I am using One Year Bible Online for my daily Bible study. For today, One Year Bible Online links here for today. I just discovered that I used the May 17 reading for this study. I may change this to May 17 when that comes, or I may rewrite this completely on that day.
     David has put together a fairly large force (600 men) and is operating in the wilderness and hill country near Ziph. Jonathan (the son and heir to King Saul) comes to David and affirms their friendship. Jonathan, also, expresses the intent to be second to David when David becomes king, even though Jonathan is the heir to the throne. Shortly after this some of the locals go to King Saul and tell him that David is hiding near them and offer to help King Saul capture him. King Saul leads a force to work with the locals to capture David. David moves into ever more remote areas and Saul follows. However, before Saul can corner David, he receives word that the Philistines are raiding elsewhere. Saul returns from pursuing David in order to drive off the Philistine raiders.
     The Bible does not really tell us what David is doing during this time, besides hiding from Saul, but he must have been doing something active in order to attract an ever growing following of men. We see in this passage that David and Jonathan have maintained their close friendship despite the hostility that Jonathan’s father held towards David. Further we see how God protected David. God did not keep David completely from harm. David needed to flee from Saul, but when David reached the end of his ability to avoid Saul, God caused the Philistines to start raiding Israel forcing Saul to give up on pursuing David. The Psalm in this study is David praising God for rescuing him from Saul in this situation.
     I see here in this passage that God will care for us and rescue us from our enemies (whether human or just circumstances) as long as we remain faithful to Him. It is important to remember that even when our success seems to be a result of our own actions, it is still a gift from God.
     In the second section of Samuel in today’s reading we see how we should interact with those God puts in authority over us, even when they go against God’s will. God delivers Saul into David’s hand. David has an opportunity to kill Saul and end the threat to his life. David chooses not to and even feels regret that he cut the corner from Saul’s robe. I see in this passage that even when those government officials that God has put over us act in ways that are evil, we should treat them with respect as those appointed by God. I have a lot of trouble with being faithful to this. In the passage, Saul recognizes the he is the one who is acting against God’s will and asks David to promise not to carry out a vendetta against Saul’s family when David becomes king.
     In the final portion of today’s passage we get some idea of what David was doing. David and his men provided protection from bandits to those who tended flocks out in the wilderness areas of Judah. When David sent some men to Nabal to request some recompense out of his plenty, Nabal responds with contempt. Nabal did not just say “no”, he called David an outlaw and a nobody. Nabal’s response was not that he would not give David’s men anything because he had not asked them for the service they did for his men. His response was that David was of no consequence and had done nothing of value. When Nabal’s wife learns of his foolishness, she rushes to make up for his churlishness before it can explode in his face and destroy both him and her. When Abigail approached David, she did so from a position of humility recognizing that David had been wronged by her husband. She recognized the danger that she and her husband and their household were in as a result of her husband’s actions and took steps to mitigate the danger. When shortly after this Nabal dies, David offers to take Abigail as his wife. This is not just David taking the opportunity to get a good wife, this is David paying Abigail back for what she had done. With the death of Nabal, in that society Abigail would have been subject to the predations of other powerful men. By marrying her David is extending his protection to her and her household.
     Nabal fails to show generosity to those who have done him a service and, according to the passage, pays a steep price for it (his life). It is only through the intervention of his wife, Abigail, that the men of Nabal’s household are spared from suffering the same fate at the hand of David and his men. I take from this that it is important that we be generous to those who have done us service to the extent that our resources allow (not all of us have the wealth that Nabal had). Also, we should act with humility to defuse the anger in a situation that results when those around us are arrogant and insulting to others. Finally, we do not need to gain vengeance on those who insult and degrade us, God will punish those who are deserving of such punishment in His time and according to His will.