What’s the big deal about taking a census? It was a big enough deal that God chose to kill 70,000 men as a punishment. Also, even David himself admitted that he was the one who made the decision. Why punish the people for his decision? What’s up with that? Also, we saw yesterday that Chronicles did not even mention David’s murder and adultery. Most of us would think that adultery and murder were far more serious of sin than ordering the census. Yet 70,000 die for the census and David get’s his sin published in the Chronicles. What’s up with that?
The essence of David’s sin was pride. The purpose of a census in his day was mainly to assess his military strength. The last nationwide census was taken when the nation had finished its 40 years in the wilderness. It was time to begin the conquest of Canaan. They needed to know how many fighting men they had in order to assess how to organize their troops in order to prepare for battle. David had already reached the apex of his military strength without a census. How could a census aid him? It couldn’t. It was a matter of pride. Look at results of the census. He had 1,600,000 fighting men. Joshua only had 600,000. Wow! He had a million more men than Joshua! Sounds like pastors swapping statistics about their ministries.
Okay, so he was having a problem with pride. So why come down so hard on that? Pride seeks to rival the glory of God. God will not have a rival. It is worse than adultery or murder. It condemned Satan to hell. It barred Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden. It transferred their kids, you and me, into a cloud of darkness. It clouds the glory of God. When we are proud, we cannot see Him. God will have nothing to do with it. Having a hard time understanding the justice of God? Having a hard time seeing the glory of God? It is pride. The more I catch little glimpses of His glory, the more I begin to see how horribly proud I am. Lord, help me to empty myself of my pride so that I may see your glory. Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
P.S. What in the world were the Tabernacle and the furniture of the tabernacle (minus the ark) doing in Gibeon when David had moved the ark to Jerusalem? After his first misdoing with moving the ark and this experience, no wonder he was afraid of the Lord. Do our failures sometimes produce an unhealthy fear of the Lord?
This is commonly called the Dome of the Rock. It sits upon the location which some believe the temple once sat. In the basement is the bedrock which Muslims claim that Abraham sought to sacrifice Ishmael. Muslims believe that the Jewish and Christian Scriptures have changed the story. They say it was Ishmael whom Abraham was commanded to sacrifice and not Isaac. Muslims also believe that Mohammed made a miraculous night journey here, where he ascended to the highest heaven and had a conversation with Allah. All three religions believe that this temple mount is where Abraham sacrificed a ram in the place of his son and where David sacrificed oxen to stay the hand of the death angel. Christians believe that outside of the Temple Mount gates, Jesus was sacrificed in our place. The first two sacrifices were types of what would happen with Jesus.
PSALM 145
“If a tree falls in the forest, and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?” It is that stupid question which people, who play with definitions, enjoy asking. But it does have some merits to it. Growing up, we would visit my grandfather’s farm located on the Cimarron River at the dead end of a county road about midway between Yale and Cushing, Oklahoma. He only had 58 acres but he also leased some more acreage from the Indian tribe next door to him. I have spent hours scouring his acres and exploring his land. Even though the land is no longer in the family, I still enjoy exploring it from google earth. If a tree fell on his land, would it make a noise? Well, if you define noise as vibration of molecules in the atmosphere or ground, then of course it made a noise. The laws of physics would indicate that the same vibrations would be there whether or not a receptor was there. But, if you define noise as the reception of those vibrations, and no one was there, then of course there was no noise. There was no one there to receive it or observe it. In my exploration of Grandpa’s farm, I found many a broken dead limb and fallen tree lying upon the ground. Did they make a noise when they fell?
As I searched the land, I found all sorts of life forms, vegetation, insects, mammals, amphibians, reptiles, birds. The variety of life was awesome! The things out of which life sprang were also varied. A good portion of grandpa’s land was good arable soil. About a third of the land was rocky, hilly and covered with blackjack oaks. It led up to the edge of his land, which was a beautiful bluff overlooking the Cimarron River. He had a couple of small ponds kept his cattle watered. A shallow well provided water for his garden, laundry, washing dishes, bathing etc., but for drinking he preferred distilled water brought in from town. Yes, there was much to receive and observe upon the farm. I could spend paragraph upon paragraph describing in much more detail the wonders of things I found on his farm as a grade school kid. If I had never had opportunity to explore, would they have still been there? But, then I would have been oblivious to its existence.
If God exists in eternity, and there is no creation to observe Him, does He still exist? Of course He does, but He would be the only One who would care that He exists. But there is a creation. But what if some of that creation does not have opportunity to explore the wonders of their Creator? Then they would be oblivious to His existence. There are only two ways that we can know His majesty: He can somehow communicate what He is like to us, or we can study what He does and guess what He is like.
Psalm 145:5 I will meditate on the glorious splendor of Your majesty, And on Your wondrous works. Two things give us much material upon which we may meditate:
1) the splendor of His majesty andWhat is the difference? The splendor of His majesty is what would be true of Him even if we had never experienced any of His wondrous works. His wondrous works are what we experience because of what He is like, revealed in what He has done. Certainly, that is a fine difference, but nonetheless, it is a difference.
2) His wondrous works.
What is He like? He has a name that should be blessed and praised forever. His greatness is unsearchable. He is good all the time. He is compassionate, slow to anger and merciful. He is powerful. He is righteous, gracious and near. All of these things would be true of Him whether or not I ever experienced an act of His that would reveal this as true of Him. I can only learn these things of Him as He reveals them in His word.
But what if I have opportunity to experience His works? Ahh! Then I should make it a point to explore, examine and meditate on His works! I can examine what He has done for others and what He has done for me. One of the most important sources of learning is from the previous generation. It is such a privilege to pass on my stories of God’s works to my children! I love to hear stories from other generations about God’s provision for them, especially stories demonstrating His compassion, goodness and mercy. For me to be able to pass on those stories it is important that I learn the art of meditating on His works so that I will know the significance of the acts when they happen. Sometimes when I sit down and begin exploring the acts of the Lord in my life, it becomes a little overwhelming. I see that it is true that when my eyes are on Him, He opens His hand and I am fed. Now that is glory! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
ZECHARIAH 7
In Ezra 2:28 we learn that 223 exiles had settled Bethel (House of God). The better translation of verse 2 is, “When Sherezer came with Regem-Melech and his men from Bethel, to pray before the LORD.” These men came with a legitimate question. Jerusalem was breached and burned in the fifth month, and Gedeliah, the provisional governor was assassinated in the seventh month. Without the instruction of the Lord, they had been observing these fast days for over 76 years to commemorate these events before the Lord. Some Orthodox Jews still observe these fasts to this day. Now that they had returned and the temple was in the process of being rebuilt, was this fast necessary?
What seemed like a great idea receives a surprising answer from the Lord. Verse 5 “Say to all the people of the land, and to the priests: ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months during those seventy years, did you really fast for Me—for Me?’” Sometimes our focus leads us to make decisions that are full of zeal but misguided. Fasting can be a very empowering discipline, but the Lord is not so concerned about some of our outward disciplines as He is the attitudes of our hearts. Part of the sin that had sent the nation into exile was their attitude toward the disadvantaged in their society. The exile seems to have cured them of their blatant idolatry, but it did not change their attitude toward the poor. Fasting is supposed to demonstrate our mourning over sin, not the discipline brought to correct us of our sin. They simply didn’t get it. They were like children who mourned being spanked not mourning that they had done wrong.
The Lord’s answer was simple. He just wants us to execute true justice showing mercy and compassion to everybody. What is playing out before us is a very real example of the Lord’s parable of the unforgiving servant. It is really pretty simple. But they would not hear it. The Lord just wanted them to reflect His true justice, mercy and compassion. Is that so hard? Apparently it is because we never get it right. They walked away in disobedience. As a result, the Lord refused to hear them.
The glory of the Lord is that He wants to display His true justice, mercy and compassion through us. Is that not incredible? Should we not then be the most just, merciful and compassionate people on the face of the earth? If we are reflecting His image, we are. Indeed, we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
1 PETER 2
Everyone wants to be part of something big. Andy Stanley tells of an early mentor in his life who used to ask him, "Whatcha got goin' 'big'?" At that stage in his life, the question bothered him. At that point in Andy's life the biggest thing he had going was getting 20 youth group members to the amusement park and back without losing any of them. Churches in the USA don't grow unless you've got something 'big' going on. One would think that if you are following the Lord of the Universe that one would be part of some impressive things. One would think that following the Lord of the Universe would be like moving from one massive victory to another.
Peter is speaking to people who are undergoing persecution because of their faith in the Lord of the Universe. They were not seeing anything 'big' going on in their lives. Consequently they were beginning to drop out. He writes to encourage them to be faithful in the midst of the persecution. He reminds them that Jesus is the Chief Cornerstone. We've looked at the cornerstone quote before in Matthew 21:23-46 and Luke 20:1-26. In the midst of persecution and seeming smallness, Peter recalls Jesus' words as encouragement. The ironic thing is that history demonstrates that when the church is persecuted, that is when Jesus does some of His 'biggest' building.
Remember a cornerstone is one from which the rest of the building gets its orientation. It is the main stone in the foundation. You pick the best quality for that stone. It is usually massive and perfectly shaped. By uniting two intersecting walls, a cornerstone aligns the whole building and ties it together. Jesus says that He is the stone the builders rejected. He became the chief cornerstone.
The wall of heaven and the wall of earth intersect. Ever since the fall of Adam the human cathedral was falling. It collided with heaven's wall. The human wall was crooked and never fit. God gave some instructions to the Jewish nation concerning how to build. Imbedded within that instruction were prophecies concerning the Cornerstone. This is a quote of Psalm 118:22, 23.
The glory of Jesus is that He uses living stones. We are not some dead cathedral that never changes. We are a living organism that continues to grow and change but ever into a more beautiful reflection of Him. We are part of an organism that is so 'big' that we cannot see even a small portion of it. But He is building it one cell, one stone, at a time. In shaping the stones sometimes the mason has to cut or break off the unwanted edges of stone. Since we are living stones, that hurts. Since we cannot always see the whole living cathedral of which we are part, we feel isolated. That is why we must look at His glory. He also suffered. He bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we having died to sins, might live for righteousness--by whose stripes you were healed. That's the way He fits living stones together. He's got something goin' really big. We are part of it. I cannot think of anything bigger than being part of a living wall that intersects heaven and earth! Let's participate in His work. Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
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