Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Samuel 16-17.

King David’s reaction to Ziba has always made me wonder.  I may go into more detail when we get to David’s return to Jerusalem, but for now, his question about Mephibosheth comes just after he had told Hushai to not accompany him because he would be a burden.  Yet here David is wondering why Mephibosheth did not join him in his flight.  It seems to me that there is a connection here between King David’s reaction to Ziba and his interaction with Shimei.  Shimei, Ziba, and Mephibosheth are all from the tribe of Benjamin and connected with the clan of King Saul.  The Bible never really goes into it, but we can see a vague outline of the power politics of Ancient Israel which King David was balancing in these individuals.

Every time I read this I am impressed by how Hushai undermines Ahithophel’s good advice by appealing to Absalom’s ego and insecurity at the same time.  First Hushai plays up Absalom’s fear of his father’s military prowess, then he hints to Absalom the glory he would receive by being the field commander in charge when King David is defeated.

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 14-15.

Joab’s role in getting King David to revoke Absalom’s banishment always baffles me.  This is one of several times when Joab confronts David to get him to do what Joab believes to be in David’s, and the country’s, best interest.  Yet, there are also numerous stories where David expressed anger that he lacked the ability to get rid of Joab and his brother.  The best I can figure is that Joab and his brother did things which they believed needed to be done which David felt should not be done. In any case, every time I read this story it strikes me that King David was a poor father.  He only brought Absalom back from exile when Joab pushed him on it.  Then once Absalom had returned, David basically ignored him until Joab once more pushed him on the issue.  The best sense I can make of this story is that King David and Joab both at this point viewed Absalom as the heir apparent, intending that he would become king when David died.

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 12-13.

I usually try to stay away from writing about the “obvious” lessons in a passage, but David’s reaction to the illness and death of his son born from his adulterous affair with Bathsheba stuck with me today.  Actually, David’s entire reaction to be confronted about his affair with Bathsheba sticks with me.  First, when confronted about what he did with Bathsheba and to Uriah the Hittite, he did not try to make excuses for his affair with Bathsheba, or make a blustery defense of arranging Uriah’s death.  Instead, David humbly confesses that he had sinned against God.  Then when the son of that affair got sick, David fasted and laid on the ground wearing only sackcloth.  He did this for seven days, refusing to eat or do anything else.  On the seventh day, when he learned that the child had died, he got up, cleaned himself, dressed, and ate.  When asked why he acted this way, David answered, “While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept. I thought, ‘Who knows? The Lord may be gracious to me and let the child live.’ ²³ But now that he is dead, why should I go on fasting? Can I bring him back again?”  The point here is that all too often we wait until after it is too late to express our desire to be with our loved ones, or to seek God’s intervention.  Instead, we should follow David’s example and throw ourselves on God’s mercy before bad things happen.  The lesson I see here for me is this: I foresee bad things coming for many people, now is the time for me to fast and pray for God to change the course of judgement I see Him sending.  Perhaps, He will change His mind, perhaps He will show me how to get people to turn to Him and change the path they are on.

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 8-11.

Early in the discussion here about David’s conquests the passage mentions that he conquered the Moabites and killed 2/3rds of them (the way the passage describes how he decided who to kill and who to let live seems odd and I may be misreading how it would have worked out).  The thing about this which strikes me is that David had taken his parents to the king of Moab for protection when he was fleeing from King Saul.  In addition, his great grandmother, Ruth, was a Moabite. Yet, here he is described as killing the majority of them.  I suspect we are missing this a part of the story here.

I find it interesting that when King David asked after a descendant of King Saul whom he could be kind to in honor of Jonathan, Jonathan’s son was described as living in a town whose name could be translated as “Nowhere”.  Which makes me wonder if the name given was intended to indicate the actual town name, or to indicate that King David took Jonathan’s son from Nowheresville (as we would express it today) to the royal palace. In fact, that is the point of this story, whether Lo Debar was an actual place, or just “Nowheresville”,  this story is here to tell us that King David took Jonathan’s son from the obscurity to which his crippled state condemned him to the heights of society, all out of David’s love for Jonathan.

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.

Upon being made king over all of Israel, and no longer just king of Judah, King David moved his capital to Jerusalem.  Of course to do so he had to first conquer Jerusalem, which had held out against the Israelites since the time of Joshua.  The other aspect of this passage, and really the entire account of David’s military career, is the way in which it both credits his military brilliance and his reliance on God’s guidance.  When the Philistines attacked him, the passage tells us that he inquired of God on how he should respond and then again when the Philistines attacked a second time.  In both cases, the writer gives me the impression that King  David made good tactical and strategic decisions because he sought and followed God’s guidance.

I want to write about King David’s two efforts to move the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem.  The first time, King David gave up on bringing the Ark to Jerusalem when one of his allies was killed because he touched the Ark while trying to keep it from falling off of the cart they were transporting it on.  David became frightened and angry when this happened.  So, King David left the Ark in the care of a Philistine who had allied himself with David.  When King David was told a few months later that the man he left it with, and everything he had, had been blessed, David moved the Ark the rest of the way to Jerusalem.  This bit has always confused me, but I realized today what it tells us.  David was afraid that Uzzah had been killed because God was angry that he, David, was moving the Ark to Jerusalem.  He left the Ark with Obed-Edom as a test.  If things went badly, King David would have known to return the Ark to where it had been.  Since things went well, David chose to move the Ark the rest of the way into Jerusalem.  However, in the meantime, King David had learned that the Ark should be carried, not carted.  Using this new information King David moved the Ark into Jerusalem.

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.

I am reminded of the murder of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, by retainers of King Henry II.  In one form or another, Henry II inquired whether someone would rid him of “this meddlesome priest,” which led four of his retainers to kill the Archbishop.  David’s actions here, and later, would mean that no one who was part of his court would think that killing his opponents would lead King David to reward them unless he had explicitly ordered it.  Perhaps the lengths David went to send this message were extreme, it is one from which rulers who wish to be godly would be wise to learn.  I am returning to this after a few hours to add something which occurred to me.  David reacted so extremely to the messenger who claimed to have killed King Saul, and later the men who killed Ish-bosheth, in part because of how brutal King Saul was.  King David reacted brutally to those who killed his opponents to communicate to everyone that he was not going to treat his opponents as brutally as King Saul had done, and at the same time he communicated that this did not make him weak.

I find the story of Abner’s attempt to come over to supporting King David interesting.  If one does not pay close enough attention, it appears as if Abner betrays Saul’s son, Ish-bosheth, because of hurt feelings.  Perhaps it was, but there was more to it than that.  After Abner reached out to King David, David responded by demanding that Michal, King Saul’s daughter who had been given to him in marriage and then, after David fled from King Saul’s attempts to kill him, to another man in marriage.  It was Ish-bosheth who gave the orders for her to be taken from her second husband and given back to David.  This tells us that if Joab had not killed Abner, Israel would have united under King David sooner, and with a greater degree of unity.

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.

We see King Saul’s complete desperation leading into his final battle in today’s passage.  One of the first things he had done as king was to drive all of those who communicated with the dead out of Israel.  Now as he faces battle against overwhelming forces he seeks one to consult the spirit of Samuel because he can get no answer from God by any of the means at his disposal.

SIDENOTE:Actually, I find it interesting that the passage tells us King Saul could not no reply from the Urim.  The Urim was to be kept with the Thummim in the high priest’s ephod and we know that Abiathar took the ephod with him when he fled to David.  Further, Abiathar used the ephod to divine God’s will for David.

So, why was King Saul so desperate?  It seems likely that the men following David were not the only potential members of King Saul’s army who had not responded to his call to arms.  Which resulted in King Saul’s army being much smaller than he expected it to be.  In any case, it shows that King Saul had recognized the failure of the path he had chosen, but had no idea how to change direction.  Once again, King Saul makes the wrong decision.  Of course, by this point I am not sure that he had left himself any way to make the right decision, but I do believe that as long as we live we may turn to God and beg His forgiveness.  If King Saul had done that here, he would probably still died in the coming battle, but the people of Israel might have suffered less.

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.

When we compare Ahimelek’s reaction to David arriving in Nob by himself with what happened later when King Saul summoned Ahimelek and his family before him, we get a pretty clear idea that King Saul was comparable to many modern day totalitarians in that he used fear to rule over the people of Israel.  It seems clear that Ahimelek feared that David had come to him under orders from King Saul to kill him.   I want to interject here that I have been struggling with what I wanted to write about this passage for some time now.

The relevance of this passage for us finally hit me when I wrote the previous paragraph.  Despite the fact that King Saul could be viewed as an evil ruler, David refused to kill him when offered the opportunity.  David recognized that King Saul was God’s anointed king over Israel and was therefore unwilling to kill him, even though David himself had been anointed by God to replace King Saul.  David knew that God would remove King Saul in His own time and was willing to wait for God to act.

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