In this sermon, the speaker reflects on the story of David and the Ark of the Covenant to emphasize the importance of following God's instructions. He highlights the need for obedience and surrender to God's will, rather than relying on human wisdom or the opinions of others. The speaker emphasizes the significance of listening to Jesus, as the Father has declared him to be his Son. He also discusses the Sermon on the Mount and the new kind of life that believers are called to live, emphasizing that true faith is demonstrated through actions, not just words.

Our text this morning actually ought to begin with Matthew 5 and verse 20. You recall that significant verse, Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees, you shall in no case enter the kingdom of heaven. In the Beatitudes, our Lord described the blessed man as being the one that has had a miracle performed upon him to cause him to become pure in spirit, and poor in spirit, and pure in heart, and meek, has had God do something transformingly real in his life. He describes the inner change that his grace is going to work in the lives of those that he draws to himself. He then proceeds to give the new relationship that these his own will have to the law, something quite different than that which had characterized Israel in the Old Testament. His people are going to keep the law because they love it, because it's the unfolding of their father's will, and not in a vain hope that somehow by it they might gain merit. The whole of the Sermon on the Mount is to describe the new kind of life that will be lived by his own. In the last chapter, he describes the judgment that is to come, makes it perfectly clear that men shall be judged not according to what they've said, but according to what they've done, what they are. And what the most terrifying chapter in the Bible is the seventh chapter, when those standards by which men would hope to accumulate merit are all exploded once and for all by the Lord Jesus, who states in these the terms of his authority, not everyone that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say unto me in that day, Lord, have we not cast out devils in your name and done miracles in your name? And I will say unto them from within, away with you, I never knew you. He's not going to judge according to outward standards, but according to inward reality. Then in the ninth chapter, the eighth chapter rather, he shows the contrast in ministry between himself and the Pharisees. They ministered in word, he ministered in deed. The first one who came to him was a leper that he touched and healed, signifying that the prescription that he had made in the beatitudes he could certainly carry forth, for if he could heal the leper, then he could deal with this thing called sin, which is pictured by leprosy. The entire portion that we have heard is therefore designed to draw the contrast between what has been and what is to be. And I think we see this pointed out in the text that I have read here in Matthew 16. Let me read it for you again. From that time forth, Jesus began to show how that he must go unto Jerusalem and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed and be raised again the third day. Because of this contrast between that which has been and that which he is introducing, the reaction of the religious leaders will be that Christ must be destroyed. It's the ancient principle. When you find out that someone in the principle of religion, when you find out that someone has something that you don't have, and he claims it's from the word, you either must seek it or kill him. In this case, the Pharisees could not seek that which he described, for then it would have meant a total abandonment of that religious edifice that they had erected and upon which their security and their status rested. And therefore, the Lord Jesus must be killed. He said it must be because there was no reconciliation between the old and the new. The new had no room for the old. For if what Christ said was true, then the whole system of synagogues and Pharisees and lawyers and Sadducees, all of this religious structure that had been so carefully erected through the centuries, was worse than wood, hay, and stubble. It was positive snare that would have the effect of destroying those who were part of it. So, rather than submit to Christ, they kept the scripture, claiming that they knew it and understood it, searching it, thinking that in the scripture they had eternal life, failing to see that eternal life is not in the scripture, but is in the person described in the scripture. Therefore, he said, it must be killed. There had to come a point of issue, had to come a point of contact. First, they did not understand. Then they began to understand, and they clearly understood. And when they understood what Christ stood for, they had no alternative but to submit to it or to kill him. In other words, what Christ introduced was altogether other from that which had been before. And they couldn't be assimilated, couldn't be reconciled. The two were just, in a sense, complete opposites. Now, Peter was very much of the old. Peter was not a Pharisee in the sense of being one of the leaders. He probably worshipped under their direction. He wasn't of the royal family, wasn't of the family of the Sadducees. He was a laboring man, a fisherman. But he was very much of the old. And Peter, reacting from the background of his own teaching from the Pharisees, that when Messiah would come, he would set up the kingdom of Israel. Obviously, the Pharisee Sadducees, who had waited and expected the Messiah, would attain in the new that same position they had held in the old, only greatly increased, and that this was not going to happen to Christ. He wasn't going to, it wasn't necessary. The two could be reconciled. The old and the new could be joined, even though Christ said, you can't put new wine into old wineskins. It's impossible. Yet Peter, thinking from the old, said, oh, be it far from the Lord. This is not what's going to happen to you. This is not going to take place the way you have said that it would. But the Lord turned on Peter and addressed him as Satan, realizing that it would be Satan's strategy first to keep him from the cross and then to get him so involved in the old that the new could never come to birth and could never be brought to reality, brought to fulfillment. And he's made the statement to Peter, Thou savorest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men. And he has now established the contrast between that which is to come from heaven, that which is new, and that which has come from men, which is the product of their thought and their ingenuity and their effort, that which has to be done away with, the old which must be removed in order that the new may come and take its place. And he is categorically stating that there can be no reconciliation between the old and the new. We see this carried then to his claims, which are completely contrary to that which was done by the Pharisees. The Pharisees were fundamental in their theology and were evangelistic in their zeal and were seeking to make proselytes, saying that no journey was too difficult if at the end they could see someone brought to conversion or convert to Judaism. But this conversion implied an acceptance of the doctrines as they were held by the Pharisees and in the scripture, a submission to circumcision and to baptism, taking off and leaving the old name as the past in paganism and coming up with a new name that would be given, and they would then be called a proselyte. There was a court of the proselytes in the temple of Herod, a place where these could gather, who had identified themselves religiously and now actually nationally with Israel. This had been the claim, believe our doctrines, live according to our rules, follow our pattern, submit to circumcision and baptism, and you're part of us. But our Lord is introducing now an entirely new gate, an entirely new standard, an entirely new principle of coming. His standard is, then he will come after me, let him deny himself. This denial of self is not a denying of things, but a denying of self. It's not a cutting off of things, it's putting the knife right through the heart, the right to rule, the right to reign in one's own life, in one's own area. This is the point where the denial comes. It's the point of saying yes to the will of God. It means, as in Paul's case, he said, I've learned how to be a base. He'd learned how to be shipwrecked and imprisoned. He said, I've learned how to abound. I can do all things through Christ. I have no choice. It makes no difference to me if it's to be here or if it's to be there. It's quite all right with me. He'd come to the place where the only thing he wanted was the will of God in his life. And I believe that this is exactly what everyone that would follow Christ wants. There's nothing that he has that he holds. He would let it go today, tomorrow, ask for it, take it. I talked with one of our pastors in the metropolitan area. He said, God has been showing me an entirely new attitude toward money. I said, what is that? He said, I will give it to anybody that asks me, that I have any reason to believe has the slightest modicum of intelligence and integrity. I'll give it to anybody that asks me. I have absolutely no interest in it any longer. And anything that I have, he said, God has done something to my heart that has made me completely divorced from it. Now, he said, I'm not throwing it away, and I'm not seeking for places to give it. I've simply come to the place where nothing has meaning or value to me but God. Well, I think that there is a sense in which that is what one does when they say, I'm going to stand with the Lord Jesus Christ with truth. And when he said, deny himself and come, he said, you come and stand with me against the Pharisees and against the Sadducees and against the entrenched religious system. You come and take your place with one they're going to call Beelzebub, one they're going to call a drunkard and a winebibber, one that they're going to crucify. You put yourself in that place. Well, ultimately, the doing of that meant that everything else was involved. Everything else had to go. So it was a commitment to Christ. How easy it is for a person to commit themselves to asceticism. Someone that's willing to wear sackcloth and ashens is to take a flagellante or a whip and pull the flesh from their bones. But there can be the highest form of egotism in this. There can be the highest form of pride in this. This can be a total contradiction of what the Lord is talking about when he is saying that from now on you have no right to choose what you say, what you do, where you go, or what you are. You have to just commit it. You deny yourself in the right to choose. Then he says you are to take up your cross. Now, some people would think that taking up of the cross is owning one pair of shoes and having an unkind mother-in-law and some other problems, as though the cross were some irritant that was going to cause them continuous difficulty. No, no. The cross is simply the extension of this principle of saying no to self, where one says I have no more right to my own time than does one on a cross, my own career than does one on a cross, my own possessions than does one that has been nailed to a cross. And then he said, follow me. This is not simply a moment of decision. This is a lifetime of obedience, completely contrary to that which had been set before. He is putting now right at the very threshold. This isn't a deeper life message, as I pointed out previously. This is the initial contact with those whom he would see brought to himself. These are the minimum terms for coming to Christ. They've never been changed or abrogated, and this is what is meant by the word believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, believe that what he said, what he demanded, and what he asked is so, and meet it. Well, now this is what you have reference to. Someone says when you give Acts 16.31, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and now shall be saved. What do you mean? Well, take them back to Matthew 16 and say, this is what I mean. This is what's involved in believing on Christ. He's the Lord. He's the sovereign. He's the king. He's the savior. This is what it involves. This is what it means to bring your life to him and to receive him, to confess with your mouth Jesus to be Lord, believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead. So the foundation is established. He's going to build his church, but it's going to be completely other than the synagogue system and Phariseeism and everything that's been there before, because the only ones that are going to be built upon this foundation of that Christ, Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God, are those that have at the very outset initially come to grips with this strange demand that the Lord makes, that his sovereignty shall take supremacy over every other interest and concern. Then said he that shall lose his life will find it. And he proceeds then to give the promise of fulfillment of this sacrifice, just as he establishes the foundation, so the fulfillment is profited. For, he says, the son of man shall come in the glory of his father with his angels, and then he shall reward every man according to his work. Now it's obscurity. Now it's obedience. Now it's simple childlike walking with the Lord, regardless of the cost and the price and what people say or think. What does God's word say? What does the sovereign demand? It's just a steadfast walking with him. And he said, if they've spoken thus of me, they're going to speak of you. And a servant certainly shouldn't want to be above his master. So it's obscurity now. It's lose your life now. It's sacrifice to the Lord Jesus Christ, the thing which men will hold to the longest, which is the sovereignty of their own wills. It's obscurity now, but it's glory later. For he said, I'm going to give some of you a little glimpse of this. You're going to see it. In just a little while, for he said, there's some of you that are standing here which shall not even die till you see the son of man coming in his kingdom. And six days later, six days later, he took three of them for out of the mouth of two or three witnesses, as any fact established. And he brought them up into a high mountain apart and was transfigured before them. And his face did shine as the sun and his raiment was as white as light. Well, you remember that John saw him and the vision that he had where his face did shine as the sun and his raiment was as white as light. And this is the same Jesus that's going to come back only now in glory. And so these three, representing all of us, had the privilege of getting a little preview of the glory of Christ and seeing Christ for a few moments in that which was his from eternity past and will be his for eternity to come and is his now from the description given to us by John. And they were able then to go back and to say to the disciples, now we saw Moses and we saw Elijah and we saw the Lord transfigured. And if this is a sample of what is going to be, it's worth everything. It's going to cost us. And so there was this revelation of Christ, certified by the transfiguration, that Christ would indeed come with glory and his angels and would be able to reward every man. But you know, there was something else. The old is creeping in. For we have this strange statement here. I can't quite reconcile myself to it. I don't understand why it should be, but it is. Apparently, the Lord wanted to give us this opportunity to see the intrusiveness of the old. Listen to it. Then answered Peter. But no one asked Peter anything. No one said one word to Peter. He is not answering a question. He is responding to a situation. And he is saying, Lord, the only way to deal with this is in terms of our accumulated experience, wisdom, and understanding, and you must depend upon us to show you how to do it. Isn't this remarkable? Let's go back in our thinking to the scriptures we read in the Old Testament. You recall how that when men were without guidance and without direction and had pagan priests who had some insight, at least, they could consult the priests, and the priest gave them good instruction. They wanted to get rid of this ark. You know, there's sometimes you want to hold on to something, and then there's a time when you want to let go of something. And they wanted to know how to let go of the ark. They thought they were really capturing something when they got it. But nothing but trouble had come to them since they had been successful. Apparently, then as now, the Lord gave them the desire of their heart and sent leanness to their soul. Certainly, this happens to all of us in our pilgrimage, and we can learn well from them. They apparently thought they'd really brought it home when they had the ark. But you saw what happened to Dagon and what happened to the people with the mice that irritated and the ulcers that tormented. And finally, they said, what do we do? How will we get rid of it? Well, their ingenious priest thought of something. Said, now we'll make a new cart, brand new cart, and we'll put the ark on that. And then we will take two milk cows that have just recently given birth to calves. And you know how a cow will stay by her calf. We'll take the calves deliberately from the cow and tie them so that the cows can see them. And then we will put the cattle in the yoke, and we'll turn them loose. And if those cattle forget about their calves and don't try to break out of the yoke to get to them and go straight down the highway to the place that this ark ought to be delivered, we'll know that it's God that's caused the trouble. Well, you read, heard, read the account. They did just that. They made the cart, and they put the ark on it, and they put the cattle in the yoke, turned it loose, and away it went. Well, a little while later, David said, when Saul was king, they didn't consult the ark, and they didn't have it. Now we must bring it back. And all the people agreed with him. And so David went down where the ark had been kept and thought, well, the Philistines did this. They were successful in doing this. They made a cart and put cattle on it. Now that's the way. What was the difference between the Philistines and David? It was Major Thomas that made the Scripture live to our hearts last fall when he pointed out that the Philistines didn't have the Scripture. They didn't have revelation. They didn't have guidance. And they could do it any way they wanted. But David, David had the Scripture. He had the oracles. And David could say, thy law is my meditation, day and night, and I love it. And David knew that the law prescribed exactly how the ark was to be carried. He knew. But he was willing to go along with, can I say, Madison Avenue, with the old, with the world, with the systems of the day and the prevailing customs and the atmosphere. And he was willing to make a cart and put the ark on it. They went ahead, and Uzzah, in whose home it had been stored, was very concerned about it because he'd been blessed while it was in his home. And he saw the oxen stumble as they came to the threshing floor. And he reached out his hand to steady the ark, lest it should fall, and he died. And it says elsewhere that David was wroth with the Lord. Why, I was trying to do something for you. I was trying to glorify you. Saul left the ark in captivity and didn't care about it, and didn't even have it here. And now, just because I'm trying to bring it back, you smitten Uzzah. We're going to call this Perez Uzzah from now on. Uzzah was smitten here so that everyone will remember it as sort of a reflection upon God. How will I get it home? What will I do? How can I please this God? And he forgot, you know, that God had told him exactly how to do it. In Numbers, the fourth chapter, let me read just a few verses because it will bring it home to your heart, and you'll understand why God dealt as he did with David. And the Lord spake unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying, Take the sum of the sons of Kohath from among the sons of Levi, after their families, by the house of their fathers, from thirty years old and upward, even until fifty years. And of the Lord Jesus it could be said he was thirty years old and not yet fifty. All that entered into the host to do the work in the tabernacle, this shall be the service of the sons of Kohath in the tabernacle of the congregation about the most holy things. And when the camp setteth forward, Aaron shall come and his sons, and they shall take down the covering veil and cover the ark of the testimony with it, and shall put thereon the covering of badger skins, and shall spread over it a cloth wholly of blue, and shall put in the stays thereof. And then the stays were to be borne on the shoulders of men not yet thirty and not yet fifty. What is the picture? The picture was that the ark speaks for that glorious meeting of God with men in sacrifice, where the law is kept by Christ as he's pictured there, where bread is out of the Lord Jesus Christ, where the blood of sacrifice is sprinkled. And the only possible way that bread and forgiveness could come would be for a man to carry the ark of God's law and God's will and God's purpose upon his back. And there had to be a picture of Christ. And there was a picture of Christ. When two stays, one on each side of the ark carried it, you take those two stays and cross them and lay the Lord Jesus upon it, and you have the glorious picture of his sacrifice. And because of this, we find that when our Lord Jesus said, the Son of Man must, must, because the only way that God could be mercy-seated was for him to die. The only way, the only way that God's purpose could be fulfilled was that every word should be kept. And finally, David, in his concern, went back to the word and learned how to do it and brought the ark up with God's blessing. But you know, the church has been in the state of trying to make the new cart and train the oxen to pull it, and it won't work. And beloved, the only way we'll ever be able to secure again the blessing of God is to come back to his book and hear him. Just as Peter said, let's build three tabernacles. And God couldn't stand it any longer. And a cloud overshadowed the mountain, and a voice spoke out of the cloud. This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear ye him, and don't listen to anybody else. Where does he speak? He speaks in his word. How are we going to do the work of God? According to the word. What's the rule? The word. I don't pretend to understand all the word, teachers. I don't know the answer to more questions than many of you have ever been able to ask. I don't know. But I know this, beloved, that if we want the blessing of God, we must give ear, not to all the siren voices of teachers and preachers and books and writers, but we must give ear to the one of whom the Father has said, this is my Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear ye him. It's his word. There's a right way and a wrong way to do everything. And unless we find the right way and do it the right way, we can expect nothing more than David got when he tried to carry the ark on a cart. There's a right way. And as he was saying to Peter that day, Peter, you've got to, if you come with me, repudiate the old, abandon the old, forsake the old. You can't bring it here and have it blessed. It's got to be from my Son. And the word is the rule. And that's why Paul said, oh, that the word may have free course and be glorified in us. It's this word that he honors. It's this truth and testimony that he honors. And so we find that there's a proper way for everything to be done. And when Peter tried at that time both to dissuade him from the cross, for it must be that the ark was carried upon the shoulders of young men on two staves, and it must be that Jesus go and suffer and be crucified and be raised again. Then he said, well, we can't avoid that. But after that, we can do it the way we want to. And the father said, no, no, no. Everything must be done the way it's told you. Everything must be built according to the pattern. Everything must be done the way I want it. And I firmly believe, dear heart, that the Spirit of God is seeking to bring us there to that ground again where we are prepared to say, I want to go back to the word. I remember asking Dr. Charbonnier at Taylor University one time, I said, doctor, why is it that everything seems to go back to Rome sooner or later? He says, it's because Rome is the mother of us all. Rome can be seen. The word are just words laid one against another in lines and in paragraphs. But Rome has edifice. Rome has organization. Rome has tradition. Rome has history. Rome has everything but God's word. And he said, the pressure is always going to be back there. But he said, brother, Paris, if we ever have the blessing of God as you want it and I want it, it's going to be that we bypass Rome and we go back to the word. And I submit to you that most of the tradition that we see around us has its origin not in the word, but it has its origin from the Philistines. And we're going to have to go back and find out what God has said. This is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. Hear ye him in your own life. There's a right way, a wrong way to do everything. Proper way. We come to the Lord's table. The scripture has made it abundantly clear. As we come to the table, we should not partake unworthily. And it says, judge yourself that you be not judged. You've been speaking this week. You've been using your tongue. I presume that most of the sins among evangelical Christians are sins that have been caused by the lips. Sin more with the lips than with anything else. Now, as you come to the table, are you doing it the right way? Are you judging yourself or are you with your mind judging someone else? There's a proper way. If you see something in another's life that isn't right, you go to the Lord first in prayer and then you come to them. And if they won't hear you, carry it to the church. And if then the thing can be dealt with. Are you doing it properly? What you see in other's lives? Or are you talking to other people about a third party? There's a right way to deal with things. And I submit to you, dear heart, that when it comes to your personal life, your private life, your home life, your financial life, your recreation life, the whole of your life has been set forth in the Word. There's a right way, a proper way. There's the cart, the way the world has it. And then there's the way of the cross with the staves and the side of the ark. As you come to the table, are you coming having judged yourself that you should not be chastened, condemned? Are you coming with a heart that's clear and open and free? Are you coming with confession, brokenness? As I reached out to touch the ark and God slew him, he says, partake not unworthily, lest the hand of God come. I do not know of any place where God can quicker begin to show the fear of the Lord than around his table. For it's here we would meet him. Would you dare to ask with me this, that if I, that if you are partaking unworthily, that God will begin to chasten in our lives, that we might not be condemned with the world? Or do you love God sufficiently and have sufficient confidence in him that you'll know he'll never hurt you or bruise you or injure you unnecessarily? Are you prepared to say, Lord, if in this I've been following the way of the cart, if in this I've been following the way of the world, if in this I've been following the Philistines, and I come to your table and I have been ignorant or I've been unwilling, Lord, I take your word and I apply it to my heart and say, begin to work in me at whatever cost. Are you prepared to invite the Lord to let judgment begin around his table, around his table? Someplace it has to begin. It began around the ark. I believe that the bread speaks of the pot of manna, speaking of the Lord Jesus, and the wine speaks of the place where the mercy seat, where the blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat. It could be to us the ark, where God's promises were met in grace and where we see the Lord Jesus Christ and he's in the midst. Are you prepared? Do you love him enough to say, Lord, I mean business about this thing of being a Christian? And I'm willing for you to begin to show me where the ark cart and Philistines logic or my life isn't right. And if I'm partaking unworthily and I put myself in your hands, you deal with me, it seems right. Someplace we've got to begin to give God an opportunity to lay his hand and touch us. God never injures just to hurt. You say, well, I'm afraid to come to the table. You mustn't be. If your conscience is void of offense toward God and toward man, you mustn't be. You're asking God to show you what may displease him. The chastening doesn't begin until you've refused to do what's been shown. But you're saying, Lord, show me. And if there is a place you've been unwilling, then, of course, you're saying, Lord, I love you enough to let your chastening hand come on me. I want you to deal with me. It seems good in your eyes. And thus, as we come, we come not to worship the table, the bread, the wine, but to worship the risen Christ and say, Lord, thou hast wanted something wholly other, something altogether yours, something perfectly your own. Oh, God, I want that. Let it begin in me. Let it begin in me that you might see of your travail and be satisfied. Will you? Let us pray. Think for just a moment. If you've been speaking, you spoke to somebody, unless you're talking to yourself these days. If you spoke without love, if you've spoken gossip or whispering or backbiting, somebody else knows it. And the strange part of it is that the one who listened to you went right away and talked about you. You know, that always happens. You know your heart. You know your imaginations. You know your purposes and your plans. You're coming to the table of the Lord. He spoke out of the heavens and said, this is my son. Hear him. Are you willing to bring your life to what he said in his word? All of it, for it's all his word. It's all his. Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean. Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow. Forgive me, Lord. Cleanse me. Purge me. Oh, let this be our prayer. Perhaps there's someone you're going to have to see after this service. Perhaps there's someone you'll have to see before you can eat. But you don't want to do this the way they did in Philistia. That won't work. For you're of the household of faith. We have to do things according to the word. My brother, I thought against thee, go to thy brother. If thou hast thought against thy brother, go to him. Brokenness. Father of our Lord Jesus, Peter was so right about one thing and so wrong about others. Oh, that we might have a revelation of Christ as the head of the church, walking in the midst of the candlesticks, raining, rolling, head over all things to the church, which is his body. That it's to be done not according to what we devise and imagine and ingeniously prepare, but to be built after the pattern. Be according to his way and word, work, purpose. Here we are, Lord. We don't know a great deal. We're so ignorant of so many things. We're asking for something to come to pass that none of us here have ever seen. We don't know any place that it's been. We're asking thee to do something that's of thyself, so wholly and so particularly and so perfectly of thee. That thou canst get glory. We don't know what it'll cost, where it'll take us. We must know, Lord. There have been voices saying, go here and go there, but we haven't heard in them thy voice. When we hear thy voice, Lord, we'll do anything that you want. But now we're coming to this, the table that's before us here. And thou hast said, when you come, examine yourself that you don't eat unworthily. And when you find something that's wrong, judge yourself. Now, Lord, as it touches the cart, you slew him. And we're coming to the table. Put fear and love in our hearts at the same time. And may we sense thy presence. May sin be uncovered and confessed and forgiven. And may those who know forgiveness and cleansing, rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory. But, O God, presence thyself now with thy people as they come to the table of thy dear son. And let holy awe come upon us. For Jesus' sake.