10. The Lord would let the nation of Israel's enemies defeat them in battle because of their disobedient way of life and unrepentant hearts. We see God saying that He would deliver them if they turn from their abominable iniquity because they have offended God. We must be a humble people (2 Chronicles 7:14). We must seek the face of God. That is, we must seek His favor and divine grace. The grace of Christ is His life and death alone. We must turn from our evil ways to the Lord. The Lord will respond with forgiveness and redemptive healing. The Book of 1 Samuel is not only historical but it is also theological. God blesses His covenant people who turn from their sin and return to the Lord. Have you turned from your sin and returned to the Lord? Have you forsaken your idols and embrace the simplicity of the gospel of Jesus? Do you chose graven images over the written Word which was the most primitive form of worship for God's ancient people? Do you have God's Spirit directing you to serve God alone? Paul says in Romans 15:4 that the OT was written for our divine and holy instruction. We have divine hope through the sacred Word. We ought to have perseverance and encouragement through the blessed Word.
11. We see that God is tender and forgiving in His divine character. God still blesses godly living and holy obedience. We ought to realize that we will still sin in a godly life. It is true that saints even sin. Luther referred to the way of a Christian is at the same time just and sinner. Saints will sin but they repent and believe the gospel. Repentance is a doctrine that we must always practice in the Christian life. Are you aware that there is constant sin in your life before your very eyes but sometimes you cannot see it? We ought to mediate on God's holy character because in it we find a rich testimony of awesome holiness, goodness and greatness. If people understood God's character, they would sin less. True repentance always gets God's mercy and forgiveness. Again, we ought to return to the Lord our God. He is full of graciousness and compassion. He is slow to anger and abundant in goodness, lovingkindnesses and relenting of evil as it says in Joel 2:13 and Exodus 34:6. He is always waiting to be gracious for His elect alone. I suggest to you that the wicked are hateful and angry at God by nature. No one loves God by nature because we are conceived in original sin. We are actual transgressors and we have spiritually failed. However, we are spiritually saved by grace alone. It is enough to save His people alone. It is all-sufficient. The divine grace we need comes from God's holy character.
12. Samuel proclaimed the divine message of repentance and the people of God repented. Sometimes the holy message of divine repentance falls on deaf ears because they do not have ears to hear. We ought to remember that repentance must be true to God, sincere to His commandments and a loving loyalty to Christ alone. We ought to remove our idols and serve the Lord alone. An idol could be an image of a saint or it could be a statue or it could be selfishness or sexual evil or TV. Sin is elusive and seeks to find a way to grab you by the throat to destroy and ruin you. The battle is the "enemy within." The danger of the flesh is a denial of total devotion to the Lord. If we do not have total allegiance or devotion to God through His dear Son, we will not authentically repent. Repentance is costly. It is a way to remove our sins and worship the Lord alone. Everyone needs reformation by divine grace. There may be an area of your life that is not up to God's standard. Mediate on God's promises and seek to conquer the sin through the very victory of the Cross. Let us mediate and dwell on the Cross of Jesus! It is where the character of God is revealed. In the Cross it is all about holiness, forgiveness, divine virtue imparted to us, and unparalleled restoration. This can only happen through the divine Redeemer and Savior and God! There is not many redeemers. Some say that we suffer redemptive suffering but this is a denial of the all-exclusivity concerning redemptive agony of the Cross of Jesus Christ. We repent to apprehend the redemptive benefits of the Cross in a spiritual sense.
13. We ought to fast from sin by reading the Word and hearing sermons. Sermons will never change us unless we have the divine grace of the Spirit and Word. Are you willing to resign your will to God alone? Are you seeking His face? We ought to provide a testimony of our confession of sin. We sometimes excuse and justify our sin. This is not true repentance. We should not make excuses or justify our sin. If we do, we may have a mistaken view of the nature of man. What do you suppose is the teaching of the nature of man in light of the Bible alone? Man is not good in anyway but he is radically corrupt and wholly depraved. Man-made tradition says that man is somehow good. I suggest to you that man is not good in any sense whatsoever. If you make excuses you may think you are good in some way. The Bible says in Romans 3 that none of us are good or righteous, but if there is any goodness that we do as fruit of the Spirit of God it is by God alone through us. We see those who claim some kind of goodness that commit rape (such as the Church of Rome). I understand this sin is not merely limited to Rome. I would like to point out that it is evidence for the nature of man as totally depraved. Isn't their behavior evidence (or consequence of their evil thought life) enough that they are clearly mistaken about the very nature of man? I simply suggest to you that sexual sin has grabbed Rome by the throat but they still think that they are somehow or in some sense "good." God help them! We ought to acknowledge our profound and total guilt before God. We ought to cast ourselves on the divine mercy of God through His all-precious Son. Are you willing to receive reproof, correction and instruction? Some are so radically stiff-necked and thoroughly stubborn they cannot endure the instruction of the divine Word. I suggest to you that you need to soften your heart before God by His all-pervasive grace. God delivers His people when they repent. Have you experienced God's deliverance? Do you practice constant repentance? Ask God to search your heart to find more sin to repent of because we sometimes miss hidden sin. Do not be ashamed of Jesus who bled and died so that you would be rescued. What would we be like without a all-true, all-awesome and all-sufficient Savior? It is the Savior that saves us not our repentance.
This blog web site is for the in-depth, sound and basic exegetical study of the Bible in Reformed apologetics; that is, I shall expound upon the inerrant and infallible Word of God, the Holy Scriptures. There shall be biblical studies in world religions and non-Christian cults. I also quote and research reformed writers and I am happy to study from them. May the Lord bless everyone who reads this blog with spiritual riches in Christ which is His imputed merit by faith alone.
