A Word about an Exalted Kingdom

 

Today I want to share a word about an Exalted Kingdom as I comment on Scripture passages from 2 Samuel 5. 

In our last episode, we saw how an uncivil war had broken out among God’s people after the death of Saul. Instead of following the clearly understood will of God, His people acted just like the subjects of every other kingdom of the world do when they are confronted with a succession crisis. They fought each other for power and control, and we learned important lessons from their experience. First, we learned that conflict comes when people sinfully exceed their authority, and the level of conflict is accelerated by unchecked aggression. We also learned that conflict is made more complicated by playing politics, and that conflict is no justification for assassination, either physical or reputational. In the end, we learned that conflict is resolved when we yield our will to God’s. In this case, David was anointed king over all of the Tribes of Israel, and this led to what I consider to be an exalted kingdom. 

Our world is full of kingdoms which make great promises, but they don’t fulfill them, or if they do, their benefits don’t last. One example of that is Disney World’s Magic Kingdom. It appears to be a wonderful place, and it is often called “The happiest place on earth,” yet, in fact, it is all a huge illusion. For example, those three-story buildings along Main Street are really only about two stories high, but the technique of forced perspective is used to make them seem taller. The third floors of those buildings are actually only half as tall as they should be. Some other buildings in the park are constructed so that they obscure views of the hotels and other modern buildings outside the park, to prevent the illusion from being shattered. 

In addition to the clever use of architecture, essential items that are not attractive, like trash cans and other such objects, are painted with a color that the Disney staff, who are called imagineers, call “Go Away Green.” Other items that are higher in elevation are painted “Blending Blue.” These colors help those ugly necessities to blend into the background, and they tend to remain unseen unless a visitor needs to throw away some trash.   

The most interesting, and possibly insidious, feature of the Magic Kingdom is the use of smelitizers, which are machines that emit artificial aromas such as the smell of fresh-baked cookies. The magic of the Magic Kingdom is how the imagineers create such powerful illusions of grandeur, mystic, and downhome comfort. The Magic Kingdom is wonderful and captivating, but it is an illusion. To be unkind, it is all fake. Even more, no one can live there! 

As David took the throne over all of Israel, an exalted kingdom would emerge. God’s people would realize their best lives in the Promised Land. But why? How? Let’s begin by reading 2 Samuel 5:1-5,  

All the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron and said, “Here we are, your own flesh and blood. Even while Saul was king over us, you were the one who led us out to battle and brought us back. The Lord also said to you, ‘You will shepherd my people Israel, and you will be ruler over Israel.’” So all the elders of Israel came to the king at Hebron. King David made a covenant with them at Hebron in the Lord’s presence, and they anointed David king over Israel. David was thirty years old when he began his reign; he reigned forty years. In Hebron he reigned over Judah seven years and six months, and in Jerusalem he reigned thirty-three years over all Israel and Judah. 

The Right King Must Be On The Throne: 

Long before it was a common saying, the Children of Israel learned the truth of the phrase, “United we stand and divided we fall.” In a healthy kingdom, only one king can reign and rule, and only one throne can exist. If that authority is divided in any way, chaos and weakness will ensue.  

In our last episode, we saw that Israel and Judah had been divided and that they each had their own king. The result was conflict, war, death, and an abundance of trouble. One people with two kings obviously doesn’t work, but what about two peoples with one king. Is that any better? Actually, no. 

An interesting historical example of that was the dual monarchy of Austria-Hungary, which joined two independent countries under one king, Emperor Franz Joseph, in 1867. They had one king and one throne, but each country had veto powers over the kingdom’s laws, policies, and budgets. This made the nation unstable, and that instability helped spark World War I, which, ironically, resulted in the collapse of the dual monarchy itself. They were not united, and so divided, they fell. 

The only way that a kingdom works is for one people to have one king who is their sovereign ruler. This is the way it works in human kingdoms, and it is the way that it works in God’s Kingdom as well. Jesus is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and no one else can be on the thrones of our lives. For Christians, that should be an obvious statement, and it is. Sadly, we too often try to qualify that statement, however. Jesus cannot be a part-time, or sometime King of our lives. We can’t decide to obey Him when we want to but then decide to go our own way when we want to. He can’t be the Lord of some parts of our lives, but not Lord over other parts of our lives. As Hudson Taylor, the missionary to China, said, "Christ is either Lord of all, or He is not Lord at all." 

God’s Exalted Kingdom begins with the right King. Then, we must let Him overcome the strongholds in our lives. Next, let’s read 2 Samuel 5:6-8, 

The king and his men marched to Jerusalem against the Jebusites who inhabited the land. The Jebusites had said to David, “You will never get in here. Even the blind and lame can repel you” thinking, “David can’t get in here.” Yet David did capture the stronghold of Zion, that is, the city of David. He said that day, “Whoever attacks the Jebusites must go through the water shaft to reach the lame and the blind who are despised by David.” For this reason it is said, “The blind and the lame will never enter the house.”  

Strongholds Must Be Overcome: 

A stronghold is any obstacle that separates us from God or from accomplishing His mission. The easiest strongholds to recognize are the physical strongholds like Jericho, and Jerusalem, both of which were fortifications that were held by the enemies of the Children of Israel. While these strongholds were different in many ways, they were both too strong for the Israelites to overcome on their own. 

In the time of Saul and David, it was not possible to successfully attack a well-prepared, fortified city. The armies of the day had no artillery, no explosives, and no aircraft. Neither did they have the Roman siege engines like the catapults and towers that they used to defeat the Jewish revolt in A.D. 70. If a city like Jericho or Jerusalem had the opportunity to stock-up on food, and if there was a well or other source of water in the city, then its people could hold-out almost indefinitely. It is no wonder that the Jebusites were so confident.  They saw their own strength, and they saw no way the army of Israel could prevail. 

Israel, on the other hand, could not abide the presence of strongholds like Jericho and Jerusalem. Until Jericho was reduced, the Jews could not enter the Promised Land and claim their inheritance from God. Until Jerusalem was reduced, the Jews could not be united as one people under one king who had been appointed for them by one God. The kingdom could never be exalted as long as such strongholds existed. 

The same is true for us today, although few physical strongholds stand in our way like Jericho or Jerusalem. Many other strongholds can exist in our lives, however, which separate us from God, and from the abundant life promised to us by Jesus. Emotional strongholds like arrogance or doubt or fear can keep us from committing our lives to God. Likewise, we may be faced with other strongholds, like an unhealthy relationship, or like an unwillingness to risk ridicule from the culture which surrounds us today. Some of us may be confronted by economic or financial strongholds which we can see no way to overcome. Regardless of whether the stronghold we face is spiritual, physical, emotional, or relational, and regardless of whether it is internal to ourselves, or imposed from outside of ourselves, the basic fact of a stronghold is that we need help to overcome them. From where does such help come? From God, of course, when we turn to Him the way that the Jews did before Jericho and before Jerusalem. Paul said in 2 Corinthians 10:3-5, 

For although we live in the flesh, we do not wage war according to the flesh, since the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but are powerful through God for the demolition of strongholds. We demolish arguments and every proud thing that is raised up against the knowledge of God, and we take every thought captive to obey Christ. 

 God overcame the stronghold of Jericho, and He also overcame the stronghold of Jerusalem. He is willing and able to overcome the strongholds in our lives as well, if we will allow Him!  

For an exalted kingdom to be created, strongholds must be overcome, but foundations must also be built upon, as we see in 2 Samuel 5:9-12, 

David took up residence in the stronghold, which he named the city of David. He built it up all the way around from the supporting terraces inward. David became more and more powerful, and the Lord God of Armies was with him. King Hiram of Tyre sent envoys to David; he also sent cedar logs, carpenters, and stonemasons, and they built a palace for David. Then David knew that the Lord had established him as king over Israel and had exalted his kingdom for the sake of his people Israel. 

Foundations Must Be Built Upon: 

Although tearing down strongholds is essential, it is not sufficient. Indeed, simply removing obstacles from our path is different than following that path to achieving God’s will for our lives. Solomon, David’s son, said in Ecclesiastes 3 that there is “a time to tear down and a time to build.” He also said that there is “a time to plant and time to uproot,” and that there is “a time to tear and a time to sew” as well. We must allow God to root out the bad things in our lives, but we must also allow Him to build-up the good things as well. This is what Jesus taught about this in Matthew 12:43-45, 

“When an unclean spirit comes out of a person, it roams through waterless places looking for rest but doesn’t find any. Then it says, ‘I’ll go back to my house that I came from.’ Returning, it finds the house vacant, swept, and put in order. Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and settle down there. As a result, that person’s last condition is worse than the first. That’s how it will also be with this evil generation.” 

Clearly, once the strongholds in our lives have been thrown down, we must shift our focus from fighting strongholds to becoming fruitful for God’s Kingdom. Fruitfulness is clearly God’s will for our lives, as demonstrated by when Jesus cursed the fig tree in Mark 11:12-14, 

The next day as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry. Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to find out if it had any fruit. When he reached it, he found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. Then he said to the tree, “May no one ever eat fruit from you again.” And his disciples heard him say it.  

Later, in Mark 11:20-25, we also read, 

In the morning, as they went along, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots. Peter remembered and said to Jesus, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree you cursed has withered!” “Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. “Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in their heart but believes that what they say will happen, it will be done for them. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins. 

 Jesus clearly wants us to grow and mature and be fruitful as we walk with Him. If we don’t, I don’t believe that Jesus will curse us. People are far more valuable to Him than a fig tree, which we know is true because Jesus died so that all people would have the opportunity for salvation. Still, this event clearly shows us that we must lay the foundations for growth in our lives, and allow Jesus to nurture us, the way a gardener tends his garden. 

Remember, Jesus has also sent us the Holy Spirit, who lives in our lives, and who gives us spiritual gifts for growth and maturity and the edification of others. Also, if we let Him, the Holy Spirit will produce the Fruit of the Spirit in our lives, as Paul taught us in Galatians 5:22-24, 

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and selfcontrol. The law is not against such things. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. 

King David led the Children of Israel into building an exalted kingdom through having the right king, through overcoming strongholds, and through building on firm foundations, but one other thing was also necessary, as we will see in 2 Samuel 5:17-25, 

When the Philistines heard that David had been anointed king over Israel, they all went in search of David, but he heard about it and went down to the stronghold. So the Philistines came and spread out in Rephaim Valley. Then David inquired of the Lord: “Should I attack the Philistines? Will you hand them over to me?” The Lord replied to David, “Attack, for I will certainly hand the Philistines over to you.” So David went to Baal-perazim and defeated them there and said, “Like a bursting flood, the Lord has burst out against my enemies before me.” Therefore, he named that place The Lord Bursts Out. The Philistines abandoned their idols there, and David and his men carried them off. The Philistines came up again and spread out in Rephaim Valley. So David inquired of the Lord, and he answered, “Do not attack directly, but circle around behind them and come at them opposite the balsam trees. When you hear the sound of marching in the tops of the balsam trees, act decisively, for then the Lord will have gone out ahead of you to strike down the army of the Philistines.” So David did exactly as the Lord commanded him, and he struck down the Philistines all the way from Geba to Gezer. 

The Lord’s Way Must Be Our Way: 

Finally, we must walk with our Lord in our daily lives. David’s actions here are a great model for us to follow. First, a need arose, and David recognized that it was a need. Second, David turned to God, not just once, but on a regular basis. Third, God responded to David, as we know He always does to the needs of His people. Finally, and essentially, David followed the revealed will of the Lord.  

Something we must not overlook here is that David inquired of God twice, and God responded twice, but the details were different. Every challenge that comes into our lives is not the same. Noted football coach and sportscaster John Madden once wrote a book, and his title reminds us of this fact: One Size Doesn’t Fit All. As an extra-large person in a world designed for medium-sized people, that sentiment resonates with me, and not just for fashion reasons alone. 

Spiritually, we must remember that God’s will for one situation might be different than it is for another situation. But get this: God’s will for two similar situations might be different, or it might even mature into something else halfway through the same situation. So, is God’s will as chaotic and arbitrary as the Transportation Security Agency’s airport boarding policies seem to be? 

No, of course not. 

Our God is an intentional God, but His ways are vastly higher and more complex than ours are. We don’t have to understand all that He is doing, however, to trust Him and His will. What we must do, however, is stay in touch with Him. One of the first signs of trouble in the Garden of Eden was when God came to fellowship with Adam and Eve, but they hid from Him because of their sin. Instead, let us confess our sin, and stay in touch with God! 

Conclusion: 

 No one lives in the Magic Kingdom, and truthfully, no one lives on the mountain top experiences we can have from time to time with God, either. If, however, we get real with Him, we can live our best lives in His Exalted Kingdom, both with Him here on earth and also in the hereafter with Him in heaven. 

Every blessing,

Dr. Otis Corbitt

A Word about An Uncivil War

Today I want to share a word about an uncivil war as I comment on Scripture passages from 2 Samuel 2-5.

In our last episode, we saw how David and his followers mourned the tragic end of Saul’s life, and we learned important lessons from their experience. First, when confronted with bad news, we must not blame the messenger, and also, while we should therapeutically tell our story of loss, we should not tell details that might complicate our grief process. We must always tell the truth, but we don’t have to tell everything that we know. We also observed that David could cherish his memories of Saul and Jonathan, while also not living in the past. In addition, while we must look to the future, we must not neglect to show appreciation for those who helped us experience good grief.

As David and his followers moved forward in their service to God, the people of Judah anointed David as their king. As we might remember, Judah was physically separated from the rest of the tribes of Israel by Jerusalem, which was occupied by the Jebusites. Although Judah had accepted David as their king, the remainder of Israel had not yet done so. In fact, the situation would get worse before it got better. Sadly, a civil war was about to break-out.

Having been born and raised in the South, I am well aware of the many people who make remembering the American Civil War into more than just a hobby to become an avocation. The thoughts of these folks range from the erudite reflections of noted author Shelby Foote to the way a crotchety old lady teacher insisted on calling it the War Between the States. I clearly remember this latter example, because she would loudly, and quite directly, correct anyone who called it anything else. And, of course, there were the wags who jokingly, well I think they were joking, called it the War of Northern Aggression. History is written by the victors, but the vanquished also find ways of having their say as well. 

The saddest part about the idea of a civil war, is that, like the friendly fire that killed Pat Tilman, it isn’t. Usually there is nothing civil about it. The American Civil War produced over 650,000 deaths, not to mention untold civilian deaths as well. As we examine the uncivil war that broke out over Saul’s succession, let’s begin with 2 Samuel 2:8-13,

Abner son of Ner, commander of Saul’s army, took Saul’s son Ish-bosheth and moved him to Mahanaim. He made him king over Gilead, Asher, Jezreel, Ephraim, Benjamin—over all Israel. Saul’s son Ish-bosheth was forty years old when he became king over Israel; he reigned for two years. The house of Judah, however, followed David. The length of time that David was king in Hebron over the house of Judah was seven years and six months.  Abner son of Ner and soldiers of Ish-bosheth son of Saul marched out from Mahanaim to Gibeon. So Joab son of Zeruiah and David’s soldiers marched out and met them by the pool of Gibeon. The two groups took up positions on opposite sides of the pool.

 Conflict Begins By Exceeding Our Authority:

Conflict begins in a family, or in a community, or in a church, when someone exceeds their authority. The Bible uses three different terms for sin. One type of sin is inherent in the human condition. It is simply falling short of God’s perfection. A second word for sin describes a transgression. This is a deliberate act of rebellion against God’s clearly known will. The third way the Bible describes sin is as iniquity, or deliberate and heinous sin. Conflict begins when someone deliberately takes an action or harbors an attitude that is against God’s Will, God’s Word, or God’s Way. In other words, conflict begins when someone deliberately sins. 

In some cases, like this one, the sin is easy to see. Abner’s role was to serve kings, not to be a kingmaker. What he did may have seemed perfectly logical to him, and in other circumstances, it might have been an acceptable act. In this case, however, God had appointed David to be Saul’s replacement, and Abner was out of bounds. He, and he alone, bears the brunt of the responsibility for all the deaths that followed.

Rebellion like that of Abner is easy to spot, but another form of rebellion exists also. It happens when we take offense at another’s mistake without being patient and trying to sort things out. Remember, Jesus told His followers to leave their offering at the altar and go and be reconciled with those whom they were in conflict. In Mathew 18, he told His followers that it was their responsibility to go make things right. Paul also said in Romans 12:18-21,

If possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Friends, do not avenge yourselves; instead, leave room for God’s wrath, because it is written, Vengeance belongs to me; I will repay, says the Lord. But If your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him something to drink. For in so doing you will be heaping fiery coals on his head. Do not be conquered by evil but conquer evil with good.

 A pastor once saw this to be the problem that a couple was having in their marriage. In a counseling session he said, “I think you both have the problem of getting too historical with each other.” The husband replied, “Don’t you mean hysterical?” The pastor said, “No, what I mean is you both keep bringing up the past that you said was dead and buried. That’s your problem, you are both too historical!”

Conflict begins with exceeding our authority, which is a deliberate sin. We accelerate conflict through aggression. Next, let’s read 2 Samuel 3:14-28,

Then Abner said to Joab, “Let’s have the young men get up and compete in front of us.” “Let them get up,” Joab replied. So they got up and were counted off—twelve for Benjamin and Ish-bosheth son of Saul, and twelve from David’s soldiers. Then each man grabbed his opponent by the head and thrust his sword into his opponent’s side so that they all died together. So this place, which is in Gibeon, is named Field of Blades. The battle that day was extremely fierce, and Abner and the men of Israel were defeated by David’s soldiers. The three sons of Zeruiah were there: Joab, Abishai, and Asahel. Asahel was a fast runner, like one of the wild gazelles. He chased Abner and did not turn to the right or the left in his pursuit of him. Abner glanced back and said, “Is that you, Asahel?” “Yes it is,” Asahel replied. Abner said to him, “Turn to your right or left, seize one of the young soldiers, and take whatever you can get from him.” But Asahel would not stop chasing him. Once again, Abner warned Asahel, “Stop chasing me. Why should I strike you to the ground? How could I ever look your brother Joab in the face?”  But Asahel refused to turn away, so Abner hit him in the stomach with the butt of his spear. The spear went through his body, and he fell and died right there. As they all came to the place where Asahel had fallen and died, they stopped, but Joab and Abishai pursued Abner. By sunset, they had gone as far as the hill of Ammah, which is opposite Giah on the way to the wilderness of Gibeon. The Benjaminites rallied to Abner; they formed a unit and took their stand on top of a hill. Then Abner called out to Joab, “Must the sword devour forever? Don’t you realize this will only end in bitterness? How long before you tell the troops to stop pursuing their brothers?”  “As God lives,” Joab replied, “if you had not spoken up, the troops wouldn’t have stopped pursuing their brothers until morning.” Then Joab blew the ram’s horn, and all the troops stopped; they no longer pursued Israel or continued to fight.

Conflict Is Accelerated By Aggression:

We must recognize that the day comes when we must fight. Solomon, in Ecclesiastes 3:8, told us that there is “A time for war, and a time for peace.” So fighting is an option, but we must pick our fights wisely. Sadly, I don’t see either general exhibiting much wisdom in this battle.

The idea of a battle of champions was familiar to the Jews because of the story of David and Goliath, but they forgot that such an arrangement meant that one side or the other must lose. The goal of conflict resolution is a just and equitable solution to a problem caused by sin. The goal is not victory, but grace, peace, and mercy. The battle of champions didn’t go well for the Philistines, and it didn’t go well for both sides in this situation.

The problem that Abner and Joab had is described by the meme about a child with a hammer. That meme goes, “If all you have is a hammer, then all the world is a nail.” All Abner and Joab had was armies and testosterone, and that is an explosive mixture. And what was the result?

First, the conflict was not resolved. Both David and Ish-bosheth remained on their thrones. Second, the cost of this aggression was high. Two-dozen of the best and brightest of Israel and Judah were killed, as was Joab’s brother Asahel. All told, 380 men died that day, all cousins of one another. That was far too high a price to pay for a stalemate. All that blood shed resolved nothing.

It would be nice to say that such unfruitful aggression among God’s people died out with the advent of the church, but we can’t because it isn’t true. But this is what James, the pastor of the mother church at Jerusalem said to his members in James 4:1-4,

What is the source of wars and fights among you? Don’t they come from your passions that wage war within you? You desire and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and wage war. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and don’t receive because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. You adulterous people! Don’t you know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? So whoever wants to be the friend of the world becomes the enemy of God.

Belligerent conduct was also present in the Church at Corinth and Paul rebuked them as well. Unbridled aggression accelerates conflict and it is almost never the solution we need to choose within the church. Neither is the next solution Abner turned to next, which is found in 2 Samuel 3:6-11,

During the war between the house of Saul and the house of David, Abner kept acquiring more power in the house of Saul. Now Saul had a concubine whose name was Rizpah daughter of Aiah, and Ish-bosheth questioned Abner, “Why did you sleep with my father’s concubine?” Abner was very angry about Ish-bosheth’s accusation. “Am I a dog’s head who belongs to Judah?” he asked. “All this time I’ve been loyal to the family of your father Saul, to his brothers, and to his friends and haven’t betrayed you to David, but now you accuse me of wrongdoing with this woman!  May God punish Abner and do so severely if I don’t do for David what the Lord swore to him:  to transfer the kingdom from the house of Saul and establish the throne of David over Israel and Judah from Dan to Beer-sheba.”  

Conflict Is Complicated By Playing Politics:

As we saw above, Abner viewed himself as a kingmaker. He knew who was supposed to be king, but he rejected the clearly revealed will of God. When he installed Ish-bosheth, he did so with ulterior motives. We don’t know what those motives were, but when Ish-bosheth acted like a king, Abner took offense. He showed just how thin-skinned he was, and just how shallow his commitment to his king was as well.

Abner, in his arrogance, seemed to look upon the throne of Israel as a gift that he could give to anyone that he wanted. We must be careful not to look upon the gifts of God as our own, to do with what we will. If we aren’t careful, we might end up like the Seven Sons of Sceva in Acts 19:11-17. They found that appropriating the gifts of God for their own benefit was playing with fire:

God was performing extraordinary miracles by Paul’s hands, so that even facecloths or aprons that had touched his skin were brought to the sick, and the diseases left them, and the evil spirits came out of them. Now some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists also attempted to pronounce the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, “I command you by the Jesus that Paul preaches!” Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish high priest, were doing this. The evil spirit answered them, “I know Jesus, and I recognize Paul—but who are you?” Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them, overpowered them all, and prevailed against them, so that they ran out of that house naked and wounded. When this became known to everyone who lived in Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks, they became afraid, and the name of the Lord Jesus was held in high esteem.

The gifts of God are bestowed upon us for the building-up of the church, not for the building-up of ourselves. Playing politics with the things of God does not bring a good result. Neither does resorting to assassination, as we see in 2 Samuel 3:1-4,

Joab went to the king and said, “What have you done? Look here, Abner came to you. Why did you dismiss him? Now he’s getting away. You know that Abner son of Ner came to deceive you and to find out about your military activities and everything you’re doing.” Then Joab left David and sent messengers after Abner. They brought him back from the well of Sirah, but David was unaware of it. When Abner returned to Hebron, Joab pulled him aside to the middle of the city gate, as if to speak to him privately, and there Joab stabbed him in the stomach. So Abner died in revenge for the death of Asahel, Joab’s brother.

Let’s also read 2 Samuel 4:1 and 5-7,

When Saul’s son Ish-bosheth heard that Abner had died in Hebron, he gave up, and all Israel was dismayed . . . Rechab and Baanah, the sons of Rimmon the Beerothite, set out and arrived at Ish-bosheth’s house during the heat of the day while the king was taking his midday nap. They entered the interior of the house as if to get wheat and stabbed him in the stomach. Then Rechab and his brother Baanah escaped. They had entered the house while Ish-bosheth was lying on his bed in his bedroom and stabbed and killed him. They removed his head, took it, and traveled by way of the Arabah all night. 

Conflict Is No Justification For Assassination:

It is tempting to think that both Abner and Ish-bosheth got what they deserved. One might find some sympathy for Ish-bosheth, who, after all, was a son of King Saul, and who might be forgiven for trying to see if he could replace his father. Leaving him aside, surely Abner deserved his death, right? He had blatantly ignored God’s will, and in doing so, the blood of many was on his hands. 

Despite the sins and mistakes made by Abner and Ish-bosheth, their deaths were not committed as righteous acts. In the modern world we would call these extrajudicial killings, and since neither fell in battle, then their deaths were no less than murders, and their killers were no less than murderers. As the saying goes, “two wrongs don’t make a right,” and as a former colleague of mine liked to say, “There is no right way to do the wrong thing.”  We must never try to do God’s work with the Devil’s tools.

It would be rare to find a church conflict today that resulted in a literal assassination, though I was once told about a deacon’s meeting where a gun was pulled and laid upon the conference table. That’s said, modern social media is a loaded gun for character assassination, and it is one which has been fired far too often by those who should know better. We must never assassinate another’s character just to win an argument. Whether we kill someone’s body, or whether we kill someone’s reputation, we are still committing murder, at least if we believe Jesus in Matthew 5:21-22,

You have heard that it was said to our ancestors, Do not murder, and whoever murders will be subject to judgment. But I tell you, everyone who is angry with his brother or sister will be subject to judgment. Whoever insults his brother or sister will be subject to the court. Whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be subject to hellfire.

Finally let’s read 2 Samuel 5:1-3,

All the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron and said, “Here we are, your own flesh and blood Even while Saul was king over us, you were the one who led us out to battle and brought us back. The Lord also said to you, ‘You will shepherd my people Israel, and you will be ruler over Israel.’” So all the elders of Israel came to the king at Hebron. King David made a covenant with them at Hebron in the Lord’s presence, and they anointed David king over Israel.

 Conflict Is Resolved When We Yield To God:

The best part of banging your head against a wall is when you stop. God’s people finally quit resisting God’s will, the same way that Saul did on the Damascus Road. In Acts 26:14 Paul described his conversion in this way,

We all fell to the ground, and I heard a voice speaking to me in Aramaic, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’

When we resist God’s Word, His Will, and His Way, we are like Saul, kicking against the goads like a rank bull in a rodeo. When we accept His Word, His Will, and His Way, we set ourselves up to experience the abundant life Jesus said that He came to give us.

Once the Children of Israel accepted David as their God-anointed king, they put aside their uncivil and ungodly war. They began to experience their best life in the Promised Land they’d ever had, and God led David to develop an exalted kingdom, as we will see in our next episode,

Conclusion:

When we do things God’s way, it works every time. When we deliberately go our own way, however, rebellion, conflict, war, and even assassination are the results. Let’s learn from the mistakes of the past, so that we may profit from them in our daily walk with God.

Every blessing, 

Dr. Otis Corbitt

A Word about Good Grief

Today I want to share a word about good grief as I comment on 2 Samuel 1:1-2:7.

In our last episode, we saw the tragic end of Saul’s life and reign as he took his own life rather than be captured by the Philistines who had decisively defeated his army. Saul’s life clearly demonstrated the cost of disobedience to God: defeat and death, disintegration and disgrace, dismay and displacement. Saul left the scene, but he left his people to deal with the consequences. That is why we will turn our attention next to how David and the people of Israel reacted to Saul’s death, and to the lessons we can learn from that reaction.

Grief is a universal experience of life. All people suffer loss during their lives, and the experience of loss brings grief. Grief and mourning are intense emotions, and that is why pastors and funeral directors are very careful about the way that funerals are arranged and how they are conducted. Things don’t always turn out as planned, however.

Paul Harvey recounted one instance when things went array during a funeral. As a funeral procession in Illinois drove from the church to the cemetery, they passed a local school where all the students and teachers were standing curbside. When the funeral procession approached them, they all began waving and shouting and jumping up and down. They were even beating drums and clanging cymbals. The funeral director was horrified and when they arrived at the cemetery, he profusely apologized to the deceased’s family. Later, he found out that the school was standing by to welcome Vice President Dan Quayle, who was in town to campaign for a local candidate. The teachers were told to cheer and celebrate as his motorcade passed by. Unfortunately, the funeral procession passed by the school first!

Good grief was the favorite expression of dismay in the cartoon series Charlie Brown. The response of David and his followers to the death of Saul provides us some lessons on how our own grief can be constructive instead of destructive.  Let’s begin with 2 Samuel 1:1-16,

After the death of Saul, David returned from defeating the Amalekites and stayed at Ziklag two days. On the third day a man with torn clothes and dust on his head came from Saul’s camp. When he came to David, he fell to the ground and paid homage. David asked him, “Where have you come from?” He replied to him, “I’ve escaped from the Israelite camp.” “What was the outcome? Tell me,” David asked him. “The troops fled from the battle,” he answered. “Many of the troops have fallen and are dead. Also, Saul and his son Jonathan are dead.”  David asked the young man who had brought him the report, “How do you know Saul and his son Jonathan are dead?”  “I happened to be on Mount Gilboa,” he replied, “and there was Saul, leaning on his spear. At that very moment the chariots and the cavalry were closing in on him. When he turned around and saw me, he called out to me, so I answered: I’m at your service. He asked me, ‘Who are you?’ I told him: I’m an Amalekite. Then he begged me, ‘Stand over me and kill me, for I’m mortally wounded, but my life still lingers.’ So I stood over him and killed him because I knew that after he had fallen he couldn’t survive. I took the crown that was on his head and the armband that was on his arm, and I’ve brought them here to my lord.” Then David took hold of his clothes and tore them, and all the men with him did the same. They mourned, wept, and fasted until the evening for those who died by the sword—for Saul, his son Jonathan, the Lord’s people, and the house of Israel. David inquired of the young man who had brought him the report, “Where are you from?” “I’m the son of a resident alien,” he said. “I’m an Amalekite.” David questioned him, “How is it that you were not afraid to lift your hand to destroy the Lord’s anointed?” Then David summoned one of his servants and said, “Come here and kill him!” The servant struck him, and he died. For David had said to the Amalekite, “Your blood is on your own head because your own mouth testified against you by saying, ‘I killed the Lord’s anointed.’”

Don’t Kill The Messenger:

Receiving bad news is not a pleasant experience, but neither is giving bad news. Too often, messengers are blamed for the bad outcome, when, in fact, they had no part in causing it. Reacting this way is both unfair and counterproductive.

Before cell phones existed, I was once given the task by my boss of tracking down a fellow employee on their day off from work to ask them to come in for a special assignment. My boss knew that my colleague played in a softball league, and he sent me to the local park to deliver this unwelcome message. When I found my colleague, he had just picked-up a bat and was about to go out to the on-deck circle. When I told him that our mutual boss was calling him in to work, I thought he was going to hit me with the bat! He didn’t, but if he had not had more restraint than David, he would have!

We must not over-react to the bearers of bad news, because they are providing us a valuable service. Bad news does not get better with age, and what we don’t know can hurt us. We may not have become too comfortable with violence the way that David had, but we must receive bad news with grace, knowing that the bearer of it is both not responsible for its cause, and also because the messenger has probably been dreading the moment of revelation all day.

Frankly, the bearers of bad news have responsibility as well. I don’t know why this Amalekite told the lie that he did, but this interaction did not end well for him. Saul fell on his own sword, and while the Amalekite may have observed Saul’s death, and he may have even heard what Saul had said to his armor bearer, Saul did not have a spear, and he fell on his own sword. The bearers of bad news are performing a sacred task. They must not mishandle the news, nor use it for their own benefit.

Pat Tilman was a professional football player who enlisted in the US Army after the 9/11 attacks. He tragically died in combat in Afghanistan, and the impact of his death was made worse when the Department of Defense hid the fact that Tilman had died due to fratricide, which is commonly called, “friendly fire.” The lies told to Tilman’s family made their grief worse, and they were a disservice to Tilman’s bravery and self-sacrifice.

Good grief begins when we honor the service of those who graciously and gently bring us the bad news we don’t want to hear, but also which they regret having to share. Next, let’s read 2 Samuel 1:17-21,

David sang the following lament for Saul and his son Jonathan, and he ordered that the Judahites be taught The Song of the Bow. It is written in the Book of Jashar: The splendor of Israel lies slain on your heights. How the mighty have fallen!  Do not tell it in Gath, don’t announce it in the marketplaces of Ashkelon, or the daughters of the Philistines will rejoice, and the daughters of the uncircumcised will celebrate. Mountains of Gilboa, let no dew or rain be on you, or fields of offerings, for there the shield of the mighty was defiled—the shield of Saul, no longer anointed with oil.

Don’t Cast Your Pearls Before Swine:

We must remember that while everything we say must be true, we don’t have to say all that we know. Exercising discretion in grief is a way to avoid making a difficult situation even worse. This can be difficult, because when we experience a dismaying event, it is natural that we tell the story of that event.

I was once involved in a traffic accident that left both ends of my car, front and rear, damaged and crumpled like an accordion. I was sitting at a traffic light behind a large pick-up truck when I was struck from behind, and my car was pushed into the reinforced back bumper of the truck. I was not injured, but I was surprised to say the least. Besides that, the back of my car seat gave way, and I landed sprawled across the back seat. Although I was not injured, and although my car was repairable (at significant cost, but that’s another story), I told my story of that event multiple times over the next month. If I had not seen you since the accident, I probably told you about it in some way.

Chaplains and crisis counselors have a saying, “Everyone has a story. They will tell their story until they are finished telling it. Then they don’t tell it anymore.” A listening ear is a key tool in helping someone to endure their grief. Job’s friends were a great help to Job as long as they were listening to him. It was when they opened their mouths that they failed him!

Jesus told his followers in Matthew 7:6, “Don’t give what is holy to dogs or toss your pearls before pigs, or they will trample them under their feet, turn, and tear you to pieces.” Some elements in our grief story might be true, but it is not necessary to share them with everyone. Although we do need to tell the whole story to those involved in a crisis, or those who can help us to mourn well, some people who are not your friends might use them to your detriment.  Next, let’s read 2 Samuel 1:22-27,

Jonathan’s bow never retreated, Saul’s sword never returned unstained, from the blood of the slain, from the flesh of the mighty. Saul and Jonathan loved and delightful, they were not parted in life or in death. They were swifter than eagles, stronger than lions. Daughters of Israel, weep for Saul, who clothed you in scarlet, with luxurious things, who decked your garments with gold ornaments. How the mighty have fallen in the thick of battle! Jonathan lies slain on your heights.  I grieve for you, Jonathan, my brother. You were such a friend to me. Your love for me was more wondrous than the love of women.  How the mighty have fallen and the weapons of war have perished!

Don’t Forget To Cherish What Has Passed:

One of the biggest failures of God’s people in the Bible was their forgetfulness. When things were going well, when they were prosperous in a “land flowing with milk and honey,” they forgot how they came to be in that place, and they forgot who made them prosperous. They became full of themselves, and they forgot all that God had done for them.

God knew His people would forget, and that’s why He gave them various tools to help them remember.  First, He instituted the Passover to remind the Jews of how the Death Angel passed over them when he killed all the first born in Egypt, which is how God convinced Pharoah to let God’s people go. Next, He had the Children of Israel create a monument of riverbed rocks beside the Jordan River to remind them of how they crossed over on dry ground because of God’s actions on their behalf. In Deuteronomy 6:4-8, God also told His people,

Listen, Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. These words that I am giving you today are to be in your heart. Repeat them to your children. Talk about them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Bind them as a sign on your hand and let them be a symbol on your forehead. Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your city gates.

Later in Jeremiah, God said that He would write His Word on the hearts of His people, and even later, Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper, conveying through it even more of God’s truths. Finally, God inhabited our very lives with His own Spirit, reminding us from the inside of His amazing actions to bless us. Yet, we still have trouble remembering God’s works on our behalf.

So, God approves of remembering the past, and He also wants us to remember and to cherish the things in our lives that have passed. We can benefit from remembering both the good times and the bad times. We don’t need to make our lost loved one’s saints, nor do we need to whitewash all our mistakes. We can remember people and things as they were and be grateful for God bringing them into our lives.

For me, a great example of this is my memories of my mother and my mother-in-law. Both women loved me and my wife and our children, but neither were perfect. We were blessed by their love, and I learned many things, even from their frailties. So, clearly, we must cherish the past, but we must be careful not to live there. This is another lesson that we can learn from David as we read 2 Samuel 2:1-4,

Some time later, David inquired of the Lord: “Should I go to one of the towns of Judah?” The Lord answered him, “Go.” Then David asked, “Where should I go?” “To Hebron,” the Lord replied. So David went there with his two wives, Ahinoam the Jezreelite and Abigail, the widow of Nabal the Carmelite. In addition, David brought the men who were with him, each one with his family, and they settled in the towns near Hebron. Then the men of Judah came, and there they anointed David king over the house of Judah. They told David, “It was the men of Jabesh-gilead who buried Saul.”

Don’t Live In The Past:

As much as God wants us to remember the past, He doesn’t live there, and He doesn’t want us to live there, either. We remember the past in order to provide context to our present, which is the foundation for our future. God has a plan for His relationship with us, and He is working that plan, constantly. He is moving forward, and He wants us to be moving forward with Him as well.

We see clear evidence in God’s Word that David cherished the memory of King Saul, and that he also cherished the memory of Jonathan, his best friend. The Word also clearly reflects David’s deep grief and heart-felt mourning for their loss, not only in its reality and finality, but also in its circumstances. That said, at the right time, David lifted his head up and asked, “What do I do now?” And God told him what to do.

Please note that David did what God said to do. It has no effect on our lives if we know God’s will, but don’t have the will ourselves to embrace His direction for the future. If David had not gone to Hebron, he would not have been anointed king of Judah, nor would he have become king of all of God’s people. So, David did not forget, but he also forged on into the future, and God would have us to do the same.  Finally let’s read 2 Samuel 2:4-7,

Then the men of Judah came, and there they anointed David king over the house of Judah. They told David, “It was the men of Jabesh-gilead who buried Saul.” David sent messengers to the men of Jabesh-gilead and said to them, “The Lord bless you because you have shown this kindness to Saul your lord when you buried him. Now, may the Lord show kindness and faithfulness to you, and I will also show the same goodness to you because you have done this deed. Therefore, be strong and valiant, for though Saul your lord is dead, the house of Judah has anointed me king over them.”

Don’t Neglect Those Who Helped:

Gratefulness is an under-appreciated quality in a person’s life. None of us should be kind or helpful in order to receive another’s thanks or praise. If we do, as Jesus told the Pharisees about their over-the-top public prayers, that will be all the blessing we ever receive.  We are kind and helpful to others to honor God in response for all He has done for us.  That said, we should also be grateful to others for their kindness and helpfulness to us.

I know of a denominational leader who once went out of his way to help a pastor find a new church. That pastor had made some mistakes at a couple of previous churches, but the denominational leader believed that the pastor had grown and matured, and that he had learned some difficult lessons. He gave the minister’s name to the pastor search committee of one of the biggest churches in his denominational group. That church called the pastor to come to their church. Not long after, the pastor led his church to reduce their support of the denomination, and he began criticizing the denominational servant’s leadership. Gratefulness was apparently not among this pastor’s core values.

David showed gratefulness to the people of Jabesh, and he also gave them a word of encouragement. In this way, David is a good role model for us to follow when coming out of a time of grief and mourning. We should be thankful for those who helped, and we should ask them to join us as we look to the future.

Conclusion:

Charlie Brown and his friends used the term “Good grief!” as an expression of dismay and disbelief. If we learn from the experiences of David and the other Children of Israel good grief can become a reality for us as we face the difficult times that come into our lives. 

Every blessing,

Dr. Otis Corbitt

A Word about the Cost of Disobedience

 Today I want to share a word about the cost of disobedience as I comment on 1 Chronicles 10.

In our last episode, David learned to be the primary leader of a group of people by leaning on God. He learned when to go together with others as well as when he needed to go alone. He also learned when to advance and when to stand fast. Most importantly, he learned to lean on God and to seek His guidance before acting.

We have observed that the stories of David and Saul were interwoven in the last chapters of 1 Samuel. We could observe one act, and then the other respond, and we could see the bad decisions both made, as well as the good decisions that David made when he turned to God, something Saul never did. These same events were covered in 1 Chronicles, which summarizes the time in Israel’s history also covered by the two books of 1 and 2 Samuel. In this lesson we will see that 1 Chronicles 10 provides the reader a concise and dispassionate summary of how Saul’s story came to its predicted ending. As we read this passage, the high cost of disobedience is clearly revealed.

Motor Ship Herald of Free Enterprise was a British roll-on and roll-off ferry that carried people and motor vehicles between England and Belgium. It was designed with ramps at both ends of the vessel for rapid loading and discharge of vehicles. Those ramps were sealed by special doors that prevented the sea from flooding the ship. They were very effective, except when they were not closed properly. When Herald of Free Enterprise departed Belgium on March 6, 1987, the crewmember responsible for securing the bow door was asleep in his cabin. The officer who was responsible for checking that the doors were closed failed to do so. The ship’s captain, who was behind schedule and in a hurry, failed to follow standing procedures and he did not verify that his ship was ready for sea before leaving port. The result is that the ship flooded and sank, and almost two hundred lives were lost. As I said above, the cost of disobedience is high.  It matters not if the disobedience is through acts of commission, or by way of omission, Let’s begin with 1 Chronicles 10:1-6

The Philistines fought against Israel, and Israel’s men fled from them. Many were killed on Mount Gilboa. The Philistines pursued Saul and his sons and killed his sons Jonathan, Abinadab, and Malchishua. When the battle intensified against Saul, the archers spotted him and severely wounded him. Then Saul said to his armor-bearer, “Draw your sword and run me through with it, or these uncircumcised men will come and torture me.” But his armor-bearer would not do it because he was terrified. Then Saul took his sword and fell on it. When his armor-bearer saw that Saul was dead, he also fell on his own sword and died. So Saul and his three sons died—his whole house died together. 

The Cost of Disobedience Includes Defeat and Death:

Humanity has perfected the art of “snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.” So much so, that Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry’s triumphant message after the Battle of Lake Erie in 1813, “We have met the enemy and he is ours,” was transformed in the comic strip Pogo in 1970 to say, “We have met the enemy and he is us!” By this, Cartoonist Walt Kelly admitted that humanity is its own worst enemy. Sadly, the Bible agrees with him.

The Biblical litany of disobedience is almost endless. Adam and Eve disobeyed God first, of course, which laid the groundwork for Cain’s disobedience and murder of his brother, Abel. By the time that Noah was born, human disobedience was so blatant that God decided to start over by sending a flood to cleanse the world of human disobedience. Of course, what happened next was that Noah and his sons were also disobedient. This pattern continues throughout the Bible, even into the time of the New Testament church. The record of human disobedience in the Bible reminds me of a song by Robert Earl King, The Road Goes on Forever and the Party Never Ends. The title is ironic because the “party” included a barroom fight, drug dealing, murder of a police officer, running from the law, and finally a death sentence. It’s a rousing tune, let me tell you . . . but not very uplifting! The record of human disobedience is not uplifting, either.

In fact, the reason that Saul was ever made king over Israel and Judah in the first place was that God’s people found themselves addicted to sin, and they were caught up in a cycle of disobedience, calling on God for help, redemption and restoration, and then disobedience again. Paul, before Christ converted him on the road to Damascus, had experienced this same kind of defeat, which he described in Romans 7:18-24,

For I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh. For the desire to do what is good is with me, but there is no ability to do it. For I do not do the good that I want to do, but I practice the evil that I do not want to do. Now if I do what I do not want, I am no longer the one that does it, but it is the sin that lives in me. So I discover this law: When I want to do what is good, evil is present with me. For in my inner self I delight in God’s law, but I see a different law in the parts of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and taking me prisoner to the law of sin in the parts of my body. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?

When we disobey God and His Word, and His Will, and His Way, we will face defeat and ultimately, we will face death. We know that the wage of sin is death, including spiritual death, mental death, emotional death, and physical death. This was the cost of disobedience for Saul, which we also continue to pay today for our own disobedience. Defeat and death are not the only cost of disobedience, however. Further costs for disobedience are revealed in 1 Chronicles 10: 7-10,

When all the men of Israel in the valley saw that the army had fled and that Saul and his sons were dead, they abandoned their cities and fled. So the Philistines came and settled in them. The next day when the Philistines came to strip the slain, they found Saul and his sons dead on Mount Gilboa. They stripped Saul, cut off his head, took his armor, and sent messengers throughout the land of the Philistines to spread the good news to their idols and the people.  Then they put his armor in the temple of their gods and hung his skull in the temple of Dagon.

The Cost of Disobedience Includes Disintegration and Disgrace:

If defeat and death are the cost of disobedience which is paid by individuals, disintegration and disgrace are part of the cost paid corporately by God’s people for disobedience. When God’s people are disobedient, nothing good happens to the congregation, and nothing good happens to the reputation of God’s name and His cause.

In truth, what happened to Saul and the Children of Israel in 1 Chronicles 10 had its roots in the very founding of Israel and Judah, because the people were disobedient and they did not completely occupy the Promised Land. Two and a half tribes stayed on the wrong side of the Jordan River, and other tribes did not completely claim their inheritance from the heathen Canaanite nations. For example, the Tribe of Dan was the second largest tribe of Israel, but they failed to drive the Amorites out of the coastal plain, Instead, they, themselves, were forced out of their inheritance and migrated to a much smaller area. This not only divided Judah from the rest of Israel, but it also resulted in the Danites becoming disgruntled with their reduced circumstances, so they turned away from God and became known for idolatry.

Sadly, the Bible also tells us that the cost of disobedience was also paid by the church in the New Testament. The church in Corinth paid the price by suing one another in secular courts over matters that should have been settled within the church. Paul also called out this church because of their sexual immorality of a type that even pagans would not tolerate, for one of their members had taken his father’s wife. It is no wonder that in 1 Peter 2:11-12 that the apostle wrote,

Dear friends, I urge you as strangers and exiles to abstain from sinful desires that wage war against the soul. Conduct yourselves honorably among the Gentiles, so that when they slander you as evildoers, they will observe your good works and will glorify God on the day he visits.

When the writer of Hebrews said that we are “surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses” at the beginning of Hebrews 12, we usually assume that he is referring to the saints of God listed in the Roll Call of Faith in Hebrews 11, and he probably was. It is also true, that God’s people are surrounded by a cloud of witnesses in schools, communities, and workplaces. When Christians are disobedient, their friends, neighbors, and coworkers observe their hypocrisy, and the name and cause of our God and His church are damaged.

As I wrote these lines, I was reminded of a church I know about from the time I served a local association of Baptist churches. The very first annual meeting of our association after I arrived there was held in that church’s sanctuary. It was compact, but beautiful, with fan-shaped seating for the congregation, and a well-designed and very useful balcony. It was a wonderful space for preaching the Word and worshipping God. I was chagrined to find out that the church had undergone a split just after their current pastor was installed, which was the third time that a conflict within the church had caused people to leave it. At that point they had less than twenty-five people in attendance, despite sitting at a well-travelled cross-roads in our county. I was told that everyone in that community knew the history of that church, and that was why the attendance was so low. This was only reinforced in my mind when the wife of the next pastor that the church called took a job at the only adult gift shop in the county. At that point I thought I had seen everything that could happen in a church ministry, but even today that situation still leaves me speechless. Next, let’s read 1 Chronicles 10:11-12,

When all Jabesh-gilead heard of everything the Philistines had done to Saul, all their brave men set out and retrieved the body of Saul and the bodies of his sons and brought them to Jabesh. They buried their bones under the oak in Jabesh and fasted seven days.  

The Cost of Disobedience Includes Dismay:

When a ship goes down at sea, like in the case of Herald of Free Enterprise, or when someone gets lost in the Rocky Mountains, or in the aftermath of a terrorist attack like on 9/11/2001, first responders will launch a rescue operation. Many times, these are risky and dangerous, and they pose a threat to the life of the rescuers. This is why in the US Coast Guard there is a saying, when lives are in danger, “You have to go out, but you don’t have to come back.” Rescuers will put themselves at risk because they have hope that they can save a life or lives.

In almost all disasters, however, no matter how big or small, no matter how public or personal, at some point all hope of finding someone alive is lost. It is then that the rescue operation becomes a recovery operation. First responders no longer take as many risks as they might have before, and the optimistic hopefulness of the rescue phase switches to a more mournful thought of, “No man left behind.” This is where God’s people were after the death of their king. All that they could do now was to bury him and grieve their loss.

First, we should acknowledge that the acts of these brave men were honorable. Their community had been saved by Saul, and they owed him a debt of honor, which they paid him. They could do nothing about the way Saul had disobeyed God, and they could do nothing about the way Saul’s remains had been abused by the Philistines, but what they could do, they did. They honored the memory of what Saul had meant to them.

The major lesson we must learn from this is not about honoring our dead. What we must realize, is that when we are disobedient and when we fall, we hurt more than just ourselves. Our sin is like a rock thrown into a pool of water, causing ripples which endure far longer than the original splash. The law of Moses warned God’s people that the consequences of the sins of the parents are felt as far as the third and fourth generation of their children. Sin can be forgiven, but the dismaying consequences of disobedience will echo down through the ages.

One other lesson we can learn from this recovery operation is more personal. We must live with the consequences of our own disobedience, and that knowledge can cast a shadow over our lives. In the movie The Patriot, Benjamin Martin, the character played by Mel Gibson, had participated in a massacre of American Indians in the time before that covered by the film. When Martin’s own son was killed in a battle in the Revolutionary War he said, “I have long feared that my sins would return to visit me, and the cost is more than I can bear.”  We know that Saul had been driven mad by his own regrets, and also that Judas ended his life, rather than face the dismay that he would have to live with after betraying Jesus. As the hymn says, sin leaves a crimson stain, and that stain is hard to live down, and also, it is hard to live with. Finally let’s read 1 Chronicles 10:13-14,

Saul died for his unfaithfulness to the Lord because he did not keep the Lord’s word. He even consulted a medium for guidance, but he did not inquire of the Lord. So the Lord put him to death and turned the kingdom over to David son of Jesse.

The Cost of Disobedience Includes Displacement:

In many ways, Saul’s story is a parallel of the story of the nation over which he was king. Saul, like Israel, had been chosen by God to perform a great mission for Him. Saul, like Israel, had been blessed by God to enable him to carry out that mission. Saul, like Israel, had turned his back on God, and he was disobedient to Him. Saul, like Israel, had refused to repent and return to God, and so he was rejected by Him.  Saul, like Israel, had the opportunity to serve God and to have his royal line be established. Saul, like Israel, threw that opportunity away.

Our God is an intentional God, and He will pursue His Will and His Way regardless of human failure. God had David displace Saul, and Saul’s line, and the line of David was established to rule physical Israel, and to become the line that established Jesus as the Savior and Lord of spiritual Israel, who are God’s people today. 

The original role of Israel was to be God’s agents of evangelism, bringing the peoples of the world to God and bringing God to the peoples of the world. Biblical Israel forfeited that privilege by her disobedience to God. She was displaced by the church, who are laborers together with God, with the mission of making disciples of all people.

Before we in the church become proud, and dismissive of Biblical Israel, we need to see two clear truths from the New Testament. The first is that the church is the Body of Christ in the world today, empowered by the Holy Spirit. We have God living inside our lives, something Biblical Israel never had. This very fact should keep us humble.

The second truth is that although God will not displace the church before the end times, He may very well displace individual churches, if they become disobedient.  God will not displace the preaching of the Gospel, but He may very well displace some preachers of the Gospel, if they, too, become disobedient. If God’s people want to love Him and His Son, they must remember what Jesus said, “If you love me, keep my commandments.” Or, phrased the other way, if you love Jesus, don’t be disobedient!

Conclusion:

As we close, you might want to say to me, “Wow, pastor. This was a depressing lesson.” And you would be correct. In my defense, I did entitle this series of lessons Royal Pains, so that was a clue that we had some less than pleasant ground to cover.  Still, I would not want to leave you without hope. And there is hope.  

In Romans 7, when Paul lamented, “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” this wasn’t a question that echoed down through the ages like a shout into an empty canyon. No! Paul did not leave us hanging, for he quickly provided an answer, proclaiming, “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with my mind I myself am serving the law of God, but with my flesh, the law of sin.” 

As long as there is breath there is hope because of Jesus. Just because we have been disobedient before does not mean we have to continue to be disobedient. Commenting on the story of Cain and Abel, Pastor Charles Swindoll said that one lesson Cain should have learned was, “It’s never too late to begin doing the right thing.” Swindoll went on to comment, “And don’t miss the implied benefit: ‘If you do what is right, you will be fine.’”

God stands ready today to help us begin doing the right thing and avoid the cost of disobedience. Are we willing to let Him?

Every blessing,

Dr. Otsi Corbitt

A Word about Learning to Lead and Lean

Today I want to share a word about David learning to lead and lean as I comment on selected verses from 1 Samuel 22-25.

In our last episode, we saw that after Saul had plotted to kill him, David ran away to fight another day.  For David, this was a brand-new experience. He had never seen such anger and rejection before. Until now, everyone had recognized David for what he was, an obedient servant of God, and of those whom God had placed over him. For David, this was a shocking and unsettling situation. He panicked, and instead of turning to God, he relied upon his own skills and judgment.   

There is nothing like good judgment in a leader, but sadly, David often exercised nothing like good judgment. David was human and flawed. He turned to deception and violence to survive, and he was also arrogant and lustful. As David tried to escape Saul, he became just like him in many ways. In the end, he did turn back to God, but not before making many mistakes.

All that said, God used David’s time on the run to educate him and to teach him to be a leader of God’s people. Tal Bonham, former executive director of the Ohio Baptist Convention once joked that, “Well digging is the only job where you start at the top.”  David learned how to lead God’s people while leaning on God’s will and way in the school of hard knocks.  David had many natural skills, and he also had gifts given to him through his anointing from God. Still, having tools is not the same as knowing how to use them. That’s what God taught David, beginning in 1 Samuel 22:1-5,

So David left Gath and took refuge in the cave of Adullam. When David’s brothers and his father’s whole family heard, they went down and joined him there. In addition, every man who was desperate, in debt, or discontented rallied around him, and he became their leader. About four hundred men were with him. From there David went to Mizpeh of Moab where he said to the king of Moab, “Please let my father and mother stay with you until I know what God will do for me.” So he left them in the care of the king of Moab, and they stayed with him the whole time David was in the stronghold. Then the prophet Gad said to David, “Don’t stay in the stronghold. Leave and return to the land of Judah.” So David left and went to the forest of Hereth.

David Learned When To Go Together:

Leadership experts have embraced an old African proverb that says, If you want to go fast, go alone; if you want to go far, go together." This is like the saying that “Many hands make light work.” Working in a group provides endurance and power that no one working alone has. 

A great example of the power of a group is the expedition to climb Mount Everest in 1953 that allowed Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay to make the first recorded successful summit of the world’s tallest mountain.  To put those two men at the top of the world took over four hundred people, including thirty-five Western climbers, twenty Sherpa guides, and three-hundred and sixty-two porters. Hillary and Norgay stood on the shoulders of hundreds of unknown people to get to the top.

Another case of the power of a group was the Manhattan Project of World War Two that produced the first nuclear bombs. In telling the story of this massive effort, popular media often will focus on two people, Dr. Robert Oppenheimer, and Major General Leslie Groves, most likely because both men were forceful and peculiar personalities and they make for interesting viewing. In reality, several hundred scientists were involved in multiple locations, and thousands of construction workers and factory workers were essential to the task. The town of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, was founded to house many of those who labored in the darkness of secrecy in the effort to end World War Two with a literal bang.

So, then why don’t people always go together as opposed to going it alone? The people we go with are just like us; they are fallen and sinful and stubborn. The group that gathered around David were not the best and the brightest. They were not the hand-picked soldiers of Saul’s army that David had led into battle. These people were the least, the last, and the lost. And David was their leader, and he would learn to lean on God as he led this mob through the wilderness.

Of course, David and his motley band of followers are not alone in the Bible. Moses didn’t lead just a gang, but an entire nation into the promised land. The men Jesus called to be his twelve Disciples were mostly outcasts as well. The lesson we learn from all of these examples is that leadership is productive, but it is also difficult, and the leaders of God’s people must lean on Him to be successful. Next, let’s read 1 Samuel 22:3-5,

From there David went to Mizpeh of Moab where he said to the king of Moab, “Please let my father and mother stay with you until I know what God will do for me.” So he left them in the care of the king of Moab, and they stayed with him the whole time David was in the stronghold. Then the prophet Gad said to David, “Don’t stay in the stronghold. Leave and return to the land of Judah.” So David left and went to the forest of Hereth.

David Learned When To Go Alone:

Even though there is power and endurance in going together, sometimes we must go alone. In this case, David took his parents to a place of refuge and he left them there. It was safer for them to be in Moab than it was to be chasing around the wilderness of Judah with David and his followers. Sometimes going alone is simply necessary.

An early example of going alone is the high priest on the Day of Atonement. Once a year the high priest would go into the Holy of Holies to sprinkle the blood of a sacrifice for the sins of God’s people. The only one who could do that was the high priest, and anyone else who entered there would die. This process, of course, was a model of what Jesus did for us on the Cross. Only Jesus could die for our sins, and only He could provide us salvation. Jesus had to do this alone, and blessedly for us, He did!

Another example of something we must do alone is to profess Christ as our Savior and to accept His sacrifice for our sins. One of the mistakes that the Jews made was that they believed that their heritage was what made the difference in their spiritual wellness. In their minds, the decisions made by someone’s ancestors in generations past still covered them as they lived frail and human lives in their current day. In Matthew 3:7-10, John the Baptist told them very directly that they were wrong and in no uncertain terms!

When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “Brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Therefore produce fruit consistent with repentance. And don’t presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you that God is able to raise up children for Abraham from these stones. The ax is already at the root of the trees. Therefore, every tree that doesn’t produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.

God’s family has no grandchildren! Each of us, on our own, must decide to surrender to God and be saved through the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is something we must do alone, as we learn to lean on Jesus.

Sometimes, the only way that God can communicate with us is when we are alone. Moses was herding Jethro’s sheep when God came to him in the burning bush. Elijah was alone when God appeared to him as the still small voice. Both Jonah, in the belly of the fish, and the Prodigal Son feeding the pigs, were alone when they finally came to their senses and turned to God. Jesus fasted alone in the desert with God before He was tempted by Satan. Some spiritual lessons are tailored for individuals to learn on their own. Self-paced learning is common today, but God already had that concept in place in His Kingdom, almost from the beginning!

One other thing we must do on our own is to repair our relationships. Jesus told His followers that if they were in conflict with someone, that they must leave their gifts at the altar and go be reconciled with that person. He outlined this process in Mathew 18:15-17,

“If your brother sins against you, go tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won your brother. But if he won’t listen, take one or two others with you, so that by the testimony of two or three witnesses every fact may be established. If he doesn’t pay attention to them, tell the church. If he doesn’t pay attention even to the church, let him be like a Gentile and a tax collector to you.”

Although others can become involved in this process, reconciliation begins with a lone individual taking an action by themselves. Sometimes we just have to go it alone, but even then, however, God is always with us! Next, let’s read 1 Samuel 23:1-14,

It was reported to David, “Look, the Philistines are fighting against Keilah and raiding the threshing floors.” So David inquired of the Lord: “Should I launch an attack against these Philistines?” The Lord answered David, “Launch an attack against the Philistines and rescue Keilah.” But David’s men said to him, “Look, we’re afraid here in Judah; how much more if we go to Keilah against the Philistine forces!” Once again, David inquired of the Lord, and the Lord answered him, “Go at once to Keilah, for I will hand the Philistines over to you.” Then David and his men went to Keilah, fought against the Philistines, drove their livestock away, and inflicted heavy losses on them. So David rescued the inhabitants of Keilah. Abiathar son of Ahimelech fled to David at Keilah, and he brought an ephod with him.  When it was reported to Saul that David had gone to Keilah, he said, “God has handed him over to me, for he has trapped himself by entering a town with barred gates.” Then Saul summoned all the troops to go to war at Keilah and besiege David and his men. When David learned that Saul was plotting evil against him, he said to the priest Abiathar, “Bring the ephod.” Then David said, “Lord God of Israel, your servant has reliable information that Saul intends to come to Keilah and destroy the town because of me. Will the citizens of Keilah hand me over to him? Will Saul come down as your servant has heard? Lord God of Israel, please tell your servant.” The Lord answered, “He will come down.” Then David asked, “Will the citizens of Keilah hand me and my men over to Saul?” “They will,” the Lord responded. So David and his men, numbering about six hundred, left Keilah at once and moved from place to place. When it was reported to Saul that David had escaped from Keilah, he called off the expedition. David then stayed in the wilderness strongholds and in the hill country of the Wilderness of Ziph. Saul searched for him every day, but God did not hand David over to him.

David Learned When To Go Forward:

An old saying is, “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there.” This may have come from Lewis Carroll’s book Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. In Chapter 6, Alice asks the Cheshire Cat for directions: “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat. “I don’t much care where—” said Alice. “Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat. “—so long as I get somewhere,” Alice added. “Oh, you’re sure to do that,” said the Cat, “if you only walk long enough.”

Our God is an intentional God. He is not aimless or random, or haphazard. From the sin of Adam and Eve in the Garden, God has had a plan for the salvation of humanity, and for the redemption and the renewal of the world that our sin has spoiled. Even when the Children of Israel were wandering in the desert, God had a purpose; He needed to cleanse His people by allowing a faithless generation to die out. 

God’s plan is marching onward, and He wants us to have a part in that plan: first to be saved ourselves, and then to help others to be saved as well.  God is going somewhere and He wants us to come with Him. The problem we often have, however, is that God is spirit and His plans are spiritual plans. We can’t see a spirit, nor can we see a spiritual plan. God, of course, has a plan for that problem also. In James 1:5-7 we read,

Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God—who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly—and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith without doubting. For the doubter is like the surging sea, driven and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord, being double-minded and unstable in all his ways. 

In 2016, billionaire investor Mark Cuban gave his Number One Rule of Investing, which was, “When you don’t know what to do, do nothing.”  This might be great advice for an investor, but I like the corollary as stated by Oprah Winfrey. She said, “When you don’t know what to do, do nothing. Get quiet so you can hear the still, small voice.” This is great spiritual advice, as long as the still small voice you listen for is God’s!

When it is time to act, turn to God, and He will tell you where and when to go, and what to do when you get there. He might also tell you to stay, as well. Next, let’s read 1 Samuel 25:4-13,

While David was in the wilderness, he heard that Nabal was shearing sheep, so David sent ten young men instructing them, “Go up to Carmel, and when you come to Nabal, greet him[b] in my name. Then say this: ‘Long life to you, and peace to you, peace to your family, and peace to all that is yours. I hear that you are shearing. When your shepherds were with us, we did not harass them, and nothing of theirs was missing the whole time they were in Carmel. Ask your young men, and they will tell you. So let my young men find favor with you, for we have come on a feast day. Please give whatever you have on hand to your servants and to your son David.’” David’s young men went and said all these things to Nabal on David’s behalf, and they waited. Nabal asked them, “Who is David? Who is Jesse’s son? Many slaves these days are running away from their masters. Am I supposed to take my bread, my water, and my meat that I butchered for my shearers and give them to these men? I don’t know where they are from.” David’s young men retraced their steps. When they returned to him, they reported all these words. He said to his men, “All of you, put on your swords!” So each man put on his sword, and David also put on his sword. About four hundred men followed David while two hundred stayed with the supplies.

David Learned When To Stand Fast:

If it is important to know when to go forward, it is equally important to know when to stand fast. Sometimes we are like the Jolene of the famous song by Dolly Parten. In the song, the character represented by Parten begs Jolene not to take her man. She sings, “Please don’t take him just because you can.” Like Jolene, at times we do things just because we can, and without seeking God’s guidance and leadership. This is where David found himself in 1 Samuel 25.

David was learning to be a good leader, and like all good leaders, he thought it was a good idea to throw his troops a party. He also thought it was a good idea to reach out to Nabal for a donation. So far, so good, but when Nabal refused David by using offensive language, David fell back on his baser instincts. He had become too comfortable with violence, and he told his men to saddle-up, intending to lead them out on a mission of revenge and sheep rustling. No where in this process do we see David seeking God’s guidance about any of these plans. It was good for him that Abigail, Nabal’s wife, had a better head on her shoulders than either David or her husband. Not only did she bring David a gift, but she also brought him a word from God that prevented him from unnecessary bloodshed and regret. We can see David’s grateful response in 1 Samuel 25:32-34,

Then David said to Abigail, “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, who sent you to meet me today! May your discernment be blessed, and may you be blessed. Today you kept me from participating in bloodshed and avenging myself by my own hand. Otherwise, as surely as the Lord God of Israel lives, who prevented me from harming you, if you had not come quickly to meet me, Nabal wouldn’t have had any males left by morning light.”

Too often God’s people make their own plans and then ask God to bless them. When we do, we are approaching things from back to front, instead of from front to back. We must seek God’s guidance first, because sometimes He wants us to stand fast instead of charging off into the darkness.

Conclusion:

As we close, you might be saying to yourself, “That’s nice for David, but I’m not a leader.” You may not be a leader of a gang of four hundred malcontents and misfits, but if you are a parent, you are a leader of your children. If you are a husband, God expects you to become the leader of your household. If you are a teacher, then you lead your students. If you are none of these, you are the leader of yourself. The lessons David learned apply to all of us in some way or the other, but the primary lesson is universal: we all must lean on God. He will not only uphold us, but He will also lead us into His rest as well! 

Every bl;essing,

Dr. Otis Corbitt

A Word about Human Error and Divine Forgiveness

Today I want to share a word about human error and divine forgiveness as I comment on selected verses from 1 Samuel 21-30.

In our last episode, we saw that Saul, instead of repenting, actually leaned into his sin. He went over to the dark side by feeding his rage, resulting in murder, obsession, witchcraft, and ultimately, paralyzing fear. All this time he was chasing David, trying to eliminate him as a threat to his rule and that of his son Jonathan. So, what was David doing during this time? David was running away to fight another day.

We can understand the timeline of the last chapters of I Samuel if we imagine them like a split-screen effect in a television show or in a motion picture. In one window of the screen, we are shown what one of the characters in the show is doing, while the actions of another is shown in the other window.  In our last chapter, we saw what Saul was doing in his window of the screen, and in this chapter, we see David‘s actions which happened simultaneously with Saul’s. 

For David, this was a brand-new experience. He had never seen such anger and rejection before. Until now, everyone had recognized David for what he was, and obedient servant of God, and of those whom God had placed over him. For David this was a shocking and unsettling situation. In the American south a common way to describe what David felt was, “He was like a calf, looking at a new gate.” Or maybe, “He was like a deer in the headlights.” 

In Scriptures that we have previously considered, David had expressed full confidence in God because when David needed His help God had provided it. In those circumstances, however, David had faced creatures and people whom he knew to be his enemies. In this case, however, David was being chased and threatened with destruction by his king, the one whom he willingly served. David was in a place where he’d never been before. How did he react? How would we react? 

Like David, we often choose dysfunctional ways to respond to these types of circumstances. In fact, David’s response is a great illustration of the saying by Alexander Pope, “To err is human; to forgive, divine.” Let’s begin by reading 1 Samuel 21:1-9,

David went to the priest Ahimelech at Nob. Ahimelech was afraid to meet David, so he said to him, “Why are you alone and no one is with you?” David answered the priest Ahimelech, “The king gave me a mission, but he told me, ‘Don’t let anyone know anything about the mission I’m sending you on or what I have ordered you to do.’ I have stationed my young men at a certain place. Now what do you have on hand? Give me five loaves of bread or whatever can be found.”  The priest told him, “There is no ordinary bread on hand. However, there is consecrated bread, but the young men may eat it only if they have kept themselves from women.” David answered him, “I swear that women are being kept from us, as always when I go out to battle. The young men’s bodies are consecrated even on an ordinary mission, so of course their bodies are consecrated today.” So the priest gave him the consecrated bread, for there was no bread there except the Bread of the Presence that had been removed from the presence of the Lord. When the bread was removed, it had been replaced with warm bread. One of Saul’s servants, detained before the Lord, was there that day. His name was Doeg the Edomite, chief of Saul’s shepherds. David said to Ahimelech, “Do you have a spear or sword on hand? I didn’t even bring my sword or my weapons since the king’s mission was urgent.” The priest replied, “The sword of Goliath the Philistine, whom you killed in the Valley of Elah, is here, wrapped in a cloth behind the ephod. If you want to take it for yourself, then take it, for there isn’t another one here.” “There’s none like it!” David said. “Give it to me.”

David Erred Through Deception:

Almost immediately after he fled from Saul, David turned to a trusted spiritual advisor, the priest Ahimelech. From other Scriptures, we know that Ahimelech had sought God’s guidance for David on several occasions, and it was natural that David would turn to him for help in a time of need. Where David erred, and what I mean by erring is that David sinned, was that he lied to his priest and that he tricked him as well.

When Ahimelech saw David, he knew something was wrong, but just like what happens in every church every Sunday, when David’s pastor asked him how David was doing, he essentially told Ahimelech that he was fine, in this case because he was on a secret mission for King Saul. Not only didn’t he say that he was in trouble, but he also actually made up a false story. Remember, we don’t always have to say all that we know, but what we say must be the truth! 

David went on to tell further falsehoods. No evidence exists that he had any men or that anyone had purified themselves, despite what David promised Ahimelech. In addition, the bread that David ate had been dedicated to God, and David was arrogantly assuming that God wouldn’t mind if he disrespected the priests, the Tabernacle, the Ark of the Covenant, and even God Himself. Also, the king’s mission was urgent, but it was to kill David, not to have David arm himself with Goliath’s sword.

In the end, Ahimelech believed David, someone who, up until now, had never told a lie. This cost Ahimelech and many others their lives, and all because David lied to him. What would have happened if David had been honest with Ahimelech can never be known, but what did happen showed that sometimes others can pay the price for our sins. Next, let’s read 1 Samuel 21:10-14,

David fled that day from Saul’s presence and went to King Achish of Gath. But Achish’s servants said to him, “Isn’t this David, the king of the land? Don’t they sing about him during their dances: Saul has killed his thousands, but David his tens of thousands?” David took this to heart and became very afraid of King Achish of Gath, so he pretended to be insane in their presence. He acted like a madman around them, scribbling on the doors of the city gate and letting saliva run down his beard.  “Look! You can see the man is crazy,” Achish said to his servants. “Why did you bring him to me? Do I have such a shortage of crazy people that you brought this one to act crazy around me? Is this one going to come into my house?” 

David Erred Through Faithlessness:

We have seen how Saul went over to the dark side spiritually, now we see David going over to the dark side literally. Achish was a king of the Philistines, someone who was a sworn enemy of David’s people, and of David’s God. Now, David was turning to this heathen king for help.

Up until now, David had kept faith with his family, his king, his people, and his God. When faced with a situation that he’d never seen before, David decided that his best course of action was to fake being crazy, so that the enemy of his people would take him in. While the saying “any port in a storm” might be true for ships on the high seas, it is manifestly not true for God’s people. 

In taking this action, David was rejecting all that was good and holy, and righteous and just. Even then it didn’t work out for him, because Achish wanted nothing to do with an apparently crazy man who had killed many of his own countrymen in battle. Later, after David had realized his mistake, he wrote the 15th Psalm which says,

Lord, who can dwell in your tent? Who can live on your holy mountain? The one who lives blamelessly, practices righteousness, and acknowledges the truth in his heart who does not slander with his tongue, who does not harm his friend or discredit his neighbor, who despises the one rejected by the Lord but honors those who fear the Lord, who keeps his word whatever the cost, who does not lend his silver at interest or take a bribe against the innocent the one who does these things will never be shaken.

Trying to do God’s work, or even trying to survive, by using the means of the Devil is not only an error, but it is also a sinful lack of faith and faithfulness. Next, let’s read 1 Samuel 24:1-7,

When Saul returned from pursuing the Philistines, he was told, “David is in the wilderness near En-gedi.” So Saul took three thousand of Israel’s fit young men and went to look for David and his men in front of the Rocks of the Wild Goats. When Saul came to the sheep pens along the road, a cave was there, and he went in to relieve himself. David and his men were staying in the recesses of the cave, so they said to him, “Look, this is the day the Lord told you about: ‘I will hand your enemy over to you so you can do to him whatever you desire.’” Then David got up and secretly cut off the corner of Saul’s robe. Afterward, David’s conscience bothered him because he had cut off the corner of Saul’s robe. He said to his men, “As the Lord is my witness, I would never do such a thing to my lord, the Lord’s anointed. I will never lift my hand against him, since he is the Lord’s anointed.” With these words David persuaded his men, and he did not let them rise up against Saul.

David Erred Through Arrogance:

One obvious factor in David’s life was that he had skills. He was a talented musician and writer, and he was also an outstanding warrior with the endurance to complete an entire military campaign. Up to this point, everything that he had put his hand to had been a success. This record of achievement went to his head, and David became arrogant and he put aside his humility.

Being humble does not mean that you can’t have confidence in your abilities. The physical, mental, moral, and spiritual abilities we have, all come to us from the greatest source of all: God above. If God has called and equipped you for a task, humility requires that you attempt to accomplish it. 

On the other hand, when you become overconfident, and when you forget how you got to where you are, you begin to exhibit an ungodly and unseemly arrogance. This happened to the Children of Israel after the fall of Jericho. Not only had a man by the name of Achan kept some gold and silver from Jericho in violation of God’s commandments, but the Israelite soldiers came to believe that they had won the Battle of Jericho instead of God. Then they started free-lancing and decided to capture the small village of Ai. Confident in their own strength, the Israelites sent only a small force to Ai, but they were quickly defeated, with thirty-six men killed and the survivors running from their enemy.

David’s son Solomon would later write in Proverbs 16:18 that, “Pride comes before destruction, and an arrogant spirit before a fall.” We must always remember that as Paul said in 1 Corinthians 3:7, “So, then, neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.” Our arrogance puts us on the thrones of our lives, and this is a serious error, and a sin. Next, let’s read 1 Samuel 25:39-43,

When David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, “Blessed be the Lord who championed my cause against Nabal’s insults and restrained his servant from doing evil. The Lord brought Nabal’s evil deeds back on his own head.” Then David sent messengers to speak to Abigail about marrying him. When David’s servants came to Abigail at Carmel, they said to her, “David sent us to bring you to him as a wife.” She stood up, paid homage with her face to the ground, and said, “Here I am, your servant, a slave to wash the feet of my lord’s servants.” Then Abigail got up quickly, and with her five female servants accompanying her, rode on the donkey following David’s messengers. And so she became his wife. David also married Ahinoam of Jezreel, and the two of them became his wives. But Saul gave his daughter Michal, David’s wife, to Palti son of Laish, who was from Gallim.

David Erred Through Lust:

In a previous episode, we saw how Samuel had twice offered David the chance to become his son-in-law, but David was reluctant. David was humble, at that time anyway, and he didn’t think that he was worthy to marry the king’s daughter. Later, after much persuasion, he did marry Saul’s daughter Michal, but he left her behind when he fled for his life.

It is interesting to note that in I Samuel 22, David had found a safe place for his father and mother with the king of Moab. However, he didn’t find a way to rescue Michal from Saul’s household. He left her there in Saul’s hands, and the king gave David’s wife to another man.  Later, when David was king and Michal was restored to him, she would come to despise David. It is easy to think that their relationship was spoiled years earlier when David ran off and left her.

Although at one time David was too humble to take one of Saul’s daughters to be his wife, he had now come to the point that he had no qualms about taking a wife. In fact, he took for himself two wives. It seems as if David had convinced himself that there wasn’t much sanctity in marriage after all. If one wife was good, then two or three must be better. Even a warrior on the run deserves a little comfort now and again, right?

It seems as if David looked on marriage the way that some people look at ice cream, wanting to enjoy the flavor of the month. Paul, in Ephesians 5:25-33 gives us a much different picture of how a husband ought to view marriage,

Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her to make her holy, cleansing her with the washing of water by the word. He did this to present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or anything like that, but holy and blameless. In the same way, husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hates his own flesh but provides and cares for it, just as Christ does for the church, since we are members of his body. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This mystery is profound, but I am talking about Christ and the church. To sum up, each one of you is to love his wife as himself, and the wife is to respect her husband.

Let me be clear, what David was doing was common for the culture of his day. Any man who could afford to have multiple wives did, and even those who probably couldn’t afford them, like David, also did so. The fact that something is common in the surrounding culture does not make it wise or acceptable for God’s people to do that thing.

All of this looks bad, but sadly, it gets worse. Let’s read 1 Samuel 27:8-12,

David and his men went up and raided the Geshurites, the Girzites, and the Amalekites. From ancient times they had been the inhabitants of the region through Shur as far as the land of Egypt. Whenever David attacked the land, he did not leave a single person alive, either man or woman, but he took flocks, herds, donkeys, camels, and clothing. Then he came back to Achish, who inquired, “Where did you raid today?” David replied, “The south country of Judah,” “The south country of the Jerahmeelites,” or “The south country of the Kenites.” David did not let a man or woman live to be brought to Gath, for he said, “Or they will inform on us and say, ‘This is what David did.’” This was David’s custom during the whole time he stayed in the Philistine territory. So Achish trusted David, thinking, “Since he has made himself repulsive to his people Israel, he will be my servant forever.”

David Erred Through Violence:

During my time as a military chaplain, I served with some troops who had been well-trained in the application of violence to accomplish a mission. Some had become comfortable with that idea, and they expressed that comfort with some pithy sayings like, “If someone is worth shooting once they are worth shooting twice.” Or “When it comes to shooting your enemy in close quarter battles, always give them ‘p’ for ‘plenty.’” Or the classic from the Cold War, “Nuke’em ‘til they glow, then shoot them in the dark.”

The passage from 1 Samuel 27 reveals to us that the little shepherd boy had now become a stone-cold killer. David had gotten far too comfortable with violence, and while his massacre of witnesses made great tactical sense, at least in the World War II German SS war crime sort of way, it is hard to see someone anointed by God killing innocent people. God’s people must not err by convincing themselves that sinful behavior, even for the right reasons, is righteous.

So far, it seems as if David was making all the same mistakes that Saul did. He was on a slippery slope to depravity and destruction, but before that happened, David, unlike Saul, turned to God. Let’s read 1 Samuel 30:1-8,

David and his men arrived in Ziklag on the third day. The Amalekites had raided the Negev and attacked and burned Ziklag. They also had kidnapped the women and everyone, in it from youngest to oldest. They had killed no one but had carried them off as they went on their way. When David and his men arrived at the town, they found it burned. Their wives, sons, and daughters had been kidnapped. David and the troops with him wept loudly until they had no strength left to weep. David’s two wives, Ahinoam the Jezreelite and Abigail the widow of Nabal the Carmelite, had also been kidnapped. David was in an extremely difficult position because the troops talked about stoning him, for they were all very bitter over the loss of their sons and daughters. But David found strength in the Lord his God. David said to the priest Abiathar son of Ahimelech, “Bring me the ephod.” So Abiathar brought it to him and David asked the Lord, “Should I pursue these raiders? Will I overtake them?” The Lord replied to him, “Pursue them, for you will certainly overtake them and rescue the people.”

David Turned To The Lord:

In this passage we see the essential difference between David and Saul. Up to this point, both men had tried almost everything imaginable to win their mutual struggle. Sadly, nothing they had tried so far was successful, and most of it was downright sinful. 

These men remind me of the test pilots that author Tom Wolfe wrote about in his book, The Right Stuff. A recording of one such test pilot tells a sad tale. As his experimental airplane was crashing, he was heard on the radio, saying, “I’ve tried A! I’ve tried B! I’ve tried C! I’ve tried D! Tell me what else I can try!” Then came a “truly spooky click” on the radio that indicated the airplane had crashed. As test pilot Bob Hoover said, “If you’re faced with a forced landing, fly the thing as far into the crash as possible.” Both David and Saul flew the crashing airplane of their lives as far as they could. One factor, however, was different between the two of them

Saul ultimately crashed, because he desperately tried all the wrong things. David almost followed suit, but at the last second, he turned to God. This both saved him and it redeemed the absolute mess he had been making of his life.

Conclusion:

As we close, let us return to the saying, “To err is human, to forgive divine.” If someone like David can make so many mistakes when faced with a new and threatening reality, so can we. David traveled a long and twisted path to come to the place where he gave up on his own efforts, and returned to his God, the One forgave him, and the One who helped him. Why don’t we skip to the end of the story in our own lives, and just turn to God? We will save ourselves from making many mistakes, only to wind up in the same place, seeking God and His forgiveness and guidance!

Every blessing,

Dr. Otis Corbitt