[0:00] Take your Bibles, if you would, and go with me to Psalm 54. Psalm 54. Tonight, David is dealing with betrayal. His friends, his own tribe members, people that should have been closer to him, people from the very tribe of Judah, are betraying him.
[0:23] And I want to give you three things to write down in the margin of your Bible as we go through this before we ever really get into it. How do you deal with betrayal?
[0:37] How do you deal with heartache and problems that come your way? There are three things that David does in this psalm. They'll be actually the middle three points, but I won't get you to mark them as we go through.
[0:48] Read with me the psalm. Save me, O God, by thy name, and judge me by thy strength. Hear my prayer, O God.
[1:00] Give ear to the words of my mouth. Why don't you write the word prayer beside those two verses? Pray. When David is being mistreated and abused, and actually they're trying to get him arrested and killed, he prays.
[1:16] He prays. What does he do when he's in trouble? He prays. That would be a good place to start. Amen? But it's going to be more beautiful because he starts a prayer because all of us would say, yeah, we all do that.
[1:28] But watch this. Read the next verse. For strangers are risen up against me, and oppressors seek after my soul. They have not set God before them.
[1:41] Behold, God is mine helper. The Lord is with them that uphold my soul. He shall reward the evil unto mine enemies and cut them off in thy truth.
[1:55] I want you to write down. Meditate. See what he did? He thought right. He started praying. He's discouraged. He's hurt. He's in danger.
[2:07] And he prays. Then he says, wait a minute. How do you get my mind straight? I need to realize God's going to take care of me. Look at the verses. It's beautiful. He said, God's my helper.
[2:19] He says two things I think are beautiful. If you can just imagine him praying. If you can imagine him hiding from enemies. Saul is out to get him. And his friends have told Saul, we'll find him.
[2:31] We'll locate him. We'll point to him. We'll tell you where he's at. And so Saul's on the march to get him. And David said, I'm going to pray. And then David said, I'm going to meditate.
[2:42] And what he meditates, he says, I know God takes care of them to take care of me. Look at verse four. For the Lord is with them that uphold my soul. He said, those who are trying to take care of me, God will bless them.
[2:53] And then he says, by the way, all them that are trying to turn me in and Saul and all them, he said, he'll reward evil to them. Don't do me wrong. God will take care of them. We'll get this in a second.
[3:04] But no vengeance on our part. Can I get an amen right there? No vengeance on our part. And then it says, I will freely sacrifice unto thee.
[3:15] I will praise thy name, O Lord, for it is good. He hath delivered me out of all trouble. Mine eye has seen his desire upon my enemies.
[3:25] Would you write down worship? And then he worshiped. And he praised. You can underline it. He sacrificed. And he praised. So when you're faced with a problem, there's a three-step solution right there.
[3:40] You start out by going to get a hold of God. I'm in trouble. I need you. Then you start thinking about how good God is. And then you start praising God.
[3:51] And you're going to be amazed at how God takes care of you. As I looked and studied and went over the chapter, I couldn't help but think. When you talk about betrayal, one of my favorite stories of betrayal is a book called The Peace Child by Don Richardson.
[4:06] He was a missionary in Irian Jaya over Papua New Guinea area and all that area. He was a missionary. And he went in, and he was one of the first people to live amongst the natives.
[4:16] They'd often killed the missionaries that tried to get in there. And when he got there, he started explaining to them the gospel message, how that God had sent his son and how his son had lived here and had these 12 guys that ran around with him.
[4:33] And then Judas kissed him and betrayed him to be killed. And as he told the story, the tribesmen clapped for Judas. And they thought, well, he is so deceitful.
[4:46] He is so deceptive. He knew how to kill and get away with it. Because in their society, you kill people after you became their friend. You would invite somebody from another tribe to your house.
[4:59] You would feed them. You'd give them stuff. And when they became your good buddy, you'd knock them in the head, kill them, and eat them. So they were like, that Judas is one big hero. And then one day he saw the two tribes were at war.
[5:12] They'd been fighting. And they finally met to try to make peace. And somebody said, we're going to take a baby from tribe A and put the baby on tribe B. We're actually going to pass it between the legs of a lady over there.
[5:25] And tribe B will raise the kid from tribe A. And that kid will be called a peace child. And you can never hurt that baby. You have to take care of it so our tribes will be at peace now.
[5:37] And then Don Richardson went, wow, that's the key. Jesus was from another country and another tribe. And he came and was born of a virgin.
[5:49] And Judas killed the peace child. Now they booed Judas and fell in love with Jesus. The betrayer was finally figured out. David's been betrayed.
[6:00] I want to take you through the Bible real quickly and show you some of that scripture. If you look it up, go with me to 1 Samuel. If you want to, 23, 13. Now you know Jesus was betrayed. You know Jesus was betrayed.
[6:13] And Jesus forgave. And so tonight I'd like to ask you, how do you handle being betrayed? Betrayed. Do you seek vengeance? We often seek vengeance.
[6:26] And we're not to. In 1 Samuel chapter 23 and verse 13. And we know this psalm refers back to that because in the note at the beginning of the psalm that the Hebrews had there, it tells us that these people of Ziph had betrayed David.
[6:43] David and his men, about 600 of them, where they arose and departed out of Keilah and went withersiver they could. And it was told Saul that David had escaped.
[6:56] And in verse 14, David abode in the wilderness of Ziph. And Saul was looking for him every day. But God delivered him not into his hands.
[7:08] So he's hiding out in Ziph. In verse 15, David saw that Saul was come to seek his life. And he was in the wilderness of Ziph. He was in the woods. Verse 16.
[7:20] While he's there in the woods, Jonathan, Saul's son, comes to David in the woods to strengthen his hand in the Lord. I'd like to ask you to underline that.
[7:32] That's kind of a side, but it really fits into the story. You see, Saul knows that it's God's will that David be the king. Saul knows that he disobeyed God and God had ripped the kingdom away from him and he's not to be king.
[7:49] Saul knows, without knowing exactly how David was anointed, he knows David's the next guy. Jonathan knows David's the next guy. Jonathan is deeply in love with David and loving and admiration and following him as the anointed man of God.
[8:07] And when David's on the run, his friend risked his life against his dad and the army and everybody else. And he went out and said, hey, God's got a will for your life. God's working in your life.
[8:18] My daddy's going to try to kill you. But the truth is, God's will is going to work out. Hang in there. Trust God. Boy, it'd be good if you and I would strengthen the hand of our friends in times of trouble.
[8:32] Verse 17, we know what he said to him. Basically, he said, fear not for the hand of Saul, my father, shall not find thee. Thou shall be king over Israel and I shall be next unto thee.
[8:46] In another place, he said, I'll be your second. Which is a tremendous, powerful picture of a powerful person because Jonathan should be king after Saul.
[8:58] But Jonathan said to David, I know God's made you king. I'll accept being second. I'd like to be next to you. You and I both know he never got that. He ends up getting killed with his dad.
[9:09] In verse 18, the two of them made a covenant and they agreed. But look at 19. Then came up the Ziphites to Saul, to Gibeah, and said, does not David hide himself with us in strongholds in the wood?
[9:26] And they said, we'll find him for you. Psalm 1 Samuel 23, 20. O king, come down, according to all the desire of thy soul. Come down. Our part shall be to deliver him, David, into the king's hands.
[9:41] Verse 21. David, Saul starts talking. He said, well, boy, God bless you guys. God bless you. You're having compassion on me. So go now and really look good because this David guy is a sneaky character.
[9:55] Read the verse. He's a sneaky character. He will, he, you got to find out exactly where he is. You got to see him because he deals very subtly. See, therefore, and take knowledge of all the lurking places where he hides.
[10:10] Make sure you know old David's the kind to sneak out to another place where he hides himself. Come with the certainty and I will go with you. He's come with the certainty and I will go with you into the land and we'll find him.
[10:25] And in verse 24, they arose and went to Ziph. David's friends, they are part of the tribe of Judah. They all live close to Jerusalem. They should have been helping David.
[10:36] It's pretty well known by now that Saul's trying to kill David. David's on the run and these guys would rather get in the approval of a lost king.
[10:47] In 26.1, they do it again. They go to Saul in Gibeah and say, does David not hide himself? And Saul arose and goes down to Gibeah.
[10:57] David has gone from national hero to villain to be turned into the authorities. Being betrayed by those you think love you has to hurt severely.
[11:09] So the psalm starts with King David on the run. He's got one encourager. He's got one encourager. Old Jonathan came to see him.
[11:21] And Jonathan reminded him, David, it doesn't matter what men say or men do. God is bigger than all of that. And you know God's will. And you know God's going to work this out. And you know God's going to take care of you.
[11:32] But it still had to hurt. So David sits down and he writes a psalm, a song to be sung and to remember. Because not only David gets to be betrayed, but we get betrayed.
[11:43] Not only does David go through bad times, but we go through bad times. Not only would David go through bad times, but Israel would go through bad times. And so they sing a song. They sing a song in their church, in their congregation, in their assembly.
[11:56] In Psalm 54, save me, O God. Save me, O God. So look at what they do. When David was betrayed, what's he do first? He calls on God.
[12:08] So go to Psalm 54, verse 1, and underline this. When he goes to God, he goes to him and says, by thy name. You need to underline that.
[12:19] Now that's a big deal. That God's name is God's authority. Fact is, when Moses said, who are you? He said, well, I am that I am.
[12:29] You don't need to know who I am. I'm the guy from Genesis 1-1. That's who I am. I'm the guy that owns the world. That's who I am. And by going with his name, you're saying his character.
[12:42] So David goes to God and he said, oh God, save. I know you. I know your name. I know how you are. I know you're a God of character. I know that what you say works out.
[12:55] I know that if you promise me, I'll be king. I know you're going to do it because you keep your word. Your name is good. Amen? And you can know that. It won't be long to be laying on a bed somewhere and you'll be dying and you'll need to know, is my salvation certain?
[13:14] Your salvation is certain as his name is. Your salvation is as certain as his character is. Your salvation is certain as his power is. He is the God of creation.
[13:26] If he can make a world, he can handle David's enemies. Now, when I read by thy name, I immediately, in my mind, go to the New Testament. You know, when Jesus was teaching the guys to pray, he said, now when y'all pray, you want to pray in my name because my name has power and my name has authority.
[13:46] Now, most churches pray that very wrong. They think it's like a magical incantation that you're throwing into the prayer. God, I would like to lose 100 pounds by tomorrow and I ask this in your name and wake up the next morning and they're just as fat as they were the day before because God didn't ever say you could say that.
[14:07] God, I wish you'd just do this for me. In your name, I ask for it in the name of Jesus. I ask for it. It's not a magical thing. It's an authority thing. It's a character thing. And so when you know what God says, you can go to God and say, you said, and I'm coming to you in your name to do what you said.
[14:26] And so we can pray to God that way in his name. That's what David's doing. David is going there and he's saying, God, in your name, in your name, it's by your name that I come and I ask you to save me by your name.
[14:40] It means based on his authority. You know that he's already promised you. Then he says, another interesting phrase in that verse, I hope you'll underline, by thy strength.
[14:53] But he says, judge me by thy strength. So it's by thy strength. Boy, God is powerful. He's the creator of God. He can do anything. But you see what he does?
[15:06] He opens himself up to be checked out. Motives and actions and everything. He said, now God, Saul's chasing me and I ask you to save me by your name, your authority, your character, your power, your ability.
[15:19] But God, I'm here. Judge me. I've got a clean conscience. I know that I'm trying to do right. You can judge me by your strength.
[15:30] You can check me out. David was simply trusting God for what he had promised that God would make him king. Verse two, he says, hear my prayer.
[15:41] Oh God, give ear to the words of my mouth. And you and I know what that is. David knew, he was talking to a prayer hearing, prayer answering God.
[15:54] And you and I can go to him and we can pray to him and things aren't static. Things aren't set in stone. Things aren't the way they're going to be. There's a God in heaven and you can go to him and pray and he will hear your prayer and he will answer your prayer.
[16:11] All David can do is lay out his complaint before the Lord and leave it there. I need you to understand something. I met with somebody this week and I said to him, worry and stress is on your face and we need to get rid of that.
[16:27] And he said, but I'm under a lot of stress. And I said, we need to get rid of that because biblically we cast our care on him because he cares for us.
[16:38] Amen. We cast our worries. We cast our anxieties and we go to him in Philippians chapter. That's first Peter, right? But in Philippians 4, we go to him and we say thank you to him and we trust him because we know he'll work it out.
[16:53] Did you know that when you need to pray, it's above your pay grade? You need to hear that. When you need to pray, it's above your pay grade. When you need to pray, it's because you can't do anything about it.
[17:07] Fact is, when I get out and get in my car in just a minute and get ready to head home, I probably won't even ask him how to get home. I got that one figured out. Say amen. And if I start driving my car, I'll just know I got that worked out.
[17:20] But David's praying because he's like, he's after me. He's come with an army. I'm going to need help here. But when you pray, you lay it out before the Lord like Hezekiah does and you leave it there.
[17:34] So many Christians, we live all stressed out. We live all worried up. We live all like, I can't control it because by nature, we are like control freaks and we want to be in control.
[17:48] But there's only one in control. So look at what he does, if you would, in 54.3. He said, strangers are risen up against me. Oppressors seek after my soul.
[18:00] They have not set God before them. They call them strangers. It's kind of like an insulting thing. It's like, et tu brute? It's like, and you, Brutus, when Caesar gets stabbed by Brutus, who he thinks is his friend, and he's like, that's the harshest cut of all because if anybody kills me, it's one thing, but if my best friend is trying to cut me and kill me and hurt me, and so David says, these are my people, but they're like strangers.
[18:32] They're like people I don't even know, and they've risen up against me. And then he says, oppressor, Saul, is after my soul. And he says, God, none of them even think about you.
[18:44] They were David's tribe, his extended family, but they're acting like enemies. Saul wanted to kill him. David knew God's will for his life. Also that Saul knew God's will, but Saul wanted to overturn what God had said.
[18:59] When you're betrayed. Now, I just like, before I go on, sometimes I wonder if I'm, if you're really listening or you're getting it, the power of prayer is faith, trusting that God will hear and answer.
[19:15] So when Hezekiah, I probably use that illustration too much for that, but when Hezekiah walks into God, he just lays the letter down, and he basically says, God, we're in trouble, and we need you.
[19:29] Here it is. You can read for yourself what they said. And he trusts God with it. And when you pray, you're going to have to go to God and say, my child is in a rebellious state.
[19:42] I am spanking my child. I'm disciplining my child, but it's beyond what I can accomplish. I need you to step in. And the way you're going to do that is you're going to walk up to God and say, here's my request. I'm going to trust you with it.
[19:53] You're going to do your part, but when it's above your pay grade, you leave it in the hands of God. And when you walk away, you say, I know God will take care of that. See, that's what we do. I know God will take.
[20:04] That's why we say Thanksgiving. We give Thanksgiving in Philippians chapter four. We pray and we ask and we say, thank you, Jesus. David goes and he says, we're in trouble.
[20:17] The beautiful thing is he tells that to God and he drops it. You know why? Because God doesn't want his people taking vengeance. Psalms 94, Psalm 94, 1.
[20:28] Oh Lord God, to whom vengeance belongs. Oh God, to whom vengeance belongs. You show yourself. You show your power.
[20:39] You do what you do. You're God. Did you get it? We go to God and we trust God with it. Betty said that when I was in the hospital, she was begging God not to let me die.
[20:56] And she said, finally she said, all right God, that's what you want. Go ahead and take him. She said, I got better the next day. I'm kind of lucky if she'd have prayed that on day one. Maybe I wouldn't have been in there 21 days.
[21:07] Could I get an amen? Take it to God and leave it there. Thank God she kept me under the tube for 21 days. Yeah, here's the deal. It was a joke obviously. But here's the deal.
[21:18] You and I know God's the only one that can handle it. Hey, you guys, you're worried about the elections and you're worried about the economy and you're worried about your health and you're worried about a virus that's going to kill you.
[21:31] Here's what you need to do. You need to go to God and say, God, there's a virus out there and it's allowed to kill me. I'm going to take all the precautions I ought to take but I'm just going to trust you. And then you get up happy and say, God will take care of me. The same thing you do about everything else.
[21:43] It's how you pray about your bills. It's how you pray about your health. It's how you pray about your job. It's how you do everything because we live expecting God to take care of us. That's no excuse for not going to the doctor, by the way.
[21:55] Don't be dumb. I want to get you a New Testament verse before we move on. Romans chapter 12, verse 19. Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves but rather give place unto wrath for it is written, vengeance is mine.
[22:15] I will repay, says the Lord. Now here's a beautiful thing. David is going to have opportunity after opportunity to kill Saul.
[22:29] You know that, right? But he won't. And even when he cuts off his, a corner of his robe, his heart smites him because it's not his place to take out Saul.
[22:42] Saul has tried to kill him 16 times. Not his place to get vengeance. God will take care of that. So in verse 20, Romans 12, 20 says, so if your enemy is hungry, feed him.
[22:56] Give him something to drink. He goes to the front of his head because here's the key for us believers. Verse 21, be not overcome of evil but overcome evil with good.
[23:09] Amen. Maybe I see things where they're not supposed to be seen but I don't think so. Look if you would at verse 4. After he prays, he meditates.
[23:22] Or you could say it this way, he preaches to himself. Or maybe he's preaching to his friends. I don't know if they're all sitting around. He might have got some of this from old Jonathan.
[23:33] He just might have got some of it from old Jonathan when he came to visit him. But he got through praying. He said, God, God, I'm in trouble. Saul's out there and he's going to get me.
[23:44] And he stopped praying. I'm just trusting you with it. In the name of Jesus, I bring this prayer to you. And then he said something and goes, now wait a minute. Look at it. Read the verse with me. God is my helper.
[23:57] He said, God is, behold, pay attention, listen up. God is my helper. I don't know who he's talking to but I guarantee you if I was scared to death and I said that to myself, it would probably scare me I said it.
[24:11] He said, God's taking care of me. He said, God will bless those that help me. The Lord is with them that uphold my soul. God will reward evil to those that try to hurt me.
[24:22] He shall reward evil to my enemies. He said, the truth will handle them. Psalm 54, 5, cut them off in thy truth. Cut them off.
[24:35] God, you take care of them. You seek the vengeance. He's preaching to himself. The truth is that God has already taken the kingdom from Saul and given it to David even though no one knows it yet.
[24:50] All David needs to do is wait for God to fulfill his will and promise. David says, we can trust God. Can we trust God?
[25:01] Can we trust God? To missionaries, I'd like to say to you that most of you that when you became a missionary, you had this little dream.
[25:14] You felt like God said he would use you. I don't mean a dream dream. I just mean a vision, a thought, an excitement, an emotion. Boy, God's going to do something with me. And you were young and dumb and you just had this idea, man, God could do something big with me.
[25:29] And all of a sudden you wake up one day and it ain't working out. And you're getting upset and concerned and you're trying to figure out every way to manipulate and twist the thing so it gets you where you want to be.
[25:41] But here's what you do. You pray. Say, God, do what you said you was going to do. Do what you laid on my heart. Do what you promised me you'd do. And then you stop praying and you get the book in your heart and you start repeating what the book says.
[25:57] I was a little boy, college age, probably 19 or 20. During the night, I would often drive to churches in our Southern Baptist Association and didn't have a pastor.
[26:10] I'd park outside and I'd pray, God, you can let this church call me to be their pastor if you wanted to. And I'd pray for an hour out there just begging God. I'd walk in the field sometimes and I'd say, God, someday, I want you to let me go around the world and preach.
[26:24] God, I'd love it if you'd let me preach in a lot of states and across the world. God, I'd just love you to do that. You know, and then he just didn't do any of it. He stuck me in Cartersville. That's like the backside of the world.
[26:36] Say, hey, man. He stuck me there and I spent eight years there and I knew it wasn't ever going to happen. So I told him, if you want me to go ahead and go to the mission field since I know none of my dreams are ever going to come true anyway, I'll just go.
[26:50] You know what happened? He let all my dreams come true. I dreamed that I was in Cartersville so I could have a Bible college. And when I got to Peru, I knew I never would. And then I had 125 students. I'm like, boy, this worked out.
[27:02] One day I'd just sit there going, this is amazing. I can't believe all this happened. God promised you, God will do it. When you're hurting, first you pray, then you preach to yourself.
[27:16] First you pray, then you preach to yourself and you keep focused on God. Go with me, if you would, to Psalm 54, 6. Psalm 54, 6.
[27:29] After praying and meditating, David makes some decisions. He's prayed and he's put it in the hands of God, which is all you can do.
[27:40] It's really all we can do. We can't handle this by ourselves. We can't win. Saul's out there. He has an army. He has hundreds of men.
[27:52] He is the king. He has the law on his side. So I prayed. And then I preached back to myself. And now I'm going to praise.
[28:03] Look, if you would, at verse 6. I will freely sacrifice unto thee. You know what he did? He backed up and said, you know what, God? Just because I love you, I'm going to give an offering.
[28:15] I'm not giving a tithe here. I'm not giving a temple tax here. I'm giving to you a free will offering. I want to give to you because I'm in love with you.
[28:27] I want to show my gratitude. I'd like to say to you, listen to me, he's not king yet. He hasn't had the victory yet.
[28:38] And very likely, he may have prayed this and sang this and taught this while he was still in the hiding. And Saul's out there looking for him. And his troops come and say, he's coming around that corner and we better run over there.
[28:50] That might have been when he did it. But in the middle of it, he said, I'm going to pray. I'm going to preach to myself. And now I want to just say thank you to God. Because that's what you were taught to do in Philippians chapter 4.
[29:02] You're taught to pray. Make all the supplications and all the petitions that you need to make. But you do it with thanksgiving and God's peace. God's peace.
[29:13] He said, I will freely sacrifice. Would you underline that? Now, can I just say something to you? If you're giving and supporting our church and missions and you're doing it out of duty, you are missing the richest blessing you could ever have.
[29:30] It can never be about that. And if you're coming to church, you come dragging in here because, well, I got to. It's my responsibility. It's who I am in the church.
[29:40] Everybody's looking at me. People are going to judge me. You're missing it. He said, I want to come and I want to make a sacrifice. I want to make a sacrifice.
[29:51] I want to say, God, this is for you. I don't know where he was when he did it. I don't know if he was in front of the church. I don't know if it was an offering time. I doubt it. He just said, God, here's my decision.
[30:04] I am going to freely sacrifice unto you. And he said, I'll tell you what else I'm going to do. I'm going to give to you. Sacrifice costs you something. And he said, the second thing I'm going to do is I'm going to praise your name.
[30:17] Look at that. Underline that in verse 6. I will praise thy name, O Lord, for it is good. What got him out of trouble or what is going to get him out of trouble?
[30:28] He said, I come to you and he said it in Psalm 54, by thy name. And he said, now I'm going to brag on his name. I'm going to praise his name for it is good.
[30:45] I'm really not trying to fuss at you, but how many times you go to him and you will be honest, you'd say, man, I do that praying part and I do that preaching to myself part. But you never really praise him.
[30:59] Maybe you do it privately. Maybe you do it privately. Maybe you're like, God, I really do love you. I wouldn't want anybody to know it, but I do. That's not really praise.
[31:12] You know what I mean? And that's what he said about God's name. He said, it is good. Good. And then when he praised, it was a specific praise.
[31:25] Look at verse 54, seven. For he had delivered me out of all trouble. I don't know what's going on there either. He's not out of all the trouble.
[31:37] Not yet. But he knows God does, doesn't he? And he's getting him out of all the trouble he's dealing with right now. David got him out of all of his trouble.
[31:48] And I would just like to challenge you to think back in your own life. I heard a man say one time, won't you think back to the number of times that you could have and should have lost your life.
[32:00] You were in a car wreck and it looked like you should have died. Why don't you realize that God took care of you? Look at the times in your life when you had a medical calamity and God took care of you.
[32:15] When I was 16 or 17, I was a rebellious teenager because my dad wanted me to stay home because it was raining nasty outside and I wanted to go to church to a Bible study that was having.
[32:27] I was being rebellious because he didn't want me to go to Bible study. And he said, you might wreck out there. And I said, I ain't gonna wreck. Well, about 15 minutes later I called him.
[32:37] I told his car. I mean, it went to spinning around in the road, turned upside down. Wheels are still burning. And I climbed out of the car and I went up on the hill. Didn't have a cell phone.
[32:48] Had to go to a neighbor's house and say, I called my dad and I'm standing there when the cops show up and I'm standing on the side of the road and they're all standing there and the people, all the neighbors, everybody's got, they love wrecks, you know that.
[33:00] Tennessee rubberneckers. They were all there and they were standing around and they said, I don't know who was in that car but he's dead. They let to peel his body out of there. And I went, I was in that car. They said, how'd you get out of there?
[33:10] I said, I think he protected me. It was amazing. I felt like he just threw me out of the driver's seat. It was completely cracked, down. But somehow in the spinning and the flipping, it threw me over into the other side.
[33:22] The only place you could have lived. God takes care of us. But you don't praise him. Why don't you think back? I had kidney cancer. I should have died. I preached a funeral of a guy with my exact cancer.
[33:35] A few weeks later, Robert and I went to that home and we were going to witness that guy and his wife was violently angry. What are you doing here? I said, I got the same cancer. She said, oh boy, I don't care what that doctor said.
[33:47] You're in trouble. I left. I told Robert, I said, I think I'm in trouble. I was plum scared. I went to call my doctor up. He said, you don't have a problem. He said, I said, you told that guy he didn't have a problem.
[33:58] We had the same doctors. We had the same oncologist. We had the same everything. That guy was dead. I was alive. Woo! Talked to him. I just got delivered just the other day.
[34:09] I'll praise him because he is good. He delivers me out of all trouble. Verse 7. Mine eye has seen his desire upon mine enemies.
[34:24] It had to be liberating to David to allow God to deal with his enemies. Do you realize if you had taken a sword and killed Saul, you'd have to live all your life with, I took vengeance.
[34:38] Do you remember when David and his mighty men had been guarding Nabal? And he's been guarding Nabal and his sheep and all that stuff. Nabal never contracted him. David was acting like a Peruvian.
[34:51] In Peru, when you pull up in your car, a little kid about this tall comes out and says, I'll watch it for you. You're like, son, if they come out there that big, what are you going to do? He said, oh, don't worry. I'll watch it.
[35:02] I heard a preacher say one time that he arrived and a 747 little kid walked out and said, don't worry, I'll take care of it while you're gone. So David was out to take care of those sheep and Nabal wouldn't give him anything and he asked for a special offering.
[35:15] So Nabal, David says to his men, mount up, boys. We're going to go in there and kill him. And Abigail says, she meets him on the way to Nabal's wife and she says, don't do that. You don't need blood on your hands.
[35:26] You leave that to God. And God killed all Nabal. It had to be liberating to know God took care of him. You don't need to seek vengeance. God will take care of it. Amen. You don't need to answer your prayer.
[35:37] God will take care of it. He could know that God was the one that was blessing him. What decisions do you make when you go through rough times? When you go through rough times, what do you do?
[35:49] You know, some people just quit church. They quit reading their Bible. They quit praying. They pull away. Do you meditate on truth? When you're in the middle of junk, when your life seems to be bad and things are hard, you need to get in the book and get the book in you.
[36:08] David prayed and David preached to himself. You need to make decisions that honor the Lord. He praised the Lord. That's what he did. And I'd like to take you to one more passage of scripture I think fits here.
[36:23] Go with me to Psalm 37. There's an upcoming trial for all of us. All of us. Sooner or later, you're going to go through a time of trouble.
[36:34] It could be a plane crash. It could be the coronavirus. It could be financial calamity. It could be the death of your loved ones. How did we get ready?
[36:47] See, God wants you to get ready. You need to get ready first. Here's what it says in Psalm 37. I just think it goes hand in glove here. Fret not thyself because of evildoers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity.
[37:04] Don't get worked up about evildoers. Verse 2, they will get cut down and they will wither. Here's what we do as Christians. Would you just mark it?
[37:14] You probably already have it marked when somebody preached this. Trust in the Lord and do good. Here's what we do. We just trust God and do right.
[37:27] We just trust God. We don't worry about what's going to happen. What's going to happen out there? Are the bad people going to take over our country? What's going to happen out there? Is everything going to fall apart?
[37:38] Don't fret about none of that junk. Don't get envious about it. Just don't worry about it. Here's what you do. Trust in the Lord and do good and you'll have victory. You'll dwell in the land.
[37:49] Verse 4, delight yourself in the Lord and he'll give you the desires of your heart. You know what that really means? It doesn't mean when I was a kid I used to pray. I said, God, I've been delighting in you long enough for the time for you to give me my desires.
[38:03] I was like, tit for tat. I praised you. I've been in church. Now your turn. That's not what it's about. It's about so falling in love with Jesus you want what Jesus wants. Falling in love with God that you want what he wants.
[38:15] Look at you what it did. Verse 5, commit your way to the Lord. Trust in him. Commit and trust. Verse 7, rest and wait patiently.
[38:28] Rest and wait patiently. Don't get upset. Fret not. Could I just say this to you before I kind of give you a few things here with that?
[38:42] Face. Got stress all over it. Worry. Hard because you're just under it. That's not where we're supposed to live.
[38:57] We're literally supposed to live like a kid in our home who's just trusting that mom and daddy are going to feed him and clothe him and take care of him.
[39:08] In fact, as the Bible's pretty clear, we're to give no thought for what we eat or drink. We're just to trust God. So they betrayed you. So they hurt you.
[39:19] So something bad happened to you. So you have every reason to give up. But you're just going to trust God. And here's what I want to get across to you. You need to get ready for the trials that are coming.
[39:33] There's no way. Good night. When I was 40, I never thought I'd have kidney cancer. I never thought I'd have some...
[39:44] The reason COVID did me so hard is I just didn't believe it. It ain't not going to happen to me. Happens to all you guys. But I'm strong. Bless God. You got to get ready.
[39:56] You need to fill your heart with the Word of God. You need to not allow the world's thinking to dominate your heart. You need to, in the hour of your trial, pray, preach, and promise.
[40:11] Pray to God. Promise Him you're going to live it out. Praise Him and preach to yourself. Teach yourself truth. Proverbs 3, 5. Trust in the Lord.
[40:24] Lean not to your own understanding. Acknowledge Him. Don't be wise in your own eyes. Just fear the Lord and depart from evil. Honor God and He'll take care of it.
[40:38] It's going to happen. Jesus was betrayed. David's betrayed. Joseph was betrayed. It's everywhere all through the Bible. Betrayed.
[40:49] Bad things happen to good people whether we like to admit it or not. And when it comes our way, whether it may be just at the day we're laying on our deathbed, we need to be able to say, I am stocked up and ready to trust God.
[41:06] Too much of a story about me but I'll tell you something. When I'm laying in that bed just a few weeks ago and I had no, I couldn't read. I picked up my iPad and tried to look at it and I couldn't focus.
[41:19] And then I dropped my glasses in the bed and couldn't find them. Finally one of the nurses said, well, move a little bit. And she said, there they are, you're laying on them. Well, that didn't help me see anything. Do you know what I was able to do?
[41:32] I laid down there and I just looked up that ceiling and I said, I'm starting in Genesis 1 and I'm going to preach the whole book to me. And I promise you, when I came out, I was still drunk with the drugs.
[41:43] Everybody came to my house, I preached the same message to them. Every one of them, I just preached that message. I was like, God spoke to me. Trouble's coming. Trouble's coming.
[41:55] Trouble's coming. Get ready. You're going to get betrayed. You're going to have a problem. You're going to have a heartache. But God got David through it. He keeps his word.
[42:06] So learn to pray. Learn to preach to yourself and learn to praise him when you get out of it. Father in heaven, I love you. I thank you for the chance to speak to your people. I pray you bless them and I give you praise for all.
[42:18] In Jesus' name, amen. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.