It's good to have each one of you here tonight. Praise the Lord for a good day. It's a good day to be in the house of God. We've got one copy left of the scripture notes up here, if anybody didn't get one. So. Anyway, we've been working our way through 2 Samuel. We've arrived at 2 Samuel 23. We covered David's last words, verses one to seven. We are now going to look at these mighty men of war. There's three of them listed here tonight. And we'll be looking at verses eight to 14. And so, as we dig into this tonight, I hope that it'll challenge you some. I've enjoyed looking at it, praying over it, pleading God to give me some answers and a few things like that. And so, it's important that we study men like this. We have all kinds of books written today about how to do business, business books on success, everything you can think of. I mean, it's gobs of them. But one of the best places to find some good information on things is just the word of God. So what I want to do tonight to make this practical for us is I'm gonna give you a little bit of information, but then we're gonna talk about what's common amongst these men. And then we're gonna talk about something about the Philistines. What's common with those Philistines? I get amazed at them. I honestly do. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. And then we'll get started, and I'll share with you why I get amazed at the Philistines, all right? Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, as we come to you right now in the name of Jesus, dear God, forgive us of our sins. Have mercy upon us. And then, Father, we thank you that we need to just come to you and, Lord, if we confess it, forsake it, we'll find mercy. I thank you, Lord, that your word says that if we confess our sins, that you're faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all immoralities. We thank you for that. And so now, Father, I pray And then while we're here right now, I pray for those that are here, God, that they might hear the word of God. Open their hearing, Lord, that they might hear. And then, Father, I pray that you'd just open our understanding that we might understand the scriptures. And then, Father, I pray for a felling of the Holy Spirit, that God did give all of us power in service and power over sin. And so now Father, I ask at the name of Jesus that you'd bless this to the hearers tonight. I ask it in Jesus' name and for his sake, amen. All right, 2 Samuel 23, eight to 14. Let's talk about the first mighty man that belonged to David here. These be the names of the mighty men whom David had. The Taqmanite that sat in the seat chief among the captains. The same was Adino the Eznite. That's his real name. He lift up his spear against 800 whom he slew at one time. Now, this guy's interesting. The word tagmanite means skillful. But there's something about it. I'm digging around looking at all these definitions of the name Adeno. What's it mean? What's it mean? I kept digging around in it. So I grabbed hold of this one Hebrew book and I looked at it and I got to admit to all of you, I got a laugh out of it. Adeno meant delicate. And I thought, this dude just killed 800 dudes with a spear. I don't know how delicate he was. But then I thought about it. The Bible says that when the Lord calls men, not many mighty, not many noble, so on and so forth, God calls people that have to be totally dependent upon God. And I was thinking about here's little David and there's big Goliath. And lo and behold, what do you find? Who is it that goes out and kills Goliath? It's not Saul, whose head and shoulders above everybody else, is it? It's not them other brothers of David who were soldiers. that went out and did it, right? Here comes this little, ruddy teenager. And lo and behold, he's the one that killed Goliath. So when I looked at this, and it said that Dino the Esnate, and then it had that word, Dino, delicate, I thought to myself, you know, I bet you, buddy, if you saw that person, You'd think, why, he don't look bad. He might be skillful, but does it look that way with him? No, not at all. You see, this young guy, What'd he look like? He was delicate. He didn't look like the type of guy that'd go out and do all that. So the first thing to come to my mind is this. God. When God wants you to do something, the last thing you need to look at is your own abilities. Because God took an ordinary man and made a Samson out of him. And God took an ordinary man and gave him the wisdom of Solomon. God took these ordinary men and turned them into heroes. You see, what we find here, this man had walked into a target rich environment. And lo and behold, he took a spear against 800 whom he slew at one time. That was a whole lot of killing going on with a spear, wasn't it? So now listen, let's talk about something that's common amongst all three of them. First of all, all three of these men had to be willing to do something alone. All three of them. They had to be willing to step out to do something alone. The second thing that's common amongst all three of them is that all three of them were greatly outnumbered. All three of them was greatly outnumbered. The third thing that I see that was common amongst them was this. Go, God will enable you. Go, God will enable you. Now, let's begin looking at this. What's common in the lives of these people needs to be common in our lives. The heroes of God have stood alone. Many of them that we could read about, whether it be in the Word of God or in the history book. We don't read about usually a group. We read about one woman or one man. And so I realized this. There's got to be something in your life that's valuable enough to you that you'd give your life for it. There's something in your life that's got to be so sustainable to you that you're willing to step out by faith to make a stand for that which is right for your side, whatever it is. You see, what you find, these men stood alone. This first man, when he took on this project of fighting the 800 with a spear, He was outnumbered. I don't know if you folks realize it or not, but when you're using a physical weapon, it takes physical endurance. And the average human does not have the physical endurance to do that. That's why I say this, God, can take the meekest of men and turn them into a Moses. God can take the most delicate man, like a Dino, and turn him into a tremendous leader of heroes. God has the ability to do that. But there's one thing here Then we have the second one. Then we'll talk about the third one. First of all, this man was willing to stand alone. He lift up his spear against 800 of them. He slew at one time. You see, ladies and gentlemen, there's going to be some times when you can trust your ability. There's other times you're going to step out and trust God's ability. And the reality of it is this. What you find is when God goes to work and starts using you, you'll find out that you'll be willing to stand alone. This afternoon, I was listening to some testimonies about men and how salvation changed them. On Sermon Audio, there's an old, there's some sermons on there by an old Irish guy named Michelson. And he was an old scoundrel. He was sitting at his table, now get this. He was sitting at his table and he looked at his wife and said, God just saved me. Now people had witnessed to him and other things like that, but he was terrified of talking to men and women about their souls. But he told her, he said, God just saved me. Now he's in a dilemma. He's got to go talk to the preacher. And so one thing led to another. And he was praying about this thing, praying about it, praying about it. And then he had to admit something else. He said, you know, God has taken away my fear of man. And old Michelson become a great preacher in that area of the world. He wasn't afraid of man no more. You see, when you step out alone and you're totally outnumbered, the thing that'll stop you is fear. But if you just look at them and say, hey, this is a target-rich environment, it'll change everything. alone, outnumbered. But God says, go, and I will enable you. Go, and I will enable you. Look at what he did when he was willing to stand alone in seemingly a totally, totally overcoming situation, totally outnumbered. But look at what he did. Go, and I'll enable you. That's what God does for men and women. That's how God makes heroes. Let's move to the second one, verse nine. And after him was Eleazar, the son of Dodo, the Hoahite, one of the three mighty men with David, when they defied the Philistines that were there, gathered together to battle, and the men of Israel were gone away. Wow, verse 10. And he arose and smote the Philistines until his hand was weary and his hand clave unto the sword. And the Lord brought a great victory that day and the people returned after him only to spoil. You see, ladies and gentlemen, there's something about heroes. When everybody else leaves, the heroes stay. What is it now? What's that first thing that's common amongst them? They're alone. Look at him now. It said, these mighty men, when they defied the Philistines that were gathered together to battle, and the men of Israel were gone away. Man, they went somewhere else. Now he's left alone and he's got to make the decision. Either he's gonna leave or he's gonna stand and fight. He's outnumbered, but the passage of scripture gives it away. The Lord wrought a great victory that day. The Lord did it. Now, there's a little bit of information I need to give you. One thing about it, these men of God like this, they didn't know what God was going to do. Eliezer right here, he didn't know that God was going to empower him. He didn't have all this inside information up front. Everybody else left and he had the heart, God put it in his heart to stay and fight. You know that? You see, ladies and gentlemen, that's why. We might be standing alone But know this, one plus God is a majority. We might be alone and look at the odds and we're totally outnumbered. But one plus God is a majority. That's why it was a sin for David to number Israel. Joab said, why do you want to number Israel? God will multiply us like crazy, inability. You see, that's what God does. That's what Joab was saying. Don't worry about that. Don't worry about that. We might be outnumbered 10 to 1, but God will make one of our men worth 12 of theirs. You see, what we find is this. When it comes to doing the things of God, God gives us abilities. God will give us wisdom. God will give us understanding. God will give us everything we need. And look at this. We find that everybody went away and the men of Israel were gone away. Wow. Well, what am I gonna do? Am I gonna stay here or go with them? What's gonna happen? Well, verse 10, and he arose and smote the Philistines until his hand was weary and his hand clave unto the sword. Now just think about this. Physical weapons require physical ability. God had enabled him to keep using that sword. His hand might have claved to it, but what about his arm? My goodness. I mean, God made it possible for him to continue to fight. So what I see here is this, he arose. He arose. Doesn't say they arose, it said he arose. He arose. You see, ladies and gentlemen, talk about encouragement. Boy, you can find it in these men, can't you? Everybody else left. And then you find him. Live or die, sink or swim, I'm not leaving. I'm gonna go out here and fight. And we'll see what happens. I'm gonna go out here and fight and we'll see what happens. And it says, and the Lord wrought a great victory that day. The Lord did it. But guess what? When I look at that, everybody else left. There was one man alone, outnumbered. And what does he do when everybody else left? He arose. He didn't run. And that's the man that God used. That's the man that God helped. That's the man that God enabled. Just shrink the people that left. Look what they lost out on. the experience of having God multiply their ability for the purpose of a victory. Never. You say, well, everybody else is left. What's that got to do with it? You might say I'm outnumbered. No, you're not. One plus God's a majority. The reality of it is this. Is there something in your life that'll keep you from running? Is there something in your life that'll allow you to stand alone? When you commit yourself to God, Hebrews 12 verse 4 stays in my mind 24-7. Ye have not yet. What's it say? Ye have not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin. You see, in other words, there's a whole bunch of people that fought against sin. They shed blood because of it. The reality of it is this. Anybody can run, but not everybody can stand. I was listening this afternoon and trying to feed my soul some. This preacher was talking about him having a prayer meeting at the church. And he said they were just praying for the power of God to be on them and God to use them. He said the greatest praying happened amongst the teenagers. He said, we had young men there, 10 to 17 years old. He said, you should have heard him pray. He said, man, they prayed with tears. They prayed with power. He said, and then they got up to serve God. When I read about this and he arose, He looked at the odds. What's that? I might die in the process, but I'm not running. Everybody else might've gone away, but I'm not leaving. These people, these Philistines are the enemies of God. They hate God, God's house, God's people, anything marked with God on it. And I'm not running from that type of person. If they gonna try to kill me, I'll kill them, but I'll fight to the end. But I'm not gonna give them free reign as long as I'm alive. And he arose and smote the Philistines. until his hand was weary and his hand clave unto the sword. And the Lord brought a great victory that day." Look at this. The people returned after him only to spoil. In other words, to pick up the goods. He done such a good job of killing everybody and everything. Then the people come back to pick up the stuff. Listen, let them have the stuff. Let them have the stuff. I'd rather be the one that was used of God to bring the victory than I would be the coward that come back to pick up the stuff. When God makes warriors out of boys and men, they don't look at the stuff. They rejoice in the victory. The people returned after him only to spoil. A lot of times we want to say, well, where are the rest of them at? Why didn't somebody else come and help me? He didn't do that. He just got up, went out, done his killing. And those people come back, he says, you won't take it. Because he knows something. You know what he knows? That he can carry around with him for the rest of his life, and I'm gonna prove something to you here in just a minute. He experienced God in a way that those cowards will never experience. He experienced the enabling of God to do something that those people that come back and got the spoil will never experience. He experienced something that brought confidence to his soul. I'll show you that in just a minute. Now let's go to verse 11. So we talk about the tachomite, Adeno, the Esnite. Then we talk about Eleazar, the son of Dodo, the Hoite. And now we're gonna talk about Shema, the son of Agi, the Hararite. The word hararite means a mountaineer. He lived in the mountains around Israel. And after it was Shammah, the son of Ageh, the hararite, and the Philistines were gathered together into a troop. There was a piece of ground full of lentils, that's beans. And the people fled from the Philistines. Sound familiar? That's what we just read, huh? But he stood. They ran, he didn't. They fled, he didn't. But he stood in the midst of the ground and defended it and slew the Philistines and the Lord wrought a great victory. Here we go again. Listen, one thing about God's men when they stand alone that's always amazed me, when you look at stuff like this, you don't find them criticizing the people that run. You know that? Let them run. The other thing is this. as they just tend to business. Watch what he does now. And so the people fled from the Philistines, but he stood in the midst of the ground and defended it. You see, each one of these three men There was something there that was so valuable to them that they were not going to run. These three men were willing to stand alone when everybody else left. These three men were way outnumbered. But these three men experienced the enabling ability of God to get to victory. So it says of Shammah, the son of Agi, The people fled from the Philistines, verse 12, but he stood in the midst of the ground. Second Samuel 23, 12. But he stood in the midst of the ground and defended it. And the Philistines, and slew the Philistines, and the Lord brought a great victory that day. Now, when we get over in Chronicles chapter 11, when all this is repeated, it's gonna give us some numbers, and that gets interesting. But still, I want you to see something, and that's this. What you find, heroes do not do what everybody else does. When other people run, the hero will stay. When other people throw down their stuff and not fight, take off, he'll pick up his weapon and fight. The hero doesn't look at how he's outnumbered. These heroes made their stand and the Lord helped them. This man, look what it says, and he stood in the midst. In other words, God was going to enable him to fight right where he stood. You see, ladies and gentlemen, there's one thing about you and me trusting God. We might have to stand alone or we might be greatly outnumbered. We might look around and say, wow, look at what we're fighting against. But then comes God. If God wants to, he can use the hornets to run them off. If God wants to, he can cause the sun to cook their brains. If God wants to, he can cause it to rain and cause their church to bog down in the mud. If God wants to, he can part the Red Sea and then bring it all back together and drown them all. The reality of it is this. It takes somebody that's going to say, dear God, I'm not going to run. Let the rest of them run. I'm going to stand here and fight. I'm not going to give these Philistines free reign. I'm going to fight. Live or die, sink or swim, I'm going to fight. And the rest is up to the Lord. Is there anything in your life that's so valuable to you that if everybody else took off running, You stand and fight? You might be outnumbered. What's that got to do with it? I want you to know God is an enabler to the people of God. God is an enabler. Listen. You surrender your life to the Lord Jesus Christ, you'll find out he will enable you. Like I've said, I've met people that stuttered so bad, terrible. But boy, when they surrendered their life to preach, all of a sudden they had the ability to get up and preach, not stutter a lick. God has this way. of assisting that one alone person. Hey Moses, what you gonna do? Well, Moses on the other side of the desert now, isn't he? And then all of a sudden there's a burning bush. Take off your shoes, you're on holy ground. And Moses said, I can't talk real good, and God said, who made your mouth? You see, God does not accept excuses. You might say, well, I can't see too good, and God'll say, who made your eyes? You might say, I can't hear too good, and God'll say, who made your ears? You might say, like Moses, I can't talk too good, and God'll say, who made your mouth? You might say, I'm a coward at heart, and God will say, who made your heart? You see, what we realized when I started looking at this, but he stood in the midst of the ground and defended it. You want to surprise some people? You surprise them greatly when they think you're going to run and you don't. That really shocks some people. Listen, you might be alone or you might be outnumbered. Let everybody else run. But all you have to do in your lifetime, one time in your life, once you experience the help of God in your life, one time, not even two, one time, you'll want it again for the rest of your life. There's just something about the power of God. Boy, once it settles in on you, you'll want it for the rest of your life. God, do it again. God, do it again. God, do it again. I don't care if I have to fight a thousand Philistines. God, do it again. The reality of it, ladies and gentlemen, is simply this. All three were alone. All three were outnumbered. All three done amazing things with physical weapons, which took physical strength and they had the physical strength to use the physical weapons all the way to victory. Only God can do that. Don't run, trust God. Now let's look at verse 13 and 14. Verse 13, and three of the 30 chief went down and came to David in the harvest time unto the cave of Adullam, and the troop of the Philistines pitched in the valley of Rephim. Verse 14, and David was then in an hold. When you look at the hold, the hold was a place where David would go to be safe and Saul would go to be safe. These men back then would go to be safe. So this place was a cave of a dulum. In other words, there was only one way in and it was sitting in a place where it'd be very, very, very, very hard for anybody to take it. That was the hold. And the garrison of the Philistines was then in Bethlehem. Bethlehem, that's David's hometown. Wow. In other words, David was a displaced person at this point. David was a displaced king. That's why next week when we start looking at the rest of this, David starts reminiscing about some water. He's remembering how things used to be. He reminisces about it. But there's something about this. You say, well, the Philistines were in Bethlehem. They have a thing, it's called a nuisance victory. In other words, it's a short-term victory that's just a nuisance. Because you know you're fixing to go back and take it back. It's just a short-term victory. It's a nuisance victory. And these Philistines were in Bethlehem. Now how long were they gonna stay there? Until God said, time for you boys to go. You see, what I find is this. When I think of the Philistines, now listen to me. Number one, it seems like to me that if you were a leader of the Philistine army, at some point you'd have enough sense to say, you know, this ain't working out too good. Every time we go up against them, whether it be a mass or just one of them, man, they kill thousands of us. But you see, Philistines don't stop. Philistines have a blind hatred. And remember this, a blind hatred It has one attribute, only one, but that one attribute is worth thousands of dollars. That one attribute is this, persistence. You see, blind hate only sees one thing, the demise of what they hate. You might say, well, you've lost just about all your army. They don't care. They hate God's people to the point they'll just keep on fighting. That's it. They're not going to stop. You see, blind hatred has persistence. And that's what you find in the mentality of the Philistines. It's a Philistine attribute. I look around today and I see lots of people that have the same type of Philistine mentality. Man, they've got a blind hatred for God, God's house, and God's people, and God's word. They have a blind hatred for capitalism. They have a blind hatred for Donald Trump. They've got a blind hatred for anybody that wants to live right, do right, talk right, according to the word of God. And guess what? That blind hatred will cause those people to be absolutely persistent. They're not going to stop. Don't think they'll stop. You might say, man, we've done wheeled them down to a basket full. That's all right. That basket full, they'll crawl out of the basket and keep on going. They're persistent with it. But there's one thing they've got to deal with. They've got to deal with, while they can, these lone, we talk about these lone wolf terrorists. Well, I want you to know something. The enemies of God have got to worry about these lone heroes of God. You might say, well, everybody, they're lone wolf terrorists. Well, guess what? God's got some wolf killers out there. You see, ladies and gentlemen, as I close this lesson out, I want to encourage you. If you have to serve God alone, do it. Because in so doing it, you'll get to experience God like nobody else gets to experience God. We were doing our work behind the iron curtain. People said, you can't do this, you can't do that. You can't do this, you can't do that. What if, what if, what if, what if? And I looked at those people and I just said, well, I tell you what, you live like that. And I'm gonna go out here and take off and me and God's gonna go do something. And I watched God do amazing things. I watched God blind people, man, they were looking straight at something and couldn't see it. You see, ladies and gentlemen, get along with God. You have no idea what God can do with you. You might say, well look at me, I'm a physical wreck. What's that to God? That's nothing to God. God'll turn you into a Samson. God'll turn you into a Dino. Put a spear in your arm and let you kill about 800 of the enemy. You see, Number one, be willing to be alone. Be willing to fight alone. Be willing to get alone with God. Don't run. The runners might get the spoil, but they do not get to experience God. I've watched people put God first. And for the people, business people and all, boy, that put God first, God is a way of blessing them tremendously. Next thing is this, as I bring this to a close, all three of these men were greatly outnumbered. But did that stop them? It didn't, did it? Well listen, don't let that stop you. Remember something, your God, I don't care if you're looking at 10,000 of them, the God we serve can kill all of them in a second. Don't worry about their number, they better worry about your God. And the last thing is this. God enabled all of these men, just like he enabled Samson. The Bible says once Samson got a haircut at Delilah's Barbershop, it said he became like a regular man. I want to tell you something. I've read that 10,000 times. And that one little statement has always hit me. That's what God uses. That's who God uses. Just regular man. That without God, you're just as weak as anything. But with God, you can go down and tear the gates off the city and walk off with them. You see, ladies and gentlemen, we talk about these mighty men. They all were willing to stand alone and fight. They were all greatly outnumbered and that didn't stop them. And they were all enabled by God. And know this, if God can do it for them, he can do it for you. Never, never forget that. God can, even though the Philistines have a blind hatred that leads them to be persistent against the things of God. Know this. Their persistence only allows you the opportunity to become a hero for God. You know that? There's got to be a circumstance or there'll be no hero. Isn't that right? Well, people that have this Philistine mentality will give you all an opportunity to be a hero. Don't ever forget it. And don't ever run. Don't ever run. Don't ever run. God will give you the ability to stand. What's the Bible say? They get you in court. He said, don't presuppose, don't plan out what you're going to say, because God will put it in your mouth in that same hour. Isn't that right? That's what he says. In other words, God will give you the ability to even say it. Regardless of the consequence, God will give you the courage to say it. Trust God. Live for God. Don't worry about the number. If you have to, stand alone and trust God. Let's all stand, if you would, please, as we go to the Lord in prayer.