Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Samuel 8-11.

Today’s passage contains two accounts about David’s war against the Ammonites.  The first is a summary about what caused the war and summarizes the course of the war.  The second mostly presents the war as a backdrop to David’s affair with Bathsheba.  The conclusion to the war in the second account occurs in tomorrow’s passage.  One of the things which always strikes me is that David was led into temptation because he did not do what he should have been doing.  Rather than lead his army to war, David sent them off to war under Joab.  As a result, David found himself in Jerusalem with time on his hands.  If instead David had led his army into battle, he would not have been tempted by the sight of Bathsheba.  He would not have committed adultery, betraying one of his most loyal men (Uriah is listed elsewhere as being one of David’s Thirty Mighty Men).  David followed up his initial betrayal by having Uriah put into a situation where he would die in battle.  Today’s passage ends with “But the thing David had done displeased the Lord.”  King David is held up as a man who sought to serve the Lord with his whole heart, but even he fell into temptation because he chose not to do what he knew he should be doing.  Many tragedies occurred in his life as a result.  Yes, to some degree they were the result of God’s judgement, but some of them resulted from his sons following the bad example he gave them here.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Samuel 4-7.

When David was made king over all of Israel, the Philistines mustered their forces in an attempt to prevent him from consolidating his power.  As I read this passage, David initially withdrew to one of the places where he had hid from King Saul, but once the Philistines had assembled their forces he decided to attack.  However, before he attacked he sought God’s guidance.  When God told him to attack, he did so and drove the Philistines from the field of battle.  The Philistines reassembled their forces and prepared a second time to attack David.  Again, David sought God’s guidance before attacking and defeating the Philistines.  Then later when he brought the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem, he danced with abandon to celebrate and worship God, with no concern for his dignity.  Let us seek to do the same.  Seek God’s guidance before we take action and worship Him without concern for our dignity.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Samuel 1-3.

As I read today’s passage I thought about the easy familiarity which Abner, who had commanded King Saul’s army, had with Asahel, brother of Joab, commander of David’s army.  Abner was King Saul’s cousin, and the man responsible for putting Saul’s surviving son on the throne of all of Israel aside from the tribe of Judah (and possibly Simeon, since Simeon’s original territory was within the territory of Judah).  While Asahel, and his brothers Joab and Abishai, were David’s nephews.  I want to note that since David was the youngest of Jesse’s eight sons, he may have been only a couple of years older than his nephews (I have a first cousin who is the same age as her niece).  Getting back to my main point.  Abner, as Saul’s cousin would have almost certainly grown up in the same town as Saul did, Gibeah in Benjamin, while David and his nephews grew up in Bethlehem of Judah.  It turns out that Gibeah and Bethlehem were only 12 miles apart, or about four to five hours on foot, and an hour or so by horse drawn wagon.  Which means there would have been social interaction between Bethlehem and Gibeah.  So, Abner and Joab (and David) would have known each other since they were children.  Perhaps not well, but at least aware of each other, such that when they became elite fighting men of Israel (which both were)  they would have interacted socially on many occasions.  All of this puts the relationship between David and Abner into perspective.

This also gives me a new perspective on why King Saul asked who David’s father was after David had defeated Goliath: Saul may have recognized David as someone he had seen around and wanted to know which family he was from.  I mean, we already knew that Saul wanted to know what family David was from, but the new perspective is that Saul knew David’s family.  To explain what I mean: I grew up in a close knit community spread out over a large geographic area.  Many people knew my father’s family, and for that matter, my father was well-known in that community.  In addition, my brothers and I look a lot like each other, but many of our cousins also bear a strong resemblance to us.  As a result, when I would meet people from the community for the first time they would often ask who my father was.  Or, if they knew one of his brothers, or cousins, better than they knew my father, they would ask if I was one of their sons.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Samuel 28-31.

Throughout his time as king, Saul had received guidance from God, and then done whatever he thought was the correct thing to do.  Now, he faces a problem which he knows is more than he can handle and seeks God’s guidance, but God will no longer answer him.  And rather than accept what God has decreed for him, King Saul chooses to consult a medium, which he knows is contrary to God’s command.  Sometimes I wish we had an example of what would have happened had King Saul chosen to repent his sins here and throw himself on God’s mercy instead of seeking a way around God’s judgment.  Nevertheless, the important lesson we learn here is that if we repeatedly choose to take the action which we thinks is best, despite it being contrary to the guidance which God offers us, eventually He will no longer offer us guidance.  We have a contrary lesson from David in this passage.  David had actively sought God’s guidance and followed it in the passages from the previous days, and in today’s, and God worked things to his benefit.  First, God arranged for the Philistines to expel David from their order of battle before they attacked King Saul in his final battle.  Thus saving David from having to decide between loyalty to Achish, who had provided him protection from Saul, and his unwillingness to raise his hand against King Saul as God’s anointed.  Even further, if David and his men had joined in battle with the Philistines, they would have returned home to Ziklag too late to rescue their families from the Amalekite raiders who had raided it in their absence.  “All things work together for good for those who love the Lord.”

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Samuel 25-27.

When I read the account of Nabal and Abigail I am always struck that it tells us a lot about how property was controlled in that ancient time.  Let’s look at the account.  Apparently, David and his men had guarded Nabal’s men as they herded his sheep, then when sheepshearing time came, David sent some men to request that Nabal give them supplies in payment for their protection against bandits.  Reading between the lines, it even looks as if there had been an implied agreement between David and Nabal.  Nabal’s response seems to be Nabal telling David, “What are you going to do about me violating our contract?  Are you going to appeal to the king?”  Then something interesting happens.  Nabal’s servants, recognizing that David had the means to enforce his contract without appealing to King Saul, went to Abigail, Nabal’s wife.  She immediately ordered the servants to gather supplies and take them to David.  The servants to whom Abigail gave these instructions would have known what Nabal had said, so they knew that she was doing this without her husband’s permission, or approval.  Later, after Nabal’s death, David asked Abigail to marry him, and she did so.  There is a bit of implication that David acquired Nabal’s wealth by marrying Abigail, or, perhaps I should say that he acquired Abigail’s wealth.  So, in reading this we learn a bit about how contracts worked.  We also learn that, although it was a male dominated society where a man controlled his wife’s economic assets, the wife still played a major role in managing those assets.  I wrote that by marrying Abigail, David gained control of Nabal’s wealth, but it occurs to me that perhaps David married Abigail because she showed wisdom in managing Nabal’s wealth, by gathering supplies for David and his men, rather than because he gained wealth by marrying her.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Samuel 21-24.

Today’s passage contrasts King Saul with David in several ways.  We also see how much David had progressed as a warrior since the day he defeated Goliath.  When David defeated Goliath, he rejected the weapons and armor which King Saul offered him as being more hindrance than benefit because they were too heavy.  Here, when he is fleeing Saul’s court, he takes the sword which Goliath had worn as better than no sword.  The fact that David could wield Goliath’s sword at this point indicates that he had grown in strength and skill.  We should seek to similarly grow in the strength and skill needed to carry out the tasks to which God calls us.  So, one of the contrasts between King Saul and David comes when Saul discovered where David had gone, and that he had gathered a force of men around him.  King Saul accuses everyone around him of conspiring against him.  Further, when he discovered that the priest, Ahimelek, had provided aid to David when David first fled from him, he had Ahimelek, and all of his family, killed.  It is worth noting that Ahimelek had no way to know that David was no longer in Saul’s favor.  On the other hand, when David realized that the people of Keilah would turn him over to King Saul, after he had protected them from Philistine raiders, he left.  Further, when King Saul relieved himself, without a guard, in a cave which David was hiding in, David chose not to kill Saul.  We should seek to emulate David, not Saul.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Samuel 18-20.

One of the things which always strikes me is that David turned down the opportunity to marry King Saul’s eldest daughter, but later married another of Saul’s daughters, Michal.  The passage never really tells us why, but it gives us a few hints.  First, it seems to me that David had no ambitions, other than serving the Lord (and perhaps, fighting against those who were the enemies of the Lord’s people).  Second, I think he knew that Michal was in love with him and desired to marry him, while her older sister, Merab, would only have married him because her father told her to do so.  I suspect that David returned Michal’s love (this is supported by the fact that one of his demands to make peace with Abner after King Saul’s death was her being returned to him).  All of this to say, that David did not seek the kingship of Israel.  It came to him due to the hand of God.  David did what he could to serve God in the situations he found himself in, and God raised him to be king.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Samuel 16-17.

I have long perceived there to be conflict between the account of David beginning to play the lyre for King Saul and the account of David facing down Goliath.  In the former we are told that Saul made David one of his armor bearers and asked Jesse to remain in his service, while the latter has David take supplies from his father to his eldest three brothers, who were with King Saul’s army.  However, that latter account tells us that David went back and forth from Saul to tending his father’s sheep.  Before today, it never occurred to me that that referred to the service mentioned in the former account.  As for the ending of the account of David and Goliath where King Saul and Abner do not know who David’s father was, that actually makes sense.  There is no reason that the commander of Saul’s army would know who King Saul’s lyre player was, and it is not surprising that Saul did not make the connection between David, the lyre player, and David, the giant killer.

Having written the above, I want to take a look at David as a budding leader as revealed here.  Every time I read this, I see a different way to interpret David’s actions here.  Today as I read David’s reaction to hearing Goliath I read it as him trying to encourage someone, anyone, from King Saul’s army to take on Goliath.  David’s reaction to Goliath was, “Who is this guy to defy the armies of the living God?”  As an aside, I want to note the distinction David makes here between the God of Israel and the idols worshiped by other nations: God is alive, the idols which others worship are not actually real beings.  But back to what David did when he heard Goliath.  He attempted to encourage one of King Saul’s warriors to step forward and take on Goliath.  When Saul heard what David was doing and summoned David, David responded by saying that if no one else would take on Goliath, he would gladly do it.  When Saul told David that he could not do it because he was barely more than a boy, while Goliath was an experienced warrior, David had an answer.  David replied (paraphrasing here), “I have taken on lions and bears to protect my father’s sheep, why would I be afraid to take on someone who is defying God and threatening His people?”  David did not take on Goliath for glory.  He took on Goliath in defense of God’s people.  He had faith that he could defeat Goliath because Goliath was defying God.  Further, when he entered into battle with Goliath, he gave credit to God for his victory before battle was entered.  David faced down the giant because the giant was defying and threatening God’s people.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Samuel 14-15.

In today’s passage, King Saul repeatedly showed poor judgement.   When Jonathan precipitated the battle against the Philistines, King Saul declared a curse against anyone in his army who ate anything before evening, causing his men to be at less than optimal because of lack of food.  Saul did this after interrupting the priest who was about to seek the Lord’s guidance on what Saul should do in response to the turmoil among the Philistines.  In addition, when the battle was over and they could eat, they were so hungry that they did not follow God’s instructions for butchering meat(which had health implications).  Further, rather than acknowledge that his order that no one eat was a mistake, Saul was prepared to kill Jonathan.  And would have done so if his men had not threatened rebellion to protect Jonathan.  Later, after being instructed by Samuel to attack and completely destroy the Amalekites and their livestock, King Saul allowed his men to keep the best of the livestock and did not kill their king.  Saul’s excuse for offering the sacrifice was that the men were scattering and he needed to seek the Lord’s favor before the Philistines attacked.  His excuse for not slaughtering the best of the Amalekite livestock was that the soldiers were bringing them for sacrifice at Gilgal.  Saul claimed that he had only allowed the latter because he was afraid of the men.  So King Saul repeatedly exhibited poor judgement.  In his condemnation of King Saul after the battle against the Amalekites, Samuel told us the source of King Saul’s poor judgement.  King Saul trusted his own judgement over God’s direction.  The curse against anyone who ate before the end of the day made King Saul look more committed to victory, but it weakened his army.  The decision to  save some of the animals from the Amalekites in order to sacrifice them, made King Saul more popular with his men (the sacrifice would have been a great feast), at the cost of encouraging people to obey him as he obeyed God.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.