Gain, send your spirit now unto us that he may touch our eyes and make us see Show us truth concealed within your word
Trouble with having him choices and hymns of course is that if you have got a cold and a sore throat and all the rest of it You seem too lustily and
Your voice begins to go I I hope it will last out this evening
If I turn around and drink some water, please excuse me More and more these days people are searching after spiritual experiences For Christians who know that God created them as spiritual beings. This is not really very strange What is sad is that so many people want a spiritual experience through anything but the true faith Now of course find people wanting to get some sort of other worldly experience so that they can feel better Also that perhaps some divinity Who they just think might be somewhere out there Can be manipulated into doing something for them. It's nothing new It's basically what Adam and Eve did in the Garden of Eden and it's been done ever since
How many people do you know who will pray when there is a real problem in their life? You think most of your friends probably pray when there is a real problem something really serious in their lives This is really for many simply a form of superstition If I pray then things won't go badly for me if I don't walk under that ladder. I shall have a good day It's at the same sort of order of things if I throw a coin in that pool I can get my wish and if I say God give me my wish I'm sure to get it human beings were created by God to have a relationship with him and God is spirit I'm sorry. I'm going to pause because I have a very definite echo coming back here Sorry about that is probably my loud voice or my horse voice or something But human beings were created by God to have a relationship with him and God is spirit so it is not surprising that we seek spiritual Experiences a spiritual experience of God We know as Christians that we can have that through faith in Jesus Christ But the problem in this world is that many people know they are spiritual beings of some sort But they do not know how to handle their spirituality They see this as something that they can switch on and off I can be spiritual one day and not the next day They think that there are probably some spiritual forces around that they do not really understand and they think that perhaps there must be some sort of God They've heard that this God might be able to do wondrous things So when they need something big doing and Doing quickly to rescue them from some impossible situation they pray or they start going to church and song It is simply superstition People who do this sort of thing are in fact involved in idolatry They're creating an image of God He's not the true God He's a God of their imagination He's a God who's like a slot machine If I do this for him if I put this coin in the right place He will do that for me God will hear my prayers better if I start going to church for a few weeks while my elderly relative is dying
Someone else prayed at that particular place or that shrine So perhaps if I go there and pray the Lord will be more likely to hear my prayer as well This is the God of their imagination The God of the Bible is not one who hears a prayer prayed in one place more than he hears a prayer plate prayed in another place That is idolatry it's creating in our own minds the source of God we would really rather like to have you see One who is there at our beckoning one who responds to us whenever we think we can do something for him This is the God of the 20th century This is the God of the person we rub up against most days of our working lives The God who is limited to superstitious activities and to occasional attendances at church This is the God of the Christmas service for example when everything is lovely and so sentimental and romantic This is the God of someone else the God I can reach by climbing on board with a friend who seems to have had real experience of God In one Samuel chapter 4, which is where we're looking today We find that people were little different then from what they are today do look to that chapter It's a strange chapter in some ways But it's basically a chapter in which God teaches the Israelites that he is not a slot machine God
He is not a God contained in a magical box that they could pull out right down when they want to use him But he is the utterly sovereign God who will never be manipulated by anyone even by his own people No one will ever Manipulate the government God and so in this chapter We've read the most amazing story. I don't know whether you kept paying attention through it being read It's quite a long chapter, but it's a wonderful story Great narrative it carries on nice and easily and straightforwardly In this we find that the arc of the government of God is Is captured by the Philistines and we are told at the end of the chapter the glory has departed from Israel We'll come back to those points in a moment, but it's a sad chapter a Very sad chapter because here we see at last what was prophesied back in chapter 2 We see God's judgment on Eli and his sons Hoffman Phineas But we also see the whole of the people of Israel having to suffer in order to learn a most important lesson Have a look at verse three The question in verse three is the question everybody would have been asking after the Philistines had beaten the Israelites in battle Why has the Lord put us to route today before the Philistines? The Israelites simply cannot understand why God should let them be defeated by these pagans These events seem to be taking place as a matter of interest between The time when Samuel begins to get known as a true priest in the temple and he grows up We're told at the end of chapter three he's growing up with the Lord and then he reappears on the scene in chapter Seven as a fully grown material man of God and a prophet So here's what is happening in these chapters four five and six is that we find the end of one era and the beginning of another We find the end of the era of Eli and the wicked priests Hoffman Phineas and we find the beginning of the new era under God of Samuel Israel went to war then in this chapter Went to war against the Philistines who by the way controlled Israel at this time that comes out in this chapter if you read it through and
They were defeated in those best two or three verses so they decided that they would go to war again and They felt the Israelites that they knew the answer to their problem. They asked the question in verse three Why has the Lord put us to route and they just they believe they had discovered the answer no doubt They went to the priest and said well tell us what's gone wrong priests something's gone wrong God wasn't with us was he? And they believe they found the answer They have forgotten to take the arc of the covenant Now the arc was a large box It was a box which contained the 10 commandments on stone and a few other things like Aaron's rod from the days when the Israelites were in the wilderness and it was designed by God to Remind the people of Israel of how he had redeemed his people in the past So every time they would look on the arc as a focus of their worship or the focus of their worship was God But to the arc was there in a central place in their worship They would look on that box and they would remember the God they were worshipping was the one who had redeemed them from Israel So many years before It was a very important chest therefore Because it was a reminder of God's power and his sovereignty normal people were not allowed to touch it It was a focal point of the presence of God a symbol of the presence of God among his people So the Israelites got the arc out Dusted it down and brought it into battle Notice that in verse four Hothney and Phineas are mentioned again These evil men these evil priests brought the arc of the covenant out of the temple and Took it into battle No doubt they would have been better employed seeking God's forgiveness and help them producing the arc at the whim of the people But when the arc came that people of Israel got so excited that their joy and festivities were heard by the Phyllis signs Over in another camp another battle camp across the valley maybe and In verse seven the phyllis signs say a God has come into their camp the phyllis signs were obviously panic stricken They probably knew how the God of Israel was thought to live in this box And they certainly would have remembered the stories of how these Israelites Has come out of Egypt and they'd even managed to get away with this God They managed to get away from the Egyptians of all people And now this box that reminded them of how the Israelites had defeated the Egyptians was being brought into battle And so the phyllis signs say when a God has come into their camp And there's absolutely nothing we're going to be able to do about it now so they say well Let's encourage each other. We're going to have to fight and we'll have to fight to the death now because they'll beat us So they thought they had no chance at all because this Greater God had now come the Israelites have worked out what was wrong. They'd worked out why they'd lost Both signs were deeply superstitious The phyllis signs thought they were now up against another greater God But the Israelites clearly thought the same thing The new international version gets the sense of the passage a little more clearly here than the pubibles doing verse 3 where we read this Let us bring the ark of the Lord's covenant from Shiloh So that it may go with us and save us from the hand of our enemies The R.S.V. there has he meaning the Lord But a better translation of this is so that it you see the Israelites were saying let's take the ark with us So it will save us They thought the same way as the phyllis signs did basically they got a better God here in this box They were as bad then as the pagan phyllis signs See the Israelites had recognized the right question to ask Why has the Lord put us throughout today? They'd recognized that it was indeed because God had left them and wasn't with them that they'd lost the battle They'd recognize that much of the truth He hadn't fought for them so they'd lost But the solution they came up with was all together wrong the presence of the ark would not put God back on their side in some way They couldn't rely superstitiously on God's works back in history and Believe they would automatically happen again whenever they got this box out They were as bad as the phyllis signs. They were associating their God with this box They believe that God was able to be manipulated if you use the ark God will be used The phyllis signs were worried in case the Israelites had it last remembered the right trick Use the special box. How like that? We are today the society around us the society that doesn't know Christ is very like that, isn't it? They want to have God in a box the God they can manipulate If they come along occasionally to the right building and they'll be able to get into work for them So they come to church They can manipulate God by using you in the process to get something for them because after all sure God will listen to you after all you're one of his people. Will you pray for me? And of course there are absolutely right ways in which we should pray for other people But I'm talking about from this perspective of superstition you see That so many people have when they say will you pray for me what they really mean is well I'm superstitious enough to believe that perhaps there is a God who perhaps you have contact with But I don't really want to know and I certainly don't want to pray
But Christians are superstitious in the same sort of way very often If only I could get back to the way things used to be I Had a wonderful answer to prayer at that conference center. I was at so maybe I'll go back there and My prayers will be more effective That person seems to have all his prayers answered so perhaps I'll use his technique So then we decide to kneel in the same way he does Because perhaps that way we'll get through to God, you know I don't mean to be flippant about this. This is true. I've seen it done I've seen people come back from conferences and tell us that if we kneel in a particular way We're more likely to get close to God It's a tragedy It's superstition at the heart of the Christian faith Or being brought into the heart of it or perhaps we believe that if we use those special words Whatever they may be then everything will be all right and we're like Israelites you see We rely on what happened in the past or with someone else and we think that if we repeat the same sort of things If we get out those old treasures and dust them down There will be all right But in one Samuel 4 the second defeat of the Israelites was far worse than the first defeat In the second defeat of the Israelite 30,000 people died Now there is some suggestion that that is an impossible number that they never fought with armies like that in those days as possible if that's the case then a thousand was a description of perhaps a particular cohort or group of soldiers and 30 of these enormous great groups of soldiers were destroyed
Whatever it is the description is absolutely clear Israel is effectively wiped out as a as a fighting force The Philistines route them if they thought it was bad before they ate nothing like what you've seen yet If you see what I mean Right Not everybody were enormous numbers of Israelites killed in battle verse 10 But verse 11 tells us that the arc itself was captured the arc The symbol of God's presence with Israel was captured in battle Is it any wonder that this chapter ends with a baby being named Ikavod Which means the glory has departed from Israel? The glory was the description that was used of God himself God was the glory The Shaqainah glory of the Old Testament the glory had gone God had left What a judgment on the false priests of Shailah What a judgment on Eli who had never had the guts Actually to do what God said with his own family let alone with the peace of it people of Israel What a judgment on Hothni and Phineas who'd rebelled against their father who had rebelled against God who had never offered proper sacrifices In spite of their privileged position who had abused the sacrifices who had slept with women in the temple precincts and so on We read all about it in way in chapters one and two Is it any wonder that Eli the old man Straining to hear the news of battle blind as he was hearing the noise around him heard the news and collapsed backwards off his stool and died His two sons were dead in one day as prophesied back in chapter two The wife of Phineas was about to have a baby and the horror of a dead husband a dead brother-in-law a dead father-in-law and the capturing of the arc Caused her to go into premature labor and the baby was born and she called him Ickabat the glory has departed What on earth was the Lord doing well the Israelites had a very basic lesson to learn They had to learn that when they were dealing with the true and living God They could not circulate him superstition superstitious actions gained him gained them nothing The ark was just a wooden box God used it all God didn't use it But if Hothnia and Phineas who had not repented before the Lord and who carried on in their sin right up until the last minute Thought that by producing the ark they could save Israel they would have to think again They were dealing with the sovereign God Here was no God to be counted around in a box. Here was a God who would judge his own people even When they sinned Here was a God who demanded repentance of all people The Israelites would never win a battle until they have got their heart right before the Lord They could not take it for granted that God was on their side This was a confrontation between God the living God and superstition This was the same sort of confrontation that we see today and we shall see the full horror of of course on the last judgment day People cannot be allowed to imagine that they will be protected by God because for example They have a cross on their bedroom window or on their bedroom wall or because they come to church sometimes or because they have good Christian friends who Can pray for them or because they can do a lot of good works The sort of God who is impressed by those sorts of things is a God of their own creation The sort of God who is impressed by their ideas is their idea of a God and not the true Living Almighty sovereign God He's the sort of God they like the idea of But who doesn't exist as the Bible says it's a fearful thing to fall into the hand of the living God And that's what Eli and Hoffman and Phineas and the people of Israel did on that day What was to happen Well, that must wait for next week Next week when we look at how God once again Exercises his supreme of sovereignty and he takes over in Israel God takes over I've entitled it for next week. He takes over in Israel and among the Philistines as well But when we stand today on all this We're coming up to what people call Halloween How much more superstitious can we get in common folklore than Halloween for most people this can simply be a case of innocent fun and games and parties so be it But more and more there is a sort of modern superstition doing the rounds at Halloween time that brings a false understanding of God a False understanding of Christ and above all a false understanding of Satan We have a Satan who is seen as seen by some people as a mad demon You show him like that in some of our films no doubt there'd be a state of these films over the Halloween period on television lots of the ghoulies and nasties on our television screens and Slowly out of what really appears in many ways to be innocent fun comes an understanding of Satan There's nothing more than a ghoul or a nasty on television And then you get the the good is in the films you see who hold the cross up against the evil and Eventually you see whatever it is Dracula or whoever it is towering away from the cross Now I'm not saying that any sensible people in this congregation would believe such stuff as that What I am saying actually is that it's a jolly good description of Of the source of approach to God that many of us are being influenced by and that certainly people we come into contact every day with are influenced by Where is God against the ghoulies and the nasties? Is he in some piece of wood that some actor holds up?
Surely we have around us an age which once a Spiritual experience. Why is there such a resurrection Resurrection of Desire to reach into the spiritual realms. What's going on? I think people are crying out from our hearts for the true God and yet They're never prepared really to seeking They recognize that they are spiritual beings. They actually quite like films that have to do with the other world The paranormal the world that they sort of feel deep down ought to be there But they're not really sure and so they go off into various superstitious acts sometimes of course it goes a lot further And that and it goes into serious witchcraft We've heard a bit about that recently But we have somehow a God who is just manipulatable There is such a word is that but you know what I mean? You can do what you like with this God you see you can summons him We need to be very very sure that we never seek to manipulate God like the sons of Eli did Like the Israelites tried to do God will hear and answer our prayers But he does so when we come before him in repentance and faith
Not when we get down gran is Bible of the book show And put on a pious air and Feel that at last we're coming to God because granny was close to God Isn't that tragic when a real Christian grandmother It's sort of presumed upon by later generations as if somehow As if somehow her merits will carry on to future generations. I feel that there's nothing more tragic than that when you see that happen
Usually those grandmothers know only too well How desperately they want to see their children and their grandchildren come to know and love the Lord properly for themselves But there is no other way in a couple of weeks time. We'll look at chapter 7 But I'm going to give you a foretaste of what happens there because this is really the heart Well, it's the end of the passages it work chapter 7 verse 3 We return to Samuel who's now a mature man The Israelites have been defeated again and again people have died and
Samuel says this Chapter 7 verse 3 if you are returning to the Lord with all your hearts Then read yourselves of foreign gods and so on If you are returning to God with all your hearts then God will come to you
People think that the God was a different God in the Old Testament from the New Testament No, he wasn't all the great men of faith and women of faith in the Old Testament knew that if your heart wasn't right before God Nothing would be right before God They had to repent of their sin. That's what Hothnian Phineas should have done They should have taken that first defeat in battle and they should have said we repent Lord You've defeated us. You've seen us defeated in this battle because we have sinned But they didn't do that now how keen are we to worship the true and living God The true God is far Easier for us to understand than it was for the Israelites to understand you know He has revealed himself in the Lord Jesus Christ They didn't have that much revelation we do praise God we live this side of the cross They look forward to God saving activity. We're able to look back Are we prepared to see that even today? He calls us as Christians those of us who do already know and love the Lord He calls upon us never to manipulate him not that we could but never to seek to manipulate him God looks at our hearts and as Moira started the service with that verse He says the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit and a contrite heart of God you will not despise That again is the old testament and it is the same for us in the new in a moment we'll be singing some courses hymns about Christ the King the Lord of all We can't manipulate this Lord. That's why I've chosen these last courses They emphasize who our Lord Jesus is here's the suffering covenant Lord He's the King. He's God. He can't be manipulated So don't ever think he can but come before him as Lord and King and Seek his forgiveness and ask from the decks of your heart for what you want And God will hear and we'll answer your prayer. Let's pray Our Father what a gracious God you are We have such lessons to learn from your word Father, we admit and Right now we repent of our sins for the many ways in which we seek to manipulate you Father for those deals we pretend to make with you Father for the way in which we Believe that if we do this or that we might gain your attention Father, how can we do this in the presence of our sovereign God? Forgive us we pray But Father, we thank you to That you really do hear and answer our prayers and our needs We thank you that you do that not because we manipulate you But because you are a sovereign God who loves us and cares for us so much That you even sent Jesus to die for us Father, we thank you