David Lamenting Over the Death of Saul Part 1 — Chuck Smith

Welcome to the Word for Today, the broadcast ministry of Pastor Chuck Smith of Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, California. Pastor Chuck is currently leading us on a verse-by-verse venture through the entire Bible.

And on today's edition of the Word for Today, we find David lamenting over the death of Saul as we pick up in 2 Samuel Chapter 1, Verse 1. And now, with today's message, here's Pastor Chuck Smith.

David Hears of Saul and Jonathan’s Death

Now it came to pass after the death of Saul, when David was returned from the slaughter of the Amalekites, and David had been back in Ziglag now for two days. It came to pass on the third day, that behold, a man came out of the camp from Saul with his clothes torn, and earth upon his head.

And so it was when he came to David, that he fell to the earth, and did obeisance to David. He bowed to him, and David said to him, Where have you come from? And he said unto him, Out of the camp of Israel I have escaped.

And David said unto him, How went the matter? And he answered, That the people of Israel have fled from the battle, and many of the people also are fallen and are dead, and Saul and Jonathan his son are dead also.

In spite of the fact that David was pursued by Saul and mistreated, David still highly respected him. But David loved Jonathan, and the news that Saul and Jonathan were both of them slain in the battle hit David very hard.

I'm certain that David, in a sense, felt the responsibility. Had he been able to have been in battle with them, they probably could have turned the tide against the Philistines. So David said to the young man who told him, How do you know that Saul and Jonathan are dead?

And the young man that told him said, As I happened by chance upon Mount Gilboa. That's an unlikely story. He was probably just up there to loot, knowing that the fight was going on. Behold, Saul had leaned upon his spear, and lo, the chariots and the horsemen were following hard after him.

And when he looked behind him, he saw me, and he called to me, and I answered, Here am I. And he said unto me, Who are you? And I answered him, I am an Amalekite. And he said unto me, Stand, I pray thee, upon me, and slay me.

For anguish has come upon me, because my life is still whole in me. I'm not dead. I'm in this horrible situation. He's got an arrow through him and a sword through him, but he's still living. So he said, I stood upon him and slew him, because I was sure that he could not live after he was fallen.

And I took the crown that was on his head and the bracelet that was on his arm, and I have brought them hither unto my Lord. And David took hold of his clothes, and he tore them, and likewise all of the men that were with him.

And they mourned and wept and fasted until even, for Saul and for Jonathan his son, and for the people of the Lord, and for the house of Israel, because they had fallen by the sword. And David said unto the young man that told him, Where are you from?

And he answered, I am the son of a stranger. I'm an Amalekite. And David said unto him, How is it that you were not afraid to stretch forth your hand to destroy the Lord's anointed? And David called one of his young men and said, Go over there and fall upon him.

And he smote him that he died. And David said unto him, Your blood be upon your head, for your mouth has testified against you, saying, I have slain the Lord's anointed. And David lamented with this lamentation over Saul and over Jonathan his son.

David’s Respect for the Lord’s Anointed

So David had one of the young men put him to death because he had put his hand against Saul, who had been God's anointed. God had said in his word, Touch not my anointed, and do my prophet no harm. It is for certain that the anointing had left Saul a long time ago.

And yet David still had a respect for Saul, because he had been anointed with oil to be the king over Israel. And so it is interesting if this young man's story is true, if he really did find Saul still alive and finished the job, it would in a sense be poetic justice.

Because Saul had rebelled against God when God commanded him to utterly wipe out the Amalekites, that he left some of them alive. And his failure to obey completely the word of God cost him his own life.

That is, one that he should have wiped out because of God's command ultimately wiped him out. It becomes doubly meaningful when you realize in the scriptures that the Amalekites, the Amalekites are a type of our flesh life, or our life after the flesh.

Walking by the Spirit Rather Than the Flesh

Now, we live in a body and as living in a body we have body appetites. However, what God did not intend is that man be ruled by his body appetites. God intended that man be ruled by his spirit in fellowship with God.

And that really, my life should be ruled over by God. That's God's intent and purpose for me, for you. That he is the Lord. That's what we mean when we say Christ is Lord. It means that he rules over our lives.

We're not ruled over by the flesh, but we're ruled over by the spirit. The Bible says that if the flesh is ruling over you, then you have what is termed the mind of the flesh. That is, what are you thinking about all the time?

You're thinking about your body needs. What shall we eat? What shall we drink? What shall we wear? Jesus said, after all these things do the Gentiles or the heathens seek. But you're not to seek those things.

You're to seek first the kingdom of God, the spiritual things, his righteousness. These other things will be taken care of. Get the right priorities in your life. Get God first, the things of the spirit first.

These other things will all fall into line. But man's lives are all upside down today. They're topsy-turvy today because man is thinking and scheming and working to try to satisfy his body appetites.

But it's a monster. The more you feed it, the more it grows, the greater the demands. So you can't really satisfy your body appetites. It just is a monster that begins to eat you up. Paul said, Godliness with contentment is really being rich.

He said, I've learned in whatever state I am in to therewith be content. A man walking after the spirit can learn that. You live a contented life because you're not living after the flesh life. But hey, you can get in that mode and I'll tell you, it'll just take over.

So that he that thinks he stands take heed lest he falls. There's a danger that any of us could be giving over ourselves to the flesh, develop the mind of the flesh, and be destroyed by the flesh. But that's basically what God is saying when he said, go down and utterly wipe out Amalek.

Mortifying the Deeds of the Flesh

Totally destroy the flesh. God said to us, make no provision for the flesh to fulfill the desires of it. God said, if you by the spirit do mortify the deeds of the flesh, then you will live. The Bible says, know ye that the old man, the nature of the flesh was crucified with Christ.

Therefore, reckon yourselves to be dead with Christ, but alive unto God through the spirit. And so it's important that we take this stand of reckoning the old flesh life to be dead utterly, completely.

Don't give place to it. But if we as Saul rebel against God and leave an area still alive, that area will rise up to destroy us ultimately. And so it's really sort of destroy or be destroyed kind of a thing.

That's what God gave to Saul, the order to destroy completely. And when Saul disobeyed and the prophet met him, he said, don't you realize that rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft? Interesting that Saul later turned to witchcraft, isn't it?

But you see, it was already in his heart in the rebellion against the word of God. It's as the sin of witchcraft. So Saul was slain, perhaps by the hand of the Amalekite. We don't know if he's telling the truth to David or not, but the Amalekite is ordered, destroyed by David.

David’s Lament and the Call to Move Forward

And then David wrote this lamentation for Saul and Jonathan, his son. But then it says he also ordered them to teach the children of Judah the use of the bull. There is a time, it says, to laugh and a time to cry, a time to be born, a time to die, a time and a place for everything.

There is a time and a place for sorrow and grieving. But then there is a time to quit sorrowing and grieving and to pick up the pieces and to start over again. And it is dangerous when a person grieving over a loss sort of becomes inactive, sort of just quits living, sort of just closes the windows and the doors around him and just sits there and thinks of, oh, how sad I am and how horrible are the circumstances of life that have brought me this bereavement and this grief and this sorrow.

And people can actually die as the result of their grief over their losses. An important thing when you are experiencing a loss and the grief and the grieving over a loss is to get busy, do something, develop a new talent, learn a new skill, get involved in a new hobby, keep active, keep busy, keep your mind active and busy or else you are just going to atrophy.

And so David said, go out and teach your children how to use the bow. Of course he realized from this battle that the bow and the arrow were going to become a very important instrument of future wars.

It was used effectively in this battle against Saul. Saul was slain by the arrow that was shot at a distance. Saul was invincible in hand-to-hand combat. He's a big guy. And from his sword, you know, he said he didn't turn back empty.

This guy was tough in hand-to-hand combat. He had been in many of them and always come out on top. But now he fell prey to the archers. David could see from having a keen military mind, could see that this was going to be revolutionary as far as future wars are concerned.

And so to prepare them for the future battles, teach them the use of the bow, learning from the past, from Saul. And then also the teaching of the use of the bow was a memorial unto Jonathan, who was an archer, and thus a very fitting living memorial as the children would be taught the use of the bow and the arrow.

And of course would remember Jonathan whenever they were using the bow and the arrow. And so David bade them to teach the children of Judah the use of the bow. But here's the lamentation. The beauty of Israel is slain upon thy high places.

How are thy mighty fallen? Tell it not in Gath, which of course was one of the major Philistine cities, the city where David actually found refuge. Don't let them know in Gath that it's happened. Of course, they already knew they had carried Saul's head through Gath.

They took his head off and carried it through all the Philistine cities so that they could rejoice over their victory. Publish it not in the streets of Ashkelon. You see, when they would come back victorious from war, then the ladies would all come out and they'd have great celebrations, dances, and jubilation over their victories.

You remember when Saul would come through the villages having come from the victories in war, the ladies would come out with tambourines and they would dance and they would sing, Saul has killed his thousands.

David didn't want the Philistines to have this kind of a celebration because the people of God had fallen to the Philistines. So don't publish it in the streets of Ashkelon, lest the daughters of the Philistines rejoice, lest the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph.

And then to the mountain of Gilboa where Saul fell. 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.

Mount Gilboa and the Meaning of Saul’s Shield

Now the interesting thing about this particular portion of David's lamentation, let there be no dew or rain, and let it be sort of barren. As you know, when the Jews began to return to the land of Israel, they began great reforestation projects all over Israel.

Hundreds of millions of trees were planted all over Israel. But they've left an area on Mount Gilboa without trees. Let it be barren. And really because of this lamentation of David and his declaration, let it be barren and all, they won't plant trees on this northernmost portion of Mount Gilboa so that when you go there today, it is still a barren area.

It is, interestingly enough, an area that gets very little rain, and thus it is pretty barren on that northernmost portion of Mount Gilboa. And when you go there today in the tour buses and you look at it, the tour guides will often read to you this passage of scripture.

As you look at that barren Mount Gilboa, they will read this passage of scripture, and it becomes very graphic and alive, looking at that barren mountainside. Ye mountains of Gilboa, 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. Now, there is a question here. You notice that a lot of the words here are italicized.

The shield of the mighty is vilely cast away, the shield of Saul, not anointed with oil. The words, as though he had not been, are added by the translators, which could be an interpretation rather than a translation.

There are certain scholars that believe that it's not a referring to Saul's being anointed with oil to be king, but with a common practice in battle in those days of pouring oil on their shields so that the spears or whatever they tossed at them would slip off more easily when they would hit the oily shield, they would glance off more readily.

And so there is that area of thought that I would just thought I would give to you. The words that do not appear in the original text but are additional are italicized so that you know that they have been added by the translators.

But if you just take out the italicized word, you can see where it could possibly just refer to the shield of Saul rather than Saul's anointing as king. From the blood of the slain, from the fat of the mighty, the bow of Jonathan turned not back, Jonathan an archer.

And from the sword of Saul it returned not empty. Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death they were not divided. Joined together in life, joined together in death, father and son.

They were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions, and they were a powerful pair. They had been a nemesis to the Philistines for many years. Ye daughters of Israel, weep over Saul, who clothed you in scarlet and with other delights, who put ornaments of gold upon your apparel.

Oh, how are the mighty fallen in the midst of battle, oh Jonathan, thou wast 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.

Those from the homosexual community like to take this verse and suggest that possibly David and Jonathan had a homosexual relationship. Such, to me, is blasphemous. There is no indication of that at all, and certainly David could not be declared to be a man after God's own heart if he had this kind of a relationship with Jonathan, which according to the Old Testament scriptures, a person involved in such relationships was to be stoned to death.

And so I think that that's utter nonsense, and it's only people trying to excuse their woeful, sinful ways that would even suggest such a thing. For the third time within the Lamentation, how are the mighty fallen and the weapons of war perished?

So, the mighty have fallen.

We'll return with more of our verse-by-verse study through the book of 2 Samuel in our next lesson as we continue with more on David lamenting over Saul's death. And we do hope you'll make plans to join us.

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That's right here on the next edition of The Word for Today. And now, once again, here's Pastor Chuck Smith.

And so pray for us, and we will be praying for you, that God will bless you, and that His Word and His law will be in your heart, that you might observe and keep His commandments, that it might be well with you, that you might be in that place where God can bless you and do those things He desires to do for you because of His intense love for you.

And so may it be a blessed week, but may the Lord be with you and keep you in His love, in Jesus' name.

The Abundant Life and Reflecting God

As we look around at Christian women today, we see many who know nothing about the abundant life that Jesus came to bring them. Their lives are less satisfying, less fulfilling, less joyful, and less God-honoring than it could be, than it should be.

For this reason, Kay Smith has written a new book for women entitled Reflecting God. In it, she shares about the godly attributes necessary to reflect the very image of God. Applying Kay's teaching on God's attributes, women will begin to have the mind of Christ.

And as this starts to happen in you, from the inside out, you will become a reflection of God to a world that desperately needs Him.

For more information on how to order your copy, visit us online at thewordfortoday .org or call toll-free at 1 -800 -272-WORD. That's 1 -800 -272 -9673.

This program has been sponsored by The Word for Today in Costa Mesa, California.