A ruler shall not multiply wise unto himself, says God, but notice what Gideon did in these verses. Verse twenty-eight. Thus was Midian subdued before the children of Israel, so that they lifted up their heads no more. And the country was in quietness forty years in the days of Gideon. And Jeroboel, the son of Joash, went and dwelt in his own house. And Gideon had three score and ten sons of his body begotten, for he had many wives. There again he failed. God said they would only have one. And his concubine, he had again he failed. That was in Shechem. She was a Canaanite. She also bear him a son whose name he called Abimelech. Gideon, the son of Joash, died in a good old age, and was buried in the sepulchre of Joash's father. an offer of the Abba, he's right. And it came to pass, as soon as Gideon was dead, the children of Israel turned again. Notice this, human nature. What is it like? And went a hoarding after Balaam, and made Balaam, spirit, their God. And the children of Israel remembered not the Lord, their God, who had delivered them out of the hands of all their enemies on every side. Neither showed they kindness to the house of Jeroboam, namely Gideon, according to all the goodness, which he had showed unto Israel. What a sad commentary. We've been going through these chapters in Judges, taking up this amazing character, Gideon, how God picked them up as a young man, how God mightily used them, and how he defeated the Midianites, a hundred and thirty-five thousand of an army, not to mention the women and the children, delivering the children of Israel out from the bondage of the Midianites. And after this great victory... three hundred select men chosen by God, defeating an army of a hundred and thirty-five thousand, right toward the end. Gideon stood up, he met all the passions, and right toward the last he began to face, and he went down fast, and finally he set up an idol, and the children of Israel were before him after him. And he seemed to fade out of the picture toward the end. And just think of the sad harvest that he reached. His family reaped after his death. He went contrary to the Scripture. He married a Canaanite. God said that he was not to marry a Canaanite. A Jew was not to marry one of another nation. And with that unequal yoke came Abimelech. What happened? What did Abimelech do? Abimelech slew all seven days, save one of Gideon's son. That was a sad part of it wasn't. Only Joplin escaped with Gideon's seventy-some. And who slew them? You read that in chapter nine and verse five. And he went on, went on to his father's house at Orpher and slew his brethren, the sons of Jeroboel or Gideon, being freestored in ten persons upon one stone. Notwithstanding yet Joplin, the youngest son of Jeroboel or Gideon, was left for he hid himself. Now Gideon had not married that Canaanite woman, there would have been no of Emilek, and therefore there would have been no slaughter of all Gideon's sons. It shows you the sad harvest that comes when God's people disobey God's word. Here's an unequal yoke, and the New Testament says, be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers. When a Christian marries a non-Christian, it will be a sad, sad harvest. There's one thing I want to point out before... We conclude this series of studies. Studies those words, a child of the king. They said, Gideon, in verse eighteen, they resembled you. Everyone looked like the child or the children of the king. In what way is a Christian a child of the king? I think there are various things you can look at. The wicked resemble their father. The Lord Jesus says, ye are of your father the devil. That's true. the wicked resemble their father. You can generally tell who they belong to by listening to them and what they do. Well, God's people should resemble their father too. The Lord Jesus Christ said to the Jews, the Pharisees, why should you have Abraham for your father? And they said, we do the works of Abraham. Well, alright, he says, if you do the works of Abraham, if Abraham's your father, so God's children should do the works of God. You should do the works of God. If God is your folly, you should do the works of God. You show your royal blood. Now, a number of things in connection with royalty. Everyone resembles the child of a king. First of all, it's birth. You can't get into the royal line for the throne unless you're born into royalty. To be a real legal, rightful heir to the throne. There must be birth into that position. So it is in the family of God. You've got to be born again. to be in God's family. To be among God's children, you've got to be born again. To as many as received him, to them gave he the power to become the children of God. So it all begins with birth. And then you have conformity to your father. Beholding as in the glass the glory of the Lord, we are chained into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. When a person is saved, is born again, the divine standing, imprimature is upon his heart. In other words, the Spirit of God stamps Jesus Christ upon the heart of the one who is born again. He's passed from death unto life. Now, says the Lord, as you behold, as in a glass, in my word, the glory, the image of the Lord, your change into the same image from glory to glory. It's a lifetime process of being changed into his likeness. That royal image that stamps upon your heart, The image of the king. I wonder if that's true with us. Then think of the titles of royalty. What are the titles that God's children have? They're the children of the king. Well, children of God, we're given that title. That's a royal title. Sons of God, heirs of God, joint heirs with Jesus Christ. We're called kings and priests. Princes and princesses. Here are the titles of the children of the king. Are we not... in wonderful society, wonderful company, when we're among God's people. See their royal titles and their royal apparel. You know, in the East, it used to be in those days, all the royal family, the king's daughters, had a certain apparel. They were always identified by their apparel. And the king's sons had a certain apparel. It was the royal robe. And they were always identified. You can tell whenever there was one of the king's family, they wore a certain garment that associated them with royalty. That should be with every Christian. The garment speaks of character. The garment of holiness, conduct. We're ruled in righteousness. I wonder when the world looks at us, they can say, there's a child of the king. There's a person who's a real Christian. You can tell by their character. There's the role of royalty. They belong to the king. Quite a challenge, isn't it? For these are marks of the royal family. And as they said concerning Gideon, everyone was like you, Gideon. Everyone resembled the children of the king. You were all alike. Isn't that wonderful? Then you have access to the king. If you belong to the royal family, you have a right to the access of the king. If you're the king's son and the king's daughter, you can walk into the king's presence. You can talk to the king. It's your privilege. The stranger can't do that. What privileges are ours? as children of the king. We can talk to the king every day, every moment of every day. We can come into the king's presence. That's it. There's a relationship between us and the king that's not true of the unsaved. They just don't know him in this relationship. Then think of the royal provision, the royal dainties. Royal bounty. Read that concerning Esther. The royal bounties, the royal dainties of the king, Mephibosheth. He always sat. at the king's table, King David's table. You know, when you start to think of Mephibosheth, he would lay him on both his feet, and yet he sat at the table of the king. When he was sitting at the table of the king, heavenly sitting across from David, David was doing this for Jonathan's sake. David didn't see Mephibosheth's lameness. Mephibosheth lameness was under the table, as Mephibosheth sat at the table of King David. It isn't that wonderful to know that now that we're saved, God no longer sees us lame. He no longer sees us in Adam. He sees us in Christ. As one of the royal sons, at the royal table, he sees us in his son. And our lame condition, as passed on to us by Adam, is no longer seen by God. There we have the royal provision and the royal education. You know, every child brought up in a royal family, they're trained for life and the talent. Their education is an important thing. They move in their circles, all of its own, and they have to know how to behave, how to act in that high and lofty circle of society, the royal family. You know God's people should be thus trained, educated. Where do you get your education, right here? Just as loyalty is often identified by language. If you study this book and your heart is full of this book, that the word of God says, the words of Christ dwell in you richly. It just simply means that people are going to identify you by the language. Your speech is going to betray you. It's the language of the kids. You're using the language of the royal household. The language of the palace. You belong to Christ. I wonder if that's true. The Lord Jesus teaches us the mysteries of the kingdom. Here's the royal family, learning the mysteries concerning that royal family and the coming kingdom. Then think of royal protection. You take members of the royal family, are protected. They have their guard. They can't go anywhere without there. A secret service man or there's a guard there to protect them against attack. What about us, the people of God? The angel of the Lord encamped the ground above them that fear him and delivereth them. Do we not have royal guards? We certainly do. Every one of God's children, everyone in the royal family, has a God. The angel of the Lord, the guardian angel. And if it's necessary, if the attack's too strong, heavenly God dispatches more than one angel. And we'll protect. There are principalities and powers at our disposal throughout the text. Here are the guards of the king's children. But then take all these royal prospects. You take the prospect of the elder son or the king's family, that his prospect is the throne. In the case of the peasant queen of England, saying there was no son, she was in line. King George VI didn't have a son. And so we have Queen Elizabeth. It simply means this. She was right in line. That was her prospect. What's our prospect? The throne. The kingdom. The crown. That's our prospect. That's what every Christian is looking forward to, when we shall reign forever and forever. There's one final thing in connection with the royal family. That is loyalty. It behooves every number of the royal family to be loyal to the throne. Loyal to the king upon the throne. Loyal to the principles of the kingdom. Advancing the... called the interest of the king. Is that true with us? I thought tonight we're coming to the meeting in this connection about King Edward VII, the Duke of Windsor, and I'm sure we all know something about that, and his marriage to Mrs. Simpson, a commoner. What did he do? He was lauded by some, deplored by others. He had drawn down in history, Some have spoken well of him, others ill. Some have made a hero of him, a man who would give up so much, the throne of England, for the woman he loved. I do not commend him. He was a selfish interest. He thought more of himself, his own personal interest than he did his duty to the very speech. He put love. before loyalty. He put personal desire before duty. Now take the obitous, Princess Margaret, deeply in love, desperately in love with Captain Townsend a few years ago. And I believe that young girl caught an awful fact. She finally had to choose between the honor of the British throne, the interest of the British throne, her respect, to the British throne. The dignity of her. For the man she loved, she gave him up. Because she rallied to her duty. And she gave up the man she deeply loved. No doubt she fought an awful battle to arrive at that decision. I read not long ago that they say that Margaret is extremely happy. Extremely happy. I think so. I've seen pictures of King Edward on various occasions, and I've yet to see him smile. You all would look sad to me, the man who gave up the British throne for a woman. And he looked quite sad at times when you see a picture in the paper and the magazine. I wonder if he had regretted what he did. When he had turned out to have been one of Britain's kings, No, I'm glad he didn't become England's king because he redeemed the weakness that I think would have shown up in his reign. He was not a man of principle. He was a man who lived for steps and thought of steps, and he put personal desire before duty. Then, Miss Margaret, it's just the other way. A young girl who gained a victory over human design, human passion. and she put loyalty to the throne before her love for Captain Townsend, and she's happy today. And so it is, the one who puts the loyalty, loyalty to the throne of Jesus Christ, loyalty to our king. It may mean personal sacrifice, but you'll be happy in days to come. The one who gives up loyalty to Jesus Christ for personal interest and earthly passion is going to regret the day. Let us be Lord. Loy to Jesus Christ and loyal to this book. And I want to say this. I've heard a lot about loyalty to the church. I'm in no way obligated to be loyal to any church that's not loyal to this book. I'll be loyal only to a church in the measure that church is loyal to that faithful Lord and seeks to carry out the command of the King.