WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.799 Now, if you have your Bibles, perhaps you can open them with me to 2 Samuel chapter 9. 00:00:07.759 --> 00:00:19.280 ! The Church Bible, that's page 312. As we join Mephibosheth feasting with the King of love and grace. 00:00:20.160 --> 00:00:25.199 ! So this morning, if you were here, you might remember that we talked about the idea of Jesus 00:00:25.199 --> 00:00:31.919 fulfilling. As Jesus said, He's come to fulfill the law and the prophets. We thought about the truth 00:00:31.919 --> 00:00:40.679 that every story whispers Jesus' name, anticipates His person, His work, in some way or other. 00:00:41.439 --> 00:00:48.560 Well, this one, I think, doesn't whisper Jesus' name so much as shout it in such a way as to give 00:00:48.560 --> 00:00:58.480 us great reason to praise. As we meet a King full of love, steadfast love, full of grace, 00:00:59.120 --> 00:01:07.680 who welcomes a crippled man to his table and to feast with him, we're invited to see in anticipation 00:01:08.400 --> 00:01:16.800 the work of Jesus and the good news of the gospel. So for a few moments, we're going to spend some time 00:01:16.799 --> 00:01:26.719 here in 2 Samuel 9. We're going to see, first of all, this wonderful King of covenant love. David asked 00:01:26.719 --> 00:01:33.920 in verse 1, is there anyone still left of the house of Saul to whom I can show kindness for Jonathan's 00:01:33.920 --> 00:01:41.759 sake? Some of you may have read Marilynne Robinson's book, Gilead, a beautiful reflective 00:01:41.760 --> 00:01:48.800 story of the Reverend John Ames. And one of the central themes of the book is his desire to show 00:01:49.920 --> 00:02:00.000 love to a man called Jack. Jack was the son of his good friend. Jack was a very troubled figure. But 00:02:00.000 --> 00:02:08.319 the Reverend John Ames is determined to show kindness to Jack, offers grace and reconciliation, 00:02:08.319 --> 00:02:15.680 and looks to bring hope and healing at various points in the story and at great cost to himself. 00:02:18.639 --> 00:02:25.439 Some ways it echoes what we have here. We find that David and Mephibosheth's father, 00:02:25.439 --> 00:02:33.280 Jonathan, have bound themselves together in an oath of love and friendship. And you find that in 1 Samuel 20. 00:02:33.280 --> 00:02:40.159 And here is David, he's now established as the king, and he remembers that oath that he made. 00:02:40.879 --> 00:02:48.560 And that leads him to take action, to find and to show kindness to somebody in Jonathan's family. 00:02:49.840 --> 00:02:53.199 And so David says to Mephibosheth in verse 7, 00:02:53.199 --> 00:03:10.719 Remember that a king of Israel was God's man, intended to be the worship leader, leading the people in 00:03:10.719 --> 00:03:18.879 worship and inviting the people to praise their God. And David in this scene very much reflects 00:03:18.879 --> 00:03:26.240 God's covenant love. We discover all through the pages of the Bible that God is a covenant-making, 00:03:26.240 --> 00:03:36.479 God is a covenant-keeping God. Unique to Christianity is this commitment of a God to bind himself to a 00:03:36.479 --> 00:03:43.519 people. There is that rock-solid covenant faithfulness established in God's own words, 00:03:43.520 --> 00:03:50.560 His commitment that I will be your God and you will be my people. And we can trace that theme 00:03:50.560 --> 00:03:57.840 through the Bible and we recognize that God has this impulse within himself, saying to his people, 00:03:57.840 --> 00:04:06.719 we will be together forever. I am absolutely committed to showing you kindness, whatever it takes. 00:04:06.719 --> 00:04:13.919 So it's this wonderful thing as we read the Bible, we discover here is our ultimate reality. Our ultimate 00:04:13.919 --> 00:04:20.959 reality is connected to relationship. That our God, the maker of heaven and earth, invites us into this 00:04:20.959 --> 00:04:29.920 beautiful, personal, committed, loving, eternal relationship. And David reflects that. Of course, 00:04:29.920 --> 00:04:36.319 at times he will be a covenant breaker if we know his story. Like us, we often break our covenant 00:04:36.319 --> 00:04:44.480 commitment. But we praise God that it is impossible. He will never break his covenant commitment. He will 00:04:44.480 --> 00:04:52.800 always keep it. So David reflects the character of God, reminding us of God's steadfast love. But David, 00:04:53.360 --> 00:05:00.079 as the king of steadfast love, also helps us to reflect forward, to think about God's greater king. 00:05:00.079 --> 00:05:08.639 Remember the words of Jesus to his disciples, the night when he was about to be betrayed. As he prepared 00:05:08.639 --> 00:05:15.839 for the Passover, he said to them, I have eagerly desired to share the Passover with you. Why did he 00:05:15.839 --> 00:05:23.919 desire it so eagerly, that meal, that fellowship? Because he would use it to explain God's new covenant 00:05:23.920 --> 00:05:31.199 love. He would take the elements of the meal, the bread and the wine, and give us a picture of the 00:05:31.199 --> 00:05:38.560 gospel. Here is how committed God is to saving a people for himself. His own son comes, his body will 00:05:38.560 --> 00:05:45.759 be broken, his blood will be shed. He will demonstrate his sacrificial love on the cross. So we see in King 00:05:45.759 --> 00:05:55.279 Jesus, God's utterly determined commitment to show us kindness and steadfast love. So that by trusting in 00:05:55.279 --> 00:06:04.159 Jesus, you and I will always know God is with us and God is for us. And God is determined to remember 00:06:04.159 --> 00:06:12.879 us and show us kindness. The storyline of salvation, the storyline of God, can be captured in some simple 00:06:12.879 --> 00:06:22.879 words. God's saying to his people, I lost you, but I have won you back. And now you are mine forever. 00:06:24.399 --> 00:06:31.279 So we meet in David, the king of covenant love. But we also see in the story of David and Mephibosheth, 00:06:31.279 --> 00:06:40.560 here is a king of amazing grace. And again, before we come to this story, somebody that helped me this 00:06:40.560 --> 00:06:46.160 week. So we like to watch the prison agency on a telly. Maybe some of you have seen it. It's a family 00:06:46.160 --> 00:06:52.399 business selling properties all over Paris, and now it's kind of international. Well, the last episode 00:06:52.399 --> 00:07:01.199 in the last series, the highlight in many ways for their story was when this family who runs a business, 00:07:01.199 --> 00:07:09.279 buying and selling properties, was visited by a chief from an Amazonian tribe. And it was amazing to 00:07:09.279 --> 00:07:14.399 think these guys who rub shoulders with celebrities and they sell multi-million pound houses, they were 00:07:14.399 --> 00:07:21.359 left stunned that this chief would come and visit them. And so they're talking on camera and say, 00:07:21.359 --> 00:07:27.679 normally he only meets with kings and presidents and he's coming to share lunch with us. And they're 00:07:27.679 --> 00:07:33.519 over the moon and they're shocked and they're stunned. Maybe we've had something of that experience 00:07:33.519 --> 00:07:40.399 when the cool kids invite you to sit at their table. Or the person that you think is so far above you and 00:07:40.399 --> 00:07:53.199 they notice you and they give you the time of day. I wonder if we think about how God operates. 00:07:54.639 --> 00:07:59.439 Do we sometimes imagine that God is just there for the great and the good? 00:07:59.439 --> 00:08:07.920 Is God just there for people who have something to offer? Do we find it hard to believe that God 00:08:07.920 --> 00:08:18.000 would have interest, would notice and show favor to us? The beauty of our good news, and it's here in our 00:08:18.000 --> 00:08:28.399 story, is that the King extends love and grace to the lowest and to the least. And that means that everybody 00:08:28.399 --> 00:08:35.600 has hope. And we see it really clearly in the story of Mephibosheth. So let's think about Mephibosheth's 00:08:35.600 --> 00:08:42.079 story and how he sees himself and how that helps us to reveal, help us to see the nature of the King 00:08:42.639 --> 00:08:51.360 and His grace. So look with me first of all at verse 3 and verse 13. Here is the description given at the 00:08:51.360 --> 00:09:00.159 beginning and the end of the Mephibosheth story. Verse 3, Ziba answered, there is still a son of Jonathan, 00:09:00.960 --> 00:09:10.560 he is lame in both feet. And then verse 13, we find him feasting at the King's table and he was lame in 00:09:10.559 --> 00:09:20.159 both feet. Begins there and ends there. Why? To remind us that Mephibosheth brings nothing to the table. 00:09:21.359 --> 00:09:28.079 Mephibosheth would be viewed as unimportant to others, maybe unimportant to himself. 00:09:29.279 --> 00:09:34.879 He's not going to add any value to David's retinue. He's not going to be the fighter. He's not going to be 00:09:34.879 --> 00:09:41.679 the powerful servant. He's always going to be dependent. He's lame in both feet. We're told 00:09:41.679 --> 00:09:49.120 where he lives. He's at the house of Machia, son of Amiel in Lo-debar, which means the place of no 00:09:49.120 --> 00:09:56.399 pasture, the place of no word. He lives in the wilderness, in other words. He's far from the 00:09:56.399 --> 00:10:03.679 places of power and influence. He's far from the throne, the palace, the kingdom. What about his view of 00:10:03.679 --> 00:10:11.679 his self? As David ushers him into his presence and as David begins to speak, Mephibosheth, verse 8, 00:10:11.679 --> 00:10:18.639 bows down and said, what is your servant that you should notice a dead dog like me? Compared to the 00:10:18.639 --> 00:10:27.199 glory of the King, he falls on his face. I'm a nobody. I'm a no-thing from a nowhere place, worthy of 00:10:27.200 --> 00:10:37.280 nothing. But when the King delights to show grace, when the King is absolutely committed to show honor, 00:10:37.280 --> 00:10:44.960 well, that changes everything. Verse 7, I will surely show you kindness. 00:10:47.520 --> 00:10:51.840 I will restore you to all the land that belonged to your grandfather, Saul. 00:10:51.840 --> 00:10:59.280 Now he's going to get back this inheritance of the land, the inheritance that ultimately comes from 00:10:59.280 --> 00:11:05.360 God himself. It's as if he's been brought back into the community of God's people. 00:11:06.879 --> 00:11:13.360 And more than that, David says to him, you'll always eat at my table. And in that moment, 00:11:13.360 --> 00:11:22.879 his identity is transformed. His status is changed. He's no longer living in the wilderness. Now he's 00:11:22.879 --> 00:11:33.039 sitting at the King's table. His life utterly transformed. And unlike the two-hour lunch that 00:11:33.039 --> 00:11:39.680 the Parisian agents got to enjoy with the tribal chief, for the rest of Mephibosheth's life, 00:11:39.679 --> 00:11:49.439 he will be enjoying the kindness of David the King. And that speaks to us of the loving heart of God. 00:11:50.159 --> 00:11:59.120 And it speaks to us of the loving heart of King Jesus. King Jesus shows us God's kindness principally 00:11:59.120 --> 00:12:07.439 at the cross, where that great exchange takes place, where Jesus is loaded up with all our sin and guilt, 00:12:07.440 --> 00:12:14.400 and he pays the price in full, and we get the credit of his perfect righteousness. 00:12:16.240 --> 00:12:23.280 Jesus comes on a mission to restore us to our inheritance, to our proper place, 00:12:23.280 --> 00:12:30.320 to life with our God, the life that we were made for. And the Lord Jesus, 00:12:30.320 --> 00:12:40.720 Jesus, he welcomes us to feast on God's grace. Like the father of Luke chapter 15, 00:12:42.160 --> 00:12:52.000 so glad to welcome and honor the prodigal son, so willing to welcome and receive the elder brother also, 00:12:52.960 --> 00:13:03.600 longing to show grace. And so our scene, it closes with a feast. Mephibosheth lived in Jerusalem because he 00:13:03.600 --> 00:13:16.159 always ate at the king's table. So we find ourselves thirdly feasting with the king of love and grace. 00:13:16.159 --> 00:13:31.279 And so there is joy. But we shouldn't miss the shock. 00:13:34.079 --> 00:13:40.399 Because this isn't how life normally operated, and still isn't really how life normally operates. 00:13:40.399 --> 00:13:47.199 And so, you can well imagine people looking in on this scene, perhaps even some of the others at David's 00:13:47.199 --> 00:13:55.199 table, whispering to them, why is he here? Because a king would usually kill off any rivals 00:13:55.919 --> 00:14:04.240 in order to secure their power base. And this man Mephibosheth, he has absolutely nothing to offer the king, 00:14:04.240 --> 00:14:12.480 so why is the king giving when he's not going to get anything back? Perhaps they find themselves asking, 00:14:12.480 --> 00:14:18.320 well, I can understand he would invite him for a few days, show him a bit of kindness, but he's here again 00:14:19.120 --> 00:14:24.720 and again. Year after year, the king is so committed to showing him kindness. 00:14:24.720 --> 00:14:36.879 Maybe it's a lot like the shock that Jesus created in his ministry. Why is he eating with tax collectors 00:14:36.879 --> 00:14:45.200 and sinners? Why does he enjoy spending time with them? Why do they gravitate to him and he to them? 00:14:46.399 --> 00:14:51.440 And Jesus says, of course, that's why he came. He came to seek and to save the lost. 00:14:51.440 --> 00:15:00.960 But this scene of hospitality that we have here, a table of fellowship, a table of joy, the extension of love and grace, 00:15:01.600 --> 00:15:14.800 is the perfect image for capturing the love of God. Remember Jesus' parable? The king who prepared a great banquet 00:15:14.799 --> 00:15:22.479 of the love of God. And invitations are sent. This is a king who wants to give people the honor of coming 00:15:22.479 --> 00:15:33.359 to receiving of his treasure. Shockingly, some people reject and they don't enter. But the king's response 00:15:34.559 --> 00:15:43.279 was to say, my house must be full. So he sends his servants with the order, compel them to come in 00:15:43.279 --> 00:15:51.199 and did you notice who was first in line? It was the cripples. Compel the cripples to come in. 00:15:53.199 --> 00:16:00.399 It's like David with Mephibosheth. Those who know that they don't earn it, they don't deserve it. You can 00:16:00.399 --> 00:16:08.399 imagine people struggling to believe it. The king says, compel them with my love and kindness 00:16:08.399 --> 00:16:18.959 so they can come and feast with me. Like King David does with Mephibosheth, Jesus does with you and I 00:16:18.960 --> 00:16:28.800 today. He invites us to come and to come again to his feast, to enjoy the privilege and the pleasure of 00:16:28.800 --> 00:16:38.800 his steadfast love, to experience his daily grace, to know his goodness and mercy, restoring our souls and 00:16:38.799 --> 00:16:48.959 following us all the days of our lives until the day when we sit at the king's table in glory. 00:16:52.319 --> 00:16:59.039 What happens when we feast? What happens when we take up the king's invitation? 00:16:59.039 --> 00:17:06.960 Well, I think there is a natural reaction and a response in where the king's blessing and the 00:17:06.960 --> 00:17:19.599 invitation then flows from us to others. I think as we feast on God's grace, it begins to change us 00:17:19.599 --> 00:17:28.240 as a church. That we would become more and more a community marked by deep joy. 00:17:29.599 --> 00:17:38.000 Committed to practicing kindness, to offering hospitality and offering restoration, 00:17:38.000 --> 00:17:43.279 enabling people to experience something of God's grace through us. 00:17:46.399 --> 00:17:55.359 By God's grace, this church, your life and mine, can become a safe space 00:17:55.359 --> 00:18:04.879 where the broken and the hurting, where the crippled and the lame can find hope and healing, 00:18:04.879 --> 00:18:15.119 can discover that God's grace and God's invitation is for them and where together we can taste and we can 00:18:15.119 --> 00:18:27.679 see that God is good. Let's pray together and give him thanks.