Anthropomorphisms for God Against Mormon Theology

One of the the doctrines that distinguish Mormons from biblical Christians is their belief that God the Father has a physical body like that of a human being. That is, they take references in the Bible literally, such as to His eyes, or arms, ears, feet. 

In contrast, biblical Christians take such references to be anthropomorphisms. That is, figures of speech in which is God is described as if He has human features, not because He does, but in order to make Him more relatable to mortal men. That is because He tells us explicitly that He is not a man: "God is not a man" (Numbers 23:29, I Samuel 15:29). Furthermore, we are told that His divine nature is invisible (Colossians 1:15, I Timothy 1:17). 

When I have denied their literal use of such anthropomorphisms in reference to God, I have had Mormons tell me that I demonstrate that I do not believe what the Bible says. 

However, anthropomorphisms in the Bible are not limited to references to God. 

"For you shall go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall break forth into singing and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands" (Isaiah 55:12). Here there are anthropomorphisms of land features and trees expressing emotions like human beings. I posted the verse in a discussion group with Mormons and asked if they believe that mountains can sing or that trees have hands. Of course, they denied that they do. So then I asked, don't you believe the Bible? Then some fell silent while others turned to ridicule. None even attempted a rational distinction between this verse and the ones that they claim refer to literal body parts of God. 

Mormon exegesis falls apart under a little examination. 

If God Has Determined All Things, Then Is He Responsible for Sin?

Let us be unequivocal: Scripture says that God has determined all things, from the beginning of the universe to eternity future. He Himself says, "I declare the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all My purpose'" (Isaiah 46:10). We also read this: "Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand" (Proverbs 19:21). Short of being deliberately obtuse, we cannot miss the meaning here. God has determined all things according to His own plan, not according to ours. 

OK, so He has determined all things. Does He change course midway, whether because He has thought of a better way or because men have not approved of His plans? "Also the Glory of Israel will not lie or have regret, for He is not a man, that He should have regret" (I Samuel 15:29; see also Numbers 23:19). To claim that God would change His mind is to make Him like us, to bring Him down to man's level. And Scripture says that any such attempt is based on a false view of God. 

Then comes the question, what of the wicked acts of men? God could not have predetermined them, because that would make God responsible for sin, right? Well, no, not right. First, let us say that Scripture affirms that God has predetermined even the wicked acts of men: "Truly in this city [i. e., Jerusalem] there were gathered together against Your holy servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever Your hand and Your plan had predestined to take place" (Acts 4:27-28). So, in a prayer to God, Peter and John, while addressing God, confess that He had planned all of the events around the suffering and death of Jesus, even in planning the evil actions of Herod and Pilate. But what was the goal in those actions? The atonement of God's people. In other words, our salvation is dependent on God's predestining the evil actions of particular men! 


Look also at Paul's words in Romans 3:7: "If through my lie God’s truth abounds to his glory, why am I still being condemned as a sinner?" Using the words of a hypothetical unbeliever, Paul has that unbeliever confess that his lies, his sins, glorify God. "However," the unbeliever pleads, "then I shouldn't be punished for them." The first part is true. His wickedness glorifies God, both through His justice to the unrepentant unbeliever and by His mercy to the repentant elect sinner. However, that wasn't the purpose when the sinner committed his wicked acts, just as Herod and Pilate planned nothing good by their murder of Jesus. That is why God is still just in bringing them under judgment. His bringing about good from their evil is to His praise, not theirs.

And it is also why God cannot be said to be the author of sin.

Esau and Jacob: The Holy Discrimination of God

 I have mentioned before that anti-Calvinists have certain verses which they consider "trump verses" against Calvinism. No matter how many verses a Calvinist cites in support of the doctrines of grace, his opponent will plunk out one of these trump verses and congratulate himself for, supposedly, ending all debate. Of course, the number one verse is John 3:16, which I have addresses here and here.

In this post, I want to address the phrase, "God is no respecter of persons" (Acts 10:34). Supposedly, this verse says that God does not discriminate between any two people. And in isolation, it might be taken that way, as is the wont of isolated prooftexts. However, doing so ignores the actions that God says that He has taken, making distinctions between people, both as individuals and as groups.

The obvious example, of course, is Romans 9:6-13 (referring back to Malachi 1:2-3): "Not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but 'Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.' This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring. For this is what the promise said: 'About this time next year I will return, and Sarah shall have a son.' And not only so, but also when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad—in order that God’s purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of Him who calls— she was told, 'The older will serve the younger.' As it is written, 'Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.'" This is clearly a discrimination between two people, the twin brothers Esau and Jacob (see, in passing, Genesis, chapters 18-33). God claims the right to choose between Esau and Jacob, even before they were born, before they had done anything good and evil. On what basis? "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion " (Romans 9:15; see also verse 16). That is sovereign election, and God feels no compunction to explain beyond that.

When the anti-Calvinist cites Acts 10:34, he should also look at Acts 15:8-9: "God, who knows the heart, bore witness to them, by giving them the Holy Spirit just as He did to us, and He made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith." Peter is expressing the surprise of the disciples upon learning that God has extended salvation even to the Gentiles, on the same basis as the Jews, i. e., by faith alone. The disciples were astonished at this, because the Jews had always though of God and the Messiah-to-come as their special reserve, not for the unclean Gentiles.

And this explains how God does and does not discriminate between men. He shows no concern for the characteristics which men value, such as wealth or physical beauty. His standard is His own will alone, the ultimate in justice. He tells us this explicitly in His choosing of David to replace the line of Saul on the throne of Israel: "Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart" (I Samuel 16:7).

Thus we see that God is certainly discriminatory, and the plunking down of Act 10:34 to claim otherwise is to ignore the message of Scripture for debate points.

Infant Rebellion, Sin, and the Judgment of God

I continually run into folks who deny that children are sinners, or that they are accountable for their sins. Most of those people claim that there is an "age of accountability," below which there is no judgment for sin. Yet, when I challenge them to show where the Scriptures say any such thing, the response generally boils down to, "Well, I just know it!"

The amazing thing is that these people will hold on to their assertions, even when confronted with the biblical evidence to the contrary, such as Psalm 51:5 or Psalm 58:3. See here and here. Yet, I will continue my fight with yet one more Bible verse.

"I knew that you would surely deal treacherously, and that from before birth you were called a rebel. [Yet] for My name’s sake I [God] defer My anger; for the sake of My praise I restrain it for you, that I may not cut you off" (Isaiah 48:8-9).

This passage is God's speaking to Israel, represented as a collective person. That person, God says, was a rebel from birth. Furthermore, that rebellion, He says, was properly subject to His wrath, though He has chosen to defer it. This deferment is an act of grace, for the sake of His covenantal reputation.

Some will say that, since God is speaking to the whole nation of Israel, this passage doesn't apply to the matter at hand. However, since He is speaking to the nation by analogy to a single person, does not logic require that His analogy also means that what He says would apply to a single person? There could be no analogy if the application didn't go both ways.

This would seem to completely obliterate any case for an age of accountability, because it both calls a newborn a rebel, a form of sin (I Samuel 15:23), and says that the rebellious newborn is properly subject to His wrath. Thus, both assertions of the supporters of infant innocence and the age of accountability are refuted.

The Immutability of God and The Cycle of Gods in Mormonism

One of the things that distinguishes Mormonism and Christianity as fundamentally-different religions is their respective views of God. In Mormonism, God the Father, whom they call Elohim, was a man like us on another planet. There he fulfilled the plan of salvation of the god of that planet, and was rewarded with exaltation to deity and a planet of us his own. Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, said, "God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man... I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea... He was once a man like us; yea, that God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth" (Ensign, April 1971, p.13-14).

In fact, Mormonism teaches an infinite recursion of such exalted gods, each having been a man on the prior god's world: "But if God the Father was not always God, but came to his present exalted position by degrees of progress as indicated in the teachings of the prophet, how has there been a God from all eternity? The answer is that there has been and there now exists an endless line of Gods, stretching back into the eternities" (B. H. Roberts - Mormon Seventy and LDS church historian, New Witness for God 1:476).

In contrast, biblical Christians point to the Bible's teaching that there is and has ever been only one God, who has ever been and ever shall be as He is now. The fundamental text regarding this is Isaiah 43:10: "'You are My witnesses,' declares the LORD, 'and My servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe Me and understand that I am He. Before Me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after Me.'" He denies that there were any gods before Him, or that there will be any after Him, just as there are none besides Him. Compare that to the recursion of gods mentioned above.

Why is that significant? Well, Mormons admit that there have been revelations to their "prophets" which were abrogated by subsequent "prophets." The best-known such prophecy is that regarding blacks in the priesthood. One revelation forbade it and a later one allowed it. How can anyone depend on a deity who says one thing at one time and another, possibly even an opposite, at a later time? His promises can be given and then revoked. The way of salvation can be one thing at one point and a different thing later. Mormons admit this possibility, but are unbothered by it. They have told me that to expect consistency from their god is to put him in a box.

In stark contrast, the biblical God binds Himself to the very consistency which the Mormon poo-poos. "God is not man, that He should lie, or a son of man, that He should change His mind. Has He said, and will He not do it? Or has He spoken, and will He not fulfill it?" (Numbers 23:19, see also I Samuel 15:29). The God of the Bible dismisses the Mormon view of deity as depriving Him of His deity, not as a limitation. He refuses it, promising instead that we can depend on His promises exactly because He is not a changeable man. 

One thing that should be clear here is that the Christian and the Mormon are not brothers, and that the Mormon claim to being Christian is false. Not only are Christianity and Mormonism distinct religions, they are different kinds of religions. Another is that Christian should pray for the biblical God to open the eyes of Mormons to their deception. As long as they are bound in their cloud of lies, then they deny to themselves the felicity that comes only from knowing the biblical God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

The God of the Covenant versus the God of Dispensationalism

The doctrine taught by dispensationalists (that is, classical dispensationalists, such as Scofield) that I find most objectionable is that God has provided different methods of salvation down through history, as man has failed each previous one. Some of them claim, for example, that Jews were (or still are, some say) saved by obeying the Law. They claim that salvation by grace through faith only became an option when the Jews rejected their Mosaic Messiah by killing Jesus. Grace through faith is Plan B. Actually it is Plan G, if you go by Scofield's seven dispensations.

I think that is ridiculous! And, apparently, so do most dispensationalists, because few still hold to that doctrine. Yet, even these progressive dispensationalists, as they call themselves, place a firewall between the Old Testament and the New Testament. In order still to be applicable, they claim, an Old Testament commandment must be repeated in the New Testament.

Where is the biblical justification for that claim? I can't seem to find it.

Rather, I find just the opposite.

One problem with that is that it has God coming up with a new plan, because His previous ones have failed. What kind of God is that?

In contrast, the bible tells us of God that, "God is not man, that He should lie, or a son of man, that He should change His mind. Has He said, and will He not do it? Or has He spoken, and will He not fulfill it?" (Numbers 23:19). And, "The Glory of Israel will not lie or have regret, for He is not a man, that He should have regret" (I Samuel 15:29). In other words, the God of the Bible is not a bumbling human being, who cannot achieve what He says, and has to come up with contingency plans! Yet, that is exactly the God described by dispensationalism.

In contrast, the God described by covenant theology is a God who has had one plan from before the creation of the world. He has had one expectation, that man would fall into sin; it was not a surprise. And He has had one plan to deal with sin, to send His divine Son to shed His own blood for those sinners chosen for salvation. That plan was first revealed, in seed form, in Genesis 3:15, called the Protevangelium by theologians: "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel." And that plan has been shown in increasing light ever since, until it was achieved on the cross and in the resurrection of that same Son, Jesus Christ. More light, not different light.

One God and One Salvation, Contra Dispensationalism

One of the worst doctrines found in classical dispensationalism is that history is divided into periods when believers were saved in different ways. For example, the Jews were supposedly saved by obeying the Law, while Christians live in a different dispensation, in which we are saved by grace. While most self-described dispensationalists now repudiate that concept, it has crept into a more-general evangelical audience. You will often run into people who claim that Old Testament salvation was by law, but the New testament is grace.

That assertion is false.

On one hand, it is true that the Bible says, "You shall therefore keep My statutes and My rules; if a person does them, he shall live by them: I am the LORD" (Leviticus 18:5). On the other hand - and no one seems to notice this - it is never stated that any person has achieved eternal life in that way! Even David, the man after God's own heart (I Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22) is described as a sinner (Psalm 51), and never as one saved by his law obedience.

Why is that? Because, as David himself says, every man, woman, or child since the fall of Adam (excluding Jesus) is born a sinner, and any sin, even just one, makes that man, woman, or child a rebel under the Law (James 2:10). So, what about Leviticus 18:5? It is God's word, and, therefore, necessarily true. However, it is just hypothetical. If there were a man who was 100% consistent with the Law in thought and action, from his conception forward, then that man could claim eternal life as his due. However, besides Jesus, there has not been, nor could ever be, such a man.

Has the Law then deceived us with an impossible dream? Not at all. Rather, the Law should lead us to despair of that way of salvation. And, indeed, that same Law points us to the only alternative: "I will not spurn them, neither will I abhor them so as to destroy them utterly and break My covenant with them, for I am the Lord their God. But I will for their sake remember the covenant with their forefathers, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am the Lord" (Leviticus 26:44-45). In that same Law, God promises the salvation of His people, not on the basis of Law, but on the basis of His covenant to be gracious to His chosen people! 

Therefore, whenever anyone claims that there are two (or more) methods of salvation in the Bible, or that Jews are saved in a different way from Gentiles, then he is parroting something which he has been taught, because there is no such dichotomy in Scripture.

Should a Christian Love Everybody?

It is taken as a truism by Christians of every stripe (something which itself should raise red flags) that we are to love everyone, every single human being in the world, with no exceptions. However, exactly as a truism, it is a principle which is rarely checked against our standard of truth, the Bible.

In I Corinthians 16:22, the Apostle Paul gives a blunt and startling command: "If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed." Unless one is willing to claim that cursing is a form of love, Paul can only be taken to be commanding us to hate him who hates God.

As startling as that statement might be, it doesn't originate with Paul. Rather, the beloved King David, the man whom God Himself calls "a man after My own heart" (I Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22), says (Psalm 139:19-22), "Oh that You would slay the wicked, O God! O men of blood, depart from me! They speak against You with malicious intent; Your enemies take Your name in vain. Do I not hate those who hate You, O Lord? And do I not loathe those who rise up against You? I hate them with complete hatred; I count them my enemies."

When I have brought this up in other circumstances, someone always mentions Matthew 5:44: "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." Does Jesus say something different? Not at all! He tells us to love those who hate us, not who hate Him. And, of course, that makes sense. We are wicked sinners, deserving of wrath. How can we blame anyone if he treats us as our sins deserve? But that is not true of the sinless and sovereign God. Not only do His enemies hate Him wrongly, out of bald-faced malice, but that hatred is an act of treason against their rightful Lord! It is far from the same thing.

God's Love: The Fly in the Oneness Ointment

"Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as He is so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. We love because He first loved us."
- I John 4:7-8, 16-19

This passage was written by the same Apostle John who gave us the Revelation. Yet, while that book can often be mystifying, I don't think anyone can say that of the portion I quote here. There is one central point, and he makes it eminently clear: It is, and has always been, God's nature to love. Therefore, we, His people, can express love confidently.

Orthodox Christians hold that the love God shows to us is a manifestation of that same nature of love that He had shared so intimately within the Trinity, the Father's loving the Son and the Holy Spirit, the Son's loving the Father and the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit's loving the Father and the Son. We have assurance of His love because it is an infinite and eternal love, preceding even our existence.

However, the Sabellian (or Modalist, or Oneness) believes in a monadic deity, a unitary oneness that had no companionship for the unknowable eternity before Genesis 1. He must ask the question, Whom did God love? Since he believes that there was no one else there to be loved, then his answer can only be "no one." And that presents a problem.

We do know from Scripture that it is contrary to God's nature to change: "I the LORD do not change" (Malachi 3:6, compare Numbers 23:19 and I Samuel 15:29). Therefore, since the Sabellian God did not have love in eternity past, then neither could He become loving, since that would have been a change of nature. A God without love would not be a redeemer, a sanctifier, or a merciful Father. Therefore, the Sabellian God cannot be the God of the Bible (John 3:16).

"Total Depravity" Seen in the Life of David

We don't usually look for much theology in the history books of the Bible, especially in the Old Testament. They show God's dealings with His covenant people, whether for good or for ill. But, if our interest is to discuss a particular doctrine, we are more likely to go to the Gospel of John or the Epistles of Paul than we

David and Saul

are to First Samuel. And that is proper. However, that practice can cause us to overlook the gems hidden in the midst of wars and genealogies that we expect in them.

In First Samuel 24, we are in the midst of the conflict between the outgoing King Saul and the rising king-to-be David. David finds a sleeping Saul in a cave, and cuts of a corner of the royal robe. Later, he shows the sample to Saul to prove that he could have killed his oppressor, but refrained, out of respect for the Lord's Anointed (verse 10). David explains (I Samuel 24:12-13), "May the Lord judge between me and you, may the Lord avenge me against you, but my hand shall not be against you. As the proverb of the ancients says, ‘Out of the wicked comes wickedness.’ But my hand shall not be against you."

I especially want to focus on the one phrase, "Out of the wicked comes wickedness." That this proverb is true is shown by its later use by David's descendant, the Lord Jesus Christ: "What comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person" (Matthew 15:18-20).

This is the doctrine of total depravity. Both David and Jesus are teaching the biblical truth that we sin, every one of us, because we are sinners. Our hearts are wicked (Jeremiah 17:9)! This is contrary to the common belief that committing sins makes us into sinners. All of Scripture teaches this, though our human hearts reject it. In fact, our natural reaction to the doctrine is subjective proof of its truth!

The Connection Between Love and Truth in the Second Epistle of John

Have you ever noticed the consistent response that a person gets if he tries to point out the theological errors of someone else, especially a TV preacher? He is "judgmental," "unloving." The vocabulary is

very consistent.

Often, the only effort at a biblical criticism is to exclaim, "Judge not, lest ye be judged!" And that is, indeed, biblical, from Matthew 7:1. However, it is not completely biblical. What does the next verse say? "With the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you." By what standard will you be judged? By the standard of the Word of God, of course. Thus, Matthew is making the same point that John does in John 7:24: "Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment." That is, judge according to the word of God, not according to one's personal preferences. In both cases, the authors are quoting Jesus. Thus, in context, Jesus in Matthew is not making an absolute statement against exercising judgment. Otherwise we would have Him contradicting Himself.

Later in life, John explained these words of Jesus in his second epistle. He uses the buzzword of the nonjudgmental crowd (that is, nonjudgmental among themselves; they have plenty of judgment for anyone who dares to disagree with them), "love," four times in just the first six verses (out of the mere thirteen in the whole epistle). And I am sure that the love crowd would love to stop at that point. However, John gives a definition of love, one that they will not like (verse six):  "this is love, that we walk according to his commandments." "Love," in John's usage, has content. 

Another word that John uses a lot in this epistle, five times, is "truth." Not just "a truth," but "the truth," truth that "we know," is "in us," and "abides with us forever." John expresses his joy that the recipients of this epistle are "walking in the truth, just as we were commanded by the Father" (verse 4). In contrast, he warns against "deceivers" (verse 7), who do "not abide in the teaching of Christ" (verse 9), and who we are "not receive him into your house or give him any greeting" (verse 10).

Thus, contrary to the judgment of the love crowd, we are not commanded to love everybody (that is, equally and openly), but rather those who are faithful to the truth, i. e., biblical truth. This is the same attitude that David expresses in Psalm 139:21-22: "Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord? And do I not loathe those who rise up against you? I hate them with complete hatred; I count them my enemies." The "man after God's own heart" (I Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22) hated those who hate the truth. And we are, too, regardless of the shrieks of rage from the unloving love hypocrites.

Mormons Refuted by the Eternality of God

One of the doctrines which most distinguishes Mormons from Christians is their belief that God was once a human being, just as you and I now are, but on another planet, ruled by its own deity. Their General Authority Milton Hunter (The Gospel Through the Ages, 1945, p. 104) wrote, "Mormon prophets have continuously taught the sublime truth that God the Eternal Father was once a mortal man who passed through a school of earth life similar to that through which we are now passing." This is one of the doctrines that the boys on the bicycles do not explain to prospective converts. It is kept until the person has been involved for a while.

In contrast, Christians profess, together with Moses (Psalm 90:2), "Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God." The God of the Bible has always been God, from eternity past, and always will be God, into eternity future.

So, we have a contrast here between an evolutionary view of a god, in opposition to a view of a God who is eternal. Does the Bible say anything else applicable to this question?

In Numbers 23:19, Moses also said, "God is not man, that He should lie, or a son of man, that He should change His mind. Has He said, and will He not do it? Or has He spoken, and will He not fulfill it?" If God doesn't change His mind, are we to believe that He changes His nature?

In I Samuel 15:29, we read, "The Glory of Israel will not lie or have regret, for He is not a man." God is not a man (this does not address the incarnation of Christ)! He is not a man now, a Mormon might respond. Okay.

In Malachi 3:6, God speaks for Himself: "I am the Lord , I do not change." We can also look at Isaiah 43:10: "Before Me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after Me." The first prophet tells us that God could never have been anything other that what He now is. The second tells us that there could never have been an earlier deity under whom our God attained His divine status. I have dealt more with the verses in Isaiah here.

I am writing this the way I am, because I have run into too many Mormons who complain when I or anyone else says that they are not Christians. First, this is the height of hypocrisy, since those same boys on bicycles are traveling around telling prospects that all other professing Christians are apostates. Did you catch that? All! Second, I know that most people aren't aware of some of the more-bizarre doctrines of the Mormons, so they are also not aware of how un-Christian they really are. I aim, in part, to educate those folks. I also intend to provide them with the truth, so that they have an answer to give both the boys on bicycles and to their Mormon neighbors (I Peter 3:15).

The Faithfulness of God, Seen in the Covenant with David

My fourth biblical-theology paper.

    David, son of Jesse, the second King of Israel, is the foremost character in the second half of I Samuel, beginning in chapter 16, all of II Samuel, and in I Kings, up to chapter 2, as well as their parallel passages in I Chronicles. He himself authored authored a large, though indefinite, portion of the Psalms. Thus, he rivals his descendant Jesus in the amount of Scripture devoted to his person.

    The first King, Saul, rebels against God in I Samuel 15. As a result, God removes His anointing from Saul and his line. In his place, in chapter 16, the Prophet Samuel is commanded to anoint a replacement. Samuel examines the son’s of Jesse, going down the line from eldest down, rejecting them one by one, until David, the youngest is brought before him, and God commands him to anoint David as king-elect. We next see him in chapter 17, as Israel is standing intimidated by the champion of the Philistines, the giant Goliath. David, too young to be a soldier, is sent by his father to carry food to his elder brothers. At the front, he is appalled by the failure of any Israelite to answer Goliath’s challenge. Then David, still a beardless youth, a mere shepherd, volunteers. He approaches, not as a swaggering warrior as God’s appointee. He tells Goliath (17:45), “I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, Whom you have taunted.” He strikes down Goliath with his shepherd’s sling, cuts of his head, and the now-inspired Israel drives away the rest of the disheartened Philistine army.

    Saul is jealous of David, as he listens to the people sing, “Saul has slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands” (18:7). He knows that he has been rejected by God in favor of David, now his son-in-law (18:20-30), and resents him for it, especially in the face of the close friendship between David and Saul’s son Jonathan (ch. 20). Saul persecutes David in chps. 21-30, during which time David marries his second wife, the widow of Nabal (ch. 25). Saul and his sons, including Jonathan but not Ishbosheth. Ishbosheth becomes king of eleven tribes, while David is crowned over Judah. The divided kingdom lasts seven and a half years (II Sam. 5:5), until Ishbosheth is assassinated, and David is then crowned king over the reunited kingdom (v. 3). The only surviving member of Saul’s family, Jonathan’s lame son Mephibosheth (v. 4:4), was to remain an honored guest in David’s household (ch. 9).

    The most important segment of David’s history is in chapter 7:8-17 (I Chronicles 17:1-15), the Davidic covenant. As was standard in such covenants, it begins with a rehearsal of God’s past blessings on David (vv. 8-9), then promises blessings (vv. 13-16). God promises peace, and a lineage on the throne of Israel forever. Verse 16 is the culmination: “Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me. Your throne shall be established forever.” David responds in a prayer of thanksgiving in vv. 18-29, ending with a confidence in God’s promises: “For You, O Lord God, have spoken, and with Your blessing shall the house of your servant be blessed forever.”

    The next major event in David’s life is his sin with Bathsheba (ch. 11). After seeing her bathing on the roof of her house, David has her husband, Uriah the Hittite, exposed in battle with the Ammonites. With Uriah out of the way, David then takes the now-widow as his third wife. The sin is rebuked by the Prophet Nathan in chapter 12, and the newborn son of David with Bathsheba is struck down (vv. 15-23). However, their next son is Solomon, destined to be David’s heir. This demonstrates the human sinfulness of this man, of whom God said, “This is a man after my own heart” (I Sam. 13:14). As a result, David deals suffers from the sins of his own children” Amnon with Tamar, and the rebellion of Absalom. We see his nature again in his census of chap. 24, resulting in God’s striking down of 70 thousand of his people. I Kings 1 and 2 are the account of the transfer of the kingdom from David to Solomon, and then David’s passing (vv. 10-12).

    David’s son, Solomon, as the newly-anointed king, relies of God’s covenant with his father in I Kings 3:6-14: “You have kept for him this great and steadfast love, and have given him a son to sit on his throne this day.” This suggests that David made great effort to teach Solomon what God had promised and done for him. But 5:3 indicates that he was also aware of the consequences of David’s bloody hands. We see both sides of David’s relationship with God in 8:15-20. But Solomon continues confident in God’s covenant promises (vv. 24-26). And that confidence is shared by all of Israel in verse 66.

    God explicitly repeats the promises of the Davidic covenant with Solomon in 9:4-5. This is similar to the pattern of the Abrahamic covenant, with the terms renewed with each succeeding generation. However, unlike David, Solomon did not keep his side of the covenant. In 11:4-6, the writer of Kings shows Solomon following after the pagan deities of his multitudinous wives. Yet, God continues faithful (vv. 12-13), not for Solomon’s sake, but for David’s. Later in the chapter, God punishes the apostasy of Solomon by dividing the kingdom with a rebellion against his son, Rehoboam. Yet, even here, God remembers his covenant, and reserves the tribe of Judah to David’s line (vv. 32-39). This pattern is repeated with Rehoboam’s son, Abijam. In 15:3, the writer explicitly tells us that Abijam did not share the faith of his ancestor David, but vv.4-5 show us God acting out of faithfulness to David: “because David did what was right in the eyes of the Lord…” This is what Paul refers to, in II Timothy 2:13: “If we are faithless, he remains faithful - for He cannot deny Himself.” In II Kings 8:16ff, when Jehoram follows the apostate path of his Israelite kinsmen, even here, the writer tells us, “Yet the Lord was not willing to destroy Judah, for the sake of David His servant, since He promised to give a lamp to him and to his sons forever.”

    The writer of Kings continues to use David as the standard against whom to compare his posterity. His lineage rates badly in 14:3 and 16:2, but well in 18:3. God again recalls His covenant in 19:34 (parallel in Isaiah 37:33-35), as Assyria, after eliminating the northern kingdom, now attacks Jerusalem:  “I will defend this city to save it, for My own sake and for the sake of My servant David.” As Paul said to Timothy, God acts according to His covenant promises because He is watchful over His own truth and reputation, as well as the welfare of His elect.

    David himself writes of God’s establishment of His covenant. In Psalm 18:20-24, he wrote, “The Lord dealt with me according to my righteousness, according to the cleanness of my hands… The Lord has rewarded me according to my righteousness, according to the cleanness of my hands in His sight.” He does not claim that his righteousness is inherent for (v. 32), “[God] equipped me with strength and made my way blameless.” He remembers the particular elements of the covenant, as he credits God with “making me the head of the nations” (v. 43) and “subduing peoples under me” (v. 47), promises “to David and his offspring forever” (v. 50). Asaph sings of the covenant in Psalm 78:67-72: “He chose David His servant… to shepherd Jacob His people… [And] with upright heart he shepherded them.” Ethan the Ezrahite has the voice of God recalling (89:19-37), “I have found David My servant; with My holy oil I have anointed him, so that My hand shall be established with him… My faithfulness and My steadfast love shall be with him… He shall cry to Me, ‘You are my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation’... My steadfast love I will keep with him forever, and My covenant will stand firm for him. I will establish his offspring forever, and his throne as the days of the heavens… I will not remove from him my steadfast love or be false to My faithfulness. I will not violate My covenant or alter the word that went forth from My lips…” Ethan claims this faithfulness for all of God’s people (v. 49): “Lord, where is your steadfast love of old, which, by Your faithfulness, you swore to David?”

    The unnamed writer of Psalm 132 applied the same principle of prayer. In verse 1, he starts with, “Remember, O Lord, in David’s favor…” He claims God’s faithfulness to david for the benefit of all of Israel. Verses 11-12: “The Lord swore to David a sure oath from which He will not turn back: ‘One of the sons of your body I will set on your throne. If your sons keep My covenant and My testimonies that I shall teach them, their sons also forever shall sit on your throne.” The writer asks, “If Jerusalem is destroyed, how can You fulfill Your promise that there shall always be a son of David to rule there?” The promise to David, in his eyes, has positive implications for the whole nation.

    The Prophet Isaiah also applied the Davidic covenant to the people of God, as the promise according to which the Messiah would come. In Isaiah 9, the famous Christmas story, he writes (vv. 6-7): “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon His shoulder… Of the increase of His government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it…” So, we see an expansion of the vision of the covenant. Where David had seen it as a political promise, with his dynasty established over ethnic Israel, Isaiah now expands that vision to point to a particular King, yet unnamed, who shall take that kingdom to a far greater glory. He repeats that vision in 16:5, “A throne will be established in steadfast love, and on it will sit in faithfulness in the tent of David one who judges and seeks justice and is swift to do  righteousness.” Again, he moves the covenant from a promise of a lineage of men to a particular One.

    Isaiah also makes use of the covenant to encourage the faithful remnant of Israel. In 55:1-5, he calls the people to repentance, assure of the faithfulness of God, as seen in His covenant with David. Verse 3: “Incline your ear and come to Me; hear, that Gsoul may live; and I will make with you an everlasting covenant, My steadfast, sure love for David.” David, the sinner of Bathsheba and Psalm 51 relied on the faithful mercy of God. If he did it, can’t I?

    God Himself made the same comparison through Jeremiah (17:24-25). Using the Sabbath as a test case, He calls the people to repent, and “then there shall enter by the gates of this city kings and princes who sit on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, they and their officials, the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And this city shall be inhabited forever.” Or, if they refuse (21:12, repeated in 22:2-4), “Hear the word of the Lord, O house of David! Thus says the Lord, ‘Execute justice in the morning, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed, lest My wrath go forth like fire, and burn with none to quench it, because of your evil deeds.’” Repent and enjoy the blessings of David, but do not presume on them to excuse your wickedness.

    Then, as Isaiah 9, Jeremiah turns to the One who will ultimately fulfill God’s promises to David. 23:5: “I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and He shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In His days, Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which He will be called: The Lord is our righteousness.” Where the writer of Kings lamented that king after king failed to evidence the faith of David, the One Davidic king to come will do so. And, on the side of the people (30:9): “They shall serve the Lord their God and David their king, Whom I will raise up for them.” Just as the One king will demonstrate the best of David’s faith, under His rule the people will do so, as well.

    The Branch appears again in 33:14-26. The content of the Davidic covenant is repeated in verse 17: “David shall never lack a man to sit on the throne of the house of Israel…” (and again in verses 21 and 26). The passage also adds a new element (v. 18): “The Levitical priests shall never lack a man in my presence…” (also verse 21). David wasn’t a priest, so this aspect of the Branch is an expansion, perhaps from the reference to the priesthood of Melchizedek in David’s Psalm 110:4. It isn’t relevant here, but Christ fulfilled this in His union of the offices of priest and king.

    The Prophet Ezekiel prophesies a coming Messiah as the fulfillment of God’s covenant promises to David in 34:22-24: “I will set up over them one Shepherd, my servant David, and He shall feed them; He shall feed them and be their Shepherd. And I, the Lord, will be their God, and my servant David shall be prince among them.” Ezekiel continues this theme in 37:24-28: “My servant David shall be king over them, and they shall all have one Shepherd… David My servant shall be their prince forever… My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God. and they shall be My people…” Notice his resurrection of the servant theme of Isaiah.

    This Davidic king also makes a brief appearance in the prophecies of Hosea (3:5): “The children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God and David their king, and they shall come in fear to the Lord and to His goodness in the latter days.” And in Amos 9:11-12: “In that day I will raise up the booth of David that is fallen and repair its breaches,... that they may possess… all the nations who are called by My name.” And in Zechariah 12: 6-13:1, especially that last verse: “On that day there shall be a fountain opened for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to cleanse them from sin and uncleanness.”

    In the New Testament, David plays a prominent role in the apologetic efforts of the Apostles to prove that Jesus was the expected Messiah and Branch of the prophets.

    In the genealogy of Jesus as given by Matthew (1:1-17), not only is the line of David prominent, but the author emphasizes the number fourteen, even skipping generations to create the three sets of fourteen. Why? Because, in hebrew, the letters also represented numbers. The consonants of David’s name (daledh-waw-daledh) add up to fourteen. Thus, not only is Jesus a lineal descendant of David, but Matthew adds that name symbolically three more times to multiply the emphasis on that fact. Not only is Jesus addressed or referred to as the “Son of David” eleven times (e. g., 9:27 and 12:23), but He Himself uses David’s words from the Psalms to express the connection in His teachings (e. g., 22:43).

The words of the David covenant appear in Mark  11:10: “Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David.” And again in Luke 1:32-33: “He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to Him the throne of His father David, and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end.” And again in verse 69: “[The Lord God of Israel] has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of His servant David.” And finally in John 7:42: “Has not the Scripture said that the Christ comes from the offspring of David, and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David was?” Thus, the Gospel writers confronted the Jews with their own covenantal expectations as pointing to this Jesus, whom they were to reject and crucify. This would serve as a direct apologetic against the claims of unbelieving Jews that the Messiah is still to be anticipated, because Jesus did not fulfill that role as they expected.

In Acts, Luke turned to David again, but with less of the covenantal emphasis. In 1:16, 2:25-30, 2:34-35, and 13:33-38, he borrows from Jesus own strategy, using David’s words to emphasize the connection between David and Jesus. He explicitly makes Jesus the hair of David in 13:23: “Of this man’s [i. e., David’s] offspring, God has brought to Israel a Savior, Jesus, as He promised.” This language is reminiscent of th Branch terminology of the Prophets. See also 15:16-17.

Paul also borrows this apologetic theme, such as in Romans 4:6-8, 11:9-10, and II Timothy 2:8. Yet, he never follows up on the covenantal theme, a role he gives, instead, to Abraham.

Jesus again picks up His “Son of David” role in Revelation 3:7: “The words of the Holy One, the True One, Who has the key of David…” And, in the words of an elder in 5:5: “Behold the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered…” And in Jesus’s words again, in 22:16: “I, Jesus, have sent My angel to testify to you about these things for the churches. I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.”

So, the story of David min the Bible is the story of God’s faithfulness, both to him and to the people of God as a whole. Through His words to him, God establishes a theme of promised redemption, peace, and prosperity, not as the result of merit, but because of God’s covenantal promises of grace, justification, sanctification, and glorification. The New Testament writers continue the story of David, both in their own words and in the words of Jesus, to point Israel to Him. Here is the man promised for a thousand years! Here is the promise of God incarnate! All that we have waited for is here, standing embodied before you. And even in the last verses of the Bible, Jesus Himself points to His purposes as bringing to pass God’s faithfulness to David, and to all Israel in him.

The Bible and Confiscatory Government

Every Christian is familiar with these words of Jesus (Matthew 22:21): "Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." His words, of course, are true. I cannot say the same of how people use them. These words are often quoted to justify the taking by government of whatever taxes or property it sees fit. And I am sad to say that no one challenges that interpretation, because few people know their Bibles, beyond a few popular catchphrases.

Consider these words of warning from the Prophet Samuel (I Sam 8:14-15): "[The ruler] will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his servants. He will take the tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and to his servants." The context is the transition from the theocratic judgeships to the monarchy. Samuel was the last judge, and he was responding to the demands of the people of Israel for a king, "that we also may be like all the nations" (verse 20).

I suspect that most of us reading this are thinking something along the lines of, "I would kill for the privilege of paying only ten percent in taxes." And that is, indeed, one of the things we should see here. But notice also that it is Samuel's warning that the king would tax them ten percent. What does it say about us that we tolerate a government that taxes - income, sales, excise, tariffs - half of our income?

What is wrong with that? Again, we forget our Bibles. Do you recall the XIIIth Commandment (Exodus 20:15)? God says, "You shall not steal." Notice that he doesn't make exceptions for government. It doesn't exclude presidents, congressmen, governors, legislators, mayors, or city councilmen, much less the hordes of unelected bureaucrats with which are burdened. And that is exactly Samuel's warning: If you want a ruler who takes care of you, then you can expect that he will consume your livelihood.

Another prophet, Ezekiel, expresses the commandment explicitly to rulers (Ez. 46:18): "The prince shall not take any of the inheritance of the people, thrusting them out of their property." Wow! Imagine the society we would have if our government submitted to that command. Imagine the liberty and prosperity we would experience, if it became shameful for government to take even just ten percent of our income, and were forbidden to take our physical property. There is no "eminent domain" here! And there is no room for "Moral Monday" protesters to be claiming that government should confiscate and redistribute more of our property. And there is no exemption for tyranny by 50% plus one!

Nehemiah 9:36-37: The American Government on a Well-Worn Path

"Behold, we are slaves this day; in the land You gave to our fathers to enjoy its fruit and its good gifts, behold, we are slaves. And its rich yield goes to the kings [and presidents?] whom You have set over us, because of our sins. They rule over our bodies and over our livestock as they please, and we are in great distress."

As we enter tax season, do these verses not ring bells for us? Not only has the government confiscated an increasing share of our livelihoods, but it burdens us with the paperwork and expense of documenting that pilferage on its behalf! Even so, Americans seem to miss the obvious parallels.

I believe that Nehemiah chose his wording in these verses deliberately, to remind his hearers and readers of the warnings of the Prophet Samuel (I Samuel 8:10-18), especially a military-industrial complex (vv. 11-12), diversion of labor to government (v. 13), confiscation of the means of production (v. 14), taxes (v. 15, wouldn't we love to pay only 10%?), and even our very persons (v. 17, especially  as military conscription).

Our social-fascist government, whether under liberals or conservatives, is the very curse that Samuel warned of. And, as Nehemiah reminds us, it is because we have brought it on ourselves.

In my particular church, the solution is commonly said to be the election of Republicans. Yet, Ronald Reagan, a Republican president with a Republican Senate, doubled the revenues of the federal government. During the 1990's, the Republicans controlled both houses  of Congress, and yet grew the government. Even under Republican President George Bush, with Republican majorities in both houses of Congress, the federal government expanded more than under any president, of either party, before him. Here in North Carolina, the Republicans control the governor's mansion, as well as both houses of the legislature, yet state spending grew again.

The solution isn't more Republicans. Or more Democrats, for that matter. Rather, the solution is a spiritual change, a looking to God to be our Savior, not to a redemptive state. That will lead to a renewal of a view of government consistent with the VIIIth, IXth, and Xth Commandments. May God speed that day!

Jeroboam and the Regulative Principle of Worship

In Reformed churches, there is a precept referred to as "the Regulative Principle of Worship" (hereafter, RPW). According to this principle, nothing is permitted in worship except that which is commanded in Scripture, or may be inferred from it. This contrasts with Lutheranism, which holds that all is permitted, except what is forbidden, and with Catholicism, which seems to have no principle of worship except the limits of papal imagination.

In the Directory for the Public Worship of God, adopted by the Church of Scotland with the Westminster Standards in the XVIIth Century, we read in the preface, "our care hath been to hold forth such things as are of divine institution in every ordinance; and other things we have endeavoured to set forth according to the rules of Christian prudence, agreeable to the general rules of the word of God."

The biblical basis for the RPW is primarily found in the IInd Commandment (Ex. 20:4-6, Deut. 5: 8-10): "You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth." While the commandment is narrowly tailored, addressing merely the use of images in worship, its application is broadened in the historical portions of the Old Testament.

In the story of Jeroboam, the first king of Israel after the dividing of the Davidic kingdom, we find two occasions of will-worship, i. e., worship after the desires of man, rather than the commandment of God.

In I Kings 12:33, Jeroboam goes "up to the altar that he had made in Bethel on the fifteenth day in the eighth month, in the month that he had devised from his own heart. And he instituted a feast for the people of Israel and went up to the altar to make offerings." Here, we see Jeroboam violate biblical worship in three ways: he changed the calendar of biblical feasts, to the point of creating a new month; he built an altar for worship away from the Temple in Israel; and he performed a rite which was properly for the levitical priests (compare Saul's similar sin in I Samuel 13:8-23).

Again, in I Kings 13:33, we see Jeroboam appointing a new class of priests for the "high places" (places of pagan worship). In fact, his standard was so lax, that "any who would, he ordained." This is a violation of God's institution of the Aaronic priesthood (Exodus 29:44).

And what are the consequences of Jeroboam's actions? I Kings 13:34, "this thing became a sin to the house of Jeroboam, so as to cut it off and to destroy it from the face of the earth."

Just as no responsible parent would leave it to his children to make the rules for the household, God does not leave it to His creatures to determine how to worship Him. That concept seems to me to be so obvious, even without the biblical instructions, that I cannot conceive how professing Christians can so easily disregard it. I have written before (use the tags below) on even Presbyterian churches which have become hardly more than pagans in their worship. Just as with His judgment on Saul, surely God will rebuke such rebellion among His professing people.

The Inconvenient Holiness of God

"For You are not a God who delights in wickedness;
     evil may not dwell with You.
The boastful shall not stand before Your eyes;
     You hate all evildoers.
You destroy those who speak lies;
     the Lord abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man."
- Psalm 5:4-6

Liberal ministers and the average nominal American Christian both love to talk about a loving God. "I believe in a loving God who accepts me as I am," they say. And it is true that love is a core attribute of God. See, for example, John 3:16 and I John 4:16. However, they wax eloquent over the love of God, not because they enjoy praising Him, but rather because it enables them to block from their consciences the other attributes of God, especially His holiness.

Notice what this Psalm tells us. God doesn't delight in wickedness and evil may not dwell with Him. He opposes the boastful, evildoers, liars, the bloodthirsty, and the deceitful. In fact, David even tells us that He hates them!

We find similar words in Habakkuk 1:13, "You are of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong..." And in Isaiah 9:17, "[He] has no compassion on their fatherless and widows, for everyone is godless and an evildoer, and every mouth speaks folly."

We find in Psalm 5, Habakkuk, and Isaiah that God isn't constrained by our fleeting standards of sophistication or political correctness. He doesn't allow us to divide Him, receiving the characteristics with which we are comfortable, but excluding those which might make us uncomfortable. David repeats this theme in Psalm 139. In verses 19 and 20, he pleads, "Oh that You would slay the wicked, O God! O men of blood, depart from me! They speak against You with malicious intent; Your enemies take Your name in vain!" Then he says of himself in verses 21 and 22, "Do I not hate those who hate You, O Lord? And do I not loathe those who rise up against You? I hate them with complete hatred; I count them my enemies." David professes hatred for the enemies of God! I suspect that this is a major part of the reason that God refers to David as "a man after My own heart" (I Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22).

Finally, isn't it significant that those who deny or ignore the holiness of God are repeating the very words of Satan, when he tempted Eve, "Did God actually say..." (Genesis 3:1)?

Reprobation in the Old Testament

Reprobation is the flip side of the doctrine of election. Just as God, out of His free and sovereign grace, has ordained some to mercy, out of His sovereign holiness and justice, He has ordained the rest to perdition for their sins. While many Evangelicals balk at this doctrine, it certainly isn't because of any lack of biblical support for it, especially in the Old Testament!

Consider Deuteronomy 2:30, "Sihon the king of Heshbon would not let us pass by him, for the LORD your God hardened his spirit and made his heart obstinate, that He might give him into your hand, as he is this day." God had purposed the destruction of Sihon and his people, so He hardened the king's heart.

And Joshua 11:19-20, "There was not a city that made peace with the people of Israel except the Hivites, the inhabitants of Gibeon. They took them all in battle. For it was the Lord’s doing to harden their hearts that they should come against Israel in battle, in order that they should be devoted to destruction and should receive no mercy but be destroyed, just as the Lord commanded Moses." Here we see the same act of hardening, but over a larger area.

Or the case of the son's of Eli, I Samuel 2:25, "'If someone sins against a man, God will mediate for him, but if someone sins against the LORD, who can intercede for him?' But they would not listen to the voice of their father, for it was the will of the LORD to put them to death." Eli tried to warn them about their evil ways, but God had already determined on their destruction, so He hardened their hearts against the words of their father.

Arminians resist the significance of these passages. They hold that God only hardened the hearts after the respective people had already hardened their own hearts, i.e., what is known as "judicial hardening." However, that appears nowhere in these passages, except in the case of the sons of Eli. Rather, the Arminian commits the very error that Paul refutes in Romans 9:21: "Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?" As Creator and Lord, God has a sovereign right to use His creatures as He sees fit. Our only option is to bow our heads and bless the Lord for His justice.

Zechariah 11:6, An Elegy for the American Republic

"For I will no longer have pity on the inhabitants of this land, declares the LORD. Behold, I will cause each of them to fall into the hand of his neighbor, and each into the hand of his king, and they shall crush the land, and I will deliver none from their hand."

I am currently studying Zechariah in an intense fashion. I have been working on it for several months. When I got to this verse, it struck home with so much of the reaction I have had to the recent "debt ceiling crisis." I have been so saddened by the imperial attitudes by both members of Congress and the President. They demanded the power to increase their own credit limit in order to borrow money in order to pay the interest on existing government debt! I know that I would never be allowed to do that with my own credit cards. Set my own credit limit? I don't think so! Pay the interest only? Isn't that what was done with the mortgages that supposedly caused the mortgage crisis? And the demand for tax increases by some (to which I expect the rest to capitulate)? What a foolish idea, in general, but especially in light of the historical habit of Congress to spend $1.50 for every $1 of tax revenue. It is like trying to cure an addiction by taking more drugs! Hand the alcoholic a beer!

Zechariah is warning of a covenant society that has earned an oppressive government. A previous pastor of mine regularly repeated his mantra, "We get the government we deserve." What kind of government is He bringing, when He warns that He will cause us to fall into the hand of the king?

I Samuel 8:10-18
"'According to all the deeds that they have done, from the day I brought them up out of Egypt even to this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are also doing to you. Now then, obey their voice; only you shall solemnly warn them and show them the ways of the king who shall reign over them.' So Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who were asking for a king from him. He said, 'These will be the ways of the king who will reign over you: he will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen and to run before his chariots. And he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and some to plow his ground and to reap his harvest, and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his servants. He will take the tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and to his servants. He will take your male servants and female servants and the best of your young men and your donkeys, and put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves. And in that day you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves, but the Lord will not answer you in that day.'"

Does this sound familiar?

I Samuel 17, David, Goliath, and the Sovereignty of God

Vv. 19-26, "Now Saul and they and all the men of Israel were in the Valley of Elah, fighting with the Philistines. And David rose early in the morning and left the sheep with a keeper and took the provisions and went, as Jesse had commanded him. And he came to the encampment as the host was going out to the battle line, shouting the war cry. And Israel and the Philistines drew up for battle, army against army. And David left the things in charge of the keeper of the baggage and ran to the ranks and went and greeted his brothers. As he talked with them, behold, the champion, the Philistine of Gath, Goliath by name, came up out of the ranks of the Philistines and spoke the same words as before. And David heard him. All the men of Israel, when they saw the man, fled from him and were much afraid. And the men of Israel said, 'Have you seen this man who has come up? Surely he has come up to defy Israel. And the king will enrich the man who kills him with great riches and will give him his daughter and make his father’s house free in Israel.' And David said to the men who stood by him, 'What shall be done for the man who kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?'"


Vv. 41-47, "And the Philistine moved forward and came near to David, with his shield-bearer in front of him. And when the Philistine looked and saw David, he disdained him, for he was but a youth, ruddy and handsome in appearance. And the Philistine said to David, “Am I a dog, that you come to me with sticks?” And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. The Philistine said to David, 'Come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the field.' Then David said to the Philistine, 'You come to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the Lord will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you down and cut off your head. And I will give the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air and to the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, and that all this assembly may know that the Lord saves not with sword and spear. For the battle is the Lord’s, and He will give you into our hand.'"

This story has entered our common lexicon. Even the most biblically-illiterate person has heard of David and Goliath, and uses their names any time an apparent underdog defeats a better-provided opponent. However, that popular version of the story actually misses its significance.

First, consider Goliath. A last survivor of the race of giants, Joshua 11:22 (eleven and a half feet, or about four meters, tall, v. 4), heavily armored and weaponed. All of the greatest fighting men of Israel, even comparably accoutered, were too afraid even to face him.

Second, consider David, the youngest of eight sons (v. 12). In fact, he was even the youngest of the five sons who were too young to join the army (as implied by the fact that only the three eldest were at the battle, v. 13). He refused Saul's armor and sword (vv. 38-39). Instead, he approached the giant with just his shepherding staff and a sling with five stones ( v. 40). Both in his person and in his provisions, David was no match for this foe of all Israel.

What does David say? Verse 45, "You come to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, Whom you have defied." He counters the humanistic bullying of Goliath, not with human strength, reasoning, or arms, but with the name of Jehovah his God. Notice especially how this contrasts with Goliath's earlier curses in the names of his own pagan deities, verse 43. David takes these curses, not as a personal insult, but rather an aspersion against the God of Israel (vv. 26 and 45).

And now we see the real nature of this battle. David's words continue, verse 46-47, "This day the Lord will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you down and cut off your head. And I will give the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air and to the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, and that all this assembly may know that the Lord saves not with sword and spear. For the battle is the Lord’s, and He will give you into our hand." He understands that Jehovah is jealous for His own deity. And indeed, He could have struck down Goliath directly, with a mere thought. However, in His grace, God condescends to bless us His people, by allowing us to be the means that He uses for His purposes. David is just a boy, with only the weapons of his shepherding, facing a battle-hardened, heavily-armed literal giant. He is perfectly aware that he has no native ability to defeat this foe. Yet his faith assures him that his God is not limited by our powers and talents, but rather acts by His own power and intent.

The significance of this story isn't that Jehovah, the true and living God, has a guiding concern about borders and political competition. Rather, His concern is for His own glory. As He Himself says (Isaiah 42:8), "I am the LORD; that is My name; My glory I give to no other, nor My praise to carved idols." This is the exact principle that Goliath explicitly challenged! And subordinately, He is concerned for the safety and conversion of His elect people. As David says in verse 47, he intends that "all this assembly may know that the Lord saves..."

In the words of Paul (I Corinthians 1:27), the true moral of this story is that "God chooses what is weak in the world to shame the strong." Is this not something we need to know in our own daily spiritual confrontations?