WHAT MANNER OF MAN ARE YOU? – PART TWO

I welcome you back, friends. We want to finish the message we started last time, with the title: What Manner of Man are You? And we took our text from 1 Samuel 13:13-14 and from Acts of the Apostle 13:22. Let’s reread them because they are short.

1Samuel 13:13-14

¹³ And Samuel said to Saul, “You have done foolishly. You have not kept the commandment of the Lord your God, which He commanded you. For now the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever. ¹⁴ But now your kingdom shall not continue. The Lord has sought for Himself a man after His own heart, and the Lord has commanded him to be commander over His people, because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you.”

In Acts 13:22, Paul speaking in Antioch in Pisidia, he said this in verse 22 – part of his sermon:

Acts 13:22

²² And when He [that is, God] had removed him [that is, Saul], He raised up for them David as king, to whom also He gave testimony and said, ‘I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after My own heart, who will do all My will.

PRAYER:

Father, thank You, again, for the time we are going to spend in Your Word now. We commit this moment into Your hands. Please, Spirit of God, speak to all my friends as no one else can ever speak to them…in Jesus Name. Amen!

I said last time that the word man is being used in a generic sense: In the sense of man and woman, in the sense of mankind. The equivalent in the Greek New Testament will be anthrópos which means mankind – man and woman. What manner of man are you also means what manner of woman are you. And this message is taken from the life of David, David the Son of Jesse, to whom God bore this enviable testimony. I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man after my own heart, who will do all my will.

And we said last time that people may argue. Well…this testimony was bore of David before he messed up and committed murder – adultery and murder at the same time. And you’ll be right. But after that God still regarded David as a man after His own heart.

And we ask the question, what does this really mean: a man after God’s own heart? We said a man after God’s heart is a man whose heart resembles the heart of God; a man who is spiritually sensitive; a man whose life is in alignment with God. But it means more than that, taken David as our bearing as it were; because it is spoken of him: a man after God’s own heart. And then in examining the life of David, we want to see whether this is true. We said:

1. That David, though imperfect, had a humble and penitent heart. When he sinned he confessed his sins and he repented from them.
2. That David a man after God’s own heart in the sense that God loomed larger in the heart of David than David’s problems.

We use the story of Goliath; and then of course beyond that all he passed through in the hands of Saul showed or shows us that he indeed was a man after God’s own heart because he saw God as bigger than his problems. And that was why he triumphed over all those problems. God loomed larger in his heart than his problems. And the problem with most of us these days is that our problems loom larger than God. How big is your God, friend? Many at time it is not the size of our problem, but the size of our God. When we bring God down to the size of a man then most of our problems will be larger than God. David was not like that.

• David was a man with a heart of Gold. King Saul hated David and chased him around to kill him – out of jealousy; and David had the opportunity on two different occasions to eliminate Saul. But he spared his life saying, “I will not stretch my hand against my lord [that is, King Saul], for he is the Lord’s anointed. That’s what David said in 1 Samuel 14:10. David had a heart of Gold. A heart that will not hurt the man who swore to destroy him even when he had the opportunity to revenge. Think of that unkind thing that somebody did to you that attracted your vengeful send-back-to-the-sender prayer. You will agree with me that your experience does not come anywhere close to Saul’s murderous intentions for David, yet David would not retaliate, even when his friends gave him a theological reasons why he should eliminate his enemy. David, a man after God’s own heart, a man who had a heart of Gold.

1. David was a man after God’s own heart because he was a man who had a heart of gratitude and who worshiped God constantly. David is known as a sweet Psalmist of Israel. Over half of the 150 Psalms were written by David. And many of them were expressions of gratitude: praise and worship. In Psalm 18, which is also found in 2 Samuel 22, that is David’s expression of gratitude to God for delivering him from the hand of his enemies and for delivering him from the hand of Saul.

Psalm 18:1-3

¹I will love You, O Lord, my strength.
² The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer;
My God, my strength, in whom I will trust;
My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.
³ I will call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised;
So shall I be saved from my enemies.

We have that in song. David, a man with a heart of gratitude, a man whose heart worshiped and praised God.

Psalm 138:1-2

¹I will praise You with my whole heart;
Before the gods I will sing praises to You.
² I will worship toward Your holy temple,
And praise Your name
For Your loving kindness and Your truth;
For You have magnified Your word above all Your name.

And finally, siting another example of his praise and his gratitude to God

Psalm 145

¹I will extol You, my God, O King;
And I will bless Your name forever and ever.
² Every day I will bless You,
And I will praise Your name forever and ever.
³ Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised;
And His greatness is unsearchable.

⁴ One generation shall praise Your works to another,
And shall declare Your mighty acts.

When a man has this kind of heart towards God, God will own that heart. And God will brag about that heart. A man after my own heart.

1. David was a man after God’s own heart because he was a heart for the Word of God. David loved the word of God, delighted in the Word of God, and meditated on it day and night.

Psalm 119:47-48

⁴⁷And I will delight myself in Your commandments,
Which I love.
⁴⁸ My hands also I will lift up to Your commandments,
Which I love,
And I will meditate on Your statutes.

These two words, commandment and statutes mean ‘God’s Word’. David had a heart for the Word of God. God is not concerned, friend, about David today. His concern is you and me. Are you a man, are you a woman, are you a boy, are you a girl after God’s own heart? He is looking for such people. God said in Acts 13:22 – one of our texts, ‘I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after My own heart, who will do all My will. He did not stop searching after he found David. Has he found you, a man, woman, boy or girl after his own heart, one whose heart resembles God’s heart, one who is spiritually sensitive, one who hungers after God, who thirsts after the Word of God. Does your heart look like the heart of David, friend?

PRAYER:

Father, again, we want to say thank You for the opportunity and the privilege You give us to approach Your Word and approach Your throne of grace. I am committing into Your hands all my friends, and praying, dear Lord, that You work Your mighty works in their lives, in their families, in their circumstances, to bring them to the point where You will brag about each one – a man, a woman, a boy, a girl after My own heart. Thank You, in Jesus name. Amen!