This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

Welcome to day three together of our seventh week of walking through 1st and 2nd
Samuel. We happen to be at 2nd Samuel chapter 7 today, and in this chapter we
learn what to do when God says no. What do you do when you have this great
dream?

What do you do when you want this great thing? And it's a godly thing. It's not
an evil thing.

It's not a selfish thing. It's a godly thing, and you ask God to do it and you
seek for it to happen. It might be a relationship.

It might be a ministry. It might be something for one of your kids. It might be
something that you've been dreaming of for a long time or the dream has been
more recent in your life, but somehow you know that God has said no.

He has allowed someone else to do it, or He has said no to you doing it. What do
you do when that happens? We learn what to do from David in this chapter.

Let me share with you what happened. It's in 2nd Samuel chapter 7. Let's start
in verse 1.

Let me read for you what happened. "When King David was settled in his palace
and the Lord had given him rest from all the surrounding enemies, the king
summoned Nathan the prophet. 'Look,' David said, 'I am living in a beautiful
cedar palace, but the ark of God is out there in a tent.

' Nathan replied to the king, 'Go ahead and do whatever you have in mind, for
the Lord is with you. ' At that same night, the Lord said to Nathan, 'Go and
tell my servant David this is what the Lord has declared. Are you the one to
build a house for me to live in?

I have never lived in a house. From the day I brought the Israelites out of
Egypt until this very day, I have always moved from one place to another with a
tent and a tabernacle as my dwelling. '" Then down in verse 8, "Now go and say
to my servant David, 'This is what the Lord of heaven's armies has declared.

I took you from tending sheep in the pasture and selected you to be the leader
of my people Israel. I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have
destroyed all your enemies before your eyes. Now I will make your name as famous
as anyone who ever lived on the earth, and I will provide a homeland for my
people Israel, planting them in a secure place where they will never be
disturbed.

Evil nations won't oppress them as they have done in the past, starting from the
time I appointed judges to rule my people Israel, and I will give you rest from
all your enemies. Furthermore, the Lord declares that He will make a house for
you, a dynasty of kings. For when you die and are buried with your ancestors, I
will raise up one of your descendants, your own offspring, and I will make His
kingdom strong.

He is the one who will build a house, a temple, for my name, and I will secure
His royal throne forever. I will be His father, and He will be my son. If He
sins, I will correct and discipline Him with the rod, like any father would do.

But my favor will not be taken from Him as I took it from Saul, whom I removed
from your sight. Your house and your kingdom will continue before me for all
time, and your throne will be secure forever. So Nathan went back to David, and
he told him everything the Lord had said in this vision.

So God clearly says no to David. He says, "You're not going to do it. Your son's
going to do it.

Solomon's going to be the one who's going to build the house for me, the temple
for me, and he does become the one. " As we walk through, we're going to find
out he does become the one who builds this temple for God. What do you do?

What do you do when God says no? This is one of David's great dreams, to build a
temple for God. He felt embarrassed that he lived in a palace, a fine palace,
and God's ark was living in a tent.

What do you do when God says no to something you want to do? What do you do when
you look back on your life and you think, "Why did God say no there? Why didn't
He allow me to do that?

" Four things that we learn from David. Number one, you remember that God is
sovereign. Remember that God is sovereign.

Verse 18, "Then King David went in and sat before the Lord, and he prayed, 'Who
am I, O sovereign Lord? And what is my family that you have brought me this far?
' And now, sovereign Lord, in addition to everything else, you speak of giving
your servant a lasting dynasty?

Do you deal with everyone this way, O sovereign Lord? What more can I say to
you? You know what your servant is really like, sovereign Lord.

Because of your promise and according to your will, you have done all these
great things that have made them known to your servant. " Now you might have
picked up as I read through that, David keeps saying sovereign Lord. He's
reminding himself as he prays.

In fact, seven times in this short prayer in this chapter, he says sovereign
Lord. Sovereign means God's in charge. Sovereign means God gets to make the
decisions.

Now David is reminding himself that because God is sovereign, God can be
trusted. You may think, wait a minute, it wasn't God who said no to me. It was
people who said no to me.

Isn't that different? In a way it's not, because the truth of the matter is, God
is sovereign. And there is no person who can say no when God wants to say yes.

There is no person who can say no when God wants to say yes. So God allowed that
for some reason. And he didn't go around that for some reason.

And he's allowed someone else to do it for some reason. I don't know the reasons
why. I may never, you may never know the reasons why.

But I do know that the sovereign Lord has allowed it. And David reminds himself,
I'm not sovereign. I'm not in charge.

God's in charge. When God says no, one of the things you remind yourself is he's
the sovereign Lord. He's the one who's in charge.

And as you remind yourself of that, you're not just saying he's the one who's in
control. You're saying he is the one who can be trusted. You remind yourself
that God is sovereign.

Second thing you do is you remember that you are God's servant. You might have
noticed in the beginning of the prayer I just read, David kept saying, God, you
are sovereign. I am servant.

I am servant. You are sovereign. You are sovereign.

I am servant. It's just like ping pong going back and forth, back and forth
between sovereign and servant. Those are the two words you hang on to when God
says no.

In verse 25, he prays, and now, oh, Lord God, I am your servant. Do as you have
promised concerning me and my family. Confirm it as a promise that will last
forever.

God's not serving us. He's not there to meet our needs and fulfill our dreams.
We're serving him.

And by the way, as we serve him, it does meet our needs. It does fulfill our
dreams. But if you get those things out of order, if you think God is serving
you to meet your needs and fulfill your dreams, instead of realizing you serve
him and as you serve him, it does meet your needs, it does fulfill deeper dreams
than you ever realized you have, you get those out of order, all of life gets
messed up.

God, you are sovereign. God, I am your servant. Third thing that David teaches
us is you praise God.

You praise God for who he is. You praise God for what he's done. You praise God
for what he's doing.

Listen in verse 22, how great you are, oh, sovereign Lord. There's no one like
you. We have never, ever heard of another God like you.

What other nation on earth is like your people Israel? What other nation, oh,
God, have you redeemed from slavery to be your own people? You made a great name
for yourself when you redeemed your people from Egypt.

You performed awesome miracles and drove out the nations and gods that stood in
their way. You made Israel your very own people forever. And you, oh, God, you,
oh, Lord, became their God.

David prays and he says, there's no one like you. So when God says no, don't
forget that. There's no one like God.

There's nowhere else to turn. David reminds himself, we're redeemed from
slavery. When God says no, don't forget that.

He's met the number one need in your life. Now, for them, it was slavery from
Egypt, for us, through the death of Jesus, it's slavery to sin. He is redeemed.

He set us free from sin to be able to live in his presence forever. We are made
your own people forever. Don't forget that.

Don't forget eternity. When God says no, keep your eyes on forever, forever.
You'll notice several times in this prayer, God brings David back and David's
brought back to this idea of what God's doing in forever, not just in now.

When God says no, we want to focus on the now. But when God says no, we need to
get our eyes on the forever, on God and who he is. One of the ways to do that,
obviously, is to praise.

You praise God for who he is, what he's done, what he's doing. And then the
fourth thing you do, this may seem obvious, but it's one of the hardest to do,
is you focus on what God has said yes to. Now, that's hard for us.

When we hear a no, all we can remember is the no. All we can focus on is the no.
For when we're little kids, there can be 50 toys to play with, but one crystal
vase up on a shelf, no, don't touch that, a little kid goes for that crystal
vase first of all.

Why would they want the crystal vase? They can't play with it because it's a no.
We tend to focus on the no in life.

But instead, by faith, you choose to focus on what God has said yes to. Verse
27, "O Lord of heaven's armies, God of Israel, I've been bold enough to pray
this prayer to you because you have revealed all this to your servant, saying,
'I will build a house for you, a dynasty of kings. For you are God, O Sovereign
Lord.

Your words are truth, and you have promised these good things to your servant.
And now may it please you to bless the house of your servant so that it may
continue forever before you, for you have spoken. And when you grant a blessing
to your servant, O Sovereign Lord, it is an eternal blessing.

" So David turns his eyes from the no that God said, the no about building the
temple, to the yes that God said, the yes about building his family, building
his dynasty, building his kingdom in ways that he could not see. And you and I
need to do the same thing. When God has said no, it's easy to get stuck on the
no.

But you turn your eyes from the no, and you focus instead on where has God said
yes? Where has God used you? Where is God using you?

What prayer can you pray? What person can you share with? Where is God saying
yes?

God does not tell David why he's saying no here. Later, he's going to tell him
it's because he doesn't want a warrior building his house but a king of peace.
But for a time, the answer is no, and David doesn't know why.

As I look at life, some of the things that God has said no to in my life, I
still don't know why he said no. And if I had to go back and rewind, I would
have said yes. I still think it might have been better to say yes, but I trust
him.

I trust him. I probably never will know why God said no to certain things, but I
do know I can trust God. And if he said no, there was a reason.

There was something I would have gotten into that I didn't know I would have
gotten into that would have taken me away from his will. There's something I
would not have done that was his will because I was doing that thing. I don't
know.

I could drive myself crazy trying to figure it out, but I don't have to try to
figure because I can trust him and I can focus on what he said yes to in my
life. As we pray today, just take a moment to pray together. Just give the no's
in your life to God.

The times when he said no, maybe for the first time, say, God, I don't
understand why, but I do recognize that you are sovereign and I do realize I am
your servant and I praise you for who you are. I praise you for what you're
doing. Lord, I want to be the kind of person that focuses on what you said yes
to, that spends the rest of my life living in your yes rather than worried about
the no that came into my life.

That's where I want to live, Lord. So I ask that you help me to live there by
the grace and power of Jesus. In your name I pray.

Amen. Tomorrow, we're going to look together at the compassion of David.