I think I met Steve Kittle in 1968, I think. About that time, his father and mother were preparing to go to the mission field in Brazil, sent by the Addison Baptist Church. And they were visiting the Norfolk Baptist Church to introduce their missions. And I don't remember him then. He was their oldest child, but he was very young. But through the years, since that time, our lives have woven together through ministry and music ministry and preaching ministry. And now the Lord's brought him back here to be a part of Madison Baptist Church again. He serves as director of our media ministries, which basically means he does anything I ask him to do, which is a wonderful task for a pastor to have. And especially appreciate him preaching for us today. So Brother Kittle, you come and preach the word of God to us. No, the honor is all mine, and I never take this for granted. Be opening your Bibles to the book of 2 Samuel, chapter 23, and you want to say, Happy Father's Day. You can see it on the slide there. And I appreciate all the fathers. Of course, mine was number one. I think you all can decide who number two is. But I certainly appreciated my father. Glad that I got to spend about 61 years with him before he went to be with the Lord. And I hope that you can say that you're thankful for your I know not everybody can say that, but thank the Lord for godly fathers who have reared up the generation behind and led them in the ways of the Lord. So it is good to be here before you today. You know, the pastor went to the eye doctor and the doctor examined his eyes and said, I see you have cataracts. And the pastor said, that shows how much you know. I drive an Audi and a Buick. In honor of Father's Day, that was a bad dad joke, OK? All right. Let's go on here to 2 Samuel chapter 23, and looking at verse 14. And David was then in an hold, and the garrison of the Philistines was then in Bethlehem. And David longed and said, oh, that one would give me drink of the water of the well of Bethlehem, which is by the gate. And the three mighty men break through the host of the Philistines and drew water out of the well of Bethlehem that was by the gate and took it and brought it to David. Nevertheless, he would not drink thereof, but poured it out unto the Lord. Speaking this morning on the subject, water from the well, Let's pray, Father, thank you for this time that we spend together looking into your work, and I pray that it might be profitable today. In Jesus' name, amen. Have you ever had something so good to eat that nothing compared to it, but you could only get it at one place? We, last time my wife and I were in the Pigeon Forge, we ate at a barbecue restaurant, and they had brisket. I love brisket. It's my favorite cut of beef. And don't get it too often, but when I get it, I really, really like it. And when we ate there at this restaurant, that was absolutely the best brisket ever had in all of my human existence. But there's only one restaurant. That's the only restaurant there is. There's no chain. That restaurant is run by a gospel singer down there in that area. And he just has the one restaurant. And so I guess we'll have to wait until we go back to Pigeon Forest to get that good brisket again. Well, David felt that way about the water at the well at Bethlehem. It's where he grew up. It's what he drank. And to David, no water is so sweet, no water is so satisfying, no water is so special as the water from the well of Bethlehem. In our story, David is being pursued by King Saul. He's hiding in a cave. the cave of Adulam. And I want you to notice first, as we get started on the outline, the longing. David mentions a desire. It's not a request. It's definitely not a command. We know that by the way he behaves later on. He's just talking out loud. what I wouldn't give for some of that water from the well of Bethlehem. Nothing so sweet, nothing so satisfying, nothing so special as the water from the well of Bethlehem. But David had a difficulty. First of all, David is hiding in a cave. Now here's what's happening. This is sort of the back story. David has fallen out of favor with King Saul and he is fleeing from Saul. Saul is chasing him, trying to kill him. And on his journey, David and his companions stop at the village of Nob and a priest named Ahimelech gives him some showbread from the altar, which is a whole other story in itself. And so they eat, they get refreshed, and David goes on his journey. And then behind him, here comes Saul with his entourage. And when Saul gets there, somebody tells him, said, hey, Ahimelech helped David, gave him some bread. Why'd you help David? Well, why wouldn't I? He's your son-in-law. You love him. See, he didn't know that Saul had turned against David. And Saul turned to his footmen and his soldiers and said, kill him. Kill him. They wouldn't do it. They would not kill the man of God, which is to their credit. But there's an Edomite serving Saul. His name was Doeg. And he kills 85 of the priests. He goes beyond that. He massacres the entire town. Men, women, children, babies, livestock. He just wipes them out. And one of Ahimelech's sons escapes. And he flees to David with the news. And that's where David is right now, is the cave of Adullam. He's just learned this news, this massacre that had happened. He's devastated. And he says, I have occasioned the death of all those people. David has a further difficulty. Not only is he hiding in a cave, but David is hindered by his companions. The people who have stuck with David, the ones who are following him, many of them will turn out to be courageous men. But they weren't what you would call the first tier or first level, the top, the cream of the crop. That's not who these folks are. As a matter of fact, it says, and I'm not making this up, in 1 Samuel 22, it says that everybody that was in distress and everybody that was in debt and everybody that was discontented followed David. Now, that to me is the best definition of an independent Baptist church I've ever heard of. The distressed, and the ones in debt, and the ones that are discontent. And that's who David's got. And there's a third difficulty. The well is held by conquerors. Our text says that at Bethlehem there was a garrison. of the Philistines. That's a military outpost. The enemy of Israel, their biggest enemy, their most persistent enemy. They were fighting for the same piece of land and they had conquered that area and they held that well. But that is by no means the end of the story. It doesn't end with David's wishful thinking. We don't just see the longing, but notice now the loving. The loving. Three people heard what David said, and they decided to do something about it. First of all, they were attentive to his words. They did not get a command. They didn't even get a hint. David wasn't saying, well, I sure wish somebody would get me a drink. I know it would probably be impossible, but that's the best water in the world. No water so sweet, no water so satisfying, no water so special to me than the water from the well at Bethlehem. These three men heard what he said and they were attentive to his words. I believe a good follower does more than just obey the commands of the leader. A good follower pays attention to the leader to know his heart, his heart. The question arises, what is God's heart? David was known as a man after God's own heart. What is God's heart? What is he like? What does he love? What matters? few minutes and in fact we don't know the full extent of the heart of God but God has chosen to reveal the Holy Spirit to reveal those things to us then we will begin to know to one extent or greater or lesser extent the heart of God. I think you can be saved and still not really know the heart of God. The Bible says in Psalm 103 verse 7 it says God may have known his ways unto Moses his acts unto the children of Israel. The children of Israel knew what God did, but Moses had a better understanding of why God did what he did. So David, the leader of this fugitive band, had followers who were attentive to his words, but more than that, they acted on his wishes. They weren't instructed. They weren't commanded. I don't think David even knew that they went and did what they did until he got back. He probably would have forbidden them to go if he had known. But they did what they knew he wanted. They did what they knew that he wished for. He hadn't told him to do it. He hadn't commanded him to do it. kids as strongly as they do it, but they did it because they acted on his wishes. About 40 years ago, And yeah, I'm not old, I know I don't look it, but I was pastoring in Michigan, and we, the family and I, on a Sunday, we were out to eat with a family there in the church, and we were eating in Olive Garden. Olive Garden was a fairly new institution back in those days. And you may have noticed that I tend to like colorful ties with prints that are bold or whatever. That's just one of my things. And the day that we were in there, I noticed that all of the servers, midwif and the like, were wearing the same tie. And the tie had on it a picture, the whole And I like the Olive Garden South, I really do. It had the tomatoes and the onions and the peppers and the lettuce and all that. It was a very bright tie and all that. And I think I mentioned to my wife, I said, man, it sure would be neat to have a tie like that. About two weeks later, this lady that we were out to eat with came into the church building on a Sunday morning And she handed me a box that was about this big and about that big. And I opened it up, and lo and behold, there was one of those Olive Garden ties. It was a uniform. It was actually a uniform place that manufactured them. And she had to look it up and get in contact. This is before the internet, you know. And so she had to go through all that and try to find out who made them. And then, I don't know how she found that out. And then she ordered one and got it and brought it and gave that tie. to me and that really did something for me and a couple years ago I had the privilege of being invited back to that church to speak at that lady's funeral and I told that story. She loved her pastor. She was attentive to my words and she acted on my wishes. Now just a small example of what I'm talking about in this passage of scripture. These three men, perhaps the cream of the crop of David's followers, they were attentive to David's words. They acted on his wishes and they were aggressive in their well-doing. Now, I've heard this story, of course, many times over the years. I've always had this sanitized idea that the three men snuck off, grabbed some water from the well, and they came back. But if you read this passage closely, you will see that there's more to it than just that. The Bible says that the well was in a garrison. of the Philistines. And then it says, look at verse 16. It says, the three mighty men break through. But not only did they break through, they broke through the host. A host means there was a whole bunch of them, and there's only three of them. So the three mighty men break through the host of the Philistines. They had to fight. The Philistines were many. They were well-armed. We don't know how much armament these men had, but probably not a whole lot because they had run a great distance. And it was about 13 miles from the cave of Adullam to the well of Bethlehem, and then 13 miles back. If you're having trouble with the math, that's just shy of a marathon. And that's no little thing. If you walk at a brisk pace, you'll cover about four miles an hour. So these men walked three plus hours. to get to the well. They fought their way through this garrison of the Philistines. They got the water. Perhaps they had to fight their way back out. And then they walked another three hours to get back to the cave. I mean, these men were aggressive in their well-doing. They set out to do something. They didn't give up when they got tired. They didn't quit when things got tough. They didn't say to themselves, well, it's, you know, it's the thought that counts. to do this thing for their leader. But that brings me to this thought concerning the loving, that David was appreciative of their work. When they brought that water back, I think David, for a minute, was speechless. stood there with his mouth hanging open. He knew how far they'd gone. He knew the Philistines had the will. He knew what they'd gone through to accomplish their mission, which was solely on his behalf. This was not something to further, you know, the military stature of Israel or anything like that. This was solely for David. And he said in verse 17, he says, be it far from me, O Lord, that I should do this. Is not this the blood of the men that went in jeopardy of their lives? And it says he wouldn't drink the water. He poured the water out on the ground as an offering unto the Lord. That was good water. He wanted it. There was no water so sweet to David as the water from the well of Bethlehem. No water so satisfying as the water from the well of Bethlehem. No water as special as the water from the well of Bethlehem. But he couldn't drink it. David was overwhelmed. by the love of these three men. He loved them back. He, listen, never doubt that your Savior loves you. Never doubt that any love you have toward him, he has already had toward you, many fold. We love him because he first loved us. Now, this is a wonderful, heartwarming story. It really is. Three men, who love their leader so much that they risk their lives, not on a military mission, but to do something personal for David. Now, did God give us the Bible merely so we could be entertained by its narrative or enthralled by its literary composition? I don't think so. God gives us his written word to reveal to us the living word, his son, Godly living. So here are the lessons that we take from this beautiful story. I'm not saying this is the only thing you can find. These are the ones that I would bring to you today. What am I supposed to do with what I read and learn from this? Well, number one, there's a lesson about service. I find it interesting as I read down through the rest of this chapter, you can do that on your own time, David names some other men who did some very heroic things, some great military accomplishments. But he says they were in the same category as the first three that acted on my wishes. Those first three mighty men were the absolute best I had. But you know what? They're not identified. He named some other men, but he doesn't identify those three that did his wishes. We don't know their names. And that's appropriate, because servants are not what matters. The Savior matters. about how much we can accomplish and be recognized for. It's about how we can lift up the Savior, Jesus Christ. Servants do not try to make a name for themselves. Be careful of people who are constantly trying to raise their profile. They're always promoting themselves and bragging about how much They've done for the Lord. Servants don't build a name for themselves. They lift the name of the Savior. Servants don't need to be known. They want to make Him known. There's people in this room today who will be miles ahead of me at the judgment seat. Far greater servants of the Lord Jesus than I am. I don't know who they are. You don't either. And, and, I would say that those in that category, they don't even recognize that about themselves because they don't promote themselves. They don't tell you the things that they do for the Lord. They don't ask the preacher, now Richard, make sure in your announcements and whatever that you mention what I did. That's foreign to their thinking. I'm talking about widow ladies and others who live on very tight fixed income, and yet when there's a need in the church, they dig down and give a little extra, like the widow in the Gospels that gave all she had. It wasn't much, from man's way of thinking, but she gave all that she had. I'm talking about men and ladies that work hard all day and then they'll come to the church house and fix a leaky toilet or clean up a stain on one of the pews and you never know about it. You say, I haven't heard about that happening. Exactly. See, that goes on and you don't even realize it. A lesson about service. And then there's a lesson about sacrifice. There were 400 people who followed David. They would stay with him. There were 30, and they were called mighty men. They would stand for David. But there were three who would go off in the dark of night across difficult trails, fight armed soldiers, grab some water, three not only would stay with him, not only would they stand for him, but they would sacrifice for him. There may not have been anyone else in the 400 that would have done what these three did. Maybe not another in the 30 that would have listened to David's words, much less acted upon them. But there were three. There were three attentive, active, aggressive, They loved their reader so much that they sacrificed, they dared, they risked their lives to make his wish come true. And that makes them special. They really are special. Addison Baptist Church, this September we're going to celebrate 124 years. Just a few months from now. I mean, you think about it. There's some folks throughout that time who have not been content to just show up three times a week, sit in the pew, put their tie to the plate, and then forget about the church until the next service. They have put forth the effort. They have gone the extra mile. They have run to get water from the well at Bethlehem. I'm talking about members who have gone beyond faithfulness. and beyond the status quo and beyond what was expected of them, they have been attentive to the Savior's words and sensitive to his heart and without being commanded or instructed, they have brought water from the well of Bethlehem. Think about this, sacrifice is seldom commanded. I mean, for example, the Bible As far as I'm concerned, you owe that to the Lord. And I've got a budget spreadsheet on my computer at home. The very first item is what goes to the Lord. It's in the budget. And so the time is the Lord. But after that, we give offerings to the Lord. Every man has a purpose in his heart. That's what it says. When we take the offering, the only pressure you should feel about what to give is from God. Now, you know, it's interesting that that time that I mentioned when the widow gave you two mites, it says that Jesus and his disciples were standing where they could see what everybody put in the collection. And I've suggested to the pastor that he ought to follow the ushers around. We haven't been able to take an offering, but when we do, that he follow you around and see what you're putting in. He said he wasn't going to do that. No, the only pressure you should feel is from God. You should ask Him what He wants you to give. Do you sacrifice your time for the Lord? See, that's between you and God. A pastor doesn't get up and say, now listen, you need to give 20 hours of your time to the church this week. Gone! I don't think God calls upon our leaders to dictate to us how much of our time we should give. I don't think God expects us to neglect our families. I don't think he expects us to neglect the jobs that he has given us so that we can feed and clothe and house our household. You see, sacrifice is not usually a command. It's a commitment. It's a characteristic of the love that we have for the Savior. But sacrifice does cost. It does cost. It's not a sacrifice if it doesn't cost you something. In the next chapter, this St. David said, now I'm going to go into the background, but he said this. He said, I will not offer burnt offerings unto the Lord my God of that which doth cost They had made a conquest and they had, you know, reaped some cattle in the herds or whatever, and David said, no, I'm not gonna use these to sacrifice so that I don't have to give up any of my own possessions. I will not offer unto the Lord that which costs me nothing. But then there's a lesson about the Savior. David is an example in many ways of the Lord Jesus, and you understand that. At this point in his life, David has been anointed. Samuel took the horn of oil. He poured it on David. He said, you'll be the next king of Israel. But even though he has been anointed, he has not yet been appointed. He's not king. He's not prince. Really? He's nothing. He's a fugitive. He's a runaway. He's a man with a price on his head. Saul the king has 3,000 soldiers trying to catch David and kill him. But there's 400 people who will stay with David and serve David. And 30 that will be mighty in their fight for him. and three, that will sacrifice for Him. What about us? God's people today, 2023. We don't sacrifice much. Facebook gives us a glimpse into many other cultures, many other countries, and there's folks that do sacrifice quite a bit to serve the Lord. We don't sacrifice much, but it costs us a little. It does sometimes cost us in the workplace. It costs us a little in the neighborhood, Sometimes it costs you something with your family. You may have brothers or sisters or parents or kids that think you're part of a cult. I mean, all you have to do is just go to church more than once a week, and they'll brand you with that. If they knew what you put in the plate, they'd really be upset. You know, for them, it's a dollar every week. I want to say this. I'm going to say it whether you like it or not, I'm glad I have the opportunity to stand and serve my Savior at a time when it costs at least a little bit. He's worthy of any sacrifice that I make for Him. No sacrifice is too great. I want to get water from the well of Bethlehem for my Savior. Can I tell you about another well in Bethlehem? It was dug in darkness. It was operated in obscurity, at least in the early days. Its walls were made not of masonry, but of a manger. It's a well of water springing up into everlasting life. Drink of any other water, you'll thirst again. But drink of this water, you'll never thirst. The spirit and the bride say, come. And let him that hear it say, come. And let him that is the first come, and whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely. There's another well at Bethlehem. His name is Jesus. He died to be our Savior. He desires our service, and I believe he deserves our sacrifice. Father, I pray that you'll bless these few words that I've spoken. It might be an encouragement to us as we seek to serve you the best we can. Help us to know your heart. Help us to hear what you're saying. and to do what we know that you would have us to do. Bless the invitation now we pray, in Jesus' name, amen.