_00: Was taking the pictures I wanted to take more important than what he was doing in the room, was creating something beautiful more important than being available to minister to this woman.
2:40
SPEAKER_00: And there it was.
2:42
SPEAKER_00: God held up a mirror, a very welcome rebuke.
2:47
SPEAKER_00: Because sometimes God reveals things in our hearts that we didn't even realize were there.
2:53
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes the interruption isn't keeping us from the work.
2:56
SPEAKER_00: The interruption actually is the work.
2:59
SPEAKER_00: It's been thinking, I've been thinking about that night, and I've been thinking about creativity and worship and what happens when we become so attached to the thing we want to produce that we stop paying attention to the one we're producing it for.
3:15
SPEAKER_00: And I kind of got stuck in the prayer in Psalm 139.
3:20
SPEAKER_00: Search me, O God, and know my heart.
3:23
SPEAKER_00: It's a beautiful prayer, but it's also a courageous one.
3:28
SPEAKER_00: Because when we ask God to search our hearts, we have to be willing to see what he reveals.
3:34
SPEAKER_00: Which brings me to a shepherd boy, a musician, a poet, a prophet carrying a horn of oil, and a king living in a palace where something had gone terribly wrong.
3:47
SPEAKER_00: Now I know the title of this episode is King David is emo, and I promise we're going to get there.
3:53
SPEAKER_00: But first, we have to enter a very strange palace.
4:00
SPEAKER_00: There's something deeply unsettling about the story of King Saul.
4:04
SPEAKER_00: Imagine a royal court court, servants moving through the halls, soldiers standing guard, a king sitting upon his throne.
4:12
SPEAKER_00: Everything appears to be in its proper place.
4:15
SPEAKER_00: But something has changed.
4:17
SPEAKER_00: Something unseen.
4:19
SPEAKER_00: And unlike the haunted houses we sometimes explore on the show, the strange thing happening here isn't folklore.
4:26
SPEAKER_00: It's written into the biblical account itself.
4:30
SPEAKER_00: Saul was the first king of Israel.
4:33
SPEAKER_00: He had been anointed, he had experienced the Spirit of God, but Saul had repeatedly disobeyed the Lord.
4:40
SPEAKER_00: And eventually the prophet Samuel delivered a terrible message.
4:45
SPEAKER_00: God had rejected Saul from being king.
4:48
SPEAKER_00: Samuel grieved him.
4:50
SPEAKER_00: And I think that is very important.
4:52
SPEAKER_00: Because the prophets of Scripture weren't simply mysterious figures cloaked appearing out of nowhere to deliver supernatural messages.
5:01
SPEAKER_00: They were people who heard from God, called to speak his word, even when it was painful.
5:07
SPEAKER_00: And Samuel mourned what had happened to Saul.
5:11
SPEAKER_00: But in 1 Samuel chapter 16, God asked Samuel how long he will grieve since Saul has been rejected as king.
5:20
SPEAKER_00: Then comes the instruction: fill your horn with oil and go.
5:25
SPEAKER_00: God sends Samuel to Bethlehem, to the household of a man named Jesse.
5:30
SPEAKER_00: And I want you to hold on to that name, Bethlehem, because we're going to return to this little town before our story is over.
5:37
SPEAKER_00: Samuel arrives carrying a horn of oil.
5:40
SPEAKER_00: He's looking for a king, but God is looking at something Samuel cannot see, the heart.
5:47
SPEAKER_00: One by one, Jesse's sons pass before Samuel, and Samuel sees Eliab, a man whose appearance seems to suggest king.
5:57
SPEAKER_00: But the Lord tells Samuel not to look at his appearance or his height, because man looks at the outward appearance, the Lord looks at the heart.
6:07
SPEAKER_00: And one by one, the sons pass before Samuel.
6:10
SPEAKER_00: Until finally, Samuel asks if there are any more.
6:15
SPEAKER_00: And there is one, the youngest.
6:18
SPEAKER_00: He's out tending sheep, David.
6:21
SPEAKER_00: The future king of Israel isn't even in the room.
6:25
SPEAKER_00: He's somewhere outside doing the ordinary work of an ordinary day.
6:29
SPEAKER_00: And when David is brought before Samuel, the Lord tells him to rise and anoint him.
6:35
SPEAKER_00: Samuel takes the horn of oil and pours it over David.
6:38
SPEAKER_00: And scripture tells us that the spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward.
6:44
SPEAKER_00: A prophet hears from God, a shepherd is called in from the fields, oil is poured over his head, and the spirit of the Lord comes upon him.
6:54
SPEAKER_00: David has been chosen, but he doesn't receive a crown.
6:59
SPEAKER_00: He goes on living inside a story whose ending has he cannot yet see.
7:05
SPEAKER_00: And then in the very next verse, something extraordinary happens.
7:10
SPEAKER_00: The spirit of the Lord departs from Saul.
7:13
SPEAKER_00: And scripture tells us that a harmful spirit from the Lord torments him.
7:18
SPEAKER_00: Now that's a difficult passage.
7:20
SPEAKER_00: The text places even this troubling event beneath God's sovereignty, but it doesn't give us permission to diagnose every experience of suffering as demonic.
7:31
SPEAKER_00: What it does tell us is that Saul is deeply troubled.
7:35
SPEAKER_00: And the people around him recognize that something is very wrong.
7:38
SPEAKER_00: His servants suggest finding someone who can play the lyre, someone whose music might bring him relief.
7:45
SPEAKER_00: And one of them remembers a young man from Bethlehem, a son of Jesse.
7:50
SPEAKER_00: He's skilled with the instrument, he's courageous, he speaks wisely.
7:54
SPEAKER_00: And funnily enough, when I was reading through first Samuel, um, they often, like more than twice, describe him as ruddy and uh with beautiful eyes and very good looking.
8:08
SPEAKER_00: So let's keep that in mind.
8:10
SPEAKER_00: I love that those details made it through.
8:13
SPEAKER_00: So David is summoned to the palace, and wherever the harmful spirit comes, or whenever the harmful spirit comes upon Saul, David takes up his lyre and plays.
8:22
SPEAKER_00: And Saul is refreshed.
8:24
SPEAKER_00: The harmful spirits depart.
8:26
SPEAKER_00: Now just imagine that scene.
8:28
SPEAKER_00: The first king of Israel sits in his palace, troubled by an unseen spirit, and before him stands a young musician, a shepherd from Bethlehem, a man upon whom the spirit of the Lord has come.
8:40
SPEAKER_00: And he plays and the king finds relief.
8:44
SPEAKER_00: There's something almost gothic about that.
8:46
SPEAKER_00: The troubled ruler, the musician summoned into the royal court, the unseen spiritual conflict.
8:53
SPEAKER_00: I almost wonder if, like in my dark goth young days, hanging out in the cemetery, listening to the cure, I wonder if I had a book of Psalms, if that would have like cured me.
9:08
SPEAKER_00: Probably, but who knows?
9:09
SPEAKER_00: I was kind of definitely had scales over my eyes at that time.
9:14
SPEAKER_00: I mean, come on, I'm listening to the Smiths in the Graveyard.
9:19
SPEAKER_00: So there's another strange palace in scripture.
9:21
SPEAKER_00: Uh, we've actually covered this uh, I think a couple times in this uh podcast.
9:27
SPEAKER_00: In Daniel chapter 5, we did a whole series about this.
9:31
SPEAKER_00: King Belshazzar is holding a feast when the fingers of a human hand appear and begin writing upon the wall.
9:38
SPEAKER_00: That king was also terrified.
9:41
SPEAKER_00: Daniel is called to interpret the message, and the judgment of God is announced.
9:45
SPEAKER_00: Now that happens centuries later in a different kingdom.
9:49
SPEAKER_00: There's no mysterious handwriting upon Saul's wall, but the judgment over Saul's reign has already been spoken.
9:56
SPEAKER_00: And the man who will one day take his place is standing in front of him, playing music, ministering to him.
10:03
SPEAKER_00: David doesn't have to force the outcome, he doesn't have to seize the throne.
10:07
SPEAKER_00: For now, his assignment is simply to serve.
10:10
SPEAKER_00: And what God has placed in his hands is a liar.
10:15
SPEAKER_00: David's story doesn't remain quiet for long.
10:19
SPEAKER_00: Eventually, we find him standing before a giant, Goliath.
10:23
SPEAKER_00: And I know most of us have heard this story since childhood.
10:26
SPEAKER_00: But listen to the way that David speaks.
10:30
SPEAKER_00: He declares that the Lord will deliver Goliath into his hand, that the whole earth will know there is a God in Israel, and that the battle belongs to the Lord.
10:40
SPEAKER_00: That's pretty metal.
10:42
SPEAKER_00: David is a musician, a poet, a shepherd, but there's this extraordinary courage in him.
10:49
SPEAKER_00: He believes that God has called him and will be able to deliver him.
10:55
SPEAKER_00: And after Goliath falls, David's life begins to change.
10:59
SPEAKER_00: He becomes very successful in battle.
11:02
SPEAKER_00: The people celebrate him, and Saul becomes extremely jealous.
11:06
SPEAKER_00: The women sing about Saul's thousands and David's ten thousands, and something dark begins to grow in Saul's heart.
11:13
SPEAKER_00: Fear, jealousy, resentment.
11:17
SPEAKER_00: Until the king who once found comfort in David's presence begins to see him as a threat.
11:23
SPEAKER_00: Then comes one of the most disturbing scenes in the story.
11:27
SPEAKER_00: David is playing his lyre, just as he has done before.
11:30
SPEAKER_00: Saul is sitting nearby, but this time Saul has a spear in his hand.
11:35
SPEAKER_00: And while David plays, Saul attempts to pin him to the wall.
11:39
SPEAKER_00: David escapes.
11:41
SPEAKER_00: The music has become, or the musician has become the hunted.
11:45
SPEAKER_00: The palace where his gift once brought peace has become a place of danger.
11:50
SPEAKER_00: Saul tries to control David's future through military assignments and political arrangements intended to bring about his death, but David keeps escaping.
11:59
SPEAKER_00: Eventually, he flees to Samuel, the prophet who first anointed him, the man who would hear from God when nobody else knew David had been chosen.
12:11
SPEAKER_00: Saul discovers where David is hiding and he sends men to capture him.
12:15
SPEAKER_00: Now, this is where the story takes another extraordinary supernatural turn.
12:20
SPEAKER_00: Because when Saul's messengers arrive, they find a company of prophets prophesying, and Samuel is standing over them.
12:27
SPEAKER_00: Scripture tells us that the Spirit of God comes upon Saul's messengers and then they begin to prophesy as well.
12:35
SPEAKER_00: These men have been sent to arrest David, but instead they find themselves caught up in this extraordinary encounter with the Spirit of God.
12:44
SPEAKER_00: Saul hears about it and sends another group.
12:47
SPEAKER_00: The same thing happens.
12:48
SPEAKER_00: He sends the third group, and again they prophesy.
12:52
SPEAKER_00: Finally, Saul goes himself and the Spirit of God comes upon him too, and he prophesies.
12:58
SPEAKER_00: Now, scripture doesn't tell us what these men said.
13:01
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't tell us that they were predicting the future or delivering some specific message about David, but it does tell us that the Spirit of God interrupted what Saul was trying to accomplish.
13:13
SPEAKER_00: I find that very unsettling because here is Saul, a man who has experienced the Spirit of God before, a man who was has received prophetic instruction and yet he continues resisting what God has told him.
13:28
SPEAKER_00: That's dangerous.
13:31
SPEAKER_00: Experiencing something supernatural is not the same thing as having a heart surrendered to God.
13:37
SPEAKER_00: Prophecy isn't simply knowing something extraordinary, it's not merely having access to hidden information.
13:44
SPEAKER_00: Throughout scripture, God speaks to reveal his will, call people to repentance, and draw them into right relationship with himself.
13:55
SPEAKER_00: And the question is never only whether we have heard, it's whether we are willing to obey.
14:01
SPEAKER_00: David is learning that lesson in a very different way.
14:04
SPEAKER_00: Because his next home won't be a palace, it will be a cave.
14:11
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so this is the part of the story that I absolutely love.
14:15
SPEAKER_00: Um, David flees into the wilderness.
14:18
SPEAKER_00: I love the imagery of this because there's caves, forests, mountains, narrow escapes, a young man anointed to become king, living like a fugitive because the king wants him dead.
14:30
SPEAKER_00: Eventually, David reaches a place called the Cave of Adulam, and something remarkable actually happens.
14:37
SPEAKER_00: People begin coming to him, his brothers, his father's household.
14:41
SPEAKER_00: And then scripture tells us that everyone who was in distress, people that were in debt, everyone who was bitter, uh had bitterness in their soul and unforgiveness, gathered to him.
14:52
SPEAKER_00: About 400 men, and David became their commander.
14:57
SPEAKER_00: These aren't the people we usually imagine gathering around a future king.
15:01
SPEAKER_00: They're distressed, indebted, discontented.
15:04
SPEAKER_00: The people whose lives have completely fallen apart, and they gather around David.
15:11
SPEAKER_00: Not in a palace, but in a cave.
15:14
SPEAKER_00: And I have to tell you that reading this part of David's story, I could not stop thinking about Lord of the Rings.
15:19
SPEAKER_00: Because here's this young man who has been anointed to become king, but he doesn't have a throne and he doesn't have a crown.
15:26
SPEAKER_00: He's hiding in caves, moving through forests, fleeing across mountains, and gathering this unlikely fellowship of people who have nowhere else to go.
15:35
SPEAKER_00: 400 men.
15:39
SPEAKER_00: Except this isn't Middle Earth.
15:41
SPEAKER_00: This is the wilderness of ancient Israel.
15:43
SPEAKER_00: And David isn't waiting until he becomes king to start leading.
15:46
SPEAKER_00: He's already caring for people, already seeking the Lord, already learning what it means to carry the burden of others.
15:55
SPEAKER_00: The kingdom is still somewhere in the future, but the work God has given him is right here in front of him, in a cave, surrounded by broken people.
16:05
SPEAKER_00: And the prophetic hasn't disappeared from David's life either.
16:09
SPEAKER_00: The prophet Gad comes to David and tells him not to remain in the stronghold, but to go into the land of Judah, and David goes.
16:17
SPEAKER_00: Later, when he hears that the Philistines are attacking, he inquires of the Lord.
16:23
SPEAKER_00: Should we go?
16:24
SPEAKER_00: Will God deliver the Philistines into his hand?
16:27
SPEAKER_00: And the Lord answers.
16:29
SPEAKER_00: David's men are afraid.
16:30
SPEAKER_00: And so David inquires again, and again he receives direction.
16:35
SPEAKER_00: Later, David asks whether Saul will come and whether the people of the city will surrender him.
16:42
SPEAKER_00: And he leaves.
16:43
SPEAKER_00: David isn't simply following his instincts, he's seeking the Lord again and again.
16:48
SPEAKER_00: And notice something God doesn't give David a complete map of his future, he gives him direction for the next step, and David has to walk in it.
16:59
SPEAKER_00: Meanwhile, Saul is pursuing him throughout the wilderness.
17:02
SPEAKER_00: There are betrayals, there are narrow escapes, and at one point, Saul orders the slaughter of the priests at Nob because they assisted David.
17:11
SPEAKER_00: It's a horrifying act.
17:13
SPEAKER_00: In 1 Samuel 23, Saul nearly surrenders David or surrounds David.
17:18
SPEAKER_00: The two men are on the opposite sides of a mountain.
17:20
SPEAKER_00: David is trying to escape.
17:22
SPEAKER_00: Saul is closing in, and then a messenger arrives.
17:25
SPEAKER_00: The Philistines have attacked.
17:27
SPEAKER_00: Saul has to turn back.
17:29
SPEAKER_00: And the place becomes known as the Rock of Escape.
17:33
SPEAKER_00: David has been surrounded.
17:35
SPEAKER_00: The danger is real, and suddenly the pursuit is interrupted.
17:40
SPEAKER_00: Then comes another remarkable moment.
17:42
SPEAKER_00: In 1 Samuel 24, Saul enters a cave to relieve himself, and David and his men are hiding there.
17:49
SPEAKER_00: Now imagine that.
17:50
SPEAKER_00: The man who has been hunting you, the man who is trying to kill you, is suddenly standing in front of you, completely vulnerable.
17:58
SPEAKER_00: David's men see an opportunity.
18:01
SPEAKER_00: Surely this must be the moment.
18:03
SPEAKER_00: Surely God has delivered Saul right into David's hand, but David doesn't kill him.
18:08
SPEAKER_00: Instead, he secretly cuts off a corner of Saul's robe and immediately his heart troubles him.
18:16
SPEAKER_00: His conscience strikes him because Saul is still the Lord's anointed king at this point, and David refuses to take his life.
18:24
SPEAKER_00: That moment fascinates me.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: Because David has every reason to be angry, every reason to want the suffering to end, but he refuses to seize the throne through murder.
18:36
SPEAKER_00: And when Saul leaves the cave, David calls after him.
18:39
SPEAKER_00: He shows Saul the piece of his robe.
18:42
SPEAKER_00: He shows him how close he came to killing him.
18:45
SPEAKER_00: And Saul weeps.
18:48
SPEAKER_00: For a moment, this is recognition.
18:50
SPEAKER_00: But the danger hasn't permanently disappeared, and David is still living in the wilderness.
18:56
SPEAKER_00: This is where I want to bring in the Psalms.
18:58
SPEAKER_00: Because when we read the Psalms associated with David's wilderness years, we begin to hear the emotional life behind all of these events.
19:07
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 57 is introduced as a psalm of David when he fled from Saul into the cave.
19:13
SPEAKER_00: David begins by asking God for mercy.
19:16
SPEAKER_00: He describes taking refuge in the shadow of God's wings.
19:20
SPEAKER_00: What beautiful imagery! A man hiding in a cave, asking to be sheltered beneath the wings of the Lord.
19:28
SPEAKER_00: Then he describes his soul as being among lions.
19:31
SPEAKER_00: He is surrounded by danger.
19:33
SPEAKER_00: But the psalm begins to rise.
19:35
SPEAKER_00: David declares that his heart is steadfast.
19:38
SPEAKER_00: And then he calls for his harp and his lyre to awaken.
19:42
SPEAKER_00: There it is again.
19:44
SPEAKER_00: Music, worship, the same instrument that once brought relief to Saul now appears in a song of praise from the wilderness.
19:53
SPEAKER_00: David isn't worshiping from a place of comfort.
19:56
SPEAKER_00: He's worshiping from a place of uncertainty.
19:59
SPEAKER_00: And that is basically every emo song ever written.
20:03
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 142 is another prayer associated with David being in the cave.
20:08
SPEAKER_00: And in it, David says that he pours out his complaint before the Lord.
20:13
SPEAKER_00: He tells God his troubles.
20:16
SPEAKER_00: I love that because I do that.
20:19
SPEAKER_00: He pours out his complaint.
20:21
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't hide it.
20:22
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't pretend everything is fine.
20:24
SPEAKER_00: He's telling God exactly where he is.
20:27
SPEAKER_00: And I wish I would have known those psalms, definitely.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: Because here was a man who understood anguish, a man who knew what it was to feel hunted, abandoned, exhausted, and afraid.
20:40
SPEAKER_00: And he brought all of it before the Lord.
20:43
SPEAKER_00: God isn't afraid of our mess.
20:46
SPEAKER_00: He isn't afraid of our broken hearts.
20:48
SPEAKER_00: He already knows what's in our hearts.
20:51
SPEAKER_00: And he invites us to come to him anyway.
20:54
SPEAKER_00: The Psalms don't demand that we become emotionally polished before we worship.
20:59
SPEAKER_00: They teach us how to bring our actual hearts before God.
21:03
SPEAKER_00: And David keeps turning toward him, even when he doesn't know what will happen next.
21:13
SPEAKER_00: And Saul's story only becomes stranger.
21:16
SPEAKER_00: Years later, after Samuel has died, Saul finds himself facing the Philistine army yet again.
21:23
SPEAKER_00: He's afraid and he asks an answer.
21:26
SPEAKER_00: He asks to see, he seeks an answer from the Lord.
21:28
SPEAKER_00: But scripture tells us that the Lord does not answer him.
21:32
SPEAKER_00: Not in dreams, not by prophets.
21:35
SPEAKER_00: And so what does Saul do?
21:37
SPEAKER_00: Something absolutely extraordinary.
21:40
SPEAKER_00: Something he himself has previously, as king, forbidden anybody else to do.
21:46
SPEAKER_00: He seeks out a medium, a woman living at Endor.
21:50
SPEAKER_00: And he goes to her disguised under cover of darkness.
21:55
SPEAKER_00: The first king of Israel, a man who had once experienced the Spirit of God.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Now traveling through the night to consult someone who claims to communicate with the dead.
22:04
SPEAKER_00: And he asks her to bring up Samuel.
22:08
SPEAKER_00: And the account takes a truly unsettling turn.
22:11
SPEAKER_00: The woman sees an apparition and cries out.
22:14
SPEAKER_00: She realizes that the man standing before her is actually Saul.
22:18
SPEAKER_00: And the figure identified as Samuel delivers a message of judgment.
22:24
SPEAKER_00: Saul's kingdom has been torn from him, and he and his sons will fall.
22:29
SPEAKER_00: Now, Christians have debated the nature of this appearance for centuries.
22:33
SPEAKER_00: Was Samuel truly permitted to appear by God?
22:36
SPEAKER_00: Was this a deceptive spirit?
22:38
SPEAKER_00: The text identifies the figure as Samuel, but it doesn't explain every supernatural detail.
22:44
SPEAKER_00: And I like that because it keeps it mysterious.
22:47
SPEAKER_00: I don't think we need to pretend anything that we know exactly what's going on here.
22:53
SPEAKER_00: What matters for our story is the terrible contrast.
22:56
SPEAKER_00: Saul once had a prophet who spoke God's word to him.
22:59
SPEAKER_00: He once experienced the spirit of the Lord.
23:02
SPEAKER_00: He once had a young musician whose gift brought him relief.
23:06
SPEAKER_00: But now, in his desperation, he seeks an answer through a practice God has forbidden.
23:12
SPEAKER_00: And I think about how often fear makes us desperate to control what comes next.
23:17
SPEAKER_00: We want answers and certainty.
23:20
SPEAKER_00: We always want to know how the story is going to end.
23:23
SPEAKER_00: But Saul's tragedy is that he keeps reaching for control rather than returning to obedience.
23:31
SPEAKER_00: And the story of David gives us a different picture.
23:34
SPEAKER_00: Not a perfect man, not a man who never failed.
23:38
SPEAKER_00: We haven't even gotten into his love life.
23:41
SPEAKER_00: But a man who repeatedly brought his fear, his questions, and his uncertainty before the Lord.
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SPEAKER_00: David spent so much of his life waiting for something God had already spoken.
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SPEAKER_00: He had been anointed.
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SPEAKER_00: The Spirit of the Lord had come upon him.
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SPEAKER_00: But then came the palace, the spear, the wilderness, the caves, the years of not knowing what would happen next.
24:08
SPEAKER_00: And all along, God was unfolding a story that David could only see one piece at a time.
24:15
SPEAKER_00: I think that's what fascinates me so much about the prophetic.
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SPEAKER_00: Not simply the extraordinary moments, not just the visions, the manifestations, the vibes, the things that cannot easily be explained, but the reality that God speaks, that he knows the end from the beginning, and that he invites ordinary people to participate in what he's doing.
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SPEAKER_00: Sometimes through something extraordinary, sometimes through something as simple as a shepherd carrying a sling, a musician playing an instrument, a prophet carrying a horn of oil.
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SPEAKER_00: And sometimes through a person willing to put down a camera and pay attention to the woman standing in front of her.
24:58
SPEAKER_00: Because God isn't only interested in what we produce, he's interested in what is happening in our hearts while we produce it.
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SPEAKER_00: David would become king, he would write songs of extraordinary beauty, he would lead a nation, and he would also fall, and he would sin and he would need correction and he would need mercy.
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SPEAKER_00: In Psalm 51, after Nathan confronted him over a sin involving Bathsheba, David prayed for God to create in him a clean heart.
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SPEAKER_00: The man God chose was still a man who needed saving.
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SPEAKER_00: But there was another promise, one that reached far beyond David's lifetime.
25:40
SPEAKER_00: In 2 Samuel chapter 7, God promised that his royal house would endure, that his throne would be established forever.
25:49
SPEAKER_00: And generations later, in a little town of Bethlehem, another child was born.
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SPEAKER_00: Jesus, the son of David, the promised king.
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SPEAKER_00: David's kingdom was never the end of the story.
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SPEAKER_00: It was pointing toward another kingdom.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: And there's a remarkable moment in the book of Acts that brings this connection into focus.
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SPEAKER_00: On the day of Pentecost, Peter stands before the crowd and quotes the words of David from Psalm 16: words about not being abandoned to the realm of the dead, words about God's holy one not seeing corruption.
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SPEAKER_00: And Peter exclaims that David was speaking prophetically about the resurrection of Christ.
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SPEAKER_00: Think about that.
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SPEAKER_00: The shepherd boy who became a king, the musician who wrote songs in the wilderness, the poet who cried out to God.
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SPEAKER_00: And generations later, at Pentecost, Peter is proclaiming the risen Jesus through David's words.
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SPEAKER_00: That's the extraordinary thing about the prophetic.
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SPEAKER_00: God was revealing something far greater than David's own future.
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SPEAKER_00: He was unfolding the promise of Jesus, the king who would conquer death, the one who could come to reclaim us all back to God, the one who sees the heart and calls us to follow him.
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SPEAKER_00: And the one who doesn't simply tell us to become better people, but makes the way for us to be forgiven, redeemed, and made new.
27:19
SPEAKER_00: And that's where I want to return to the night back at First Wednesday prayer, because I went into that room with an idea of what I wanted to create.
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SPEAKER_00: And God was already doing something that I couldn't see.
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SPEAKER_00: I was so concerned with what I wanted to bring out of that evening that I nearly missed what he was doing and what he was inviting me into.
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SPEAKER_00: And in his mercy, he showed me his heart.
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SPEAKER_00: He showed me my heart.
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SPEAKER_00: Not to shame me, but to call me back to him.
27:51
SPEAKER_00: And I think about David's prayer in Psalm 139.
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SPEAKER_00: Search me, O God, and know my heart.
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SPEAKER_00: Try me and know my thoughts.
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SPEAKER_00: See if there is any grievous way in me and lead me in the way everlasting.
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SPEAKER_00: That's the prayer that I want us to carry out of this story.
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SPEAKER_00: Not simply, Lord, tell me what happens next.
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SPEAKER_00: Not Lord, show me how to make everything turn out the way I imagined, but search me.
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SPEAKER_00: That's a dangerous prayer.
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SPEAKER_00: Teach me to recognize your voice.
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SPEAKER_00: Give me the heart that is willing to obey.
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SPEAKER_00: And help me to recognize the work you're already doing right in front of me.
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SPEAKER_00: Because we aren't the authors of the story.
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SPEAKER_00: By his grace, we are invited to be a part of it.
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SPEAKER_00: And the most extraordinary thing about the story God is telling isn't that we get to play a part.
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SPEAKER_00: It's that through Jesus we get to know the one who is telling it.
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SPEAKER_00: So until next time, guys, remember, the truth is out there.
28:56
SPEAKER_00: God is with you, and everyone always ends up in the kitchen.