Empty of Self Faith Series

In 2 Samuel chapter 15 and in verse 30 we read, And David went up by the ascent of Mount Olivet, and wept as he went up, and had his head covered, and he went barefoot. And all the people that was with him covered every man his head, and they went up, weeping as they went up. Here is a picture of a band of desperate people following their rejected leader in utter humiliation.

Did you ever climb a mountain in your bare feet? Do you know how slashed and bruised and cut and bloody David's feet were as he climbed that mountain? Every step made him wince. It felt like a knife driven into the tender part of his feet. Well, who is this refugee with his head covered, his feet bleeding, crying and agonizing as he goes up that mountain? Is he a homeless person? Is he a beggar? Is he a criminal on the run? No, he is a king, the king of Israel.

You wouldn't know it by looking at this stripped, pitiful figure of a man. Sooner or later, a believer must come to the end of himself where self must go the way of the cross. The cross and the life of a believer is a forgotten teaching today of our modern church.

Our church today just promotes self. We have teaching on self-improvement, bestsellers on how to be your best you. Even so-called Christian booksellers not have entire departments dedicated to self-help books.

But the way the cross is lined with the pavement of self-annihilation. F.J. Hegel said of Moses, for forty years on the lonely slopes of Midian, the fiery Moses is schooled. There were graves, if I may so speak, scattered all over the mountainside, where hope after hope was buried until at last self went down in utter annihilation.

But today's teaching in the church is a popular message on how to become a better you through self-improvement, self-empowerment, and self-preservation. But Christ on the Calvary Road paints a vastly different picture of the Christian life as Christ in his humiliation is carrying his cross across his lacerated back where his congealed blood was drawn flies as he struggled along that dusty road on his way to his own execution. The reason why the church today lacks power is because she is full of self, self-promotion, self-recognition, and self-preservation.

I know an evangelist who's really successful. He's been preaching for forty years, and he's invited to some of the biggest churches in his denomination, and his message is always a happy, cheerful, encouraging word to become a better you. That's what the people want to hear.

They don't want to listen to a preacher who informs them that they must be stripped of self, and pruned of self, and purged of self if they ever want to really get serious with God and be useful to God. We have ministers today whose personalities light up a pulpit as soon as they enter it by their entertaining their crowds with jokes and funny stories, and everybody has a big old time, and he gets a huge love offering because he knows how to work a crowd. But when the apostles preached, they were arrested and beaten and thrown into prison because they preached up a crucified Christ who had risen from the dead and was now sitting on a throne, and he is Lord, and you better bow to him and submit to his lordship if you want any hope of heaven or any usefulness here.

This picture of King David going barefoot up the mountain with his head covered and his face drenched with tears reminds me of a comment by J. Sidlow Baxter who said, how can a man full of himself preach the Christ who emptied himself? The question is, do you want recognition or do you want power? If you want recognition, then cater to the people's desires and give them what they want. Give them soothing messages they want to hear. But if you want power, then be prepared to be called out, cast out, stripped down, humiliated, broken, and misunderstood.

The old time prophets knew the cost of serving God, and it wasn't for self-recognition or self-promotion, but a complete denial of self, death to self, a continual emptying of self. The prophet Jeremiah had to endure the hardships of being cast into a dungeon with damp muddy floor where he sunk in the stinking mire, and he lay there until he had to be pulled out. The prophet Ezekiel was not allowed to mourn the death of his precious wife, nor even to weep a tear for her.

The prophet Hosea was ordered to marry a harlot and then experienced the heartbreak of taking that unfaithful wife back. The prophet Isaiah was a man of culture, of education, who was thought to have been the son of a prince of Judah, yet he was told by God to go preach naked for God before the people for three years in public humiliation. Yet each of these men had unusual power with God, for to gain power with God means to become empty of self.