1 SAMUEL 6 NO SUBSTITUTE FOR PURSUING GOD2017 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: 1 Samuel 6 No Substitute For Pursuing God

You are listening to FerventWord, an online Bible study ministry with teachings and tools to help you grow deeper in your relationship with God. The following message was taught by Jerry Simmons in 2017. It is definitely great to be back with you in the Word and back in 1 Samuel chapter 6. Let's begin 1 Samuel chapter 6 by reading verses 1 through 6 and then we'll get into what the Lord has for us this evening. 1 Samuel chapter 6 verse 1 says...

Now the ark of the Lord was in the country of the Philistines seven months. And the Philistines called for the priests and the diviners saying, what shall we do with the ark of the Lord? Tell us, how should we send it to its place? So they said, if you send away the ark of the God of Israel, do not send it empty, but by all means return it to him with a trespass offering.

Then you will be healed, and it will be known to you why his hand is not removed from you. Verse 4. Then they said, What is the trespass offering which we shall return to him? They answered, Five golden tumors and five golden rats, according to the number of the lords of the Philistines.

For the same plague was on all of you and on your lords. Therefore you shall make images of your tumors and images of your rats that ravage the land, and you shall give glory to the God of Israel. Perhaps he will lighten his hand from you, from your gods, and from your land. Why then do you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened their hearts when he did mighty things among them?

Did they not let the people go that they might depart? Here as we pick up the account in 1 Samuel and look at 1 Samuel chapter 6, we're

continuing the discussion, continuing to focus on this idea of pursuing God's heart. That's the theme as we look through the book of Samuel and consider the heart of God and what it means to pursue the heart of God and what God's heart is like and how we do that. And it all comes from this theme verse or the key verse found in 1 Samuel 13, verse 14. And

As God is speaking to King Saul, who we'll be introduced to later on, God speaks through the prophet Samuel and says, And so God tells Saul,

You are no longer going to be king. Instead, I've chosen someone to be king who is a man after my own heart or a man who pursues my heart. And that is who the Lord was looking for. He sought for himself this man. And what does it mean to be a man after God's own heart or a man or a woman who pursues God's heart? Well, we can see here from the verse what God is talking about is obedience.

To be a man or a woman after God's own heart is really about obedience to God. And Saul was continually disobedient to God. He continually, after many opportunities, disobeyed God and disobeyed God and disobeyed God and ended up doing what he wanted to do more than he would do what God wanted him to do. And that's why at the end of verse 14, God tells him, because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you.

You've been disobedient. That's the issue. You're not in pursuit of God's heart. But God says, I've chosen someone. I found someone who we find out will be David, who is the man after God's own heart, who will pursue with everything that he has, obedience to God. And God is always in search of those men and women who will be pursuing his heart.

And so again, I would ask you this evening, are you a man or a woman after God's own heart? Are you in pursuit? And pursuit, I like the word pursuit because it kind of tells you it's not kind of like a lazy meandering. You know, do you lazily, you know, meander in the general direction of God's heart? You know, that's not what God's looking for. He's looking for a pursuit in

that, in my mind at least, you know, that conjures up images of, you know, sirens and lights and, you know, pedal to the metal and all out pursuit, all out seeking after whatever it takes. I must, I want to, I desire to be obedient to God.

And that's what we're learning about as we look through 1 Samuel, about that pursuit of God's heart and that need for us to really be aggressive in seeking to be obedient to God. Now, as we've been studying through 1 Samuel and seeing the condition of the nation of Israel, we find that the people of Israel are not pursuing God's heart.

As we are introduced to the book of Samuel and the prophet Samuel and the things that will ensue after this, we find that the people are really corrupt. They're far from God.

But God has been doing this work to raise up Samuel, who is a man after God's own heart, to bring his people back to him. And so Samuel's ministry is really going to begin in the next chapter. We'll pick that up next week. But we've been watching this develop as we see the state of the nation, the condition of the people. In chapter 4 and 5, we studied this two weeks ago.

the nation of Israel went into battle against the Philistines. And in this battle against the Philistines, we see the depth of their corruption. We see the distance that they have from God in that when they were defeated in the battle with the Philistines, they, well, they called out to the Lord and said, Lord, why did you allow this to happen? But then they brought the ark into

into the battle. And very clearly it says that they trusted the ark to give them victory. And so even then in their defeat, they really weren't looking to God and they really weren't pursuing the heart of God, but they had this like good luck charm of

the Ark of the Covenant, and they thought that that would protect them or force God to protect them in the midst of the battle. But they lost the battle. They lost the Ark. And so now for some time, the Ark of the Covenant, the most holy of all the tabernacle furnishings, the place where God said he would dwell with his people between the wings of the cherubim, this really important and vital piece of the tabernacle is,

for seven months has been in the land of the Philistines under Philistine control. And we saw last week or two weeks ago in chapter five, the things that were taking place as the Ark of the Covenant was there. And so in the land of the Philistines, they lived on the coast and they were taking territory away from Israel and taking more and more ground. And that's why they went to battle in chapter four. But now this is where the Ark of the Covenant is in their territory.

in the temple of Dagon. But God was at work and knocked down the statue of Dagon. And then the next day broke the statue in pieces. And there was plagues and rumors that were breaking out in the city as the people were holding on to the Ark of the Covenant. And so they sent it on to another Philistine city. And then plagues broke out there. And then they sent it to another city. And it's bouncing around as they're trying to deal with and trying to get...

figure out the right place where their gods can coexist with the God of Israel and not have any of these problems. But of course, that's not going to work. And so now as we head into chapter 6, they've given up.

And now they're ready to send the Ark of the Covenant back. And so that's what we're going to be looking at here in chapter 6, this account of the Ark of the Covenant coming back to the land of Israel, which will be a great celebration and cause for rejoicing for Israel, but still further illustrates the reality that the people of Israel are far from God.

As we look at chapter 6 this evening, I've titled the message, No Substitute for Pursuing God. And I want you to be thinking about that as we work our way through this chapter, that there really is no substitute for pursuing the heart of God. There's a lot of good things that we might be able to do, a lot of good things that we consider, you know, but there's really no substitute.

for, as I described, that all-out, full-on pursuit and seeking after aggressively the heart of God, the will of God, and obedience to God. There's no substitute for that, and every one of us needs to have that kind of aggressive approach to walking with God and pleasing Him as we live our Christian lives. And anything short of that is going to be trouble. Well, for

There's four points that we'll look at as we work our way through the chapter this evening. Point number one is found in the verses we read, verses one through six. Point number one is God's counsel is better than good counsel. God's counsel is better than good counsel. You can have good counsel, but again, understand it's not a substitute. Good counsel is not a substitute for God's

counsel. Again, the Philistines here are at the point where they're ready to give up. They're going to send the Ark of the Covenant back to Israel. In verse 1, it says, So here the Philistines...

seek out counsel from their priests. Now, when it talks about the priests, it's not talking about the Israelite priests. It's not talking about, you know, the priests of the true and living God. It's talking about their priests and their diviners. And so their spiritual leaders, their, you know, spiritual guides and seekers and, you know, those kinds of people, they're calling them to get some counsel from them.

And ultimately, these guys give them what maybe you could classify as good counsel. But the point that I want to highlight for us is, even though it's good in the sense that it worked, what they provide is not God's counsel. Now, the Philistines have been suffering now for about seven months.

The Ark of the Covenant has been there, it says in verse 1, for seven months. And if you look back into chapter 5, you can see

the plagues that God was bringing upon the people were pretty severe. In verse six of 1 Samuel 5, it says, the hand of the Lord was heavy upon the people of Ashdod and he ravaged them with tumors. And so there's these tumors, there's this kind of plague and there's a lot of speculation about exactly what that plague was. Some speculate that it's the bubonic plague because of the association with rats that we'll see here in this chapter.

But whatever it was, it was this supernatural striking of the people where God's hand is heavy upon them and they're ravaged. Their bodies are ravaged with these tumors, with these boils. It tells us in verse 9 of 1 Samuel chapter 5, "...the hand of the Lord was against the city with a very great destruction."

And then in verse 12, the men who did not die were stricken with tumors and the cry of the city went up to heaven. And so you can see as the ark is going from place to place, the whole area is just being struck hard with these plagues. So why did they wait for seven months?

Can you imagine? I mean, some of you have experienced, you know, sickness recently. You've experienced some affliction and difficulty. You've experienced, you know, some bad bug that's gone through, right? And then imagine that for seven months. You understand that that would be quite unbearable. That would be quite difficult. It's a long time to be experiencing these kinds of plagues. Why did they hold on to it for seven months?

that long. I like what Dave Guzik says about this. He says, why did they keep it seven months at all? He says, it can take a long time before we realize the futility of resisting God. And I want to just, I'm just camping out here on these first couple of verses just to give us the opportunity to stop and think, am I resisting God? Have I not learned? Am I putting myself through more suffering because I've been resisting what God is saying?

And I want to encourage you this evening to really allow God to search your heart. I want to encourage you to take these things before the Lord and consider there is no substitute for pursuing God. And anything lesser than that is a resisting of God. And it's futile. And it is painful to resist God. And yet sometimes it takes us so long to really give up our resistance.

And to give in to what God has called us to do, commanded us to do, desires for us to do, however you want to work it, look at it, word it, whatever. But submitting and surrendering to God is the best thing for us. And the sooner we do that, the better. And so they held out for a long time, suffered for a long time, resisting God. But you don't have to do that. You don't have to follow their example. They're the Philistines. They're not the good example of

We kind of expect that from unbelievers. But for us as believers, sometimes we're just as stubborn and we resist God and we resist what God wants and we fight against it and we afflict ourselves longer and longer the more that we resist. And so here they are now. They've resisted long enough. Now they've come to the point where they've realized we can't fight this. We can't overcome this. We can't win this conflict with God. We just got to get rid of the ark.

And so now they call for counsel. They bring in the priests. They bring in the diviners. And they say, how do we do this? We got to get rid of it. What do we need to do? How do we send the ark back to its place? Now, they're seeking counsel. And I would say, generally speaking, it is good to seek counsel. I think if you would ask...

any of us normally in any context, you know, hey, is it a good idea to seek counsel? We would say, yes, that, yeah, that's a good idea. And I would say even generally speaking, just kind of just throwing out a little nugget to all of us here. Generally speaking, I would say we don't seek counsel enough. That far too often in our lives, even as believers, we, you know, we do things just according to what we think.

We do things according to what we want. We do things according to what, you know, seems best to us. And we could, well, we could learn a lot and we could benefit a lot from seeking counsel. It's something that is needed. But at the same time, that's not really the point for this evening. The point for this evening is as good as good counsel is, what we need most is God's counsel. And there really is no substitute for God's counsel.

As the Philistines seek out counsel and bring in these guys, we'll go on and see that the counsel that they receive is good in the sense that the plan works. The good counsel seems to pay off, but I'd like you to think about it in a little bit different way, and I'm just going to be blunt and say it this way. Prepare yourself for that. Their plan worked, but they still went to hell. Good counsel, right? It worked. They got the ark back to Israel, but they still went to hell.

And so although it may seem like good counsel, it's not God's counsel. And it's really no substitute for God's counsel. It gets them out of the immediate jam, but it really does not benefit them beyond that. And so the counsel is short-sighted. And that is really the problem with our counsel, our wisdom, our ideas. What we really need is God's counsel. If they would have sought God in this situation...

they would have been given completely different instructions. If they would have humbled themselves and stopped resisting God and surrendered to God, they would have been given something completely different. But they did the best that they could in their resistance to God, and it seems to work. But in the end, they're still lost.

And that's important for us to understand because, of course, yes, we need good counsel. And it's important for us. It's wise for us to seek out good counsel, but also to hold on to and recognize that what we need most is God's counsel. Now, many times God will use good counsel. So you seek out counsel and God uses that. But good counsel is not a substitute for God's counsel, right?

And they're not always the same. And so there's no substitute for us connecting with God and hearing from God. God, what do you want in this situation? What do you want from me? And he will provide some confirmation and speak through the good counsel that you seek out. But that's not a replacement for you connecting to God directly. That's not a replacement for you hearing from God. That good counsel is the confirmation for what God is speaking to you

but cannot take the place of it. God's counsel is better than good counsel. Don't settle for good counsel. I mean, we need good counsel, but don't just settle for good counsel because it'll be short-sighted. God's counsel, his instruction and his direction is going to be far better for us if we will listen to it. Well, here's the counsel that they gave in verse three. So they said,

Now again, this good counsel sounds pretty good. So don't send it just by itself, but send a trespass offering.

Using terminology that we're familiar with, right? That's good language. Trespass, oh yes, I've sinned. You know, please forgive me. Send it back with an apology. Send it back with an acknowledgement of sin, with a confession of sin. Send it back with a trespass offering. But as you continue on, you'll see that their idea of a trespass offering is not like anything that God has ever described in his word. It's their own ideas, right?

It sounds good. It uses similar language, but it's not God's counsel. It's their own counsel. Verse 4. Then they said, They answered,

five golden tumors and five golden rats, according to the number of the lords of the Philistines, for the same plague was on all of you and on your lords. Therefore, you shall make your images of your tumors and images of your rats that ravage the land, and you shall give glory to the God of Israel. Perhaps he will lighten his hand from you, from your gods and from your land. So they say, well, what kind of trespass offering should we offer? Well,

five golden tumors and five golden rats. Now the number five is because there's five lords of the Philistines. And so it's representing the different authorities or territories within the land of the Philistines.

But there are these images of the tumors that they've been struck with. Now, we don't know exactly what that was. So what would that look like? What does a golden image of a tumor look like? And so if you're imagining a boil or a sore, how do you make a golden image like that? We don't know. Some...

Commentators have speculated that these tumors that are being referred to is actually like an issue like hemorrhoids. And so if you want to make a golden image like that, you know, you're welcome to do that. But that's what they instructed them to do. Whatever the disease, whatever the breakout was, make images that represent that.

And then there's rats that go along with this plague that they've experienced. So make some images of rats and send all that with the ark back to Israel. Now, again, there's some elements that you could look at and say, well, this is pretty good. This is good counsel in some sense, because they're recognizing these specific things were done at the hand of God.

And so we're sending this back and saying, God, we recognize you brought these boils, you brought these tumors, you brought these rats. We know that this was you. And so we're apologizing. I'm very sorry, God, for offending you and taking your ark. And so here you go. You can have it back. It seems like good counsel, but again, it's short-sighted and it's not God's counsel. The plan works, but ultimately they're still lost.

What they really needed in this instance was to humble themselves and seek God, not to seek their diviners and their priests and, you know, try to figure out their best, but they needed to hear from God and to get God's counsel on the situation. Verse six, now the advisors go on to say, why then do you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened their hearts when he did mighty things among them? Did they not let the people go that they might depart?

Now, here we have some interesting insight, right? The Philistines have heard about the Exodus and the deliverance from Egypt and the 10 plagues, and they know how God delivered Israel out of Egypt. And again, here we just have a little bit of a reminder that the Philistines are without excuse, right?

in their disobedience to God, in their rebellion against God, in their resistance to God, and in this case of not seeking God. They know about God. They know about his power. They know about his strength. They know that he is real. They know about him. And the advisors of the Philistines even remind the Philistines and say, hey, remember, you know, don't harden your hearts. Don't fight against God.

which is good advice. Don't fight against God is always going to be good advice, but it's not the same advice as submit to God, you know, surrender to God. It's a little bit short of what they really needed to hear. It's good counsel, but ultimately it's not really God's counsel. It's not really what they needed. And so again, I make the point God's counsel is better than good counsel. The plan works, and we'll see that in the next few verses. It works. It's a good plan. Good counsel.

in some sense, but they still are lost. They're still separate from God. It was short-sighted counsel. It wasn't what was best for them in the long run. Listen, we need good counsel, and we need to seek out good counsel more than we do, most likely. But even more important, we need to hear from God. We need to seek out good counsel, and we need to seek out God's counsel. And when they align, when the good counsel is the confirmation of God's counsel, then we have a

Well, the clear direction from the Lord. But good counsel is not a substitute for God's counsel. Don't just think that you're okay to do what you're planning to do just because, you know, Harvey told you, hey, that's probably a good idea. Now, Harvey, if you seek him out, I mean, he's got some good counsel, but he's not God. Even if Elsa tells you that he is, he's not. Anything that we seek out from others does not substitute counsel.

for God actually speaking to us. We need to interact and hear and receive and be teachable and learn and get wisdom from others. We need that. But it's not a substitute from connecting with God directly, hearing from God and responding to what God is saying to us.

And those things will line up when we're right where God wants us to be. When we're pursuing God's heart, the good counsel and the godly counsel that we, or the counsel that we receive from God, it's going to match up. It's going to line up and we'll be able to continue to pursue the heart of God. And so no substitute.

for God's counsel. Well, moving on to point number two, we'll look at verses seven through 12. Here, point number two is that God's hands are better than man's plans. Verse seven says, now, therefore, make a new cart. Take two milk cows, which have never been yoked, and hitch the cows to the cart, and take their calves home away from them.

Then take the ark of the Lord and set it on the cart and put the articles of gold, which you are returning to him as a trespass offering in a chest by its side. Then send it away and let it go. And watch, if it goes up to the road, I'm sorry, if it goes up the road to its own territory, to Beth Shemesh, then he has done us this great evil. But if not, then we shall know that it is not his hand that struck us. It happened to us by chance."

So now here's the good counsel. Here's the plan of the Philistine advisors. They set up a test. Get a cart, put the ark on the cart. Get a couple cows that aren't used to pulling a cart. They've never been yoked. Get a couple cows that have young calves that, well, they would be used to tending to and nurturing cows.

separate the calves from the cows, yoke them to the cart. And then in verse nine, it says, and watch. So they're setting up this test. Let's see what happens. And let's see if this will show whether or not the things that we've been experiencing are actually from God. And so again, the test involves these cows that have never been yoked.

And I don't know exactly what that looks like. You guys know me. I'm not much of a farm person, but I immediately picture a rodeo, you know? And so, you know, trying to yoke a bull that is not wanting to be yoked, you know, you're going to end up with a fight. Cows not being...

yoke normally. They're not trained. They're not broken. And so they're not going to just automatically say, oh, here's a yoke. I know how to pull a cart. Let's do that. No, they have no experience with that. So that's not going to, they're going to be resisting the yoke. They're going to be resisting the restraints. They're going to be fighting against that and probably more distracted by it than actually pulling the cart. Now, again, I just making this stuff up because I don't, I'm not a farm person, but again, you can talk to Harvey and find out all the farm stuff later on. But

But that's the idea, right? They're not used to the yoke, so they're not going to be, you know, they're not going to tend to pull the cart in the way that others who had been trained would. And then having their calves taken away, the cow would not immediately want to, you know, walk away from the calf, but would want to go and be with the calf and to continue to nurture the calf. And so

They set up this test basically to say, look, if the cows behave unnaturally, then we know all of this was the God of Israel. And so they say in verse 9, and watch. So set it up. So like this is not going to happen by accident. This is not going to happen normally. But set it up and then watch what happens. And if it goes up the road to Beth Shemesh, then we know that God has done this great evil. And if not, well, then we'll just think it happened to us by chance.

So they set up this test and are going to watch and see what happens. Again, I like what Dave Guzik says about this. He says, they think all the calamity of the plagues has been from the Lord God of Israel, but they're not 100% sure. So they devise another test. After all, one never wants to repent unnecessarily. Isn't that so true of our hearts? You know, God's prompting you something. He's putting something on your heart. He's kind of like nudging you a little bit and

and you're trying to set up more and more tests because, you know, you really don't want to repent unnecessarily. Listen, if God is revealing any sin to you, no matter how great or little it is in your opinion, the right thing to do is repent. Stop trying to finagle out of it. Stop trying to run from it. Stop trying to set up tests. Well, if Jerry mentions this tonight,

Then I'll know God really wants me to repent from this. No, no, no. If you're having that conversation, then you already know right now God wants you to repent. You don't have to set up a test and go, okay, well, if this happens and then if this, so then I'll really do this and get right. You need to stop wrestling and negotiating and trying to like get out of, can I get away with this? And just give in to recognize that

God, you've brought this to my attention. I need to deal with it according to what you've said. And so they set up this test. They're still just like, well, I don't know. Maybe, I mean, it seems like it's really a God, but maybe it's not. And so they're still trying to get out of this reality of the God of Israel. Verse 10, it says, then the men did so.

And they took two milk cows and hitched them to the cart and shut up their calves at home. And they set the ark of the Lord on the cart and the chest with the gold rats and the images of their tumors. Then the cows headed straight for the road to Beth Shemesh and went along the highway, lowing as they went and did not turn aside to the right hand or the left. And the lords of the Philistines went after them to the border of Beth Shemesh. So they go ahead and carry out this test.

And the miraculous happens. The cows head straight to Beth Shemesh. They do something completely contrary to their nature. They pull the cart. Completely contrary to their nature, they go away from their calves that have been removed from them. And they pull this cart down to Beth Shemesh. And it says that they do this lowing as they went. Which gives us the indication they weren't especially happy about this. But there was...

There was something driving them, even though it wasn't the Philistines driving them. They were going under the hand of God. And so as you look at this again, you could say the plan worked, but not so much because it was a good plan. The plan worked because God was at work and God was causing these animals to do something completely unnatural to them for his own glory, for his own sake.

It seemed like good counsel and the plan seems to work. But again, the Philistines are still lost. They don't turn to God. They don't surrender. They don't submit. They don't repent at this time. They continue to fight against God and resist the people of God. And we'll see that as we go forward. But the plan works. Dave Guzik says, the Israelites and the Philistines were both resisting him. So the Lord found a few cows to show his glory through. It's interesting. The Israelites were resisting.

They were far from God. The Philistines, they were far from God. But God still finds his ways to show himself, to reveal himself, to show his glory, to show that he is at work. Now, the good aspect of this plan, I would say, is that they put things in God's hands. They set it up so that God...

You can do this if you want, you know, and rather than forcing it or manipulating it, they wanted to make sure, I don't want to have a part of this. You know, God, if this is going to happen, I want you to do it. And there's good elements to that. And so we can kind of like, you know, pull out a little bit of the good from their plan and recognize God's hands are better than man's plans. And you know, there's a lot of times in our lives where we're better off

letting God take care of things and putting things into God's hands. As the scripture says, to cast your cares upon him because he cares for you. And we do that, but then so many times we take those cares back, right? And we try to fix those cares. We try to deal with those things on our own. And God's hands, putting it in God's hands is much better than you coming up with a plan to try to resolve it yourself. That

that we need to learn to trust God and set things in God's hands and let them be. And perhaps there's some things that we don't want to test the Lord in a negative sense, but maybe like Jonathan in 1 Samuel chapter 14, we'll get to that, where he says to his armor bearer,

God doesn't need a whole army to save if he wants to save. He could just save with the two of us. So let's just throw it out there. Let's just test it. And the test was that we're going to go present ourselves to the Philistines. If they say this, then we'll know God's with us. And they just put it in God's hands and they trust in God. And that's a good example for us that we need to put things in God's hands. I was thinking about Peter also as they're on the Sea of Galilee crossing over and

The Lord comes out to them in the middle of the night while they're fighting against the storm. They're on the middle of the sea and it's dark and they see Jesus and they think it's a ghost and they're all freaked out. And Jesus says, hey, be quiet. I'm fine. You know, it's just me. You know, you're okay. And Peter says, Lord, if it's you, tell me to come out to the water, come out to you on the water. And the Lord says, okay, yeah, come on out.

He just puts it in God's hands. Is that really you? Okay, tell me what to do, Lord. I'll get out of the boat. I'm going to trust you and step out into the water. But then, of course, we know the account, right? What happens? He begins to walk on the water. He takes a step or two and things are going well, walking on water. Wow, that's pretty cool for Peter. But then his eyes began to take in the storm, the waves, the wind.

And man's plans begin to consume his mind. This is too scary. This is too hard. This is too crazy. And he begins to sink. But then he calls out to the Lord, the right thing to do. And he puts himself. And what does Jesus do? He reaches out his hand and he lifts him up. That's the right place to be.

taking steps of faith, putting ourselves in God's hands, casting our cares in his hands. And when we're falling short to call out to Jesus and he'll extend his hand, that's where we need to be. There's no substitute for pursuing God's heart. There's no substitute for putting ourselves in God's hands and giving him opportunity to direct us, to lead us, to work in us, and to do the things in provision. And you could even think about revenge, right?

Revenge is mine, says the Lord. Don't take it into your hands. God says, leave it in my hands. Don't make your plans. Leave it in my hands and let God take care of those things. And so we see here this little bit of a good example from this plan that they make. Again, for them, ultimately, it's short-sighted. It doesn't, it works. It gives them immediate relief, but it's not really what they needed the most. But it works because God was at work.

And we need to keep ourselves in that place where God is at work, where we're in God's hands, not in our plans. Well, moving on to verse 13 through 19, here we have point number three, and that is God's instructions, or God's instruction is more important than good intentions. Verse 13 says, now the people of Beth Shemesh were reaping their wheat harvest in the valley, and they lifted their eyes and saw the ark and rejoiced to see it.

So again, the plan works.

The cows lead the cart to Beth Shemesh, the city of the nation of Israel. It was kind of their neighboring city. So right across the border, you know, from where the Philistines were, was this city of Beth Shemesh. And they're reaping their wheat harvest and they're out there working in the fields and they look up and kind of out of the blue for them, it's random for them. They didn't know about this whole conversation and all the issues that the Philistines have been having. All of a sudden they just see this cart is being led by nobody and

except for God, but led by nobody to Joshua's house. And it just camps out there. It just sits there. And so they rejoice. They celebrate. They're excited. They're happy. Remember in chapter four, when the ark was lost to the Philistines and there was great sorrow. And one of the

the daughter-in-law of Eli, she went and gave birth and named the child Ichabod. The glory has departed. There was great mourning because they had lost the glory of the Lord, the Ark of the Covenant. And so now, likewise, there's great celebration. There's a great joy that comes because now the Ark of the Covenant, which to them...

It was supposed to be the place where God met them, but they had kind of gone beyond what God had intended and they were trusting in the ark. But so for them, kind of in their lost minds, God has returned. They'd lost God for a while. He's been away, but now God is back. And that's kind of the way that they would approach it. But there's this recognition, there's a celebration. The ark has returned.

And so they offer sacrifice. They use the wood from the carts and the cows and they offer a sacrifice and they celebrate and rejoice in this. And Beth Shemesh was a Levitical city. It was one of the cities that God said, you know, you're to give that to the Levites. And so the people there were Levites. And so they take charge and they bring down the Ark of God and the chest that's in it and begin praying.

to receive back this ark that has been gone for so long. Verse 16. Now when the five lords of the Philistines had seen it, they returned to Ekron the same day.

And so...

Here it just records the Philistines watched it. They made sure everything got back. And they here have a record of the five loids of the Philistines and the cities, the tumors represented, the rats represented by all their cities. And so they made sure the plan was carried out in full. Verse 19, then he, talking about God, then God struck the men of Beth Shemesh.

because they had looked into the ark of the Lord. He struck 50,070 men of the people, and the people lamented because the Lord had struck the people with a great slaughter. So quickly, the great rejoicing turns to great mourning, right? Because here they are, they see the ark coming back, they're excited, they, you know, do a sacrifice, they're celebrating the

But then it tells us, and it's kind of like for us as we're reading through, it's like, whoa, you know, verse 19 is kind of shocking. As it records the celebration, it kind of gives a little bit of detail about the Philistines. And all of a sudden, and then God killed them all. You know, it's like, whoa, wait, what happened? Like, what? It's kind of shocking. But again, it says he struck the men of Beth Shemesh because they looked into the ark of the Lord. They, well, they did something that God had instructed them not to do.

And the penalty, the consequences were pretty severe. Now, verse 19 says he struck 50,070 men of the people. Now, there's a lot of discussion about what number actually is the most accurate number for this verse. And scholars will disagree and there's not going to be really, you know, one definitive answer. So here's the options.

It's possible that this verse actually refers to this number that's listed here in the New King James, 50,070 men. If you remember earlier in the battle in chapter four, 30,000 men of Israel died in the battle with the Philistines. So, you know, those large quantities of, you know, numbers and people dying, that is a possibility. It's not likely that 50,000

inhabited Beth Shemesh, but in the surrounding areas, it's possible that there was that many people around and that they were affected. And so that 50,070 men died in this, it's possible. Another option is that it was just actually 70 men

That the 50,000, that was a mistake that a scribe made when copying the original manuscript. And so that's not, you know, originally there. Some suggest, well, it is supposed to be, you know, that the 50,000 is there. But what the Lord is saying is that 70 men out of 50,000

So, you know, only some of them died is one possibility. Others suggest it's 70 men and 50 oxen died as a result of this. And so you can, you know, go back and forth about, you know, which one you want to hold on to. But either way, you get the point. There was great mourning, and it talks about it in verse 19. It says, you know, no...

scribal errors or anything, no dispute here. It was a great slaughter. So whatever the number was, it was a severe thing. It was a severe slaughter that took place. A great slaughter happened. And why? Well, because they disregarded God's instruction. The Ark of the Covenant, if you think about this, okay, the Ark of the

God has very clear instructions. If you read through the account in Numbers chapter 4, as God is giving the instructions to the Levites on how they're to handle, the Ark of the Covenant would stay within the tabernacle in the Holy of Holies. The high priest would go in there once a year. That was it.

And when they were not camped out on the move, well, God gave instruction in Numbers chapter four, verse five. It says, when the camp prepares to journey, Aaron and his son shall come and they shall take down the covering veil and cover the Ark of the testimony with it. You know, that veil we talk about that was ripped in two when Jesus died upon the cross, right? That veil, the first thing they were going to do, okay guys, time to pack up camp. What's number one on the list? Take that veil and cover the Ark. Okay.

They were going to have to move it out of the tabernacle and carry it. But before that ever happened, take the veil and cover it.

Immediately, the ark was to be covered. It was not intended to be seen amongst the people. It was meant to be covered all the time or in its home in the Holy of Holies in the tabernacle. Now, there were the people that God had entrusted to move the ark from place to place. The rest of the Levites, so the priest, Aaron, and his sons, they would cover it. And then the Levites would come in and

handle and move the actual things, but God gave clear instruction there in Numbers chapter 4 verse 15. It says,

So here we see, not just with the Ark of the Covenant, but with all the furnishings of the temple, the tabernacle, they were not to be touched. So even the Levites who carried them couldn't touch them. They carried them by poles and they could touch the pole, but they were forbidden. And God said, if you touch it, you will die. And so that was God's instruction for the articles of the tabernacle. In Numbers chapter four, verse 20, God goes on to say,

but they shall not go into watch while the holy things are being covered, lest they die. So even the Levites who moved the articles from place to place, they were allowed to carry them by the pole. They couldn't touch them. And God says, you can't even go inside and look while they're being covered. That's not for you. And if you look at it, you're going to die. So don't look at it. Don't touch it. The Ark of the Covenant was not intended. And God gave clear instruction. It's not to be seen. It's not to be touched. But here, what does...

The people of Beth Shemesh, what do these guys do? They lift up the lid. The Ark of the Covenant was a box and the mercy seat was the lid that sat on top of the box. And then inside the box was the manna, the Ten Commandments, the rod that butted, you know, those elements. These guys actually lift the lid. So they do more than just like touch it or like brush up against it.

We'll see later Uzzah, you know, he like holds the ark trying to keep it from falling and he gets struck down. But they do even more. They're lifting the lid. They're looking inside. Now, I think that it's safe to assume that these guys had good intentions. I think it's safe to assume that. I don't think that these guys were trying to do something scandalous. They weren't being vandals. You're like, hey, let's, you know, spry paint inside the ark of the covenant.

They weren't trying to be mischievous. They weren't mocking God in that sense. They weren't trying to destroy the ark. I mean, it's very easy to imagine what they probably wanted to know was, did the Philistines take anything, right? Is the stuff still there? Is it intact? Is it in good condition? I think it's safe to assume that these guys had good intentions. They wanted to make sure that everything was there. But you know what? Good intentions, they're not as important as God's instructions, right?

It doesn't matter how good their intentions were. It's not enough to excuse direct disobedience to God. Again, there's no substitute for pursuing God's heart. Pursuing God's heart is obedience to God. And disobeying God because you have really good intentions doesn't work. It doesn't work. The only time it would be okay for them to look into the ark of God is if God said, hey guys, you should take a look inside the ark and make sure everything's there.

If God told them to do it, well, then they could do it. But no matter how good their intentions were, no matter how well they thought that they had good motives, it's no excuse for disobeying God. There's no substitute. God's instruction is more important than good intentions. And you know, so many times we excuse ourselves and our disobedience by our good intentions. And we know what God says, right?

But we convince ourselves we're okay because, well, we mean well, and it's not a good excuse. And you know what? People will be hurt. Whether it was 50,000 and 70 or 70 men, it wasn't that many guys who actually peeked into the ark, but everyone around them was affected and impacted. So let's imagine, you know, let's say it's three or four guys. Lift the lid, look in, hey, what's in there? But at least 70 guys die as a result of that.

At least 70 families are affected. There's maybe 70 widows as a result. These couple guys affect everyone around them in their disobedience. It's not worth it. Good intentions are not as important as God's instruction. Again, we need to go back to the beginning. What we need is God's counsel. What does God want? What does he say about the situation we're in? We need to be pursuing God's heart.

It's what's best for us and for everyone around us. Well, moving on to point number four to finish up, we're going to look at chapter six, verse 20, and then on into chapter seven, verse two. Here, the point is dedicated to God is better than distant from God. Think about this. What do you do when you've messed up really badly?

When you've sinned and many people have been hurt by it, what do you do? What's the right thing to do? What's the best thing to do at that point? Well, let me tell you, it's not to follow the example of these guys. In verse 20, it says, Here, the people of Beth Shemesh go, whoa, God is holy. They recognize God.

They've forgotten that God is holy, but now they remember. It's a harsh reminder, but they remember. Whoa, God is holy. And then what's their response? Let's get this away from us. Let's put some distance between God and us. They say, to whom shall it go up from us? We need to get this away from us. We need to put some distance between us and God. And their solution is distance. It's space, space.

It's separation. And so verse 21, it says, I think it's interesting how they're behaving just like the Philistines. They have the ark. There's a great devastation. What's their solution? Send it somewhere else. It's just like unbelievers. That's the best thing that they can come up with.

Stephen J. Andrews, the commentator, says, Again, we're talking about the people of Israel and the reality that they are far from God. They're not pursuing God's heart.

And so their response to the reminder that God is holy, to the reminder that God is real, to the reminder that God is powerful, their response is to push away, to separate, not to surrender. Again, it's very similar to that of the Philistines.

Verse one now of chapter seven, it says, then the men of Kirjath-Jerim came and took the ark of the Lord and brought it into the house of Abinadab on the hill and consecrated Eliezer, his son, to keep the ark of the Lord. So it was that the ark remained in Kirjath-Jerim a long time. It was there 20 years and all the house of Israel lamented after the Lord. Now we're gonna go on next week into chapter seven and see this is when Samuel really steps up

And he becomes really God's spokesperson to the nation to call them to repentance. But there's this like 20 year period of probably Samuel continuing to grow up and Israel continuing to flounder in their rebellion against God in sinful ways. But as the ark is taken now to Kirjath-Jerim, it's able to stay there for a really long time, 20 years. How long was it in Beth Shemesh? Not very long.

Why was it able to be there in Kirjath-Jerim? Well, there's not a lot of details that are given to us here in these verses, but just to highlight one thing here in verse one, as they brought the ark in, it says they consecrated Eleazar to keep the ark of the Lord. Now we don't know for sure if this guy was actually a priest, which would have been the right way to handle this, but we don't know if he was from the line of, we don't know all the heritage and genealogy, but here's what we do know.

They devoted, they dedicated this one person. Your responsibility, your charge is to take care of this Ark of the Covenant. And he very safely for 20 years was able to keep watch and protect the Ark of the Covenant. Now later on, David's going to bring this Ark into Jerusalem. It's going to go into the temple. God has, you know, still some plans for the Ark of the Covenant. But here, instead of sending it away and keeping it distant,

This guy is devoted to be right there, to be taken care of, to be handling the ark of God appropriately. And so he's devoted, he's dedicated to God rather than distant from God. He's dedicated to honor the Lord rather than, ooh, that's heavy, that's hard, that's crazy, that's severe. Let's put some distance in. And you know, sometimes we do that. When we fall short, when we sin,

Our first instinct many times is to kind of distance ourselves from God, but it's really the worst thing that we can do. It's not the right thing to do. What we need the most is to run to God, to be dedicated to God, to come back into close proximity with God, because being away from God is what caused the issue and the problem to begin with. What we need is more of God and to be closer to God.

You know, as I was reading through and preparing for the message this evening and considering this chapter, I was reminded, and I think we all need to be reminded of how much we enjoy the grace of God, but how we also need to be very careful that we don't take God's grace for granted. There's a strong reminder here that God is holy. God is holy. And sin is an offense to God.

And we live in grace and we appreciate God's grace. And sometimes we take God's grace for granted and forget that God will deal with sin. Sometimes we forget that God has the right to deal with sin whenever and wherever and however he pleases. You know, if God wanted to reenact Acts chapter five with Ananias and Sapphira, he absolutely could. He'd be well within his boundaries to do so.

Ananias and Sapphira, they lied to the Lord. They lied to the people and they fell down dead. And the church was reminded, well, God's holy. And you know, sometimes we need those reminders. Now, I'm not asking for God to do something like that, right? But I'm asking us to learn from the passage so that we don't have to be reminded of it in real life, that we have the opportunity to be reminded right now in the passage and recognize, listen, sin is

is an offense to God. It's an affront to God. God will deal with sin. And in his mercy and his grace, he has great patience with us. But that doesn't remove his right to deal severely with the issue of sin. The author of Hebrews in Hebrews chapter 10 says,

Verse 30, it says, for we know him who said, vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord. And again, the Lord will judge his people. You know, a lot of times we think about judgment, we think about unbelievers, but judgment begins at the house of the Lord, Peter says. Judgment begins

It belongs to God. He has every right to bring judgment for sin, to bring consequences for sin, to deal with us when we're living in sin. And the author of Hebrews goes on to say, it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. It's a fearful thing. It's a severe thing. But listen, the response to that, recognizing that God is holy and we are sinful, don't let that be a reason to put distance between you and God.

Let that motivate you to draw near to God. And that's the point that I want to encourage us all in this evening as we wrap up. It's better to be dedicated to God than to be distant from God. And to carry on in sin and to overlook sin and maybe to excuse it because we have good intentions or whatever. To think that, you know, God hasn't dealt with it yet, so that must mean he's okay with it. No, recognize if God is...

revealing some issues in your heart, some issues in your life. And maybe you've blown it and a lot of people have been hurt, been affected, just like the men of Beth Shemesh. The best thing to do is not to put distance, not to send away, but to draw near. Again, go back to the beginning. The Philistines, they came up with a good plan, but ultimately they were still lost.

The men of Beth Shemesh, they came up with a good plan in a sense. The ark went somewhere else and it stayed there for a long time safely. But they were still far from God. You see, so many times we're just dealing with the immediate situation, putting a band-aid on a wound. That really needs some much greater attention than that. And what we need the most is to draw near to God, to lean in in our relationship with God. Let your great failures...

Let the facts and the reminders that God is holy and you are sinful, don't let that be a motivation to push away, to run away, to put distance between you and God. Let that be the reminder of how much you need God, that you would run to him. That's not taking God's grace for granted. That's receiving the mercy and grace that he extends to you. Taking God's grace for granted is to continue on in sin.

to not deal with it, to keep yourself far away from God. God, the whole purpose of mercy and grace is so that you can draw near. If you're counting on the mercy and grace of God, but you're not drawing near to God, that's taking God's grace for granted. That's the issue. And so we need to draw near. We need to turn and seek out God and pursue God's heart. Again, not just kind of a lazy meandering towards the general direction of God, but an all-out journey.

full on, seeking after aggressively the heart of God, the will of God. And even after we've messed up really badly and a lot of people have been hurt, that's the best course of action. That's what we need to do. We need to seek out God's heart and pursue his heart. Noah and Esther are going to come up and lead us in a couple closing songs. And I want to give us opportunity in this time to just come on up. Yeah, go ahead.

I want to give us opportunity in this time to seek out God and to allow God to work in us. And if God's been showing something to you, now's the time to draw near to God. Don't keep distance. Don't hold on to things, but lay everything down at the feet of the Lord. And let's take this time to pursue God's heart. One last quote from Dave Guzik. He says, their question was not, how can we be made right with a holy God?

But it was, who can we give this problem to so the holiness of God is no longer a burden to us? God is holy. That's the reality. That's the truth. Don't try to escape, push away that holiness. Embrace it by repenting, by turning, by surrendering and submitting and letting God do the work in you.

that he wants to do. And so let's take this time to seek out God's heart, to seek out God's counsel, to let go, to repent, to turn, to draw near, to do all those things that God is stirring up within our hearts. Also during this time of worship, as usual, if God puts upon your heart and prompts you to pray for somebody, encourage somebody, or ask for prayer, feel free to do that during this time of worship, that we can call out to the Lord together and seek him together as the Lord is ministering to our hearts. So let's worship the Lord in this time.

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