June 21, 2020 David Under King Saul 1 Samuel 15:34-16:13

I am not a fan of King David. The Bible says that he is the greatest of Israel’s kings, and therefore I must accept that. However, if it were up to me I’d choose King Josiah, who rules hundreds of years later, to be the best of the kings. Nevertheless, David is the strongest of the kings. He unites the tribes into a nation and creates a central religion, which will become Judaism.

We heard a summary of David’s rise to power earlier (Harper’s Bible Dictionary, 1985, Pg. 208) I want to look at two things in our sermon. The first is a dilemma, which is also kind of funny. I’m going to read a passage from 1 Samuel to you about one incident.

The dilemma is that Saul is anointed by the prophet Samuel as king. But years later while Saul is still king, the prophet Samuel also anoints David as king. So now you have two anointed kings. What to do? As the stories in 1 Samuel go, David knows this. He knows that God has ultimately rejected the kingship of Saul and chosen him instead. However, Saul is still God’s anointed king. That is a role that cannot be lost. And so David has to wait until Saul dies.

Saul is afraid of David’s popularity and his military might. Saul tries to have David killed on a number of occasions but isn't successful. What then would happen if David had a chance to kill Saul? Here this strange account from 1 Samuel 24:1-15. (NRSV)

1 Samuel 24:1-15

When Saul returned from following the Philistines, he was told, “David is in the wilderness of En-gedi.” 2Then Saul took three thousand chosen men out of all Israel, and went to look for David and his men in the direction of the Rocks of the Wild Goats. 3He came to the sheepfolds beside the road, where there was a cave; and Saul went in to relieve himself. Now David and his men were sitting in the innermost parts of the cave. 4The men of David said to him, “Here is the day of which the Lord said to you, ‘I will give your enemy into your hand, and you shall do to him as it seems good to you.’” Then David went and stealthily cut off a corner of Saul’s cloak. 5Afterwards David was stricken to the heart because he had cut off a corner of Saul’s cloak. 6He said to his men, “The Lord forbid that I should do this thing to my lord, the Lord’s anointed, to raise my hand against him; for he is the Lord’s anointed.” 7So David scolded his men severely and did not permit them to attack Saul. Then Saul got up and left the cave, and went on his way. 8Afterwards David also rose up and went out of the cave and called after Saul, “My lord the king!” When Saul looked behind him, David bowed with his face to the ground, and did obeisance.

9David said to Saul, “Why do you listen to the words of those who say, ‘David seeks to do you harm’? 10This very day your eyes have seen how the Lord gave you into my hand in the cave; and some urged me to kill you, but I spared you. I said, ‘I will not raise my hand against my lord; for he is the Lord’s anointed.’ 11See, my father, see the corner of your cloak in my hand; for by the fact that I cut off the corner of your cloak, and did not kill you, you may know for certain that there is no wrong or treason in my hands. I have not sinned against you, though you are hunting me to take my life. 12May the Lord judge between me and you! May the Lord avenge me on you; but my hand shall not be against you. 13As the ancient proverb says, ‘Out of the wicked comes forth wickedness’; but my hand shall not be against you. 14Against whom has the king of Israel come out? Whom do you pursue? A dead dog? A single flea? 15May the Lord therefore be judge, and give sentence between me and you. May he see to it, and plead my cause, and vindicate me against you.”


Commentator Bruce Birch notes in the New Interpreter’s Bible (Volume 2, pg. 1157) that this story was told with amazement and humor. It is silly. But it also hints at something serious.

Biblical scholars have spilled rivers of ink trying to make sense of what is going on in the Saul/David dual anointed kings situation. What is God really thinking? What are the Bible’s authors really trying to convey?

Very significant among them, although no ideas are perfect, is that of David Gunn in his writing, “David and the Gift of the Kingdom (2 Sam 2-4, 9-20; 1 Kings 1-2)” Semia 3 (1975) 14-45. There he raises the contrast between gift and grasp for understanding successes and failures of David. When David receives the kingdom as a gift from God and acts accordingly, all is well; but whenever David attempts to grasp the power of the kingdom for his own selfish purposes, all goes awry.

That can be a very important lesson for our own lives.

I think it is important to recognize how David acts. First, he is the Lord’s anointed king. He knows that. With that knowledge what does he do? Does he just sit back and expect the kingdom to come into his lap? No. He knows he has to strive for it.

Indeed, when God calls us to do something that does not mean easy street until it happens. It often means hard, arduous work. But how hard do you work, and to what ends? And do the ends then justify the means?

Can David, as the Lord’s anointed, claim divine authority to just go out and kill his opponent, the person who is in his way to accomplish his goals? No. If you read the stories of David you discover that indeed he does that any number of times. He takes matters into his own hands to get what he wants. David was not afraid to kill people, many people in fact, in order to get what he wants. And when David does things go wrong.

The nation of Israel under David was not a safe, stable, peaceful place. We’ll explore that in the next couple weeks. There were civil wars, coop attempts, and many many many political assassinations. Ultimately when David wants to build a temple to God, God says no. David has been too violent.

Receive from God as a gift and pursue it diligently, yes. But try to grasp and keep and hold and things will go awry.

The other thing overarching thing from David is the way he appears to have put everything together into one whole. We Americans often pride ourselves in separation of church and state. As a power position it has its virtues. In theory at least we do not make our national policies based on religious teachings. And, we do not have our religious teachings reflect national policies. The church is always allowed to choose whether to back or renounce the things of the government.

But there is a drawback too. Sometimes people create a separation in their lives. They put religious things in one box and political things in another. They separate spiritual things from physical things.

The congregation where I did internship was a highly conflicted congregation. There were a lot of problems going on. One thing some church council members said to the head pastor, my internship supervisor, “Pastor, you be our spiritual leader. You take care of spiritual things. We’ll take care of the real things.”

Nope! While there’s a host of things wrong with that statement, the thing I want to focus on is the compartmentalization it creates: spiritual vs. real.

King David combines everything into one whole. He combines: being a political leader, with being a military leader, with being God’s anointed king, with being someone who lives by God’s will. All of it is integrated into one whole.

We do well when we can combine our religious beliefs with our life decisions with our political ideology with our scientific understand, and so on. While there may be tensions within ourselves at times, we want to put it all together into one whole. And finally, as David learned in his role as king, work hard for that which God is calling you to do, but even so receive it as a gift. And never grasp for our own personal agenda or gain. Such grasping will make everything go awry.