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Transcript

this is the voice of wilbraham

in august 1961

the eastern christian delton bible school welcomed brother harry tennant of dundee scotland as guest teacher

brother harry scarcely requires an introduction as he left us in 1958 with a lasting memory do you remember in the steps of the master

in 1961 our brother has chosen for his subject

one which has proven equally as interesting as that of 1958

it is entitled david the shepherd king

we take pleasure now in presenting brother harry tennant in the first of seven class sessions

well brother and sisters we begin

by going first of all southeast from jerusalem

down into the jordan valley

over the river

and across the other side

to the hill country of the land of moab

moab

where we first find

the scene

to begin our life of david

for there in that land there are three people

an elderly woman

marked with sorrow

she has suffered the death of three people in her family

her husband

and her two sons

and news has come to her for she is from the land of israel that she could return

the famine has passed

and in her sorrow she returns to the land which gave her birth

and she bids farewell to

her two daughters-in-law

one is quite willing to return

leaving her and to go back to her own family

but the other clings tighter and closer

anyone of her own land would normally do to someone from the land of israel

and her name is ruth

and he says entreat me not to leave thee

or to return from following after thee

for with a thou goest i will go

where thou lodgest i will lodge

thy people shall be my people

and thy god my god

where thou diest i will die

and there will i be buried

and so ruth gives her a declaration of faith

in the way of life that naomi had led

and desires herself to embrace it

and here the hand of god is moving in the land of moab a land now shadowing with the wings

of the spirit of god

brooding over that land that he might in his goodness bring forth ruth from her loneliness to be both a comfort unto naomi and also to be the beginnings of great things for that little book of ruth tucked away there between judges and samuel is one of the delightful touches of inspiration

in our scriptures

for it was ruth that was to bring forth

by boaz the beginnings of the line

of david the shepherd king

and ruth who could have died

unknown in the land of moab

dies probably in bethlehem the city of david and the city of the great king for those last few verses

of the book of ruth

although their list of names are a certain sign that the hand of god was at work

now these are the generations of faires

fairies beget hezron and hezron beget ram and ram begatta minidab and aminadab begat nashon and nashon begat selmon and selmond to get boaz

and burrs beget obed

and obed beget jesse

and jesse begat david

how

wonderfully brethren sisters this woman

by her act of faith

is woven into the great pattern of scripture

and stands herself as one of those women to whom god has looked and has recorded her name in both old and new testament

and through whom we have the beginnings of this great character this man whose love

and whose tenderness whose courage and whose faith whose wisdom both in statesmanship

and also in spiritual matters is something to imitate and yet who is so like us

in that he falls from great heights

into deep caverns of sin

and requires that god should lead him out

and that's true of us

and if we follow in his life this week we shall find ourselves too caught up by his faith and desiring to be in that great company of people who with david will stand before his greater son and lord and give praise to our heavenly father

our second seen is an old man

he too is mourning

not the loss

of his immediate family

but the loss of a king

saul the king

has proved disobedient to the word of god he hadn't understood the great calling or the immense possibilities of his leadership over the children of israel and though he was head and shoulders above the people he was not so spiritually and the lord rejected him rejected him with words which samuel himself had pronounced

words which went right deep down into the heart of saul both of as words of condemnation and as words of prophecy the 15th chapter of the first book of samuel sees the rejection of saul

you remember the occasion it's the destruction of the amalekites and saul and his people have done a great work but they've not completed that which they should have done there was to be complete destruction complete annihilation of this people who had been the enemies of god and now they'd failed they'd kept the best of the cattle

saying that they were for sacrifice to god

and they kept the king alive

and so as samuel draws near to saul these are the words

going down this 15th chapter

and at verse 20

and saul said unto samuel yea i have obeyed the voice of the lord and have gone the way which the lord sent me and have brought a gag the king of amalek and have utterly destroyed the amalekites but the people took of the spoil sheep and oxen the chief of the things which should have been utterly destroyed unto the lord

to sacrifice unto the lord thy god in gilgal

and samuel said

hath the lord as great delight in burnt offerings

and sacrifices

as in obeying the voice of the lord

behold to obey is better than sacrifice

and to hearken than the fat of rams

for rebellio rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry because i hath rejected the word of the lord he also hath rejected thee from being king

there is in those words brethren sisters

a deep understanding of the sacrifices of the law and of the whole of our old testament that the whole of the work of god in presenting to us the law

whether it be an old testament or new testament is to bring us to an understanding

to obedience to him that the ritual of things that we do is of no avail if it be not carried out to serve him in a true spirit of obedience

and there was something awful in those words in the 23rd verse

saul hadn't seen it

not yet

for rebellion

is as the sin of witchcraft

he wouldn't have thought that

but he will later on when his rebellion is complete and he's in that dark room

with the witch of endor

but there is two brethren and sisters in these words an exhortation for you and for me

for saul is typical of all who go away from god

you and i included

we have been called to be king

is it possible then that in that day

when the king of kings and lord of lords returns that to some of us these words will be addressed

and we should be turned away from him because we have preferred to do those things which are not in accordance with his will because thou hast rejected the word of the lord

the lord hath also rejected thee

from being king

and so saul stands the permanent warning to each of us and samuel who had anointed him

from that vial of oil and had seen his growth and his downfall had loved him and had lost him

now begins to mourn

samuel is still judge and continues so right until the day of his death even through the reign of david himself or at least uh through that time of wandering of david himself samuel continues as judge

and now he feels that the children of israel once again as it were without a shepherd they have learned from the their sin and have lost a king that they had chosen and were likely now to find themselves bereft of leadership

and he sits down and mourns

but god upgrades samuel as he has done to his prophets from time to time as he did to elijah

urged him on to greater work and told him that he had already sought out for himself a king a man after his own heart that's in the 13th chapter it's already done the lord has found him sought him out found him upon the mountains of israel among the sheep

and so he sends samuel down

to the house of jesse

of bethlehem

now samuel must have been a remarkable figure

you remember in this 15th chapter

how after that again the king of the amalekites had been spared by saul

and samuel sent for him as he came along he said surely the bitterness of death is passed

as he came to this old man

properly white-haired and with a white beard wearing his mantle

but the old man was not so quiet and so me because he looked

for he took forth his sword and he hewed egg to pieces before the lord

to complete the destruction that god had asked saul to do

the short samuel

by the great saul

that samuel was head and shoulders above saul

in spiritual matters

and yet he was afraid of saul

he tells the lord he's afraid if i go down to bethlehem to anoint someone whom that has chosen surely saul will seek my life and so he sets out as it were to offer sacrifices in bethlehem and to meet the family this offering of sacrifices in various places in the land of israel is something perhaps we can't understand

but the worship is so confused at this time there is no center

of worship even when david himself brings the ark unto jerusalem we shall find that the tabernacle is elsewhere

the two things are separated and so it is that there are various places of offering acceptable to god and so samuel goes down to bethlehem and seeks out jesse and calls for jesus sons to have a look at them

and as jesse comes down with the elders of bethlehem to meet samuel

what an odd question to ask come is thou peaceably

well i suppose if we knew what samuel was like we too would have asked that question he was a man stern in judgment he was a man who went round his circuit

to three cities every year he drowned in rama in gilead sorry rama in giber

and he went to three places right from bethel

and to gilgal

in his circuits

each year and when he judged

he judged without fear

and so it was that i'm sure that before jesse

and the elders of bethlehem as they came out they must have been in their hearts just that question what he found wrong with bethlehem

i wonder brother and sisters if he came to wilbraham

what questions we would ask him

could he come peaceably

or would he find something

on which he would have to put the finger of god

or to your home

or to my home

could samuel come peaceably

suggested he said peaceably am i come

and so the sons come before him and the first one is striking in his appearance

and he said surely the lord's anointed is before him and the lord waved samuel on leave him alone he's not the one that i have chosen for the lord look it's not on the outward appearance but the lord looketh on the heart and so the second comes before him and again the lord shakes samuel's head until finally all seven sons of jesse have passed before him and there has been no choice made

is all your family here jesse

well he said we've got one other lad but he's out with the sheep bring him in

and so they send for david

fair haired alban haired probably it's an interesting description that's given of him and he comes in from the field

where he'd been watching the sheep and the spirit of god burns into sudden life in samuel this is he

and he takes him to anoint him

and so this young son of jesse is anointed as the future king of israel

but he's got a long way to go he's anointed in the midst of his brethren but he has a long way to go even as it were the lord jesus christ as he comes forth from the waters of baptism

this is he this is my beloved son in whom i am well pleased and he too is anointed in the midst of his brethren as the spirit of god comes upon him

but he has a long way to go before finally he will be enthroned over all the nation and before everyone will bow down to him as king of kings and lord of lords

but the lord had chosen a man after his own heart he says i have found david what a lovely expression as though the lord had been seeking throughout the land looking for the man upon whom his hand could rest i have found david they had chosen saul

well it says the lord chose him but they had chosen sword he was exactly the man they wanted he stood magnificently above them

a man to appeal to the eye but his heart was bent and crooked it could have been humble there were great possibilities in the man until darkness took hold of him

and as the spirit of the lord comes to rest upon david so suddenly it leaves saul

and it says an evil spirit from the lord

comes and plagues saul now i don't suppose it's possible for us to say precisely what this is

but it's certain in our new testament that from time to time the spirit of god did bring upon people who were disobedient both plague and trouble

for example upon ananias and sapphira

or the work of the apostle when he struck a man blind

or those words of the apostle when he says he delivers certain people to satan

that they might be purged from the effects of the flesh

it seems to be that the spirit of god in the new testament certainly brought disease as it did in the old and it's quite possible that as far as saul was concerned

although one can't be absolutely sure that this evil spirit from the lord was a visitation of a kind of melancholia that came upon saul some kind of distress of mind some foreboding of things to come and so the great figure was bent huddled up in his dark room

as he could see his kingdom collapsing and the words of this little man samuel coming into fulfillment

and he wants to be comforted

and someone one of his servants

and this is interesting because one feels that the lord moves

in israel in this way just touches a servant here or touches somebody there and they've got to do the bidding of the lord why not send for someone who can play music

and saul is moved to do so i've heard of somebody who can play music down in bethlehem

and so they send the message down to bethlehem and david who'd prayed to his sheep

who had played to the lord

with his sheep and had sung the psalms on the hills

and by the spirit of the lord now was able to compose psalms that were of great wonder and some to be preserved even unto our own day it was to come and pray and to saul the king have a look at the eighth psalm

a psalm

of delightful beauty

and yet like all the psalms of david it's greater than david he didn't know what he was writing

oh he applied it to his own day to his own sheep to the things he saw around him to the movies of the spirit within him to his work in the past to his life at the present to his hopes for the future but there was beyond david in all these psalms the spirit of god moving to point to the messiah

to the one greater than david who would stand head and shoulders above david yeah above all his brethren and would finally be david's lord and master

now look at this eighth sound

it's not very long is it

we haven't got the music

we couldn't sing the tune that david sang

and we can't hear his fingers upon the strings

but the lord has preserved both the music and the rhythm throughout this psalm for us and i want us to read it together as an act of devotion

the eighth psalm

verses one to nine

right verse one

oh lord our lord how excellent is thy name in all the earth who has set thy glory above the heavens

out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength

because of thine enemies that thou mightiest still the enemy and the avenger

when i consider thy heavens the work of thy fingers

the moon and the stars which thou hast ordained

what is man that thou art mindful of him and the son of man that thou visitest him

for thou hast made him a little lower than the angels and has crowned him with glory and honor thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands

thou hast put all things under his feet

all sheep and oxen yea and the beasts of the field

the fowl of the air and the fish of the sea and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas

oh lord our lord how excellent is thy name in all the earth

and the beauty of that kind of psalm moved david one can see him at night with his sheep looking upwards and seeing the spangled heavens and counting them

and counting his sheep

as god in his promises and said that his sheep

should be as numerous as the stars of heaven

and isaiah says he counters them and knoweth them everyone

just as david could hear the sound of his sheep and know them by night know each one by name and find it out if it were in any kind of distress or of trouble that he might anoint it or care for it or carry it or bring it near to him or deliver it from any kind of evil that would

reset it at night so the lord was to do with david and david leaves beth to him

with his heart

and the spirit of god

and he comes up to saul what a meeting

he met him in the dark no doubt saw greatly distressed of mine

and david coming in

the king

rejected the king

elected

and so he comes in and he sits down before saul it's doubt for whether saul really saw him in his distress of mind and then david takes his heart

and he plays

and sings to him the songs of the lord

and the dark brooding spirit that had come upon saul

is quietened and removed

and he's at rest

but brethren and sisters this isn't just for saul

do you think

doesn't this spirit come upon us from time to time

aren't there even perhaps some who came to wilbraham with just this darkness upon their souls

wondering whether they could ever remove from themselves their troubles or their sins

and then they hear the word of god

and the psalms are opened echoing in their minds of the strings

of the harp of david

and they find that there is lifted from them

as though by hidden hands

that great weight

just in the presence of david

because the spirit of the lord was upon me

and his word was in my tongue he says and that's for you and it's for me

and i'm sure that any kind of distress of mind that we have there is somewhere in these psalms from david a deliverance for all of us we can be either saul or david according as we choose

saul had chosen his path of life the lord had elected him to be king and he could have been so he could have been an acceptable servant to god and he did not finally fulfill his word he decided that it was a little better that he should do it this way

as though the cattle were pleasing to god as if the law could have been pleased with all the cattle that saul could have brought from the amalekites

or could not the lord snap his fingers before saul and say the cattle upon a thousand hills are mine

obedience is better than sacrifice

and here he comes

david

the obedient

but he seems to sink into obscurity for a little time he doesn't stay with saul and it seems unlikely that saul really gets to know him although it says that he became his armor-bearer it's likely i think either that he became his armor-bearer later on or that he became one of several people appointed to saul's house of armor i don't think he at this time becomes a personal servant of saul in whom saul really confides i think as a young man he comes in plays his music sues the heart of saul has a few words with the king but finally leaves his presence at least we find him now in bethlehem after all these events until finally the philistines the ancient enemies of the children of israel are on the move again now if you think of the land of palestine we're not now going out toward the south east to moab we're going out toward the south west that strip philistia that great strip of land

now there's something interesting here as we take up this record as the army of the philistines comes into the land of israel and moves up toward jerusalem

if we're in jerusalem and look out the philistines are down toward the south west and they come to a great valley an interesting valley a valley quite wide

and the philistines

pitch on the one side and the children of israel on the other and yet between them there's a great fissure in the rock straight down in little brook running down below now probably dried up at this time of the year

and the philistines have got a man [Music]

he's taller even than saul

and that's saying something

he's nine feet tall at least and perhaps taller

now if we go to the book of joshua we'll see why we expect to find him goliath of gas

this reference from one or two others um

i've taken from a book called blunts

undesigned scriptural coincidences it's not now in print

but if you can get hold of it do so it's worth reading i'll give you the title privately afterwards should you desire it

but here's the point joshua chapter

11

this is the seven years war when they were trying to establish themselves in the land

but they didn't manage it

at least not completely

this is what we read in verse 21

[Music]

and at that time came joshua

and cut off the anakims

from the mountains i just stopped remember the children of anak were the ones of whom the spies originally were afraid

they were tall men there seemed to be a race of them almost and i suppose when they saw them in their height

and their breads

they were afraid in their hearts well here comes joshua to cut them off and he cuts them off from hebron

one of the places i think to which the spies went from debia

from anab

and from all the mountains of judah

and from all the mountains of israel joshua destroyed them utterly with their cities there was none of the anakims left in the land of the children of israel only in gaza

in gath

and in ashdod

they remained

and so here are the seeds of future trouble i think actually the lord if joshua and the soldiers of israel had been mighty would have exterminated even these from these places because they were they were thorns in the side of israel from this time onwards for a long time

and so the giants were still breeding in gath and goliath is one of them what a touch of inspiration brother and sisters isn't it we go through these lists of names from time to time or do we

perhaps we don't always but hidden away quite unexpectedly is this touch of truth

none of us need to be afraid

of standing by our bible

in whatever age it might be

the lord has so woven into his scriptures

these threads of gold

some yet to be discovered by us some already seen some discovered by others that those who see them find that their eyes missed with tears as they read

you wouldn't think

you'd have tears as you read gaza and gath and ashdod

but until we find that there comes goliath striding out of that very city and establishing the word of the book of joshua how wonderful well there it is and goliath comes up and he parades himself a champion the man between the two hosts

and defies the armies of israel

looks upon them from his nine feet of height looks at the whole of the army and defies them an uncircumcised philistine

but who would dare to stand against him in that array of armor with that sword

and with a voice like that

and with all the philistines behind him

and with their history too

and it is that god moves jesse

to send up david to feed his brethren or his brethren have been conscripted or have volunteered to the army of saul

samuel had said you remember earlier in the book of samuel he had said that saul would have conscripts in his army he would take of your sons and make them to be his soldiers and his cooks and whatever he desired and so they were and there were these men now whom god had not chosen to be king

in the army shivering in their sandals

as they looked out and heard the voice of goliath as he came out twice a day

and it says finally he came out for 40

days and how they must have been afraid of that echoing word

and none of them was willing to get up

and even to answer him back

until david comes with a little food in his hands

to feed his brethren and as soon as his brethren see him it's just as though it was joseph and his brethren they despised him and one wonders why i think they despised him because he was good despisers of those that are good

but let us keep our eyes on david's brethren

there's something like the brethren of the lord jesus christ they're not lost

but they haven't been won yet but they will

at the appointed time these men as did the brethren of joseph will fall down before him

just as the sun and the moon and the stars were to fall down as it said before joseph but now they mock him aha you've come to see the battle have you get home and look after those few sheep that's your job

david didn't answer except to say there isn't a cause for this

but he come to look after

the sheep of israel

that haven't got a shepherd

who was looking after those few sheep that little huddled flock on the mountainside when the wolf of goliath was coming down the other and roaring as it came who's this said david oh it's

it's goliath afghan

what defying the the armies of the living god what a wonderful expression taken up in our new testament taken up by peter

the living god that's the god we serve he was a dead god so far as israel was concerned at that moment he might not have lived

their god was not greater than goliath of gas

but david's was and he begins to speak with such faith and courage that his his voice finally echoes even in the tent of saul and souls has sent for him

and he says i'm willing to fight goliath of gas

well i suppose saul was startled to see anybody who was willing to fight goliath

nobody else is willing to do it

but saul was willing to lend him his armor

it fitted saul better than it fitted david as david found when he got it on and sat at his very knees

he said i can't take this i haven't proved it

but there was saul who was head and shoulders above israel and getting on for goliath's eyes

the nearest to him among the israelites

trying to keep his height down

lest he should be picked out as the one to go and fight goliath of god

but finally david goes or with the blessing of saul no doubt well done my lad

as he sets out

but he doesn't need the blessing of saul he's greater than saul he doesn't take his heart with him but he takes his psalms in his heart

as he sets out and goliath comes down the other side

i'd like to think about that great gulf that's fixed between

because that's why they were able to be so near and yet so far apart

as goliath sees him

he looks at him for a moment and say wonders whether he's looking for a lost dog

no weapons

just a shepherd's purse

and his sling

but of course the israelites were very wonderful with their slings

the finisteins had made them wonderful

you see the finished eyes didn't allow them to keep

proper weapons for a time

and so it was that they had to learn how to use other things

and it was interesting to notice that it was saul's tribe that finally were the masters with the sling there were 600 of them in the tribe of benjamin that could go with the sling with the left or with the right hand and not miss at a hair's breadth they could go

but david had been with his sheep no doubt as the birds came down to feed upon the little lambs at times when they were weak or about to die

while other beasts had come down upon them and with his sling so he'd been able by a wonderful aim to lay them low

he goes down and he chooses in this dried brook of the stream his five stones

there have been all sorts of suggestions as to why there were five

goliath had at least one brother we know that

and there were other giants

in the land of the philistines

but perhaps it wasn't that reason

perhaps he just took what he considered was sufficient ammunition

he wasn't presumptuous to think that he would do it the first time

and i think perhaps it's better to think of it in that light he took what was sufficient he knew that by the time he'd used five of these things

the battle will be joined and if with five

the man was not laid low then he'd have to depend entirely upon god

but as goliath draws near with his armor bearer before him and a great target of brass between his shoulders which is either a long spear or something to protect his back we're not quite sure

bawling at david and telling him that he'll tear him up and give his body to the birds

the typical kind of braggart

david said you're coming down to me with all your armor

and i'm coming to you

with my armor i'm coming in the name of the god of israel

and with one

great swing of the slain he took his stone and let fly and there was just one spot

in goliath

he was like so many braggarts

he's like our whole world

he was weak in the head

and our lord

by direct aim through david's hand laid low goliath just that one spot it's not for nothing that in our new testament in the last book the intellect

is marked out the place of the mark of those who belong to god is marked out they're made strong in heart and in mind before god and so goliath is laid low and like a flash david is down over the stream up the other side draws goliath sword cuts off his head and brings it back coming up the other side by this time the whole the armies of israel have been released all their pent up emotions one can hear them cheering and shouting as they come down the side against the philistines who are retiring in confusion

their leader dead

headless and israel pursues them right down to the gates of gath

and david comes up the hill and saul finds him to give him a little pat on the back and to encourage him but saul's uncle is there and he's rather more interested he's abner the captain of the host

one can see him as he puts his arm around his shoulders and said young man

whose son art now

and that's the question for all young men

that's the question god willing this morning were to ask the teenagers

young man

who's son art now

it's a question for all of us too isn't it a question to be asked every day

and he was the son of

of bethlehem named jesse oh yes it was greater than that he was also a son of god

what is man

for the son of man that thou visited him he visited david he who set the stars

with unerring precision

had also directed the stone

the stone

and the shepherd of israel

surely there's something there coming right down from the book of genesis isn't there from thence is the stone the shepherd of israel isn't goliath of gath a great picture of the work of god

some have even seen in him in his measurements the 666 but that doesn't matter

he surely is the great defiant sin of all the world to be laid low by the one stone just that small stone directed by god that would finally grow and fill the whole earth and itself become the shepherd of israel

well we must leave goliath of gath with all his thoughts

and all the encouragement that he would give us in his death

and if you look at that head

or don't look at it

according as a circumstance might be

how many goliaths in your life

how many in mind

great men that stand in our way not just men but our thoughts and our inner sins things that defy us every day as it were for 40 days on end and come out twice a day and we feel we could never cast them down [Music]

until we see this little figure moving

and hear the voice of god in him let's lay goliath lo shall we

in our daily living

try to remember the shepherd and the word of god but finally we might see this headless giant and see him for what he is something himself to be cast to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field and let's hang up his armor in the house of god as did david in some tent

some place which was at that time the repository of things belonging unto god but he kept his sword for a little time

for his armor and put his in his own tent and so david is lifted up from bethlehem and put right with saul

and now begins that time of his life which we shall have to follow ourselves together for a little while in which david will both suffer and become victorious

Transcript

this is the voice of wilbraham

in august 1961

brother harry tennant of dundee scotland

chose as his subject

david

the shepherd king

we take pleasure now in presenting brother tennant

in the second of seven class sessions

my dear brother and sisters we

saw that god had found a king

we saw that david had found works to add to his great faith that the law the lord who had delivered him out of the mouth of the lion

and from the poor of the bear

was able also to deliver him from that uncircumcised philistine

now we begin today with something quite different

i have found a friend

for david when he came into the home and company of saul and his servants

was sought out not only by abner the captain of saul's host

but also by the king's son by jonathan it seems likely that jonathan was quite a number of years older than david

in fact some would say that he was 20

years older

but that isn't of any great significance

the wonder is the character of jonathan

sometimes when bright lights shine in company with other bright lights they are out shone

like john the baptist in the company of jesus

but the greatness of john should never be underestimated nor that of jonathan

david sean brightly but jonathan was a star of wondrous beauty

he had no envy

no selfish thought no kind of greed or of pride

no jealousy

but a desire that the will of the lord should be worked out in david and in him

and so jonathan finds david and becomes so wrapped in david and david in him that their souls fulfill that command that thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself

even to the extent of david receiving from jonathan the gift of david's own outer garments and the weapons that he carried

his apparel his sword his girdle

he set upon david the king's son [Music] setting it upon david the one who should be king

and as he did it he did it not reluctantly

but he did it with delight

and these characteristics i think are the most difficult of all to develop

competing spirits find themselves sometimes with envy or jealousy until they kneel as does jonathan

before god

in humility and in self-effacement

that he might quietly become jonathan a brighter star

and david as he walks with jonathan jonathan's friendship before saul and before all the courtiers in the palace it says he behaved himself wisely withers whoever he went

the spirit of the lord upon david was such that with jonathan's friendship and with his own experience behind him and goliath dead

he was able to behave himself wisely as he walked about the palace

or the place where saul abode

he didn't seek high things but kept his mind upon the lower things i think jonathan had taught david a lesson

because of course jonathan himself was a pattern of the lord jesus christ

whose apparel are we wearing brethren and sisters

and whose sword do we carry

and who was gertes about with righteousness

who was the king's son

to whom we have become knit

as to a brother

and to a master

is it not jonathan who loved us as he loved his own soul yea jesus

the greater jonathan who loved us as he loved his own soul shall we not then like david as we walk in other men's presences walk as before the king himself and behave ourselves wisely

david was appointed to be a captain over the soldiers of part of saul's army and went in and out against the philistines and came back with saul at the head of his marching forces until they hear the songs of the dancing maidens ahead of the army joining them day by day rejoicing as the army comes back from its slaughter for the philistines now are being routed

and so they sing their songs and souls ears

pick up the delightful music saul hath slain his thousands

and so he has he stretches his head and shoulders above the host and marches before the people and they look upon him saul hath slain his thousands

until he hears

the second line of for him he doesn't want to hear

but david

his tens of thousands

and a dark shadow flits quickly across his heart

and his eyes go sideways to david

and he envis david in his heart indeed he says to himself already having most peculiar forebodings about things to come he says concerning him and what can he have now but the kingdom

we cannot wonder then that the occasion should come when saul should once again be brooding in his darkness

and with his javelin in his hand and the javelin it would seem was a mark of office it's interesting as we go through this life of david and of saul together now in parallel we shall often see samuel saul with his javelin in his hand see him sitting under a tree wondering with his javelin in his hand but on this occasion in his darkness as david is near to him and david has once again been playing and trying to attune the mind of the king to the mind of the king of kings suddenly the javelin flies through the air and slights the wall and david escapes

and knows now that for certain saul is in pursuit of his life

but yet saul

seems peculiarly attracted to david

quite often one finds that evil men are attracted by the good although they hate them and don't really wish to follow their paths they find that there is a certain attraction in their righteousness

and despite all that they can do they cannot undo the character of such men as david

he offers to him

his eldest daughter marab

and david never receives her

she's given to somebody else for some reason which is not very easy to find in our reading of the records

but it's then suggested that perhaps david should have michael

that second daughter somewhat attractive perhaps and vivacious

indeed it says that she loved david

and i think david loved her

and the dowry that he had to pay was only a hundred philistines

and so he brought 200 back

and paid the diary but he said interesting words i'd like you to listen to them he said seem it it to you to be a light thing to be a king's son-in-law

seeing that i am a poor man

and lightly esteemed

you see the servants of saul were trying to lead david into a trap if only he would seem to be enticed by michael if only he would aspire to greater things if only his pride would take hold of him and he would seek to be the king's son-in-law then it could be seen that saul in a moment could smite him down as someone who was trying to rise up from being a poor man that he might take from saul that which belonged to him

but david is quite

humble and reluctant in his approach but brethren sisters those words have something for us have they not

seemeth it to you [Music]

to be a light thing [Music]

to be the king's son

or is that that our calling

and yet are we not poor men

and lightly esteemed

shall we then not take to ourselves this bearing of david and see constantly in him the humility that was to be perfected in the lord jesus christ he who was the king's son

and yet was a poor man

though he was rich yet became he poor for our sakes

and though he had all grace and the beauty of god his father was upon him yet was he lightly esteemed we esteemed him stricken smitten afflicted of god

but he was the king's son

and so our self-esteem should diminish

and our worship of god

and also our honor to his son should daily increase

as did that of david before his god both in heart and mind and in his psalms

it says that saul had become continually

david's enemy notice not david had become saul's enemy saul had become continually david's enemy the enmity was in the heart of saul he was seeking him out if only he could find some little fault by which david

could be brought low just as they looked for christ as he walked about that's what they were doing for david to try to find some little way jonathan walks in the field with saul his father for for his father has said that he will slay david and jonathan mediates for him

i don't think brother and sisters we can overestimate the love of this character jonathan why should jonathan want david to be delivered david was going to take the crown from jonathan's hand and to wear it no he wasn't going to take it

jonathan was going to place it on david's head

and there is the beauty of his character he mediates for david until his father says he shall not die

as the lord liveth he says

he shall not be slain

but david goes out to battle again and comes back victorious and saul's heart is torn again by his envy and his jealousy of this man he is madly envious against david and attempts further to put him to death with that javelin his mark of kingship which should have been to feed as it were the flock of god and to keep them instead of which he would try to drive david out and to hunt him to seek out his hearts and his very life until finally david now married to michael is in that home where they are together and the servants of saul are walking about at night outside

just have a look at psalm 59

i'm sorry that we really have an opportunity to go into all the psalms that we should there are many written about this time by david

but here by the heading of the psalm

we read

the introduction to the heading and then when saul sent and they watched the house to kill him

let's not forget the fear that must have been in david's heart despite his faith when his house was surrounded by the king's men and they were there at night parading around and michael in her love within was trying to shield her husband from her father's rock

this is david's prayer from within

deliver me from mine enemies

oh my god

defend me from them that rise up against me

deliver me from the workers of iniquity and save me from bloody men

for lo they lie in wait for my soul the mighty are gathered against me not for my transgression nor for my sin no lord they run and prepare themselves without my fault

awake to help me and behold verse 14 and at evening let them return and let them make a noise like a dog and go round about the city and this was a description of what they did and of what david hoped for them we find that he commits all judgment to god there is in these psalms running through them a certain desire for david to see his enemies eradicated

and such will be god's will but he takes no step to do it he commits the whole of this matter to god

never do we find him rising up against any that would put him to death and now the men knock at the door

and michael looks out in distress they've come for david this time to take him by the command of the king and he can't escape

maybe it's night but at least she tries to ward off that which they would do she takes what seems strange in this house though it may have belonged to her rather than to david what would appear to be an idol some household god that she had and she wrapped it in the bed and so disguised it as though it were a man until finally when the men coming she said concerning david he's sick

and she allows him to look into the room they see what appears to be a figure in bed but david is away he's followed a route that two other men had followed no three

altogether had followed and were to follow the two spies who have been let down by the window by rahab on that scarlet cord so david now has slipped down through the window and slipped through the net that was cast about the house and he's gone out to spend a life away from home

and so was saul of tarsus to begin his life when they hunted for him he'd escaped and he bids michael farewell we shall see her again on occasion she's given to someone else in the meantime but we shall see her again coming along a way of weeping and we shall see her finally rejected because she has failed

in her appreciation of david and where do you think david would go when he left that house where would you have gone

into some cave of hiding right away no not david he goes to one place

he goes to rama of gilead

just to find out to seek out one man the old man

who had anointed him and he goes to find samuel and samuel takes him to the school of the prophets it would appear that samuel had established a company of young men

which he was instructing in the way of the lord who no doubt communally considered the word of god and also were able to exhort others from time to time and upon whom it would seem god on occasion sent down his holy spirit so that they gave inspired messages not always this school of the prophets seems to have been a school where they were taught but occasionally from them there was chosen a prophet elijah for example came from such a place and so it is that samuel now takes david down to the school of the prophets until suddenly to this very school of the prophets there come three companies of saul's men not together but separately they come down to take david and as they approach the school of the prophets so the spirit of the lord falls upon them and they are seized as it were by a paroxysm from heaven whereby they've got to express themselves in some way to give glory to god and are unable to take his anointed and on three occasions it happens until saul himself comes down

and he lies down before the lord having cast off his outer garment until they ran through israel a certain expression

is all also among the prophets

as though a man should say

is the wolf also lying down with the lamb

that's the expression

and so saul finds himself seized by a power from outside and knows for certain that god is working against him because he is working against god on every occasion saul has opportunity if he desires to go back and he doesn't desire it

and so it is that david and jonathan must bid farewell

jonathan explains to david no doubt with tears in his eyes despite all his mediations on his behalf

saul wants to kill him and so as they walk in the field they arrange a final meeting he says now tomorrow there will be a feast

and i will put it to my father and see how it is that he reacts to you now meet me in this field

and so it was that although there was to be a feast there was to be an empty place

it's rather interesting to notice this feast and to think that there was a place prepared for david at the king's table

and there was a place for abner the captain of the host and a place for jonathan

and in reading the record it just looks as though for a moment jonathan has to give place to abner at this feast

and abner takes his seat

and there's an empty seat

and saul looks at it for a moment and says to himself well he must be unclean

in some way he must be defiled then he'll be here tomorrow

but on the morrow the seat is empty again

and he looks at the seat

and at jonathan

and he realizes now that the absence of david from this feast is not just an absence of uncleanness whereas david he says oh he asked me that he might go to bethlehem to a family sacrifice there and immediately saul comes out with an outburst of roth thou son of a perverse and rebellious woman

wasn't woman that he should have used was it

he didn't think of the fatherhood he thought only of the motherhood but who was the perverse and the rebellious in that household

and so it says that jonathan rose up

from that feast in righteous anger

and went out

defending the righteousness of david against the wrath of his father

and there jonathan would be

in tale of his own life

by this king knowest thou not that this son of jesse is risen to thine own hurt

oh saul knew that the throne was slipping from his head and it was not to fall upon jonathan but upon david

and so on the third morning

jonathan goes out into the field with his bow and with his arrows now he told david that if on this day i come to you and the arrow goes beyond you then know for certain that you must flee for your life and so jonathan walks out into the morning air such as we have enjoyed this day with a lad at his side and he takes his arrows and he fires them

and david listens to its flight and hears it sing over his head and fall beyond him

and he sends the lad to fetch back the arrows as he sends them across

is not the arrow beyond thee

till the lad finds them and brings them back again to jonathan and jonathan sends him back home

and then david comes from behind the rock

i know what weeping as they part

jonathan

how he could have delighted to see that david was now to be an outlaw rejected by men but no he wraps himself in his love around david and they strike a covenant before god a covenant of exceeding beauty

they strike a covenant whereby david says that he will as god lives

he will show kindness both to jonathan

and to his seed these are the words the lord be between me and thee between my seed and thy seed

forever

oh what a delightful covenant they were able to make but brethren sisters is now that the covenant that god has made with us and are not we bound similarly

and was it not too though this figure i don't think is really here in samuel was it not two

by two awful nights

of an empty place

and a third morning by which we were brought to god

was it not

and has not he who rose from the dead made with us an everlasting covenant sealed and sure in all things even the sure mercies of david has he not made those with us but david is off he's scampering away now alone well almost alone but there seemed to be one or two young men with him one or two who are attracted by that magnetic quality of david his quality of leadership he's an inspiration to all who see him

and so he frees to knob a city a little north of amathoth which is a little north of jerusalem and there he finds the priest

nahimalik

the priest is afraid as soon as he sees david he knows something of the rumors that are going through israel and he's afraid that now that david has come that perhaps the time has come either for david's death or for there to be some

terrible stirring in israel

the baby comes in and asks

for bread

five loaves are given to him

loaves of bread oh but he doesn't get them right away him alexis i haven't got any bread here

except the showbread

and the opposite to david saying that

if the men who are with him have kept themselves clean and if david himself is clean then he is willing that the showbread should be given to them and both the priest and david show an understanding which jesus himself was to take up later on an understanding that that showbread although it was reserved to be kept in the holy place and to be eaten only by the priests when it was taken and the new bread was put in its place on that table every first every first day of each new week that that bread should be eaten only by the priests but in a manner of speaking both the priest and david knew

that they were priests before god

and that law was given not that it should be kept to men's death

but it could

be kept in spirit even to life and so as david said we're clean we've had no association of any kind that could defile us in this last few days david had been hiding for three days and perhaps the young men hiding with him they were a comfort to him the lord had provided friends hidden friends for david as we shall see unexpected friends the lord had provided the lord wasn't behind pushing david on the law was in front seeking out a way

god had reached knob

long before david reached it

but it is so that as david now says and is there a weapon here for me

that the hi the priest says yes there's a weapon there's the weapon of goliath the giant wrapped up in a cloth

and david said give me that for there's none like that

and he took it and with his young men and his food he departs

but just for a moment another man has seen a dark-eyed

dark-hearted man

doeed the edomite who for some reason is detained before the lord either because he has a message or because he himself having embraced the faith of israel has become unclean or has a vow to pray and wishes in some way to receive the assistance of a priest

and he sees david and he hears the words david doesn't say that he's freeing from saul he says he's about the king's business

there are one or two things that david says during this time that have a certain dubaity about them

they they're a little doubtful and perhaps one has to take them in the circumstances in which are said

they're not always with absolute clear honesty

and perhaps in fear there's this tinge

of double meaning whereby david was able to be delivered but be that as it may what would you have done

i don't think we'd have kept the purity of character that david kept

all been purged as david was purged by his constant confession and his love of god

oh this was the man doing the edomite whose tongue he writes in one of his psalms psalm 52

thy tongue divideth mischiefs like a sharp razor working deceitfully oh what a man

that's his reference one has to go in the psalms to see the inner thoughts of david concerning this matter he flees from nob north of jerusalem skirts jerusalem itself which has not yet become the capital city but in which there seemed to be some residents of the kingdom of israel skirts it and goes round down towards the south on a way down to the south west

until finally he comes into the land of the philistines and there he meets

abimelech a name like pharaoh that is as we read from that 34th psalm the king

hatish king of gath

but the philistines don't receive him very kindly

it wasn't to be expected that they would in a way i suppose their memories were not too short

and david had a certain renown and he comes now with goliath sword

and his young men

i suppose he stirred up a few memories

akish for some reason was willing or might have been willing to receive him

but david sees that the circumstances are not in his favor and he feigns madness before the king

he scrabbles upon the gate and allows his spittle to fall down his beard and akish asks a question i suppose which has been asked by many people from that time forward have i need of mad men

it's

rather a reflection on the number he already had

perhaps

his expression in that form is is just a little little peculiar i think and and somewhat amusing i generate david pine and he can't take refuge there with the philistines but this poor man cried and the lord heard him and delivered him out of all his troubles it's at this time or through these circumstances that david wrote that 34th psalm and had the comfort of those words that the angel of the lord encampeth round about those that fear him and delivereth them for though there was a dark-eyed dark-hearted man

in knob there was also a bright eyed

immortal creature the angel of the lord encamping round about david to deliver him and now david goes to the cave of adalam now this is southwest of jerusalem an area that is riddled with caves

these caves come right back from the time of the book of judges it's just an interesting point if one goes into the book of judges to find that these caves were constructed

hewn out at that time for men to live in when they were oppressed by their various oppressors and this cave of adalam was a cave of considerable size and david and his few men take refuge there and now they begin to flock to him from all parts of the land for the word has gone like a beat of a drum through the land as to where david is although saul hasn't found it yet

and so they come to him men from here and men from there not rich men but it says the dissidents of all kinds came to him those who were in debt and in any kind of trouble the malcontents

of the land of israel until he finally has 400 such men with him in a cave

think about it brother and sister just for a moment what would you do with 400

men like that oh perhaps they got into debt because they had been oppressed but perhaps not

perhaps they could say concerning david as a man later was to say concerning himself

and his newfound friend and master

what would he say

oh we suffer for our deeds

but this man

hath done nothing to miss

and so they came to him in the cave

but david's wonderful leadership he takes hold of these 400 men and by his love

and his faith and his strength of character he welds them into a body of people of perfect friendship and allegiance to david and to the lord

david was to receive another comfort no doubt this cave in the hill had its lookout men

david was too wise a soldier too wary a man to be unprotected and one can imagine the day when

as the lookout was at the door of the cave so the message came into the cave where david and his men were there are men coming

and so it echoes right along the cave a long cave

it could take 400 men inside

so every man stood by with his sword in his hand

until finally

it's an old man

and a woman

and several young men

until david himself comes to the door of the cave and recognizes

his family

neither did his brethren believe on him not to begin with but now that he's an outlaw and perhaps their own life too is in great danger

they come to david into the cave

oh what an embrace there must have been as david takes his father mother and his brethren into this cave and they meet his friends

the 400

debtors and the malcontents

and men who perhaps had been evil doers before

but davey can't stay in this cave for very long

it's a place that is too dangerous for him to stay in and certainly too dangerous a place for him

in which to keep his father and his mother and so he sends his parents down right across the river jordan straight over into the land of moab right down to the southeast the land in which we began our studies yesterday and why should he send his parents there

because of course he had associations there

yes right back to the days of ruth

the moabitess

and so he puts his father there

into that place

and his mother there are all sorts of strange rumors as to what happened to them there the scripture says nothing but there are sorts of rumors that exist outside the scripture even that his parents were put to death there but i don't think that need concern us at the moment david was doing his best for his parents and the scripture has seen fit to be silent upon what happened to them

one other person comes to david and that is a man called gad the seer now i'd like to think about him because he seems to be specially sent to david as a man through whom the word of the lord was going to be revealed

there is an order of revelation given in the book of deuteronomy

the revelation is through the prophet

and the priest is to keep the word and to pass it on to the king and the king is to write it out for himself and so to observe it the priest was not the origin of the word of god it was the prophet

the priest's lips should keep knowledge that which they receive and the king should write it out and so observe it and that three-fold chord should have existed in the kingdom of israel it would certainly exist with david he was a prophet himself of course and received direct messages but many of his directions now come from gad the seer and it would seem also that gad the seer was a scribe writing down the events of the life of david as did nathan the prophet these things were not to pass day by day without some kind of record being kept a record of samuel and of kings and of chronicles has sprung out of the records written by these men many of them written no doubt on the spot

many of them direct recollections of the people who took part either in battle or in meeting or in private thought the descriptions of the hillsides and of the country the places where david and his men were hidden were all kept in the minds of people like the priests gad the seer and of david himself and so we have such a record upon which we can place uh implicit trust knowing that it has a touch throughout of reliability and of inspiration by god and so it is that god through god sends david away from the cape of adalam and sent him down into judah into the forest of hereth which is about 10 miles northwest of hebron and just to place that for you it's quite easy we're in jerusalem now we're looking south right south

on this side is the mediterranean and on the eastern runs jordan we're looking south over bethlehem and beyond that till we see hebron indeed it is to hebron that the priests used to look when they stood in the temple of solomon

when they stood or herod in later times and they wanted to know whether it was daylight and as the first light came over the hill so they looked right down to hebron

and they'd say that it was beginning to be the light of a new day and the question will go is it light as far as hebron could the city be seen

and as soon as that was said so they say they regarded it as being the new day but beyond that was a forest into which david was now to take his refuge we find saul with his javelin in his hand under a tree in rama

notice it seems to be his symbol of office this javelin and he carries it with him and messages come to him as he laments the loss of his followers and of jonathan his son messages come to him concerning david's welfare the growing band of people who are placing their confidence in david and so it is that jonathan for though he is a great man he's but a little baby

haven't i any friends he says

isn't there anyone to tell me what david is doing and their steps forward a man

with his dark eyes

and his dark heart i've seen him he says doug the edomite the man from the other side

descendant of esau i've seen him he said i saw him in nob i saw him speak to the priest oh are the priests also against me

send for himalay bring him here and the other priests and so they bring some of the priests and the himalay from norm himalaya says i don't know anything about this matter i wasn't aware of the fullness of this situation i did just

what i did out of the righteousness of my heart before god and before david he said he was on the king's business

but doug is there the king's side urging him on

and saul then does a dreadful thing

he turns to his soldiers and he says

slay the priest to the lord

not a man raises his sword

oh to be a

king we shall see how david's men respond to him

but not souls they won't slay the priest of the lord but notice what saul has done he's defied the prophet

he's defying the priesthood

and he's defying the king

a threefold defiance of god

but dog says i'll do it

and he goes through the priests of the lord and slays them in the presence of saul some of them and then he goes down to knob the city and slays there all the inhabitants of that city that belong to the priesthood except one man a buyer who flees

and where does he go he comes to david

and davis is a wonderful thing to him

he says abide thou with me

fear not

for he that seeketh my life seeketh thy life

but with me

thou shalt be in safeguard

what a wonderful confidence

can't you hear the poetry of david i'm almost inspired saying

but can't we hear one greater than david speaking to us

abide with me

thou shalt be safe with me

that's the invitation the dog had completed his work no not completed it and that's the wonder you see god wouldn't let him complete his work oh yes he would wreak havoc upon this city except for the one man who would escape with the effort under his arm the very thing by which they consulted god and take it not to saul

but to david and so doing the edomite only spurs on the great work of david and saul can never be satisfied would you be satisfied with the blood of priests

upon the sword of your servants would you

the blood of the priests was to be upon saul's head

as was also the blood of david that he would like to take well we find about this time the city of kela

south of jerusalem is besieged by the philistines now it was saul's duty to relieve his people he should do that that's what the king's business is now saul was no coward let us remember

oh no he'd at the beginning of his reign when he had been anointed he was established by an act of bravery right on the other side of the river jordan

in gilead was a city called jabush gilead that was besieged by the ammonites you remember who said that they would put out the eyes of the inhabitants of that city the right eyes of all the men unless they could find someone to deliver them and they sent a message back into the land and it came to saul and it was soul that went to j bush gilead

and delivered it by his bravery and his courage he was no coward this man he was a man who if only he had taken the right path could have been acceptable to god

but he didn't and i think in that lies a warning for us brother and sisters

if we commit ourselves to god then he will commit himself to us and deliver us and even though we might have to at times yield things to god we shall not yield eternal life but keep it even though the lord wished to take the throne even from saul that he was righteous and give it to david there would have been no unrighteousness with god and so need not have lost his faith

i think that the crown would have stayed for a time at least with saul's family if saul had been righteous but he was not

and so this city of kiela is delivered not by saul but by david david goes down with his 400 men who have now become 600

so fast that his army multiplied and with david at their head in constant leadership with astounding courage he delivers the city from the philistines and goes in

and he's in the walls of keilar and news comes to saul that there he is and salted his mind once he's inside a city with walls and with gates he's mine

and then david consults a buyer he can touch the lord actually now there are all kinds of ideas as to how he consults the lord and i haven't found a solution but at least one or two suggestions can be made it is said that in the ephod there's a little pocket in which two stones the urim and thumbing were to be kept of different colors that if a man consulted the lord saying shall i go

put his hand in and took out and looked at it and according to the color so he either went or did not that was the answer from the lord now i don't think that's the answer to the problem by any means because the kind of thing that god gives to david through the e4 and through the priest is a more clear direct message that could never be answered by stones

shall i go

should i stay in kilo or or not he's told he shouldn't stay in kilah will the men of this city deliver me into the hands

of saul should he come and he says yes so they will now these initial questions i think and one or two others that we have later on could have been answered by the yes and no stones we shall find as we go on some of the things that god gives are pieces of information concerning saul and concerning david that could not have been found just by little stones plucked out of the pocket for yes and no and so it is that he leaves these selfish unthankful men of killer and forsakes the city and himself is delivered from the hand of saul he goes down into the wilderness of zif further south into a land where no doubt there was less provision for him and for his men i'd like you to think of him now as complete outlaw cut off from his his associations in bethlehem cut off from his normal worship cut off from his normal friends

away from jonathan

away from jonathan

oh no not away from jonathan

he'd never be away from jonathan

jonathan is praying for david

and though david is right south of jerusalem beyond hebron beyond the forest of hakilah right down into the wilderness of zif

they hear a message

there's a man coming

it's jonathan the king's son

and it says jonathan sought out david and he strengthened his hand in god

brethren and sisters is not that one of the wonderful things we enjoy here

strengthening the hand in god and that's what jonathan did for david fear not for the hand of saul my father shall not find thee and thou shout the king over israel in the wilderness of zif jonathan

have you got faith to say that concerning me

yes and he adds a little phrase

and i shall be next unto thee

he was willing to be below david next to him something that god would not see fulfilled

in god's own wisdom and understanding but there was a willingness in jonathan to see david exalted

that every man esteem his brother better than himself to be and he was quite willing no not just willing thou shalt be king i'll lift you up david even though you be in the wilderness of zeus oh such courage from the king's son but there are many

sneak northwards through the forest up through hebron bethlehem until they come north of jerusalem finding saul under the tree with his javelin and say we know where david is come down and find him come and take him he's in the hill of hakilah

so it is that this time david is still writing his psalms praying unto god for strangers are written up against me and violent men have sought after my soul he moves further south and he comes to a little hill called mayon and there it is that saul comes down seeking david with his thousands of men looking round the hill to try to find this

anointed of god and it just seems that for a moment david is caught

he's in the hill perhaps hiding in a mountain in there in caves with his 600

men and saul comes around one side of the mountain and david is going around the other until it seems as though saul has completely surrounded this place and david must certainly fall into the grasping hand of saul the king

until there comes a messenger to the kings as the philistines have invaded the land

and so it was that god sent the philistines to deliver david

and saul has to release his grip of the city

and david breathes again he doesn't stay in that hill oh he's got wisdom he's off now down to all the dead sea steeply going down to that place that's 1200 feet below sea level until he finds a cave here in gedi the place where men fish

there there's a brook that comes into the dead sea a kind of well and there are still caves in that area of the dead sea

indeed of course occasionally

scrolls are found in caves by the dead sea but there was a greater scroll at this time

thy law have i written in my heart

and not on tables of stone or of skin

but upon david himself

a scroll by the dead sea in a cave protected by the lord

saul comes down again with his three thousand men seeks david

and david's inside the cave with his six hundred men

and oh what a stroke of providence

saul takes a nap

at the mouth of the cave

and david's got three men with him oh what men they are

the sons of zeruaya and they said to david at least one of them said he's here and the lord has delivered him into your hand this is the very moment for which you wait waited

the dead sea in a dead soul all in a moment it could have been

the king could have gone

and

david

withholds his sword

i'd like you to think about it

behold thine enemy delivered into thine hand his men is six hundred this is the moment you've waited for

won't take long let me do it

and he be dead

and he goes up and he takes off the fringe

from the garment of saul

and the saul and his men leave the cave and go down and away

so david comes to the mouth of the cave

and he calls

you can see saul's eyes as he turns

and sees where he's been

and where david was

and david calls to him across the distance and abomus has been standing by and the three thousand men listening and david 600

the lord judged between me and thee

and the lord avenged me of thee

but mine hand shall not be upon thee

or is it thou my my son david

how strangely the thoughts of saul mingle with righteousness and unrighteousness quite unwillingly he now says thou art more righteous than i

and the lord will reward thee for the good

which there has done to me this day

and so it is that saul goes northward and david still stays where he is and we think about david in his righteousness there was righteousness by his withholding his acts and sorrow with what darkness and despair he must have gone north and now his three thousand souls must have walked with weary feet they'd come to accomplish a purpose and it could not be done and saul had lost the fringe of his garment

and david

had a new fringe to his

a fringe of righteousness and the remembrance of the lord

and that was acceptable to god

Transcript

this is the voice of wilbraham

in august 1961

brother harry talent of dundee scotland

chose as his subject

david the shepherd king

we take pleasure now in presenting brother tennant

in the third of seven class sessions

yesterday we left david sweltering in the heat by the dead sea in the caves of en gedi

now the system of communication in those days was such that it's quite certain that david knew what was happening in the kingdom and that his friends dispersed here and there throughout saul's kingdom also knew where david was

now news at this time comes through that samuel has died

and it appears although it's not absolutely certain from the record it appears that david attended the funeral it's possible that he did so

it would be a meeting of a strange kind with

a great prophet dead

with the rejected king

wondering about his words

and seeing perhaps david and his company of men

it's just a thought

and it's something about which we can't in any way pronounce

i generate immediately after this david goes further south still almost as though he's in complete fear now because he goes right down south of the dead sea right into the hottest part of the wilderness and there he is with his company which appears to remain about this time at 600 men no doubt he trained them no doubt he taught them to worship i'm sure that they were men not only who fought for him but men who learned from him no doubt he also sang to them his psalms and perhaps they echoed the kind of sentiment that we ourselves have sung this morning

what time i am afraid

i will trust in god

and that's a word of education brethren and sisters

for in all our vice attitudes of life i don't suppose we shall ever find that our circumstances are any worse than david's

and yet in all his fears he was able to lean upon his god notice the kind of temptation to which he's put as we go through his life the temptations of those without and the temptation of that which lies within the breaking up of his family it's absolutely shattered by the time david dies but his faith remains constant right into the end and his eyes though dim with age look forward with brightness to the time when the kingdom would be established and the sun would be enthroned

david's men come north from the wilderness now into that place south of hebron

where it is possible to keep and to look after sheep and to do so prosperously

and it appears that they acted as a kind of wall

you see the amalekites were on the south of the land of palestine on that part that runs from the dead sea right out onto the mediterranean sea the amalekites were there and they made numerous excursions into the land of israel

to attack the villages to take supplies to come down at harvest time and to satisfy themselves with loot and booty of different kinds and so it appears that for a time david and his 600 men were in the wilderness as a kind of wall of protection against certain of these southern villages indeed he wins their allegiance later on because of what he has done for them and in this area we find there is a man

extremely prosperous in a place called carmel not the carmo right away in the north on the coast another carmel altogether near to that place called mayon the mountain that was surrounded by saul and there there lives a man called nathan nabal whose wife is abigail now we remember the circumstances it's the time of sheep shearing and of great rejoicing the man now has gone through his year he's reached the time when he's reaping all his labors for the year a time when all his servants gather together in rejoicing the time of sheep shearing and it is then that david sends by his servants just a request to enable that perhaps he will share his prosperity with those who have been a wall to him by day and by night and who in no way have done any injury to his servants nor taken any of his goods

and nabal says who is david

now i'm sure he's heard of him there are many servants he says that break away from their masters in these days

and so he despises the anointing of god and the servants of david return to him with this message and david becomes furious and he is desires of taking revenge indeed he girds his sword upon him and takes at least 200 of his 600 men and sets out to take revenge of nabal and his household

but one of the servants of naval a man of wisdom and understanding speaks unto his mistress

and tells her what had happened between the servants of david and between nabel

and abigail herself understands he says i mastered a brutish

he understood his master although he worked for him

and abigail was well aware of this and she calls together a company

brings supplies and sets out and goes south as david is coming north and in her wondrous way and she's a character standing out just like a jewel in the darkness here for david has taken the wrong path

he should never have taken his sword upon his side to avenge himself and have you noticed how sometimes we do precisely this

having taken a great stand in a matter of importance we allow at times less lesser matters

to take it into sin

david wouldn't raise his hand for a moment against saul he saw the principle absolutely clearly but here in this smaller matter when it really didn't matter whether he received supplies from label or not he could have had them from elsewhere he desires to take a revenge

as he comes northward with his men so abigail comes southward with her servants and her maidens and with supplies

but i'd like you to look at her words first samuel 25.

she is a pattern

of mary the mother of jesus

she is one of those characters of the old testament who uses concerning herself despite her status remember she's higher than david in standing at the moment at least so far as the land is concerned she's the wife of a rich man she has no need to have anything to do with an outlaw

or his band of stragglers just 600 when the whole of saul's kingdom is behind her

but her eyes have seen something that neighbor would never see

nabel the

fool and as she comes on this is what she says

verse

23

and when abigail saw david

she hasted and lighted off the ass

and fell before david on her face

and bowed herself to the ground and fell at his feet and said upon me my lord

upon me let this iniquity be

and let thine handmaid i pray thee speak in an audience and hear the words of thine handmaid

let not my lord i pray that he regard this man of belial even nabal for at his name is so is he nabel is his name and folly is with him

but i thine handmade saw not the young men of my lord whom thou did sin now therefore my lord as the lord liveth and as thy soul liveth seeing the lord hath withholding thee from coming to shed blood and from avenging thyself with thine own hand

now let the enemies thine enemies and they that seek evil to my lord be as naval do you notice her understanding she doesn't regard her coming now as being something of her own will at all she regards herself as being moved by the spirit of god to come down and to deliver david from blood guiltiness she's a delightful contrast

with bathsheba

who brings blood guiltiness to david she in her wisdom delivered him from it this was her will the lord's will and she comes down in such humility and understanding both of god and of david himself and of david's life and of his future and of the whole purpose of god that we delight to see her in her humility upon her face before david i wonder what the 200 men did with their swords

when abigail stood before them

i wonder how a shame david felt with his sword by his side

was it still goliath sword

if it was then she was to remind him about goliath or what does she say concerning his enemies and concerning the work of the lord

verse 26 i pray thee

forgive the trespass of thine handmaid

for the lord will certainly make my lord a sure house

notice this god hasn't said this yet

this hasn't been said by the word of god as such this was to come later this this swelling of the purpose of god into a sure house

but abigail seems to be able to anticipate in the selection of david the development of the whole purpose of god

because my lord fighteth the battles of the lord and evil hath not been found in thee all thy days

yet a man is risen to pursue thee and deceit thy soul but the soul of my lord shall be bound in the bundle of life

with the lord thy god and the soul to thy enemies then shall he sling out and she brings back his mind

to goliath

the binding of david with god himself and the slinging out of the enemies of the lord and so it is that her perception of what is righteous in god's sight is considerable isn't it and to our sisters we commend this woman

have you noticed her strength

in her humility

she does obeisance before david

but she stands above him in his character at this time

david knows as he goes away with those gifts that he's received from her

that in abigail he has found someone not only faithful in israel but someone who's pointed right beyond his present sufferings to the time of the sure house

and brethren sisters all of us are abigail

this is how we meet the lord jesus christ

not in his blood guiltiness of course but in our faith

though he is in the wilderness and at the present time not crown king of kings yet the lord will establish for him a sure house and we confess our faith and do our obeisance before him we are the handmaid of the lord

and he will bless us and sling out all the enemies of the lord and bind us into the bundle of life

and that's our hope and that's why we come here may it be brother and sisters that none of us will be slung out

but all of us find the tight band of the lord about us when his day comes and so abigail returns and one can see david standing as she goes away thinking and talking to his men perhaps to joab to abhishei and to asa hell his three faithful warriors who walk with him his sister's sons

men who stood by him in all his trials

and i wonder what psalms he sang as he went back and what thoughts he had

as she had reminded him that in god do we trust

and we shouldn't take vengeance of any kind ourselves

it so happens that as soon as nabel himself

has finished his sheep cheering and continued his great rejoicing he goes into a carousel

he's drunk

and in his foolishness he's smitten by god

and he dies i think it is from this 25th chapter of first samuel

that the man who would pull down his barns and build greater

finds some of his origin

thou fool

this night thy soul shall be required of thee then who shall those things be and they became david's no doubt

because as soon as nabel is dead david sends messengers not with swords but with love northwards to fetch abigail and she comes with five maidens

and one can see them as she comes south and he comes north and she comes upon him

perhaps in the hollow of a hill so they meet she comes over and he comes over the other side

and in her humility she still falls before him and he takes her unto himself as his wife

well now after this she becomes

a queen in the wilderness

not yet a queen but a queen to be she's with david in all his trials and all his sufferings and they're going to be considerable she's now exposed herself to something to which she's not at all accustomed she lived in luxury in her own house with servants about her she's brought her servants with her but from now on they must learn to march to ride to fast

to be afraid of battle to hide in caves at night

and to depend upon the lord for protection and so her own character too is to be developed in this time of wandering and that's our status isn't it we too are in the wilderness a queen to be yet we have to walk with our lord with us with us whoever he leads us during this time

and he leads her into the wilderness of zif the wilderness again well south of jerusalem yet north of the dead sea and the ziphites there again betray david and send a message up to saul and he comes down once more with his three thousand men on the hunt for david and i suppose as david's company increases and there are women in the company or he takes also to himself another wife at this time as there are women in the company so it must have been increasingly difficult for them to move without being seen

indeed i imagine that with that company of men it was now almost impossible to move without being seen and so the message goes north and saul comes south and he pictures again near the hill of hakilah you remember the hill that we mentioned yesterday he pitches there and goes to sleep at night so he sets around his camps all all the baggage that they brought with them as an outer wall of defense and the king's pillow is marked by his javelin at his side that's the mark where the king is that's his mark of authority as well as a weapon that he might use

and david and his men have discovered them

david says who will go with me into the camp of saul and he speaks to joab and to obishi

the guy said i'll come until they steal through the night

through the baggage into the company right up the javelin

navishai says

behold the lord has to deliver thine enemy into thine hand let me smite him

i won't have to smite him a second time

and so it is that david has got to say to this man as he's got to say to job and to others that these sons of zeroway are too hard for him they don't understand the purpose of god and he will not in any way afflict saul but he takes away the crews of water

from the side of saul as he sleeps a sleep that's from the lord

so they needn't come down so quietly and the javelin and disappear until they're on the hillside opposite and again as dawn breaks so david calls

is it thou abner

an abner was a man of considerable bravery and also a man with considerable allegiance to saul he's a tribe of benjamin his soul's uncle and he stands faithful even in his distresses

he's a man with character

have you taken care of your master says david

one of these things that i have and holds them out

oh but saul is moved again beyond himself visit thou my son david

he calls across the gap between them

and david stands purely looking at the man

upon whom are already the marks of death the hand of god is upon him

i have sinned

i will do thee no more harm

says all

the lord shall render to every man according to his righteousness and his faithfulness says david the lord in all his principles has learned to trust in god

and listen to these words now of saul his second prophecy his first one was at the time when david similarly delivered him and this is his second one blessed be thou my son david thou should do great things and thou shalt prevail

this inner awareness of saul

is strange isn't it and have you noticed how some of the qualities of saul lie in all of us how sometimes in our own strivings sometimes in our weakness in sin although we know what the purpose of god is and what we should do yet we sometimes strive against it knowing how vain it is and how useless to pursue the path that was chosen and yet we do it how in our daily living outside our equation and out of association with brethren and sisters we sometimes live in the land of darkness and in the land of the shadow of death and walking it willingly and yet in our hearts we know concerning not david but somebody else blessed be thou o my lord jesus christ

thou shalt do great things and thou shalt prevail

and he will over all of us in this room whether we are faithful or unfaithful the lord jesus will prevail in that day will he not

he could bind us in his bundle

or he can sling us out

and the choice is ours

as it was withdrawal so it is with us today

david still in fear of saul despite what saul has said goes further south and this time he turns over toward the south west and goes down into the land of the philistines and on this occasion the king achish there in ghat gives him a city and he gives him zig lag which is on the outer coast i think ziglag originally belonged to judah

or benjamin it certainly belonged to the children of israel and this city is given to david and to his 600 men and to their wives and children and they dwell there and from that place they go out and make excursions of battle against the people of the south country against the amalekites and those tribes that wandered in the wilderness and used to come up against the south of israel and they went out and when they went out they brought back no captives

only the spoil not a whisper of what they were doing was to come into achish king of gas

akash would appear seem to think that david was in constant conflict with the children of israel but he was going up into the south of judah and they imagined the palestinians imagined in their hearts that david was making himself continually the enemy of the people

but it so happens that at this time the finistines decide to join battle with the children of israel now i'd like you to picture this scene because it's one of considerable importance

the land of palestine mediterranean sea going up northwards now right northwards to carmel

and then coming in the direction southeast runs the great valley of megiddo

great plain of armageddon this is the place where mount tabor stands the place in which we can find jezreel the place where mount gilboa is to be found and shunam

and so there begins to march northwards the army of the philistines not through the land of judah

in inside the land but at that strip of land that green strip of land by the coast and the philistines march

and david and his 600 behind them to do battle to the children of israel with the children of israel i wonder what david thought as he went north had he made a mistake in committing himself to the philistines well that's for you to decide it's something on which there is no comment in scripture

the lord does bless david even throughout all these circumstances but now he was in the predicament i'm sure which exercised his conscience tremendously is he going to fight against the children of israel or is he not going to fight he's been faithful to gath to akish king of gas decree says i found no fault in him at all while he's been with me

david had seen to it that he didn't

but he certainly hadn't found any faults and they marched north and saul and his armies marched northwards until they are pitched on the southern side of the plain of megiddo and the philistines are pitched on the northern side they've come up north and come down onto this place and so they are now opposite one another in their encampments

and the battle is about to be joined

the saul

is distraught

he has no message from god of any kind neither by dream nor by any kind of vision yorim and thummim have forsaken him he still has his own priest his own high priest there are two at this time a priest with david and a priest with saul but he gets no answer from god at all and he's never seen samuels since the day that samuel rejected him it says quite clearly in that chapter 15th chapter of first samuel that saul never saw samuel again until the day of his death from that day of rejection

with whom then is he to consult

is there anybody that he can approach

and so out of the darkness of his mind

swimming up from the bottom right from that 15th chapter first samuel rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft

is there a witch

is there some medium here

and his servants of course knew that saul had in the beginning of his reign put down all witches and all those who were against god in that way his enthusiasm was great at the beginning

he put his hand to the plow but he'd look back and he would never enter into the kingdom of god he had great possibilities even as though he had been one of us baptized

and set on the way to the kingdom

then he turned the plow and gone another way

his pharaoh was never straight

he never bring forth fruit unto righteousness

but thorns and thistles

that which was displeasing to god he said yes we found a medium we found somebody and so by night saul and some of his men leave where they are on the south of this great valley and they go behind the army of the philistines until they come to the place of endor where the witch is

he comes to her this great man

and asks whether he might consult but she says you know that saul has put to death all the witches and all people of that kind i i i don't enter into this

but he presses upon her and his servants with him

and she asks him

whom shall i bring up

he said samuel

she said right away thou saw

until he's got to quiet and her feelings of fear that he might on the spot put her to death

he's too weak a man now to put her to death she is the stronger oh but there's a stronger than both of them there for out of this circumstance it appears that god himself works

but this was not just between the witch and between saul for the lord here is now going to deliver a message and whether samuel himself appears personally is a matter of course of some controversy but certainly the words that this woman is caused to speak an act which saul himself is caused to hear and is caught afresh upon his mind is a message direct from god and perhaps in those words in the first samuel 15 that saul never saw samuel until the day of his death now receives a fulfillment because as their springs to the mind of this woman what's all once

there also springs to her something beyond her own control

but she herself is afraid when she sees the old man with the mantle

why hast thou disquieted me

to bring me up

and saw now in all his poverty says that he's bereft of every vision of god and where there is no vision the people perish and that's precisely the message that samuel was now to deliver unto saul he had no message of comfort no word to give to him

and the witch listens

and saul hears the words that by this time tomorrow both thou and thy sons shall be with me

just an interesting side comment there they were all going to be the righteous and the unrighteous in the same place tomorrow saul with samuel samuel with jonathan and the rest of his sons

all their tomorrow and so saul is about to set back through the night but no the woman prevails upon him to take a meal all his strength is gone and he's cast down upon the ground but his servants and she herself prevail upon him and he takes a little sustenance meanwhile in the camp of the philistines there's some disturbance for there the lords of the philistines who've marched on before and akish coming on behind have come into this great array moved up their army to the place ethic where where battles had taken place before this is the place where balak and deborah had entered into conflict with cicero you remember in this battle also later on josiah was to meet with pharaoh nico and his in this very place

according to scripture there will be a great and final conflict and here it is that saul's army is pitched on mount gilboa and david is coming into a ray on the other side and the philistines say who's this and aiki says this is david but isn't it this the servant of saul they said

haven't we got a traitor in our midst send him back and so it isn't the lords of the philistines the five lords of the philistines prevail upon akish

a name like pharaoh achish of gay and so it is that david is to be sent back and yet david seems to be hesitant i don't think he really was i think this was a great relief to him he seems to be hesitant for the moment and says what evil have i done and achy says nothing at all but returns him southward and so it is at the hundred mile march begins again southward which it looks as though david and his men perform in three days from the place where they're pitched right down to ziglag and as his men march southward and come to ziglag

it isn't there

just smoldering ruins left

no people

no possessions and for once this seems to be the only time until later after david jones sinned

the 600 men turn against him and there are murmurs in the camp about stoning him

but he takes consultation with god and asks whether he should pursue the force that has overtaken ziggler his home

abigail is gone a he know him the jesuits the wives of the 600 men have gone nothing has left all their children and all their possessions and just a smoking smoking ruin is left there behind but god says pursue

and they pursue and go on and on but there's still no sight of those who raided their home and burned it to the ground until they come across a man lying on the ground

an egyptian

a servant

who is sick

and you know that was the undoing of the amalekites

a man had ill-treated his servant

and they lost a battle

it was only an egyptian

you can get servants any day anywhere you can buy them for money and we've taken plenty of money from zig lag the servant can't march he's sick leave him behind and so the whole of the amalekites and their company go southward and leave one man a sick egyptian behind

but that's all that the lord requires

and the egyptian communicates to david and to his company who it is and where they are and where they might be found at this time and so out of sickness out of weakness the lord brings forth strength

and so david and his men march they've done 100 miles in three days and they're still marching southwards and they can't keep pace they've got to split up into two companies some men are too sick too tired too wayne too faint and weary to march further and david leaves them behind with the stuff david is still marching until they come that night upon the great company of the amalekites and see all their encampment and their dancing and rioting at night

and david and his men

finally enter into the encampment

and there's a great slaughter that seems to last a whole day either from the evening to the following morning or from the morning the following morning until the following evening it's not absolutely certain because of this matter of evenings being spoken of in jewish-wise as either the beginning or the end of the day it matters not there was a conflict for the whole of the day and the only people that escaped the amalekites were some young men who rode away on camels

but david recovered his family he recovers everything

lady takes spoil of the america themselves and comes northward with all his stuff

and they come after marching for a little time upon the company that had been left behind sitting down weary and those who fought the battle said too bad

you can't share the spoil with us

but david was aware of the law shall we have a look at it it's in numbers chapter 31

the conscience of david and the way he imposes his will

the will of god upon his people is remarkable even though he's no he's not king and has no true authority yet he constantly brings to bear the principles of the righteousness of god he exercises them in himself and he expects his servant so to do in numbers 31 i think at verse

25

and the lord spake unto moses saying take the sum of the prey that was taken both of man and of beast thou and elias are the priests and the chief fathers of the congregation and divide the prey into two parts between them that took the war upon them who went out to battle and between all the congregation there was a principle laid down by the lord

the men of battle were not to be separate from the people of the congregation nor the people of the congregation from the men of battle they were one in the sight of god and so it was to be with david if he'd allowed this

division to appear between his men he would never have held them together there would have been envian strife between them but by bringing to bear the principles that god had laid down so they divide the spoil and in their triumph they return together and to ziglag we go now northwards to the battle that's about to be joined i wonder how saul entered into that battle how would you have entered if you knew that that day was to be your day of death

the enemy comes heavily upon saul jonathan is fighting there as bravely as he can with the remainder of saul's family the philistines press upon them in this great valley until they've got the whole the children of israel upon mount gilboa and they're firing at them with their arrows

for david there'd been an arrow of deliverance

but the saw an arrow of death

it entered into him and he's wounded by the archers i think he's still fighting very hard until finally the philistines are about to come upon him and he asks his armor bearer to put him to death that he call not into the hand of these uncircumcised philistines

but this man won't perform the work of his master these men who wouldn't slay the priests of the lord neither will they touch the lord's anointed and so it says that saul falls upon his sword and falls unto the ground

and saul is dead

and jonathan is dead

and all the glory of israel is laid low

when in the morning the philistines come and look through the hosts for the spoil for the bracelets

that which is about their ankles for the garments that are worth taking and for the weapons that are worthwhile for the jewels that men carried any possessions that they had they come there upon the king

slaying upon the hill they see his crown and things that belong unto him

and they take him and they cut off his head

saul

like the lion

slain this time by the philistines they've taken their revenge

and he became no better than goliath in his death

although he's one of the chosen of israel and they take him and put his head in the house of dagon and they take his body and they hang it from the wall of bethshan a city north of the plain of megiddo which seems already to have been either in allegiance with or in possession of the philistines and so the bodies also have saul's sons

and do despite unto them and hang them in the sun

and there comes a message right over the river

straight over jordan right onto the other side to the long long memories of the men of jabesh gilead you remember

saul had delivered them

when the ammonites wished to put out their right eyes

and now right at the end of his reign when he is dead and can no longer receive their thankfulness they send out brave men from jabish gilead and they go up to the walls of bethshan and take down the bodies of saul and of his sons and carry them through the night down across the river jordan and bring them to jabez gilead

where they burned them and bury their bones

and david was mightily touched

by that active affection and of allegiance to a dead man

the message now comes right south to david

what would you have said

if your enemy was dead

second samuel

chapter one

and david verse 17

lamented with this lamentation over saul

and over jonathan his son

also he bad them teach the children of judah the use or the song of the bow

behold it is written in the book of the upright that's the meaning of the word

now i'd like us to look

at verses 19 to 27

and to enter into the feelings of david when he thinks both of saul in all that he might have been and all he was at one time in his beauty of character and of jonathan his love

and notice how

david

blots out the iniquity of saul

and holds nothing against him the judgment was not to be his

but to be that of god

shall we read this together and enter into the feelings of this lamentation inspired by god no doubt as david

writes down with poetry

his inner sorrows

verse 19

the beauty of israel is slain upon thy high places

how are the mighty fallen tell it not in gath

publish it not in the streets of ascalon lest the daughters of the philistines rejoice

lest the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph

ye mountains of gilbert

let there be no dew neither let there be rain upon you nor fields of offerings for there the shield of the mighty is vilely cast away the shield of saul as though he had not been anointed with oil

from the blood of the slain

from the fat of the mighty the bow of jonathan turned not back and the sword of saul returned not empty

saul and jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives

and in their death they were not divided

they were swifter than eagles they were stronger than lions

ye daughters of israel weep over saul who clothed you in scarlets with other delights who put on ornaments of gold upon your apparel how are the mighty fallen in the midst of the battle oh jonathan thou were slain in thine high places

i am distressed for thee my brother jonathan very pleasant hast thou been unto me thy love to me was wonderful passing the love of women

how are the mighty fallen and the weapons of war perished

and those brethren and sisters who from time to time have in their studies to study the classics

of rome or of greece

or the books of britain to enter into the poetry of great men [Music]

will never find anything to excel the beauty of this kind of expression that is here read it time and time again and notice the feelings in the heart of david

i'm sure he was distressed

he was distressed before jonathan died when he stood on the northern side of the valley

and jonathan was on the south

notice the allegiance of jonathan

sticks to his father right after the day of death

fought

with the lords anointed

you see neither david nor jonathan would betray the lord's anointed and it cost jonathan his life and one wonders sometimes but why was it that god allowed jonathan to die

but isn't that the question that we asked time and time again about the death of the righteous

it was right that he should die

it was the right time

and jonathan was ready for death

he required nothing else neither a seat at the side of david for any kind of honor from david to make him righteous or lovely

yes truly david and jonathan were separated at the day of jonathan's death

but they will be united

in the day of the resurrection

when one who has loved them with a love surpassing the love of women who himself was greatly distressed on our behalf and delivered us from the streets of the uncircumcised and brought us unto himself and has taught us the song of the bow and has written our names in the book of the upright even the lord jesus christ himself shall bless us and jonathan

will greet john the baptist

two lesser lights

made to shine brightly in the firmament of god's heaven

it's now brother and sisters with saul dead that one would think that immediately the kingdom would fall right into the hands of david but he's down in the south in ziglag right on the borders of the land of the philistines and remember that saul is of the tribe of benjamin and the benjamites are going to be faithful to him

they stick to him

as does abner and the soldiers the host they remain faithful unto saul for some considerable time

now david moves northwards and comes into hebron

now hebron is a city of refuge

i'd like you to notice that it's a city of refuge and it's in hebron

that david becomes first of all enthroned

he sent all his presence

to the men of the south of judah sent presently taken from zig lag sent spoil that he'd taken to many of the places to which david and his men had paid visits during the days when david was outlawed lots of those southern villages were faithful to david no doubt they gave him provisions water words of encouragement perhaps an opportunity of communal worship from time to time and it's to them that david sent his messages of love and a thanks and he comes up he's anointed king over judah in hebron and it's in this place that he reigns for seven and a half years he becomes king there in hebron for seven and a half years he sends a message right northwards across the river jordan to the men of jabesh gilead

send his greetings to them and his thanks for that which they had done to saul and to jonathan and tries it possible

to secure their allegiance he doesn't for the time being the men of jaibus gilead are going to be faithful to saul they wouldn't have fetched his body otherwise and in the north right there on the other side of the river jordan in a city called mayhem where jacob met the angel of the lord in that city saul's son is crowned king of the ten

northern tribes it's interesting there's a kind of division at this time perhaps 11 tribes in effect are included in this and he's crowned king and he reigns there for two years a mayhem on the other side jordan and abner the captain of the host is the one who crowned him king and who stands faithful to him

abner faithful to saul this delights david he's a man that delights in allegiance in faithfulness of spirit and that's precisely what abner is willing to show to his dead master and now to his master son

but after two years there comes about a meeting a meeting between abner and joab

they come down to a place where they meet

and they bring their men with them it's rather a peculiar meeting and one tries to bring out of the record what one can

they meet at a pool in gibeon and there's an account there's a kind of athletic match there

i don't quite understand this this encounter but it looks as though 12 men from one side and 12 from the other enter into a kind of battle before all the people almost as though they were themselves to decide who was to be victorious between the two opposing armies although so far there has been no mention of battle

but in their strange encounter it says that each man took hold of his opponent

and ran him through with his sword and all men fall down to the ground in a great bloody heap

and as soon as that's over so it is that the men of the south under joab go northwards in pursuit of abner and his host

and abner escapes but joab abhishai and asa hell pursue and ace of hell is light a foot he's like a row on his feet it says and he's in pursuit of abner an abner as he goes in flight from the battle keeps looking over his shoulder and ace the hell is coming on behind

and he recognizes ace the hell he knows who he is an ace of hell is a young man who seems hot in pursuit of abner as though he's determined to do a duty for david and to put abner to death an abner is most reluctant in any way to do death unto a sahel he tells him to turn her aside to the right or to the left but asahel keeps on coming coming coming until abner sees that it's a matter either of his own life or that of acer hell

and no young soldier can fight against an experienced hand like abner

just with a deft movement of his spear and abner is fallen from behind and falls to the ground

and jab and dabbish i find him

the job never forgot the death of his brother

he saw his blood

the young man left in the way until it is they pursue northwards northwards northwards in great slaughter until finally abner says

unless this stops there'll be nothing left of our people

and so they return each to his own place

and abner remains still faithful throughout this time

and to saul

so when the years have been finally accomplished so it is that saul and his kingdom saul's kingdom is finally turned unto david

Transcript

this is the voice of wilbraham

in august 1961

brother harry tennant of dundee scotland

chose as his subject

david the shepherd king we take pleasure now in presenting brother tennant

in the fourth of seven class sessions

uh just for those who wanted psalms by the way some people said could they have psalm numbers here they are

you know psalm numbers referring to the life of david

these are possibilities

101

and 68

and 24

to do with the bringing up of the ark

number 30 the dedication of david's own house

number 20

and 21

going out to battle and returning

psalms 32 and 51

in connection with sin

numbers 3

4

63

in connection with absalom and his rebellion

36

51

62

109

the betrayal by ahithophel

and psalms

27

and 28

david's exile from jerusalem

now if anyone wants them again afterwards i'll be glad to be of help

we have reached the position now where david has been enthroned in hebron he was 30 years old when he was made king and he reigns in hebron for seven and a half years

where on the other side of jordan we can still see abner with ish bosheth as king over israel and so those two opposing forces have been at war for two years we saw the great battle yesterday which was resolved by the southern forces being victorious hell joab's brother was slain in battle and now after a little time abner the captain of the host of the northern forces is accused of misconduct with saul's concubine and we'll have perhaps a little more to say about the nature of that kind of offense later on

and it is that as soon as he is accused

he resents it strongly one can't say whether he's guilty though possibly he is so and he immediately switches his affection from ishbosheth saul's son although he's a benjamite to david in the south

and he sends down messengers to david

saying that he knows that david has been appointed king by god over the whole of israel and now he would like to come down and make a league with david and so he comes down and meets david in hebron and he brings with him 20 servants and they sit with david at table and have meal and during that time joab and abishai his brother and the forces of david are out fighting and an agreement is reached between david and abner as to the unity of the kingdom conditions are laid down one of which is that michael saul's daughter should be returned to david

and abner bids farewell and leaves the city of refuge hebron and sets out northward

he's hardly left the place before joab is back with the forces and word comes to joab that abner has been in the camp

and job is rough with the king and says

you allowed the murderer of my brother to come down and to talk with him

and to let him go free

he says nothing further

but he sends out a secret message to abner and to his twenty men who've now reached a little well a distance away from hebron

and the way the message comes to the well that david would like to have further conference with amna an abba returns with his men and he comes down and approaches the city of hebron and comes between the two walls of the city

two the two walls that ring the city he's just between the two when job steps out from between them with abhishe eye behind him speaks as it were for a moment to joab and runs him straight through and kills him on the spot

there could have been nothing more calculatedly cold i think than jobs action and if you and if one is to think about it as to his behavior particularly as we see it there in the city of refuge the very place to which a man who was a murderer

could come and seek trial if even if he were guilty

and that joab should in complete disrespect and disregard of god's law murder abner

puts a mark upon his character joab is a complex enigmatic character he has a wonderful allegiance to david

and i think to himself

he's patriotic in the extreme yet i think he's desiring the whole time to retain his rank as captain over the forces he's a servant of god after he's been a servant of himself

of the kingdom as a patriot

then he begins to observe the word of god he speaks of god and yet i think that as we can see here he would disregard god's law and that

with impunity

now as soon as abner was dead a situation was created that could have immediately exploded and prevented the unity of the kingdom and it's here that david's statesmanship as well as his wonderful conscience shine through we find here that as soon as this happens he completely dissociates himself from the murder

he sends message right throughout the whole of israel

that there will be for abner a state funeral

and the benjamites who very well could have turned against david

are moved by david's own action

he pronounces a curse upon joab a curse i think which isn't worked out until the time that solomon comes to the throne but the difference between asa hell's death by abner you remember in was in battle and it says so in the word distinctly

and that of abner is that abner abner was a calculated murder and there was in the eyes of god and in our own eyes of course a difference in those two deaths and a curse is pronounced upon joab well the funeral takes place and again it's strange how in circumstances like this david is able as it were to well up in both poetry

and in mourning at the same time should abner die as a fool diet

thy hands were not bound

nor thy feet put in fetters

as a man fall it before wicked men so fellaist thou

and david

and joab

come behind as the body goes on to its burial and all israel is moved by the wonder of david's love for abner and his respect for him as a man

and joab strangely it seems is compelled by the king's command to take his place

behind the man whom he has murdered how strange a procession one would think that job should have been taken right away and tried and perhaps in some way he should but his death will come at the appointed time and it will be because of this act of murder and of that other act which he will perform later on

the job is marked out now as a man who when he wishes will move by himself among men with no respect for god and not even respect for his king but respect for himself if abner had been accepted by david who would have been captain of the host abner

with probably more men under him than joab or joab

and joab resolves that without troubling to receive the word of the king

and so it is that as soon as this message reaches the north ish bersheth saul's son is murdered by two men who bring down his head to david as witness that they are servants of david and the kingdom has been delivered to him and david stands aghast when he sees it

he said that he was sorry enough when he'd learned of the death of abner and would he have wished for the death of saul's son

and he has the men who do this foul deed executed immediately in his presence

now one master stroke is performed by david at this time it's interesting to see how even though he's a man of god he's also a man of wonderful common sense and wisdom remember right back in the deuteron in deuteronomy god had said that in the name in in the place in which he would put his name there would israel worship and although jerusalem up to this time had been partially in the hands of the children of israel it had never been fully in their hands and there was as it were the fortress the hill the walled part

of what would become jerusalem quite isolated from the rest of jerusalem and there were in this city the jebusites

and they were so confident that it was impossible for a man ever to take

their city and their citadel that they were able to say over the walls to those who came to attack them

unless you come and take out of this city the blind men and the lame you'll never take it

and that became a saying amongst the people

but david said

whoever it is

that takes this city he will become captain

established as captain over my host

and of course

joab is no coward

although he can engineer that he might be captain he can also do it in a valiant spirit and he seeks out a way in which he can work through and find access to the city of the jebusites

they have to bring water into the city

and he discovers and this place has been discovered since the very spot has been discovered by which joe had entered into the city he had to go 50 feet westward under the city following a watercourse

no doubt he'd have to crawl on hands and knees

or bent as he walked through and then when he'd walk through the 50 feet there was a shaft 100 feet high down which they drop their buckets to take up the water from below

and joab works his way up 100 feet

until he's into the city and by having gained excess so he can bring with him

those who will finally take the city of the jebusites and it becomes the stronghold of zion the city is taken and jerusalem is now established by david under the guidance of god according to deuteronomy as the place that god has marked out the king is there the city is established but we have yet to see the ark of the lord brought into that city and so it is that these thoughts must have been in the mind of david as soon as he is established king nor messages come from the north from hiram king of tyre to greet him an age-old friend it seems in some way of israel tyre and sidon for a long time were not enemies of israel

and they send greetings to david as later on greetings would come down to solomon the philistines attack and david repels the repulses this force that comes against his kingdom and they they sink back into their own kingdom of philistia they're not destroyed they have yet to come up again and david will have to work out his plan whereby they will be completely subdued

but where is the ark of the lord

we've seen already that there has been a very strange way in which worship has been taking place in israel in fact so many things are strange about this time the violence of men

the multiplicity of wives

the apparent lack of the execution of the word of god at the very moment when it should be carried out the separation of the ark from the tabernacle how could the tabernacle exist without the ark and how could the ark exist without the tabernacle but they did

and even during the lifetime of david there was no never complete unity between these two

and so it seems that in some way either because of the weakness of the flesh of men

and i think that probably is the real reason and not because the revelation is progressive and not yet complete i think it's the weakness of men the word was there as to what they should have done but the men were not able to accomplish it not even david i think we ought perhaps to try to understand something of what david was doing in welding together a kingdom this had never been done before as david was to do it and we shall see that as the center of david's life is god so the center of his kingdom becomes god that could never have been said of saul his javelin was his center and mark of office but david considers himself to be anointed of god and we know that he is and the oil of anointing the spirit of god is the center of david's kingdom and so they go to bring up the ark from kerjath jiren this is right down away to the west from jerusalem between the land of the philistines and jerusalem itself you remember that after the ark had been captured

by the philistines it was returned came into the field at beth shemesh and the men of that city saw the ark and it was finally put into a house in kirjath jiren there are two names for that city in the records but the name we'll use for this purpose is kerjaf jiren it's been there for 20 years

and now david decides to bring it up with shouting and with 30 000 men

what a gathering of people

he can gather his men to battle

he can gather his men to worship

this is the power this spirit of david

and so as they gather and bring up the ark out of the house

so it is that they march forward with the ark upon a new cart

and as they're going up toward jerusalem david happy-hearted and all the people rejoicing that once again this center of their worship is to become the center of their lives and not on its outer fringe

so they come to the place of a threshing floor and the option that a drawing this cart stumble

whether of the will of god

or whether some accidental stumbling is a question which each of us can answer for himself but i'm quite certain in my own mind the lord had so designed

that the oxen should stumble and that david and all the people should learn their lesson if the ark is to be the center of the worship of god and if david and his people are to respect the word of god there must be respect from the beginning

otherwise this word of god

will be ignored in greater things later on and so the oxen stumble on the ark it's two feet ten by one foot nine by one foot nine lurches over and azer stretches forth his hand to prevent it falling to the ground and no doubt he does

but other is consumed of the lord

a dead man

by the cherubim of god

and david doesn't know what to do

he's stricken by fear

he's stricken by a kind of anger against god a displeasure surges within him he determined to worship god and god had turned him back how easy to bring the ark unto jerusalem

and so the thirty thousand who came down hoping to go back with the ark

are sent away in sadness it will not be the only time that we shall see david and his people sad together

but the ark is turned aside

into the house of obed edom the gitit

now there are those who have thought about this story here in the old testament that in its harshness harshness it could never show forth the love of god but the god who performed this act is not the god of our new testament but their lie around this very simple record again brought together in that book i mentioned blunts

undesigned scriptural coincidences a number of very interesting features that established at the record is quite true

now i'll try to summarize them and um perhaps we can have a look at one or two of these things um

numbers chapter 4 and verse 15.

numbers chapter 4 and verse 15.

it's quite clear here in this chapter

who it is who should carry and deal with the ark

as i had no place unless he belonged to these people

verse 15

and when aaron and his sons have made an end of covering the sanctuary and all the vessels of the sanctuary as the camp is to set forward after that

the sons of cohab shall come to bear it but they shall not touch any holy thing unless they die these things are the burden of the sons of kohaf in the tabernacle of the congregation it's quite clear isn't it that the keratites are the ones who should bear the ark it is to be carried not upon a cart but upon the shoulders of men

no worship of god is to be born by men

not upon a cart but even these karthites were not to see the ark themselves it was to be covered by aaron and his sons the very center the high priest and his sons were to go in and they were to cover the ark and they would do it in a specific way for the eyes of one man only looked upon that ark and that upon the day of atonement once in the year

and so the idea that it should have been carried upon a cart was against the will of god

go a little further now and have a look at chapter 16.

now korra

the son of isha

the son of kohath the son of levi and dathan and obairam the sons of eliab and on the son of pilath sons of reuben took men now this is the chapter of the murmuring and of the rebellion and we might think once again that these lists of names that we have found sometimes to be useful and sometimes a burden these lists of names are an embarrassment but no there's a mark here

korra

is the son of cohath and it's the keratites who should bear the ark of the lord

now if we go to joshua chapter 21

this chain is quite fascinating

we now come to the division of the land by its cities

joshua chapter 21 and the allocation of the cities

to the tribes

and to the levites

here we read

in verse 24

verse 20

and the families of the children of kohath

the levites which remained of the children of kohaf what did they have

had certain cities we go through them there right down to verse 24

agilon with her suburbs gath

women with her suburbs four cities

now gath

is the origin of gitaites

and the ark was turned aside into the house of

obedient

the guitar

and so it is that there now is a link between the very man to whom they commit the ark and the very word of god

and when we read the record of chronicles it's quite clear that both david and all the people came to realize that god smote other because they had not sought god after the dew order it says that's the reason

and so it is that from this time and there are other verses which one can use in support of this matter without laboring the point so it is that obed edom is a man appointed

a man who should in the first place

have brought up the ark so david has learned his lesson

and they do bring up the ark

from the house of obedient having learned of god

but in the same way that god can smite so he can bless as soon as art went into the house of obama the git the lord began to bless his household and the word came to david that the house of obedient has been blessed since the ark came to rest with him

so when it's with the wrong man

the lord punishes when it's with the right man the lord blesses not because it is an ark of wood covered with gold and because the cherubim are upon it but because this represents the living god and his mercy and the mercy of god can only be received after the due order

men can't dictate to god the principles upon which he will receive them whether they will be baptized or not baptized whether they will break bread or not break bread whether anybody can break bread or only those who belong to the lord jesus christ

and so it was here that the lord laid down his principles right at the beginning that david in his mightiness might know that there is a mightier than thou

that there is a god in heaven and before him

we are all as the dust of the earth and that should he withdraw his breath and his spirit all flesh would perish together now come to psalm 24.

i'd like us to think of this psalm

as being the psalm of the ark coming up to jerusalem

and of david in his rejoicing bringing it up he comes up with wearing a linen ephod

not because he was a priest but because he was like a priest we're like the priest who should be in righteousness

now i wanted to read this psalm together until we get some change in the volume of our voices

versus one and two strong

tones in those verses the power of god

verses three and four the question holding back the volume of our words

verse five we can begin to swell forth and in verse six and now we've come to the very gates of jerusalem itself and we stand outside to say lift up your heads or ye gates and be lift up the everlasting doors and the king of glory shall come in and i'd like just the sisters in verse 8

to ask the question who is the king of glory

and also in verse 10 and all of us to swell forth with the answer just the sisters with the one question in verse 8

who is the king of glory and in verse 10.

right psalm 24

the earth is the lord's and the fullness thereof the world and they that dwell therein for he hath founded it upon the seas

and established it upon the floods

who shall ascend into the hill of the lord and who shall stand in his holy place

he that hath clean hands and a pure heart who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity nor sworn deceitfully

he shall receive the blessing from the lord and righteousness from the god of his salvation

this is the generation of them that seek him that seek thy face o jacob

lift up your heads o ye gates and ye lift up ye everlasting doors and the king of glory shall come in

the lord strong and mighty the lord mighty in battle lift up your heads o ye gates even lift them up ye everlasting doors and the king of glory shall come in

the lord of hosts

here's the king of glory

thank you

just a little comment on the word sila

i know it's a custom generally to read it it seems to be a mark rather not to be read but an instruction

whether one reads it is another matter but it seems to be an instruction of either to the musicians to withhold their music while the congregations think

or vote for there to be some music while the congregations think but the idea is meditate upon that

david comes into jerusalem dancing before the ark of god

when he comes to the ark he looks through a window or rather his wife is looking through a window but david dancing in the presence of the ark michael

saul's daughter and he sees the king without his royal robe

without any special mark that he is the king how could david wear a royal robe when he's asking the question who is the king of glory is it i no the lord of hosts he is the king of glory and so he takes off that royal robe and dances before god in delight wearing only a garment of linen to mark the righteousness he that hath clean hands

other's hand

or david's hands

and michael looks through the window [Music]

and she despises him

in her heart

oh she'd love david i think she'd loved him as a man

for there is no doubt that he was

handsome to look at a man of war a man to be acclaimed of the people

but she hadn't seen david's heart

she'd been taken from him she's now been restored to him brought to david by abner with her husband weeping as she came away weeping as she came from the town of bahurim and she comes and was restored to david and would have been to favor and she could have been established in the house of david as a worshiper of god

but she was her father's daughter

not just by flesh

but she despised david

because she didn't understand the spiritual things

and so david instructs her

haven't you understood

michael what this is all about haven't you seen why god chose me before your father what the reason was

and michael of course will never grasp the spiritual things now

and david has no further association with her

and uh there is perhaps a little comment there about the relationship between david and his wives

we perhaps

as we go along shall see a little something of this matter for us i think it's difficult to understand the multiplicity of wives or of concubines handmaidens

seems to have existed for at least a thousand years no longer than that almost from immediately after the flood it's not according to the basic will of god that they should be in any household that kind of arrangement

one man one wife to represent the unity between god and his earth between christ and his church and anything other than that destroys both the figure and the nature of the man with his wife

but as this system grew up it seems that it was in part sanctified by the nature of the men who took part in it even so much that the 12 tribes spring out not out of one woman but out of four

and uh so it is with god that he he granted a blessing even though he didn't approve basically of that which was taking place and he finally designs to eradicate it and so it seems that after the exile in babylon this has gone we find that the lord jesus christ as not to discuss that subject when he talks with his people in his day the perfect pattern one man and one wife and in this period the wrath of god is not manifest toward those who are not able or do not keep this command i think if a man enters into this kind of arrangement

with the basic lust and greed

of a man whose passions are not in accordance with god then surely that would have been displeasing to him i don't think david entered into that kind of arrangement

with his wives

except for a moment

and god dealt with that right away

he has children

by different wives and with different results

he marries somebody right up from the north near syria the daughter

of a king there and by her absalom is born

and we shall see later on the results of that unity

it now so happens that when david has reached jerusalem with the ark and his own house is built there that he suddenly feels that there's something incongruous about his own living and the living of god

he dwells in a house that's established a house of cedar

hiram king of tyre has been his servant and all the wealth of david's kingdom begins to flow in because the lord establishes him

and he feels

that the lord ought to have a more appropriate dwelling

than the one he has got now shall we go to second samuel chapter seven where he expresses this and where nathan the prophet listens to what david has to say

ii samuel chapter seven

i think basically david's feelings were right in the sense that he knew that there must be finally some permanence for the home of god

verse one and it came to pass when the king sat in his house you see that's what brought forth the thought

and i think brother and sisters here in the united states at home in britain when we sit in our own houses we ought to think of the place in which we worship

do we give it the attention that we give to our own homes

do we

which comes first the house of god or our own house maybe the house of our own house comes first in point of building or establishing as it did with david but first in our hearts

we shall see that david was willing to devote

all his wealth to the house of god and i think we should similarly be willing to make proper devotion of our substance

to the place in which our worship is conducted

and the king had given him rest the lord had given him rest round about from all his enemies to the king said unto nathan the prophet

just a thumbnail sketch of nathan he's a prophet

he is a rebuker

he is an instructor of solomon

and he is a divine historian

so just think of him in those terms

but he's not quite sure of himself here at least god shows him that nathan too requires instruction

see now i dwell in a house of cedar but the ark of the lord dwelleth in curtains

and nathan said to the king go do all that is in thine heart for the lord is with thee

and he came to pass that night the word of the lord came unto nathan saying go and tell my servant david thus says the lord shalt thou build me and house for me to dwell in whereas i have not dwelt in any house since the day that i brought up the children of israel out of egypt even unto this day but have walked in a tent and in a tabernacle

just one word brothers and sisters that i never noticed in that verse before

the lord walked

even though the ark was at rest as it were in the tabernacle the lord had something in his mind beyond that

he wasn't at rest

he was walking

he wouldn't be at rest

until the day when he will make the place of the souls of his feet glorious

that's the day when finally there will be complete rest meanwhile as we see here the lord walks the tabernacle is only a temporary place the lord wonders with israel

and so he now speaks to david and and tells him that he will build him a house and establish it firmly and that forever and that in the presence of david himself there are here intertwined two promises a promise that concerns solomon certainly but a promise that reaches out right beyond that time for as david says is this the manner of man oh lord is this law is this arrangement that which can concerns just man's arrangement and his very question is the answer for david knows that this is right beyond him and he uses one word

in this chapter and similarly elsewhere to describe his state of mind

he calls himself

thy servant twelve times it occurs

thy servant

and not only that

but god both in that fifth verse

and later on uses the word concerning david himself he says go and tell my servant david

brethren sisters that's all it requires this is required isn't it

just that word that's all that god requires of us

my servant

what did he say about moses to joshua

moses

my servant

is dead

that's how he regarded him

not the mediator appointed by me not the leader of my people not the king over israel here but

my servant

and what does paul say

and ourselves

your servants

for jesus sake

and the lord jesus christ

he himself thy holy child jesus in the acts of the apostles the revised version thy holy servant behold my servant

see him rise exalted in my might him have i chosen and in him

i have supreme delight

my servant

shall we remember that brother and sisters and try to practice it in our daily living

david humility here who am i and what is my house oh lord let thy name be magnified and let the house of david thy servant be established

and so the matter of the ark was taken out

of the hands of david there was to be no permanent place for the ark which david could build but the lord himself had seen beyond this time that there was to be a man who could build a house

in which david could dwell

and not god in a house that david had built

and now david establishes around himself his kingdom he's ringed around with enemies even as the land of palestine is today we find that the philistines come up twice and the lord

grants a blessing to david and in the second battle the lord himself

produces an ambush by which the philistines are routed and then david goes across the river and fights the murabites he goes north to the syrians and subdues them and even establishes troops right northwards in damascus

he smites amalek and edom right down in the south and coming up around the southeast and finally he's going to close in and attack the ammonites and so right round david has subdued the whole kingdom and begins to flow into him into him a great wealth from these kingdoms his rulers are there in the cities and they begin to pay tribute to david and david looks around establishes his kingdom joabo with the host a high hood the recorder zadok under him elect the priests zadok have been high priest for saul ahimalek had been high priest for david and the two were brought together just for some time benaya is over the personal bodyguard of david the lifeguards i think we might call them

those soldiers that stand around david his own personal servants and banaya is over those and he's going to prove a very reliable man

and sariah is the scribe the the recorder for the kingdom the one who sets down the things that are done

and then david looks round

and there comes to his mind

a field

and a man with tears

bidding him goodbye

the lord be between me and thee

and between my seed and thy seed forever

jonathan

is there yet any of the house of jonathan

to whom i might show kindness

he says

how that must have moved the benjamites

who could have been his enemies continually

and it so was that in the north there was a child the son of jonathan that was now lame on its feet

there's just a little little sketch given that in the time of the slaughter that took place in the north when ishboshet himself was taken that the nurse picked up jonathan and ran with him jonathan's son and

dropped him

and he became lame on his feet

and so he's restored

to favor but this time not by the vendomites but by david himself and he's given lands and he's given zebra to be his servant to manage his estate because he himself was unable to do it on account of his lameness

and now the syrians come down from the north they've been defeated once but they've come down now as hired mercenaries of the ammonites on the other side of the river

amman you remember the present capital on the other side of the river

is the place which was finally besieged by david

now this siege is interesting it shows forth the character of david the character of joab and all the intricacies of the human mind when it indulges in sin

as we read outside our scriptures oh what a tangled web we weave

when first we practice to deceive

that's one of our

lesser poets

shakespeare i think

well now just one little point i'd like to bring out about joab before we see him here outside amman the capital rubber as we know it in our scriptures he's a man of tremendous courage i don't think i'd like to have been in this battle i haven't got the courage that jab had but when he came and saw the syrians and the ammonites gathered together and realized that there were two sets of forces here

he said to abishai you take that side and i'll take this side

and these are his words joab said be of good courage

let us play the men for our people

and for the cities of our god and the law do that which seemeth good

now i think that was job's character it got streaks in it uh of unworthiness even from human standards but i think that was job's character i think he was a man of courage and so each of them faces an army

and this is the part that partly amuses me and yet shows his shows the faith of joab he says to abhishe now if they prove too strong for you i'll come and help you if they prove too strong for me you come and help me but he never said what would happen if both sides prove too strong [Music]

it's just one of those blind spots i suppose that would never happen because they were going to be of good courage and they were to play the men well they defeated these people but they didn't take the city of rabbah and the siege is laid to this city finally and it continues for a long time and when the spring time comes the time when men go out to battle jab and his forces are out over the river jordan besieging this city

and david is at home

and his face changes as we look at him

i wonder what he was thinking

when he walked

upon the roof of his home that hiram had built

what was he thinking

we only know one other man who walked upon his roof

is not this

great babylon that i have

built i wonder whether for a moment he dropped his defenses

because if we drop our defenses in one direction

we've got to be very careful unless we drop them in other directions also a man who thinks that weakness in one part of his character can be tolerated and that it will have no effect upon another part of his character is sorely mistaken as we all know

for it seems that david had dropped his other defenses also as he looked out across

and saw bathsheba

and asked who she was

and brought her to him

and committed the act

which in the sight of god

caused great displeasure

what's not everything david's

and why should he touch that which belongs to another man

and i think perhaps he would have forgotten the act if bathsheba had not come along to say that there were consequences of that act

there are consequences to all sins whether visible or invisible

and so he sends for uriah the hittite

oh david what have you done

you've won the allegiance of a hittite

didn't belong to the children of israel

and he'd won his allegiance fighting for him at the very front a man who is named among the thirties 33

brave men that belong to david

and he has betrayed him at the front

send him back home

he feeds him well urges upon him that he should return to his own house but you rise a man of greater spirit than that can i he said and there seems here to be almost a connection

between the ark resting in its curtains and the words of you rather hitter can i he says go home

while all the rest of the troops are sleeping out in the field and in the tents i sleep outside this door and so for two nights he does

and the king can't secure his will

then he's sent back

with a letter for joab

he takes with him from jerusalem

on that great descent of four thousand feet

down to the river jordan up over the other side to present to joab

his own death warrant

he hadn't read it

he kept it

he was a man of integrity

and he delivers it to joab

i know how joab relishes the situation

david in joab's hand

from now on jai will hold just that one thing blackmail

over david

and so uri the hittite is set into the forefront of the battle job assigns him a place where he knows that the better will be the hardest and uriah the hittite without fear go straight into the battle and he falls

and so it is that message comes to david about the course of the battle david inquires about it and they say were the many slain he said yes there were men slain well why did you get so near to the wall said david

and your eye the hittite is dead also ah well he said the battle takes one as well as it takes another and all the deceit of david's heart which is just like yours isn't it and just like mine comes forward and we see him as a man

a man requiring one thing

and that is forgiveness