I Samuel 19:9 to II Samuel 10:19

[00:00:00] We apologize, the listener for a very bad patch of interference. This interference only lasts about seven minutes. At the early part of this recording we do apologize. [00:00:12] The first book of Samuel and chapter 16 tonight, where we left off last week, when not going to go over any of the ground at all of last week. [00:00:30] And we're just on the second main section of these two books, which is the principles of kingship as revealed in Saul and David. We have already dealt with the first section, which was the instrument to introduce the kingdom, the king and the kingdom. Now we are upon that section from one Samuel, chapter eight to the second book of Samuel, chapter the end of chapter one, which is what we have called principles of kingship, as revealed negatively in Saul and positively in David. [00:01:21] Now we're going to today, tonight, take up simply from David onwards. Remember last week we dealt with Saul. We looked at his good qualities. We noticed how he was, his relationship to the things of God. We noticed his disobedience. We noticed what he conceived to be the corporate nature of things. And we saw also how he ended. We noticed writing, as it were, an epitaph over him. We noticed how easily he came to the throne. There was an absence of conflict, of antagonism, of opposition, everything, generally speaking, except for one or two very small, almost insignificant exceptions, was for Saul coming to the throne and contributing to bringing him to the throne. Now we come to David, and of course, the record is largely taken up with David. Saul really is only given a certain number of chapters and even then is only, as it were, preparing the way for God's man. By contrast, the books of Samuel are mostly taken up with this man, David. [00:02:58] And the first thing we want to note this evening in the principles of kingship is what we have. We're going to look at him as the shepherd lad and we find that in chapter 16 and verse 70. I wish we could take the psalms this night that were written by David and find out how they give to us a key to his life in these different periods. But that is another study altogether. [00:03:28] We see him in these two chapters, chapter 16 and 17, as the shepherd boy or the shepherd lad. And we have a tremendous amount to learn about David from this question of his very early history and experience of God. Now, you know, in these studies we haven't sought to avoid some of the technical difficulties because we have felt that it was good to look at them. And the books of Samuel are probably some of the most difficult in the Bible for discrepancies. [00:04:10] We have to admit that there are discrepancies in the two books of Samuel we have to say that in truthfulness and honesty before God, and yet without in any way impairing our faith or confidence in this as the word of God, utterly and completely inspired. We can't take too much time with the discrepancies, but there are quite a few. They are largely to do, of course, with the way that these two books of Samuel don't always corroborate the two books of Chronicles. Sometimes we find different figures given to the same time. And Hebrew is a language, particularly on the numerical side, given to a very real possibility of mistakes being made by copyists in numbers, particularly in actual numbers. [00:05:11] One of the discrepancies here, if you have read this and I wonder how many of you have with your wits about you, you will have noticed that chapter 16 and chapter 17 seem to contradict one another. For first of all, we find in chapter 16, from verse 14 to verse 23, that David is brought into Saul as a skillful musician, and Saul so loved him that he made him his armor bearer. And evidently, every time that this mental sickness came upon Saul, David was brought in and played him. An armor bearer is not just some small, but is one of the most honored, if not the most honored position that could hold in the personal company that are just around David. [00:06:34] Regarding all what we've been told only a few verses before about Jeffy, but household and service of it would seem that there is some discrepancy, but the key to it all is twofold. First, this is the scripture is not giving us, in which at every point it is actually put up, that a history which is so constituted, so patterned, so ordered, that it is bringing out some of the reasons why we find David, why we all this in chapter 16, that some believe philosophers do a slightly later time after he had slave Goliath, we find more because the Lord David had a hidden history. This is kingship or dominion. [00:08:56] No man has ever been of God who has not got such a history. [00:09:04] Listen to this. That is chapter 16. [00:09:30] This reveals what a hidden you and are going to be tried by fire in life. He has introduced to us on the scene immediately. [00:09:58] And one of the qualities we find, for instance, is his skillful intellect. [00:10:05] This means that David practiced. He played the harp. It was not just an intuitive gig. It wasn't just simply that it was something born in him. No doubt it was. It was part of David, but it was something which needed careful practice. [00:10:26] A man who can kill a lion and can kill a bear, and whose whole life is taking up the book has got to keep his touch on the cross. [00:10:42] This is just one hidden issue. [00:10:48] He was a man of Dalton. Now, why should we have another man of war? Not all men of war. [00:10:57] This has been proved again and again. We find that there are men of war. They're in the business, they're in the business of fighting, and yet they're not mighty men of God. In all Saul Bartheon, there was only one man who he had got that wallet of courage which was drawn out of him in the moment. [00:11:24] In spite of all these are my friends and as not included, who was something about it uniquely. [00:11:36] And it was something developed by God when he was. [00:11:44] He was a man walk. [00:11:50] There was a to enable him to, as it were, with other. [00:12:07] And then some of them get a war like temple. [00:12:21] Yet David we are called. [00:12:26] That is something you know, that comes in challenge. [00:12:32] People who are born are usually, they ride over because they've never experienced. When you have experience, you whilst you are, you are also full of grace. There is something prudent about your speech, something wise about your speech, something careful about your speech, not hypocritical tactfulness. A lot of tact, of course, is just hypocrisy. But prudence in speech is a gift of the Holy Spirit. Then he was a comely person, that Jorgent put it more in our own language, a handsome person. There was something about David that was handsome. Of course, he was marked out. His other brothers were evidently outstanding men. David was slightly shorter than the others. Of course, he was younger, but he had auburn hair and he had very pale eyes. If we take the description of him, he was fair of eyes or very beautiful of eye. Both these things marked him out as a person that was uniquely beautiful to look at. There was something comely about David. And I believe, of course, that because of that, it is quite obvious that David took care of himself. But he wasn't just a ruin or wreck of a person to even look at. There was something about him which must have impressed you. And it says simply, it sums it all up. The Lord was with him. [00:14:09] Here then, at the very beginning of the introduction of God's man for the throne, are these qualities that have all come out of a hidden history. We know very little about the hidden history of David, yet we believe the 23rd psalm certainly comes from the very early part of his life, possibly written even at the time of which we are now speaking. Here was someone who had not only a very real experience in these ways, which showed qualities, but had above all through it all an experience of God. And this is what is revealed in chapter 17, in his experience with Goliath. If you will read with me just a few verses, I think the word itself will speak to us much more than I can. Verse 26 we read. This is what David said. David spake to the men that stood by him, saying, what shall be done to the man that killeth this Philistine and taketh away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God? This is a lad, as we have already said, of about 16 speaking. [00:15:26] He already knows what it is to have a reproach upon his nation. [00:15:34] Even though he's young, he feels keenly the fact that the people of God have got a dishonor. There's something soiled about the people of God, and he reveals to us that it's not just a patriotism. [00:15:53] He shows to us quite clearly by his words that it is the living God's name that is the root of his concern. This is something that has come out of an experience which is largely hidden. We do not know about it. We do not know what he learned looking after the sheep, but we do know that it came out in his experience with Goliath. Then if you look at verse 37, you find here again another key to David's spiritual condition and character. David said, the Lord that delivered me out of the poor of the lion and out of the poor of the bear, he will deliver me out of the hand of this philistine. [00:16:37] Faith does not just suddenly fall on us when we are found in a situation. Faith is the product of a history. [00:16:46] When we have got a routine history with the Lord, then when we're in a crisis, that history is proved. Faith does not suddenly come out all of a sudden to keep us at the right moment. We must remember that here there was something that came out of a history. And then in verse 45, we find something else. [00:17:15] Then said David to the Philistine, thou comest to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin. But I come to thee in the name of the Lord of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied. This day will the Lord deliver thee into my hand, and I will smite thee and take thy head from off thee, and I will give the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines this day unto the birds of the heavens and to the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, and that all this assembly may know that the Lord save us not with sword and spear, for the battle is the Lord, and he will give you into our. [00:18:01] That does surely reveal a history hidden from our gaze, but a history here the boy of 16, speaking words that we ourselves would find difficult to say. Touch. [00:18:16] He gets right to the root of the whole matter and is able publicly before not only the unbelievers, but before the Lord's people, who are in such a state of disorder and fear and timidity and despair. He is able to say words like this one lad against a host, and without even the backing of his own Kithan king. He'd already been rebuked by his brother for the naughtiness of his heart and for his pride. Yet he is able to talk like this. That, I say, shows to us that there is a history behind David which was beaten out in his looking after sheep. And then, too, in chapter 18, you will find David in the household of Saul. [00:19:07] And you know that one of the most difficult things of all, and a thing which many people crack up under, is to live under the same roof with someone who is violently antagonistic. [00:19:21] Kingship comes out of this kind of atmosphere. [00:19:27] It comes not only out of the way that we develop the gifts of God in us, the way that we diligently fulfill the functions that God has given us. It comes not only over the truly enrawed experience that we gain in our routine, everyday business life, but it comes out of situations of jealousy, of hatred, of suspicion, of insinuation of poison. When people have got to live under the same roof and in the atmosphere of murderous malice, this is where kingship comes out. There is nothing like this atmosphere to destroy us spiritually. Many people cannot put up with that. They can put up with anything else, but they cannot put up with living under a roof, with anything like that, with whispering, happening, with talk, with gossip, with suspicion and insinuation. [00:20:40] How that takes hold of our old natures and how it kills them. It can't kill the new nature, but it can destroy the old. We hate to be slummed. We hate to be thought of as in the wrong. We hate to be maligned. We hate to have people engineering things against us. We hate it when people we know are talking and banding themselves together in corners. That's the thing that will draw out any self interest in us, bring it right out into the open. [00:21:18] But it says three times in the record that David behaved himself wise. [00:21:26] He learnt that in bitter experience it is a very unusual way of things to find someone behaving themselves wisely in such an atmosphere. It is just there that we behave ourselves very unwisely. We either answer back or we start to come down to the same level of engineering things, or whispering or answering or arguing or all the rest of it. We come down to that level so quickly. But to behave ourselves wisely is a gift of God. It is something which only the Lord can do in us when our heart is holy toward him. I say that's one of the principles of kingship, a spirit that is prepared to live ungreeved in the presence of every kind of. [00:22:18] Then if you go on, you will find David as the fugitive. From verse 18. [00:22:28] No, from verse 19. I'm sorry. Verse 19. Right the way on to two. Samuel. One, we find David as the fugitive. [00:22:38] And this is a very necessary part of God's school for kingship. [00:22:44] He hounds us. He allows us to be in a wilderness. He allows us to know what storms are. He allows us to know what barrenness is. He allows us to know all the things that can afflict us, all the things that can pile up in front of us as evidence that the Lord has forsaken us. You know, the rabbi said, and Josephus records that when Samuel anointed David and he bent over to anoint him, he whispered in his ear that he was the chosen one of God for the throne. [00:23:20] Whatever it is, it is quite obvious that David did know in his heart that the Lord had his hand on him for the throne. [00:23:29] And yet, you see, you can imagine how in this wilderness of his life, this wilderness period of his life, he must have questioned time and time again as to whether it was not all a very fanciful doing. And I think we shall find out that once or twice he thought it was the first place we find him at in chapter 19. And the last part is in Naoth, where Samuel lived. The first place as a fugitive, that we find him is there. And what has that to teach us about kingship? [00:24:07] It teaches us the value of instruction. For David found himself amongst the prophets. There he told. He poured out his heart to Samuel. There he told him all that had happened. And no doubt, Samuel took the word of God and instructed him together. It says, they dwelt in neoth of Reva. So you see, that is one of the things we have to learn, that we need instruction. We've got to be prepared to be instructed by those older than ourselves. We've got to learn from those who possibly belong to another phase there is a very foolish school abroad which thinks that you must not take anything, you must not be educated, you must not be instructed in any way unless it's someone in your own phase. But this is not so. We must be those who can take a man like Samuel. Samuel wasn't the king. Samuel wasn't actually in the kingdom as such. He belonged to the phase that ended the judges and introduced the kingdom. Yet David, as God's chosen king, could put himself into the hands of Samuel for instruction. And you know, the Lord has a wonderful way when we put ourselves into the hands of others, of undoing all the attempts of the enemy to undo us. [00:25:35] When Samuel came, first of all, he sent one band of armed men. Then he sent them again. Then he sent another band, then he sent a third band. What happened to each successive band as they came to the prophets? They prophesied, and that was the end. They joined the prophets. So in the end, Saul comes to find out. He has decided that he himself will murder David. He will put an end to David. But when Saul comes, before Saul even gets near the prophets, he starts to prophesy. And that is the reason that we have the little proverb. Is Saul also among the prophets? This is the way the Lord can undo things when we are wholly given into his hands. [00:26:16] That's the first thing we learn about David the fugitive. [00:26:20] In spite of the fact that he knew something of God's purpose, he was prepared to learn from others. He was prepared to be just simply with others. If God has given you any gift, any function, you will lose nothing by putting yourself unreservedly and in a way that is completely submissive in the hands of others, you will not lose anything. If God has something for you, he'll bring it all out. He'll draw it out, he'll develop it, he'll show it to everyone else. He'll bring it out into the clear in the end. [00:26:58] And every attempt to finish you off, to eliminate you, will be met by the Lord himself in a very wonderful way. And then the next thing we find is in chapter 20. And there we find the very sad, rather wonderful but sad story of the stone of easel and Jonathan. The stone of easel. You remember the stone of easel where Saul tried to murder David? Three times he tried to murder him. [00:27:32] He got away from it twice. Then he went back into the household of Saul, and then again he tried to do it. And then in the end, David comes to Jonathan and begs Jonathan to do something. Jonathan says he will find out, and Jonathan tells him they agree on a little plan. You stay here and hide, and I'll come out and I'll shoot arrows as if I'm just pretzel. And if I tell the lad to come back and bring the arrows, you know, you can stay. You can come out and come back with me. Saul will have you in his home again. But if I shoot the arrows beyond the lad and tell him to go on quickly, then you will know that Saul determined to murder you. You must get out as quickly as you can. [00:28:17] Well, you know the story. It's there for you to read. But what does it teach us? The word easel means demarcation or separation. [00:28:30] And this stone is called the stone of separation. And truly it was. Here were two people who loved each other. [00:28:40] They truly loved each other. [00:28:43] But it was the kind of relationship that would not go through. [00:28:51] It was a relationship that in the end, ended Jonathan to stay with Saul, although he knew that David was to be king. [00:29:03] And David depart from Jonathan only to see him once more in his life. It is very beautiful, the way that Jonathan says to David, the Lord be between thee and me. In other words, the Lord be the union, the Lord be our oneness. Between me and you, the Lord is our oneness. He is the common thing about Ishbone. But you see, in spite of all Jonathan's protestation, in spite of Jonathan's very real and genuine love and concern for David, Jonathan ends in death. Slain by the Philistines. Ignorant. Slain by the Philistines. He never comes to the throne. And in the very next few chapters, very next few verses, we find a Darwin. [00:29:55] There are 400. Their love for David was not pure like Jonathan's. Their relationship to David was not like Jonathan's. Yet that 400 came to the throne, and Jonathan was rejected and died on the battlefield at the hand of the Philistines. What does this teach us? It just simply teaches us that the most pure friendship, the most beautiful friendship, the most real love, unless it is prepared to so identify itself with that which it loves, then it can lose everything. [00:30:34] Precision, father, mother, home, all thought of coming to the throne. [00:30:41] Unless it's prepared for that, it will not end up in the throne. It will end up in death at the hands of the enemy. A terrible thought. Yet the Stone of Esel is the Stone of separation only once more in Jonathan's life. And that for a brief few moments in a forest, was he to hold communion with David. Let us learn from that lesson. There are many such associations in the christian world today. People, congregations of people, companies of people, very beautiful love for one another. [00:31:16] Something very touching, very pure, very genuine. But it's not going to end in the throne. [00:31:25] It's not going to end on throne. It is something that must die at the hands of the elephant when put to the most acid test of all. It does not. [00:31:36] Let us learn then, from that period of David's life. And then again the next period, we find in 21 and the first part of chapter 21. And we find here that David is found at the tabernacle at nove. And there in the tabernacle he inquires of God. And we find two or three things. He inquires of God in the house of God. He is fed in the house of God, and he receives the very sword with which he slew Goliath. [00:32:09] What does this teach us? It teaches us that one simple thing, that within the house of God, our past victories are there for the present. Isn't that a wonderful thing? [00:32:24] Things which belong to our past history are kept in the house of God for present need. [00:32:36] Elsewhere, we lose them. The house of God is the greatest preserving factor in the universe. There our life is preserved. There our contribution is preserved. There our fruit abides. There our victories are kept. [00:32:57] That is a lesson we have to learn. We find that alone we can fall, but in the house of God we are preserved. David learns a very deep, hard lesson in the tabernacle. But he is given the bread which is going to keep him alive, and he is given the sword with which to fight out of the house of the Lord, albeit there is much weakness about his manner and attitude in the house of God. [00:33:27] Then we find next that we have a very sad little interlude in David's life as a fugitive. [00:33:37] He evidently feels that perhaps the whole thing is a fanciful demon. He wonders, with all this set against him. He, one man, with everything ranged against him, he flees into gath of the Philistines and there he thinks he will be safe, only to his horror to find out that there he is less safe than ever. And David has to get out of gath of the Philistines by scrabbling on the doors and failing. Madness. [00:34:11] You know, that's just what happens with some of us when we are in this battle for the throne and the house of God. There are times when we think it's all a fanciful dream and it's all as far, far too much against us. Here we are alone, little insignificant group, absolutely alone. Perhaps we feel almost like an individual left alone. Very few people understand, very few people are going to commit themselves to such a way. Oh, they'll rest on things that have already been gained in past church history. But anything new to be revealed, anything new to come out, anything new to be recovered, you will find it cut right down to the tiniest little handful. And there'll be times when you just really wonder whether, quite honestly, it's all a fanciful being. Why haven't everyone? Why hasn't everyone else? Why aren't they all coming flopping forward? Why do we left like this? [00:35:06] And sometimes we get off the ground and we go onto natural ground. We get into situations that the only way out is by sheer humiliation, by just having to get ourselves out of the scrape we've got ourselves into. [00:35:28] There's a lesson to be learned there about getting off God's ground onto natural things. But then we also find in chapter 24 that David comes out of Gath of the Philistines with a great lesson learned, and he goes up into a cave. Now, this is very interesting, because evidently he comes out of gath, the Philistines alone, and goes into the cave of Adalam alone. As far as he's concerned, he's the only one that he's perfectly sure that the Lord is going to fulfill his purpose in one way or another. God has got the first foundational thing laid in David's life. He's got one man now prepared to go through. And from that he begins to expand, and we find that 400 come. I cannot say that these men are exactly beautiful in character or in their relationship. We would call them brighams. We would call them outlaws. They were men who were in debt. They were men who were discontented with things. They were people who were bitter of soul. 400 of them, no doubt. If we could see them today, we would just wonder quite who and what they were. But here they are, contrasted with the very beautiful friendship of Jonathan. These 400 mighty men of David are to come to the throne and to. To ask hold all kinds of positions in the kingdom of God. [00:36:49] That's something for us to learn in that cave. And that name of Adalam means resting place in that cave, beaten out a very real experience of a life together. I don't suppose for a moment if we could question the 400, they would have called it a resting place, but it was called a resting place because it was God's resting place, not their resting place. As such. A lot was being dealt with there in that cave, but it was God's resting place, the place where God was progressively getting his rest. He was forging an instrument there in that cave, which was to produce a kingdom, modern exploration has revealed to us a lot of things. One of them is this, that if this cave of Adalam still exists, we are told that it could only possibly accommodate 250 at the very most. This, I think, is at least rather interesting to think that of all the caves in the Bethlehem and the Dullham area, they feel all of them could not have accommodated the number that are here mentioned without very real difficulties. They would have been living on top of each other. That's something you, if any of you want to go into that, there are some books upstairs you can go into as to why some of the larger caves in the area are definitely ruled out as far as there being the location of the cave of adullum. But those that could be could only accommodate a smaller number. And that speaks volumes as to the very real difficulties there must have been for those men as they had to get through together. [00:38:49] And then we find in chapter 22 and 20, in chapter 23, that David has to learn another very deep lesson, and that is the treachery and the shallowness of the people of God in many ways here. You find him here, in one case, being hunted into the wilderness. And they're only two, prepared just for diplomatic and political reasons, to give up David to Saul. They'll mark him and give him away. In another place, he delivers a whole city from the Philistines. And yet he's told by the Lord that when Saul comes against them, they will deliver him up without even a conscience about it. He learns deeply and bitterly what is in humanity, and this is one of the principles of kingship. We learn what is in one another. We do. We learn what is in one another. We find out just the capacity for treacherous, just that capacity for shallowness, for political engineering, diplomatic movements. Oh, how quickly the Lord's people will sacrifice one another at times just for diplomacy, just for sheer politics. [00:40:11] Some people will greet you and smile at you and will shake your hand at certain occasions, but will cut you dead. At others. They don't want to see you or have anything to do with you at sometimes because it just doesn't serve the purpose. At other times, they'll be all over you and all around you, very sweet and nice. [00:40:33] You have to learn that if you're going to come to the throne in any way. And then another thing you also have to learn is the exact opposite in yourself. [00:40:42] You'll find that in chapter 24 to 26, you find three things that David has to learn. Twice Saul is brought into his hand, and twice his men say, come on, let's kill him. The Lord's delivered Saul into your hand. The kingdom is actually yours. He's there for you to take. [00:41:04] But each time David deliberately allows Saul to escape, he will not move as much as a finger to bring the kingdom nearer to himself, to bring the throne nearer. The other, of course, is the story of Abigail, a Nabal whose name means fool. A very prosperous man, a very successful man, a self made man, but a very foolish man, and a man who was very, very short with David's young men that were sent down to receive provision and payment for the protection that they'd given to Nabal's shepherd. And you know what happens? David is so angry that he decides he'll wipe out Nabal and his whole family and everything to do with it, furious of the whole situation. But Abigail, a woman of tremendous capability and wisdom, saddles ass, who collects together a whole amount of provision and goes out to meet him on the way and turns away his thought. But one of the interesting things that she says to him is this. [00:42:20] Two things. First, she says, you don't want to be guilty of the shedding of blood. And secondly, she says, you don't want to avenge yourself. [00:42:29] This was the deep lesson that David had to learn. [00:42:33] Not ever to take anyone's life needlessly. And secondly, not to avenge himself. Not by destroying someone to bring a kingdom near to get to gain an advantage. And secondly, not ever to seek to vindicate himself. Now, this is one of the deepest principles of kingship. In actual fact, it is one which, in a sense, embodies everything else. [00:43:00] The sheer refusal to take or make any advantages to bring yourself near another throne or the fulfillment of God's purpose concerning and the refusal in any way whatsoever to vindicate oneself or avenge oneself even when the opportunity is given. And do you know that the Lord will give us opportunities? He will deliberately give us opportunities of vindicating ourselves, of avenging ourselves upon those that have done us wrong, just in order to bring us to the place where either something in us is exposed or we learn the deepest lesson that is the very foundation of the throne. The Lord Jesus himself, the lamb upon the throne, personifies all completely, any way at all to make or take advantage or to vindicate himself right through to the end. That is the very principle of the throne of God. So we learn some very deep lessons. But then we come to the last part of this book and we find that it is all bound up with the Philistines. Again. It is amazing that after David has learnt such a deep lesson, he suddenly is taken by fear and flees into the Philistine country and takes all his men, 600 of them, with him, into the Philistine, over to the Philistines and actually become part of Achish's, the king of the Philistines bodyguard. [00:44:51] An amazing situation for someone who's marked out for the throne of God to so become so compromised that they are actually bolstering up the enemies of God. [00:45:05] Now this is exactly what can happen to you and to me. [00:45:09] It is not something fanciful, it is not a dream, it is not an adjunctive. [00:45:15] We may be being brought by the grace of God to dominion to the throne, but just because we are being brought by God to such a place, the enemy will come in on every avenue he can. And do you know that we can actually be found supporting the enemies of God? [00:45:39] We can be engineered into such a situation by circumstances that we are actually bolstering up the very forces that are against the people of God and the enemy. [00:45:53] He is given a city of the Philistines that is putting God in debt for a start. I don't know whether you've ever had an experience like that where the enemy makes you a gift and puts you in debt to himself, gives you a place, a nicely feathered nest, something that is very pleasant and opportune and helpful, but he's putting you into his debt. And when the Philistines go out to war with the people of God, David has got to come out with them. He is actually found in the very armies that are marching against the interest and the purpose and the people of God. [00:46:40] He is put in the place of confidence by the enemy of God. He is put in the Ria with the king himself. [00:46:52] David learns bitterly his lesson. When there is division in the ranks of the enemy and they say, we are not going to have that man bringing up the rear. He might well play the traitor to the lot of us. [00:47:05] Send him back when he is, as it were. Look at this man, this great man of God. Now he's brought in and he's tipped out at the will of little minions, people that he met their champion and destroyed. Now he's being ordered about here and there as we wish. [00:47:31] When he goes back to Zikat, he finds everything is lost and his own choice, 600 speak of stoning him. [00:47:43] David has come to rock bottom. [00:47:47] He has lost his home, his wives, the others have lost everything. [00:47:54] Do you know the story, how they took the 600 quickly and pursued after the Amalekites and how? 200 of them got faint, by the way, and stopped by the brook besor the 400 went on and caught them and found everyone safe. Destroyed the Amalekite, except for some young men that got away on camels and brought back all the wives, the children and the spoil. And then David was not finished for the 400. Then said, we will not share the spoil with the 200 who will faint. [00:48:27] David has to settle a principle that those that stand by the baggage and those that fight at the front must all share the spoil. It became a statute in northern Israel forever. [00:48:41] Well, that's the end of david. As a fugitive, he comes to the throne. But the thing we note about David is this, as Saul dies in that very battle with the Philistines in which David was involved, but by the grace of God, was removed in the Mikatah, we find that come to the throne of God, there is conflict, there is privation, there is every kind of affliction. [00:49:15] There is satanic antagonism. [00:49:18] There must be a bitter experience of human life in every form. [00:49:26] There's no such thing as these dear old ladies that fill up christian circles, who have no idea of what this life is about and no experience of it. [00:49:41] So separated in a wrong way, they don't even know how the world thinks, can only gather the scouts around and flee. The very smell of tobacco. [00:49:55] Terrible. [00:49:59] That's not an experience of life treacherously. Shallowness, superficiality, its sorrow and its joy. [00:50:10] The stuff that goes behind psalms is a history of human experience in fullness in every way. [00:50:23] And it is also an experience of God, deep, hidden experience of the Lord. [00:50:35] That is what brings a man And a woman to the flow. Let us learn, then, from david, as God's man, how wonderfully that is exemplified. And then lastly, we find the rest of the chapters are taken up from chapter two of two, Samuel to chapter 20. With the establishment of the kingdom, it is the throne established. And this is seen in three distinct phases. First of all, we find, from chapter two to chapter five, we find david at HebRON. Now, what does HebRON mean? [00:51:22] God has brought his man to the throne. David is crowned king of JUDAH. For seven and a half years, he reigns over just the tribe of JuDAH. [00:51:32] But we find now that everything has got to be consolidated. EVERYThInG's got to be consolidated. [00:51:39] All the principles that we have seen, expressed and displayed have now got to be established and consolidated. [00:51:49] And where does the lord teach a first. What is the first thing the lord does? He brings into a place called Hebron. What does Hebron mean? It has the most interesting meaning. First it means a ford, and from then, we are told, because it was a ford, it came to mean a company. How can a company and a ford be associated together simply like this? There is a ford over a river, and any number of people coming to cross that river are narrowed down to one point on the river over which they must go. [00:52:25] So the word came to mean Hebron. Came to mean not only a ford, but a company of people going the same way. And so it came to mean fellowship. We understand it as fellowship. What does it mean? It means many people narrowed down to one ford. They have all got to go over the same course. [00:52:49] This is how God consolidates his kingdom. Once he has, as it were, brought us into the kingdom, he's got to consolidate things. And he does it. By this, we are crowned as Hebron. What does that mean? It means that in association, in union with other children of God, we come to the throne. There is no other way. No individuals will sit on thrones, as many people so foolishly think. There's no way that you'll find it in the scripture. There are not millions of crowns each to be apportioned out to millions of saints upon millions of thrones. You will not find it. You will find one throne and a bride with one crown. [00:53:30] It is a bride that's crowned as the queen of God's king. [00:53:36] One throne with a king and a queen. [00:53:41] That means that to come to the throne, we've got to be associated together. [00:53:46] We've got to be bound together, fused together, welded together, knit together. [00:53:54] That's why David was crowned. Hebron. Nowhere else Hebron. [00:53:59] It was there that he was crowned. And there he was crowned, king of Israel. Not only king of Hebron, but seven and a half years later, king of Israel. We won't stay more with that. You must read it yourself. You will find some very interesting things there in those chapters from two to five. How, first of all, we find Abner and Joab. This man, Joab, what an interesting character study this man, Joab, is. He has been used of God to consolidate the kingdom. And yet, oh, what a terrible trial he was to David. What a hard man Joab was. And yet God sometimes needs hard men. [00:54:44] Sometimes he has to associate a very hard man with a very soft man. David, in his heart, was a very gentle man. Joab, in his heart was a very severe man. Oh, what Joab did when he took that city of Ammon, how he saw the people, how he put them under those threshing instruments of iron, how he made them pass through the brick hills to destroy them. What a hard man. [00:55:13] When Abner came on to try and make a pact and covenant with David and indeed succeed in doing so, you know what Joab did? He followed him out, took him into the gate and slew him. When later on, another nephew of David came to a high position under Absalom and then was later appointed by David to a position of trust, Joab slew him as he kissed. And yet this man we shall see later on one day in another study how he ended. But you know, he was used to God. [00:55:50] David learnt from bitter experiences and the consolidation of the kingdom through that man job. And you find again and again he's saying, oh, you sonned with Beth. That was his sister. You sonned Beth. You were too hard. They did many things. We learn from this that our friends often give us more grief and trial than ever our enemies. David spent many a sleepless night, I'm sure, over Joab, more than he did over others. So we learned that. And then we find from chapter five and the few chapters to chapter ten, just a few interesting things. They're tremendous things, really, because for the first time, the heart of it all is open for us. We find suddenly that Zion is captured. This is the first real point in scripture when the city of God comes into view. It has been wonderful through our studies up to now just to see how at each point, through the different books, different things have come in for the first time in the word of God. Here, for the first time, Jerusalem comes on the city. Up to now it is Jerusalem, the royal city of the jebusite. Now it is Zion, the Zion of God, the perfection of beauty, God's holy habitation. Everything is to be summed up in Zion. Jerusalem, the city of God. There the temple is going to be now, mark the wonderful way in which God is working. First we must capture Zion. So David goes up to Zion. And of course, Zion was a stronghold. And they said, oh, dear, dear, dear. The lame and the blind can stop David from taking Jerusalem. But David and Joab, particularly as we know today, found a wonderful means of getting into Jerusalem. They found a shaft that had been cut by the jebusites for water. And up along that shaft they poured into the city and took it. [00:57:58] So Jerusalem became Jerusalem. [00:58:03] It became the city of God and David's capital and a place for the temple and the house of God. That's a very wonderful thing to find. First of all, that here is something taken for God. God gets the ground now, mark that. He gets the ground first. The second thing we find is the ark. [00:58:28] The ark is the symbol of the presence of God. When God has got the ground, the presence of God comes. It is very interesting. For instance, at Pentecost when the Lord gathered together 120 in an upper room and is a certain geographical locality. When he got them there, the presence of God came. [00:58:50] First you get the ground. Then the presence of God comes. [00:58:54] The presence of God commits himself to saints on God's ground. Then you'll have the house of God. There are three things in these chapters. First, Zion, that is the ground. Secondly, the Ark of God. That is the presence of God committed to his people on that ground. And thirdly, the house of God. David opens up his heart before the Lord to tell him what he really wants to do. He wants to build a house. The Lord tells him to postpone all that. He declines that he will build David a house. We learned some very wonderful lessons about the ark. As it's taken up. It's taken up, you know, on an ox cart, a new ox cart. They followed the philistine device and it was a mistake. [00:59:43] And when it came to a rut in the road and the ark nearly slipped off, Azar put forth his hand and died for his projection. [00:59:53] This again is just simply one more evidence of this simple principle running through ball. God takes care of his own work. [01:00:06] This is the basic thing about kingship. You can't vindicate yourself. You can't make or take advantages. You can't, as it were, further your own course position in this question of kingship. It's got to be done. And David learned a very big lesson. He learned that he hasn't read the scriptures. [01:00:31] He should have known that it was the Levites who bore the ark upon their shoulders. So he leaves it in the house of Obedidom, who was a coalite. And they are the very section of the Levites that were meant always to carry the furniture of the most holy place on their shoulders. And that is why the Lord blesses the House of Obad. And later on it is brought up into Jerusalem by the Levites. And the Lord is with them as great rejoicing. So we find there in those few chapters something, I think that reveals the heart of the whole thing. It's the consolidation of the kingdom. But what is the kingdom for? The kingdom is not something in itself. The kingdom is for the habitation of God. [01:01:20] So here you've got it. First Zion, then the Ark of God. And now the first talk of the building of the house of the Lord isn't that wonderful? First the Lord commits himself to his people when they're on the right ground, and then he starts the building of the house. But I want you to notice that you get a lot of victories recorded from it. Chapter eight to chapter ten. And what do we find about these victories? We find that all the brass, all the silver and all the gold is being brought in for the house of the Lord. These victories are yielding spoil which is going to build the house of the Lord. [01:02:06] This is something that David is finding out. Every victory, won corporately or individually, is bringing in precious things to the building of the house of God. [01:02:21] That is a very real truth. When we are victorious, wherever we are, we are bringing in things to the house of God. God is able to build because of those things. I think it's very important that we should understand that, how much it would encourage us when we are tempted to collapse under strange things, when we just simply remember that it is the house of the Lord. And every victory gained is bringing in those vessels of silver, vessels of gold or much brass or harem. Who sees David now truly as God's king, sending over carpenters and others and wood in order to help these things. Well, I think we should learn from all that now. I think perhaps you're tired and it would be better to close here, even though we haven't finished entirely, and to go on perhaps next week. [01:03:25] What we have yet to cover, of course, is a very sad part. In a sense, we have come to the end of the happier side of David's rise to the throne and the consolidation of the kingdom. We have now viewed the greatest event of David's reign, which is the capturing of Jerusalem and of it being constituted the city of David and of God. [01:03:59] The place where the house of God is to be erected. The ark is brought in as the earnest of the house. The house is to be built. And we shall find that the second book of Samuel ends with the purchase of that very threshing floor in Jerusalem, which used to be recited the altar in the very house of God. [01:04:23] But we have still to view something full of lessons for us. David's sin. And then all the consequences that we very few of us realize came out of his sin. God forgave him. But all what came out of that terrible fall, the last years of David's reign, whilst they were glorious in one way, were filled with conflict and sorrow for himself. [01:04:54] So we leave that and we will come to it next week. Maybe it will help you to read these chapters more so that there is a greater understanding of the background. Shall we just together now, we place all this into thy hand, and we ask thee above and beyond all that's been said to record in our heart everything, Lord, that was meant for each one of us individually by the Holy Spirit. There are many situations, many needs, many problems. Lord, use thy word to instruct us in thy ways. And so to bring us to a place where we know the Lord more deeply. We thank thee for all thy gracious purpose in bringing us to the throne. But, dear Lord, we know that the throne is, as it were, within thy house. And we ask thee, Lord, that we, those given utterly and holy to thee first and then to one another. We ask it in the name of the Lord Jesus.