2 Samuel 2 Not On a Silver Platter

Of Recast Church in Matawan, Michigan. This week, Pastor Don Filseck is preaching from his series, The Warrior Poet King, Study of Second Samuel. Let's listen in.

The Need to Hear God’s Word Before Singing

Well, good morning and welcome to Recast Church. I'm glad that you're here. I'm Don Filseck, I'm the lead pastor here. And I'm gonna get our minds thinking about God and his word by introducing the message this morning before we come to praise him in singing.

Part of the reason that I do that is because I'm convinced, I mean, some people think of the singing as preparation to hear from God's word. I like to think of both of those things go hand in hand and to some degree, we need to know who we're singing to.

We need to be reminded. How many of you have had a busy week? You've had things going on. And there's all kinds of stuff that presses in around us. And so I like to hear from God's word, get reconnected to him in that way before we sing together.

And so let me introduce the message this morning. It's gonna be from Second Samuel, chapter two. And we may sometimes, you'll notice that the title of the sermon is Not on a Silver Platter. We may sometimes use the phrase, he had his future handed to him on a silver platter.

And what we mean by that phrase is that everything came easy to him, that it was given to him. He didn't have to work hard for it. Have any of you, are you familiar with that phrase? Not, you know, he was handed to him on a silver platter, something to that effect.

But it's quite rare, and I think many of you can testify that it's very rare that anything is handed to anyone on a silver platter. Now, some people come into some old money or inheritance or something like that, but it's very rare that that happens in our lives.

And as we look at our historical passage this morning at the start of the reign of King David, we see that the kingdom he was promised through the anointing of the prophet Samuel in his youth will come to him in waves.

It doesn't come to him all at once. The kingdom is not handed to David on a silver platter. Now, imagine in your youth that you have this prophet, the man of God of Israel come to you and say, you're gonna be king one day.

And he anoints you with oil. Now, how many of you would think like, that would do something in your brain? Would that impact you? Would that impact your view of the future, what's going on in your life?

How many of you would just be kind of waiting for that day from that point on? It would be like, wow, I'm gonna be king? Like, everything in your life in preparation for that moment. And when we read these Old Testament historical accounts, I encourage you all to consider that these words are recorded not merely, it's not merely for our information, but it's also for our daily benefit.

In other words, it isn't as though we're studying this stuff so that we can identify the names of Abner and Joab and Asahel, names we'll see in our text this morning, so that we can pass a quiz later and then move on to chapter three.

No, that's not the point. God is showing us in these historical books how he works in and through the real lives of real people in a real fallen world. Now, why would he show us these snapshots of ancient life?

I mean, isn't that so old? We're here and we're in 2022 and we've got the internet and we've got smartphones and life is so different. But let me suggest to you that it is all about our faith. It is to show his faithfulness in history, even in the waiting times.

Is that something that's familiar to you? Have you spent some time waiting for things? Go ahead and raise your hand if you've spent some time waiting for some things to happen and transpire in your life.

Think, all of a sudden we can relate to that regardless of the internet, regardless of smartphones. There's similarity to the experiences that they had to the experiences that we have today. In this particular account this morning, I believe that God is seeking to shatter within all of us any expectations that we have that a life lived in his service is just handed to us on a silver platter.

We see how God works in this text in the life of his servant, David, and his pathway to the throne should inform us about the ways that God works in preparing those he calls to serve. And that's all of us.

That relates to all of us. He calls all of us to serve him. So as we open up and read this strange passage this morning, I wanna encourage you to not lose sight, don't lose sight of the fact that God is working in this strange chapter too, and we'll talk about it after we have an opportunity to read it, sing some songs, and then we'll come back to it in more depth, so open your Bibles, your devices, your scripture journals to 2 Samuel chapter two.

Yes, we're gonna cover the entire chapter. It's one kind of common unit, and although it's a little bit longer, we're gonna read it in its entirety. Recast, we value God's word and think that there's benefit even in reading a long historical text like this.

So 2 Samuel chapter two, and recast, this is God's holy and precious word on what he desires for us to take on this morning and come to greater understanding about. After this, David inquired of the Lord, shall I go up into any of the cities of Judah?

And the Lord said to him, go up. David said, to which shall I go up? And he said, to Hebron. So David went up there, and his, went up there, and his two wives also, Aenom of Jezreel and Abigail the widow of Nabal of Carmel.

And David brought up his men who were with him, everyone with his household, and they lived in the towns of Hebron. And the men of Judah came, and there they anointed David king over the house of Judah.

When they told David it was the men of Jabesh-Gilead who buried Saul, David sent messengers to the men of Jabesh-Gilead and said to them, may you be blessed by the Lord because you showed this loyalty to Saul, your Lord, and buried him.

Now may the Lord show steadfast love and faithfulness to you, and I will do good to you because you have done this thing. Now therefore let your hands be strong and be valiant, for Saul, your Lord, is dead, and the house of Judah has anointed me king over them.

But Abner, the son of Ner, commander of Saul's army, took Ish-bosheth, the son of Saul, and brought him over to Mahanaim, and made him king over Gilead, and the Asherites, and Jezreel, and Ephraim, and Benjamin, and all Israel.

Ish-bosheth, Saul's son, was 40 years old when he began to reign over Israel, and he reigned two years, but the house of Judah followed David, and the time that David was king in Hebron over the house of Judah was seven years and six months.

Abner, the son of Ner, and the servants of Ish-bosheth, the son of Saul, went out from Mahanaim to Gibeon, and Joab, the son of Zariah, and the servants of David went out and met them at the pool of Gibeon, and they sat down, the one on one side of the pool and the other on the other side of the pool, and Abner said to Joab, let the young men arise and compete before us, and Joab said, let them arise.

Then they arose and passed over by number 12 for Benjamin, and Ish-bosheth, and the son of Saul, and 12 for the servants of David, and each caught his opponent by the head and thrust his sword in his opponent's side, so they fell down together.

Therefore, that place was called Helkeph Hazorim, which is at Gibeon, and the battle was fierce that day, and Abner and the men of Israel were beaten before the servants of David, and the three sons of Zariah were there, Joab, Abishai, and Asahel.

Now Asahel was as swift a foot as a wild gazelle, and Asahel pursued Abner, and so, and as he went, he turned neither to the right hand nor to the left from following Abner. Then Abner looked behind him and said, is it you, Asahel, and he answered, it is I.

Abner said to him, turn aside to your right hand or to your left and seize one of the young men and take his spoil, but Asahel would not turn from following him, and Abner said again to Asahel, turn aside from following me.

Why should I strike you to the ground? How then, how then could I lift up my face to your brother Joab? But he refused to turn aside. Therefore, Abner stuck him in the stomach with the butt of his spear, so that the spear came out at his back, and he fell there and died.

And he fell there and died where he was, and all who came to that place where Asahel had fallen and died stood still. But Joab and Abishai pursued Abner, and as the sun was going down, they came to the hill of Amma, which lies before Giah on the way to the wilderness of Gibeon.

And the people of Benjamin gathered themselves together behind Abner and became one group and took their stand on the top of a hill. Then Abner called to Joab, shall the sword devour forever? Do you not know that the end will be bitter?

How long will it be before you tell your people to turn from their pursuit of their brothers? And Joab said, as God lives, if you had not spoken, surely the men would have not given up pursuit of their brothers until the morning.

So Joab blew the trumpet and all the men stopped and pursued Israel no more, nor did they fight anymore. And Abner and his men went all that night through the Ereba. They crossed the Jordan and marched the whole morning.

And marching the whole morning, they came to Mahanaim. Joab returned from the pursuit of Abner, and when he gathered all the people together, there were missing from David's servants 19 men besides Asahel.

But the servants of David had struck down of Benjamin 360 of Abner's men. And they took up Asahel and buried him in the tomb of his father, which was at Bethlehem. And Joab and his men marched all night, and the day broke upon them at Hebron.

Let's pray.

Father, I thank you for your word, and it is sometimes strange to our ears. It is difficult to understand all of this fighting, all of these battles, this representative battle between these 12 men, Asahel and all that's going on there.

Those relationships don't mean a whole lot to us. We know that we've got relationships that do matter a whole lot to us. And so, Father, I pray that you would help to bring this text to light into our world today.

I pray that you would allow it to break over us in a new way. This is a passage that would be very easy to skip over, a passage that would be very easy to just kind of brush aside as so much ancient history and somewhat confusing to our ears.

But Father, I pray for your word to have its way in our hearts in a way that allows the Spirit to use it to give us power and strength and greater faith. Father, I thank you for the most important thing that we have in thinking about this text.

You're leading to a kingdom under David and one of his descendants that will reign and rule forever, Jesus Christ our Lord. And it's in his name that we have hope. It's in his name that we have trust.

It's in his name that we have faith. And so I pray that even now as we have an opportunity to sing songs before you, it's on the basis of that greater King who came in David's line, who is our hope, who is our peace, who is our love.

And Father, I pray that that love would be poured out of our hearts now in song before you. We rejoice in the chance that we have to gather together in your name. And we ask that you would be present in our singing today in Jesus' name.

Amen. Well, you can go ahead and be seated. And let me encourage you to get comfortable if you need more coffee or water or donuts back there. Take advantage of that during the message and keep your Bibles open or your scripture journal to 2 Samuel chapter two.

And you see that that's the flow. We're going through that passage. So we have a long text this morning, but the narrative moves along pretty quickly. I mean, it's important to understand that 2 Samuel follows the rise of David to the throne as the King over all of Israel.

He was promised this kingship, as I mentioned in my introduction, in his youth. And it has been deferred for years at the start of our text. Where we begin, it's already been deferred for years. And at the start of the text, it seems like it's going to come to pass finally.

The former king has gone, he's died, and it seems likely that he is now going to inherit his kingdom. But not every passage, let me just state this directly, and I think you already know this. Not every passage in scripture is obviously applicable to our lives.

You don't read it and go, oh, now I know what to do. Here's my three steps for this next week. Here's something obvious for me to do. We might honestly skim this if we're reading through the Bible in a year and say, that was weird, and then move on to the next chapter, right?

How many of you know what I'm talking about? There are passages in scripture where it's like, I don't really get what in the world is going on here. I don't know how to apply this to my life. I don't know what it's got to do with me.

I think I'm gonna skip it and move on. Not really skip it, but I'm just gonna blaze. But I'm convinced that by the end of this sermon, every single one of us will see something in here that the Spirit wants to work into our lives.

Have you ever had an unrealized dream that seemed like it would never arrive? A stage or a movement in your life that you thought, that's the next step, and the next step isn't coming. Do you know what I'm talking about?

I think all of us can relate to that to some degree. Or have you ever had bad people come between you and what you knew that God desired for you? Have you ever had that happen, where somebody was standing across the pathway in the way of what you believe God desired for you?

Or have you ever tried to figure out God's next step in your life? God, what do you want for me? I think that pretty much sums up all of us, right? All of us at some point have said, God, what's my next step?

What do you want from me? This text will address all of these things as we watch God's movement and the movement of the things that God desires to accomplish in the life of David. Now, I would start off by saying all Americans have, I would say, a misguided notion that we were made for greatness.

Every one of us is unique, has a really high and special calling, and we define greatness, and I would say misguided primarily because of our definition of greatness. We define greatness as fame, fortune, spotlights, or heroism, or something to that effect.

But our outline this morning has four points that I draw from this text, and you'll see why I'm talking about our quest for greatness as Americans in the highlight of what I mean by these points. These points I will call four steps to owning our years of unrealized potential.

Let me say that again. Four steps to owning our years of unrealized potential. And I kind of say tongue-in-cheek unrealized potential because that's something that we ascribe to ourselves, right? How many of you have some potential out there that you're just like, my boss isn't using me right.

God, you're not using me right. I mean, you don't know what I'm made to do, and you don't know where I'm supposed to be, and I'm already supposed to be five years ahead of where I am today, and my boss is just holding me down, or somebody else is holding me down.

I've got this unrealized potential that God desires to do in me, and everything's in the way. I would suggest to you that this is an expectation-setting sermon. What do you expect life to give to you?

How do you expect it to roll?

What do you think God is doing in your present? That's that kind of question. The key in all of these steps that God took David through is to remember that he was promised the kingdom over Israel in his childhood.

And now that the old king is dead, and the crown prince is gone as well, David seems just mere moments away from the throne, and yet those moments are gonna turn into seven and a half years before he comes into the crown of Israel.

Think that through. How many of you are sitting where David's sitting, the crown was delivered to him already in chapter one. A courier came and said, here's the old king's crown. He's dead on the battlefield.

How many of you think David's like, this is it?

This is it.

I am now going to be king. So here are our steps to owning our years of unrealized potential. If you're taking notes, these are gonna be the four main points. The first is submit to God's leadership, verses one through 4a.

I don't like to divide up verses like that, but I have to in this context. It actually has a paragraph break in the middle of that verse. The guy in the Middle Ages who sat down to write chapters and verses in the Bible did a pretty fabulous job, occasionally didn't quite get it spot on.

But submit to God's leadership, one through 4a. The second is be winsome toward all, verse 4b through seven. And then the third is acknowledge there will be enemies, verses eight through 12. And the fourth is expect setbacks, and it's a big chunk, verses 13 through 32.

So let's first talk about submitting to God's leadership. That's in these first four verses here,.

One through 4a.

This is about, listen carefully, church. This is about a stance toward God more than just merely what you're doing. It starts in your heart. Submission to God begins here. It doesn't begin with behavior.

The behavior follows the submission in your heart. If we submit ourselves to his will, that is more than half of the battle. Because once we've submitted to him in our hearts, the other two things we need to do fall in line.

Well, what else do we need to do? If we are submitted to God and we say, God, I want things to be done your way, then the only thing left is to know what does he want, seek his instruction, and then second of all, obey his instruction.

So submit yourself to God, and then seek his instruction and obey his instructions. We see that in verse one, David inquired of the Lord for his next move. And this is often what set him apart from King Saul.

David will often seek the Lord in the coming chapters. But when we saw him, and I think it's important that we understand what it meant for David to seek the Lord because I think some of us have probably some fuzzy notions of what it means to seek the Lord, right?

Does it mean pray and ask him to send me an email? Am I expecting a phone call?

What am I expecting?

What was David doing when he sought the Lord? Well, we have an example of that back in 1 Samuel chapter 23 that's worth mentioning. It was through the priest Abiathar who followed David around, and he brought the priestly ephod which contained two stones called the Urim and the Thummim.

These were used as sanctioned lots that God would speak through, and they'd put these two stones in a bowl or in a cup and swirl it around, and whichever one came out first was determined to be the Lord's will.

This was a scripturally ordained method of determining God's will in the Old Covenant. One of the reasons we don't necessarily do things that way is I'm not a priest. We don't have an ephod, and God has not ordained that method for his church in any clear manner.

But there are two observations I wanna make clear as we consider David seeking the Lord and what it means to submit to his leadership. First is that God is concerned to guide his people. God is concerned to guide us.

He is indeed concerned with your lives, and God is also, secondly, God is able to communicate. He is concerned for your life, and he is able to communicate. He's able to tell David where to go here. How many of you just, that's a fundamental thing that you need to grasp, because some of us were raised in churches where it's like God doesn't still speak today.

He only speaks through his word. God is able to speak, folks. He's able to communicate to us, but the starting point for each of us to assess honestly this morning is whether or not we really want God to speak into our lives.

Take a careful thought about that for just a moment, because many of us, I would suggest, want to limit God in his communication, and we wouldn't say that out loud, but in all honesty, I'm like, God, I really would like to know whether you'd like me to sell this house and buy this house, but could you stop right at the point where you start telling me how to talk to my wife or how to respond in this situation or what to look at on my computer and not to look at my, do you know what I'm talking about?

How many of you would acknowledge that there have been times and seasons in your life where you're like, God, I love it. I'd love for you to answer this, but please stop talking about this. Do you know what I'm talking about?

Anybody with me on that, or is that just me? Okay, a few of you won't leave me hanging. The rest of you are like, nah, never. Never been there, don't know what you're talking about, Don. I'm gonna leave you guys out on that one.

God is able to communicate to us, and so are you submitted to his authority in a way that you want to obey his instructions? Do you want to obey him? Before you ever ask him to talk, be sure that your heart is ready and say, God, whatever you want of me, I want that, too.

If you tell me you want to hear from God, you come to my office and you say, Don, I'm struggling with my job right now, and I don't know whether to switch jobs, I don't know what to do right now, or I'm struggling with this, or I'm struggling with that, and I need God's guidance, and I want to know what he wants from me, and you equally can tell me you are not spending time in his word, I'm throwing the flag and blowing the play dead.

For a false start.

I'm saying, you didn't start in the right place, okay? You didn't start in the right place. Begin with his word, and begin saturating your life with his word, and demonstrating a willingness to follow his word.

From this passage, I have no problem saying that it is a good thing to give our decisions and planning over to God's will. We do this in prayer, we do this through drawing near to him in his word, we also do so by asking him to communicate to us in a way that we can understand.

David inquired of the Lord about whether or not he should relocate to Judah, God said yes, and God told him, even the city, he said go to Hebron, a city that had a significant history, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rebecca, Jacob, Leah, all buried in that area, and so a very significant place in the history of Israel.

God revealed very likely through Abiathar the priest that David was to do these things, and so David obeyed. David moved, he moved his wives, he moved his family, and his men with him, and there in Hebron, he was made king over Judah.

Now what's happened here? One of the 12 tribes of Judah is now declaring David their king. One twelfth of the promise of God is now David's. Does that sound like a small number? For seven and a half years?

One twelfth of the promise is his. But let me wrap up this first point of submitting to God's leadership by highlighting two things that stand out. First is that David valued God's leadership enough to ask him first.

We could take that on as a lesson. Second, but even more important, is that we serve a God who communicated with David in a way that he understood. We serve a God who is not distant from our lives, who is able to communicate to us, and here in this text, God communicated in a unique way to David.

He communicates to us also quite specifically through his word. But if we come to expect the same kind of interaction that David has, and we think that that's normal everyday life, you better get yourself a priest and you better bring an ephod.

It's not to be our expectation. Don't fall off of either side of this table, church. Don't be immobilized in the line at Wendy's waiting for God to tell you chocolate or vanilla today.

Okay?

I mean, how many of you like Frosties? That's good stuff, right? And you've got two good choices there, folks. Two good choices. The vanilla, mm, it's kind of newer. How many of you grew up with only the chocolate?

Still, oh, that's my go-to, right? But don't let this text lead to inaction and indecision. So many of us can freeze up, ha ha, freeze up in trying to make decisions. That wasn't even in my notes, but I am a dad.

Welcome, kids, are you in here somewhere? Don't let it freeze you in indecision. But equally, the other end of the spectrum is possible for many of us, too, and that's just to leave God out of our decisions.

Well, he already knows what I'm gonna do anyways. He's already planned it. Why even consult him? Can he even talk to me anyways? Is he really going to answer my questions? Is he even really concerned about these things that on and on, the rationale can go to fall off the other side of the table and exclude God from our decision-making?

So I recommend, and I'm gonna say this tongue-in-cheek, but I recommend a humble prayer like this. I've prayed this regularly in my life, and I encourage you to grab it, too. God, I am thick. I have a hard time understanding you.

I have a hard time, I'm gonna interpret everything that I see from this moment on because I got a decision in front of me, and I don't know how to make it. I prefer chocolate, but would totally do vanilla if it was your choice.

If for some reason the vanilla glorifies you better, then I will do that. But I'm about to have a frosty. I'm stepping up to that counter, and I'm gonna order, and I'm gonna act, Father.

So if you for some reason want the vanilla, make it clear.

Because I'm going to order chocolate right now. And then I step up to the counter, and I order the chocolate. I act, I'm not immobilized. But I'm giving God the opportunity to stop me in my tracks. And I might step up to the counter, and you know what the guy behind the counter might say?

Sorry, we're out of chocolate. All we have is vanilla.

And I go, Lord, thank you.

For some reason, you're more glorified by the vanilla. Obviously, I'm being facetious about that decision. I mean, we make decisions all the time without having that kind of dialogue, and that's okay.

But what I'm suggesting to you is when it comes to those bigger decisions, we act, but we give God the final trump card. He has the ability to stop us, and we say, I'm not easy to get through to, God, but you're powerful enough to communicate to me in a way that I will understand.

I don't have to tell everybody else how God speaks directly to me and makes this clear or whatever, but if you could just make that clear to me, then I will do what I can to honor and glorify you. Submit to God's authority, then act.

Winsome Kindness Toward All

Now, the second step to owning our years of unrealized potential is a little bit strange, and it seems like kind of a module added into the middle of this text, but it's be winsome to all. And I think what the point here is, in verses four B through seven, you have this part about Jabesh-Gilead, and it can be kind of confusing what's going on there.

You need to understand that David in the meantime, okay, he's in this waiting period. He's in this time between the start of his kingdom and the finality of being the king overall. And there's some brief history and geography that help make sense of what David is doing with Jabesh-Gilead.

They're a unique place. You see, Jabesh-Gilead was probably the most loyal of cities to King Saul, who has just died. Saul's first act as king over Israel was to break a siege on Jabesh-Gilead. They were under siege.

Saul comes into the kingship, and he breaks that siege. You see, the city was surrounded by the forces of an Ammonite ruler known as Nahash the Mutilator. Name sound good?

What do you think?

That doesn't sound good. You see, he set to siege Jabesh-Gilead, and he wanted to subjugate the citizens there, and he said, don't worry. I'm not gonna starve you to death. I'm not gonna smoke you out.

I'll let you all live, because I'm gracious that way. The only thing I want is by tomorrow, I'm gonna attack, and I'm gonna take you all, and I'm gonna kill you all, unless you come out to me right now and make peace.

In the next 24 hours, make peace with me, and all I ask for is the right eye of every man. That's all I want, just a little token of your goodwill towards me, and also to make it more difficult to shoot arrows.

I just want the right eye of every guy. That's history. That's in 1 Samuel. That's a biblical account. So Saul broke that siege by rallying all of Israel to come to the defense of Jabesh-Gilead and smack and nahash the mutilator down.

Can you imagine that the city loved this guy? Can you imagine that they loved Saul? He had saved them. They looked up to King Saul with both eyes. So when Saul was killed at the end of 1 Samuel 31, it says, the men of Jabesh-Gilead, this is the last thing recorded for us in 1 Samuel, the men of Jabesh-Gilead led an all-night rescue mission to recover the bodies of King Saul and his sons.

They trekked 10 miles in the darkness to Beth-Shan, where the bodies were hung on the city walls, and they trekked that 10 miles back with those mutilated bodies to give them a proper rest, out of dignity and honor for the one who had saved them.

So when David seeks to win the hearts of Jabesh-Gilead under his kingship, he is being generous to those who had expressed severe and extreme loyalty to his predecessor, who obviously had no love for him.

We can learn a lesson here of expressing winsome kindness toward all. He commends their deeds of bravery, asks for the Lord to bless them. He pledges his own goodwill towards them and prays for them that they would have strength and be valiant, and even calls for the Lord's covenantal love and promise-keeping to be applied to the people of that city.

Now, I don't believe that this is merely a record of David offering self-serving flattery to a people he desires to win over to his cause. I believe that David is honestly commending the noble and gracious actions of the people of Gilead.

Now, it may seem like negotiations with Jabesh-Gilead are left inconclusive in verse seven, and we move on to another subject in verse eight, but not so, because David gives us a model of rewarding and commending those who do right, regardless of where they fall in loyalty to us.

We'll see in verse nine the outcome of these negotiations. But while we're living out our days, unsure what God is doing in the big picture, in the days of our unrealized potential, we see here a record of routine kindness.

When you don't know the big picture, and it feels like your wheels are spinning and you're not getting anywhere, be faithful in the little things, church. Be faithful in the little things that God has right in front of you, like being winsome to all.

Expecting Enemies to Resist God’s Plan

Well, David's kindness towards Jabesh-Gilead produces zero personal benefit, because our third point comes abruptly in verse eight, and even includes the loyalties of Jabesh-Gilead in verse nine, which says that they were under the reign of Ish-bosheth, we'll see in a moment.

So the third step to owning our years of unrealized potential is acknowledge that there will be enemies. Acknowledge that there will be enemies in our lives, verses eight through 12. And I don't mean, I don't mean like your mother-in-law.

I don't mean like, you know, enemies like as in just the guy that's in the cubicle next to you who plays his music too loud, or I don't mean those like little annoyances. This is significant what Abner does here.

Abner, an enemy of not just David, he does indeed set himself over and against David, but he is absolutely an enemy of God in this text. Abner was the commander of Saul's army. Saul is dead, but rather than giving his loyalty to David, Abner sets up a puppet king named Ish-bosheth.

Now I say puppet king because the words used in verses eight and nine leave nothing to the imagination regarding who it is that's doing the action. Ish-bosheth didn't take the crown. Abner pushed him into it.

Abner made the youngest surviving son of King Saul king over Israel, despite the fact that it's quite clear all throughout 1 Samuel that Abner knows that David is called to be the next king. Well, it's interesting to note, some of these things are funny.

Ish-bosheth means man of shame. I doubt that he went by that. I mean, you know what I'm saying? If your name was man of shame, how many of you would change that pretty quick if you became king, right?