Our enemy seeks to usurp the line of David. Athaliah did nearly destroy all the seeds, but one little boy was saved. The lie did not win and truth held fast. And so much later a Child was born and the Son given. God preserved the way to Redemption. (2 Kings 11; Deuteronomy 33:29; Isaiah 9:6)

Speaker(s): Thomas Schaller
Sermon 12416
7:00 PM on 11/30/2022

 

P. Schaller –

Thank you, Jemima. Great. Let’s have prayer for a minute. (Prayer). A couple verses. Isaiah 9, the first one.
This is the beautiful verse, vs. 6. Notice those two phrases. They are really the hypostatic union
of the divine with the natural. The child is born of the seed of David, and a Son is given. The
eternal Son of God who has always been and always will be. Is this child the everlasting God? Is
this child the Father? Is he called Father? Is this child the union of man and God?
Look at vs. 6b. He carries on his shoulder government. What kind of government? World,
global, universal. The King of Kings. On his girdle, he has some keys. I was counting them today.
He has the key to death, the key to hell, and he has the key to the Church. Wow! Who is he?
Look at vs. 6.

I think there’s nothing that lifts our hearts more than the wonder. Have you lost wonder in your
life? Old people lose their wonder. Little children are constantly fascinated with the wonder of
the natural, created world. “Look at the doggy! He licked my hand.” “Look at the bee go to the
flower.” “Look at the bird on the telephone wire.” What is happening? Children are amazed.
They have wonder. Old people [pause]. But Christ is wonderful. Christ never loses the wonder
and the Holy Spirit is in us and we see him.

Look at vs. 6. Counselor. Is there ever a need for a counselor? Why do we come to church? For
counsel. Why do I have a Bible? For counsel. Do I need a counselor? Who is my counselor?
Nothing less than God. Huh? God. Christ. God-Man. Christ, our Counselor. Where is Christ
today? He is seated on the throne and indwelling all of us that believe in him. We have the
Spirit of Christ, the wisdom of Christ, the joy of Christ, the purpose in Christ.

Then the next word title, “The Mighty God.” Is Christ God? Of course, he’s God. That’s what
makes our religion different than all other religions. They don’t have God as a man. They have
many gods. They have many ideas. They have a god that is not a man. They have a god who is
called “Allah” in Arabic. He is god but he is so far removed from my humanity. He is so far
removed from me. Does he feel what I feel? Does he know? Can I decide things? Can I make
decisions? Does God walk with us? Is he in us? Has God become a man so he can identify and
say to us I know what pain is. I know what hunger and thirst is. I know what it is to be tempted
though I never sinned. I was born of the virgin in Bethlehem and I am God.

I was meditating recently God died on the cross, and I don’t allow myself to say God died. But
then I checked myself. God died on the cross. How could God die? He did. He is Christ. He is the
mighty God. Who died on the cross? God. A mighty God that is so mighty that he would be so
humble to be a man and God. And die a shameful death in front of the whole world to draw us
to him. To draw us. “My hands have been stretched out all day long to a disobedient and
gainsaying people.” That’s at the end of Romans 10. When I think of that verse, I think of the
cross. My arms are stretched out all day long to a people, to all of us. Wow.

He is the mighty God and then look at the next title, “the Everlasting Father.” We always read in
our Gospels that Jesus prayed to the Father. But now we read something different. Jesus
prayed to the Father and by the way, the Father is not the Son. The Father is not the Holy Spirit.
The Father is the Father and the Son is not the Father and the Holy Spirit is not the Son. They
are three separate persons in the administration of the Godhead.

And if you understand it, there has to be when you have love, there has to be an object of the
love and there has to be the actually love between them. This is one. This is two. And this is
three. The reality of the universe is based on the Trinity. Me, you, and that which is between us.
Me, God, and that which is between us. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit forever eternally past,
always existing, never stopping love. Never not being occupied with truth. Always rejoicing
before the Father, Proverbs 8:34. Yes, the Trinity. Fascinating. Enraptures our heart. He is a
Wonderful God. He is Wonderful. His name is Wonderful. Wow.

And here he has the name Father. It says it, doesn’t it? vs. 6. The Everlasting Father. And then
we have Prince of Peace. I once was soul winning in a truck stop and there was a guy at the
table having a coffee covered with tattoos and long hair and leather jackets and everything, you
know. Like a real biker guy and I was intimidated by his looks but my faith overcame and of
course I’m not really that intimidated. But you know, it’s easy not to talk to a stranger. It’s easy
not to say anything. It’s easy to go on our way.

Maybe God answered prayer by having me open my mouth or slide a tract on the table. And he
looked up at me and said, I am a Christian. And I doubted it, so I asked him some questions. I
said, really. How did you become a Christian? He said in prison. I said, what happened? He said
someone told me about Jesus and I needed Jesus and Jesus came into my life. I said, what’s the
real thing, what’s the change in your life? He said, peace. I have peace. Christ came into my life
and gave me – I said what do you do now? He said, I drive a truck. I drive a truck all day long
and I say the name of Jesus. I love Jesus. I go, wow! That’s amazing.

What’s the name of God? What’s his name? Prince of Peace. If Jesus came into this world and
he says, peace, I give you, not like the world gives. I give you real peace. When you have it,
there’s a satisfaction because nobody can deal with you and me without giving us peace. We
are so restless. We are so angry about things. We are so upset about life, so troubled in our
relationships, so disappointed with people and ourselves. It is so common.

This isn’t really the message. I want to tell you what the message is which will come later, but I
wanted to share that. Turn to 2 Kings 11. This will not be long night. No, it won’t be a long night
but I’m so glad you came. We got Donny Fisher from Ohio over here on my right. Donny Fisher’s
here. We got P. Carl from Wilmington. All you folks want to stand up if you’re from Wilmington,
Delaware? It just encourages us. That group right there. Wow! Thank you, Lord. Yeah.

Other visitors. You want to raise your hand if you are visiting from outside or first time here in
Baltimore. You are visiting to be with us. You’re welcome. Good to have you.
Look at 2 Kings 11:1. Okay. This woman had a son who was king. He was killed. She goes, I’m
going to kill all the seed. Nobody is going to be king but me. I will be the queen. I’m going to
take them all out. This is a kind of tyranny. A control move. Usurping is a good word. Usurping.
This is the key to the message. I want you to see this word, “usurp.” It’s replacing. It’s pushing
that I will be in charge and the legitimate – here’s the other word, “legitimate.” Legitimate
leader, I will destroy him. I will take over.

I wonder how much this happens in life where someone steals from you your lunch. That
phrase. Someone usurps your life. Someone takes over your stuff. Somebody says it’s mine. Not
yours. Yeah. So, she did this for some years. But she didn’t know that one of the seed – and you
got to follow this. I don’t think it’s hard to follow. The seed of David has to be the king of Judah.
The seed. The biological seed. So, the children are destroyed to take away the seed. The
monarchy. Destroy it. Wipe it out.

It happened in Russia with the Bolshevik Revolution. It happened in France with the French
Revolution to kill the seed. Nobody goes to the throne. The monarchy is over. Destroy it. It
happens in history. So, she’s doing it here in this place in Judah.
But the nurse hides a little boy, vs. 2. Don’t trip over all the names there. I am. We all do but
don’t worry about it. They hid a little boy that could be the king. The future for the kingdom. So,
he’s growing up in the temple for seven years. I want you to see something here in life. You
have to identify when this happens. You have to identify truth because truth can be stolen from
you. You have to hide it. You have to hide it in your heart.

There’s a plan by an enemy to take it away. And she will become the queen. She wants the
power over you. She wants the power over you and she will lie. These are lies. I encourage you
to read the story but I’m going to hit the main points very simply and you follow it with me.
Because it is very relevant in life that someone is going to want your stuff, want your life, want
your time. Somebody wants to take you out and take over you. Take over. Have authority over
you. They want to have the authority over you. It’s common. Honestly happening in many ways
in our society and in our daily life. It can happen.

It can happen but I want to teach you something. Would you all stand with me for a minute
cause I want to have you act it out for a little bit. You got to use your finger. You got to turn to
your neighbor. You be relaxed. It’s no big deal. Be relaxed but you got to say, not going to
happen. Not going to happen! Go ahead. Enjoy it. Work it up a little bit. Not going to happen.
It’s not yours. No. Go ahead. Say it a few times. No! No! No! it’s not right. It’s a lie. It’s a lie. The
king has no clothes on! It’s a lie! I don’t believe that. That’s not acceptable. I don’t accept it.

Athaliah, Athaliah, go back to your bedroom. You’re not in charge. I found out you are a liar.
You don’t have the legal right. It’s not your place. You cannot have it. You’re not the queen. We
got a little boy that has been in the temple for seven years and I think of the little boy when
they crowned him. They put him back. They put him in authority.

I think of the crown kind of on his head. He’s seven years old and he can hardly stand up with
the crown on his head but he’s the king. He’s the king. He may not look like it but he is. And the
truth is the truth and you’re a liar and I found it out. And say that with your finger acting it out a
little bit. Shakespearean style. I found it out! I found it out! No. I found it out. Okay. You may be
seated.

Turn now to the last part of the message is Deuteronomy 33. So we have legal. We have the seed. We
have the true king and he’s actually seven years old when they coronate him. And she cries out,
the woman that is not legitimate, she cries out, Treason! Treason! And they take her out. She
goes, Treason! She’s lying. She’s a murderer and she’s lying and she wants the authority and the
minority or the legitimate, small boy is the one that is – that’s the one we are with. We are with
him. We are on his side. We recognize God’s order. God has honored him. He is the king. We
are recognizing truth.

We are living in a world where there are so many lies and so many misconceptions that we got
to get rooted and grounded in what it is that we believe, where we stand, what is true.
Because, – follow it with me – we are Jews. We are Jews. What I mean by that is Paul called us a
spiritual Jews in Romans 2:28-29. And so, when you read your Old Testament I’m not saying you
are biologically Jewish. Maybe you are, maybe partially or however it goes. That’s not my point.
But my point is the things written in our Bible is for our learning. And when we understand this
little country and what happened in their history, we understand the challenges that we have
as believers. That we have to have the same fight in us. We have to have the same
understanding that they had. They had to go against the Amalekites, Philistines, the Egyptians,
the Syrians, the Babylonians. They had to have it in their heart the things that God had taught
them and follow.

Well, all the more, we are living in a world where there are enemies against us and in our lives,
our children, our country, our way of life, our thoughts, our freedom, our books, the Christian
movies. The Chosen. Praise God for that series. Incredible work by very gifted, incredible
people. Touched by the Holy Spirit to help believers understand their Bible and so on. So, look
at the verse with me.

Deuteronomy 33:29, So, you have O Israel and the people saved by the Lord. That could be us. We are not
Israel but we are spiritual Israel in a sense. We are not replacing Israel in our Bible. That’s called
replacement theology. We do not embrace that. We are not replacing Israel. Israel is the

earthly seed and we are the heavenly seed. Remember? In a word, Abraham – God said,
Abraham, I bless you. You will be the father of many nations. A father of a great nation and
many nations. And Abraham is there. The Lord chose him and takes him out and he sees the sky
and all the stars. This will be the population that comes from you. From you. Wow! Okay.
How did it come from him? It came from Christ, the heavenly. And then the earthly is the sand
by the seashore. That’s the earthly Jews. Abraham has both multitudes. The earthly Jews, the
sand. Heavenly Jews, the born again people that are his people.

Go to vs. 29 and we’ll finish here. Let’s write this down here. Enemies. I wonder how to
illustrate this. Enemies. I remember in the Netherlands – for some reason this sticks in my mind
– we were at the airport. The plane took off and there were these row houses down at the end
of the airport and they were inhabited by – it was in the paper. Somebody explained it to me. I
don’t remember how I got the information but what is it? Squatters. Yeah, squatters.

People move into the houses. They move into the houses and they live there for years but they
don’t own the house. But they take over and they live there for years. They’re called squatters.
You know the term. You know the idea. Are they legal? No. Technically, no. The owners own
the houses and those people are not legal tenants. They are not paying rent or anything but
they take over. They usurp. They take over and they say we live here. We live here and we have
legal rights in the Netherlands. We have a right to live here. We are moved in and we are taking
over. We are living here for years and this is ours. Okay.

Who decides that? The higher authority. The law of the land. And what did they judge? They’re
intruders. They are not legal. They have to go. You have to go. You’re out. The police come.
Take them out. They’re gone. And they may be resisting or they may be arrested or however it
goes. So, think about this for a second. It’s a good story.

Is anybody taking over your life? Is anybody moved in to take over? And can you say, I found
that you, my enemy, you are a liar. That’s what it says. Your enemies will be found to be liars.
What do liars say when they want your stuff? I have a right. It is mine. You are in violation.
What do they say? They say, no. How about this whole thing about our culture. There are many
examples I think. Remember it’s sexual things or ownership or possession, culture, habits. This
is the way we are. This is how I live in America. This is the way I live. This is the way I grew up.
I remember living in Hungary and there is a gypsy population in Hungary. And when we went to
the prison, the prison is filled with gypsies. Why? Because they learned to steal when they are
little boys and girls. They live this way. They learn it from their family. But okay, they learn it
from their family. Does that excuse them? They learn bad habits. We learn bad habits in our
culture and we say this is the way it is in America. Yeah, it might be that way in your world.

That’s not in my world. I’m taking it back. You are an enemy of mine. You have no right to that.
That’s not yours. That’s mine. You kind of follow. I’m provoking you to think with me.
Do you have any fight in you for what is true or are you going to let truth fall in the street? Do
you have any fight in you when this woman is murdering the whole family and taking over. You
are to say and the Holy Spirit is in us to say we have love and we love the truth. We want truth
in our life. We want Jesus to bless us in our life. We want Jesus to be our king. Jesus cares about
it. Yeah. Okay.

Finishing. Look at vs. 29 again. Liars, liars, pants on fire! Go ahead. Say it with me. Just have fun.
Liars, liars, pants on fire! I don’t know. I don’t know. You have to have sex like before you get
married. Why? Why do you say that? Why? Is that true? Is that really? I want God’s way. I want
God’s way. What does God say about it? Ethics in a permissive society. I want to study that. We
are Christians. We are different. We have the power. We have the Holy Spirit in us. We have
the name of Christ.

I’m not saying that people don’t – we aren’t perfect, but I am saying I’m looking for the truth
when the truth is a little boy kind of hiding under a bed and just not knowing what is going on
but God kept him alive. That little seed in your heart and in the hearts of many people around
us. That seed is there to be fed. To be watched over. To be cared for. To grow up. And to get to
the truth. And for the truth to be embraced.

Last thing, vs. 29. “Tread” means like walking. Tread and we’ll put here “high places.” What are
high places? I don’t really know exactly but in the mountainous regions where Israel was to go
into the Promised Land, there were like fortresses and high places, cities, and the Jews were to
take it over. They were to find that their enemies aren’t in charge. God gave it to the Jews. They
were to go in and take the land. I think it was a metaphor for us, too.

When I was afraid, I was afraid as a young man or a young woman. I’m afraid. I’ve been beat up
in life. I’m a victim of misfortune or maybe mistreated in high school. I remember counseling
people in Europe where they got shamed publicly in high school or they had a bad self-image or
beaten up by their parents and those kind of things. So, I’m under that. It’s almost like this thing
is a high place. I find that it’s a lie. Christ doesn’t say this about me. I have a new life. I find that
God has made us in his image. I find it’s a lie. She wants me to all the time live my life subject to
her and her lies. That’s the picture there.

And so, good counsel from the Counselor, God, will say to you in your heart, she’s not in charge.
Those squatters don’t own that property. There’s someone with the legal title and they have
the right and they could come with the police and take their property back and it’s theirs. That’s
the idea.

I would say the counsel that the Holy Spirit can give you in these coming months and years is
counsel that you can get a hold of and it will not just be from the pulpit. It will be in the heart
with your Bible by the Holy Spirit in your heart and you’ll start embracing that. You have been
embracing that. You do embrace it. For some of us, we’re at the beginning stages and we’re
learning. But I would like to challenge you. There might be some area in your life where you
could say, not going to happen. I’m taking a stand and watch the enemy melt. The enemy melt.
Another thing is a lie is very good if it’s hidden. So, I’m going to lie here.

Like a told you a lie. I’ve lied to you and that’s the way it is. All the seed is dead. I am the queen and that’s the way it is.
She’s there and she’s hiding. One good thing that God does for the Jews is he pushes the lie out
in front of you like this. You’re there and you see it’s a lie. You see it. You go, no! What? It’s like
the Wizard of Oz. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain! They don’t want to be found.
But when Christ came into the world, this is what he showed us. I am the way, the truth, the
life. I give you a higher quality life. I give you love. I am the Prince of Peace. I am the Mighty
God, the Everlasting Father. I am Wonderful. The government is on my shoulder, not on the lie,
but it’s on my shoulder and I am for you not against you.

You know the sweetest times that I have – I’ll finish with this – is sitting with a few people in the
Spirit and we’re just talking about Jesus and just having a good, edifying time. Fresh things that
come. Fresh word. Oh, that’s good. Fresh sentence. Fresh definition. Fresh things. And we are
all like there and then the lies around us are exposed. When there is a lie and you know it is a
lie it kind of becomes a joke.

I’ll give you an example. I don’t know. A lie. I sometimes use Napoleon Bonaparte. I should
come up with a new one. Napoleon Bonaparte is Chinese actually. Really. He’s Chinese. Are you
serious? He is French, right? No, He’s Chinese. So, I lie. But it’s so obviously a lie that it’s like a
joke, you know, and so on. So, God has a way of making the lies to us apparent and when we
see them, they are discredited automatically. You’re not going to go out of here wondering is
Napoleon Chinese or French. You know that he’s French and the whole thing has no weight. It
has no authority. It doesn’t mean anything. It’s like a joke.

Could you be in a place where it is sad that people that are believing lies and are in bondage to
them where you would pity people? You would love them and feel sorry for those that are
embracing things that would destroy their lives and they are. That’s God’s business and we are
sorry about it but it cannot destroy your life and it cannot be how you and I are. Cause we are
called to something better. Amen. Would you say a prayer with me.

Do you want to turn to your neighbor and ask your neighbor, have you ever lead someone to
Christ before? You want to do that for a moment. That’s a week from Saturday, correct?
[Outreach breakfast]. Praying for Dave Bellerose and Ginger’s here. Pam Greaves is heading forSingapore. Would you like to stand, Pam, right where you are. Is that good? Okay. How long are
you going for, Pam? Two months to be on the team in Singapore with P. Plunkett. So, she’s
going out to do outreach in Singapore. We got it easy. We can just do it in Baltimore. She’s
going to Singapore. Let’s pray for her. (Prayer).

 

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