Dennis Tuuri

tell us that they were then to pray for the people and to lead the people in this worship service as it were that was conducted at the temple or at the tabernacle. And we tried to put a great deal of stress in the fact that the priesthood and the nation of Israel was a series of concentric circles as it were. At the center you had Aaron or the high priest who represented Jesus Christ of course this glorious garments representing the righteousness of Jesus Christ as he went into minister before God the yearly sacrifice atonement for the people outside of the high priest himself or the Aaronic priesthood.

He had a whole set of priests that whose special function was to minister in the whole tabernacle or temple itself. And outside of them, you had the tribe of Levite. Levite was a priestly tribe given over to God for the consecration of his services, ministering to him. And so the Levites were priests in that sense also. A larger concentric circle around the high priest, the Aaronic priesthood, and then the Levites themselves.

And of course, we read from Exodus 19 last week that the priesthood of all believers is not a New Testament truth. It was true of the Old Testament as well. All because God said that he’d make the nation of Israel a royal priesthood. And he made that in the context of saying that all the earth belongs to me. It’s not as if you’re the only ones I care about. All the world belongs to me, but you’re a royal priesthood to me.

There was the same distinction made between Israel and the rest of the world as there was the Levites and the rest of Israel. The priestly function of guardianship was to keep the specific area or the realm of control that God had given to them free from profane influences. And so, for instance, the Levites couldn’t go into certain portions of the tabernacle to minister. And only the high priest could go into the specific geographical location at the center there in the holy of holies.

He was to guard that from intrusion by non-consecrated people. And so, the priest has a function to guard, but the priest also has a function to consecrate all things to God for his purposes and the coming purposes of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. The priests were to consecrate things. And so, the nation of Israel was to be a priesthood in that was supposed to then teach the law of God in an evangelistic function to the entire world and minister to the world.

And we looked at Isaiah 61, Isaiah 66, and the importance of that. Remember that this is not a restrictive priestly idea where only certain people have privileges and nobody else ever gets them. The idea was to expand the Holy of Holies. The idea was to expand the temple as it were to be God’s dwelling place over the whole earth, consecrating all the earth to God’s purposes, defending as it were what we’ve already consecrated to God, expanding the territory of that consecration and then defending that territory as well.

And so this idea of Nehemiah, for instance, with the sword and the trowel of being a defensive battle on one hand and a building battle on the other, that’s part of the because that’s what he’s involved with is guarding again the people of God and what has already been consecrated to guard and that’s a priestly function under the old covenant and it’s also a teaching function and a priestly function under the new covenant we’re also now a nation all of priests in the new covenant of course well I could go on about that but there was a tape I guess made last week that came out okay and you can listen to more about that last week but today we’re going to go on to the office of the king We’ll be spending most of our time specifically on the passage that we just read, which was the only passage in the Pentateuch that gave specific reference to the office of the king and how it was to be established.

I’ve got a four-point alliterated outline. How about that? Number one, we’ll talk about the conditions for the selection of the king. Number two, we’ll talk about the corrective king that God supplied. Number three, we’ll talk about the coming king that was prefigured in this king. And four, we’ll do draw some conclusions for our church, for our family and for our government. We’re making some application as we go through those things as well.

But first, the conditions that which the king was established, the corrective king supplied by God, the coming king prefigured by this king of God’s coming king, and then some conclusions. First, the conditions for the selection of the king. Verse 14 says, when you enter the land which the Lord your God gives you and you possess it and live in it, and you say, I will set a king over me like the nations who are around who are around me, verse 15, you shall surely set up a king this way.

The point was there’s a prefiguring here of the apostasy to come on the part of the covenant people by rejecting the judges that God had placed over them and by seeking a king like the people around instead. Now this is fulfilled specifically in 1 Samuel 8 of course and we’ll be spending some time talking about that. But it’s also interesting that in for instance in this was not the only time of apostasy of the people of God for having God reign over them.

In Judges 11:22 and 23 Gideon says I won’t rule over you nor my sons, but God will rule over the nations. And that’s a clear indication that they wanted to make Gideon king at that time. We’ll see this a little bit as we go through here, but the king had an inherited the king’s office was an inherited office. Normally, the sons of the king were to be the next king. The next son was to be the next king.

And so when Gideon says, “I’m not going to rule over you. Neither are my sons.” He’s saying, “I’m not going to be your king that would have the son my sons inherit that office from me, but God will rule over you. Well, in 1 Samuel 8, we see the rejection of God ruling over the people. 1 Samuel 8, of course, let’s just turn to that for a minute. Situation was that Samuel was older now. he appointed his sons, judges over Israel to replace himself.

And it says the sons weren’t very good guys. And then in verse four of 1 Samuel 8, then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah and they said to him, “Behold, you have grown old your sons do not walk in your ways. Now appoint a king for us to judge us like all the nations around us.” Now some commentators say that the problem of course here in this passage was Samuel and Samuel’s sons.

That was the reason why the people needed a king because he had lousy sons. But you notice that the people here don’t say give us a king who will judge us wisely unlike your sons who are judging us unwisely and unrighteously. They don’t say that. What they say is give us a king like all the nations around us. So that explanation doesn’t hold water. Others say that the cultural evolution that Israel was going through demanded a more centralized form of government.

Well, you know, that’s interesting to read this into this passage, but it’s not what the word of God tells us. God tells us specifically what the problem in this in this portion of scripture was. In verse 7, we read, “The Lord said to Samuel, listen to the voice of the people in regard to all that they say to you. For they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them.” The problem with the people at the time of 1 Samuel was they rejected God’s reign from heaven over the nation of Israel.

They didn’t reject the idea of judges in favor of a monarchy. The choice of their government, I think, is a secondary consideration to them here. They could just as well have said president or prime minister, anything else. The point was this is not specifically a commentary on monarchy. It’s a commentary on a people who reject God as the sovereign over their nation, as king over their nation, and his laws for their nation, and want to turn instead to their own laws and their own form a government.

That’s what’s going on here. They rejected the reign of God. This is what happened throughout the book of Judges. Of course, when they tried to make Gideon ruler over them and Gideon said, “God will rule over you.” The people rejected that. It doesn’t say so explicitly in the passage, but at the end toward the end of the book of Judges, we read that everybody did what was right in their own sight because there was no king in Israel.

Now, we know that doesn’t mean that the monarchy is what the people really should have had because God instituted a system of judges. I think what’s plainly being referred to there is that they were not having God as their king. And so they turned from God’s the sovereign over their land and his laws to what was right in their own eyes. And that’s the same thing that people are doing here in 1 Samuel 8.

And God gives them a king, but he doesn’t give them a king like the nations around them. The kings that were around them, there were several types of kings that were common throughout time actually and specifically in the oriental phase of history here as well. First of all, you had kings that were total sovereigns over the entire nation. What they said was law. They were totally in control, omnipotent as it were, as much as a man can be in ruling the nation.

Another type of king you have is the king priest. The king would determine the religion of the people as well. He would be both the king and the priest combined in one office. He would control both religious functions and state functions as well through the one personage. And the third thing that’s indicative of the pe the kings that were around the people of Israel at this time is the fact that they were visible.

They would sit on thrones. They visible kings and the people of God rejected the visible the invisible reign of God and they wanted instead a visible king like the people around them at heart their sin was one of unbelief it’s interesting that later in 1 Samuel 8 I believe in verse 20 19 and 20 they say no we shall have a king over us that we also may be like all the nations that our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles the people of is wanted a king to go out and fight their battles for them.

Now, that isn’t a bad motivation in of itself. The point is though that several chapters later that Samuel reminds them that God had fought their battles for them. They had a God who fought their battles. He didn’t come down and put on armor and ride a horse. But it’s clear from 1 Sam, I believe it’s in 11 or a couple of chapters down the line here in 1 Samuel. Well, Samuel recounts the various victories that God had given them over various enemies.

They had a king who fought for him, but they wanted a king to ride on a horse in front of them. They rejected the invisible reign of God, even his winning of their battles for them. And they wanted somebody to ride forth in front of them, win their battles for them. They rejected God. It was basically a sin of unbelief. And so they turned to serve other gods. And it just was that’s God’s commentary on the passage that just like they did in Egypt, they’re turning away from me and they’re turning to serve other gods.

That’s what God’s commentary on this passage is. Now, it’s easy to think about what turkeys these guys were in rejecting the invisible king of God and wanting a visible king. But let’s not be too hard on without a little bit of self analysis. Also, there are many churches today that reject the kingship of Jesus Christ until he returns physically to this earth. Now, I don’t want to believe that point because this church, I think, doesn’t have that problem and I don’t want to spend this morning criticizing other groups, but think it through this afternoon and your families.

Think about this passage and the ramifications of it by people who reject the reign of Jesus Christ until he comes back to actually ride a horse. What Jesus Christ has done, as we’ll see, is to fulfill the prophecies of the coming king. He is the King of Kings. He was declared so by God. He was coronated by God, crowned by him, anointed by the Holy Spirit. He was baptized by God as the king. He ascended and he sits at the right hand of God the Father now on his throne.

And so we have a King Jesus Christ ruling over us now. And it’s easy to fall from to unbelief in that matter and want instead Jesus to be here physically on earth leading us before we’ll go forward into battle. That’s sin and unbelief. But what about in our own situ maybe the things that are more tempting for this group? Maybe not. We’ll see. I hope I don’t offend too many people this morning. Some of these subjects I didn’t know how else to talk about them.

Tell you the truth. It seems like they’re pretty obvious applications. If for instance we withhold our tithes from God because we don’t think we can afford to pay God. I don’t know very many of us who would do that very long at the civil government. And of course, we’ve talked before that was God’s commentary in the minor prophets on the people then too. He was saying in some of the minor prophets, you try doing to the king, the civil governor, what you’re doing to me in payment of your taxes and see how far you get.

And if we tried to withhold from the IRS our taxes and the tithes that they require of us that God of course predicted here in 1 Samuel 8, what would we get? Well, we’re fearful of that, aren’t we? And so, we pay our taxes every month. Most of us do. Maybe some don’t. Most of us do because we’re fearful of the civil magistrate. But we’re not afraid of God. We’re not afraid to withhold our tithe from God, are we?

When we do that, we fall into the same unbelief of God’s rule and reign and his blessings and cursings that these people fell into. We reject God as king and we have another king put over us. Another touchy subject. I’m going to try to say this real carefully. If we find some law of the civil magistrate frightening to us to walk in obedience to us to it, now I’m not saying if we reject it for religious reasons.

There’s certainly places for that. We have to obey God rather than man when it comes to that issue. But if that’s not the issue in a particular area of the civil government that we want to walk in disobedience to the law of God, if we’re motivated to disobey a commandment of men because of fear, sure of what obedience to that command will bring upon us from the civil magistrate. Aren’t we then fearing the civil magistrate again more than we are God?

And aren’t we rejecting the reign of God over our lives? We can’t allow fear of man to dictate our actions. We must fear God first. And we’ll see that’s one of the requirements of the king to fear God always and walk in obedience to his commandments no matter how dangerous it may seem to us before the civil governor. where how dangerous it may seem in terms of criticism by our neighbors, we must walk in obedience to God and his commands that the scriptures teach us, not being fearful of the civil governor.

And when we’re fearful of the civil magistrate and as a result violate a command of God, then we walk in the same sin of these people. Now, I’m not saying that everybody in this state who hasn’t walked in obedience to the to the instruction of the civil magistrate to notify them of the education of their children in their home. Some people may be doing so out of conscientious reasons. They may be doing so because they think the word of God instructs them in that path.

And it’s important for those people to think that through. But if that’s their conclusion, then they have to obey God. But there are other people in this state who refuse to notify the civil magistrate because of fear of what will happen in two years or four years when the bill is repealed. And I’m telling you that if the word of God tells us to obey God and to trust him in that obedience. And the civil and God tells us that what part of his order in the universe is to obey the civil governor unless he causes us to walk in disobedience to the commands of God.

If that’s what we believe the scriptures say, and I’m sure there’s disagreements on that, too. Some valid ones from people, we can talk about that. But if you believe that, and then you don’t act in obedience to the civil governor because of fear of what he might do, you’ve fallen into the same sin of unbelief in the victory that God will give us. over people that these people in 1 Samuel 8 fell into.

Also, you want a different king over you to protect you because God isn’t going to do it. But the scriptures are clear that God does protect us. That’s the kind of king that people wanted. Somebody who would replace God. Somebody that would allow them to replace God’s law and some king who had administered to them both in terms of being a total sovereign over their lives in the civil arena and in the religious arena.

But that’s not what God gave them. He gave them a king, but then he put stipulations from this passage in Deuteronomy that we read. He put stipulations upon that king so that he gave them a corrective king. And we’ll talk now about the corrective king that God provided to them. First of all, the very first thing it’s important to recognize here, you shall surely set a king over you whom the Lord your God chooses.

God had to choose the king that they would have over them through the oracle. And so God first of all said, “You’re not going to have it like the other kings of the nations around that I didn’t appoint. I’m going to instruct you who you can appoint. Now, it’s important to recognize here that they had to set them set the king over themselves. He said, “You shall surely set over yourself a king that I chose.” So, there’s two functions that go on c-minus here to the selection of a king.

The selection by God and the selection by the people. We’ve talked about that before and I won’t belabor the point now, but if you look at the selection of Saul and the people re confirm Saul after a couple of chapters when he goes back and does his work, Then when they have the need of a king again, the people confirm him. What I’m That’s a little confusing. What I’m trying to say both in Saul with David, Solomon, and many other kings, what you see is God selecting an individual, but then the people appointing that man to reign over them.

Okay? That’s the way God’s government works. We’ve talked about it many times that God selects people, but then the people also confirm that choice and they say, “We’ll follow that man.” And that’s what happens with Saul, David, and Solomon. Well, we’ve talked about that before. So, first of all, God must choose the king. Secondly, he said that this king you’re going to have over you cannot be a foreigner.

Can’t be one of the people from the nations around you. Had to be a covenant member, a member of the visible covenant community. Now, that’s important to it. Seems rather obvious, but what did they want? They wanted a king like the other countries around us. I suppose that if he didn’t give that instruction, they would have taken some Canaanite king or something to rule over them. But he said, “No, Oh, no.

It can’t be like the other countries around. You have to have a member of the covenant community and walking in obedience to my commands. He’s the one that you can place over you. Another restriction, another corrective to the king that they sought. Fourth, the king was forbidden in verses 16 and 17 to multiply horses, women, or money. That’s important. Also, the king couldn’t multiply horses. Now, horses were multiplied by the nations around about Israel by those kings.

God said, “You can’t have a king like the nations around you because you can’t have a king who multiplies horses to himself who gets a big cavalry up. The purpose of the cavalry of course was to wage offensive war primarily. They weren’t particularly effective in defensive war. They’re particularly effective in offensive war and going out against other countries. And God says you won’t can’t have a king over you who is going to wage offensive physical warfare around the nations round about.

Why? Well, like we said last week, it’s really the job of the priests. It’s their task that is primarily evangelistic in the community. Their task is to teach the people. The Levites were to teach the law of God. And it’s through teaching and proclamation of the law of God that evangelism and the growth of the covenant people and the visible covenant community occurs. It’s not through going out and militarily conquering other nations round about.

So he says, “Fine, you can have a king, but don’t think that the king is going to expand your borders. Your borders will only be expanded if you’re faithful to me, if you’re faithful to proclaim my law, if you’re faithful to evangelize, as it were, the nations round about, as a good priest would do. So they couldn’t multiply horses. Additionally, they couldn’t multiply women unto themselves. And again, this was a common characteristic of the kings and the pagan kings around them.

They would have big harems. And traditionally or usually these harems would consist of women from other nations as well. And of course that’ll happen later on with Solomon. And those women from other nations will lead him off into other religions. And so that was prohibited also. And then finally, of course, the prohibition they’re prohibited from multiplying money to themselves. They couldn’t have a lot of gold and silver that they would multiply to themselves.

Now, it’s interesting. I was just thinking as we were going through this that we began this series several months ago, the discussion of the qualifications for eldership. And you can see right here in these three prohibitions of multiplication characteristics of elders as well. I mean, an elder could not be a brawler, a striker. He couldn’t be prone to want to go out and beat somebody up. And the king couldn’t multiply horses.

The elder had to be able to defend the gospel and to teach the gospel and to evangelize in that way. And so the qualification for elder also is seen here as a qualification for the king. He couldn’t rely upon horses to gain the victory for the people of God. Secondly, the elder had to be the husband of one wife. Certainly can’t have a harem. And so that’s another qualification for eldership. The same thing we see here of kings.

And third, the elder can’t be addicted to ill-gotten gain. And of course, the king who begins to accumulate great masses of wealth to himself does so through levying the people of the land round about and does so really in by stealing money from the people around them. And so the elder can’t be fond of ill-gotten gain nor can the king. Another prohibition against the final the most important prohibition here in terms of the correction that God gave the king that he would give to them was that the king had to be under covenant law.

And in verse 18 he talks verses 18–20 he talks about the king had to as it were attend himself to the law of God. He had to write a copy of the law. He had to read the law continually and he had to walk in obedience to it. Another particular thing that the king could not do here is you’ll notice that when he had to write the law, it says in verse 18, you should write for himself a copy of this law on a scroll in the presence of the Levitical priests.

And by that command that the king had to do to write himself out a copy of the law of God in the presence of the Levitical priests, He was reinforcing to the people to the king and to the priest that there was a division of powers here. The king was not to be the primary ecclesiastical ruler. There were Levitical priests still. And the next section of this of Deuteronomy in verse in chapter 18 begins in a section devoted to Levitical priests.

And so this king could not be like the other kings and that he could not be a king priest. He had to have those separation of offices as it were between himself and the Levitical structure. and he couldn’t be like them and he couldn’t be an absolute ruler. He had to be under God’s authority through God’s law. Now, it’s important to recognize here that the king had to write himself out a copy of this law, which probably included all the book of Deuteronomy.

And this was case law that God had given to him so that he could judge wisely and rule righteously in the land that he was to rule over. It’s important, therefore, to recognize the king was not the head of the ecclesiastical order, but he was under religious obligation to God. to walk in obedience to the laws of the people and to promulgate those laws in the land. This is just one indication. I mean, we could go on several weeks about the importance of the civil magistrate walking in obedience to God’s laws, which we see repeated in the New Testament, of course, the book of Romans.

We won’t bother to do that again. We’ve talked about it many times in this church. But it’s important to recognize here the obligation of the king to walk in obedience to God’s law. And I’d remind you that this is Levitical law here we’re talking about. It’s case law that was established in the book of Deuteronomy. I say that because you have to be very careful when you read people who talk about obedience to the law of God, you have to understand what they’re saying by the law.

What do they mean by the law of God? In the review article of Christianity Today of Christian Reconstruction in downstairs, the copies on the piano, those of you who have read it, you’ll notice that he talks in there about Herb Titus a little bit. And Herb Titus in the tape that a lot of us listened to several weeks ago said that any law of the civil government governor that isn’t in conformance to God’s law is no law at all.

It doesn’t have to be obeyed. Well, I don’t believe that for several reasons, but the point I’m trying to make here is that the Christianity Today article, which is a fair it’s it is that is very accurate in the interviews they conducted with people. Herb Titus told them that he rejects the Mosaic covenant and Levitical law as a source of law today. He looks to the Adamic and the Noahic covenants for his interpretation of general law or natural law in our country.

Now that’s a and you may not quite understand all that, but the point is that when people talk about the law of God, they can mean many things by it. And when some people talk about the law of God and the law of nature being the law of God, what they’re talking about is the Adamic and Noahic covenants give us a microscope or an eyepiece as it were through which we can look at the general revelation around us and correctly ascertain good laws for our nation.

That’s not what the king in this passage of scripture was commanded to do. And I don’t believe that’s what the king today is commanded to either the civil rulers are commanded to understand all the law of God including Mosaic covenant including the Levitical laws and apply those laws as they rule in the nation. Specific example of how that affects of course what we do is that Herb Titus in the basis of that since he does not believe that the execution of homosexuals is a valid civil law today.

And so if if we think that these case laws are binding upon the civil governor and we press for society that eventually does bring God’s penalty upon homosexuals, which is the death penalty. And by the way, they correctly quoted Dr. Bahnsen in the article as saying that the homosexual have to be doing something openly before men. It’d have to be two witnesses before he can be convicted. And so, it’s not just a matter of killing people for what they believe or what they do in the privacy of their homes.

That’s not what it’s talking about. But in any event, if we were to do that and to enact such a law that prohibited outright homosexual acts that other men could witness and be influenced by upon pain of death, Then people who believe in the natural law and Adamic and Noahic covenants would say that’s no law of God either because they reject Mosaic law and the law of the covenant. Important to think through these things. Anyway, the king was commanded to write a copy of the law to read that law and then to walk in obedience to it.

And here you’ll see the basic underlying principle that led to Rutherford’s book Lex Rex law king. It up to that time the divine right of kings was lex ex lex king law but instead God says no the king is responsible to act under the law of gods revealed in his scriptures and he actually had to write out a copy of the scriptures and walk in obedience to it the bible never posits the divine right of kings no matter how much people may try to twist it to that end why did he okay now it’s interesting in verses 18–20 what he tells the king to do in terms of writing out this book of the law why was he supposed to do it and to read it says in verse 19 that he may learn to fear the Lord his God by carefully observing all the words of this law and these statutes that his heart may not be lifted up above his countrymen and that he may not turn aside from the commandment to the right or to the left in order that he and his sons may continue to continue long in his kingdom in the midst of Israel.

So what God says here in verses 19 and 20 is that the king is supposed to write and to read the law of God and meditate on it to the end that one that he fear God and by that fearing of God walk in obedience. Number two, that his heart not be lifted up above his countrymen. And the third result of that would be that he does not turn aside from the law to the right or to the left. So I think that what’s going on here is that remember the first commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

And the second commandment is like unto it to love your neighbor as yourselves. The king was being commanded here to fear God, to love God, to be devoted to God’s glory. But secondly also to fulfill the second commandment which was to love your neighbor as yourself and not to be lifted up above your neighbors. And the result of those two commandments together is that he might obey the law of God. Okay?

First commandment, second commandment put together equals obedience to God’s law. Obedience to God’s law equals blessings upon the king. And it was only upon that sort of king that his sons would inherit the kingdom from him. If the king was careful to obey the first and second commandments and by implication then to obey all of God’s laws, then God said that your sons will continue in your kingdom after you.

If the king didn’t obey, the reign was taken away from his sons. It was not a perpetual inheritance simply based on blood. It was still based upon faith working in obedience to God’s law. Now, this is quite important for us and I’ll quote from the Christianity Today article again here in a minute. Says that the king should not be lifted up above the people. If you do a little word study on that word, Lots of occurrences of that word, but I want to just point out a couple of them in the scriptures.

Psalm 131:1, David says, “My heart is not proud, nor my eyes lofty.” And the word there is lifted up. David said, “I’m a king, and I’ve walked in obedience to this section of Deuteronomy because my eyes aren’t lofty. I don’t lift myself up above the people around me. I’m not proud. Proverbs 30:11–14 I’ll read. There is a kind of man who curses his father and does not bless his mother.

There is a kind who is pure in his own eyes yet is not washed from his filthiness. There is a kind, oh how lofty are his eyes, and his eyelids are raised in arrogance. There is a kind of man whose teeth are like swords and his jaw teeth like knives to devour the afflicted from the earth and the needy from among men. This should be a stern warning to us as parents as to how we should raise our children.

We should raise our children not to curse their father not to actually bless his parents. Of course, the end result the there’s a progression here of the child who does not who curses his father and doesn’t bless his mother. These children are proud in their own eyes and lofty. In verse 13, there’s a kind oh how lofty are his eyes. And the word lofty there means lifted up. And again, it’s a violation of this command of the king.

And remember, we’re talking about a nation of kingly priests here. It’s a violation of that to see oneself as being better than or lifted up above the people around us. How lofty are his eyes. How lofty are his eyes. His eyelids are raised in arrogance. And what’s the result of that kind of lofty attitude? That man, there is a kind of man whose teeth are like swords and his jaw teeth like knives to devour the afflicted from the earth.

and the needy from among men, teeth like swords. If we raise children who are lofty, who see themselves as lifted up above their companions and their playmates in this church, if we exercise that quality in our neighborhoods around us, if we see ourselves as somehow better than the people around us because we understand the law of God and applying the law of God, these other people aren’t and what turkeys they are.

If we raise ourselves in our own estimation, we become lofty before God and our speech will reflect that loftiness and it will be death to the people that we try to minister to in the community around us. We must at all costs avoid the haughtiness that would cause us to walk in violation to the second tablet of the law to love our neighbor as ourselves. That’s extremely important. Proverbs 6 verse 17 sorry verse 16.

There are six things which the Lord six things which the Lord hates. Yea, seven are an abomination to him. Lofty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood. Same progression. Lofty eyes, pride, seeing yourselves as better than the people around you, a lying tongue as a result, and hands that shed blood. That same progression of attitudes. God hates the lofty eyes. And so he commands the king here who had every reason in the world to believe that he was somehow better than the people around him.

He was the head of the nation civilly speaking. He knew the law of God than anybody else probably because he had to write actually write it out at the beginning of his reign. Write out the whole thing and meditate upon it and walk in obedience. do it. He had to judge righteously. To do that, he must study the law of God. He had this great amount of knowledge and so it’d be really easy for him to see himself as better and as with to see the people around him with lofty eyes holding himself above them.

I said I’d quote from that Christianity Today article again. At the end of that article in summation, they quoted from frame and they said that frame talking about Rushdoony and his institutes said that Rushdoony never talks about the love ethic of scripture which requires godly emotion. a renewed conscience and a renewed sensitivity to the concerns of others. Well, I haven’t searched through institutes yet to see if that’s true or not.

And Frame normally, of course, likes Rushdoony a great deal. And so, it’s kind of implying that Frame is a higher criticism of the reconstructionists that he actually have. Frame would probably consider himself a reconstructionist, I suppose. But leave alone, leave aside the fact that he might have attacked somebody that you like. I think that all of us would have to acknowledge as we look at the Christian reconstruction movement over the last 5 or 10 years in this country that there’s a degree of truth to that.

Maybe not with Reverend Rushdoony, maybe with some other elements that we know of the people who are some of the leaders in the Christian Reconstruction movement, but there’s some truth to it, isn’t it? We haven’t been necessarily all that sensitive to the concerns of others around us. And certainly the scriptures teach us that the law of God is the application of those two great commands to love God and to love your neighbor in all these different areas.

That obedience to the law of God should be to the end that we do love God and our neighbor. Love for our neighbor is defined by that law. But certainly that law should require us to have a sensitivity to other people and a love ethic toward them in obedience to God’s law. We don’t want to jump over the other way and emphasize just the external results of the law to the end that we neglect to see that they’re to be coming from a heart that has been turned back to the people around us as it were in an attempt to serve.

Now this is real important for us. If it’s true that some of the leaders of the Christian Reconstruction movement have fallen in this regard and I think it’s absolutely it’s hard to debate that fact. I think some of the we could all probably give instances of newsletters we’ve read that have that kind of attitude to them at times. If that’s true, then there’s we I think we have to be very careful that we don’t allow that same attitude to creep into this church.

That we don’t see ourselves as lofty above the people around us. That we don’t see ourselves as necess of that we forget then to be sensitive to the needs of the greater Christian community around us. We’re part of the church of God. And if part of the church of God needs reminding that there are requirements of God’s law they must act in obedience to, let’s remind them of it, but let’s not uh just cut them off and consider them as terrible people while we’re doing it.

Let’s have a sensitivity to them. Let’s see that God is raising up this church and the men of this church to be leaders, to be like the king in Israel, to instruct people again in the law word of God. But not in a lofty condemnatory fashion and to the end that we would encourage the church of Jesus Christ that they have a great king Jesus Christ who has given us visible commands in his word that we can build a godly society on we should be ministering to the people I guess is what I’m trying to say leadership in the Christian church is to be demonstrated by service and service must be because you want to help the other people that you’re ministering or serving and we go down to Salem you know it’s so easy to think gosh I’m down here and no nobody else in the church cares there’s two hoots about this thing and you know I was on KPDQ and six or seven calls is all we got out of that show and you think what’s wrong with people you know maybe God should just judge these people well that may be true but the point is we should be doing it I should be doing it when I’m down at Salem not grudgingly but because I love these people who are trying to teach their kids at home maybe they don’t got it all together yet maybe they don’t understand the theological implications of the curriculum they’re using maybe they’re just too concerned about their own families to be worried about the family whose child has already been taken away.

But then my job, if I’m going to be involved in this fight, is to help those people understand the necessity of looking after other people within the church. And I can’t do that unless I look after them as well, unless I have a caring heart toward them. It’s important that we as a church have that kind of sensitivity to concerns of others and seek to help them in those concerns that they have by putting them back to the word of God.

Now, it’s also true in this church. This is Reformation Covenant Church. This is not reformation covenant uh intellectual club, you know, we’re not just a group of of men who get together and discuss these things and hold these ideas in common intellectually. We’re a church. We’ve talked a lot about when people sign the covenant, they enter into the covenant community. It’s a community. It’s not just a matter of intellectual stimulation one for another.

Now, I’m not saying that’s what we’ve slipped into, but it’s an easy thing to happen in our in the way we live today. Living great distances apart, the greater Portland area. Some people out in Boring, some people out in Hillsboro, some people over in Washington. It’s easy to let that distance distance us to the concerns of other people in our church as well and in the covenant community. We must strive and work hard and write the law of God and study the law of God just like the king did that he would obey God by obeying the first and second tablets of the law that we would have concern for the people around us and minister to them by obeying God’s law.

It’s important that we see that emphasis is necessary in our church because it is a church. It is a community. I think I think it’s particularly easy not to be sensitive to the needs of people in our church who are smaller than we are. I don’t know how much I should say about this, but I think It’s important that we teach our children these things. Now, children are kind of funny. You know, they exhibit a great amount of the sin nature they’ve been born with.

And it’s our job as parents to correct that. It’s our job as parents to teach them the law of God. But it’s also our job as parents, if we understand that this is the law of God, to teach them a godly concern and sensitivity for the other children of the church as well. It’s not good for the children of our church to be divided or insensitive to each other. Now, that’s the way they’re going to be naturally.

And it’s our job as parents to teach them that the law of God includes a renewed heart, conscience, and sensitivity to the children and other people of this church as well. We have that obligation as parents in this church. It’s not enough for the men to be able to get together and talk about these things. It’s not enough for the women to meet together once a month and talk about these things either. We have to get the children together as well that they might see themselves as part of a covenanted group of people who are committed to each other and acting in obedience to God’s law as they work out the service to one another.

It’s just real easy not to do that in specific situations and we just have to be sensitive to that need in our church. If we’re going to be reconstructed and reconstructing, we can’t ignore the compassion we’re supposed to have for each other. We have to teach our children to have that compassion for each other as well. Try to think of specific examples as you go through the week. Watch how your children interact with just the children of the family for instance and then also try to see how they interact with other people from the church in that way.

It’s important that the children in our church I guess what I’m saying is the men in this church we feel pretty much committed to each other. We’ve discussed these things at great length. We’ve gotten together and encouraged each other in the faith. I think we’ve done that pretty good. But it’s important that the children feel part of that community as well. And it’s also important that the women and the wives feel part of that community as well.

We have to work to do that. It’s not going to happen in and of itself. You got to create opportunities. And when we see opportunities to get the kids together, we ought to make use of them. Okay? So God gave them a corrective king. But the king that God gave them in Deuteronomy also of course pointed to the coming king Jesus Christ. We read in 1 Kings 10:18–20 of Solomon’s ascension to the throne. Solomon of course was a type of Jesus Christ.

And while we’re not necessarily we’re certainly not saved he should have necessarily accumulated so much wealth as he accumulated in light of the scripture we just read about gathering wealth to oneself. Still, we see in Solomon a type of Jesus Christ. Solomon’s throne had, as it were, six steps that led up to his throne. And on either side of the throne, there were twelve lions. And this was emblematic, of course, of the ascension of the king to that platform from which he would rule the people.

And by this king that God gave Israel and by the specific throne that he gave Solomon, he was teaching the people that the true king would also ascend to a throne and sit as it were above the people. And Ephesians 1:20–21 shows us that came to pass with Jesus Christ says that he brought about in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and every name that is named not only in this age but also in the one to come.

He after Christ’s resurrection Christ ascended to the throne as the seventh layer up where Solomon sat was emblematic of the seventh heaven as it were a rule far above all of the rules. That’s where Jesus Christ reigns. And it should point out to us of course that the king was finally fulfilled in the great king Jesus Christ who came as our king of kings and lord of lords and his ascension now is to a throne in heaven that was typified by Solomon in the old covenant.

So God was teaching the people when he gave them an earthly king in the whole way the king was set up in the obedience of the king to the law in his being a mediator as it were of authority and control over the nation to the people from God. He was pointing them even when he gave them a king in response to their obedience in response to their apostasy. He was giving a king reminding them that a messiah would come who would sit far above all rule and he would be the true king.

You may not know probably a lot of you do that the word messiah of course the word Christ means anointed one and this king who was to come would not have the separation of offices required of this king that we just read about in Deuteronomy 17 who had him levitical priest there while he wrote the law. No, Jesus Christ came as we said last week as great high priest. But Jesus Christ also came as great king of kings and Jesus Christ took unto himself both those offices.

Those were the two anointed offices under the old covenant. The high priest and the king were both anointed. And Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Christ, the anointed one brought into himself those two branches as it of government, the sword of the church and the sword of the state together into one person, Jesus Christ. And he now sits above all rule and authority. He shares that dominion that reign with no one.

He is king of kings, lord of lords, and great high priest all at the same time. When we talk about the gospel of Jesus Christ, we’ve used the phrase the ascension of the savior king to the throne. And that’s what the scriptures talked about the coming of Jesus Christ. He would be our great savior king exalted to that position high above God. It’s interesting that as I said, earlier. This Deuteronomy 17 passage is followed by Deuteronomy 18.

Deuteronomy 18, the first eight verses relate to the priestly office. The next 9–22 relate to the prophetic office. And we could have used just that chapter and a half of scripture to talk about those three offices all fulfilled in Jesus Christ. And that’d be a good study for somebody as they begin to if for instance if somebody would like to maybe preach on that one of these weeks, it’d be a good thing.

It’s a good one, two, three outline, king, priest, and prophet. But any Jesus Christ came the Westminster Conf. Chapter 26 talks about this dominion of Jesus Christ, the great king of kings in this way. How does Christ execute the office of the king? Christ executed the office of a king in subduing us to himself in ruling and defending us and in restraining and conquering all his and our enemies. You hear what he said there?

These writers, the great Westminster divines, subduing us to himself and in ruling and defending us and in res straining and conquering all his and our enemies. That’s what the scripture teaches in some of the office of Jesus Christ. He conquers us, but he conquers all enemies as well. That’s the great king we have to serve, Jesus Christ, who came as the great savior of man, the great priest, king.