Heavenly Father, as we come to your word this morning,
we pray, God, that we will understand it correctly.
We will understand what you're trying to say to us
from your word, Lord.
We don't wanna come to your word with our own ideas
and try to read into your word what we want it to say.
We wanna hear from you.
So God, won't you help me to explain it?
But God, more than just understand with our heads,
we want to be edified in our hearts.
We want to be encouraged to trust you, to hold onto you,
to live by faith for you.
And so God, I pray, won't you meet each one of us
in the places that we're at, Lord.
God, we pray for the many churches of Hong Kong this morning.
Some facing great challenges,
some in great stages of advance or good things happening.
Lord, we pray more than anything else in Watermark,
in all the churches, of all the languages,
in all the cultures,
that your spirit will be in our churches,
that we will be a spirit-led people.
As we listen to you speak to us through your word,
shaped by the gospel, renewed by the gospel,
enlivened by your spirit,
God, we pray for really a sense of revival and renewal
to come to Hong Kong.
And we say, God, start with our hearts.
God, come and renew us.
Come make our hearts beat with love for you, God.
Help us to see our own hearts,
to confess our sin, to hold onto you.
Lord, we need you to move in our midst.
So we pray these things for ourselves
and all our brothers and sisters
across this great city of Hong Kong.
Do this in your name we pray.
Amen.
Let's listen to CK.
She reads to us from 2 Samuel chapter 7.
Good morning, Watermark.
Yes, today we're going to read 2 Samuel chapter 7.
You may follow along the bulletin or refer to the screen.
So basically today, David proposes to build God a permanent house,
as you will find out later, to glorify God.
Surprisingly, God's response to David's offer
is to build David a permanent house,
a permanent and secure Israel,
and establishing a dynasty for the house of David.
So starting in verse 1, let us read.
Now, when the king lived in his house,
and the Lord had given him rest from all his surrounding enemies,
the king said to Nathan the prophet,
See now, I dwell in a house of cedar,
but the ark of God dwells in a tent.
And Nathan said to the king,
Go, do all that is in your heart,
for the Lord is with you.
But that same night,
the word of the Lord came to Nathan,
Go tell my servant David,
thus says the Lord,
Would you build me a house to dwell in?
I have not lived in a house
since the day I brought up the people of Israel
from Egypt to this day,
but I have been moving about in a tent for my dwelling.
In all places where I have moved
with all the people of Israel,
did I speak a word with any of the judges of Israel
whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel,
saying,
Why have you not built me a house of cedar?
Now, therefore,
thus you shall say to my servant David,
Thus says the Lord of hosts,
I took you from the pasture,
from following the sheep,
that you should be prince over my people Israel.
And I have been with you wherever you went,
and cut off all your enemies from before you.
And I will make you for a great name,
like the name of the great ones of the earth.
And I will appoint a place for my people Israel,
and will plant them,
so that they may dwell in their own place,
and be disturbed no more.
And violent men shall afflict them no more,
as formerly,
from the time that I appointed judges
over my people Israel.
And I will give you rest from all your enemies.
Moreover,
the Lord declares to you
that the Lord will make you a house.
When your days are fulfilled,
and you lie down with your fathers,
I will raise up your offspring after you,
who shall come from your body,
and I will establish his kingdom.
He shall build a house for my name,
and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.
I will be to him a father.
He shall be to me a son.
When he commits iniquity,
I will discipline him with the rod of men,
with the stripes of the sons of men.
But my steadfast love will not depart from him,
as I took it from Saul,
whom I put away from before you.
And your house and your kingdom
shall be made sure forever before me.
Your throne shall be established forever.
In accordance with these words,
and in accordance with all this vision,
Nathan spoke to David.
This is the word of God.
Okay, great.
Thank you, CK.
Well, if you're new to Watermark,
we are doing a preaching series
where we are zooming out
and looking at the whole kind of storyline of the Bible.
It's very tempting to look at the Bible
as just a collection of stories,
you know, Jonah and the whale,
David and Goliath, Daniel and Lion's Den,
and think, what are the lessons,
the life lessons we can learn from this?
Or we think of the Bible
as just a collection of wisdom
to help improve our lives.
But actually, the Bible has a storyline,
a narrative arc.
And in order to understand the message of the Bible,
and especially the message of the individual parts,
we need to know what is the storyline.
So that's what we are doing.
And so let me,
and what is the main message of the Bible?
I think the main message is this.
God makes a promise
and then works to act on his promise
to put everything right again.
If you look at the world,
not everything is right.
Our world is broken.
People are broken.
But God makes a promise
right in the beginning of the Bible,
and he's working throughout the Bible
to be good to that promise,
to put everything right again.
And so let me recap the story.
The story starts in Genesis with creation, right?
God makes humanity,
and he makes us human beings in his image
to be in relationship with him,
to know him and love him,
to find our meaning and our identity
and our security in him.
And the pinnacle of creation,
the essence of being human,
is to know God
and be in a relationship with him.
That's where our meaning
and our security
and our identity is found.
It's why the atheistic worldview
can deconstruct faith,
but it can't give you meaning
and purpose in its place.
It can tell you
there's nothing meaningful in this world,
there's no purpose,
there is no God,
but it can't give you something meaningful.
Meaning and significance
and purpose and identity
are found in knowing the God
that made us
to be in a relationship with him.
And so God creates us,
but we as humanity,
we turn our back on him.
We reject his word,
we reject his authority,
we think we know better than him,
and so we go our own way.
And the consequences for the sin
is disastrous.
We come out from under God's rule,
we are exiled from his blessing,
we are no longer his people
under his rule,
no longer experiencing his blessing.
But mankind's rejection of God
doesn't do anything to his kingdom.
It doesn't threaten his kingdom,
it doesn't thwart his kingdom,
it doesn't diminish his kingdom,
God's kingdom still stands,
just we, his humanity,
are outside of his kingdom.
So God's kingdom is still very secure,
but we are now outside of it.
And so God wants to bring us back.
And so he comes with a plan.
And he starts off with this promise,
this promise to this man called Abraham,
and he says, Abraham,
I will bless you and all your descendants,
your descendants will become a mighty family,
they will become my chosen people,
and through this family will become
a one particular person,
a Messiah, a king,
and he will open up the doorway to the kingdom
so that all people from all nations
and all cultures and all time
can come back into my kingdom.
So God makes this promise to Abraham,
I'll bless you, through you,
the doors will be opened so that all people
can come back under my rule
and experience my grace and my blessing.
And so God does that.
And so Abraham's family grows
and they get bigger and bigger,
but then God wants to take this family of Abraham
called the Israelites,
and he wants to make them
his distinctive set-apart people.
So how's he gonna do that?
Well, he brings them through a rite of passage,
this profound experience
that shapes and changes them forever.
This rite of passage is the Exodus from Egypt.
They are delivered from slavery and from judgment,
and now they come out of Egypt,
and they are God's distinctive people,
set apart from him.
The identity has been shaped
by this rite of passage they've gone through.
And forever now, they are God's people.
They've been bought by him.
They belong to him.
They are his distinctive people.
But then God,
how's he gonna keep them,
his distinctive people?
Well, he gives them his instructions.
We call this the law.
It's what Neil spoke about last week.
God gives them his instructions
how to live as his distinctive people forever.
And so he gives them these instructions.
These are not harsh instructions.
They're not legalistic.
They're good.
They're gracious.
They help keep God at the center
so that God's people can be under God's rule
and experience his blessing.
And so the storyline of the Bible
is that God's people have been rescued and saved.
They've been given God's instructions for life.
And you think, okay, all is good.
Go and live happily ever after.
But it doesn't quite work out like that, right?
As you read the Old Testament,
you see God's people,
they kind of follow instructions
and they don't
and they kind of do and they don't.
And things go very up and down.
And what's the key?
Why do God's people do well and then do badly?
What's the key at the top of this,
the kind of wave and the bottom of the trough?
Well, often it comes down to leadership.
What kind of leaders they have.
When Israel has a great leader,
man, God's people are blessed.
The whole nation does well.
They flourish.
But when there's a lousy leader,
oh, things go down.
And the whole nation kind of falls into disarray.
And so the key is leadership.
Leadership.
What God's people need
is the right kind of leader.
You see, the thing with God's instructions
is they tell you what to do.
God's law, they tell you what the sands are,
but they don't actually give you the ability to do it.
So they tell you,
this is what it looks like to be a righteous people,
a righteous nation.
This is how to experience God's blessing.
They don't give you the ability to actually do it.
And so they know the instructions,
but how do they do it?
Well, they actually need a leader
that's gonna help them to do it.
And so Israel's story really depends
on what kind of leader they have.
And so at first they have Moses,
and he's a pretty good leader.
A couple of bad moments,
but generally Moses is great,
and God's people go forward.
They get to the brink of the promised land.
And then they have this leader called Joshua,
and Joshua's a great leader.
He's a man of God.
He's a man of faith.
He really trusts God.
He defeats their enemies,
and he brings them into the promised land,
and things are looking good.
But then Joshua dies,
and things start to go down here.
And so listen to what Judges says.
Judges chapter two,
it says,
after Joshua,
the servant of the Lord,
died,
there arose another generation
who did not know the Lord
or the work that he had done for Israel.
So the people of Israel
did what was evil in the sight of the Lord
and served foreign gods,
abandoning the God
who brought them out of the land of Egypt.
And so this really is the storyline
of the Old Testament.
They have a great leader,
things are doing well,
the nation flourishes,
oh,
they have a bad leader,
and things fall apart.
And it's up and down.
It's kind of like,
and whenever there is a great leader,
it's kind of like a sandcastle on the beach.
You must have built a great big sandcastle, right?
Amazing, wonderful thing.
And you go back 12 hours later,
24 hours later,
and it's gone.
And that's what a great leader's like.
They restore things,
they revive things,
they reform the nation,
but after them,
things just fall apart.
And so the final verse
in the book of Judges says this,
in those days,
there was no king in Israel.
Everyone did what was right
in their own eyes.
So when there's no king,
things just unraveled to seems.
And the nation of Israel falls apart.
Everyone's doing what they want to do.
And so what they need is a king,
a righteous king,
a good king,
a godly king,
a God-fearing king.
And why is that?
What does a king do?
Well,
in the Old Testament,
a king does three things.
He rescues them from their enemies.
So whenever the king
is the commander-in-chief
of the forces, right?
When an enemy is attacking,
the king rallies the army
and he defends them,
he rescues them,
he keeps the enemies
out of the city
or out of the nation.
He keeps them safe
and protects them.
He also rules in a good way.
So he rescues them
and he rules.
So in other words,
he enacts righteous laws
and good principles.
He puts judges in place
and magistrates
that can rule for people.
He rules with wisdom.
And he establishes
righteousness and justice
in the nation.
When there's a good king,
justice kind of flourishes.
The powerful don't take advantage
of the powerless.
The rich don't take advantage
of the poor.
Injustice flows in the nation.
So he rules well.
You could say a good king
protects his people
from the enemies out there
but also the enemies within.
The warring armies out there
but also from injustice
within the nation.
He protects them.
From the enemies without
and the enemies within.
He rescues and he rules.
But the third thing a king does
is he represents.
He represents God to the people
but he also represents
the people before God.
So in a sense,
when the king
is a godly,
righteous leader,
everyone who comes under him
experiences the blessings
that come to him.
God's blessing flows to the king
and all those who are under his rule
get blessed as well.
Now not everyone in the nation
is righteous and good
but generally the nation flourishes.
There's justice.
There's goodness.
There's prosperity.
Right?
China's here.
Everyone wants prosperity.
Well, we need a good king.
And so the king does these three things.
And so the law could tell the nation
what to do
but they couldn't empower them to do it.
But a king in some ways
could empower them to do it.
If you've got good laws in a nation
but you've got a corrupt leader,
what's going to happen?
No one's going to obey the laws.
And so the nation becomes corrupt.
But if you've got good laws
and you've got a good king
or good systems
or good magistrates
and judges
who enact justice,
well, the whole nation flourishes.
So what Israel needs is a king.
And so that's the next stage
in the journey.
So there's creation.
There's sin.
There's the exodus.
There's God's instructions.
And God gives them a king.
He gives them a king.
And so the first king
is this guy called Saul.
Saul is the king
that everybody wants
but he's not the king
that they need.
Saul is just like them.
He's insecure
and he's jealous
and he wants to build
his own kingdom.
Saul wants to rule
God's people
instead of God
rather than under God.
So Saul wants to build
his own kingdom.
And Saul's kingdom
starts to unravel.
And the whole thing
just falls apart.
And Saul's sorry reign
comes to an end
when he's killed
one day in battle
by his arch enemies
the Philistines.
And Saul's
he's a terrible king.
But God brings them
another king.
And while Saul's reign
is starting to fray
and stumble
in the back waters
of Israel
some small little village
called Bethlehem
there's a shepherd boy
and God is choosing him
to be the king.
And so God chooses
this man called David.
David is the king
that nobody expects.
Nobody thinks
he should be king.
He's a shepherd boy.
He's the overlooked sibling.
Jesse comes to his dad
and says
one of your sons
is going to be king.
Who should it be?
And they pick
all the other seven
and they forget about David.
He's overlooked.
He's not very promising.
But he's the king
that they need.
And he's got two things
going for him.
One
he's chosen by God
and two
he's a man of character.
He's God fearing.
He's honest.
The Bible describes him
as a man
after God's own heart.
And so David
becomes king
and he rules
with justice
and with righteousness.
And as soon as David
is installed as king
peace returns to Israel.
He's the king
that they longed for.
The king that they really needed.
He's not a perfect man.
He sins pretty spectacularly.
But he's deeply repentant.
He confesses his sin
like Jeremy Ledison earlier.
He's a good man.
He's a godly man.
And good things happen
to Israel.
But
there's one more problem.
And that is that
even the best king
doesn't live forever.
David is going to die.
And so what Israel
really needs
is not just a king.
They need a kingdom.
They need a dynasty.
A kingdom
that is going to last forever.
That's going to outlast
even the best kings.
Because you've got
this amazing king David
and he dies.
But then what's going to happen?
Things are going to fall apart.
So you need a king
and you need
a kind of dynasty of kings
that are going to
continue
forever
to rule in righteousness.
To bring goodness
to God's people.
So that
through this people
Israel
finally heaven and earth
true king
can come
and can
open the way.
And so that brings us
to our passage today
that CK read for us
in 2 Samuel chapter 7.
In this passage
God takes David the king
and he makes him a promise.
And the promise
is very similar
to what he said to Abraham.
He said
I'll make you great.
I'll give you a name.
I'll give you a land.
I'll bless you
and through your descendants
will come
heaven and earth's
true king
the true Messiah
and he will open up
the doors
for all people
all nations
and cultures
and nationalities
and Chinese
and Filipinos
and Africans
and all people
not just the Jews
to come into my kingdom
if they receive the king
and receive my blessing.
From you and your descendants
will come the true
Messiah king
for all those
who receive him as king.
And so that's the promise
that God makes to David.
So let's look at
this passage
and there's two things
that God tells David
that we need to see
in this passage.
The first one is this.
God
not man
is going to build
his kingdom.
God
not man
is going to build
his kingdom.
Okay let's see
how that works out.
So verse 1
Now the king
lived in his house
and the Lord
had given him rest
from all his
surrounding enemies.
Okay so David
has just been
installed as king
he's sitting in his
palace
and life is good.
Finally there is
peace in Israel.
After years of turmoil
and internal conflict
and almost civil war
and conflict outside
finally
there is peace.
peace from our enemies
without peace within
things are looking good.
And David
has brought
the ark of God
which is this big
wooden box
that kind of
represents God's presence
he's brought it
back into Jerusalem
so now Jerusalem
is the center
of Israel
politically
and spiritually
God's presence
is there
things are looking good.
And David
gets thinking
verse 2
David said to his
sidekick
Nathan the prophet
see now
I dwell
in a house of cedar
but the ark of God
dwells in a tent
so David
has just refurbished
his palace
it's looking good
but the ark of God
is in this
tent on the outskirts
of the palace
and David thinks
this isn't right
and so he has an idea
what's his idea?
He wants to build
a temple
massive great big temple
for God
where the ark of God
can rest.
Now why does David
want to do this?
Well on the one hand
he wants to honor God
he says listen
I'm a mere mortal
I live in this
great big palace
God is the supreme
being of all creation
it's not right
that I live in a better
house than his
ark of the covenant
so he wants to honor God
but there's something else
David also wants
to secure
God's kingdom
and God's presence
because
it's pretty vulnerable
out in the tent
and so David thinks
if I can build
a big secure temple
lock it away
forever
God's presence
will be with us
forever
we will be blessed
God's kingdom
on earth
will be firmly established
so he's kind of thinking
my kingdom is established
now let's establish
God's kingdom
okay
but God has other ideas
God doesn't want
anyone to think
that his kingdom
depends on
David's brilliance
or leadership
or generosity
look what God says
verse 4
that same night
the word of the Lord
came to Nathan
go and tell
my servant David
thus says the Lord
would you build me
a house to dwell in
I've not lived in a house
since the day I was brought up
by the people of Israel
from Egypt
I have been moving about
in a tent for my dwelling
so God says
David thanks for the offer
but actually I've been a right
for the last 300 years
never mind the previous
13 billion years
I think I'll be okay
thanks
okay
then he says
David
just remind me
how did you get to become
king
anyway
oh yes
I remember
verse 8
I took you
from the pastures
from following the sheep
he says
remember you were a shepherd
right
and now you're king
how did you get there
oh yeah
it was me that did that
I made you
to be prince
of my people
Israel
I have been with you
wherever you went
I have cut you off
from all your enemies
before you
he's saying
David you're king
and how was your kingdom
established
it wasn't your brilliance
or your genius
or your great military skills
actually I was the one
that's been doing this
the whole time
not the other way around
I established your kingdom
you don't establish my kingdom
he says
I chose you
when you were nothing
but a shepherd boy
I have been with you
and protected you
from the lions
from the bears
when you were a shepherd
from Goliath
from Saul
who hated you
and wanted to take you out
from the Philistines
you've had countless enemies
and who's protected you
every time
it wasn't you
it was me
I have done it
so picture this
imagine you
in your company
you hire
a fresh graduate
out of college
and you hire them
as a junior
sales associate
which kind of means
very low rank
fresh graduate
junior sales associate
and you train them
and you teach them
you coach them
everything
and you set them up
and you
you do role plays
with them
you show them
how to make calls
and all this kind of stuff
six months later
this division
of which they're
the most junior member
lands a great client
and makes a great sale
okay
and suddenly
this junior
sales associate
starts walking
around the office
telling the vice president
of global sales
how to do sales
right
well I think
you should just do this
and let me just
coach you a little bit
and start giving instructions
to the president
of the company
what are you going to say
hey just pipe down son
let's just remember
where you came from
right
let's just remember
who you are
that's what God's
saying to David
okay I know you're king
but let's just remember
where you came from
who got you there
it was me
God reminds David
where he's come from
and who brought him
to the throne
who's building his kingdom
it's not the work of David
it's the wonderful work
of God
and then God
says well that wasn't
just true of your past
let's talk about
your future
verse 9
I will make for you
a great name
like the name
of the great ones
on earth
I will appoint a place
for my people Israel
I will plant them
so that they may dwell
in their own place
and be disturbed
by their enemies
no more
verse 11
I will give you rest
from all your enemies
moreover the Lord
declares to you
that the Lord
will make you
a great house
so God's saying
I'm going to do
great things
and who's going to do it
I will do it
not you David
remember a few weeks ago
Neil spoke about
God's covenant
with Abraham
and he makes
this amazing covenant
promise
and where is Abraham
while God is doing this
he's fast asleep
right
he's fast asleep
what's God saying
Abraham
you contributing
nothing
to this promise
I'm doing it all
that's what God's doing
yeah
he's saying the same
thing to David
this is something
I will do
in spite of you
not because of you
look at verse 2
David says here
in verse 2
I will build a house
for the Lord
what does God say
in verse 11
no the Lord declares
that he will build
a house for you
God is saying
this is something
I will do
and years later
David's son Solomon
would write a psalm
Psalm 127
anybody know it
it's the first sermon
I ever preached
at Watermark
David's son Solomon
wrote the psalm
saying unless the Lord
builds the house
those who build it
labor in vain
unless the Lord
watches over city
the watchman
stays awake in vain
it is in vain
that you rise up early
and go late to rest
eating the bread
of anxious toil
for he gives
his beloved rest
unless the Lord
builds a house
David
your work is all in vain
so God's promise
to Abraham
back in Genesis
and to Moses
and the Exodus
and to Israel
and Mount Sinai
he's going to
overturn sin
he's going to
take this broken world
and he promises
to make it right again
through this people
and now he gets
a king called David
and he says
David you are
another instrument
a piece in the puzzle
through whom my promises
will go
till finally
the true king
heaven and earth
true king comes
and he will burst
open the doors
so that all people
can come under his kingship
and experience my blessing
and my grace
David's kingdom
in many ways
is just the instrument
through which
God's promises come
because through
David's dynasty
or the words of Samuel
his house
God is going to bring
his kingdom
God wants David to know
and he wants us to know
that this is not
in response
to David's great work
it precedes it
this is what God is doing
but look at the second thing here
there's a second thing
that I think God
really wants us to see
and that's this
God's kingdom
is undefeatable
I don't know if that's
a real word
but for today it is
right
it's undefeatable
it will prosper
look at verse 12 to 16
with me
it says
when your days are old
and fulfilled
sorry
when your days are fulfilled
and you lie down
with your fathers
I will raise up
for your offspring
after you
one who shall come
from your body
and I will establish
his kingdom
he shall build a house
for my name
and I will establish
the throne of his kingdom
forever
I will be to him
a father
he will be to me
a son
and when he commits
iniquity
I will discipline him
with the rod of men
with the stripes
of the son of man
but my steadfast love
will not depart from him
as I took it from Saul
whom I put away
before you
your house
and your kingdom
shall be made sure
forever before me
your throne
shall be established
forever
if there's one thing
we need to see here
God is making this promise
David
through you
and your dynasty
my kingdom
is going to come
and this promise
is undefeatable
in the words
of Dale Ralph Davis
it is indefectable
that means
it cannot fail
you can throw
whatever you wanted it
it cannot fail
look at what he says here
God lists
a couple of the things
that would derail
most kingdoms
right
and he says
let's think about that
what about death
okay
I mean David
is a great king
great guy
he's not going to live forever
one day he's going to get old
and die
what will happen then
are God's redemptive promises
going to fall apart
look at verse 12
when your days are old
sorry
when the days are fulfilled
and you lie down
with your fathers
I will raise up
your offspring after you
who will come from your body
and I will establish
his kingdom
he will build a house
for my name
not even death
can annul it
David's descendants
will lie down
in death
and God will raise up
a king
who will
reign forever
and God will raise up
a king
after king
until one day
there will come
a king
born of his lineage
of his house
and dynasty
that will never die
one day
there will come
a king
who will actually
defeat
the grave
who will die
but will rise
from death
and defeat death
forever
one day
there will come
a son
a king
from David's own lineage
and he will defeat
death
forever
not even death
can stop God's kingdom
what about sin
I mean David's a good man
he's a righteous man
he's not perfect
as we find out
he sins pretty badly
but he repents
what about sin
sin has a way
of derailing
even the most
strongest kingdoms
well look at what God says
verse 14
I will be to my father
he will be to me a son
when he commits iniquity
I will discipline him
with the rod of men
but my steadfast love
will never depart from him
as I took it from Saul
whom I put away before you
nope
not even sin
will destroy this covenant promise
God's people
will be disciplined
but the judgment
will never go so far
as to destroy it forever
David's family
will never experience
what happened to Saul
it will never come
to an end
David's line
will continue forever
God will correct
and deal with sin
and he will continue
continue continue
until finally
will come one king
in whom there is no sin
in fact finally
this king will come
and he will be punished
with the rods of men
and the stripes of
punishment
on behalf of those
who deserve to be punished
he will take their sin
upon himself
and he will swallow up sin
so that sin no longer
needs to derail
God's plans
he will put an end
to sin's great power
forever
and what about time?
we all know
that what time does
right?
time erodes things
time destroys things
I was talking to a man
this week
he was walking up
the driveway
by our house
and he was out of breath
he was an elderly man
and he said
when I was young
I used to do so much sport
I could do anything
but now I'm an old man
and then he says to us
old age comes to all of us
what about time?
is time going to destroy
this kingdom?
well look at what God says
verse 16
and your house
and your kingdom
shall be made sure
forever
your throne
will be established
forever
for all eternity
forever
and ever
David's great descendant
Jesus Christ
heaven earth
true king
will be on the throne
forever
and 100 billion years
from now
he will still be on the throne
and his kingdom
will still stand
and those who are
under his kingdom
will still be
receiving his blessing
and his grace
it's almost like
God's staring down
any challenge
and he says
give me your best shot
sin?
I'll handle that
death?
I'll defeat that
time?
nothing for me
my kingdom
will last forever
my promise
will stand
my wonderful work
of putting right
what is wrong
with the world
will come
to pass
it cannot
fail
so how should we respond?
how should we respond?
God makes this promise
to David
and the promise
isn't so much for David
it's actually for all of us
he says
David you are my chosen king
and I'm going to establish
your kingdom
and through your descendants
will come heaven earth's
true kingdom
and he will open the doors
that all people
not just Jews
not just Israelites
all people
who receive him as king
can come under his kingdom
and will experience
his grace and his blessing
his righteousness
and his justice
and death will be no more
and sin will be no more
and tears will be no more
and for all eternity
those who receive him as king
will experience his blessing
and his grace
forever
so how should we respond?
well let me give us
three brief responses
first one is this
trust in the God
of the promise
friends why are all these stories
in the Bible?
why are they there?
is it just to give us
a couple of pep talks?
is it to give us some advice?
no it's to remind us
that God made a promise
thousands of years ago
and he is good
to his promise
his promise
will not fail
trust the God
of the promise
trust him
these are a multitude of ways
of showing us
what the entire Bible story
is all about
which is God's promise
to put right
what is wrong with the world
to bring people back
into his kingdom
outside of Christ
we are exiled
we are under his curse
and his judgment
but as we come under him
God will restore his blessing
so friends
don't trust in the kingdom
of the HKD
or the USD
or the RMB
or any other three letters
you want to put in there
right
US dollars
that kingdom is going to fail
Hong Kong dollar
that kingdom is going to fail
your stocks
crypto
gold
it's going to fail
there is a kingdom
that will last forever
trust the God
of the promise
those things
by the way
they promise you a lot
they cannot deliver
their promises
they cannot deliver
they will fail
he who promises faithful
he will do it
secondly
rejoice in God's
track record
of faithfulness
friends
this week
something bad
is going to happen to you
things are going to go wrong
and you're going to wonder
God where are you
and this week
God is going to make you
wait for something
and you're going to feel like
I can't wait anymore
I've been waiting so long
and that's enough
and God is going to make you
wait longer
and you're going to feel like
I can't wait another day
and you'll wait another month
friends
trust
God's track record
of faithfulness
in the Bible
God often seems like
he's very slow
it seems like
God is doing nothing
and you often think
God what are you doing
this is taking 300 years
trust
God's track record
of faithfulness
he has promised
he will do it
he is good
and finally
receive Christ
as your king
receive Christ
as your king
friends
for those of us
that are not Christians
I'm so glad
you're here this morning
there are 100 places
you could be
you chose the best place
to be
maybe not this church
necessarily
but a church
I'm so glad
that you're with us
this morning
friends
if you're not a Christian
you need to understand
very very clearly
what this passage is saying
there is a king
his name is Jesus
and those who come
under him
and receive him as king
receive his blessing
and his grace
forgiveness of sin
safety from the curse
of sin
in this world
friends
those that are outside
are under God's curse
and one day
will face judgment
Jesus Christ came
and died on the cross
to defeat sin
and death
so that you can come
under his kingship
and receive him
friends
if you're not a Christian
this morning
your life
and your eternal
existence
is in deep
deep jeopardy
do you remember
what God said
to David
in our passage
he says
I will put an end
to your enemies
friends
if you're not a Christian
this morning
you are in some sense
God's enemy
you've rejected him
you're rebelling against him
you're saying
I will do things
my own way
friends
can I implore you
can I beg you
receive Jesus
as your king
surrender to him
bow down to him
say Jesus
have your way
in my life
he will change
your life
forever
you will never
be the same person
he will rescue you
and save you
and deliver you
friends
come to Christ
follow him
if you haven't done that
and you want to do that
today
come and chat to me
afterwards
I would love to pray
with you
and help you
receive him as your king
but for those of us
who are Christians
let me ask
is Christ still your king
do you live as though
Jesus is your king
are there areas
of your life
to Jesus
you can be king
over this area
but this area here
I want to be king
friends
let Jesus be king
over all
let Christ be your lord
why don't you come back
to him today
wholeheartedly
give yourself to Jesus
there are so many things
in our city
that are vying
for your attention
vying for your affection
your worship
your love
those kingdoms
will let you down
Jesus made a promise
thousands of years ago
he was faithful
and he will be faithful
his kingdom
will never fail
let's come to him
now
let me pray for us
heavenly father
your faithfulness
is so good
lord
god as we read
the bible
we see that you make
promise after promise
and you are good
to your promise
a descendant of David
did come
Jesus
the son of David
but more importantly
the son of God
and Jesus
you've came to
establish a house
a kingdom
that will last forever
you will defeat
your enemies
you defeated
death
and sin
partially on the cross
one day
they'll be vanquished
forever
god thank you
for the good news
of the gospel
but thank you even more
that you are such a good king
and when we come under you
we can experience life
and life to the full
god I pray
won't you help us
as a church
help us as a people
to surrender to you
to welcome you as king
to love you
and trust you
in your great name I pray
amen