The scriptures are so rich and it's a wonderful look at them and see all the things that God has for us. David is in the midst of his retreat from Jerusalem because his son Absalom has come after his throne and is out to kill his father. And we see this from his acceptance of the Hithafels and even Hush-Eyes Advice. But we get to 2 Samuel 16 and David in the midst of his retreat as this encounter with Zeba, one of the stewards in the household of Saul who had been king, who's now been dead for a long time. 2 Samuel 16 verses 1 through 4 and then we'll also look at a few verses in chapter 17. This is God's word, eternally true. Chapter 16 beginning in verse 1. When David had gone a short distance beyond the summit, that summit was the Mount of Olives just outside the Jerusalem. There was Zeba, a steward of Mifhibasheth, waiting to meet him. He had a string of donkey saddled and loaded with 200 loaves of bread, a hundred cakes of raisins, and a hundred cakes of figs, and a skin of wine. The king asked Zeba, why have you brought these? Zeba answered, the donkeys are for the king's household to ride on, the bread and fruit are for the men to eat, and the wine is to refresh those who become exhausted in the desert. The king then asked, where is your master's grandson? Zeba said to him, he is staying in Jerusalem because he thinks today the house of Israel will give me back my grandfather's kingdom. Then the king said to Zeba, all that belonged to Mifhibasheth is now yours. I humbly bow, Zeba said, may I find favor in your eyes, my Lord, the king. Now, turn over to chapter 17 and verse 27, look at verses 27 through 29. When David came to Mahanam, show be son of Nahash from Raba of the Ammonites, and Mekir son of Amiel from Lodobar, and Barzali, Legiliateite from Rogolim, brought bedding and bowls and articles of pottery. They also brought wheat and barley, flour and roasted grain, beans and lentils, honey and curds, sheep, and cheese from cows. Milk for David and his people to eat, for they said the people would become hungry and tired and thirsty in the desert. Hereins are reading, we respond in thankfulness to the Lord, we have a response printed for us in our bulletins, the word of the Lord. Thanks indeed, let's pray. My dad had someone who was in the front of his office who greeted people and she was great, her name is Kara. And Kara could run marathons, which I can't do, I think that's a silly thing. That's a great thing to be able to do, I just can't do it. But my dad went to one of her marathons and she got over the finish line. And my dad always loved Pepsi, sorry, Coke people. Coke was an athlete to us in my house as we grew up. We were like, yeah, dad likes Pepsi, we like Pepsi too. And so we always had Pepsi. Now he wasn't addicted to it, he didn't have it in the mornings. But we had hamburgers and hot dogs, so we were out for pizza. He would get Pepsi and he would be disappointed at restaurants when they only had Coke products, as they say now. But my dad was excited for Kara. And so he thought, what can I do, especially to show my appreciation for her that I'm excited with her for finishing this marathon. And so he got a Pepsi and he handed it to her as she crossed the finish line. She drank a little bit of it and then vomited. Just two intense, two sweet at that point. In contrast to this, I remember when I was at the university, I went to Whitenburg University in Springfield, Ohio, or Sprinklefield as we called it, because it was always gray and rainy and miserable there. Except in August. And when we would come for soccer practices, and we had three days, I think the first two years, and then two a days, because we realized three a days were too much. The last two years of it, and we would be practicing in middle of August. And out there, and if you've been in Ohio in the summer, it is hot. It gets cooler at night than here, but it's very hot, you know, 90 degrees or so, but it's very, very humid, very muggy. And so we would be attended to by athletic trainers, would be out in the fields with us. And at timeouts or different times during practice when we'd ever break, they'd make sure we all got enough water, one time I lost 13 pounds over the day. And I wasn't allowed to practice the next day until I got my weight back up. It was all just water weight. But one of the things they would do is it was wonderful. They had those five bucket cans, you know, like five or five, sorry, five gallon cans, buckets, like that you have paint in. You know, like this big, those ones that like contractors use, and they'd have those full ice water. But on top of this, they put ammonia in there too, with the water. And what that does, ammonia, you know, evaporates very fast, right? And so actually, you know, when you sweat, it's that your body evaporates off the sweat, and that cools down your body, allows your body to release the heat. So when you add a little bit of ammonia in there, it even increases that. And so what we would do after getting up our courage, exhausted from the heat, we'd come over to the side, and we'd play our nose, we would put our head down into the bucket of ice water with ammonia in it. And the trainers would take these towels that were soaked in this water, and right before we put our head in, they'd lift up the towel, we'd put our head down in there, and then they'd squeeze the towel down over top of our head. So we had our face and the front part of our head in this ice water, and the water going off, and it was like instant cooling. It was so great, and so refreshing. And then you had to work up your courage, because that was a bucket of ice water, right? To put your head down in that. But it cooled us off so none of us would have heat stroke and, and, and, and die or anything like that. But, but, uh, refreshment, great refreshment that was brought to us. This passage is about refreshment, and what our role is in refreshing. So, what can we do to be a source of refreshment to other believers around us? So, refreshing Christ people is what we're talking about this morning. Now, one thing to realize about this is, is that, that King David is still central in this passage. Even though we hear about Zeba, this is really a passage about King David. And anytime we're talking about something in the church, we're still talking about King Jesus. And when we get a little bit of wisdom here from Zeba, as he approaches King David, because Zeba understands something about King David, that we and each person on the earth should understand about David's great son, Jesus. And what Zeba understands is this, and if you like to fill blanks in an outline, here you go. It's number one. God communicates to us from this passage. He says, because inheritance inheritance is in Jesus hands, seek the favor of Jesus. Because inheritance is in Jesus hands, seek the favor of Jesus. Zeba recognized this about David. You know, Israelites talked about the plot of land that they had. The plot of land that they owned in the promised land as their inheritance. That's how God refers to each person's plot of land. It was their inheritance. It was their gift from God, given to them. And they were not to permanently sell it, and no one was to permanently buy it from them. They had poor, they could sell it for a while, but it would return to them in their family, because this was a lasting inheritance. And what we see here in this passage is that inheritance, it can pass within the family group there, and those associated with the family in Zeba understood this. And David exercises this right as King to pass on inheritance from one person to another. And we see here what he does is he passes the inheritance from Mephibasheth, who was the grandson of King Saul. The son of Jonathan, the good son of King Saul, both of whom were dead, Saul and Jonathan are dead, but Mephibasheth is still alive. And we see that David passes the inheritance of Mephibasheth on to Zeba. Because David is told by Zeba that Mephibasheth is back in Jerusalem wanting the kingship to come back to Saul and to Saul's family, contrary to God's words through Samuel the prophet in 1 Samuel 16. And so David says, you see verse 4 there, the king said to Zeba, all that belonged to Mephibasheth, that is Mephibasheth's inheritance, is now yours. And we're to understand this with Jesus, the great son of David, inheritance is in his hands. And so your A there, for us, every person's eternal, every person's eternal state or eternal inheritance is in the hands of Jesus. Just like David doles out and says, this belongs to you now, Zeba. For every person on the earth, they can have an eternal inheritance, but this is something that has to be handed to them by Jesus. So we have first Peter 1, 4, response to what we get when we come to faith in Jesus as an eternal inheritance or Ephesians 1, 14. It speaks of what we get from Jesus upon faith in him is eternal inheritance. And this is the New Testament writers picking up on Old Testament language. They're telling us we don't no longer get a plot of land on the earth in the promised land, Israel. But now what we get is greater, we get an inheritance that is eternal. Something that belongs to us, but like this passage shows to us, this is doled out. This is handed to whoever gets one by the great king by David or one of his sons. So we see Matthew 25, Jesus talks about when he comes at his second coming, and he's handing out inheritances, excluding some people from it, and saying, I never knew you, and to others who have served him, who have come before him, who are humble before him, saying, when did I ever do anything for you, Jesus? When did I ever visit the sick? When did I ever visit the imprisoned? When did I ever do anything to you? Those who are humble before Jesus, Jesus says, come, take your inheritance, the kingdom that I have prepared for you before the foundation of the world. So Jesus is the great David, handing out inheritances. Or we see this in Revelation 20, when John relays to us his vision of coming final judgment. It's Jesus on the judgment throne. It's him who is saying, come into the new heavens and the new earth, or casting others into the light of fire. One's eternal state, one's eternal inheritance, one's what someone gets for eternity, is from Jesus himself. And this is why Jesus says in John 14 and 6, I am the way and the truth of the life. No one comes to the Father but through me. It's all pinpointed on Jesus. Nobody gets around going through Jesus for an inheritance. And we see this with David and Zeba here. So receiving, this is your next line here, receiving the eternal favor of the king, which Zeba does. He receives the favor of the king. And that's his last line there in verse 4. He says, I humbly bow, Zeba said, may I find favor in your eyes, my Lord, the king. And so Zeba comes and he sought the favor of the great king and he's obtained an inheritance. So receiving the eternal favor of the king, Jesus has two aspects. The first aspect is this. You cannot please, you cannot please the king by your record because of your sins. Your record with its sins are not pleasing to the king. And so you can't come to the king, you can't come to final judgment saying, look at what I've done. Like the goats in Matthew 25. When have we not done this for you? When have we not done that for you? They're going on their own record. And Revelation 20 shows us that those who are judged by the record of what's been done and said are cast into the lake of fire. We do not please the Lord and gain any eternal inheritance by things that we've done or things that we've said, because there are just as many probably much more of wrong things we've done or said. We do not are in the favor. We do not please our king by the actual things that we've done to obtain an eternal inheritance. So Ephesians 2, 1 through 3 in our Declaration of the Gospel. It reviews this for us. Our lives have been characterized by sin. We don't have good records. Second Corinthians 5, 10 puts it this way. Paul says, we almost appear before the judgment seat of Christ that each one may receive what is due to him for the things done well in the body, whether good or bad. And to that we say, uh oh, hope there's another solution. Hope there's something else and we know there is through Jesus. So we can't please our king by the record by our record, but we can please the king by our faith. That's your next thing too. You can please the king by your faith in his mercy. And this is what Ziba has. His faith in the mercy of David. David could have come and just wiped out everything that belonged to the house of Saul as he took over. And he doesn't. And Ziba has seen how David has been merciful to his master, Mephibah Sheff, Jonathan's son, Saul's grandson. David has included Mephibah Sheff to sit at his table and eat all the king's choice food. And so what David got to eat, what was prepared for him, Mephibah Sheff got to sit at David's table and eat that. David took care of Mephibah Sheff in every way. And so Ziba knew David could be merciful to people who had been associated with the house that was against David. Saul tried to take his, as I was going through for Samuel this time, I counted ten times Saul tried to take David's life, ten different times that are listed for us. Saul tried to kill David, a spear Adam bringing out troops against him. He's trying to kill David. And yet David Ziba knew was merciful to the house of Saul. And David had gone into a covenant with Jonathan, Saul's son, and said, you know, I won't hurt any of your household. And this is why it takes care of Mephibah Sheff, the crippled son of Jonathan. And so Ziba has this sense in his mind, perhaps David will be merciful to me. And so he comes to David in faith, that David will be merciful. And this is the gospel experience that a person needs to have, to come in faith to the son of David Jesus, believing he will be merciful as we come to him. This is why it's so important that we get out the grace of God, the forgiveness of God through Jesus to unbelievers, because they don't come to Jesus because they think they're going to get a slap across the face because they know their sins. Deep down, even if they're claiming to be good people, deep down they know their sins. And so they don't come to God, they don't come to Jesus because they know they rightly deserve retribution and punishment. And so in the gospel what we declare is that Jesus is God, he is your judge, and he forgives sins. Ziba understood this. Ziba understood that I can approach David, and he will forgive the fact that I've been serving all my life, me, and all my sons, all my life in the house of Saul. Ziba comes in faith in the mercy of the son of David, and that's what we read in Ephesians 2, 4, and 8, 9, also in your declaration of gospel. But God who is rich in mercy because of his great love with which he's loved us, and he saves us by grace. We have a gracious God so we can come as Ziba comes trusting in the mercy of God. Hebrews 116 says this, without faith it is impossible to please God. So we come to Jesus in faith believing that He'll be merciful to us, that's what we did if we've come to faith. And this faith believing in Jesus' mercy is pleasing to the Lord. Have you ever been mis-evaluated? Right? Someone assumes you're a certain way, and so they treated you a certain way. And that really bothers us. We've been mis-evaluated, but on the other side sometimes people evaluate us in a very nice way. My dad once told somebody, John's never made a bad decision. I thought, that's nice. A lot of bad decisions. But that's how my dad thought of me. And that just lifted me. I remember it 30 years later, because 31 and a half years later, that he said this to someone who said to catch. That's pleasing. It's pleasing when someone evaluates you accurately and even a little bit beyond what you deserve. Because you recognize that person loves me. When you love someone you just say, hey, they're great. Yeah, no, I'm sure he didn't mean that. He meant something else, because he's really great or she's really great. If you love somebody, you come to them, assuming good things are true of them. And so God is pleased when we come to Him, and we assume that He's merciful and gracious. But as He says to Ezekiel, I take no pleasure in the death of anyone who dies, says the Lord. When we assume that He's good, and He looks down upon a person, all of us who bear His image and says, my desire is to be compassionate, to be merciful, to be gracious, to show my love. And God's honored by that, that we don't consider Him a tyrant or unfair when we come to Him and say, you would be fair to wipe me out, but I know you're merciful. That's all I have to rest on your mercy, not on my record. This is pleasing to the Lord when we have this faith. And so that's what the writer of Hebrews is getting at, without faith it's impossible to please God. But when we come to God with faith in His mercy, with faith that He cares for us and He's going to take care of us, He's pleased. So we don't please God by our record, we please God by our faith in who He is, our faith in His kindness and His graciousness and His forgiveness to us. That's pleasing to Him. And then be every person's state well-being in this life. So we talked about our state eternally. Now we're talking about our state or our well-being in this life is up to Jesus as well. And we see this especially with Zeba. Zeba understood this. My state in this life is dependent on what David thinks of me. Zeba has confidence, David's going to win out here. The war versus epsilon hasn't been fought yet, but Zeba has this faith that the day being under David, I'll be taking care of. And so Zeba understands my state in this life will be good. I'll be taking care of depending on David. And that's true for us as believers as well. It's true for everybody. Where we are in life and where our souls are and what's going on in our lives, the quality of our lives is dependent upon Jesus. Zeba understands this, again, verse 4. Ephesians 1, 22 tells us that God has given all things over to Jesus and that Jesus is dominant over all things for His church. He's not indomitable over the world and extinguishes sin. We know that. Lots of sin going on. But that Jesus is raining over all things, making sure that we are doing well. And that comes through us experiencing hardship and us experiencing blessing as well. And this is why Romans 8, 28 is true. God has called us to Himself. And so all things are working out together for our good. Zeba understood it's good to be in good with the King. And he understood his life on earth was dependent on the favor of the King. So number one for you and I is one who's received the King's eternal favor by faith is one who's received past tense the King's eternal favor by faith. You're going to live your life to please him. Now you can't get you can't get eternal life from your works. You get eternal life from your your faith, but in your works. You're going to live your life to please him. Colossians 1 10 says this Paul says and we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way bearing fruit and every good work growing in the knowledge of God. Second Corinthians 5 9 and 15 Paul writes so we make it our goal to please him. This is the goal of the Christian to please our king. Now that's not for eternal life. We can't possibly do that. We please the Lord through our faith and the all pleasing son of David Jesus. But in our lives we live our lives to please our king like Zeba did here. And Paul emphasizes that says our goal is Christians is to please him. That's our goal. Number two you should not live your life to please others. Don't live your life to please others to gain their approval if you have to be unfaithful to do so. So don't live your life to please others especially if you have to be unfaithful to do so. So first us learnians 2 4 Paul writes this on the contrary we speak as men approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel. We are not trying to please men but God. Paul says we're not trying to please men but God. Likewise in Galatians 1 10 here's what Paul says. He says am I now trying to win the approval of men or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men I would not be a servant of Christ. So pleasing men and pleasing God generally are set up here's opposites. They're not always opposite but generally set up is that way in that way. So a here don't care. Don't care what people think of you. Ultimately don't care what people think of you. Paul writes here we're trying to please God who tests our hearts. Care that God is pleased with you. Care that you're walking in his ways and that he can look down upon you like he looked down on Job and says have you considered my servant Arthur? Have you considered my servant Crystal? You want God to be able to say that about you and your life at any point. So don't care what people think of you as you live pleasing Christ especially if people don't value Jesus. If they're not Christians or if they're Christians and their value systems off don't care about what they think of you. There's a funny kind of quirky movie that I like called Nebraska and we'll forte from Saturday Night Live was in it. And it's just a real funny movie about it's not it's funny in a quirky way. He's taking care of his dad who has some dementia. His dad has gotten a letter in the mail that says you've won a million dollars. He's a publisher's clearing house and the dad doesn't realize that he hasn't actually won a million dollars. And he doesn't trust the mail to you know to call the number and to send for them to send him a million dollars. So he needs to go to Nebraska to the address where this letter came from to collect his million dollars. But on the way will forte is his dad go back and they visit relatives who are along the way between where they are in Montana and Nebraska where they're going. And there's these two cousins that the main character will forte has not seen in since they were kids like seven years old. Now they're all about 30 and these two twin brothers cousins of his are laughing at will forte because it takes them 12 hours to get from there to where they are. And they said we've done that Nate and they just keep laughing at that and we'll say I don't care. It's not in my value system of getting to one place to another in eight hours and like that makes me a good person versus a bad person. So it really doesn't affect him. He just thinks it's kind of funny. But when a non Christian or a Christian who's a legalist or what are often his value system is judging you or and you're not pleasing him or you don't have his approval don't care. You care about the evaluation of someone who's lined up with the values of God. You care of God looks down and says with this one I'm well pleased think about the apostle Paul yet all God's people the Jews at the time saying Paul's a renegade let's let's put him to death. Let's run him out of town. What did Paul care about that and left the message of the gospel. That's Paul's point and passages I care about what God thinks about me. I have to stand before him and give an account not these Jewish leaders who are seeking my life and that should be the same that should be the same for us. So don't care about what people think of you as you live please in Christ. Not qualification be. It's okay to seek others approval. A coach, a friend, a teacher, a parent, a family member, a future spouse if you don't have one already. Don't seek the approval someone who's a future spouse if you're currently married. When it doesn't compromise your faithfulness. Right. Seek the approval of your boss because you're being faithful to Jesus who tells you through Paul. Do your work heartily as for the Lord. So do your work at your vocations heartily and do it greatly so that your bosses please so that people you're working for are pleased. But if they don't like you because you're following Jesus there's nothing you can do about that. And if you're doing great work and working really hard and they're just picking and trying to find fault don't sweat it. You know you don't need their approval for eternal life so don't sweat it. Love your neighbor through your work. Work hard. Work loving them. Work despite the way they're treating you. But and hopefully they'll be pleased but if they're not don't worry that don't care. The approval we seek is the approval Zeba seeks. It doesn't seek the approval of the Absalom. It doesn't seek the approval of most of his sister like brothers who have gone after Absalom. He seeks the approval of David. He says in verse four may always find favor in your sight. So that's the way where to be. Care about what Jesus thinks of you. And if other if men like you to bonus next number two having received your Jesus eternal favor through faith. Through faith in his mercy as you live in Jesus kingdom the church as you remember of it. Be a blessing. Be a blessing to the people of the church. Be a blessing to the people of the church. Here's why a first of all because if you love your king you care for his people. So we learn here. If you love your king Jesus you care for his people. And you want to help them. You want to help them in their following of him. If you love Jesus you love his people and you want to help his people other Christians in their following of him. It's not easy to follow him. I always want to feel like Kermit the frog when I say that. It's not easy following Jesus. We walk outside these doors you go into your workplaces you go into your neighborhood you strike up a conversation with anyone. And immediately you know within 20 seconds of talking to somebody non-Christian values and priorities come out of their mouths. And then if you tell them you're a Christian guess what you're going to receive some kind of persecution one way or another if they're not a Christian. It's not easy to follow the anointed king the Messiah. It's not easy to follow David out of Jerusalem to lose your home to lose the respect of all Israel who's following Absalom to put your life at risk by following the one that not everyone's following. And so we want to be like Zeba and we want to help other people who are following the right king. And lift them up. That's what we learn big thing here from Zeba and also from the folks we see in chapter 17. So be a blessing to the people of the church because if you keep loved your king you care for his people. This is seen in verses 1 and 2. You get that in verses 1 and 2 here. When David had gone a short distance there's Zeba, stood on the Fibeshath, waiting to meet him. So he's there. He's waiting waiting to meet David and the people with David and what's he have. He has a string of donkey saddled, loaded with two hundred loaves of bread, a hundred cakes of raisins, a hundred cakes of figs, and a skin of wine. This was like modern day, you know, cinnamon, cinnamon buns, right? Skin of wine. David says, why have you brought these things? The donkeys are for your household David to ride on. Bread and fruit are for the men to eat. The one is to refresh those who become exhausted in the desert. Zeba cares about not only David but David's people. See how loving Jesus and not being a part of a church is silliness, right? Jesus says, you love me? Well, care for my people. Help them out. See what needs they have. I won't sit at home and say, I love Jesus but I don't like his church. Jesus, the church is my body. So what, you like my head but not my body? How to be in a Christian? It's loving his people. Loving his people and that's what we see here from Zeba. So number of ways, number of ways we'll see this. Be generous. Be generous. Whatever you have, be generous with it. We see this in verses 1 and 2 here with Zeba. We see it in chapter 17 verses 27 through 29 with these other two or three people that come along. Hebrews 13 6 puts it this way, did not forget to do good and to share with others for with such sacrifices God has pleased. So in one of the ways God continues on sacrifices for us in the New Testament, we don't offer sacrifices for a tonement. That's been taken care of for us in Jesus. But we do sacrifice our effort, our energy, what we have. Whatever we have to give, we share with others. And this is especially in the context of the church. God's pleased with this. Well, we're like Zeba. And we say, hey, I can make all this bread and raising cakes and fig cakes and wine that I can come and give to David's people. We read Jim read for us first Corinthians 12 verses 4 through 7. And it says, we don't all have the same things to give. We don't all have the same things to be generous with. And so, you know, we generally think of generosity in terms of money. And so if you're, you know, making good money, you can be generous with that and help God's people from that. But if you have various gifts, which first Corinthians 12 talks about, whether it's teaching or helping or demonstrating or whatever it is, use those things to help, to help God's people. Use your time for others in the church. Use your effort for others in the church. Use your stuff for others in the church. If you've got a power washer, let someone borrow it to take care of their house or their driveway, whatever you have here with Zeba, he brings what he has. This is stuff I can bring. And so he brings it because it might be helpful to God's people. Use your expertise for others in the church. And some of you know how I use your expertise. Some of you know how to take care of cars, some of you know how to take care of plumbing, some of you know how to take care of bricks and mortar and different all kinds of things. And so I text you and say, hey, what's the deal with this? And that's you sharing your expertise with me so I can take care of it if I have the ability to. For some of you, it's a listening ear. Share your listening ear, share your compassion, share your sympathy with others, give in that way to the church to help your brothers and sisters in the church. Share your skills, various skills you have. We have to reshape this area over here when we moved into the dojo and many of you helped out with that. Okay, so be generous. Next, see, refresh, refresh them. And again, we see this word used that Zeba comes along and end of verse two. He says, I bring the wine to refresh those who become exhausted in the desert. Scripture defines our lives here on earth as wandering in the desert. It's our Exodus. We're in our Exodus wanderings. We haven't reached the promised land of heaven yet. And we're in need. We're decaying and we're struggling with sin. And we need to be refreshed as we struggle as we become exhausted in following Jesus in a world that doesn't encourage us to do so. And so we come along and we say, what can I do to refresh God's people? God describes himself as one who refreshes his people in Jeremiah 31. He says in verse 25, I will refresh the weary and satisfy the faint. This is what God does for us in our lives. And we're to be godly, we're to be Christ like and say, what can I do to refresh the weary, to refresh those who are struggling now? So we do this with other believers that they endure hardships and trials in life. Paul says we're to be doing this to each other. Second Timothy, once 16, I listed for you there. He says, may the Lord show the household of a necessary force because he often refreshed me. It was not ashamed of my chains. So when Paul was in Rome and he was in prison, a necessary, a necessary force came to him and was not ashamed of him and refreshed him as he was there. If I lean in seven, he writes to Paul writes to if I lean in it says he has refreshed the hearts of the saints. That's what we're to be doing. Refreshing the hearts of one another as we follow our king and the wilderness of this life, just like the people were following David out into the wilderness away from their homes in Jerusalem. So that's what Zeba does. It looks to refresh. She says, well, they need to be refreshed. She says, I know food, food like my mom. She's to say when I feel a little bit sick, she's to hear you eat a little something, you'll feel better. And I did. Be thoughtful. Be thoughtful. Philippians two, four talks about this. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Don't come into the church to get. Don't come into the church. Say, boy, I need this. And it's okay. You need this. You do. But come into the church. Not only looking to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Look at others in the church following the great son of David Jesus, like David, like Zeba did. He saw David and is retreating people. And he said, what do their, what is what do David's faithful citizens need? Well, donkeys, David and his family can ride on these donkeys food, drink. He's thoughtful. He's thinking about them. What do they need? He doesn't take them, you know, STP cars or Rubik's cubes. He takes them what they need. He's thoughtful. He's thoughtful about it. So when you come into the church, don't think about your own needs and interests. God will take care of those. Think about others. Don't be consumed about taking care of yourself in the church. Later, in chapter 17, you can look in those verses, verse 27, when they get to Mahanam, which is a city on the other side of the Jordan River, Shobhi, Makir, and Barsalai Kham. And they bring bedding. This is thoughtful, right? They bring bedding, bowls, pottery, wheat, barley, flour, roasted grain, beans and lentils. Honey, and curds, milk, sheep, and cheese. For they said the people who have become hungry and tired and thirsty in the desert. They're thoughtful. They're thinking about others who aren't them. What do they need? So we look at that for those who are following Jesus, following Jesus with us. Jesus said, and Jim read it for us this morning, it's our tendency to think you're great if everyone's serving you. But Jesus said, that's not the way it is in Mahanam. For I'm serving you guys and I'm the greatest. And that's the way you are to be too. Don't think you're great if you're sitting at the table, getting served. Know that I, looking from above, will look down and see you serving my people and say, he is great. She is great because they're serving. Matthew 23, 11, Jesus says, the greatest among you will be your servant. So think about how you can serve others like Ziva and these others as they get to Mahanam. So this is Ziva here and the King approves the service to the people. He's pleased and he rewards him. So know that as you serve just as David rewards Ziva, he's storing out for you rewards and having as you serve others who are fellow believers following him today on the earth. And then F, F, seek to encourage, seek to encourage the people of the church. Ask yourself, what might encourage or lift up that person? Look around you. Again, you have the at Mahanam. How could I encourage them? Dry bedding, some clean sheets, place the sleep, a refreshment of food. Flipens 2, 3 says, do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility, consider others better than yourselves. Paul writes in 1st Sonia's 5, 11, therefore encourage one another and build each other up. Hebers 3, 13, the writer of Hebrews says, but encourage one another daily as long as it is called today so that none of you may be hardened by sins deceitfulness. We live in the desert, sin is deceitful and we need to be encouraged. So the writer of Hebrews says, encourage one another, daily. Then Hebrews 10, 25 speaks of why we come to church each week. Let us not give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing but let us encourage one another and all the more as you see the day of Jesus' return approaching. So summary of number 2 here, when you're in the church, think of other people. Think of how can I encourage? How can I refresh? How can I serve other people? Even if you're not cherry, even if you're down, even if you've had a hard week, even if you don't feel like talking anyone, find ways to help or you don't have to talk to people. Stack some chairs or hang out in the trailer where you just receive chairs in there and you don't have to talk to anybody. You don't have to be, this doesn't mean you have to be happy and cherry with everybody. You can be going through really hard times in your life but serve in the church. It will help you out really well. God's command to us to love others as we love ourselves is psychologically good force. It's our mind off ourselves and our own grief and pain and it gives us joy as we help other people. Number 3. Why be a blessing to the people of the church? There are many reasons to be blessings to people and a blessing to people in the church but we see here especially in verse 4.3. Be a blessing in Christ's kingdom and humility to your king. We see this humility to the king in Zeba and verse 4. He bows before his anointed king, the Messiah, the anointed one David. He bows before him and today we bow before our king, Jesus showing him reverence, showing him humility, proclaiming our belief that he is worthy of us being faithful to him. I bow to you David, not to absolute. You are worthy to follow even if I have to be out in the desert to follow you. It's a thing of humility. So in the church number A there, letter A, worship the king in the church, humbly and in reverence. We read this in our call to worship this morning. Let us be thankful and so worship God acceptably with reverence and all. Worship is a thing in which we humble ourselves before God. We don't worship and pride is like oxymoron. Worship is our declaring God is worthy, not us. And we need to recognize this just as Zeba when he comes into the realm of David. He meets him at the top of Mount Owl. It's just as he's crossed over. He recognizes this is David's realm and he bows. He offers gifts and he bows. And when we come into the church, when you come into the church recognize this is Jesus' realm and where to be reverent and humble before him. These are his people who I'm seeing now. I need to treat them well. They're not my people. They're not just my peers. They're the loved citizens of my king. And so we're kind and we're reverence to him. We're humble before him. And so we treat his people well. So we do this in worship, at least in our hearts, if not in our physical posture. We're humble before our king is we worship. And then be where to remember, remember when you step into the church that this is his kingdom. And we see this in verse 1, 2, 3, 4. This is through and through. David is king. You see the word king, kingdom, kingdom, kingdom. This is about David. What's your attitude when you come into David's realm and into his kingdom? You're not calling the shots anymore. You're not the one who's worthy. He is in your bow and in reverent worship. You bow before him and say let me just be a citizen. Let me have a zeba says just let me have your favor. Okay. And that's good. That's good enough for me. And so that's what we do when we come into the church we say I'm in Jesus kingdom now and he's the king and I get to be a citizen. So our group, the church, our group of people following Jesus is all about Jesus. So remember this, everyone's here because of him. We're in his house when we come here, we're in his house in his realm, not ours. Our job here is to be like Zeba to serve, to serve him, to serve his people, to walk in humility remembering that he is right. He is the rightest chosen king that can worthy of our following. So in summary, in summary, believe have faith that Jesus is worthy of following. He's better than following Absalom. He's better than having the approval of other people who don't know him. Secondly, seek to refresh his people as they follow him. People, Christ, people need refreshment because it's hard to follow Jesus in this life. So we're in heaven. So we're in the new heavens and New Earth. It's difficult to follow Jesus, right? Jesus says to Paul, I will show you how much you must suffer for my sake. Welcome to the kingdom, Paul. Welcome to suffering. And that's what the citizens of the true king do. They leave their homes. They head out into the desert. I'm Christianity. See how errant the prosperity gospel is. Following Jesus is not about having everything go well for us. Following Jesus has been dispossessed in various ways until at the end, everything works out for us. I watched Cinderella this week. I found out Mallory really hasn't watched a lot of Disney classics that happens to a last child sometimes. And so we're watching different things and we're watching Cinderella now. And it's really wonderful. I hadn't seen Cinderella in a long, long time because I'm a guy. She's nice to the mice. She's nice to the birds. She's nice to the dog, the horse, the wicked cat named Lucifer. She's nice to the stepsister. She's nice to the stepmom and they are hateful and awful. She's ready to go to the ball and she's all set. And she's all set because the mice and the animals have put together her dress. Remember that? She's so delighted she can come. She says, wait, I'm ready. And the sisters come and they rip the beads off her and they rip the sash and they ruin her dress so she can't come. And she heads out crying ever Cinderella. She heads out of the house and she's weeping and all the animals that are left in the house is the stepmother and the daughters go off. They're just beyond words. The most deserving person is suffering. And I thought, wow, that's the Christian life. But then there's the end, right? The Prince recognizes who deserves to be uplifted and who deserves to be honored. And she lives half way ever after it literally says that. And that's the Christian life. We go through and we're living with the step sisters and we're living with the stepmother. And life is the stepmother for us. And it's not that great. But we live in cheer. We live in hope. And in the end, we get, right? We're thinking of you, Emily, as we're watching it, too. We live half the way ever after it. So refresh God's people. Life's tough. Don't be judgmental of another Christian. You just don't know what he or she's going through right now, right? Maybe in a really hard place. So look to see what you can do to refresh them, to lift them up. And remember, the church is the dominion of Jesus. It is, here's your last point. It's Christ kingdom. It's Christ kingdom. Let's pray.