In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the role of the angel of the Lord in rescuing and protecting those who fear Him. The angel is described as being present to rescue believers from various challenges and consequences, including thirst, condemnation, and the consequences of their own sin. The preacher encourages the congregation not to be discouraged by their past mistakes, but to focus on the sufficiency of God in their lives. The sermon also includes instructions for the worship service, including opportunities for congregants to choose songs, read scriptures, and share testimonies.

I'll ask you to turn in your Bibles to 2 Samuel 24, please. I'll ask you to turn in your Bibles to 1 Chronicles 21, please. As we come to study God's Word, there is a principle of Bible study that's absolutely indispensable, and that is total reliance upon God's Holy Spirit. God delights to unveil His Son to our hearts. Just before I came up, we were singing together, just as I am, I come, I come. And I thought to drive home that indispensable principle, I'd read you several verses from Song of Solomon. When you read that precious, precious book and you hear the groom and see his heart, so much of that is in Song of Solomon, the heart of God and how he feels toward his bride. And there's this precious passage that I'd like to share before we pray together. It's from chapter 2, you're the bride, he's the groom. Listen that way. Beginning in verse 8, it says, Listen, my beloved, behold, he's coming, climbing on the mountains and leaping on the hills. So anxious is he. My beloved is like a gazelle, like a young stag. Behold, he's standing behind our wall. He's looking through our windows. He's peering through the lattice. My beloved responded and said to me, Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, and come along. Behold, the winter's past. The rain is over and gone. The flowers have already arrived, appeared on the field. The time has arrived for the pruning of the vines. The voice of the turtledove has been heard in our land. The fig tree has ripened its figs. The vines are in blossom. They've given forth their fragrance. Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, and come along. Let's pray together. Our Father, we thank you that our Lord Jesus gallops into our lives like a gazelle, like a stag, swift, ready, looking through our windows and standing behind our walls and knocking at our doors and looking through the lattice, seeing us, saying, Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, come along. Just as I am, I come. I come. Thank you for that invitation, and we pray now that you would take this precious story from your Word and clinch it in our hearts. We pray that we'd leave this place hearing the music, knowing your heart having pressed near to you. Thank you for all of the angel of the Lord appearances. Thank you for this final one we'll look at this morning. We commit our time unto you. Do your eternal work, we pray. Shed light on Jesus, and then transform us with that revelation. We ask in the matchless name of our Lord Jesus. Amen. I'm so used to speaking a week apart or several days, and so I'm big on review. And I do a lot. I know we don't need that much, but let me just get this before us. Psalm 34, 7, the angel of the Lord encamps around about those that fear Him and rescues them. Every time the Lord Jesus appears as the angel of the Lord in those Old Testament stories, it was to deliver, to rescue, to emancipate, to set free. And we've only touched several of those. He appeared to Hagar to illustrate the first time He appeared how He would always appear, to satisfy thirst, to rescue from thirst. And then we saw how He appeared to Balaam in order to rescue His people from the curse and from condemnation. And anyone that would dare stand up and try to bring His people into condemnation, He stands against that with a sword drawn in His hand. And then we saw how He appeared to Joshua with a sword drawn in His hand in order to rescue him from the total responsibility that He thought might be His to possess everything that lay in front of Him, the land that pictured our Lord Jesus Christ. And now this morning He appears again with a sword in His hand to David. Let me give you the principle. First let me tell you what it's not. He doesn't appear with a sword in His hand to rescue us from the consequences of our own sin. He does not. Here's the reality. He stands with a sword in His hand to rescue us from the evil consequences of our own sin. That's not the same thing, and I pray God will show us the difference as we look at this precious story. Now, the story is recorded in two places in the Old Testament, one in 2 Samuel 24 and one in 1 Chronicles chapter 21. This story is often referred to as David's sin in numbering the people, and that's how you get the context of the story. I think it would be most practical, especially in the beginning of this message, as I try to lay down the foundation and the background and so on, if you have access to both passages. I just think if you have some kind of a marker, because we'll flip back and forth from 2 Samuel 24 to 1 Chronicles 21, and then go the other way sometime. And it just would help if you had that in such a way that we could do that. Now before we actually get to the story, let me just sort of sweep some things away. Let me give you some observations about this story as a whole. Just some general observations. I'll give you three impressions that I get, just to get by it. Because sometimes you get hung up on that, and you never get further than that. The first general impression is this, that this passage, David's sin in numbering the people, has become a playground for destructive critics. They love these two chapters. And I call attention to the fact that they love these chapters because there are at least five apparent contradictions in the record that you have in Samuel and the record you have in Chronicles. Now the point is not, can Ed Miller stand up there and show the answer and solve these apparent discrepancies. I think for a couple of them I have satisfying answers. For some of them I just scratch my head and put it on the shelf. I don't know. Maybe you have some answers for some of the others. But just so you know what I'm referring to, I'll just mention the five. The first is this. In 2 Samuel 24-1, it says the Lord's anger against Israel incited David to number the people. And then when you come to 1 Chronicles 21-1, it says Satan moved David to number the people. And someone says, well, see, look, there's a contradiction. Why did he number the people? Was it God's anger against Israel that incited him or was it Satan that incited him? And they think they have a ground of argument in that kind of thing. The second apparent discrepancy is in the actual numbering. He gave a command. Joab was over the program. They went out, they numbered the people, and they gave the results of the numbering. Except that in 2 Samuel 24-9, you have one set of numbers. And when Chronicles gives you the tally in chapter 21, verse 5, you have a different set of numbers. One is 800,000 and 500,000, and one is 1,100,000 and 470,000. And they say, look, you've got a contradiction there. There's a different tally. The third apparent discrepancy has to do with the three chastening. Remember, God gave David a choice. Because of your sin, you can have A, B, or C. What do you choose? Well, the Samuel record says seven years of famine or three years of war or three days of pestilence. But then you look at the Chronicle record, it doesn't say seven years of famine. It says three years of famine or three months of war. It's not just war. It's a losing battle. You're going to be losing this war. They'll be chasing you for three months. And so they say that's a big problem. And then they make a problem out of how much David paid for the threshing floor of the Jebuzah. If you read 2 Samuel 24-24, it was 50 shekels of silver. If you read 1 Chronicles 21-25, it's 600 shekels of gold. And then they try the value system and say there's no way that that silver can equal that gold. And so they make a problem. And they even say there's an apparent discrepancy. One place calls him Ornan, and one place calls the man Arunah. And they're different names. And so they make a problem out of that. Now, I didn't bring that up to show you the five discrepancies in order to try to answer those critics. But I don't want you hung up on that. If you've already been aware of some of that and, oh, I hope it gets into how did Satan move him and how did God move him, I'm not going to get into that, probably because I'm not qualified to get into that. But the point is, certainly God knew that the destructive critics would fly over Daniel and fly over Isaiah and come to something like this. And say, aha, there you go, contradictions in the Bible. One thing says one thing and another says another. Can't be trusted. You've got a problem. I think our approach should be this. When you come to a Bible problem, I love it since God has dawned this truth on me. God puts problems in the Bible for the same reason He puts problems in your life to drive you to the Lord. It's a call of faith. It's a call to trust the Lord. And I might not be able to answer this. In fact, I can't explain some of this. But I can still come by faith. I know sight unseen that this book is true. I know sight unseen. I don't have to explain everything. I don't try to. Sometime God will show me, sometime He won't show me. I think, as I said, I have some satisfying answers to some of these things. But I think God puts problems in the Bible in order that we might take the simple step of faith. Let me set that aside. My second observation is this, that as far as the record goes, it appears to me that the Chronicle record, 1 Chronicles chapter 21, is a more complete record than the Samuel record and more spiritually suggestive, at least with the light I have now. And let me give a couple of examples of that. In the Samuel record, 24a, Samuel tells us how long the census took. It says nine months and twenty days. Right to the day. That's how long it took. And if you just had the Samuel record, you'd think David sent Joab out. He got a committee. He went out, numbered the people. He got so many. That's how many he came back with. And this is how long it took. But when you read the Chronicle record, 21 and verse 6, you see that the job was never completed. That Joab got so fed up with this thing, he quit. And they never even numbered the tribe of Benjamin and the tribe of Levi. A second example of the same thing is what Arunah or Ornan saw. He was the Jebuziah. If you only had Samuel, 2420, Arunah looked and saw the king and his servants coming toward him. You'd get the idea that that's all he saw. But when you read 1 Chronicles 2120, and Ornan turned back and saw the angel and his four sons that were with him went and hid themselves. We're going to talk about the angel of the Lord, but the Jebuziah saw him too. And so did his four sons. And they went and ran and hid. Chronicles tells you that, that they saw the angel of the Lord. When you read Samuel, in my understanding of this whole story, the main point is left out. Samuel doesn't give you the end of the story. You've got to wait until Chronicles to get to the importance of that wonderful threshing floor of Ornan. Samuel is not as dramatic as the Chronicle record. We see in Samuel, we see David going in, he purchases that field he was told to purchase. And he makes an altar and he offers a sacrifice and he prays. And that's all you see. But you come to the Chronicle record, and he sees the angel of the Lord between heaven and earth. We see the angel of the Lord in front of this field, with a sword drawn in his hand, standing over Jerusalem. We don't just see David praying, we see fire coming out of heaven and consuming the sacrifice. We see the angel of the Lord actually take, the Bible says, and put his sword back in his sheath. That's all in Chronicles. You don't see that in the Samuel record. Now you need both. But I'm just suggesting that you're going to, for our purposes, we're going to lean heavily on the Chronicle record. Let me give one more observation and then we'll get to the story itself. As far as the chronology of events, when did this happen? What was going on in David's life? Was this before this event or after this event? The best we can say is that it was late in David's experience. It was toward the end of his reign, toward the end of his life. But we're not able to nail down the detail. We don't know. The Bible says God was angry with Israel. About what? He doesn't tell us. He doesn't tell us. We don't know. Someone will say, well, it's because of the insurrection with Absalom. I suppose that might be true. God sent a famine in 2 Samuel 21. It says for three years God sent a famine because He was still angry because Saul was dealing with the Gibeonites and was killing the Gibeonites. And they had this whole thing. Maybe it was something about that. We don't know the historical background. And that's a little strange because the story is built on God was angry and that incited David to do something. And the whole story is around that. And your heart asks, well, what happened? Why was he angry? And you're left saying, I don't know. And it becomes important that we don't know. And I'll show you why when we get to that. Well, I hope those observations help us get past the outside. And now let's move a little closer. There are three parts to this story, or at least as we're going to present it. Part 1 begins 2 Samuel 24 and verse 1. The anger of the Lord burned against Israel. That's where it starts. But the ending of part 1 is in Chronicles. So if you go to Chronicles and verse 7. See, Samuel leaves this out. God was displeased with this thing and so He struck Israel. What did He do? We don't know. He struck Israel. So it starts out God's angry with Israel and it ends with God struck Israel again. That's part 1. And inside of that part you have God smiting Israel and David responding to that anger by numbering the people. And after he got all done numbering the people, God struck Israel. That's part 1. Part 2 of the story is David's repentance. That includes the chastening, God's three choices to David. That includes the appearance of the angel of the Lord with the sword in his hand. 2 Samuel chapter 24 verses 10 to 25. In other words, to the end of the chapter is part 2. And the Chronicle record is chapter 21 verses 8 to 27. Part 3 of the story is only, as I suggested, in Chronicles. He's the only one that gives the end of it all. What happened after all of that? And the answer is in 1 Chronicles 21 verse 28 and actually spills over into chapter 22. We're going to call part 1, just for the sake of simplicity, David's sin. Let me give you the references if you're taking notes. Here's part 1. 2 Samuel 24, 1 to 9. And 1 Chronicles 21, 1 to 7. That's part 1. David's sin. Part 2 we'll call David's repentance. Here's the references. 2 Samuel 24, 10 to 25. And 1 Chronicles 21, 8 to 22. David's repentance. And the third part we'll call David's transformation. And you'll see me hurrying to that part. That's where I want to get. 1 Chronicles 21, 28, through the rest of the Bible. That's the end of that. I'm going to ask you to turn to, well, we're going to read one verse from Samuel, and then I'm going to read part 1 from Chronicles. So let me read verse 1 from Samuel 24. And again, the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel. He moved David against them to say, go count Israel and Judah. Now if you'll go to Chronicles. 1 Chronicles 21. I hope that's not confusing you going back and forth, but I think it's helpful to get in this arrangement. Beginning at verse 1, Satan stood up against Israel and moved David to number Israel. And so David said to Joab and to the princes of the people, go number Israel from Beersheba even to Dan. Bring me word that I may know their number. Joab said, may the Lord add to His people a hundred times as many as they are. But my Lord the King, are they not all my Lord's servant? Why does my Lord ask this thing? Why should He be cause of guilt to Israel? Nevertheless, the King's word prevailed against Joab. Therefore, Joab departed and went through all Israel and came to Jerusalem. Joab gave the number of the senses of the people to David, and all Israel were 1,100,000 men who drew the sword. And Judah was 470,000 men who drew the sword. He did not number Levi and Benjamin among them, for the King's command was abhorrent to Joab. God was displeased with this thing, and so He struck Israel. If you go back again to Samuel, chapter 24, verse 1, again the anger of the Lord burned against Israel. As I suggested, we look in vain for the cause of that anger. And how did He express it? Was it famine? Was it pestilence? Were people dying? Was there a sickness going through? Was there threatened warfare? Did enemies rise up? We don't know. All we know is that God was angry, and because God was angry at His people, for some reason that incited David. And Satan used that to number the people. At first I thought, well, David is mad at God because of something, and so he's just going to go out and do this sin. I'm not so sure he was. It doesn't really say he was mad at God. He saw that God was angry at Israel, and because of that, that stirred him up to number Israel. There's some mystery there. We're not left in the dark as to whether it was right or wrong. I may not know what he had in his mind, but I know it was bad. It was wrong. It was sin. He blew it. 2 Chronicles tells us it was satanic. So we know it was wrong. Even Joab got the idea, don't do this thing. And he's not exactly, you know, Joab. He's not really the standard of what's right in Israel. And even he was saying, I don't think you should do this thing. And then later David confesses it and calls it sin, awful sin. He knew it was wrong. And the fact that God brought that terrible chastening, you know it was wrong. 70,000 people died because he did this thing. So I don't know all the ins and outs, but I know that it was David's sin in numbering the people. Now though we can't really nail it, we can get sort of a hint about the anger of the Lord by the steps that David took in response to it. Verse 2 of 2 Samuel 24, the king said to Joab, the commander of the army who was with him, go around through the tribes of Israel from Dan to Beersheba and count the people. Now what's wrong with that? What's wrong with counting? Didn't the Lord encourage us in some places to count the cost and make sure that you have enough if you start so that you can finish? Somebody counted how many got converted on Pentecost because I know the number. Somebody did some counting somewhere. Is it wrong just to count? The whole book of Numbers, right? Counting, it's counting. And in fact, you'll be interested in the chapters that follow the Chronicle record. David goes out then and begins to number the people again. But this time it wasn't sin. It's not wrong in itself. It might be a sign of something that's wrong. It's one thing for a king to be well advised and acquainted with his defenses and their preparation. I hope President Bush has an idea of our military strength and what's available and so on and how prepared we are. But it's another thing to have this vain glory to count them for numbers and how many. I hate the question, how many? I'm going to go back. The first thing they're going to say is, how did it go? And then they're going to ask, how many were there? They always ask, how many? How many? And this idea of counting how many are confirmed and how many are converted and how many are baptized and how many join and how many. I heard one guy say, there were between 400 and 500 at my last Bible study. And the guy says, well, is that true? Now, I was there. There were 11. And he said, well, that's between 400 and 500. Yeah, I know. I told you I shouldn't have used yours. I don't think that David, I can't picture him like a Nebuchadnezzar, you know, standing over, this is the great Babylon which I have built and with my own strength and my own. I can't picture David having that kind of a pride that I want to know every person and how many and I've built it. That's not David. That's not the record we have of David. Verse 3, Joab said to the king, May the Lord your God add to the people however many they be a hundred times more. And may the eyes of the Lord my king see. But why does my Lord the King delight in these things? Joab sensed some kind of problem in David. He may not have been a Nebuchadnezzar, but he saw something. I don't think he was standing there in arrogance, but I do see him depending in an unhealthy way on numbers and human defenses and so on. Is there some evidence that when he numbered the people that he was selected? And I think if you read it carefully, he wasn't numbering everybody. He was numbering the military. He was numbering the defenses. Verse 9, Joab gave the sum of the number of people to the king and there were in Israel 800,000 strong men who drew the sword. That's the point. This isn't a population census for the purpose of taxation. He's counting the armies. He's counting the fighting forces. And some even suggest it was more than counting, it was recruiting. That as they went through, they're trying to build up the force. I don't know if that's the case or not. But clearly God was angry and David's response is, let's see how strong our military is. And I want to know it from the north to the south. Go through the land and count up all of the military forces. By numbering the people, I think David was sort of calculating, now I might be reading this in, but I think he was calculating what he's going to do if God fell through. God's angry with the people. We could be in trouble. If God's angry with us, He might not come through. Let's count the military and see what we can do just in case God doesn't come through. If God happens to fail, I think we need a plan B. I think we need a backup plan. It's not enough that we have the Lord, but now He's angry and He's not favorably disposed toward us. And so let's see what happens just in case there's a rogue group of conspiracy that comes against us and there's a confederacy and so on. And I think that was all part of it. You know, sometimes Lillian, when she gets on the phone, she's my watchdog. She protects me. She does. In fact, when the phone rings, I say, growl. And she goes, grrr. I say, oh, I answer the phone. And she says, it really happens. And she answers the phone and she protects me. Because sometimes, you know, there's legitimate needs, but sometimes people just want to talk and I don't have time to do that. But sometimes, you know, we have a deaf child in our family and so we use sign languages. And I'm chasing her around the house. She's got this phone with no cord. And I'm over there, which is who? Who is it? Who is it? And I'm chasing her around and she's going, who? And she's talking and pushing me off like that. But sometimes by hearing some of the things she says, I can pick up the other end. I can guess who's on the other end. I only have one side. But by hearing one side, I can, you know, if she says, I'm sorry, we won't be able to come on Thursday. In three months from now, Ed says we have to wash the dog or whatever it is. I can guess what the invitation was and so on. Sometimes if you hear an answer, jeopardy, and figure out the question. But we don't know why God was angry. But we know David's response to it. He numbered the people. So can we look at David's response? If that's the solution, what's the problem? See. And I think sometimes we can't get it all, but I think we can look a little bit if David says the answer to this is numbers. We need more. Then I think at least the problem must be we may not have enough. And therefore we need more. That's part of the problem. And the fact that God uses numbers I think is so marvelous because the story begins with a problem. We don't know what. And I think it's because God doesn't want us to know. Because every problem's the same. Every problem is designed to show you that God is enough. That the Lord is sufficient. And when He brings a problem into your life, the Lord's enough. You don't need to say, yeah, but let's start numbering. What about this and this? And I have to have this. And so He went to numbering because in my view, that was His great sin, not thinking that God was enough. And I know Satan hates the message that God is enough. And I can see why Satan would instigate David then to begin another plan. Jesus needs to be supplemented. We need more than Jesus. He's not enough. So count them. How many soldiers do you have? How many pawns? How many bishops? How many knights? How many castles? Let's count them all up. Brothers, let's not get lost in the history. Let me retell the story in my own words in a simple way. God allows a problem in my life. Think of Chronicles. God allows a problem in my life. And the problem is designed to teach me that He's enough, that He's adequate, that He's sufficient. But I'm nervous. I'm afraid because I've got my eyes off the Lord and it's on the problem. And when I look on the problem, I'm not sure He's enough. And so I want to see what other resources I have. And it doesn't matter that He's the king, a leadership, or some elder, or some pastor, or some teacher. A person, anybody who has a problem is designed to teach us that He's enough. And when I take my eyes off the Lord and look at the problem and I see that He may not be enough, I have to do what David did. I've got to come up with a program. And so David comes up with a program. He comes up with a plan, a strategy. Well, when you come up with a program, you usually involve other people. And so you read the record and he involves Joab and he involves the captains and he involves all these other people and it looks like he's asking for volunteers and they hate it. It's amazing how people hate the program. I've got this great idea, a new program. I need you and I need you and I need you. And Joab was one of these volunteers we've been hearing about this weekend that got volunteered. And David just said, you get a committee, an accountant committee. And I've got this plan. And he hates it. He doesn't want to do it. It's a burden. And so for nine months and 20 days they're on this committee and they're accomplishing a lot. One, two, three, there's a five, six. And that's what every program accomplishes. It's just that. It's nothing more than that. And so we get a problem. We look away from the Lord and our solution is a program. And then we involve others in our great program. And they hate it. It's odious to them. And they quit. They don't even do it, but they don't tell you. And you think it's finished. It's not finished. This is exactly what happens every time. And so now they're out doing their program. They're accomplishing nothing. They're wasting energy, resource, a whole year almost, and going through this great program. And it's so abhorrent to them. And at the end of the program, verse 7, God was displeased with this thing, so He struck Israel. When it's all over, it's worse. It starts with a problem. I turn away from the Lord. I get a program. I involve a bunch of people that hate it. They all get involved in the program. They quit because they hate it. And when it's all over, I've got a stack of numbers. And then God strikes the people. And I say, that program fizzled. And if there was another chapter, He would have started another program, another program, except by God's grace. He saw the stupidity of what He had done. God is enough. God is sufficient. I don't need all of these other defenses and to lean on the arm of flesh. My program is a failure. All the expense, all the money, all the energy I've spent in it, everybody has been put in bondage. Everybody hates it. They quit. They don't like it. They come back. And then God blasts the whole thing anyway, and it's worse. And maybe when He struck people, they had to count again because He probably wiped some out. Oh, that's it. No, no. That's part one. At the end of nine months and 20 days, David sees the stupidity of it. 2 Samuel 24 10, and David's heart struck him after he numbered the people. And David said to the Lord, I've sinned greatly in what I've done. I beseech You, O Lord, take away the iniquity of Your servant. I have done very foolishly. That brings us to David's repentance. This chapter to me is an illustration of what C. H. McIntosh, you're familiar with that wonderful brethren writer, he wrote a paper, many papers, and he wrote a paper called Grace and Government. I don't know if you're familiar with that, but if you can get hold of it, it's wonderful. And the idea is that there's grace, God will forgive you, but there's also government. There are consequences to your sin. And those consequences continue and it doesn't violate grace. There's grace and there's government. If you get out of fellowship with the Lord and get in a drunken brawl and lose your right arm in that drunken brawl, come back to the Lord and repent, your arm's not going to grow back. From that moment on until the day He comes, you'll have to give Him a one-armed service. It's not going to grow back. And if you have a child out of wedlock, that child's not going to go away just because you repent. I had a brother come to me one time, he said, if I repent, I'll have to turn myself in. Will it guarantee I won't go to jail? It doesn't guarantee you won't go to jail. There's grace and there's government. There's consequences of sin. And David's about to see that there are consequences of sin. But there doesn't have to be evil consequences of sin because of the angel of the Lord. And that's what I want us to look at. Many people were hurt by David's sin. I think you may be familiar with these three choices. I'm not going to get into the Scripture, but just sort of trust me and then read along if you'd like. God sent His servant Gad to David and said, here's where you stand. You've sinned against Me and now you've come crying out for grace. There's going to be consequences to your sin. Seven years or three years of famine, three months of fleeing before the enemy while the sword of your enemy overtakes you, or pestilence, three days of pestilence, described in 1 Chronicles 21-12 as the angel of the Lord destroying throughout the territory of Israel. Terrible consequences. I don't know if you've ever sinned a sin that hurt somebody. I don't know if you've ever sinned a sin and now someone is not on the earth anymore because of the sin you sinned. Don't read this la la la. It seems so innocent, numbering the people. 70,000 people are dead. And those 70,000 people had families. How many people are grieving? It's on David. This is a tremendous thing. And brothers, it makes sense to me that if I'm Hagar and I'm thirsty and I'm needy, it makes sense that God the angel is going to come to me. And it makes sense to me that if I'm being threatened by some force that wants to curse me, submit to the chastening of the Lord. And so I'll submit and I've got a choice. I can either have seven years of famine or I can have three years of defeat in a war or I can have three days of pestilence. When I read that, I thought, you didn't even have to fill in the other part. You just say seven years, three months, or three days. Which one do you want? I'd take the three days no matter what it is. That's how I would look at it. And God lays this out before David. You've got to have consequences for your sin. Which of the three did David choose? Did he choose the first one? Famine? Second one? Third one? He got the third one. Did he choose the third one? Ah, I see you shaking your head. I think you're right. I don't think he chose one, two, or three. What do you want? Number one, number two, number three? He said, I'd take number four. I want the mercy of God. I'm going to cast myself on the mercy of the Lord. I don't want to be in the hand of men. See, all of those God was controlling. Any one of those could have been the Lord. Could have used anything he wanted to. And I think David just threw himself on the mercy of the Lord. And I think it was because of that whole issue. He said, I know you're enough now. I'm not going to lean on the arm of flesh. I just did that. And 70,000 people are dead. And families are hurting. And people are crying because of my sin. I think if he had chosen one, two, or three, you would have seen a Christian, and you would have seen the chastening of the Lord. But because he threw himself on the mercy of the Lord, he saw, this is marvelous brothers, he didn't see the chastening of the Lord. He saw the angel of the Lord in the chastening of the Lord. And I tell you, that's another direction. That thing changed his life. That thing changed his life. He didn't just brace for the chastening and say, alright, I sinned, I've got to bear it, I've got all this trouble, and I know it's my fault, I've forgiven, but I'll just go through it, and I'll suffer this. That's not what happened. He saw the Lord. And when he saw the Lord in the chastening, it was awesome. Turn to 1 Chronicles 21 please. I'm going to read you several verses. Beginning in verse 15, And the angel of the Lord was standing on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. And David lifted up his eyes, and he saw the angel of the Lord standing between heaven and earth with his sword drawn in his hand, stretched out over Jerusalem. Sometime I try to picture that. The angel of the Lord between heaven and earth. Was he floating in the sky? In between heaven and earth? Was it like Jacob's ladder touching the earth and standing all the way to heaven? What an image that would be with a sword in his hand. What did he see there? Just a marvelous, marvelous thing. Verse 18, The angel of the Lord commanded Gad to say to David that David should go up and build an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. 26, David built an altar to the Lord and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. And he called on the Lord and he answered with fire from heaven on the altar of burnt offerings. The Lord commanded the angel and he put his sword back in his sheath. That was David's repentance. Not just a spanking, not just chastening, but the angel of the Lord in chastening. Now brothers, as we wrap it up, let me show you the end of the story. What's his name? Paul Harvey. The end of the story. And then we'll say, Good day. 1 Chronicles 21, 18, The angel of the Lord commanded Gad to say to David that David should go up and build the altar to the Lord on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. If you read all the way through, I'm not going to take time to read those verses. There's a field over there, God says. There's a Jebusite that owns it. I want you to go make a deal with him and buy that piece of property. And I want you to build an altar there and I want you to meet there and I'm going to stand here with my sword. 70,000 are dead. That was killing David. He said, I'm the one that's in. Strike me. Strike my family. Not them. What did they do? These sheep, they've done nothing. And he said, I'm going to be standing there with my sword over Jerusalem. Same as to say, I'm not done with this chastening. And David goes in and he buys the field and he pays the price and he builds the altar. Fire comes down out of heaven. Consumes the sacrifice. Strange place, that piece of ground. Piece of land. Who knows how big this piece of land is. When you see the angel of the Lord in your chastening. Not just see your chastening. See, the angel of the Lord, when you see the Lord, He's going to bring you to a new place. You see, they had an old place and the Bible tells us, if you read in those verses, that they used to worship up in Gibeon. And up in Gibeon they had, it was God's will. That was the place, the altar. Everybody went. That's where you go to church. At Gibeon. But David sinned. And the angel of the Lord weren't there in His feet beautiful when He announced that good news to us. Sometimes in sin, we think that God's going to pull away. I expect the angel of the Lord to meet me if I'm needy or if I'm in danger or if I've got a job to do. But when I sin, can I see Him? And so David goes over here and everybody's worshiping up in the place of tradition. They're all worshiping up there at Gibeon. And it comes time to go to church next week and say, Dave, you going to church? I'm going to worship here. No, no. The ark, the altar, the people of God, they're over here. And that's where the traditional place to worship. You know what David said? He said, I'll never go back there again. I've seen the angel of the Lord. I'm going to worship here all the days of my life. I'm never going back. And he never did. He never went anywhere but on that field. He'd go on that field. And then it came time to build the temple of God. Solomon's temple. He said, that's where you're going to build it, right there on that piece of land. When you see the angel of the Lord in your chastening, He brings you to a new place. And you can no longer go back to the old traditional place. He brings you to a brand new place, the place where He can build His temple. It's not over when you sin if you see Jesus. The angel of the Lord stands against the evil consequences of your sin. There's no consequences, but He turns it into a blessing. Even when you sin, He'll bring you to a new place. And in that new place, He'll build His temple. And what was the temple? That was His place of testimony. That was His place where He put His name. That was the place, that was the attraction, that was where He lived. That's His home. Brothers, hear the music on this. Don't be stopped dead because you think I've messed up and I've hurt a lot of people and I didn't think He was enough and I screwed up and everybody's hurting and I have just surrendered. I know I'm going to have a hard time. It's my fault. I'll bear it. I'm going through it. Don't look at your chastening. That's got to be there. Look at Jesus. Man, if you'll look at Jesus, He'll bring you to a new place. And you'll never be able to go back to that old place again. And in this new place, He'll build His temple. Place of testimony. Place of His name. His reputation on the earth. This is what He wants to do. The angel of the Lord encamps around those that fear Him to rescue them. Rescue from thirst. To rescue them from condemnation. To rescue them from the responsibilities of living this life in our own strength. And even to rescue us from the consequences of our own, the evil consequences of our own sin. Don't let that get in your way. I don't know where you are. Here we are. We're ready to leave now and go on our own ways. I tell you, the angel of the Lord loves you. He's singing over you. He's come to rescue you. I wish we could go through all of them and show how many ways He rescues you. But brothers, there's got to be somebody here that's messed up by thinking, I screwed up, I've hurt people, it's all over, and all I can do now is bear the chastening of the Lord. God wants to build His temple. Let Him bring you to a new place. Ask the Lord to show you Jesus. Throw yourself on His mercy. Surrey of sin. That doesn't make Him run away. The angel of God came. And one of the greatest revelations of the angel of the Lord is here. The angel of the Lord stands there. He's ready. Throw yourself on His mercy. And you watch what God will do in your life. And He'll build you into His temple. Father, thank You for every man that You brought here. We just pray that You would sing Your song into our hearts even now as we get ready to worship You and share in this wonderful memory feast. We just pray that You'd clinch all these things in our hearts. And I pray that not one man that has been sent here by You would leave this place discouraged or downcast or not trusting in the Lord. Thank You that Christ lives in us. Thank You that He's conforming Himself to us, conforming us to Him, and that He's being formed in us. Thank You that He's manifesting Himself through us. Thank You that nothing can stand in the way. Nothing. Not even the consequences, the evil consequences of our sin. Oh, we love You, Lord. Work these things in our heart. We ask in Jesus' name, Amen. It's quarter after ten now. Let's start our worship service at 1030 to give the guys 15 minutes to get set up. There are three basic components of our worship service. The first one is that you will have the chance to stand up or let us know what song out of the songbook you'd like to sing, and we'll sing it. Number two, if the Lord has laid a Scripture on your heart that you'd like to read, you can stand up and read that Scripture. Number three, if the Lord has touched your heart on this weekend, and you'd like to give Him glory in the midst of this, brothers, you can stand up and share that testimony. We ask that you don't share testimonies before this weekend, just what's happened here. And there'll be times of quietness. There'll be times when you can just pray to the Lord and the two of you get together. At the appropriate time, we'll have the Lord's Supper. We'll remember Him as a final part of our worship time. So right now, we need you all to set up the chairs in two concentric circles, 110 chairs should do it, and spread out the songbooks. Thank you.