Transcript for THE LORD'S ANOINTED (Captioned)

Pastor Dave, Zion Ev. Lutheran Torrance, CA 1-10-2010

Let us rise.

(Audio difficulty) Text 1 Samuel 16:1-13

THE LORD SAID TO SAMUEL, "HOW LONG WILL YOU MOURN

FOR SAUL, SINCE I HAVE

REJECTED HIM AS KING OVER ISRAEL?

FILL YOUR HORN WITH OIL AND

BE ON YOUR WAY;

I AM SENDING YOU TO JESSE OF BETHLEHEM.

I HAVE CHOSEN ONE OF HIS

SONS TO BE KING."

BUT SAMUEL SAID, "HOW CAN I GO?

SAUL WILL HEAR ABOUT IT AND KILL ME."

THE LORD SAID, "TAKE A HEIFER WITH YOU AND SAY,

'I HAVE COME TO SACRIFICE TO THE LORD.' INVITE JESSE TO

THE SACRIFICE, AND I WILL SHOW YOU WHAT TO DO.

YOU ARE TO ANOINT FOR ME THE ONE I INDICATE."

SAMUEL DID WHAT THE LORD SAID.

WHEN HE ARRIVED AT BETHLEHEM, THE ELDERS OF THE TOWN

TREMBLED WHEN THEY MET HIM. THEY ASKED,

"DO YOU COME IN PEACE?" SAMUEL REPLIED,

"YES, IN PEACE; I HAVE COME TO SACRIFICE

TO THE LORD. CONSECRATE YOURSELVES

AND COME TO THE SACRIFICE WITH ME."

THEN HE CONSECRATED JESSE AND HIS SONS AND INVITED THEM

TO THE SACRIFICE. WHEN THEY ARRIVED,

SAMUEL SAW ELIAB AND THOUGHT, SURELY THE LORD'S ANOINTED

STANDS HERE BEFORE THE LORD."

BUT THE LORD SAID TO SAMUEL, "DO NOT CONSIDER HIS

APPEARANCE OR HIS HEIGHT, FOR I HAVE REJECTED HIM.

THE LORD DOES NOT LOOK AT THE THINGS MAN LOOKS AT.

MAN LOOKS AT THE OUTWARD APPEARANCE, BUT THE LORD

LOOKS AT THE HEART." THEN JESSE CALLED ABINADAB AND

HAD HIM PASS IN FRONT OF

SAMUEL. BUT SAMUEL SAID, THE LORD HAS NOT CHOSEN

THIS ONE EITHER." JESSE THEN HAD SHAMMAH PASS BY,

BUT SAMUEL SAID, "NOR HAS THE LORD CHOSEN THIS ONE."

JESSE HAD SEVEN OF HIS SONS

PASS BEFORE SAMUEL, BUT SAMUEL SAID TO HIM,

"THE LORD HAS NOT CHOSEN THESE."

SO HE ASKED JESSE, "ARE THESE ALL THE SONS

YOU HAVE?" "THERE IS STILL THE YOUNGEST,"

JESSE ANSWERED, "BUT HE IS TENDING THE SHEEP."

SAMUEL SAID, "SEND FOR HIM; WE WILL NOT SIT DOWN

UNTIL HE ARRIVES." SO HE SENT AND HAD HIM BROUGHT IN.

HE WAS RUDDY, WITH A FINE APPEARANCE AND

HANDSOME FEATURES. THEN THE LORD SAID,

"RISE AND ANOINT HIM; HE IS THE ONE."

SO SAMUEL TOOK THE HORN OF OIL AND ANOINTED HIM

IN THE PRESENCE OF HIS BROTHERS, AND FROM THAT DAY ON

THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD CAME UPON DAVID IN POWER.

SAMUEL THEN WENT TO RAMAH.

This is the Word of our Lord. Let us pray:

Glorious and gracious God, may the words of

my mouth and the meditation of each of our hearts,

be acceptable in Your sight, our only source of

hope and comfort.

Amen.

(Text from the HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION.)

Pastor Dave motions

for the congregation to be seated.

Dear Followers of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

God's people, have for all of their history

wanted to be like

the people that were around them.

As the people of God, He had brought them together and

separated them. Made them

separate and distinct and unique. They were

His children. But when those people looked around at the

other nations, and the other peoples around them, they were

envious of something.

They wanted someone who could lead them. Someone

they could see. Not a god who was

detached from them. They wanted a king.

They wanted to be like all of the other nations

on the earth. And they went to God

and they pleaded with Him: Give us a king!

We want a king.

So the LORD said: All right. I will give you what you want.

And He selected for them: Saul ...

to be their king.

And then they realized,

that they were going to be like every other nation

on the face of the earth.

Immediately they were happy. They were thrilled.

They had a leader. They had a king. They rejoiced.

They put all of their hope and strength in Him.

And then Saul didn't do what they wanted.

Then Saul was not being the king that they wanted

him to be. And guess what? They became very disgruntled.

They were very unhappy and

then all of a sudden comes this young warrior.

This young man who takes a stone and

slays the biggest giant that was against them.

And they loved him!

They go after him. They sing wonderful

songs of praise to him.

They rejoice because David is the wonder child.

He's the one that we want.

He's the one that we like.

And Saul went into a spiral of despair and

jealousy and anger and

suicidal behavior.

And he beomes almost crazy,

to the point that he hates David.

It's NOT a good time

to be living as God's children,

let alone to be the prophet

that God had sent to speak to God's people.

But yet, that's where Samuel finds himself ...

dealing with Saul, who is obsessed

with getting rid of David, and God

coming to him and saying: I have selected

a new king and I want you to go

and anoint him. And Samuel's immediate

reaction was: I can't do that. If Saul

finds out about this, the state of mind that he is in,

this is not going to be good.

Notice how God doesn't really argue with Samuel?

Doesn't say: No. You're still going to do this.

God just says: This is what you're going to do.

You're going to take the heifer and you're going to go

down and say: We're going to have a sacrifice and

in the middle of that party, I'm going to show you

who you are going to anoint as the next king.

It will be someone from Jesse's family.

So Samuel takes this heifer and off they go

so that they can

anoint the next king.

Brings Jesse's family there, his seven sons ...

they consecrate them ... they set them apart for

this holy activity and the sons start parading themselves

before Samuel.

And the oldest son comes first and Samuel thinks

in his head: This has GOT to be the one.

Here stands before me, the LORD's anointed.

This one has GOT to be it.

And the LORD said to him:

Absolutely not.

I don't select things

the way you people select things.

I don't look at what's on the exterior and say:

This is the one that I want. I don't judge things by

appearances, I look at the heart.

Because appearances can be deceiving.

And it was not only the oldest son

that was rejected, but the

second son that was rejected and the third son

that was rejected. And the fourth son

that was rejected and the fifth son

that was rejected and the sixth son that was rejected

and the seventh son. All of them that were there

were rejected. And Samuel

finally had to say to Jesse: Don't you have any more?

And Jesse said: Oh yeah ... there's the youngest one.

He's out with his sheep.

Samuel said:

Go and get him.

He said: We're not going to do anything ...

We're not going to sit down and eat until he comes.

And in comes David. Handsome,

ruddy in appearance.

But we know that's NOT what he was selected for.

Because the LORD looks INSIDE,

at the heart and

it was God who picked that youngest son ...

the most unlikely to be His anointed.

And He had him anointed by

Samuel with the oil

to be the next king.

That was a shadow

of what was to come when God sent His Messiah,

the heir to David's throne.

The One who was going to reign on David's throne forever.

He sent Christ into this world

in the appearance of a man.

And the outward appearance didn't mean a thing.

People weren't attracted to Jesus

because He was a stunningly handsome man.

He wasn't selected

for the way He looked.

He was selected for Who He was ...

the Son of God,

who appeared in human flesh

and yet ... was truly the Messiah of the world.

The wise men came from afar to worship Him ...

to bring him gifts, great gifts

of gold and frankincense and myrrh,

to lay at His feet.

Because He was the Lord's anointed ... the chosen One

who was going to take care of people's greatest needs.

That He would be greater than David himself was

because He was going to be eternal and

take care of people's sins.

Because He goes right INTO THE HEART

of every person, and there He

finds a heart that is filled with sin

and hatred for God and is dead to

anything that is good.

He is the One that is taking care of that sin

with His death on the cross of Calvary.

And it is our baptisms that unite us with Christ

in that death. It is as if

we had died with Him as well.

And we are united with Him in the resurrection for

the forgiveness of our sins.

So that we, too, will have eternal life.

At Jesus' baptism, He was anointed

by the Holy Spirit and with power

to accomplish that will.

Just as David was anointed with the Holy Spirit

and with power to do what God had asked of him.

A difficult, a horrendous job,

because for years,

Saul would trace him down, track him,

go after him ... to kill him!

That he establishes himself

as the King over Israel after Saul's death and

Saul's family is upset with David, and

comes after him.

David, thinking that he was above reproach

in his sin with Bathsheba, brought so much evil

into his own life and his own family

that his sons fought forever to the death

over who was going to reign.

Yet the Spirit of the LORD

was on David, not because he was perfect,

but because the LORD had chosen him

to lead His people ...

set him apart to do His work.

It's the Spirit of the LORD that in David caused him

to understand that.

That he was NOT a perfect human being;

but he was a HORRIBLE sinner,

someone who needed God's forgiveness and

went to God daily and REJOICED in the fact that

he WAS forgiven. And was reminded of

the blessings of God and reminded God's people of that:

Put the worship of God first and foremost

before God's children, to do

what God had selected him to do.

Just as God's own Son ... did the work that God the Father

had selected for Him to do,

which was EXTREMELY difficult.

It was horrifyingly painful.

Yet He did that work

because it was what God had selected,

chosen, and appointed Him to do

to accomplish the salvation

of all people. And we remind ourselves today

that that ... same ... Spirit

has come on us.

And today is the day for us to realize

that in our baptisms, we have been given power.

Power enough to sit back

and complain about everything that's not being done and

who's not doing work and what we can't do.

The time for all of us

to stand up on our God-given Christian feet

and say: This is what God

called ME to do.

God has given you the power of His Holy Spirit

to do His work, to accomplish His will,

to carry out His ministry.

And THAT is a TREMENDOUS gift.

And it is NOT going to be easy.

We just need to get that out of our heads right away.

It never WAS easy; it never WILL BE easy.

It is always going to be difficult.

Because we're not like the world and

the world is going to make it a struggle. But look what

God's people did when they wanted to be like the world

God gave them to it.

And they hated it. We're to fight with the power and

the strength of our baptism each and every day.

To get up

and say once again: I'm not a perfect person.

I'm a horrible, terrible miserable sinner but

God loves me and He has

forgiven me once again today.

And today I wake up and say:

I CAN bless His Name. I can praise Him.

I WILL do His work.

I WILL carry out His ministry in my life

as a husband ... as a wife as a parent ... as a child.

As someone who goes to work

and carries out their God-given work. I will

proclaim Christ through my congregation. I will be here

active in worship. I will be here actively

seeking to support the ministry that goes on here

because God has called me to do it.

He has given us all unique and varied gifts

for the ministry of the Word

in this building.

So that others may know that Jesus Christ is

the Lord's anointed. So that children may be

instructed and taught that their sins are forgiven.

That we, as adults, can struggle together through

the difficulties of this life

knowing that our eternal life is secure.

We will be free ... free from all of the sin and

corruption that is here.

We are the Lord's anointed.

Anointed in our baptisms

with the power of the Word and the power of the Holy Spirit.

That same Spirit and Word

that came to David; that came to our Lord and Savior,

Jesus Christ ...

has been poured out on us generously.

We see the LORD's anointed.

All we have to do is look around at each other

and see God's power

at work. His Word alive

in people's lives.

And we support that work. We encourage that work.

Together we do that work.

As we're reminded by the prophet Isaiah: So those

blessings of God will go to the ends of the earth

and all people will know that

Jesus Christ is Lord and Savior of all.

God's beloved Son, His Holy

and anointed One.

Amen.

Let us rise.

Now may the peace of God which goes beyond all of our

understanding, keep your hearts and your minds and

especially your lives, in the one true faith unto

life everlasting. Amen.