If you have your Bibles turn with me to 2 Kings chapter 9 verse 36 as we talk today about the Loyalty of Dogs. I confess to being a dog lover. My great grandfather, who was an ordained Primitive Baptist minister use to say that a dog was man's best friend because they wag their tales and not their tongues.
A pastor was invited out to dinner at a members home after preaching on Sunday and he noticed a big bird dog lying in the corner keeping a sharp eye on him as he ate Sunday lunch and every time he took a bite the dog's eyes would follow him. And he said to the hostess, "that is certainly the most intelligent dog I have ever seen. He seems to be interested in every bite I eat." She said, "He is. Because you are eating out of his bowl."
The more I know about dogs, the less I think about some people. I use to say that society was going to the dogs, but I've quit saying that out of respect for the dogs. You can put poison in front of a dog and he'll walk away from it every time. Put poison in front of a man and he'll smoke it till he gets cancer. He'll drink it till his liven is gone and then blame God for it. Dogs are smarter than that.
Every dog, regardless if it registered with the AKC or just an alley dog will protect and defend its offspring till the death. Child abuse has become a national dilemma in America.
Dogs have more character than some people. No dog will bite you without a reason, yet humans shoot one another in drive by shootings just for the recreation of it. I repeat. The more I know about dogs, the less I think of some humans.
The purpose of this sermon is not to challenge you to live like the Apostle Paul but to at least live on the same level as the apostles of Alpo. 2 Kings, 9:36, "Therefore they came back and told him. And he said, "This is the word of the LORD, which He spoke by His servant Elijah the Tishbite, saying, 'On the plot of ground at Jezreel dogs shall eat the flesh of Jezebel;" -- 2 Ki 9:36
Father, let us see in the Word of God the Bibles definition of loyalty and let us live according to it, in Jesus name and all of God's children said, praise the Lord.
The dogs in this text were loyal to the commission of God, spoken by Elijah, to eat the flesh of Jezebel, who was a witch and occultist, a radical feminist, and who controlled the government of Israel with her manipulations, because she had a spineless husband named Ahab.
If you have difficulty grasping that picture, just envision what we have in Washington today and you have it.
(story of preacher's dog)
Back to the loyalty of dogs. This past month the body of an elderly woman was found beside the road. There was no human being standing by her loyally, but there was her loyal and faithful dog and the police of that southern city are trying to find out who she is and where she lived, not by asking the next of kin or her friends, but by following that dog.
That says something about our society that is frightening. That we have not learned to care about each other very much and that some people find more companionship in dogs, literally, than they do in human beings.
The loyalty of dogs is further illustrated by this true story carried in the pages of the Los Angles Times. There was an Airedale, who owners lived on a ranch near St. Anglo Texas. He began barking one night just after midnight. The dog awakened the family barking furiously to awake them. The ranch house was engulfed in flames on all sides. There was no Fire Dept. And by the time the family stumbled out the front door the fire was too far gone to stop.
With the family safely outside, the dog began running from one family member to another, barking furiously. Seeming to feel that he must protect each of them from danger. The oldest boy ran around the house and into the garage to get his sports car out of the garage. And the dog missed the boy. Not knowing the boy had gone to the garage, he ran thru the family members barking at them, seeming to try to communicate to them the great danger.
The family tried to comfort him, but he would not be comforted. He would look into their faces and try to communicate. He would paw the ground and whine. He would look at the fire in the house and bark at it as if it were a monster. Suddenly, without warning the dog leaped into the burning house, looking for the eldest son. Within seconds the house collapsed. When the fire died down, and the embers cooled, they found the charred bones of that dog at the door of the boy's room he was trying to save.
That dog did not have an immortal soul. That dog was not built in the image of God. That dog was not destined to walk the streets of the New Jerusalem. Yet that dog had a loyalty that demanded that he lay down his life for his friend.
The Bible says, "Greater love has no man, than this, than he lay down his life for a friend." Jesus said, "By this sign shall all men know that you are My disciples, is that you love one another." "Love one another as I have loved you, and gave My self for you." Meaning that I died for you that you might have life and have it more abundantly.
Jesus said, "I want you to have this signature among all the nations of the world, wherever you go for all of the generations to come. I want you to be such a loving fraternity of people, that people will want to be a part of you because of the love you have, one for the other."
I ask you the question. Is that what happens in the average church in America? Absolutely not.
In the Bible a salt covenant is the covenant of loyalty. Here's how it works. There are 3 covenants in the Bible. A shoe covenant, a salt covenant and a blood covenant. Just time for the salt covenant.
It's a covenant of loyalty. If you and I are entering into a contract, in Bible times each of us would wear a salt pouch because we would take salt periodically for the same reason construction workers take salt because of the great heat. But if we were entering into a contract, you would open your pouch and I would open mine. I would take salt out of my pouch and put it into your's and you would take salt out of your pouch and put it into mine and as we recited the content of the covenant, we would shake it up and the only way the contract could be broken was for you to get back your exact grains of salt and for me to get back my exact grains of salt. Which was an impossibility.
It was a covenant of loyalty. Salt is a symbol of loyalty and worth. In the Bible times salt was precious. Workers were paid in salt. Soldiers were paid in salt. If you were a poor worker people would say, "You're not worth your salt." Salt is a symbol of loyalty. Jesus said, "If the salt loses its saltiness, it is good for nothing but to be cast out and trodden under foot.
The point is this, if you lose your ability to be loyal, you're worthless. You have no value. Not in the kingdom of God and the a message the Church of Jesus Christ needs to hear. Eating together in the Bible was an act of loyalty. If dogs can be loyal, why can't we. It is time to act like Christians. It is time to talk like Christians. It is time to think like Christians.
Loyalty in the American family is a word that has gone to the wind. 51% of the marriages in America end in divorce. Mothers desert their children. Fathers abuse their children. Child abuse is an American tragedy. 4,000 babies every day are murdered in the wombs of their mother.
If a child cannot have loyalty in the womb of its mother, where can it find loyalty? Fathers will not work to support their wives and support their children. Even the attorney general of a large state calls them dead-beat dads. I want you to know they are worse then that. God says, that the man that will not work to support his family and provide for his own is worse than a infidel. Go to work.
The death of loyalty in America. As citizens, we are not loyal to each other any more. There was a day boys and girls when you could conduct business in these United States with a hand shake.
Loyalty has lost its meaning in America. We are not loyal to God. We are loyal to something called the New Age. Secular humanism has be the philosophy of the public school system for the past 30 years. Materialism is our god. The thought has become, If it feels good, do it regardless of what the Word of God says. Regardless of what morality has to do with it. If you want to do it, do it. Let me tell you. Dogs won't do it. Why would human beings. Loyalty has lost its meaning. We are not loyal to God. Our stars are rock stars. Athletic stars. Movie stars. My star is the Bright and Morning Star, Jesus Christ.
What does loyalty look like? What does loyalty sound like? Where is the portrait of loyalty? Loyalty is Abraham walking towards Mt. Moriah, with Isaac to sacrifice his only son as an expression of loyalty and love to Jehovah God. That's real loyalty. Loyalty is Ruth saying, "Entreat me not to leave thee or to return from following after thee. For where thou goest I will go, where thou lodgest, I will lodge. Thy people shall be my people and thy God my God. Where you die, there will I die and I will be buried there." That's what loyalty sounds like.
Loyalty is a marriage that last for 50 years, thru thick and thin. That's becoming a modern day miracle, a marriage of 50 years. Loyalty is Jesus Christ hanging on the cross at Calvary, saying, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." Martin Luther said, "If the world had treated me that way, I would have kicked the wretched world to pieces." That's a good German reaction.
The one thing that Christ could not do was save Himself. Had He saved Himself as the thief ask Him to do, there would be no salvation. No healing. There would be no deliverance. There would be no hope of heaven tomorrow, but because Jesus Christ was loyal to the will of the Father. Because He was loyal to you, to you, to you, to you, to you and to me. He stretched out His arms and died, so that I can stand in the sanctuary today and sing, "There is a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Emmanual's veins, and sinners plunged beneath that flood, lose all their guilt and shame. I am saved by the blood of Jesus, I'm on my way to heaven, because of the loyalty of Christ.
I close with this simple statement. If dogs can stand by the body of an old woman, dead beside the road, out of loyalty. If they can leap into fire and love until they die, why can't Christians love each other. Why can't we demonstrate that kind of loyalty. Jesus did. And it's time for us to do it, that we may be called "the body of Christ."
Can we stand in the presence of the Lord. Our heads bowed. Many of you in this room can say, Pastor, I have been disloyal to God. There is sin in my life. I am a compromising, cold, calace, half baked Christian and I need to rededicate my life to Christ. If that describes you, I want you to lift your hands, right where you are.
How many of you can say, Pastor, I have stolen my tithes and offerings from God. That's sin and I need forgiveness. Can I see you hands.
How many of you here can say, I've been disloyal to my family. I've been disloyal to the body of Christ. How many in this room can say, Preacher, as a Christian, I want to know a level of loyalty, deeper than anything I've ever know before and I want to experience that today in Christ.
Can I see your hand right where you are.
As we sing, #150 "Come, Holy Spirit" chorus only, I want you to come from all parts of the building. This is important. Today, God's going to heal marriages in this room. Today, lives that have been looking for relationships, will find them, because Christ is a loyal Lord and He can heal, restore and give new beginning. Let's sing and let's come.
I want those who have come to pray this prayer with me. Lord Jesus Christ, because you are the Lord of my life, I want to know, a depth and quality of loyalty, that I have never known before. Lord Jesus Christ, forgive me of every act, that has been disloyal to You, or to my family, or to the Word of God, Lord Jesus today, I want to demonstrate your love, and your loyalty, that the world may know that we are Your's, thru that love and loyalty. In Jesus name. Amen
