THE LORD CAN SAVE – BY MANY OR FEW
1 Samuel 13:19 – 14:15, 23

This story reminds me of the capture of Quebec by General Wolfe in 1759. France and England had been at war in various ways and places for many years and both had settlers in Canada. Quebec, the French capital, is on a high rocky promontory on the St. Lawrence River. While the French were being distracted by other attacks both upstream and down-river, Wolfe led a force under the cover of darkness up the steep and dangerous cliffs from the river to the city. They surprised and overcame the guards and the rest is, as they say, history.

Someone once said to George II, England's king at the time, that he thought Wolfe was mad. "Mad is he?" replied the king, "Then I wish he'd bite some of my other generals." Maybe Jonathan should have bitten his father. He might have been infected with his courage.

Who dares wins – is that the motto of the SAS? But there's more to Jonathan than daring. He is zealous for the Lord's honour and he acts out of true faith that says, Circumstances, be blowed! That is what this story is about: the Lord saves his people through Jonathan's faith which is stirred up by his zeal for the Lord's honour and disregards adverse circumstances. 

Let us look first of all at this matter of circumstances.

1.	CIRCUMSTANCES, BE BLOWED
Things were at a standstill between the Philistines and Israel. 
#	Saul had sinned. He hadn't waited for Samuel to come as Samuel had commanded him to in any such situation. Saul had gone ahead and offered sacrifices and sought the favour of the Lord himself. And apparently the Lord had given him no answer. Samuel, after telling Saul off to his face, had simply turned tail and left him to his own devices. And at present, his own devices had only got him to sitting under a pomegranate tree in Migron (verse 2); probably indulging in a little self-pity, I suspect.

#	Furthermore, Saul's army that was once 3,000 men, had been whittled away to only one fifth of that number. He had 600 men left with him. The rest had "hid themselves in caves, in thickets, in cliffs, in cellars and in pits" (13:6). Saul had failed the men in not providing leadership and the men, who had asked for this king to provide just this leadership, "to go out before us and fight our battles" (8:20), had deserted him just when he needed them and needed their encouragement.

#	There is one other very important factor which, humanly speaking, makes this whole situation understandable – and humanly speaking is a very important aspect of the whole story. Looking at their situation from the human standpoint is exactly why they asked for this king in the first place. See what happens when we do this, brothers and sisters, when we look at things from the human point of view? It seems so sensible, so wise. But when it comes to the crunch, it is utterly inadequate. In the hard situations in life, we need faith in the living God, but that is precisely what Israel, by and large, does not have at this point.

But the other important factor which, from the human point of view, was discouraging, was the state of the armoury. It was mother Hubbard's cupboard – bare, zilch, empty. Look at chapter 13, verse 19; "Now no blacksmith could be found in all the land of Israel, for the Philistines said, 'Lest the Hebrews make swords or spears.' So all Israel went down to the Philistines, each to sharpen his plowshare, his mattock, his axe, and his goad…. So it came about on the day of battle that neither sword nor spear was found in the hands of any of the people who were with Saul and Jonathan, but they were found with Saul and his son Jonathan."

Circumstances did not look good for this little foray of Jonathan's which turned the tide of this standoff between the Philistines and Israel – a dejected king, a dispirited army and depleted military hardware.

And how often does it not seem the same to us 3,000 years later in the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ? 
#	Church leaders – few and far between and sometimes hard to gather up and be willing to take on the task. It sometimes reminds us of Isaiah three where we are told that Israel's men were more interested in their personal financial well-being than taking up their duties of civic and religious leadership. And most religious leaders who do seem to have prominence in our day are either liberals who do not love the Lord at all; or evangelicals who are a bit gung-ho and claim things like direct revelation from God and, in all, make us a bit afraid of what they're going to come out with next.

Mind you, the real leader we should be looking at here as the parallel today of Saul in his day, is the Lord Jesus Christ. Saul wasn't, but he ought to have been, a type of Jesus Christ. That's what Israel's king was always supposed to be; that's what David was. And Jesus, being our king, leaves us all without excuse for any failure of nerve or lack of faith.

#	So we must speak about the people of the Lord in general, as the army of Israel, if you like. They were dejected, but not with good reason. Saul was empowered with the Spirit and had just won a great victory over the Ammonites recently and Jonathan over the Philistine garrison just a few days ago.

There is no cause for us to be dejected. Jesus has won the initial and decisive battle and is bringing his kingdom. He has given the Church his Spirit of power "that you might be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in Judea, and in Samaria and unto the uttermost parts of the earth" (Acts 1). And look how he has fulfilled that – the Gospel continues to go to all the world and has, in our day, gone to almost "every tribe and tongue and kindred and nation" which are to surround the throne of Jesus praising him forever and ever.

We must constantly look at the victory of the Lord Jesus Christ and the growth of his kingdom. This is the day of his power. For two thousand years we have called it A.D. - Anno Domini, in the year of our Lord; not in the year of Jesus, not even in the year of Jesus Christ; in the year of our Lord, the one who reigns. People around us today want to change this B.C./A.D. business to B.C.E/C.E., before the common era and the common era. But that is exactly wrong. This is not a common era. This is the era of God’s grace. This is the era of the rule of the Lord. And we must be, "in this day of the Lord’s power," Psalm one hundred and ten, the Lord’s people who "volunteer freely" and are willing. 

It is true brothers and sisters, things do look bleak at the present time. The kingdom of the devil is making a bit of a come-back. We appear to be living in one of those periodic reversions to paganism that happen every now and again in history. It happened in Elijah and Elisha’s time. It may last a long time; it may not. But instead of looking at the Lord Jesus Christ, we look at this and we become dispirited. That ought not to be. 

As part of this pagan comeback it is true, the hardware, the wherewithal to fight the enemy is surely depleted – or I think we’d have to say now, in the computer age, the software. Christianity has lost control at the present time of our universities, of our justice system, of our governmental authorities, of our news media. And as the Philistines had removed the Israelites’ blacksmiths so our humanist, pagan rulers make it very difficult for us to own and operate our own educational institutions. So just as the Israelites had to go down to the Philistines to get their tools sharpened, and then pay for it! so we have to go to the Philistines, at least for our higher education. So the world exercises this control and this influence and the weapons of our intellectual warfare are often thus blunted, or sometimes sharpened with a Philistine bent. We find ourselves even thinking in a non-Christian way. 

These are the circumstances of Israel and it’s not altogether hard to see them reflected in our own situation. But you know what Jonathan said to all this? Two simple words: “So what?” So what? Circumstances, be blowed! Jonathan didn’t live out of his circumstances; he lived out of, for my second point, 

2.	FAITH IN ALL CIRCUMSTANCES 
There are three things I want to say about Jonathan’s faith. First of all,
i)	Jonathan knew his God. Saul and the rest of his men looked around them and they saw the Philistine army, which was for number "like the sand which is on the seashore in abundance,” (13:5). They knew their circumstances. They were wise to the situation in the world. 

Jonathan knew this as well but Jonathan knew his God and so he says in verse six to the young man who was carrying his armour, “Come, let us cross over to the garrison of these uncircumcised fellows; perhaps the Lord will work for us, for the Lord is not restrained by many or by few.” Jonathan knew what Nebuchadnezzar the great king of Babylon came to see, that Israel’s God is God and "all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing before him. He does according to his will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth and no one can stay his hand and say to him, 'What are you doing?'" 

Brothers and sisters in the Lord Jesus Christ, do we know our God? Do we really know him? Jesus said that "the things that are impossible with men are possible with God" (Luke 18:27). How will we know that? And how will we know it with a deep and firm conviction? By reading and meditating on the works of the Lord through history. That’s why we’ve been given the Old Testament especially. We can read stories like this and be strengthened and encouraged. We can only really know our God through his word and this book is filled with stories like this and "they were written," says Paul, in Romans chapter fifteen, precisely "for our instruction that through perseverance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope."

That is the way we will know our God and the greater we know our God, the greater will be our faith. So, for the second point about his faith, 
ii)	Jonathan expected God to do great things. Somewhere – I couldn’t find it in my concordance this week – it says in the Bible, “The people who know their God will do exploits.” Not only did Jonathan know that the Lord is not restrained to save by many or few, he acted on it. 

"Perhaps," he says to his armour-bearer, "the Lord will work for us." Now note, congregation, this was faith in what the Lord was perfectly capable of doing. It was not a presumption that God was going to do it. One commentator I read brought this out very well when he said, “This word perhaps is refreshing. To pray according to God’s will and say perhaps, is not doubt. Too often today people seem to think that to pray according to God’s will cuts the nerve of faith; that if faith is faith, it must always be certain and dogmatic and absolutely positive.” He is right when he says that. How often do we hear people saying things like, “We are believing that God is doing this.” Or sometimes I’ve heard people say, “Well I’ve prayed and so it will be.” That is not their exact words, but it is certainly the idea. That is not faith; that’s presumption, that’s arrogance! 

Jonathan had a much more humble faith. He knew what God could do but he wouldn’t presume to say what God would do. But you can know this was a true faith all right, because thirdly, 
iii)	Jonathan's faith produced action, and action that placed him in great personal danger. Where Jonathan led his armour-bearer up to the Philistines' guard-post was a near-vertical cliff. We know where it was; you can go to Israel and see it today. Whether he went up Slippery or Thorny (that’s what the names more or less mean – Bozez means slippery and Seneh means thorny) – which one they went up, we don’t know, but neither sound ideal for your first lesson in rock-climbing. 

And if they dared come up, the Philistines had threatened to teach them a lesson (as the NIV puts it so well). So confident were the Philistines that they couldn’t get up, so impossible a climb was it that no one in their right minds would try it, they’d no doubt gone back to their card playing to while away the hours in a perfectly safe situation. So they were completely taken by surprise and before they’d really woken up to what was going on, twenty of them were dead. Not too many Philistines teaching the Hebrews lessons that day! As a result the whole army began to tremble and God confirmed the victory by sending an earthquake. Very soon it’s the Philistines melting away in fear. 

Where, congregation did Jonathan get this faith from? What motivated him to do this, a very dangerous deed, one that had a very slender chance of success and a much greater chance of taking his life? There is a little note of scorn in his call to his armour-bearer that indicates that Jonathan was motivated by, for my third main point,

3.	ZEAL FOR THE LORD’S HONOUR 
Jonathan is indignant, as every believer ought to be indignant, when the Lord’s people, the Church, are subjugated by unbelievers, because the Church is the Bride of Christ; the Wife of God is the Old Testament picture. 

Back in chapter nine of one Samuel when God told Samuel that tomorrow he was going to reveal to him the man whom he had chosen to anoint as king, he said to Samuel that that king would "save my people from the hand of the Philistines." Whether, at the present time, Jonathan knew that Samuel had just told Saul that his kingdom would be taken away from him and given to another, we don’t know. Jonathan might have known that but he might not. But either way, Jonathan was the king’s son and he took his position seriously. He had been raised to a position of leadership, even though it was now only temporary. He now occupied the position of the heir of the type of Christ, the king of Israel. Even though he would never take it up, and he might even have known that, that was his position and so he would fulfill his duties. His father might have been having a pity-party over there under the pomegranate tree in Migron but Jonathan would not join him. No doubt that was why he didn’t tell his father what he was going to do. 

As heir to the throne of the type of Christ, he was indignant with these unbelievers. “Come,” he says, “Let us go over to this garrison of these uncircumcised scoundrels.” Brothers and sisters, that is a characteristic of all who truly love the Lord. "Lord, who may dwell in your sanctuary? Who may live on your holy hill?” David asks in Psalm fifteen. Among other things, "he in whose eyes a reprobate is despised, but, honours those who fear the Lord." So David wrote and so David, the greatest type of Christ in the Old Testament, did. 

For in Jonathan here, can’t you see David and Goliath? What motivated David to such a fool-hardy escapade as to take on Goliath who towered three feet or more above him? "When all men saw him," we read, "they fled from him and were greatly afraid." "Oh David," said Saul when David goes and presents himself and says, "Listen, I’ll fix that fellow." "You are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him; you’re just a lad. Goliath is a grown man and he’s been a soldier since he was a lad." So Goliath despised him too. 

But David was indignant. He was consumed with zeal for his God. “Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should taunt the armies of the living God,” David says. And we find exactly the same thing in the real king of the Lord’s people, the Lord Jesus Christ. He goes into the temple and he finds merchants and money-changers and he makes a scourge and he drives them out and overthrows their tables and their money goes flying and their doves hither and thither. “Take these things away,” he says. “Stop making my father’s house a den of thieves.” Den of thieves, because they were getting very good prices, I can assure you. "And later the disciples remembered that it was written," in Psalm sixty-nine, "Zeal for your house will consume me." And forever after the Jews hated him and sought to kill him. 

People of God, it is true, we do live in pretty discouraging circumstances so far as our faith is concerned, but so did Jonathan at this point. So did David, looking up at Goliath a little later. And so did the Lord Jesus Christ. He lived his whole life on earth lonely. Nobody really understood him. And he went to the cross absolutely alone. “They smote the shepherd and the sheep were scattered.” 

But zeal for the Lord and for the affairs of his kingdom and for his people consumed all these three men. So motivated were they by that, their circumstances seemed as nothing. And they acted out of their faith and God enabled them to overcome insuperable opposition. Jonathan killed twenty men in a few minutes and so turned the whole situation around for Israel. David killed Goliath with one well-aimed golf ball, except it was made of rock, and the Philistines fled again. And the Lord Jesus Christ did not buckle under that terrible and horrible anticipation of the cross. He went, he suffered, he died and then God raised him up again from the dead with power and displayed him before the world and before the devil and his angels as the risen Lord and the devil’s grip on the nations of the world has been slipping ever since. 

So why are we afraid to talk to our neighbours or our workmates about the Lord? Some of our young people have been recently and they have even been showing an interest and coming to Church; maybe you’ve noticed them. We should be indignant, brothers and sisters, at the state of the Church in the world at present, because it reflects on the honour of our Lord. And the honour of our Lord should drive us to want to get to know God better: just who he is, just how great he is; that the nations of the world are like a drop in the bucket to him; the moon and the stars are the work of his fingers only; that he does his will in heaven above and on the earth below and no-one can gainsay him. 

And when we know God better then perhaps we’ll expect him to do greater things, because he’s a great God. And who is to say, congregation, if we would go out again in faith like Jonathan and David and Jesus, perhaps the Lord would work for us too. "For the Lord is not restrained by many or few;" neither "is his arm shortened that he cannot save." 
Amen.
John Rogers, Reformed Church of the North Shore, 17th October, 2004