"Donkeys & Destiny" - 1 Samuel 9 & Luke 19:28-34 - Dr. Joel Gregory

0:03 Well, bless the Lord, O my soul, and let all who's in me bless his holy name. What an anticipated privilege and a great excitement to me it is to be here at St. Paul's and my dear friend of the year and your beloved and esteemed pastor. God, thank you for the invitation to be here and to join in this Sunday on Palm Sunday with Christians all over the world as we anticipate this holy week to come. I esteem my friendship with your pastor. He said we got acquainted in this city. He's joined me in seminars. We've been friends since then. I was able to be with him in St. Louis at his wonderful pastorate there. I don't think they've forgiven you for taking him away.

0:59 Word I give. Your pastor, to give honor to whom honor is due, is known across this country. in great cities and in small country crossroads. He's a pastor of pastors and a leader of leaders, and you're privileged. You know, honor is not a tip you leave. It's a debt you owe, and I want to bring honor to him. Thank you, Pastor, for inviting me here. If I were to write a title over this Palm Sunday message, I would call it Donkeys and Destiny. I want to invite your attention to two texts this morning that relate to donkeys. One very familiar in a moment. Before that, another text about another donkey that was actually a runaway donkey that led a man to his destiny. It's in 1 Samuel chapter 9 in that history book of God's people. 1 Samuel 9, reading with verse 1.

2:26 There was a man of Benjamin whose name was Kish, son of Abiel, son of Zeror, son of Bacareth, and of Heah, of Benjamite, a man of wealth. He had a son whose name was Saul, a handsome young man. There was not a man among the people of Israel more handsome than he. And he stood head and shoulders above everyone else. Now the donkeys of Kish, Saul's father, had strayed. so Kish told his son Saul take one of the boys with you go and look for the donkeys now he passed through the hill country of Ephraim passed through the land of Shalashah but they did not find them they passed through the land of Sha'alim but they were not there passed through the land of Midjim but they did not find them when they came to the land of Zoph Saul said to the boy who was with him let's turn back or my father will stop worrying about the donkeys and worry about us.

3:35 But he said, there's a man of God in this town. He's a man held in honor. Whatever he says always comes true. Let's go there now. Perhaps he'll tell us about the journey on which we've set out. At the same time, in verse 15, The day before Saul came, the Lord had revealed to Samuel, Tomorrow, about this time, I'll send you in from the land of Benjamin, and you shall anoint him to be ruler over my people Israel. You'll save my people from the hand of the Philistines, for I've seen the suffering of my people. Their outcry has come to me. And thus we read the story of a young man who started out chasing runaway donkeys and instead found his destiny. That's the less known donkey.

4:38 Now, from Luke 19, 28, like a pendant hanging from this story, on that first poem Sunday, Jesus said this. He'd come near to Bethphagie and Bethany at the place called the Mount of Olives. He said to the disciples, saying, Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you'll find tithe there, hope that's never been written, untie it, and bring it here. If anyone asks you, why are you turned high? I can just say, the Lord needs it. Those who were sent departed and found it just as he told them. Please pray with me. Eternal God and our Heavenly Father, as we join with Christians circling this globe and around this planet, to remember the day that the incarnate Son of God, higher than the highest rode into town on that beast low as the lowest.

5:43 May your spirit speak to our heart about those destinies and about our own. In Jesus name we pray and all God's people say amen. When it comes to animals, do we not have different attitudes? The lion is the king of the jungle. Literally in our time, the lion king, the lion so fabled and famous that he gets Broadway shows, movies. A lion honored. Or a bear. A bear may not be honored, but by and large a bear is feared. Or an eagle. Eagle soaring, protected, emblem of the nation, the eagle. Many people even have affection for a dog, don't they?

6:41 Not so much for a cat, I guess. if you feed a dog and care for a dog and love a dog that dog thinks you're God if you feed a cat, love a cat, that cat thinks I'm God But when you say donkey, some of you just laughed. There's something about that sterile offspring of a mare and a mule that makes people laugh. Donkeys just don't get that much respect. Well, we're going to talk about a lesser-known donkey and hang from that a word about a better-known donkey today. Because in this there are two donkeys, two kings, and two destinies. More about the one you don't know about.

7:43 I read an ancestry.com a moment ago of Saul, the son of Kish. Seven generations of this mighty man of the little tribe of Benjamin, the favorite tribe, the smallest tribe, the beloved tribe of Benjamin, and Kish evidently was the best known name in that tribe. The description in Hebrew suggests he was a mighty man, a warrior, a man of strength and of substance. And you find here in this spiritualancestry.com seven generations of the Kish family leading to this young man named Saul. I suppose if they lived in a great manor house, there were oil paintings of some members of the Kish family. I don't know any of the Rockefellers, wish I did. But you know, today there's John D. Rockefeller the Sixth.

8:40 I think the fourth, the fifth, and the sixth are alive. The sixth would be the great, great, great grandson of the man who was the richest man in America up to his time. I know this about the fourth and the fifth and the sixth. They have on their shoulders the weight of a legacy. I wonder if young Saul didn't feel that way. All of those glorious ancestors before him, surely with that kind of patrimony, he had something great ahead of him. But he not only had those kind of ancestors, he had his own endowments. Did you hear? He was the tallest man in Israel. And Israel was a country then of relatively short people, and he was the most handsome person. If they'd had a reality TV show, find Mr. Israel, Saul would have wanted. I don't know if he's kind of like a Denzel or Brad Pitt or somebody.

9:42 He was it. And he was the handsomest. Now, if you're taking notes on this sermon, I want to share something with you very insightful. If you're tall and handsome, it's good. Did you ever understand how George Washington got his picture on a dollar bill on Mount Rushmore, got the capital name after him, the state named after him? It's not because he was a great general. In fact, in 77'6' he almost lost everything. He wound up that way because at 6'2'' tall, at 43 years of age, on a horse, he looked better than anybody else. They said, let's make him general.

10:30 Well, Saul had all of these endowments and entitlements. Now, if you didn't know this story, you would expect that he was going to be sent to do something tremendous. Maybe be a decathlete. Or like Indiana Jones, find the lost ark. Or like LeBron at 20 years and 20 days old. Youngest man in the NBA to get a triple-double. He's going to go conquer the world. you're not ready for what you read. With all of this entitlement and endowment, he has to chase runaway donkeys. That's like a preface without a book, or an overture without an opera. You think you're going into a mansion and you get in the entranceway and you wind up in the outhouse.

11:23 It's just, it's a disappointment. With all of this ability, he's sent on a donkey chase. But not only that, a chase needs to be of value in terms of what you're chasing, and he's sent on a nationwide donkey chase. Uphills, down valleys, day after day chasing these runaway funny animals. And to add to all of that, it's an unsuccessful donkey chase. Thank you. If you're in business, you're familiar with the phrase lost opportunity cost. That means if you're doing one thing, you're not doing something else. So here is this young man with all this ability and endowment and entitlement, losing the opportunity to do something else.

12:19 Until they get to a place called Zuff. We don't know today where Zuff was in Israel, But I can say this, when you get to Zuff, it's tough. When you get to Zuff, you've had enough.

12:39 And that's what happened to Saul. He says, we've been chasing runaway donkeys these days. Now dad's going to get worried about us. Let's go back. It must have been a dedicating thing. In fact, if you read this, he and his friend were broke. In fact, they had about $1.85 in today's money. they'd been chasing donkeys and they were unsuccessful.

13:07 Lost opportunity. I wonder if anybody here listening to me here or beyond here today you had dreams you were going to soar like an eagle but you feel like you're surrounded with turkeys. You wanted to be on the main line, but you've taken a detour to the sideline. You thought you had a destiny, but really, you're on a detour. Could have been anything, but I want you to understand a word from this today. God can take your detours and turn them into your destiny. At the same time, Saul is chasing runaway donkeys.

14:09 Samuel, the spiritual leader of the nation. Samuel, that bridge person leading to the prophets. Samuel, a name that was on every lip in Israel. Verse 15, literally the Hebrew says God dug through his ear. and told him something he didn't want to hear. You see, Samuel was the leader of the anti-king party. He said, God wants to be your king. But finally, the people wore God out. Could I just say something parenthetically?

14:44 You can sometime wear God out and you say, okay, I'm going to let you have what you think you want. Only to find out it's not what you really need. Hear me now, he does that sometimes. Like in other centuries, they used to let little boys who wanted to work in candy shops, they let them have all the candy they wanted the first day until they got sick of candy. God said, all right, you want it? I'll let you have it. So here's Sam, Samuel. I'll call him Sam. He was the head of the anti-candy, but God dug through his ear and said, tomorrow you're going to meet a young man chasing runaway donkeys. I want you to anoint him king. Saul thought he was on a donkey detour, but unknown to him, he was going to be anointed king.

15:45 Sometimes when you think you're chasing donkeys, you're on your way to your destiny. I want to encourage somebody here today. You think you're on an endless detour to nowhere. Oh, no. Well, how does that happen? Well, glad you asked.

16:06 First of all, help can come to you from unexpected people. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Sometimes people who are important in Scripture don't even get a name. This servant who was with him didn't even get a name. He was incognito, anonymous.

16:28 And yet Saul's destiny turned on him. Saul said, Daddy, going to be more worried about us than the donkey? Let's go home. But this nameless, incognito young man said, no, listen. I've heard there's a man of God in these parts. Let's see what he knows about runaway donkeys. Here's where I wish I could sit down at your kitchen table of a cup of coffee and share with you from my own life what God has done with people unknown to me who showed up just in time and changed my life. Can I just tell you one personal story?

17:15 I'd been pastor of one of the largest, richest churches in America. And of my own volition, because God told me to, walked away. I didn't know what was next. And a man kept calling me. His name was Chandler Peoples from Ringgold, Georgia. He said, I'm a box manufacturer. I make big boxes. He did. He's a big guy. He made big boxes for big stuff.

17:39 And Pastor, he kept calling me, and I was a little bit paranoid in that time of transition. I didn't know what this man wanted. I didn't know him. I'd never met him. And after many times of begging me, I said, well, I'll meet you out at DFW Airport. I figured that was a safe place to meet somebody. And he got off a Delta jet, walked up to me and said, I'm Chandler Peoples. I said, hello. And he said, you don't know me. And I said, that's right. He said several years ago when I was going through both a divorce and the loss of my business, I had a stroke. He wasn't an old man at all. And he said all night long, I used to listen to your cassette tapes. And it got me through that triple tragedy. I've rebuilt a business.

18:34 I have a large box company now. And God told me to help you in this transition in your ministry. He wanted me back. He's a Presbyterian. He became one of my closest friends, and in some of the toughest days of my life, this man who heard me preach on cassette tapes became a bridge to my destiny. Now, come close to me. Come close to me out there in your future. Somebody that you don't even know. will build a bridge to your destiny. It may be a roommate in university. It may be somebody across the hall in a dormitory. It may be somebody you sit next to on transportation and that person, keep your eye open. God has somebody to bridge you. Oh, I could go and give testimony, but let me say this. Divine timing will get you from detours and donkeys to destiny.

19:45 Our God is a God of pre-arrangements. And just as it was with Saul and Samuel, neither of them knowing what God had said to the other, God was pre-arranging. I always wanted to be a good chess player. I never got any better than moving a pawn or a knight. I always wanted to be good, but I found out reading about chess masters, those that win global matches. When you make your first move, they're already able to think through it to the very last move and checkmate. Now listen, if on a lower, lesser, lighter level, a mere human chess master can do that, on a higher, holier, heavier level, how many moves is God ahead?

20:46 When you zig, God already zagged. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. He's ahead of your game. You know, I don't have time to go into this, but if you counted up the things that had to happen in God's timing for the donkey chasing Saul to run into Samuel and anoint him, if you counted, there are 13 things, any one of which hadn't happened, they wouldn't have met. Yeah, man. First of all, the donkeys didn't have to run away. They could have been stay-at-home donkeys. Oh, God. Kish was a rich man.

21:39 He didn't have to go chase donkeys. Right, right. Saul didn't have to go. He had other brothers, other siblings. Right. First of all, he could have found the donkeys day one and gone home, and he wouldn't have met Samuel. Right. You can go on through this chapter. The young ladies who come down from the hill at Zuff to tell Saul that the prophet is there. He meets them at just the right time when the prophet Samuel is there ready to have church. You can count it 13 things. Let me give you an illustration of this, could I? They tell me that in a deck of cards, there are 52 cards. They told me that. I think it's a church member somebody told me that if you perfectly shuffle those cards what do you think the odds are that you could call the card before you dealt it 13 cards what are the odds two spades 13 cards and you call them you know what the odds are One out of 635 billion.

22:52 It wouldn't be an accident, would it? If you could call those cards in that order, there'd be something behind it. If you believe that was an accident, you'd think a printing plant blew up and encyclopedias fell out of the sky. God was arranging every detail. to get Saul and Samuel together so Saul would stop chasing donkeys and meet his destiny.

23:28 Now let me say this. God knows the details of your life as if you were the only person on this planet. Don't forget that. It doesn't strain his omniscience. He doesn't fall off his throne trying to keep up with the details of your life. And he doesn't read your life like an Agatha Christie or John Grisham novel. He knows the last page from the first. And he is in the business of making pre-arrangements in your life. Now let me hand you something else good. That doesn't depend on you. It depends on God. He can dig through the ear of the national religious leader who didn't even want a king. Turn him around and turn him into the head of the king party.

24:30 And he anoints Saul as king. God is indeed God all by himself. You know, I've been up and I've been down. I've been level with the ground. I started preaching when I was 16 years old. And it's been a hard 30 years.

24:53 I wish. I wish. I wish. I'll let you guess. But I've been preaching. And I've been up and down and level with the ground. And you know something I've learned, church? don't try to force any doors open that God doesn't want to open.

25:18 He's the one that opens and no man closes and the one who closes and no man opens. Pastor, I was talking to a friend, you'd know his name. He was been a famous national evangelist. He'd had some ups and downs. And I said to him, Bob, I said, I, I've never forced a door open. And he said, well, Joel, I put some WD-40 on the hinges. No, I've learned don't even put WD-40 on the hinges. he can get you where he wants to can I take another page out of my life's book a friend of your pastor and of mine Reverend Dr. Joe Carter of the New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, New Jersey I didn't know him I used it one time in my life nearly 30 years ago being preaching and publishing and I had to go to New York City over the month to meet with people in the publishing world the late one night. My plane was hours late at Newark Liberty Airport. I landed late. Oh, I was tired and hungry. I grabbed my grip, did something I've never done before. After church, I went to the cab line, and I told the cab driver, take me to the closest hotel. That's not the smartest thing I ever said, but he did. We went around the runway to an old Ramada Inn. He said, here it is.

26:46 I got out, went up and said, do you have a room? They said, well, we have one room. Thank you. Then I looked over in a grill, two or three in the morning, they were serving something. Waterman sat down by a man, eating chicken and rice. I was hungry. Out of the back of that came a voice, Dr. Gregory.

27:07 Well, my first impulse was to put my hands on it. It was Newark. And a tall, handsome, African-American man walked up to me and said, I'm Joe Carter. And I said, I'm Joel Gregory. And he said, I'm surprised to see you here. And I was thinking, he's not half as surprised as I am. But listen to this. He said, I just finished reading your autobiography today. and he said, I wouldn't even know what you look like other than the picture on that book jacket.

27:54 And he said, I'm pastor at New Hope Missionary Baptist Church on 106 Sussex in Newark. And he said, I don't think this is an accident. Since that time, he's become closest of friends. We've worked together on issues, on justice, on civil rights. he's on my ministry board, all because of divine timing. A plane that could have been an hour earlier, an hour late. Oh, incidentally, he told me also, he said, did you get a room? He said, I got the last room. And he said, well, that's interesting. I was waiting for a preacher whose plane was delayed, and I just turned that room back in. God is a God. Let him do it. Here's Moses, 80 years old.

28:52 On his business card, there were two lines. Forty years, assistant shepherd. Forty years, prince in Egypt. Parked in the backside of nowhere, God set that asbestos bush on fire. Let God do it. Here's Joseph in prison. A knock comes on the door. God prearranged it. Here's Amos out there growing sycamore fruit, raising sheep, and God prearranged it. But that leads me to this Sunday, Palm Sunday. There are two kings, two donkeys, and two destinies. In the first instance, there was a runaway donkey.

30:02 But the world today, billion people, will pause to think about a prearranged donkey. In this strange little story, Jesus tells two disciples. They're at Bethany. He was at the home of Mary Martha Lazarus. You go over to the next town, Bethphagia, it means house of figs, and you're going to find a donkey tied up. Now, just because you're going to look like donkey thieves, you tell them when they ask you why you're taking that donkey. With the mastonization. They say, oh yes, take it.

30:58 Now let me tell you this. Not just in 1 Samuel 9, or not just in Luke 19, but all the time. God is a God of mysterious prearrangements. Any reader of the gospel is wondering, how did they know that? We don't know how they knew that. And you don't know how God is prearranging things in your life. They will be just as much a mystery as it was to those two disciples who found that donkey tied up. But this is also a story of two kings. Saul, if you know his story. tall, handsome, gifted, entitled, endowed. And yet shortly after he began, his trajectory was not up, but down.

31:58 Oh my. A disobedience. Even visiting a witch in the cave of Endor when he was old man, calling up the same Samuel who anointed him out from the life beyond. It's a king who was an unworthy king. But oh, the king on that donkey palm Sunday.

32:25 Oh, the trajectory of that king when he was born. The astrologers came and said, where's he who's born? King of the Jews. Pilate would ask him, are you a king? And on that cross, on Good Friday to come this week, they had in three language, Jesus of Nazareth. king of the Jews Latin for the legal language Greek for the philosopher's language Hebrew for the language of Revelation Jesus king of Jews and if you read the end of the book it's going to say he's king of kings Lord of Lord and different destinies. We read the name of Saul today with some degree of sadness as the king who wasn't worthy of being a king.

33:21 But this week, all over this planet, people will sing the praises. Listen, of the Son of God, member of the Holy Trinity, God incarnate, higher than the highest, who rode on that beast, lowest the lowest, that carried him to his destiny as the burden-bearing beast,

33:51 bearing a burden-bearing Savior. And that's where you come into this story. the Son of God, God incarnate, member of the Holy Trinity,

34:20 riding a donkey into Jerusalem, lower than the lowest, humbler than the humblest, for you. And just as that donkey bore him to Jerusalem, he in his own body bore your sins on the tree. Now, it may be, I believe, for one somebody, today is a divine prearrangement. if he could prearrange a runaway donkey and a prophet like Samuel, if he could prearrange for that donkey to be tied up at Bethphage, for somebody this day, you have a divine prearrangement.

35:24 It may be this, like Saul, you seem to be on a path of discouragement. detour, sidelined, off the main track and on a side track. You may not even know how you got there, but you know that's your biography right now. In a moment, in a moment of decision, you can come back to the God who specializes in bringing people off detours and putting them back on their destiny. It may be that you're here today and you need a burden-bearing, sinless Savior. He made him to be sin who knew no sin, that you might be the very righteousness of God in him.

36:22 I want to tell you both then and now, he can lead from donkeys to destiny. And for somebody, this is a prearranged moment. I want us to bow our heads in prayer and in a moment in the tradition of this house and in your own way there'll be a moment to look at your destiny Lord eternal God our triune God Father, Son, and Spirit faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God I plead with you now you said if we being evil know how to give good gifts to our children how much more will you give the Holy Spirit to those who ask I pray now that your spirit would visit with somebody here, even if it's one somebody.

37:27 They might know it's no accident, it's destiny that they're here this morning. Lord, bring the wayward, wandering person back. give guidance to the lost and save those who need to be rescued.