1 Chronicles 22–27

We're in 1 Chronicles. I'm going to go ahead and have you turn to the 22nd chapter, and the reason that I'm starting off tonight with some thoughts about worship is because really the last part of 1 Chronicles, from where we are to the end, is David spending the remainder of his life getting ready for the building of the temple. There's never been a temple up to this point. There's only been a tent of meeting, which even got its name from Moses’ tent where he used to meet with God, and then they eventually made the tabernacle and the word tent of meeting got transferred over to the tabernacle, and they became one. But the Arc of the Covenant, the altar and all the other things that go along with the worship of Israel had been essentially in a tent or just outside of it, and it was David's great desire in his lifetime to build a temple to the Lord. But as we see repeatedly in the chapters that we're looking at here tonight, the Lord spoke to him and said that he was not to be the one to build it and he'll even give the reason tonight. But that his son would do it, and so David set out for literally the remainder of his life, preparing for the temple to be built, and he never got to see it with his physical eyes. He prepared for it. He spent his life preparing for it. And I got to thinking about that in terms of just our lives. And I got to thinking about just what it is to invest yourself in the kingdom, to spend your life, your resources, all that you have, all of your energy on something in the kingdom of God, for the work of God, and for the continuation of that work, you know what I'm saying? It transcends, and it, I'm having a hard time putting this into words. Yeah, I know hard for me, but I'm usually not at a loss for words but there's something that is so mundane about the way we tend to live our lives in this world. We tend to live them for the next paycheck, our next vacation, our next relationship, our next whatever, might bring pleasure into our lives. And we go from thing of pleasure, to thing of pleasure, or at least we seek things of pleasure. If you're a totally worldly person, then all you talk about is being happy. And we as Christians can fall into that same pattern of living from happiness to happiness. And when we're going through, when we're between happiness, we're a little bit befuddled, maybe even depressed, discouraged, and we're wondering when our next happiness is going to come along.

I think we're doomed to live that kind of a life apart from some kind of a focus in the kingdom of God. Jesus told us to seek first the kingdom of God. As a matter of fact, not seeking happiness, not seeking pleasure, not seeking a relationship or all the other things that might possibly give us pleasure or whatever. He said, seek first the kingdom of God, and then He said, and then all these other things that you’re looking for, that you think are going to fulfill you or meet all of your needs, they're going to come in like manner. They'll come and you'll get taken care of but seek first the kingdom of God. That's probably one of the most unsought after works of the Lord that He put before us. To seek first His kingdom. As we're looking at the life of David, I want you to be thinking about, not only what we're reading about here in terms of how he invested the latter part of his life, and I'm not saying that being the king wasn't cool too. I mean, I think I think David probably thought being the king was pretty cool, and he knew that he had been anointed to do that. But this right here, this timeframe in David's life presents a bit of an epoch in the focal point of his life and what he lived his life for. And you'll remember this came on the heels of a great failure, and often the calling of the Lord does. Often it does come on the heels of a great failure, and David had this colossal failure, and we talked about it the last time we went through Chronicles. It was where he counted the fighting men and the Lord brought discipline upon him that resulted in many, many people in Israel actually dying. And you'll remember that the Lord instructed David at the very end of the last chapter, which is chapter 21, to build an altar on the threshing floor that was owned by a particular man. And David did so, and the mercy of the Lord allowed that plague that had been visited upon the land to be quelled. And you'll remember that we ended our study last time in 1 Chronicles by reading the first verse of this chapter. Look with me again at verse one here in chapter 22, because it says, it's really just a continuation of the story from the last chapter. It says,

He could have summed that up very easily by just saying, hey guys, we're going to build the temple right here because that's what he meant. Guys, here's where we're going to build the temple. This is it right here, guys. On the heels of this terrible failure that cost the lives of many people in Israel, rather than David retreating into himself and feeling sorry for himself and throwing a pity party, he threw himself into the work of the Lord.

He threw himself into the purpose for which God had allowed maybe some of these things to take place, and he wanted to see the goodness of the Lord come out of this situation and so he said, he said, here, this is the place right here where the temple is going to be built. And we're told in verse 2 that, “David commanded to gather together the resident aliens.” And by that, when they talk about resident aliens, they're talking about Canaanites who still lived in the land, that were supposed to have been defeated when Joshua brought the armies of Israel initially into the land. The tribes were to go into their allotted areas and clear the land, but they didn't all do that. And there were still Canaanites living in the land, and they were considered the resident aliens and, rather than destroy them, David, it says here gave them jobs he pressed them into a forced labor, and he made them stone cutters to prepare, as it says here in verse 2, “dressed stones for the, for building the house of God.” And in verse 3 it says, “David also provided great quantities of iron for nails for the doors of the gates and for clamps, as well as bronze in quantities beyond weighing, 4 and cedar timbers without number, for the Sidonians and Tyrians brought great quantities of cedar to David.” That means the area of Tyre and Sidon on the coast. “5 For David said, “Solomon my son is young and inexperienced, and the house that is to be built for the LORD must be exceedingly magnificent, of fame and glory throughout all lands. I will therefore make preparation for it.” So David provided materials in great quantity before his death.” Stop there please, just for a moment. Do you see the point of what I'm getting to here? This is the time in David's life, where for the rest of his days he is going to serve the Lord, the kingdom, by doing all that he can to prepare for the building of a temple which he will never set physical eyes on. Isn’t that something? And which we know will eventually be destroyed by a king by the name of Nebuchadnezzar when he comes and ravages the land because of Israel's unfaithfulness, and yet David throws himself into this why, why? Because he loves the Lord. This is his worship. David is worshipping God. David was a worshipper. David's heart was a heart of worship. He longed to worship, and he understood what worship meant. Worship meant giving. Do you remember in the last chapter when he approached the man who owned that threshing floor and said, I want to build an altar on your threshing floor, sell it to me. The guy says, dude, you can just have it. Just take the threshing floor. I'll even give you the oxen to sacrifice on the altar. Here's some wood to build or put on top of the stones that you'll build the altar with. I've got everything right here. Just take it. It's yours. Remember what David said? No, he says, I won't offer anything to the Lord that doesn't cost me something. David understood that worship was to give. It is to offer sacrificially to the Lord. He lived for that. And to you and I it's become singing some songs, and we've lost sight of the real meaning of what it is to worship God. Yeah, I went to church today, but the music was, I don't know, it just wasn't the songs I liked or whatever. I’ve got to tell you a story. We had a couple of lovely old gentlemen who used to attend our fellowship. They're both with the Lord now. They were both in their 90s, and one of them started coming here to Calvary Chapel and then invited the other one to come. And the second one was telling me about the invitation of, that the first one had given him. He says yeah, you need to go to that Calvary Chapel church. He said, the music is terrible, but the worship, or he says, but the teaching's pretty good. That's how he invited him to the church. And I get it, I mean, a lot of, and that, by the way, that's not a commentary on our worship team at all that's more or less a commentary on the fact that some people were raised with, in a very different style of worship, which I was too. I was raised with hymns all my life. But, to some people that is worship to other people it’s the music that we do. To other people worship is getting pretty animated. If you don't, move around and shout and whatever, then you haven't really worshipped God; and you go to some places where, if you don't fall down on the ground, you haven't worshipped God; and some places, you’ve got to dance; and some places you have to sit quietly and light candles and turn the lights all the way down so you can barely see anything and that's what it means to worship God; and some people have to go to a church where they blow a trumpet or, they have to have, everybody has a tambourine or, you know what I'm saying? It's as different as there are people, but we have begun to define worship by all of those externalities, and we've lost sight of the fact that worship is giving. Worship is sacrificial giving. Paul said in view of God's mercy, he said, “let us offer ourselves as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, for this is your spiritual act of worship.” Offer yourselves as living sacrifices, right? Offer yourself, give yourself. This is what David is doing. This is why he's doing it. This is why he's focusing on the building of the temple. It's not because he's concerned about a building. He knows that buildings are temporary. But he knows there's something that's far more eternal and lasting, and that is the love that we have for God, and that is the sacrificial heart that we convey to that God by the giving of our lives, the offering up of our resources, our abilities, our time and where we stop living day to day, hand to mouth for the next pleasure, for the next thing on my calendar that might look a little bit promising, and start living for God, and to give all that we have and to do all that we can do to bless Him, to exalt Him, to live for Him. Therein lies true joy, true fulfillment. David understood that. David is preparing, he's spending this latter part of his life just preparing for the temple as an act of worship. Verse 6 says, “Then he called for Solomon his son and charged him to build a house for the LORD, the God of Israel. 7 David said to Solomon, “My son, I had it in my heart to build a house to the name of the LORD my God. 8 But the word of the LORD came to me, saying, ‘You have shed much blood and have waged great wars. You shall not build a house to my name, because you have shed so much blood before me on the earth.” Stop there for a moment. Interesting, isn't it? David knew and understood, and by the way, when God said to him no, you're not the one to build it. David didn't again sink into a pity party. Say, well, now what? I guess I might as well just go on vacation. It's the one thing I wanted to do; God won't let me do it. Humpf! My son gets to build it. Bully for him. You know, those are emotions that can happen inside of people. David, the king that he replaced, Saul, couldn't stand the idea that David was going to be king after him. He was so prideful, so jealous. David could have been jealous of his son, I suppose. He gets to do it, I don't, how come he gets to do it? I fought those wars for God, he could have said. But David’s not that guy, to get all high centered on issues, all of that are all about himself. The kingdom wasn't about him, and David understood that. This life is not about you. It's about God. And when we keep that into perspective it keeps us from being preyed upon by the voice of the enemy. Look what a raw thing you got buddy. God doesn't seem to like you very much This is interesting. This temple, we're told here, that is to be built, is not to be the final work of a man who was known as a warrior. This temple was rather to be a house of peace, and that's why Solomon was to be the one to build it. Because you see Solomon's name actually sounds very similar to the Hebrew word for peace, which is Shalom. In fact, Solomon's name means, man of peace, and God told David beforehand that he was going to name him that. He said, you're going to have a son and you will name him Solomon because he will be a man of peace. And God wanted this temple to be a place of peace, and for the most part, peace did embody Solomon's reign until the end of his life when he got a little bit whacked out himself. But in the way of being a man of peace and having a name that means man of peace, Solomon is a forerunner of Jesus. Not a perfect example, but a forerunner to give us a picture of Jesus. Who is Jesus? The Prince of Peace. There is no peace, ultimately, apart from Christ because He's the Prince of Peace. David continues telling Solomon about when the Lord even foretold his birth look at verse 9. He says he's still quoting the Lord here to Solomon,

(Forever)” Interesting word, isn't it? You might be thinking to yourself, yeah, but his throne wasn't really established forever. I mean, Solomon died. Well, you could say, okay, his sons, we call that the Davidic line, and they did take over for a period of time and on and on, but even eventually they stopped ruling and reigning. After Nebuchadnezzar came and demolished the city and the temple with it, there were no more kings. The Davidic line was still there, but they weren't ruling or reigning. But we forget something when we hear these kinds of statements. We forget that David's royal line is also a forerunner of the reign of Christ. I don't know if you're aware of it, but the kings of what we call the Davidic dynasty, meaning those who were in the line of David, were referred to in a very special sense in the Scriptures as, sons of God. Did you know that? David’s Davidic line were referred to as sons of God, which of course paved the way for our understanding of the divine Sonship of the ultimate ruler, who came in the Davidic line. David's line continued on, and Jesus was born in that Davidic line. In fact, we're not going to take time to turn there, but in the second Psalm there is a reference in that Psalm to the king of Israel spoken to as God's anointed, which is where we get our word Messiah. But it's talking about David's son, those in his line, they're called God's anointed, and they're also called God's son in Psalm chapter 2. Now, what's interesting is that then we come to the New Testament, and again I won't make you turn there, but in the book of Hebrews, the writer of Hebrews takes Psalms chapter 2 and connects the dots for us, that those terms speak of Jesus. We know that David's line was a forerunner, a picture if you will, of the Messiah, and the line that He comes from and so forth. It's all very interesting. Verse 11,

I want you to notice the promise here in verse 13.

By the way, did you notice in verse 13, David did not say, then you will be saved. He said, “Then you will prosper...” What was the promise of the Mosaic law? Prosperity, blessing. It was never salvation. God didn't promise that they would go to heaven if they kept the law. We've been talking about that in our study of Galatians. Alright, so it goes on in verse 13 to say,

Then he goes on to say this.

Good pep talk, right? David's invested in this far more than just financially. Why? He's worshipping. David has always been the worshipper. David's heart is to worship God. He's just doing it now by providing for the temple, by exhorting his son. It says in verse 17,

You wonder if God gave David an opportunity from heaven. From the presence of God where, or from actually, David was not in the full presence of God as we are now when we pass, we know that, right? We know that David went to a place awaiting Christ's final sacrifice, a place of comfort, a place of peace, but it was also a place from which you could see the place of suffering. Jesus tells us about it in the Gospel according to Luke. But you wonder, don't you, if David was allowed to behold the temple that he had worked so hard to help to build. 1 Chronicles chapter 23 begins by saying,

And with that single statement, the writer of Chronicles leaps over a boatload of trouble. He doesn't even talk about it. There was all the trouble that we read about in Kings surrounding David or Solomon's coronation. Oh, there was this weird and Heimer brother of his that rose up, made himself crown King. I'm the King, Adonijah. I think his name was that had to be dealt with. There was all kinds of drama and intrigue that was going on during this time that just kind of muddied the water that David had to deal with. Now, he's an old man. We know that he even dealt with some health problems toward the end of his life. And all this drama is going on, but ultimately God's will was done, and as the writer of Chronicles says here, in very short form. Solomon was finally installed onto the throne, and he was installed while David was still alive so there was a co regency that went on for a short period of time, where Solomon was on the throne and David was still alive. Now, the rest of 1 Chronicles, and I mean to the very end, and we're not going to get to the very end tonight, we're going to leave the last 2 chapters I think for next time, because they are actually pretty full, but most of the rest of what we're going to be reading here can fit into the category of just what we've been talking about. David's preparations for the temple, and it's erection and also Solomon's reign. In fact, the rest of this chapter deals with how David assembled the Levites into large groups and gave them their specific duties. Remember, David is not just King, he's a worshiper, and he takes this group of people called the Levites, who were the people of the descendants of the tribe of Levi, who were given to the work of the Lord, and he said, you guys are going to be very instrumental in this whole process of serving and your service is worship. And all unto the glory of the Lord. Verse 2, we're not going to read the whole chapter.

men. 4 “Twenty-four thousand of these,” David said, “shall have charge of the work in the house of the LORD, 6,000 shall be officers and judges,” You think, wow, that's a lot of people working. Well, they didn't all work at the same time. They took, they cast lots to see when their time of duty would be, and then they would serve the Lord according to when their lot, the lot fell to them, and sometimes it might not fall to them for years. There were so many people to work in the area of the temple. Notice here, it says in verse 5, “4,000 gatekeepers, (which we'll read about here later) and 4,000 shall offer praises to the LORD with the instruments that I have made for praise.” (David was the ultimate worship leader, and he's putting these guys into their positions to lead worship) 6 And David organized them in divisions corresponding to the sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari.” And then the rest just gets into their specific group names and stuff like that. Skip down to verse 25. “For David said, “The LORD, the God of Israel, has given rest to his people, and he dwells in Jerusalem forever. 26 And so the Levites no longer need to carry the tabernacle or any of the things for its service.” Stop there. You see, one of the main functional jobs of the Levites was to carry the tabernacle and all of the worship furnishings. But David is saying, we're entering into a period of rest. My son, we've taken Jerusalem, this is now the Holy City, God has made it clear where He wants the temple to be built. My son is coming after me, he'll be a king where peace will reign. Guess what? That means no more carrying this stuff all around, but that doesn't mean you're out of a job. He says, I have all kinds of ideas for you guys, and that's what He's doing here. Verse 27 says, “For by the last words of David the sons of Levi were numbered from twenty years old and upward. 28 For their duty was to assist the sons of Aaron (who were the high priests) for the service of the house of the LORD, having the care of the courts and the chambers, the cleansing of all that is holy, and any work for the service of the house of God. 29 Their duty was also to assist with the showbread, the flour for the grain offering, the wafers of unleavened bread, the baked offering, the offering mixed with oil, and all the measures of quantity or size. 30 And they were to stand every morning, thanking and praising the LORD, and likewise at evening, 31 and whenever burnt offerings were offered to the LORD on Sabbaths, new moons, and feast days, according to the number required of them, regularly before the LORD. 32 Thus they were to keep charge of the tent of meeting and the sanctuary, and to attend the sons of Aaron, their brothers, for the service of the house of the LORD.” Wow! The Levites are worship leaders and servants and take care of the temple and all of its furnishings. Chapter 24 says,

And the rest is really just organizing the priests into the groups, and there were 24 of them according to their families, and then they were told to cast lots. Chapter 25 gets into the musicians. Here's where David organizes the musicians to play instruments for the Lord, and this was all to prepare them for leading worship in the house of God. And they, like the priests, were arranged into 24 divisions based on the three family groups, remember? Worship and music was very important to David. You remember when he came into service of the king? Why did he first come into service? Because he could play the harp. Remember? It says in verse 1,

And it goes on to tell it. Did you catch what it said there? They were to prophesy. Means to speak forth the Word of the Lord with musical instruments. Why did David instruct them to do that? Because that's what he had been doing. And that's what you and I have in a very large portion of what we call the

Psalms, the Book of Psalms, is David taking musical instruments and prophesying, speaking, and remember, prophecy doesn't always mean foretelling. It also refers to forth telling, just speaking, just speaking. Right? Someone might say, I have a word of prophecy and it is this. I am the Lord and there is no other. That's it. See, that's a message. Is that a word or does that qualify as a word of prophecy? Absolutely, if it's inspired by the Lord. It doesn't have to be foretelling some future event. David, knowing that the Lord had used him powerfully in this area, instructs these other men. And we know that many of them did because we have their writings too in the Psalms where they spoke and they're beautiful songs from the Lord, as it were. Pretty powerful stuff. The rest of the verses here in this chapter really go on just to name these guys and speak about how they were given the task of exalting God, which, of course, is a wonderful way of describing worship, right? Wouldn't it be great if I guess, I don't know if I've ever said that to our worship leaders, your job is to exalt the Lord. I like that, isn't that good? And so, it goes on down that chapter. Chapter 26. This is about the divisions of the gatekeepers. This was something else that David organized concerning the duties of the Levites. It was the Levites who functioned also as gatekeepers. And this chapter tells how they organized themselves under their family clans, how they cast lots to determine their areas of responsibility. But there were more going on with the gatekeepers than just keeping gates. Skip all the way down to verse 26, it starts to talk here about one of them and his brothers. It says,

These gatekeepers were also in charge of treasuries so, they had to be honest guys.

search was made and men of great ability among them were found at Jazer in Gilead. 32 King David appointed him and his brothers, 2,700 men of ability, heads of fathers' houses, to have the oversight of the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of the Manassites (Remember, they were on the other side of the Jordan) for everything pertaining to God and for the affairs of the king.” You can see what David is doing here. He's setting up these, it's talking about people that help him administrate the kingdom. And then chapter 27 deals with a lot of the same stuff, we're talking about military divisions here, and some who are put in charge of the king's property and belongings. It says, “This is the number of the people of Israel, the heads of fathers' houses, the commanders of thousands and hundreds, and their officers who served the king in all matters concerning the divisions that came and went, month after month throughout the year, each division numbering 24,000:” And then it lists all those divisions and who was in charge of them, and there are 12, and they go through verse 15, skip down. Now, verses 16 through 22 speak of those who had functional leadership roles over the various 12 tribes of Israel, and we don't know exactly what these guys did. They must have had some kind of representation, or some kind of oversight, perhaps to get messages to them, or just to I don't know, speak for them. We don't really know. But they represented each of the 12 tribes and verses 16 down through verse 22, basically just kind of give their names. Look at verse 23. It says, “David did not count those below twenty years of age, for the LORD had promised to make Israel as many as the stars of heaven.” And you'll remember, and we read about this that. “24 Joab the son of Zeruiah began to count, (when David ordered him to) but did not finish. Yet wrath came upon Israel for this, and the number was not entered in the chronicles of King David.” Now, the final verses of the chapter tell of who is in charge of the king's stuff. His treasuries, his property, herds, stuff like that. Skip down to verse 32. It says, “Jonathan, David's uncle, was a counselor, being a man of understanding and also a scribe. He and Jehiel the son of Hachmoni attended the king's sons. (I assume that means they helped assist them) 33 Ahithophel was the king's counselor, and Hushai the Archite was the king's friend. (But then there's a note here that) 34 Ahithophel was succeeded by Jehoiada the son of Benaiah, and Abiathar.” And that is, you'll remember the reason for that, is that Ahithophel went along with David's son Absalom when Absalom attempted to overthrow the kingdom. And so Ahithophel, yeah, went with David's son and ended up ruining his life. And then we're just simply told at the end here that, “Joab was commander of the king's army.” And he too was replaced eventually as well. Now, I know it’s a weird place to stop here just talking about, here's the guy David put in charge of stuff. But I really did want to stop there because I wanted to take ample time to do the last 2 chapters of 1 Chronicles because there is quite a bit of information there and I did, I wanted to be careful not to hurry through it. So, I'm going to wrap us up right here and we'll have a little time for fellowship before the kids are released here in about 15 minutes or so. But I want to just end here this evening by reminding you of how we started talking about worship, talking about serving the Lord, talking about having a focus that is kingdom minded. I was talking today or actually e-chatting back and forth with a brother that I've known for many years who's pastoring the church in England, and he attended some of my Bible classes that I taught over in Boise a number of years ago when he was a young man and then he decided to go to England, and we've just been chatting about what's going on in his church. And I look at guys like that, who’ve given everything, who've dropped everything and just gone to live in a foreign country. England might not sound like a terrible, I mean there are certainly countries that are going to seem more foreign, I suppose. Especially those that have a different language. But to live across the ocean and to be separated from family and friends that you grew up with, to give all that you have, it just reminded me today of this heart of David, to worship the Lord by giving everything be willing to lay it all down. To give it all to God. To say God wherever You want wherever You call, whatever Your desire for my life is, that's what I want to do, and if it takes me somewhere else to live, then so be it. However many years I have left, and again, we don't know how many years David spent at the end of his life preparing for the temple. We're not exactly sure. The Bible says he died old and full of years He was 70 years old when he passed away. You and I today don't really consider that that old. And frankly, there was a lot of people back then that lived a lot longer than that, and yet he spent whatever time he had left worshiping the Lord by giving sacrificially, focused on the kingdom. God, what are you doing? What are you doing? I want to get in on what you're doing. Instead of saying, Lord, please bless what I'm doing, which is usually the way we go.