Mike Bickle emphasizes the significance of David's anointing as king in Jerusalem, portraying it as a foreshadowing of Jesus' future reign. He highlights the people's delayed recognition of David's leadership and his generous response to their past resistance, illustrating the importance of grace and forgiveness in leadership. Bickle draws parallels between David's actions and the prophetic implications for the future, particularly referencing Zechariah 14 and Revelation 19. He encourages believers to embody David's spirit of generosity and commitment, especially in the face of adversity and betrayal. Ultimately, the sermon calls for a deeper understanding of God's purpose in establishing leaders for the benefit of His people.

Why this passage of Scripture is so important is that it's a type and shadow, it's a picture of the greater David when he enters Jerusalem to set up his throne to drive out the enemies of the kingdom of God. And so this is a snapshot of what's going to happen in that day. And that probably, if I had to pick one chapter, I would pick Zechariah 14 and I would add Revelation 19 to it as well. Zechariah 14 and Revelation 19 are the clearest pictures of when Jesus enters into the city of Jerusalem and does in fullness what David does as a picture right here. I mean, now David really did it, and I'm not sure that David was aware that he was actually prophesying by the events. But the reason, one reason this is practical to us is because the type of response of the people of God in that day is the type of response that God wants in the hour when his son enters into the city of Jerusalem again. There'll be a great battle, as you know. The nations will surround the city of Jerusalem, and it will be the area of the earth most contested, just like in that day it was the area in Israel most contested and resisted against the people of God. Well, let's read it, 2 Samuel chapter 5, verse 1 and 2. It says, Then all the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron, and they spoke to him, saying, Indeed, we are your bone, we are your flesh and bone. In other words, we're your spiritual family. Also in times past, when Saul was king over us, that was almost 15 years. No, no, I'm saying it wrong. That was seven years earlier, but David had been chased around by Saul and the leaders of Israel for seven years before that as well. So David's been chased by Saul or resisted by the leaders of Israel for two periods of seven years. And so they're coming to him all sweet and happy and, Hey, we're family. Don't you remember that the Lord did these things to you and we're all in this together? And we remember when Saul was king over us, way back when, before Saul chased you in the wilderness for five to seven years, back when you were in your early 20s, you were the one that God was anointing in the battles to help Israel. And so the Lord said to you, even back in those days, you shall shepherd my people and be ruler over them. Now the reason, the significance of this passage is that it shows the generosity of King David because again, five to seven years of Saul chasing David in the wilderness with the elders of Israel behind Saul. And then seven years after Saul dies, they're still resisting him. We looked at it in 2 Samuel 2, 3, and 4. So almost, you know, 12 to 15 years later, they've come to the recognition that David actually is the one that God has called. And David's generous response that we looked at in the last sessions, chapter 16, which is really Leadership 101. Kingdom Leadership 101 was chapter 2 to 4, and though there were, you know, several episodes that many were not familiar with, you get familiar with what David did, it's again our last session, you will gain so much leadership insight and wisdom I've drawn from those passages over the years, but it's here, again, you gotta catch a little bit of the, I guess, better late than never. But they've been resisting David for almost 15 years, I mean, trying to kill him, trying to bring his ruin, and David has this tremendous response of generosity towards him, and that's kind of the underlying message in this passage because you don't see anything but David saying, thank you. And you think, well, why wouldn't he? They're making him king. But in other nations, in other generations, a king would purge all the former resistors and have all their families exterminated because David was going to win anyway, because Abner, the great general, was murdered, and Ish-bosheth, the king, he was murdered. There was nobody left. All the options were gone. And Saul's dynasty was getting weaker and weaker. David was getting stronger and stronger, and then the elders of Israel said, we're in. And David said, okay, I'll take it. Let's just push, delete, and let's go from there together. Remarkable. Paragraph one, all the tribes of Israel, again, it's the northern tribes. Judah is the southern tribe, and the other 10 or, depends, there's different ways to count it. The other 10 tribes plus, because they didn't always count the Levites, because Levites were supposed to be on both teams. And so it was really, when you talk about the southern Judah, that's Judah, the tribe of Judah, and the northern 10 tribes, that makes 11 tribes, and then you have the Levites that are supposed to be on both teams, so that's where the 12 tribes are. So it's really the 10 northern tribes have been resisting David all this time. And I give a couple things here, which really are indictments against them. They said, hey, we remember, paragraph one, when your leadership was so effective back in your early 20s. Now, good, the other answer could be, is then why did you resist me for these 15 years? We remember, number two, the prophetic word. I mean, everybody knows the words. We remember that Abner, just before he was murdered in the chapter before, actually in chapter three, we're in chapter five now, he was singing your praises, and so we have confidence you're the one. And we do remember how generous and how kind you have been to all the people that were loyal to us all. You didn't try to pay us back, you didn't have bitterness, you were gracious. I mean, one of the great ones is right before Saul died, if you remember, in the wilderness of Ziph in chapter 26, verse 26, when Saul cut, I mean, David took his spear, remember he snuck into the camp late at night, took his spear and then went across the valley and goes, Saul, I got your spear, or he said it to Abner, actually, the commander of the army, and Saul shouted across the valley, he goes, I know that God's going to cause you to prevail, and I know you will succeed. So all of the nation, thousands of soldiers heard Saul with his own mouth declaring clearly that David was God's choice. So they've had all this knowledge for all these years, but they've been so resistant. And that, I just, I can't hardly get over this, because the story doesn't press that point, although it's clearly woven through the fabric of this story. But it's that attitude, because if we want to be like David, which we do, or you wouldn't be taking this class, is that we want to have that kind of extravagant generosity, not just to the people trying to kill us, but to the person trying to steal your drummer or your boyfriend. I mean, that counts too. Getting real practical to worship leaders. I mean, I've seen a few folks almost lose the faith over those issues. Paragraph two. I mean, I'm joking, of course, but there's some truth to it. I mean, the way we get tweaked and then get resistant towards one another over small issues, but we want to be like David, and the Lord's saying, no, just get the vision and go all the way. Get a vision. Really do this. Don't read about it. Actually do it. With your siblings back home, your friends, leadership in the church, when those of you, many of you will be in church leadership in the church in various places in the days to come, there'll be all kinds of feelings of lack of appreciation and betrayal and undermining. And a lot of leaders, they lose it on these, they're small things in reality, but they're big things to them, and they lose their way with God over it. I've seen 40 years of pastoring, so many leaders can't get a hold of this, and they want to be like David. They all want to be like David, but David has real extreme injustices that I'm describing here, and he overcomes them time and time again. The graciousness of this man, I mean, he's only 37 years old, meaning it's not like he's been in the grace of God 50 years, you know, like a mature apostle. He's still a young man, but the grace that he operates in and the generosity of which he releases people of the things that many good men, many good women would hold a grudge and would be resistant and guard their heart from them and keep them at a distance and all those kinds of things. Paragraph two, I have eight examples here of men or women that had declared they knew from God that David was called. Now, there's eight examples, eight different individuals or groups that this knowledge was widespread. Well, if it's widespread at this level, why is it that they didn't respond? And again, then we see the hardness of their heart. Paragraph three here, they said, God called you to be the shepherd and the ruler. They said, we know now that our own government up north, the ten tribes up north, Saul's family's all collapsed, it's all broken down now, the leaders have been murdered, there's disarray, division in the government, everything is collapsing. They said, we know that you can unify the nation and we know that you can heal the wounds between the north and the south, not just because you're anointed in battle, because you're gracious in your way that you perceive situations. The way that you perceive people, you're gracious. Not naive. David was not naive at all. Remember in our last session, we talked about wise as a serpent, but innocent as a dove. He wasn't just innocent, meaning having good motives, he understood what was going on, but he got the big picture. In his wisdom, he saw the big picture and his graciousness was rooted in his revelation of God's heart towards him and the revelation that graciousness would cause the kingdom to prosper. It wasn't that he was naive and didn't get what people were doing against him. They saw him very different than Saul. Saul was a ruler, but was not a shepherd. And some people are shepherds, they're caregivers, but they don't exhibit much leadership. But what David was going to do in the Holy Spirit was going to bring skillful leadership together with skillful caring. He was going to bring caring and leadership together into the same government, because Saul was a leader, but not a shepherd. And other leaders, again, might be shepherds, caring, but they're not good at leading in the government and all of those kinds of things. But David, being a picture of the greater David, the Lord Jesus brought the whole thing together. Paragraph four, they appealed to him and they say, flesh and blood, we're your family. Meaning we're all from Abraham, David, go back, he goes, go back a thousand years, Abraham was 2,000 years B.C., David was 1,000 years B.C. So Abraham was a thousand years before David, go back to Abraham, we're all from the twelve tribes, we're all from Abraham at the end. Hey, let's let the past bygones be bygones and let's move on. I like how the elders of Israel said, in times past, we remember, now David's 37 at this time, and they're remembering when he was about 22, in his early 20s, when he first entered into Saul's court in 1 Samuel, chapter 18 and 19, when God was anointing him in battles, he was in his early 20s. We remember back then, again, there's about a 15 year gap where they did not remember so much, but here's the point, and I mean this for real, better late than never, I mean better late than never. But there is a time, there really is a time when the Lord causes your past services, the value of them to come to light. Now in this case, it was 15 years later, 15 years later, and 15's a lot of years, right? I mean, he was not appreciated by the government of his nation for 15 years, but 15 years later, there is an hour, there is a time in God where your service, the value of it, is seen by God's people, but it's not always in the timing that we would appreciate. Okay, paragraph B, paragraph B, verse 3, the elders came to Hebron to King David, because he was king of Hebron, he was king over, you know, one tribe. So he's a little king over one tribe, and they want him making a big king over all 12 tribes, is the idea. So he's already king, but they're going to make him a king, capital K, is what they're coming down there to do. But here's the point that I want to make here. They came to Hebron to make the covenant with him, and it was a political covenant, but it also was a spiritual covenant, they made it before the Lord. They made it in light of God's prophetic words, they made promises to each other, knowing that God was watching. So these were oaths that were sacred and serious, but they had political ramifications to them as well, and they had a big ceremony, and they anointed David as king. But here's the point I want to bring out. They came to David, and each time when David's kingship was the subject, the other people always came to him, meaning he didn't use his power. He could have gone on any of the three occasions, I'm going to give in just a moment, he could have used his superior power, and he could have exerted it and forced the others to submit to him, but he didn't on all three occasions. The first one is when he first went to Hebron seven years earlier, back in chapter 2, that the leaders of Judah came to him, back in chapter 2, I mentioned that last week. Here the elders of Israel come to him. About 20 years from this time, when there's a big revolt in the nation, and his son Absalom rebels against him, and many leaders betray David. He's in his 60s at this time, while Absalom is killed, and all the nation comes and they receive David again. But even on that time, he didn't use his force and power to demand his position to be king all three occasions, 2 Samuel 2, 2 Samuel 5, and 2 Samuel 19. In each occasion he said, God, you called me to be king, therefore, in terms of my position of power, I don't have to fight for my position of power. Now as I mentioned in one of the other sessions, some people misinterpret this, and they think David was passive, where David just kind of sat in a chair and did nothing until every door opened. No, David was serving people, seeking God, fighting the enemies of God all the way. But he wasn't demanding his position of honor and authority over people. So when I'm talking about David waiting instead of pressing, don't interpret that as a lifestyle of passivity, but only in terms of demanding his position of honor and his position of authority over other people. He waited for that position to be given to him. Okay, now in our next session I have here in paragraph B, we're going to look at our next session, I mean, after the break, but in 1 Chronicles chapter 11 and 12, we're going to get a lot more detail on this whole setting. Matter of fact, it develops it even more. They give more details that Samuel doesn't cover. Well paragraph C, paragraph C gives us a little bit of context, a few dates, so we can kind of have a framework, a time chronology framework to kind of put things, some of these events in the right order. It tells us verse 4, David was 30 years old when he began to reign. Now he's 37 right here, but the writer here is saying, let me give you the big picture, he was 30 years old when he ruled just over Judah and Hebron. But his reign went for 40 years. It was the 7 years over Hebron plus the 33 years where he reigned over Jerusalem, and together the 7 plus the 33, that's the 40 year total, and so you can kind of get the whole framework here. Okay, let's go to page 2. Now David's going to now begin to pursue capturing the city of Jerusalem. Interesting enough, the city of Jerusalem, now they've been in the land of Israel for almost 500 years, but strangely the city of Jerusalem is still not under their authority. I mean, think about how long America has been a nation. Well it was twice that long they were in the land, and this one city up on a hill named Jerusalem, it still was under the hands of the enemy. Israel didn't have control over that. To me it's interesting that 500 years later they still don't have it. And so David's first recorded act as king is he's going to capture the city of Jerusalem, and he's going to make it the capital city for Israel, and I think David understands that the prophetic and spiritual significance that Jerusalem is actually the city of the great king. The city of his, the son of David, the Lord Jesus, I think, it's my opinion, you don't know for sure, because David had revelation of the Messiah. When you read Psalm 2 and Psalm 110 and several other Psalms, David had more understanding of the Messiah, his son, generations down the road, but he had this passion for Jerusalem that was very, it was odd, nobody else had it but him. And there were practical, political considerations for choosing Jerusalem, which we'll look at in a moment. But there were also spiritual and prophetic considerations as well. There were practical, political ones, because it was a neutral city, and David's uniting the north and the south, these two kingdoms, Judah in the south, Israel and the ten tribes in the north, they needed a new city, because if David said, well, the south, Hebron was the capital of the south, his little kingdom, it was a very small little kingdom, he goes, if I keep this as the capital, everyone in the north is going to think we're against them. I can't go to Saul's capital, Gibeah, because the Philistines have conquered it and they've taken it. And so David chose the city of Jerusalem, which was actually technically in the border territory of Benjamin, which is Saul's tribe. So this was politically correct. He chose a city that was on their territory, but it was also a border city right between Judah and Israel. So it was right in the middle, it was technically Saul's territory, the tribe of Benjamin is Saul's territory, but it was also prophetically and spiritually, it was the city that I believe that David knew and had understanding would have implications forever. Because it wasn't just a city, it was the city of the great king. It was, God picked the city of Jerusalem before He picked the nations around it. I mean, all of history was organized around the city. It wasn't the other way around. It's not like God organized the nations and said, now, where would I like a good city to be? That's not how it was. A thousand years earlier, Abraham left Ur the Chaldees, which is modern-day Iraq. He lived in Iraq. He grew up in Iraq, in essence. And Hebrews 11 says that Abraham was looking for a city, in Hebrews 11, whose builder and foundation was God, and he went to Jerusalem. Abraham, a thousand years earlier, had a revelation of a city that was God's. And that's why Abraham left Ur of the Chaldees, or Babylon, or modern-day Iraq, because he was looking for a city. So I think that Abraham knew about that city, and I think David knew about that city, too. But it just works out perfect, because practically and politically, it was a neutral city that had no bad history with either Israel or Judah. It was a border city, a city on the border, and it was technically in the northern territory, so they couldn't be fearful that David was going to be biased against the twelve tribes. David went out of his way to tell the ten tribes regularly, you're my family. I'm not going to have favorites for Judah. I'm going to rule with justice and righteousness. I'm not going to have any favorites at all. It's not going to be that kind of deal. Paragraph B. Jerusalem was the main city in Salvation history. And it's right here that David, that Jerusalem enters David's story. And as I have written here, just to kind of reiterate it, David made Jerusalem the capital of all Israel. That's why he got the city, was to make it capital. That's what he's after. Then I describe here why it was a neutral city and why that was good, because the ten tribes in the north were still a little bit nervous. They've got this history that David's been incredibly gracious to them in the last couple years, but still, everything David does, he is signaling his graciousness towards these ten tribes that have been hostile towards him for almost fifteen years. And even the choice of that city in the political, practical sense was like that, but we know that there was something else going on as well, which is paragraph two here. In Deuteronomy 12, Deuteronomy 12, back in the days of Moses, now Moses was five hundred years before David. I mean, now these are ballpark numbers. Abraham was a thousand years before David, Moses was five hundred years before David. That's very broad strokes, but it kind of gives you a framework to kind of see the storyline. Abraham's two thousand years B.C., Moses is fifteen hundred years B.C., David is one thousand years B.C. So five hundred years earlier, Deuteronomy 12, God tells Moses, he goes, Moses, you shall seek the place that your God chooses. He's talking to Moses through the nation of Israel. He goes, the nation of Israel, the day will come when they will choose, they will seek out the city that God Himself will put His name on. And then here in 2 Chronicles chapter six, it makes it clear that Jerusalem is the city where God put His name on it. And David, again, that's what he was really concerned about, honoring and living in and being a part of and having the tabernacle of David, the prayer and worship, the night and day prayer and worship. He wanted it going on in that city because he wanted a little, he wanted a bit of what's happening in heaven to be released on the earth. Like they worship around the throne in heaven, he wanted that kind of worship on the earth in the earthly Jerusalem like they have it in the heavenly Jerusalem. And then here at the end of paragraph two, Jesus called it, it's His city, it's not David's city, it's the city of the great king, and of course Jesus meant Himself. He goes, it's My city. He goes, I picked that city back before Adam was even created, I picked Jerusalem. I didn't pick Jerusalem afterwards, I picked Jerusalem on the front end. And I built all of history, or designed all of history around it. Okay, so they decide they're going to go to Jerusalem. And they're going to capture it, okay. Okay, so let's go to the top of page two and read the passage. It says, verse six, the king and all of his men, they went to Jerusalem and they went to fight against the Jebusites. And the Jebusites was this native people that have had the city for most of the 500 years since Moses and Joshua's generation. Now, the city of Jerusalem, some of you have been to there, I imagine many of you have or you've seen pictures of it, it's on top of a hill. And there's valleys all around. And the Jebusites were at the top of the hill, and there's three valleys, I mean valleys on three sides of where the Jebusites lived. And so it made it a very difficult city to conquer. Because you gotta charge up a hill, and their archers would just shoot everybody, I mean there was no match. I mean, if you go up a hill, you know, a couple hundred yards, the archers are going to mow you down on all sides, and there was just no way to attack the city. So the Jebusites, they said, they mocked David. They had this statement of contempt to taunt him. They said, you can't come take this city. We know you beat the Philistines, and we know that you've conquered Saul, and you've won these military battles, but so what? You've never conquered a city like this one before. They said, even if we put the lame and blind citizens on the wall to protect us instead of the soldiers, if we give them the duty of the soldiers, you can't even make it to the top of the hill if the lame and the blind are on duty instead of the seasoned soldiers. David says, well, verse 7, nevertheless, David took it anyway. He went up there and took the city. He took the stronghold of Zion, is what it's called. Now notice, in parentheses, the stronghold of Zion is called the city of David. And I've got a little bit of this on the notes. Let's go down to paragraph D now. This phrase, the stronghold of Zion, what does that mean? Because Zion is such an important term in the Old Testament. It's used in the New Testament as well. But a stronghold is typically a military fortress. That's what a stronghold is. Sometimes David was in the wilderness in a stronghold. It wouldn't be a fortress like a fort, but he was in a cave hiding. But it was a military encampment with security. When David was in the stronghold in the wilderness, it normally meant a cave. But normally, whenever Israel, I mean, any of the Scriptures talk about a stronghold, they're talking about a military fortress, a fort, a city with walls around it is what they mean, protected by strong walls. Now, on the top of this hill, Zion, it was only 11 acres. Okay? It's only 11 acres. You know, I don't know if you can picture what 11 acres is. If you go to FCF, that's two acres. So five times bigger than that parking lot is as big as Zion was. So it was only 11, 12 acres of land, but it's at the top of a hill. And it had steep valleys on each side, so it was very hard to take, and it had walls all around it. It was inaccessible. Now, paragraph E, just to make it simple. There were two hills up there, two peaks, mountains that, I mean, they're called mountains, but they're only mountains relative to one another. You know, I mean, if you compare them to Mount Everest or Colorado, they don't look exactly like mountains. They look more like hills. But there were two main peaks. There was the mountain called Mount Moriah and Mount Zion, and they were only a couple hundred yards apart, I mean, from one end of the parking lot to the other. So Mount Moriah is where the temple was built, Solomon's Temple. Mount Zion, a couple hundred yards away, is where David built his palace, where he put the singers and musicians initially. Now, this whole, you know, ten, twelve acres of Mount Zion, then a few acres just a couple hundred yards away, Mount Moriah, they're right next to each other. They're all, you know, when you talk big picture, you know, you take a few steps back, get the big picture, people say, in Jerusalem is the temple. That's true, but in a very narrow sense, it's on that one hilltop in Jerusalem called Mount Moriah. Or, if you go a couple hundred yards over, the other little hilltop is Zion, which was this ten, twelve acre piece of property that David built out, and it's where he built his house, his palace. He built a palace there, and it's where his government offices were. And so, that's why David renamed it after he captured it, the city of David. It was kind of his family government compound of eleven, twelve acres that he built up and beautified, and then the temple was right next door on Mount Moriah, so that's kind of a snapshot of what they're talking about here. Then, when you read the Scriptures, particularly the book of Isaiah, Isaiah will use Zion, that eleven acre piece of land, ground, and Jerusalem, the whole city, almost interchangeably. And if you're not clear on these simple details we just laid out, you could lose your way on it and say, which is it? Is it the whole city or part of the city? Really, the city of David is that family compound of eleven acres, but some years go by, some generations go by, they started calling Jerusalem the city of David, the whole city. But technically, it was that one geographic area. Paragraph F. David, top of page 3, top of page 3, verse 8, David made a deal, he got his leaders together, he goes, this is a pretty risky deal, but I think our next session in 1 Chronicles 11 and 12 is going to give a little insight on why it maybe wasn't so risky. He goes, whoever can go to the top of Zion, this little fortified city with a little fort around it, whoever can capture it will be the captain of my whole army. Because remember, David has just joined the army of Judah, his army has been over seven years, and the army of Israel, Saul's former army, together into one big national army. There's not a leader. And remember, Abner was the main experienced leader, but he was just murdered by Joab. So there isn't any really clear leader. Joab's still a young man, he's in his thirties, he's not a seasoned military commander, you know, with thirty years of experience to lead the entire army. Typically, the man that leads the whole army has been in the military for thirty, forty years, because they know all the strategies and all the way. So David says, whoever climbs up, because remember, they've got to go up a steep incline, and if you can get up there and capture that, I'll make you the head of the army. Well, that doesn't sound like a very good deal, because they're going to shoot you with the archers, they're going to kill you. But David did a little investigation, and he found a water shaft, because up there at the top, Zion, this eleven acre piece of property that's fortified, their water supply is down here. And they would dip with a well, and they would draw the water up, and they would have water up there. But they hid it, they dug this water shaft through the rock, in case there was ever a siege around the city, like is what's happening, David's got a siege, I mean, he's around the city. They would still have a water supply, and nobody would know how they had water. David somehow found that water shaft, and he goes, if you climb up, and they say it was 50 to 100 feet, I mean, that's hard to climb, have you ever tried to climb up a little shaft straight up for 50 feet of slimy rocks? Well, Joab did it. I don't know how, you know, do you inch your way up, do you stand on each other's shoulders, it's all wet, slippery, dark, slimy, narrow, I mean, I would have went, Alan, why don't you give it a shot, I'll cover you in the prayer room. I'm not so sure I would have, like what? And if someone happened to be getting some water just about then, even though it was a dark shaft, I mean, you had no way to protect yourself. Well, let's go to Roman numeral 3, Roman numeral 3, verse 9, David, now he captures the city, and he dwells there in the stronghold, again, it's that fortress, that fortress property of 11 acres. He decides he's going to live there, because remember, he's moving up from Hebron, so he doesn't have a house in Jerusalem, well, nobody does, the Jebusites own all the houses. Nobody has a house there, I mean, it's not a friendly neighborhood at this point in time. But David says, now I'm going to make this the head of the whole government, the spiritual capital, the political capital, the whole thing. And so David says, I'm going to build, I'm going to be the first one, I'm going to live there right, I mean, dead center, and I'm going to make a statement, we're committed to this city, because just because they defeated the Jebusites doesn't mean they all were instantly gone, and they had some thriving subdivision the next month for families and children and wives and all that. No, there was a lot to do to make it work, but David said, I'm putting an anchor in the ground, I'm committed to Jerusalem, I'm actually going to make it my residence, I'm going to go all the way, and I'm going to move from Hebron here, and I'm going to build a house, and I'm in, I'm committed, I'm burning the boats, I'm not ever going back. So this was a huge statement of commitment for David to decide to live there, because again, nobody else that he knew lived there just yet, he was kind of the first guy in the neighborhood, so to speak. And he named this fortress, this 11-acre fort area, the City of David, he goes, okay, it's my family compound, my government headquarters, it's where my top leaders will live, and we'll take, it'll take a little while, but we'll develop it. And David built all around the milo, and a milo is a, is a terrace he built up, he put landfill in, brought rocks and dirt, and he built up, there were some gaps in there, I mean, it did quite a bit of extensive, sophisticated landscaping, is what he's talking about, the milo, it's the building up of the terraces and the ground, and he put houses there, and it's government buildings, and it's quite a project, but the big thing here is that David was committed to be fully involved before the city was developed, and before it was filled with his friends and with people that were in agreement with him, he said, I'm going to live there first, even though it's going to be unsettled for a little while. So that's kind of the big statement that you capture. David was always a guy, when you read the story, that he was the first one to be committed to the challenging project. When he wanted it done, he didn't say, hey, someone else go do it, I'm going to put my time and energy and my risk in it, and then others go, well, we're in that with you. And so that's incorporated in this idea of David dwelt in the stronghold, that he said, I'm going to put my stake down, and I'm going there. Okay, let's look at paragraph C. Well, there's a man, a Hiram, just to the north. It's the powerful country of Attiyah, just right above Israel, right to the north. And he's a powerful king in the region, and he's looked at David beat the Philistines, David beat Saul, they've made him king, he's conquered other smaller tribes, and he's a young man, and the Lord's with him, and Hiram goes, wow, I'm putting my money on this kid. The favor of God is on this guy. I mean, Hiram doesn't like him in a social way, he doesn't even know him, but he's reading all the evidences of the blessing of God on David's life, and so paragraph C, verse 11, he sends a delegation to David, and he says, David, I don't know you, but I want to be your friend. I can see the blessing of God all over you. And he sent some trees, that's pretty cool, to send some cedar trees, and really what it meant was logs, the cedars of Lebanon, the most expensive wood in the area, the exquisite, beautiful, fragrant, sturdy, beautiful cedars of Lebanon is what he's talking about. He's talking about logs, and he sent stonemasons and carpenters, he said, you're committed to Jerusalem, I'm committed, I'm going to stand with you, and I will finance it and give you the labors, but remember, you and I are friends, because I can see where your future's going, and so, verse 12, this is one of my favorite verses in the life of David, I have about ten favorite verses in the life of David, this is one of them. David knew, so just mark verse 12 and put your name on it, because this is a verse you want to put your name on. David knew that the Lord had established him as king over Israel, and that's number one. He also knew that he exalted David and his kingdom, meaning when he exalted David's kingdom, it meant his political sphere, his sphere of authority. It says here that he knew that God exalted his kingdom, or his sphere of authority, for the sake of the good of others, for the sake of his people Israel. I mentioned this point in the very first session, in 1 Samuel 16, on session one, God told Samuel, chapter 16, verse one, go anoint a king for me. And David got that. He was first anointed to bring pleasure to the Lord, to obey God and to do God's heart and for God's pleasure. Here, it's, you're anointed to benefit the people. But the temptation of many people, it's a natural temptation, they view their ministry and their prophecies, the Lord says, yeah, I'm going to anoint you, and they go, oh, and they're thinking of, they're going to be important, that their life is going to have importance in the eyes of others. And the Lord's saying, you might, that might happen, might not happen. I'm not anointing you for you. I'm not anointing you so you can make it. I'm anointing you for me, says the Lord, and I'm anointing you for people, not mostly for you. But a lot of guys have a hard time breaking loose of this, and they view their anointing as that which should benefit their life in an individual way, and they have this, you know, aggrandizement kind of view of, if I'm really anointed, then I should be, life should be easier. But it's, for Paul the Apostle, it's exactly the opposite. He was anointed for the Lord and to bless the people, and he was whipped and stoned and thrown in jail and betrayed by the church and rejected by the church. I mean, Paul had heartbreak after heartbreak and rejection and betrayal by people, I mean by believers. Beaten and whipped and horrible things happening, and Paul never had the idea that he was anointed for himself. He always had the idea he was anointed to bring good to the people. And the reason this is key, because we dream of our future different if we have this right picture. Because, again, a lot of folks are dreaming of their anointing, their calling, and it's going to make their life better and stronger and more honor and more choices and more just better. But it doesn't end up that way. And so they're 10 and 20 years in it, again, I've got 40 years of experience looking back, and they're heartbroken. I thought, God, you said, he goes, I did do that, I know, you healed some people, remember a couple of years ago you did? He goes, really? I thought it was going to be way better than this. I thought I was, things were going to get easy or something. The Lord says, no, no, it's not what I said, I just said I was going to anoint you to heal the sick. And you thought you were going to take over Reinhard Bonnke's job, and I wanted you to go to the hospital three or four hours a day, four or five days a week by yourself and pray for people, and when they don't get healed, the family rebukes you, and the hospital kicks you out, and then they tell stories against you on the internet. That's what I mean, go pray for the sick. Really? That's what you meant back when that prophecy came out? Yeah, yeah. I mean, but a few people got healed, isn't that good? And when I began to line up, and by the grace of God I got to do this earlier on than later on, I lined up that I was anointed and called for a reason different than the ease and comfort of my life. So therefore when the bumps and the betrayals and the hardships and all kinds of resistance, it's not offensive. I didn't sign up for easy, I signed up to do the will of God. God to be a pleasure, I was anointed for you, and I'm anointed for people. Look, that works, it's working. And I mean, not all the people appreciate it, but the ones you want, they do, and there you have it. And when I settled that, it made, I wasn't near so vulnerable to offense and burnout and all this attitudes that so many leaders, I mean the chronic disease in the church or whatever, I don't know if that disease is the right word, the chronic, the horrible thing happening in the church is leadership burnout. It's this chronic problem where, you know, I read the Christian articles and they say like 70% of pastors are all burnout or whatever, I don't know the real numbers and all this stuff, but it's a crisis in the church, and I believe it's about having wrong expectations, and it's about entitlement. They're imagining they're in leadership and anointed with a spirit of entitlement, with that American culture spirit on their calling, and it leaves them angry, lonely, burnout, and how dare you God treat me this way, and this is how the body of Christ treats me, and this is how the body of Christ treated Paul the apostle. That's how they treated all the reformers through history. Yeah, there's a real devil, and people are really sinful, that's how it really works. Go for it. I'm pleased by what you're doing. Keep going hard, and that spirit of entitlement that's so a part of the American culture, we get free of that when we do our ministry. We have such a protection against burnout, because burnout is this terrible crisis in the church today. Now here's what happens, paragraph D, when you know God establishes you a king. Here's what I love about it. When you know God made you king, and don't trip over the word king, but think of your position, your sphere of authority, whatever it is. Maybe you're over one person. Maybe you're over 10, maybe you're over 1,000. Whatever that sphere is, that's what I'm talking about. If God gives you this sphere, then nobody can take it from you. They might interrupt it for a minute, it might be a momentary parenthesis, but when David knew God made him king, he didn't have to push for it. Even when his son Absalom rebelled against him, and there was a revolt, and I mean much of Israel turned against David for a season. He just said, God, if you want me king, you know my address. You knew my address back when I was a kid in Bethlehem. You got my address now, because David left Jerusalem and was in mourning and fled. He goes, you know where I live. You can make me king again. It's not my problem. I don't have to make sure I stay king. But if you're the one that kind of twists and turns and manipulates and gets yourself in that position, you're never, ever confident that position will stay there, because you're not sure God did it, because you made a deal with that one guy, and you got him going, and you got him against him and her, and she said yes, and it all worked. But if that's how you get into a role, use a little pressure, and hey, if you don't give me this role, I quit, then you're never sure when you're in the role and the devil attacks. You never know where you're at. But if you know whatever role, whether it's over one person, 10 people, or 10,000, it doesn't matter the number. It's whatever the sphere is. Beloved, you could go to bed at night completely relaxed, because you didn't give yourself the role the first time. You don't have to protect it, because no one gave it to you besides the Lord. And you don't have to protect it, and that's a whole nother burnout, something that causes a lot of burnout, the anxiety of people trying to protect their turf. And the verse here, John chapter 3, John the Baptist said it. He goes, because they went to John the Baptist, and they go, John, Jesus is baptizing more people than you, and your disciples are going to him, because there's no problem. He goes, I don't mind. They go, what do you mean you don't mind? You were the most famous preacher. This new guy from Nazareth, this carpenter guy, he left his carpenter shop, he's got bigger crowds than you. And John's answer was, a man can't receive anything. There's no sphere that you can receive unless heaven gives it to you, and if heaven gives it to you, no devil can take it from you. And if we lock into that, and so that's why I've always wanted in my journey with the Lord, I don't want like a hype, a prophecy, you know, like somebody goes, oh, he said this and that, I go, I don't know, I don't want a prophecy that God didn't believe. If God doesn't believe it, I don't want a story, I want the true word of the Lord. I don't just want a good story, I want what's real, because if it's real, it will hold up under pressure. If it's not real, and it's just a story that a couple guys got together and they all had the same dream and they kind of exaggerated it and kind of pieced it together and added a little hamburger helper to it and all that stuff, it's not going to, it's not real. It's not real. Okay, Talbot page 4, we'll do this just real quick. I'll let you read the notes, Talbot page 4, but I just want to point it out to you. What happens, verse 17, I'm just going to describe it to you and then leave you the page to read on your own. But it's very important, I just spent too much time on those other subjects, is that the Philistines, now remember Philistines, remember Achish, king of Gath, David's been his kind of his buddy for 16 months. The Philistines, now it's seven years later since David's been with Achish, they heard, oh no, David's king over Israel. We were not troubled when he was king over Judah, over one tribe, because he kind of left us alone, we left him alone. You know, for the seven years when he was over Judah, he never attacked the Philistines, they never attacked him. It's never in the scripture at least. But they said, now if he's going to be over all 12, and we are competing for the same territory, because there was quite a bit of land overlap that both nations wanted, and God's with this guy, we know David, we've got to take him out now, or we're never going to be able to take him out. If he gets established, I mean, he's king now, all 12 tribes are following him, and now he just captured Jerusalem, and the king of Tyre built him a palace, and therefore they've got an alliance? It's only a matter of time until he gets more and more powerful, he's going to wipe us out. So they said, we've got to strike now. So they went to this, verse 18, they deployed themselves to the valley of Rephim, and they go to this valley, which is only one mile from Jerusalem. And they're in this valley, and they're getting deployed, meaning they're mobilizing their troops, verse 19, David does what we love about David, he says, Lord, I've got all these successes happening, but I'm going to ask you, I'm going to talk to you every time. I'm not going to assume anything, you know, my track record of beating the Philistines, you know, it's a pretty good record, you know, I've beat them every time I've fought them, I've beat them every single time, but I'm not going to presume on that, which is a part of David's glory, verse 19. He inquires, shall I go? Verse 19, the Lord says, go up, and he has a breakthrough. OK, let's look at paragraph B. Verse 22, a little bit of time goes by, maybe a few weeks, the Philistines, they just got beat by David back in verse 17 to 20, the Philistines said, hey, he beat us, but you know what, if we don't attack again, he's going to be really strong this time next year and this time in five years. Let's take him out now. They came again to the same valley, I mean, here they are, they show up, maybe it's a few weeks, maybe it's a month or two later, we don't know, but it's soon after, the same attack, the same enemy, the same attack, and David has the same response, verse 23. He inquired, shall I go up, but this time God gives him the opposite answer. See, last time God said, go up. This time God says, don't go up, and here's the point, here's what I want you to do. He goes, you know that mulberry trees, that grove of trees, because you remember this valley is right around Jerusalem, a mile from Jerusalem, there's big valleys and canyons there. I mean, there's all this very difficult turf to navigate armies in. I mean, they had to go through these valleys, very narrow passes, and the mountain ways, and so God tells David, you know that grove of mulberry trees over that one pass, you turn right, go left, and go left again, up there, yeah, a patch of trees, yeah, go hide right in front of those trees. David goes, really? He goes, the Lord says, just go do that, and wait on me. Well, David could say, well, the last time, Lord, we just went straight on, and the Lord says, no, no, no, it's a different strategy. So David went right, left, through the canyon, over here, hid in front of this little patch of trees. It says, now just wait until you hear the sound in the trees. Like, what's the sound? The Lord says, don't worry, David, you won't miss it. So David's there, and the Philistines are, where's David at? And all of a sudden, this sound, it's a supernatural sound, in the trees. The Philistines, ah, they're coming, a million of them, and the Philistines panic and run. They run straight to David, and David's hiding by the mulberry trees, and they just wipe him out. It was an ambush. They were hiding. It was an ambush attack. But here's the moral of the story. The same enemy, attacking in the same place, God may use a different strategy. It's not mechanical. It's not, you know, one size fits all. It's, the Lord says, it's relational. Talk to me. Don't have confidence in yesterday's victory for tomorrow's battle. Talk to me. Stay in connection. And that was the glory of what David did. Amen, and amen. Amen. Okay, we're going to take a ten-minute break, then here's what we're going to do. Wait a second. I want you to hear this. Take a ten-minute break, then we're going to come and worship for ten minutes.