I. The background.
A. At the death of Saul, David was appointed King over the tribe of Judah in Hebron.
1. Abner who was the general over Saul's army remained loyal to the family of Saul and appointed Ish-bosheth, the son of Saul as the king over the other 11 tribes of Israel.
2. Ish-bosheth made a foolish accusation against Abner, which caused Abner to recognize that he had thrown his lot in with a man, who as his father, was a fool.
3. Abner came to David with an offer to turn over the whole kingdom to David.
4. David made the covenant with Abner.
a. This was the same Abner that David had chided for not watching carefully over Saul when David had taken Saul's sword from his side while he was sleeping.
b. The Abner who had killed Asahel the brother of Joab who was the head over David's men.
5. Joab was away at the time that Abner came to David with the offer to turn the kingdom over to him, and when he returned was angry that David had received Abner in peace.
6. Unbeknown to David and through subterfuge Joab called Abner back and killed him in a revenge killing because of his brother.
B. When David heard of the dastardly actions of Joab he was chagrined. As a matter of note, Joab was a cousin of David.
C. At this point, David was not fully confirmed in his position as king, and as he notes he was weak.
1. He was not strong enough in his position to take the proper action of justice against Joab.
2. He wanted to see justice done, but he did not have the power to do it.
3. David said: "I am weak, and these sons of Zeruiah are too hard for me."
D. How many times have you found yourself in that place of frustration, because you want to see an injustice corrected, but you did not have the power or authority to do anything about it?
1. We hate to see people get by with their evil.
2. But many times we are powerless to do anything about it.
E. What do you do at a time like that?
1. Just sit and stew?
2. We have a situation somewhat similar today.
3. We are angry with those men who hate us so much they are willing to commandeer Jet planes filled with innocent passengers, and deliberately fly them into the world towers, and destroy so many innocent lives and property.
4. We are angry with those who plotted and financed that horrible crime.
5. We are angry with those who rejoiced and danced in the streets when they saw on their T.V.s the human suffering that resulted from those attacks. We wonder do they belong in the human race? What kind of monsters are they?
6. What kind of religious beliefs could possibly condone much less applaud such actions?
F. Our hearts cry for justice, but how?
1. These are the emotions that David felt when he heard of the horrible deed of one of his own men. A man that was so powerful that David could not bring justice to bear on him.
II. Where David found solace was in this fact. "The LORD shall reward the doer of evil according to his wickedness."
A. What are your feelings when you return to your car, and you find that someone broke a window and stole your stereo?
1. You feel violated. You feel wronged.
2. You call the police so that a report can be made out, but you know that the chances of ever recovering your stereo, or the apprehending of the offender is somewhere between nil and none.
3. Your heart cries for justice.
4. Deliberately stealing something from someone else is so far from your capacity to even imagine, you wonder what kind of a person could do that?
5. How could a persons mind become so twisted?
B. One day our daughter called us from her Condo in Huntington Beach. She had heard a knock on the door and she didn't answer, then she heard as the door knob was being twisted off. She slipped into the bathroom and as the two men passed by the bathroom to burglarize the rest of the house she slipped out the back door and called dad. Jeff and I sped over there hoping to find these fellows. To think that someone would deliberately break into my daughters home caused me to be so angry, I wanted to catch them and turn their bloodied and beaten bodies over to the police. Fortunately we did not find them, but my thought was they should be caught and punished.
C. It is hard to see a person escape justice. We hate seeing someone getting by with evil.
D. What can you do? You can sit and fret, or you can turn them over to the Lord.
1. It is a comfort to know that the Lord will reward the doer of evil according to his wickedness.
2. We read concerning the law of God, that every transgression and disobedience will receive a just recompense of reward.
3. The Lord said, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay."
E. You might say that the world has two kind of people.
1. Those who seek justice.
2. Those who seek to evade justice.
3. Bin Lauden may be sitting in a cave somewhere today thinking that he is safely sheltered in his mountain bunker.
4. With all of his money and connections, he may successfully elude being brought to the justice bar of man, but even with all of his money and cunning he cannot elude death and someday he will stand before the judgment seat of God, from which there is no hiding or escape.
5. Someday you also will stand before the judgment seat of God.
a. You will be found guilty or justified.
b. We are all guilty of sin and deserving the penalty of death. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God, there is none righteous, no not one.
c. Some of you will have to plead your own case before God. Others of us will have a superior advocate pleading our case.
d. John wrote, "My little children, these things I write to you that you sin not, but if we do sin, we have an advocate with the Father, even Jesus Christ the righteous one."
e. Can you imagine standing before the Father on your own, and being cross-examined by Him? If you can't imagine it, you had better start thinking about it, for it is going to happen one of these days, sooner or later. For many in the world trade center on September 11th it was sooner.
f. There will be only one question you will have to answer, "Why did you reject My love and forgiveness that I offered to you through My Son, Jesus Christ?"
g. What will your answer be?
6. Have you ever thought of how lame some of your excuses will sound when you stand before God?
a. "Well there were so many churches, I didn't know what church to believe."
b. "There were so many hypocrites in the church, I hate hypocrites."
c. "I didn't believe You existed and the story of You sending Your Son to earth to die for sin sounded too far fetched."
d. But you believed the far fetched lie that you somehow evolved from a single cell apart from intelligence. That your ability to see was developed by the sun shinning on the forehead of a worm as it was emerging out of the ooze which created a freckle which through time and other accidental mutations somehow evolved into an eye, that somehow transmitted intelligible signals that your brain was able to interpret as sight, but how do you suppose your complex brain evolved? How could you believe that such a simple thing as your watch could not have evolved but was designed by some intelligent engineer and yet believe that the wrist upon which you wore your watch, which is so much more complex than your watch could ever be just evolved through eons of time through blind chance?
7. One by one, your foolish excuses will be blasted away and they will appear to be what they are, absolutely absurd.
a. Paul wrote to the Romans:
ROM 14:12 So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God.
b. Solomon wrote:
ECC 11:9 Rejoice, O young man, in your youth; and let thy heart cheer you in the days of your youth, and walk in the ways of your heart, and in the sight of your eyes: but know this, that for all these [things] God will bring you into judgment.
c. Jesus said:
MAT 12:36 But I say unto you, Every idle word that men shall speak, they will have to give account of it in the day of judgment.
F. You can be sure, as David said, one day the Lord will reward the doer of evil according to his wickedness. Justice will win in the end. That thought brings comfort or terror according to what your relationship to Jesus Christ is. You will one day face Jesus the Messiah as your prosecutor or defender.
Verse-Reference
Square — [Jhn 1:1 KJV]
Abbreviate Books
Use SBL Abbrev.
