2 Samuel 21- Wrath and Strength

SCENE 1: Famine in the Land (1-14)

• Some time after 2Samuel 9 because Mephibosheth is mentioned.
• Israel swore an oath to the Gibeonites.

So Joshua established peace with them and made a treaty to let them live, and the leaders of the community swore an oath to them. Three days after making the treaty with them, they heard that the Gibeonites were their neighbors, living among them. So the Israelites set out and reached the Gibeonite cities on the third day. Now their cities were Gibeon, Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kiriath-jearim. But the Israelites did not attack them, because the leaders of the community had sworn an oath to them by the Lord, the God of Israel. Then the whole community grumbled against the leaders. All the leaders answered them, “We have sworn an oath to them by the Lord, the God of Israel, and now we cannot touch them. This is how we will treat them: we will let them live, so that no wrath will fall on us because of the oath we swore to them.” — Joshua 9:15-20 (CSB)

1.  Difficulties can be a spiritual .

But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven. For he causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. — Matthew 5:44-45 (CSB)

Don’t be deceived: God is not mocked. For whatever a person sows he will also reap, because the one who sows to his flesh will reap destruction from the flesh, but the one who sows to the Spirit will reap eternal life from the Spirit. Let us not get tired of doing good, for we will reap at the proper time if we don’t give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us work for the good of all, especially for those who belong to the household of faith. — Galatians 6:7-10 (CSB)

• • 1. We what we .
    2. We reap than we sow.
    3. We reap .

Endure suffering as discipline: God is dealing with you as sons. For what son is there that a father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline ​— ​which all receive ​— ​then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Furthermore, we had human fathers discipline us, and we respected them. Shouldn’t we submit even more to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time based on what seemed good to them, but he does it for our benefit, so that we can share his holiness. No discipline seems enjoyable at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. Therefore, strengthen your tired hands and weakened knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be dislocated but healed instead. — Hebrews 12:7-13 (CSB)

1.  The wrath of God is always .

The Lord God took the man and placed him in the garden of Eden to work it and watch over it. And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree of the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for on the day you eat from it, you will certainly die.” — Genesis 2:15-17 (CSB)

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God — Romans 3:23 (CSB)

It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. — Hebrews 10:31 (CSB)

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. — Romans 6:23 (CSB)

1.  God is close to the .

As soon as Mary came to where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and told him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died!” When Jesus saw her crying, and the Jews who had come with her crying, he was deeply moved in his spirit and troubled. “Where have you put him?” he asked. “Lord,” they told him, “Come and see.” Jesus wept. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Couldn’t he who opened the blind man’s eyes also have kept this man from dying? — John 11:32-37 (CSB)

• God moved after David’s not the .

Kindness to the poor is a loan to the Lord, and he will give a reward to the lender. — Proverbs 19:17 (CSB)

• Kindness brings a .

Or do you despise the riches of his kindness, restraint, and patience, not recognizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance? — Romans 2:4 (CSB)

• Kindness leads us to .

But when the kindness of God our Savior and his love for mankind appeared, he saved us —not by works of righteousness that we had done, but according to his mercy ​— ​through the washing of regeneration and renewal by the Holy Spirit. — Titus 3:4-5 (CSB)

• The ultimate kindness of God was the appearance of .

SCENE 2: Strength (15-end)

1.  New Testament leadership is based on of leaders.

After they had preached the gospel in that town and made many disciples, they returned to Lystra, to Iconium, and to Antioch, strengthening the disciples by encouraging them to continue in the faith and by telling them, “It is necessary to go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God.” When they had appointed elders for them in every church and prayed with fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed. — Acts 14:21-23 (CSB)

1. Who were these ?

• They were normal men born very large.
• Descendants of the.

When mankind began to multiply on the earth and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of mankind were beautiful, and they took any they chose as wives for themselves. And the Lord said, “My Spirit will not remain with mankind forever, because they are corrupt. Their days will be 120 years.” The Nephilim were on the earth both in those days and afterward, when the sons of God came to the daughters of mankind, who bore children to them. They were the powerful men of old, the famous men. — Genesis 6:1-4 (CSB)

But the men who had gone up with him responded, “We can’t attack the people because they are stronger than we are! ” So they gave a negative report to the Israelites about the land they had scouted: “The land we passed through to explore is one that devours its inhabitants, and all the people we saw in it are men of great size. We even saw the Nephilim there ​— ​the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim! To ourselves we seemed like grasshoppers, and we must have seemed the same to them.” — Numbers 13:31-33 (CSB)

• UFOs and aliens, and abductions: (Billy Crone, “UFO’s Aliens & The Coming Mass Abduction Book”)
• https://store.getalifemedia.com/UFOs-Aliens-The-Coming-Mass-Abduction-Book_p_303.html
  • Aliens need a medium to communicate with man.
  • Aliens claim a group of “apposers” will be removed and then they will appear.
  • Often abductions turn sexual.
  • Independent Ufologists discovered that persons who were during an abduction who called out the name of Jesus the abductions ended immediately.

1.  God’s Kingdom is always more than the world.

You will have suffering in this world. Be courageous! I have conquered the world.” — John 16:33 (CSB)

Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. This is how you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming; even now it is already in the world. You are from God, little children, and you have conquered them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. They are from the world. Therefore what they say is from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God. Anyone who knows God listens to us; anyone who is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of deception. — 1 John 4:1-6 (CSB)

EMERALD CITY:

1.  Where are you seeds?
2.  Is there something in your life that you need the LORD to ?