Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Samuel 23-24.

I am not sure when relative to the other things which happened during David’s reign the things in today’s passage occurred.  It begins by recounting David’s last words.  I will state that I am unsure if we are meant to understand these to be the last words he spoke before he died, or a statement David desired to be repeated after his death about his life.  The passage goes on to recount some of the exploits of David’s mightiest warriors and then lists the name of those warriors.  Finally, the passage contains the account of David’s census and the plague which followed.  It tells us that this plague led to David building an altar where Solomon would later build the temple.  Interestingly, it contains what at first appear to be two different accounts about how the plague ended.  First, it says that as the angel delivering the plague was about to strike Jerusalem God commanded it to stop.  Second, it says that Gad told David to build an altar at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite, the place where it first said the angel was when God commanded it to stop.  In the second part it tells us that God stopped the plague after David offered sacrifices there.  After giving it some thought, I think we are supposed to see these two things as being together.  David built the altar at the place he saw the angel and offered sacrifices which led God to stop it from continuing to spread the plague, and God stopped the plague at that place so that David would know where to build the altar.

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

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Samuel 23-24.

Today’s passage starts with what it says are David’s last words.  I do not think they mean that he spoke this on his death bed.  Rather, I think this was a psalm he put together when he realized that he would soon die which was intended to be his last message to the people of Israel, sort of like the farewell speech a President might give as he leaves office.  Then the passage gives us a list of the men whose exploits led to so much of David’s success.  Finally, we have the account of David’s census and the plague which resulted from it, leading to David selecting the spot where the Temple would be built.  Again, we see Joab try to talk David out of this bad idea (although the passage does not explain why it was a bad idea), which is yet another example of the complex relationship between David and Joab.  According to this passage, when David received the results of this census he realized that he had sinned against God by having this census taken.  As I said, the passage does not explain what sin David had committed here.  Perhaps it was his failure to collect the “census tax” which God had commanded Moses to collect, or, perhaps it was because David felt the need to know the number of fighting men he could muster rather than relying on God that there would be enough for whatever wars God led him into.

In any case, when the prophet Gad came to David the following morning offering David a choice of consequences, David chose to fall into the hands of God, rather than into the hands of men.  Then later, when David witnessed the people suffering, he asked God to not punish the people he led for his sin but instead to punish him directly.  Whenever my Dad spoke about this passage he always focused on David’s desire that God mete out the punishment for his sin directly.  God has great mercy, but we humans all too often want others to suffer more than called for by their misdeed.  I, always think about the importance of leaders taking responsibility for their mistakes and striving to keep those they lead from suffering for them.

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

Today, I am reading and commenting on  2 Samuel 23-24.

I enjoy reading here about some of the exploits of David’s mighty men.  I also often struggle to understand what sin King David had committed by ordering the census of Israel (the passage never clearly tells us what that sin was).  I even find the accounts about how David chose the site on which he built an altar of interest.  However, I want to focus on what the passage records as David’s last words (I suspect that the writer here does not mean what we usually mean by “last words”).   David tells us that a one who rules with righteousness is like the light of the dawn, or that of the sun breaking through the clouds after a storm.  Those who govern in fear of God bring forth growth like the sun breaking forth after spring rains.   If one seeks to govern with righteousness, one needs to reveal that which is hidden just as the sun at dawn does.  Then he tells us that evil men will be cast aside like thorns, which are burned where they lie.

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