Now please turn to our gospel lesson text for this morning. First Chronicles chapter 7 beginning in in verse 1 That's found on page 7 10 in the Bibles that are in your seats And again as we go through this I'll Will not be reading every every verse of chapter 7 and chapter 8 rather we will Hit highlights as we go through so I will Direct you down to the next verse we'll go to but we will begin in verse 1 of chapter 7 This is God's word given for our benefit in his glory Here in first Chronicles the context is God's people have come back from an exile from being carried off as prisoners from Jerusalem and Israel They had been carried off the Babylon That began around 605 BC and then 538 BC. They were returned to the promised land and the walls of Jerusalem As we read about in the amyel were broken down and everything was a mess and The writer of Chronicles writes nine chapters of genealogy establishing various things various truths about the people of God He goes on here in chapter 7 of verse 1 I'm talking about a sons of Isaac car Isaac car was one of Jacob's sons Jacob is also known as Israel So Isaac car and Isaac car's sentence were part of the sons of Israel and The writer of Chronicles tells us about them God's word The sons of Isaac car Tola Pua to Shub and Shimran for and all The sons of Tola Aziz Raffaea Jerry L. Jammai Ibsum and Samuel heads of their families During the reign of David the descendants of Tola listed as fighting men in their genealogy number 22,600 The son of Aziz is Rahaya the sons of Israel Michael Obediah Joel and Isha'a all five of them were chiefs According to their family genealogy, they had 36,000 men ready for battle For they have many wives and children The relatives who were fighting men belonged to all the clans of Isaac car as listed in their genealogy There were 87,000 in all Now we go to the tribe of Benjamin first six Three sons of Benjamin Bella Becker and Jedi out The sons of Bella Ezban Aziz Azil Jaramath and Erie heads of families five and all their genealogical record listed 22,000 and 34 fighting men The sons of Becker go down to verse nine their genealogical record listed the heads of families and 20,200 fighting men verse 11 All these sons of Jadiel were heads of families there were 17,200 fighting men ready to go up or Verse 13 now we go to the third tribe that we're looking at this morning the tribe of Naphtali verse 13 The sons of Naphtali Ghazel Minni Gezzar and Shilin The descendants of Bilha Next the descendants of Manasa Azrael was his descendant through his airman Kankiban She gave birth to Makir the father of Gilead Makir took a wife from among the Huppites and Shuppites His sister's name was Makkah Another descendant was named Zalafahad Who had only daughters
Makir's wife Makkah gave birth to a son named Timpuresh Verse 17 The son of Ulum Beton These were the sons of Gilead son of Makir the son of Manasa His sister, Hamulaka, gave birth to Ishad, Abyesar, and Malah Verse 20 Neutrade the descendants of Ephraim Verse 27 Last of these mentioned Verse 27 None his son In Joshua his son Verse 30 The sons of Asher Verse 31 The sons of Baraya Hibir and Malkil Who is the father of Berseth Verse 40 All these were descendants of Asher Heads of families, choice men, brave warriors, and outstanding leaders The number of men ready for battle As listed in their genealogy was 26,000 Chapter 8, Verse 1 Now we go and recount some of the Benjamites Benjamin was the father of Bella, his firstborn Asher Bell, the second son, Ahara, the third Verse 6 These were the descendants of Ihad Who were heads of families of those living in Gevah And were deported to Manahath Verse 12 The sons of Elpah Ivor, Misham, Shamed Who built Ono and Laud with its surround villages Verse 28 All these heads of the families, Chiefs, is listed in their genealogy And they lived in Jerusalem Verse 32 And Miklaw, who was father of Shemaah They too lived near their relatives in Jerusalem Nur was the father of Kish Kish the father of Saul And Saul the father of Jonathan Makashua Abinad and Eshbael The son of Jonathan Meribale, who was the father of Micah Verse 40 The sons of Ulum were brave warriors who could handle the bow They had many sons and grandsons, 150 and all All these were the descendants of Benjamin Chapter 9, Verse 1 All Israel was listed in the genealogy Recorded in the book of the kings of Israel Here ends our reading. Let's give thanks to the Lord A word of the Lord Let's pray Our God and Father, we are grateful to you for giving us this your word Causes to understand to see why you have it here for And to see the message that you have for us tomorrow And Jesus preached to us by your word Spirit illumine this word Grant us understand that we may know you better Believe to your glory better We're asking Christ's name. Amen
Sometimes there are people that you get along with just great And other times there are people that you don't know that well But you know as you just kind of see them there That you don't you won't wouldn't get along with them quite as well You can think about people like that that you had Has classmates in school or or co-workers that you that you have at work maybe there's not Commonality between you very many things in common Maybe it's very apparent that they have a different set of interests Then you do Maybe they do things that just bug you
This passage deals with this kind of dynamic for us the people of God And what it says to us and if you follow in your outline and like to fill in blanks here We go befriend and receive all Christians befriend and receive all Christians This is not to say that we're not to befriend non-Christians Okay, we are to befriend non-Christians as Jesus did But this passage wants to make very clear for us That there are no group of Christians those that are indeed in the household of God that we should shine or or stay away from The situation we've seen and and read about and talked about already that the situation in post-Exile Israel Israel as it existed after 80 90 Hundred years after Nebuchadnezzar had come through and destroyed the land He had gone from the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar had gone from village to village all across Israel and destroyed things Finally, he was able to destroy Jerusalem his last conquest in Israel And he took the best and brightest of Israel and deported them off to Babylon. Daniel was one of those and Daniel's friends But then as Babylon the kingdom is is crushed in 539 B.C And the Persians take over The Persian king Cyrus also known as Darius, depending on which language you were speaking during that day Has a policy where he releases all the peoples That had been taken captive to their homelands And God delivers his people through this Cyrus and so God's people come from Babylon modern day. I ran I rack And they return to Israel to Palestine to the promised land and they return to the walls of Jerusalem having been crushed Not one stone left upon another in the same with the temple the temple had been burned down to the ground Got the people were dealing with these things But another thing they were dealing with was who was legitimate now in our post Exile community post exile community whose legitimate who should we respect who should we allow in who should we not One of the dynamics of the return from Babylon with there were burns waves There were some that came back right away in 538 And others that came back later and others still later and others still after that And what we have here in this section of the genealogies is tribes of Israel Members descendants of Israel of Jacob who were Not back right away at least in great numbers Not many representatives of them had come back right away to the land to the promised land
So the writer of chronicles writes and he he tells about who these Ans that the ancestors were of these tribes and he speaks to us about how he speaks God's people here about how they were to treat Those who were underrepresented or those who were from tribes that were different from theirs How they were to treat them what they were to hope for them The returning Israelites The message here from the writer of chronicles The returning Israelites Israelites who returned were to receive all their brothers They were to see all the people that came from regardless of what tribe of Israel they came from They were to receive them Even the ones Even from the tribes it seemed less important even from the tribes that were notorious for for a evil acts Prior to the exile Question is why gather all Why was God encouraging his people to gather all back all of his people back from the exile regardless of tribe It's because God even among this first Returnies Even those that the first returnees didn't appreciate These people were important. That's your blank. They were important to God
God's people who had returned early were to hope for a full return of all gods people regardless of what tribe of Israel they had come from regardless of whether they had Apparently faithfully left right away with great eagerness and enthusiasm to come back to the promised land where they could worship God fully at his temple How do we see this in this genealogy? Well in two ways the writer of chronicles first shows us the God had blessed That's your blank God had blessed These people These apparently less important people or or more despised people in the past God had blessed them God loved them
When I was a freshman in college I was living in north hall at Whitonburg University on the first floor in room 118 And right next to me is you looked at our door on the left We're two guys Tom somebody or other actually a guy named Joe Sheeran and He moved down Tom moved in but the other guy his roommate was guy named Brad Bowman And I met Brad and Brad was from Maryland and he was a tariff and span and and I told him that Maryland would never win a national championship
They did this year So I thought about Brad but Brad was a guy who Sometimes bugged me Just things he did or his mindset or whatever just a little bit not a whole lot I enjoyed Brad most of the time But sometimes he bugged me one time I was especially bugged because I was convinced that he had stolen some money off my counter My dresser canner in my room. I later figured out he probably hadn't and that was a big dumb head for But I found out something about Brad early on as we talked my father is Professor of orthodontics vice chairman of the orthodont department at the University of Rochester So it's hot Brad's dad orthodontics Brad's dad had come up through his orthodontic training at the University of Rochester was one of my father's students And somehow we made this connection and I called my dad and asked him and he said oh yeah Charles Bowman I remember him and he's In such and such place now So we found that out and that was kind of neat They had had this relationship my dad with with Brad's dad of teacher to student And then when you're in that relationship if it's a good relationship the relationship of blessing My dad had had had in some sense the word blessed Charles Bowman teaching him skills that he's still using At this point in his life Now how did that affect me? How did that affect how I acted toward Brad? Well how it affected me because my father was in this relationship even though they hadn't seen each other for 16 years or so That affected how I treated Brad I knew in the back my head no matter how much Brad bugged me No matter even if I thought he had stolen some money is actually just some change and I was just a little bit tight back then Ha Or now No matter what grad did or how he bugged me there was a line I wouldn't cross Because my dad was this relationship with Brad's dad And so I always treated Brad Fairly well or not as bad as I would have treated somebody else if I were angry with him And that's the deal with God and what he's saying about these these brothers these certain tribes that are Listed in chapter 7 and 8 here. You know what you guys you have a lot of reason to be bugged at these tribes Maybe they are unfaithful because they didn't return right in 538 when you returned But you know what I've blessed them in the past We see that Isaac with Isaac are in verse 4 chapter 7 We have the account that he had many wives and children. This was a sign of blessing God said when I bless you, I'll give you many wives and children with Benjamin and chapter 8 verse 40 It says the Benjamin that there were many sons and grandsons
And God had enabled Of them to to build cities That was also a sign of blessing That people would have be that blessed they were actually build whole cities and that's mentioned to us here The tribe of Naphtali in verse 13 It establishes that Naphtali was indeed from Jacob Manasseh it talks about that there was one descendant Zalafahad who had only daughters That means he's a really great guy
And the way descendants are or land or inheritance was passed on in Israel as as typical all through Most of of history is it's passed on to the oldest son That way the land doesn't get all divided up or doesn't pass out of the family Which is always get to the divide or always get inherited by the oldest son Zalafahad had no sons and so Moses had made special legislation and the matter had come before Moses And we read about this in numbers 26, 27, 36, and Joshua 17 that Moses had ruled that these women often excluded In Israel These women would become the inheritors of their father's property
So we have all kinds of account of how those that might be assumed to be unimportant Whether they be whether they be women or tribes that were lesser had been actually blessed by God There's a second way that God shows the city and blessed them
Writer of Chronicles shows us certain prominent men from these tribes Why should I accept these other tribes these other believers Because there were other prominent men from these tribes. That's your blame prominent You know, we treat better descendants of prominent people, don't we? I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that We should treat everybody very well But JFK's descendants For instance we treat them well with a certain amount of honor and respect and and there's a amount of a national grieving that we do When we just hear the tragedy after tragedy that has happened to not only John F. Kennedy but his his family after him When I was in Cincinnati working with an athletic ministry We had Anthony Munoz's kid in basketball camp I was helping with the basketball camp and Anthony son Michael who's now Finishing the sophomore year at the University of Tennessee starting it a lying huge kid It's I think he was nine years old and we had to put him with the 13-year-olds They'd pass him the ball and all he had to turn around He was so huge all I had to do is turn around and put it in nobody could do anything about it But we treated Michael Munoz Anthony Munoz was a 10-year-old pro offensive liners for the Cincinnati Bengals argued by most to be the greatest offensive lineman ever in the NFL Anthony was a believer and and a friend of our our ministry and and kind to us and and we treated Michael Munoz with special care because Anthony was prominent We treated Michael with more respect We see this in the genealogy here that chronicler writes of different prominent people that his people were to remember at this time after the exile We have told Told a ludge I a deliverer in Israel judges chapter 10 He was one of the good judges That was Tribe of Isaac are now there are two tribes that could have been especially derided or hated Among God's people at this time those tribes for Ephraim and Benjamin Tell you why in the book of judges chapter 17 one thing that's highlighted is an Ephraimite whose name is mica not the prophet mica He came much later, but a man named mica who was an Ephraimite Who is idolatrous he had all he had a whole tent full of idols and a shrine he had set up and he actually hired out a Levite To serve him personally instead of having a Levite work according to God's law A despicable man In the prophets themselves we read the books of the prophets When God wants to really get at the northern kingdom of Israel And talk about how sinful they are he doesn't call them Israel anymore He calls them Ephraim You know in the prophets that God is really mad When he refers to the northern Israelites as Ephraim it was a pejorative term It was a swear word so to speak that God used So this tribe of Ephraim had that stigma on them Whenever God was really bad they got called Ephraim It's like if if everybody if the church was really bad that they called us muskrave And it was synonymous with being bad and being evil and being unfaithful So God's people in returning from Babylon had a problem with the Ephraimites rightly the other tribe that was Her rightly looked badly upon was Benjamin Benjamin had done awful things in the pastor's the story in the book of judges and account in judges Benjamin had done awful things in the pastor's the story in the book of judges and account in judges 19 and 20 And it seemed set up very much so that you make connections with Sodom and Gomorrah In which in a town and in in in Benjamin in the land of Benjamin and Ghibbia There was a woman who was sent out among men in the street and abused so badly all through the night by man after man that She died she was dead in the morning This happened in Benjamin In public out in open and it was so heinous that all of Israel gathered together and actually waged war against the tribe of Benjamin you see that in judges chapter 20
So these two tribes were the tribes that could be especially despised among God's people
But the writer of Chronicles does something here he points out the facts Chapter 8 verses 33 and 34 if he points out the fact that the first king of Israel saw Was a Benjamin The first king of Israel was a Benjamin And another great hero of the faith E-Hud Judges chapter chapter three E-Hud's mentioned in first Chronicles 8 6 E-Hud was a judge of Israel a deliverer and he killed that the evil Moabite king who's oppressing God's people Eglon That's one of my daughter's favorite stories because of what goes on in the E-Eglon E-Hud story you can ask them all about it if you don't mind some cruelty Is that what the that's what the story is about What is the state of us today? You know what they're certain as Presbyterian people as people very much in in tune with our our theological heritage Coming from the the days of Jesus through Augustine through the the Reformation Church Very centered on on theology and and and guides it were just sharp as sharp as attack Like John Calvin and carried on through through Westminster and the Westminster documents in England from which we read our confession of faith We can look out around us and in the church in America today That doesn't give a rip about the teaching of scripture or doctrine some of them do some of them don't But it would be tempting for us to look at churches that say no creed but Christ Which sounds good at first But how can you have Christ if you don't know who he is if you don't have a creed about him if you don't understand what is true about him You don't know who you're worshiping It would be very tempting for us to look on other denominations or other individual churches that don't focus on the teaching of scripture But don't put their energy and vigor in defining out who God is And what he has for us it would be very tempting for us to look at them and despise them Say that's it than us It's okay to disagree with them That's just part of that's just part of life We have agreements with everybody as people we What color things are and all kinds especially talking about erics and What colors things are But as a church and as people in the church we're not to despise God's people With all the weaknesses that we can very obviously see And part of why we don't despise other of God's peoples because we remember the gospel remember we remember That we have all kinds of weaknesses that they can see That we're blind to right now
That's what the gospel is about We don't have it all together We'll never have it all together this side of glory this side of the grave We'll never reach a state of perfection or perfect belief or perfect practice Of the things of God And so when we look at others and see things that we were convinced are off And their Christians We deal with them with humility and grace and kindness And we don't write them off and and and and cut them off and say well They're not really gods people and that was the message that the chronicler was speaking to his people in that day You know what these people are people the people of God yes, they're from the tribes that could easily be despised But hope and pray for the return So that restoration in my people and the church is full And that's the message to us today For those outside of our immediate circle here That we don't look at them with with derision or we don't despise them Rather we we love and we hope that in areas where we think them to be weak They God gives them greater strength and greater greater depth greater maturity in those areas as we look to ourselves and say You know what there are areas that we need to develop too that we don't even see right now Part of our deal with our church name is about that Clayton Community Church That we would not exclude anybody from among our midst
From that just denominational tag or for somebody that feels like they've been looked down upon by a Presbyterian in the past That's part of this that we include all Christians and pray and and hope for their return hope for their Understanding of things in a greater and greater way The second point We hope and and and befriend and receive all Christians one because that's the right thing to do But there's also a task at hand point two We hope and receive we Befriend and receive all Christians For there's a war that's your blank for there's a war
Why else receive them these others Besides that God had blessed them and loved them and that they had a major that they had major roles and in our history Well because there was in post-exilit times a war going on And so verse after verse and what we read here this morning chapter 7 and 8 We see an accounting of how many military men they had
What is the writer telling these people hey you need them The prophets have said we're going to have nations messing in against us so that we don't have their wall rebuilt So the temples not rebuilt and we need Them because there's a war at hand. We need soldiers And you don't want to reject this tribe because they have 22,000 soldiers are 50,000 soldiers. You need the other members of the body of Christ You need the other members of the people of God to be strong and to withstand Because there was a war pending in post-exilit times God's people needed more warriors More soldiers. That's your blank more warriors We saw this in Nehemiah 4 the threats that were up against God's people
So we have account after account Verse verse 2 of chapter 7 in the tribe of Isaacar there were told as fighting men
Israel's sons were ready for battle verse 4 Verse 5 among the clans of Isaacar there were fighting men from all the clans of Isaacar With Benjamin in this regard we read in chapter 7 verse 7 9 and 11 The numbers of their fighting men in chapter 8 in verse 40 They're called brave warriors among the tribes of Benjamin. There's great focus here on Benjamin's military might Ephraim One of the potentially despised tribes, you know, who's an Ephraimite? Joshua warrior of warriors among God's people Joshua son of none Moses assistant verse 27 the one who led the charge in the battle in the promised land Chief of chiefs Joshua was an Ephraimite The mess you need the Ephraimites they're good warriors for the fight Asher the tribe of Asher verse 40 in chapter 7 there were heads of families choice men brave warriors And outstanding leaders
Why do we not exclude people? Better believers but not of our strike Not of our denomination not of our vent Because there's a war Because there's a war what kind of war is this? Number three in your outline. What kind of war is this? Is it a war so we can rebuild Jerusalem or rebuild the temple or Build a wall up somewhere physically now There's a war for souls. That's your blank. There's a war for souls That's what the New Testament does with all the Old Testament imagery of war And the Old Testament there were physical wars and a physical promised land And a physical king present over God's people and the New Testament. There's a spiritual king who reigns from heaven There's a heavenly Jerusalem of which we are all members And the battle is not a battle of swords Peters is rebuked for this in the Garden of Gethsemane remember Peter pulls out the sword and it starts fighting this this battle this this military political battle And Jesus says no That's not the way it is now Our sword moves and we read about that in the feasts New Testament war is this great commission. That's your two blanks there. New Testament war is this the greatest Thought with The spirit which is the word of God
The word of God through scripture Sometimes just referred to the word of God sometimes referred to its gospel and they're used interchangeably The sword of the spirit which is the word of God that gospel the gospel the word of God is what the spirit of God uses In conquering people as king before himself A king during any day the David's day or feudal times and would conquer people And then those people would become part of his people There would be a conquered people under his kingship And that's exactly what Jesus does is king He reigns a king from heaven the heavenly Jerusalem above Feeded upon his ascension next the right hand of God seated in his throne directing his troops Who are fighting by the spirit and the gospel conquering people by the gospel And including them in the people of Jesus
sometimes this passage in Ephesians 6 is taken out of Taking out of the context of in which Paul is writing it here And it's just purely taken as a here's how to deal with temptation Set a verses Put on the shield you know This on that all that stuff But we see that that stuff is valid also But we see the context of this is driving at the battle for souls
We see it we see it in a number of places verse 15 and Ephesians 6 Your feet are fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit verse 17 Which the word of God and pray in the spirit and all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests With this in mind be an alert and always keep on praying for all the saints Verse 19 pray also for me Spiritual battle that when I open my mouth Words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel. Here's the battle at hand It's the battle the gospel going forth the message of the king the troops of the king going forth and conquering people by the gospel Slaying the pridefulness against God Slaying their illusions that they can please God and go to heaven in their own strength That they can be accepted by God by what they've done We slay that in the gospel which declares all men needing to shut their mouths before God because of their sin
But the gospel doesn't stop there and in conquering pride It also picks up the conquered. I was conquered When I was in eighth grade And I'd been thinking that that my life if I just had more good things that I did than bad things I would make it to heaven But then I heard the gospel and I was conquered That idea that I could be good enough that God would accept me was slaying It was defeated. It was destroyed And I stood before God with nothing to offer as I saw his gospel message But the gospel doesn't stop there picked me up And declared me a child of God Declared me one of God's people part of the kingdom Jesus spoke of the the good news of the kingdom of God This is what he's speaking of that the kingdom is expanding that people are being conquered And included with him as king a good faithful caring Fatherly protective sovereign King Pray also for me and I will fearlessly make known that God missed through the gospel for which I am an ambassador in chains Pray that I may declare it fearlessly as I should This is the battle We include All Christians from all various stripes. We don't ask people as they come in our doors or are you Presbyterian and if not turn them away We've received them in We build them up in the things of God's word in the underneath of God's grace That we have We care for them because God cares for them and there's a war at hand a war for souls And we need them in here We want them in here to build them up So that they too can be a soldier Of the Lord declaring his gospel by their life And by their words to those that are around them That's right Father we are glad that through Christ and by your spirit the sort of your spirit You sluice And any false pretensions we had pleasing you apart from the mediation of Jesus Jesus. Thank you for being our mediator for bearing our sins in your body Spirit. Thank you for resurrection life That you gave us as we heard the gospel That enabled us to believe
Help us but be people that aren't prideful looking down on the Benjaminites and Ephraimites and Isaac ourites of our day Causes to realize our own frailty and and weakness in our own sin Which deserved the exile
Causes to see ourselves here in the promised land your church Not because we're great For we deserve dexile but because you're merciful In being a deliverer god for us bringing us to the promised land of the church
Causes to deal with to think about to have an attitude of grace and and mercy and love Toward all your people Causes to build them up as your soldiers is your gospel army And use us our god for the battle is yours and we call out to you use us win the battle for souls here in Clayton We ask in Christ name