1 Samuel 22

Sovereign Grace Family Church

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February 20, 2023

1 Samuel 22

00:00: Good morning.
00:03: Brian Mack, would you open us up with a word of prayer, brother? Amen.
00:46: I guess I'll need my tool if I'm going to work.
00:53: Hey, showing up to work with no paintbrush.
00:56: Alright.
00:57: Alright, 1 Samuel, chapter 22.
01:11: Man, I'm going to read the chapter.
01:14: So David departed from there, and he escaped to the cave of Doolom.
01:18: And when his brothers and all his father's household heard of it, they went down there to meet him.
01:24: Everyone who was in distress, everyone who was in debt, everyone who was discontented gathered to him, and he became the captain over them, and there were about 400 men with him.
01:36: And David went from there to Mizpah of Moab, and he said to the king of Moab, Please let my father and mother come and stay with you until I know what the God will do for me.
01:50: Then he left them there with the king of Moab, and they stayed with him all the time that David was in the stronghold.
01:57: Then a prophet Gad said to David, Do not stay in the stronghold.
02:01: Depart and go to the land of Judah.
02:03: So David departed, and he went to the forest of Harith.
02:08: Then Saul heard that David and the men who had been with him had been discovered.
02:15: Now Saul was sitting in Gibeah under the tamarisk tree on the height with his spear in his hand, and his servants were standing around about him.
02:25: Saul said to his servants who stood around him, And hear now, O Benjamites, will the son of Jesse also give you all the fields and vineyards? Will he make you all commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds? For all of you have conspired against me, so that there is no one who discloses to me when my son makes a covenant with the son of Jesse, there is none of you who feels sorry for me and discloses to me that my son has stirred up my servant against me to lie in ambush as it is this day.
02:59: Then Doeg the Edomite, who was standing by the servants of Saul, said, I saw the son of Jesse, and he was coming to Nob, to Ahimelech, the son of Ahitab.
03:09: And he inquired of the Lord for him.
03:12: He gave him provisions, and he gave him the sword of Goliath the Philistine.
03:17: Then the king sent someone to Ahimelech, the priest and the son of Ahitab, and all of his father's household and the priests who were in Nob.
03:27: And all of them came to the king, and Saul said to them, Listen now, son of Ahitab.
03:32: And he answered and said, Here I am, my lord.
03:34: And Saul said to him, Why have you and the son of Jesse conspired against me, in that you have given him bread, you have given him a sword, and have inquired of God for him, so that he would rise up against me by lying in ambush as it is this day? And then Ahimelech answered the king, and he said, And who among you of all your servants is as faithful as David, even the king's son-in-law, who is the captain over your bodyguard, and is honored in your house? Did I just begin to inquire of God for him today? Far be it from me.
04:11: Do not let the king impute anything to his servant or to any of his household of my father, for your servant knows nothing at all of this whole affair.
04:19: But the king said, You shall surely die, Ahimelech, you and all of your household this day.
04:25: And the king said to his guards who were attending to him, He said, Turn around and put the priest of the Lord to death, because their hand also is with David, and because they knew that he was fleeing, and they did not reveal it to me.
04:38: But the servants of the king were not willing to put forth their hand and to attack the priest of the Lord.
04:44: And then the king said to Doeg, You turn around, and you attack the priest.
04:48: And Doeg the Edomite then turned, and he attacked the priest, and he killed on that day eighty-five men who wore the linen ephod.
04:55: And he struck the city of Nab, and the priest with the edge of the city, both men and women and children and infants, oxen and donkeys and sheep, and he struck all of them with the edge of the sword.
05:07: But the son of Ahimelech, the son of Ahitab, named Abiathar, well he escaped and he fled to David.
05:13: And when Abiathar told David that Saul had killed the priest of the Lord, then David said to Abiathar, I knew on that day when Doeg the Edomite was there that he surely would have told Saul, I have brought death about to every person in your father's household.
05:29: Now stay with me, and do not be afraid, for he who seeks my life seeks your life, but you are safe with me.
05:40: Well, terrible scene, and the end of it is very brutal.
05:47: We're going to go back up, and we're going to walk through, beginning in verse 1.
05:51: It says that David escaped to the cave of Adullam.
05:55: Do you remember where he was at last week before he left? He would have been here.
06:01: This is Gath.
06:03: Remember, he's out like a madman.
06:05: Drunk on his beer and all that.
06:07: He went to Adullam, which is just right here.
06:10: I don't know how many of y'all can see, but it's that far.
06:14: So he went to Adullam, and that's where the cave was.
06:17: Remember, he is by himself.
06:19: I know there was some question whether he had men with him, he had a cohort.
06:24: David is by himself.
06:26: He is alone.
06:27: He ends up in this cave, and it is in this cave that he writes some psalms concerning his fleeing, being fearful.
06:38: I think it's Psalm 34, Psalm 56, and then Psalm 142 and 57 would most likely have been written while he was in that cave.
06:54: So he's there.
06:55: He's all by himself.
06:56: It's interesting that Saul, if you read through this, Saul does not know where he's at, does he? What does it say here? And when his brothers and all of his father's household heard of it, they went down there to meet him.
07:10: It's interesting that here it is.
07:12: He has every asset to him to find out where people are at, where they're going, where they're traveling, any kind of intel.
07:21: And he can't find David, but somehow, some way, his father, who was in Bethlehem, knows where he's at.
07:33: So somebody had to go to Bethlehem to tell him.
07:36: So it says that him and all of his father's household heard of it, and they went down to meet him.
07:40: Understand that this isn't just his mother and father that go and see him.
07:45: Remember, he had brothers.
07:47: He had Eliab and all those ones that had been walked before Samuel to see if they were to be the anointed king, and they were not.
07:55: So it would be them, their wives.
07:57: It would be his sister, Zariah, who we don't hear much about, but she's the one that has three sons, Joab, Asahel, and Abishai, who wind up being basically the commanders and leaders and the valiant men of David as we go on.
08:14: So we get to this part down here further on where it says that everyone, then everyone that came to him who was in distress, everyone who was in debt, everyone who was discontented, were gathered to him, and he became captain, and over there were about 400 men.
08:31: It would be among those 400 men would be Joab and those guys.
08:37: Look, man, when I tell you Joab and his brothers were ruthless, David himself in 2 Samuel even says it himself.
08:46: They want to brutally slay some people for disrespecting him, and he says, those men are so fierce that it bothers even me.
09:00: Heartless.
09:01: Joab, he's the kind of guy you would have wanted on your side.
09:05: He winds up being the commander of David's army, and he is faithful to David, but he is absolutely ruthless.
09:13: Even in the conspiracy with Absalom, Joab winds up killing Absalom, his son, after he is told to don't kill my son, y'all go out, just bring him back safely, and Joab actually finds him hanging by his hair in a tree, and he puts three spears into his heart, and when that word came back to David, David weeped, and it's a very, very moving, it's in chapter 22 of 2 Sam if you want to read it, and after he had killed Absalom, he is crying, he's weeping, they can hear him outside the palace, and listen to how heartless Joab is.
10:01: He says, do you not know I saved the kingdom for you? Why are you crying over him? I mean, can you imagine weeping over a loved one, and your closest confidant comes up to you and says, hey man, dry it up, get out there and be a man, and that's basically what he says.
10:18: You read it for yourself, or we'll get to it sometime at the end of the year, hopefully, if you stick around in here.
10:24: So, it's those men, Abishai, ruthless as well, he likes to try to take people's heads off that bad mouth of king, and Asahel, the other one, he likes to chase the commanders of other armies, and it winds up costing him his life.
10:42: But it would be those men, in debt, discontented, and disgruntled.
10:49: Why would these men have been in debt, disgruntled, and discontented? Saul was a very hard king, what did they say he was going to do? He was going to take everything away, he was going to tax them.
11:02: So, they're in debt because of the tax, they're disgruntled, they obviously don't like the way the country is going, as the monarchy was leading it, and these men say, you know what, well, David was obviously a man that was one of the people.
11:15: Remember, he went in and out among the people earlier in the book.
11:19: He was like, even though he had a place of distinguishment, he came and went with the people like it was no big deal, like he was one of them because he was.
11:28: He never put himself above them.
11:32: So, it's all going to be in this cave where these people come, this is where it begins to have his group of men that will actually be a force to be reckoned with as far as they make their military campaign, and it starts with 400 people.
11:47: In verse 3 it said, but David went from there to Mizpah of Moab.
11:53: So, there's some moving going on.
11:58: So, his family comes from Bethlehem, they go to the cave of Adullam, and then they go from here to here, and it's actually right here.
12:12: This is where he ends up.
12:15: You see how long that is? Hey, imagine how old his dad and mother are.
12:21: Having to cross the Dead Sea, or if they had to go around, if they crossed here, or if they had to come around, you do realize that was a trek for some old folk.
12:32: That'd be a trek for some young people.
12:34: And, what's that? It's interesting that they made it without Saul finding out.
12:37: There's a lot of, and why, good point, because I was going to get to this.
12:42: Why is all of these things working out the way that they are without Saul knowing? God.
12:48: Because the Lord was with him.
12:50: Remember the constant refrain at the beginning, because the Lord was with him.
12:53: Because the Lord was with him.
12:54: Because the Lord was with him.
12:56: Hey, even if you go back and you all want to read Psalm 34 and 56, and you want to read those, even though he used deception against Achish and all that, you know who he said he trusted in at that time? That it was God that kept him.
13:10: Even though we could talk about the moral infractions of lying and deception and all of that, and we'll have to get into that here in just a second again.
13:17: All of that.
13:18: He trusted in the Lord.
13:20: Okay? And looking back after when he writes those Psalms, when he was in the cave of Adullam and he was alone, and there was nobody there, he remembered that it was the Lord that preserved his life.
13:32: Not his wit.
13:33: Not his ability to sling a large sword.
13:36: Not his ability to call men to himself to try to gather, you know, take men as Saul did.
13:41: Remember, Saul was taking people.
13:43: You see what happens here? These men willfully go and attach themselves to David to be a servant to him.
13:51: It's because the Lord's with him.
13:53: So the word Mizpah, if you remember back, you go, well, that was part of the circuit.
13:59: Mizpah would have been part of the circuit of Samuel.
14:02: Now, Mizpah just means strong tower, overlook.
14:05: So you have Mizpah here of Moab.
14:09: That's why it says of Moab.
14:10: And you have Mizpah right here, which would have been up in the northern part of Ephraim, center part of Ephraim, and there's also another one down here in the southern end of Judah.
14:22: So when you see the word Mizpah, it just means lookout point of, it's easier to say the lookout point of Moab.
14:30: High place.
14:32: So that's where David ends up.
14:34: He goes to the king of Moab.
14:35: Why do you think he would have planned to go to Moab anyway? True, but why? Certainly they were enemies of, Andy taught on this just a few months ago.
14:49: Why would he gonna, did he have ties to Moab? His great-grandmother.
14:55: He had some ties there.
14:57: Hey, my great-grandmother's there.
14:58: Hey, I can go to at least, and we don't know for sure, but maybe he could appeal.
15:02: Hey, my great-grandmother's from here.
15:03: Obviously, he was able to waltz into the place where the king was and actually have a conversation with the king and say, hey, can my mom and dad stay here? And he says to them, hey, can they stay here? And here it is, please let my mother and father come and stay with you until, and here it is, his trust in the Lord, until I find out what God will do for me.
15:27: David don't know what's going on.
15:29: It is, it is, he is uncertain of where he is going and what he's doing, but he's confident that God's doing it.
15:37: Isn't that what he's saying? Hey, I don't know what's going on, but I know that God's gonna do something for me.
15:43: In verse 4, and then he left the king of Moab, and they stayed with him all the time that they was in the stronghold.
15:52: Now, the stronghold is believed, and it's not marked on here.
15:57: They would have had to come back here, across here, around.
16:01: The modern-day place would be Masada.
16:04: Anybody heard of Masada? It's not in the Bible.
16:08: The actual name's not, but Fortress Masada was an actual natural height of tower, and it wound up being Fortress Masada where Herod would build his place of refuge, and it would be actually the last holdup in 73 AD when the Jews ran there from the Romans when they crushed Jerusalem.
16:32: That's where they would stay.
16:33: I've actually been there.
16:35: We went all the way, me and a friend, Mike Summers, when I was in Israel, we went up the snake trail to the top, and it is, dude, it's breathtaking.
16:42: If you look at some of the, just get online and look at the stuff, the natural fortitude of that place is, how high it is.
16:49: It's like a thousand feet up, and you're overlooking.
16:51: I mean, you can see, when you get on top, you can see all this stuff here, and it's cool because you can see the Dead Sea and see all the minerals and all that.
16:59: So that's where he went.
17:00: That is believed to where, because the word stronghold means Masada or fortress.
17:06: So that's where David went, and he says, and then Gad came to him.
17:12: Well, who's Gad? This is the first time we've seen this guy.
17:14: Anybody remember Gad reading through your Bible? You ever heard of Gad? Anybody? Anyone? Anyone? Yeah.
17:24: Gad.
17:25: He is a prophet, and he's, this is the first time he comes up, and in my mind, I'm reading this.
17:31: Well, how did the prophet know that David was in the stronghold? Once again, Saul doesn't know where David is and what's going on.
17:39: His family knows, and then all of a sudden, this prophet says, hey, man, you need to depart from here.
17:46: Well, Gad the prophet was obviously, and no doubt, he was the mouthpiece of God, and he comes into play a couple of times in David's life.
17:54: This will be the once when he tells him to leave.
17:57: God tells him to leave the stronghold and actually go back to Judah.
18:01: Why does he want to go back to Judah? Dude, you don't need to find refuge here.
18:04: You need to go back where it started and go back to Judah.
18:09: Well, Gad also is the prophet that will speak judgment to David when David later in his life, I think it's in chapter 24 of 2 Samuel.
18:23: He is told, he was told never take a census of the army.
18:27: Never.
18:28: Trust in the Lord.
18:29: If not, you'll take a census and you'll trust in all the numbers that God has made for you.
18:34: He says, don't take that.
18:35: And it's funny that, or ironic that when he tells Joab, hey, you go make a census of the army, Joab says, God said don't do that.
18:48: Now, this is a man who's ruthless and he says, hey, don't do that.
18:51: But if you tell me to do it, I'm going to do it anyway.
18:53: He says, you go make a census.
18:55: Well, he does.
18:55: He makes a census.
18:57: Then immediately David is convicted by God for breaking the command of God.
19:02: God comes to him.
19:03: He gives him three options.
19:04: You want me to give you seven years of famine? You want me to give you over to the enemies? Or a plague? And he says, I know you're a merciful God.
19:14: Don't put me into the hands of men.
19:15: They're unmerciful God.
19:16: You do whatever you want to me and let my destruction be on me.
19:23: God sends the death angel through the city.
19:27: 70,000 Israelites were slayed to the death angel.
19:30: And it is Gad.
19:32: Gad comes to him.
19:33: He's like, hey, man, I don't know what to do.
19:35: How do I stop my people from being slayed? And Gad says, you go to the threshing floor of Orna and you build an altar and you make an atonement for your sin there and God will stop the plague.
19:47: So those are two times that Gad really speaks into David's life.
19:53: And there's one other time, and we'll see it, or actually it's in 1 Kings, when he's basically going to turn the kingdom over to Solomon.
20:04: So Gad's the mouthpiece of God.
20:06: He is the prophet of God here.
20:09: He says, do not stay in the stronghold.
20:11: Depart from there.
20:12: Go to the land of Judah.
20:13: So you're going to leave down here at the southern end of, he's like basically on the border of Amalek, and you're going to go up into Judah.
20:22: And he says, go and depart from there.
20:24: And so he went to the forest of Herod.
20:25: The forest of Herod, man, this dude's been on the move, is up here.
20:30: It's in between Bethlehem and Adullam, right here.
20:35: And you see, man, he's moving.
20:37: Imagine moving like that, and he's got 400 dudes with him.
20:40: It's almost like the people all know where he's at, but they're hiding it from Saul.
20:44: Or at least keeping their mouth shut.
20:46: And partially, that leads you to that conclusion when you get towards the middle to the end of this when the actual king says, kill the priest.
21:00: And they, no, they're innocent, and they don't.
21:03: So you're right, we do draw that conclusion.
21:05: The text doesn't say that, but it's a good conclusion that the people are just, hey, man, he's off his rocker.
21:11: He's losing it.
21:13: He's not being just.
21:16: He's being unjust to this man who's done nothing wrong.
21:19: So I do believe Mom's the word.
21:21: Because even when he sent the men to Michal's house, his wife, they didn't say, hey, we drug you.
21:31: We're going to go ahead and kill him in his bed.
21:33: What did they do? Hey, he's sick.
21:34: We can't kill him today.
21:36: I guess we've got to kill the guy when he's in full health.
21:39: So they were looking for reasons to not.
21:42: Verse 6, then Saul heard that David and the men who were with him had been discovered.
21:51: Now, we're going to see some contrast, and there's contrast all the way through this.
21:55: One, David just begins with David alone in a cave.
22:00: And then this next paragraph begins with Saul around all of his homeboys, basically.
22:08: And it says that Saul heard that David and his men had been discovered, and Saul was sitting in Gibeah under the tamarisk tree, and on the height of it, and a spear in his hand.
22:18: Every time we see Saul, it's almost like he's got spears in his hand.
22:21: Anybody remember Linus from The Peanuts? That's how I see Saul with his spear.
22:27: He's just kind of walking around, holding it.
22:30: I guess it's good if we see him holding it.
22:31: He's not throwing it yet at somebody.
22:34: So we see Saul sitting in Gibeah under the tree, and Saul said to his servants who stood around him, Hear now, O Benjamites.
22:47: Obviously, there's nobody else around him but Benjamites.
22:50: Why would that be? He was of the tribe of Benjamin.
22:56: Just like if we have a Democratic or Republican president come in, what does he put in his cabinet? All of his people that think like him.
23:06: Yeah, and that's basically what we're seeing.
23:09: He's got, Hey, O Benjamites, will the son of Jesse give you fields and vineyards? That should go back to the beginning of what was Saul going to do.
23:22: He was going to take your vineyards.
23:23: He was going to take your farmland.
23:25: And he was going to give it to who? His servants.
23:28: He was going to take it from you, and then he was going to give it to his people.
23:32: And he says here, Is the son of Jesse going to give you fields and vineyards? By him saying that, what's the implication about David? David's going to be king.
23:45: If David's going to be able to give you vineyards and farmland, that means that David's going to have some authority.
23:51: And who was the only one that had the authority to take vineyards and farmland? The king.
23:55: He says, Is he going to be able to do that? All right, here's another one.
24:00: Will he be able to make you commanders over thousands and hundreds? Well, who's the only one that can make people commanders over thousands and hundreds? The king.
24:11: For all of you have conspired against me so that there is no one who discloses to me when my son makes a covenant with the son of Jesse, and there's none of you who is sorry for me or discloses to me that my son has stirred up my servant against me to lie in ambush as it is this day.
24:30: So here it is, Saul, sitting in all of his glory under the tamarisk tree.
24:35: Remember, Gibeah was home base for him.
24:37: That was his home.
24:38: That would have been where his throne would have been.
24:40: And he's basically having a pity party.
24:45: Nobody wants to tell me that my son, remember, he's still, it sounds like he's still a little hind and hurt from his son standing up for David.
24:54: Remember the last time we see he threw a spear at him and that he was conspiring with Jonathan to take the throne.
25:05: And he even uses the word covenant there with the son of Jesse, and there is no one who feels sorry for me.
25:11: What a wuss, you know? I mean, this guy's going to have anything that he wants, and he's wanting these people to feel sorry for him, and they don't except one.
25:22: And it says that you stirred up my servant against me to lie in ambush.
25:29: Did David ever at one point try to set an ambush to take the throne? Not one time.
25:38: What did Jonathan say? Is David not faithful to you? Is David not been good to you? Has David not been wise for you? Has he not gone out and fought the battles for you and been wiser than those that were over him? Remember, why did he make David head over the thousands? Because he went out and he fought against the enemies of Saul and against God, and he was wiser than the commanders before him.
26:08: He says he lied in ambush.
26:10: No, he didn't lie in ambush.
26:12: Saul is paranoid.
26:14: He is very paranoid.
26:16: Why is he paranoid? Because he's jealous.
26:21: He's jealous of David's...
26:23: People have affirmed David.
26:25: They're jealous that people like David.
26:27: And one, he's jealous and angry with David because the Lord is with him.
26:32: Remember, the first time he was angry with him, what was the reason? Because the Lord was with him.
26:38: It says that Saul knew that the Lord was with David.
26:41: Do you think he's suspicious of him because that's the kind of things that he would do if he was in David's position? He might, yeah.
26:49: Well, we know this.
26:50: If he was in David's position, he'd have already been anointed to take the throne.
26:53: He'd have went in there and took it by force.
26:55: And we see David, you know, he's not going to put his hand against God's anointing.
26:58: He's not going to do it.
27:00: Remember when he went to...
27:02: When he found Saul, he went into the cave? Yeah, that's coming.
27:07: He could kill him then.
27:11: Yeah, about his drawers, his tunic.
27:15: Yeah.
27:16: Hey, it's actually there where Abishai says, one time.
27:19: There he is.
27:20: God's given him the hand.
27:22: He goes, I can hit him one time with this spear, and I'll pin that joker to the ground.
27:27: Let me do it.
27:28: And he says, don't do it.
27:30: Don't do it.
27:30: He says, I won't have to do it twice.
27:32: I can do it one time, and I'll stick him to the earth.
27:34: And he says, don't do it.
27:36: So, Doeg the Edomite.
27:38: Once again, here's that guy.
27:41: His name, you just don't even like him.
27:43: Doeg.
27:44: Sounds like something off one of the characters in the bar in Star Wars.
27:49: You remember Star Wars? Yeah, there's Doeg.
27:52: So, Doeg the Edomite.
27:54: Why does he keep saying the Edomite? Why? Outside the covenant.
28:01: So, who's inside Saul's court? Who's serving? What's that? An outsider.
28:09: And one, that the Israelites were to be kind to an Egyptian and an Edomite.
28:14: But what did the Edomites constantly do? They fought and tried to kill the descendants of Jacob for taking the birthright.
28:22: That was the constant fight and battle.
28:25: So, he's got Doeg here.
28:28: And Doeg stands up.
28:30: He stands up by the servants of Saul.
28:31: And he says, oh, wait a minute.
28:33: Wait a minute.
28:33: I've got something for you.
28:34: He says, I saw the son of Jesse.
28:36: Look how he appeals to even the language that Saul uses.
28:41: To even get Saul's approval.
28:43: You know, Saul don't say David.
28:45: He hates David's name so much.
28:48: He doesn't even use his name.
28:49: He doesn't want to hear David's killed.
28:53: Saul's killed his thousands.
28:54: And David has killed his tens of thousands.
28:57: He doesn't want to hear uttered he hates David so much.
29:00: So, what does Doeg do? He uses, well, I saw the son of Jesse.
29:03: He came to Nob.
29:05: And he came to Ahimelech, the son of Ahithah.
29:08: And he inquired of the Lord for him.
29:10: And he gave him provisions.
29:11: And he gave him the sword of Goliath.
29:13: Okay.
29:15: Now, there is a discrepancy here of what actually took place and what Doeg is saying.
29:22: What we know took place is he shows up to Ahimelech.
29:25: Ahimelech was trembling.
29:26: Hey, man, why are you alone and no one with you? So, he appeals to Ahimelech with deception.
29:35: I'm on the king's business.
29:37: So, he obviously saw that there was fear or apprehensiveness from Ahimelech.
29:44: So, how did he get Ahimelech on his side? Saul sent me.
29:51: Saul sent me.
29:52: So, he lied to him to get him on his side.
29:55: Remember, he had two people that were very suspect of one another.
30:00: David was suspect of Ahimelech.
30:01: Ahimelech was suspect of David.
30:04: And rightfully so.
30:05: But it doesn't give him the right to lie.
30:09: So, he gives him provisions.
30:13: And he gives him a sword.
30:14: One, we see the Lord's providence here.
30:17: He provided food for David.
30:19: And he provided protection.
30:21: But here it is.
30:22: He says also that he inquired of the Lord for him.
30:25: We don't know if that actually took place.
30:29: Because that's not...
30:30: When David comes there, he didn't say, Hey man, I'm here to inquire of the Lord.
30:33: We don't know.
30:35: Is Doag lying here to embellish, to make Saul all the more angry? We don't know.
30:42: But when Ahimelech actually speaks to Saul, when he does that, he addresses that very thing.
30:50: Now, whether he actually did inquire of the Lord for him, we don't know.
30:54: He basically says, Hey, if I did, what's the big deal? I've done it before in the past.
31:00: So, the king sent someone to summon Ahimelech, the priest, and the son of Ahitab, and all of the father's household, and the priest who were in Nob, and all of them came to the king.
31:12: Okay, so, Nob would have been...
31:14: And it's not on here.
31:15: It would have been right here.
31:20: So, he sends from Gibeah, which is right here.
31:23: He sends here and brings 85 people back.
31:28: All the priests.
31:30: That should have been somewhat troubling to Ahimelech.
31:36: All right.
31:37: All the men are leaving this...
31:40: All the priests are leaving this city, and we're going to Gibeah.
31:44: Saul did not come to Nob.
31:48: He sent men to bring them back.
31:51: Did he bring them back bound with their hands? I don't know.
31:57: Did he bring them back in a procession? We don't know.
32:04: Verse 12 says, Saul said, Listen now, son of Ahitab.
32:09: Once again, he doesn't use his name.
32:13: He's obviously very upset with him, and here's why.
32:17: He says, Here I am, my lord.
32:19: And he said, Why have you and the son of Jesse conspired against me, and that you have given him bread and a sword, and have inquired of God for him, so that he would rise up against me by lying in ambush at this day? Once again, did David ever have any intention of laying in ambush? Did he inquire of the Lord about laying in ambush? What did he inquire of? I'm hungry? I'm hungry? That's what he inquired to Ahimelech, not to the Lord.
32:54: He inquired to Ahimelech.
32:55: Dude, I'm hungry.
32:56: I need some food, and I need something to protect myself as I'm on my way, because I'm on the king's journey, and I left in such a way that I forgot my spear and my sword.
33:06: But I know you've got something here.
33:10: And in verse 14, it says, And Ahimelech answered the king, and he said, Who among you of all your servants is as faithful as David? Ahimelech did not appeal to the fact that David had deceived him.
33:25: He could have at this point said, Hey, dude, check it out.
33:28: When he got here, I was a little concerned of what was going on.
33:33: He had me a little trembling.
33:35: I was shaking in my tunic.
33:37: As he walked up, he told me he was on your business for you.
33:43: It was a covert operation.
33:45: He had sent his men on.
33:47: That is why I received him.
33:49: That's why I gave him food and a weapon, because he was on your journey.
33:56: He was on your business.
33:57: Remember, that's what he said.
33:58: I'm on a secret mission from the king.
34:01: That's not how Ahimelech addresses it.
34:04: He didn't say he was deceived by David, that David deceived him.
34:07: He actually appeals to David's character.
34:11: Has David not been faithful among all your servants? What's the answer? He had been faithful.
34:20: Do you think Saul would have believed him anyway at this point? What's that? Do you think even if he had said that, Saul would have believed him? I don't know.
34:27: I have no idea.
34:29: I just think it's very telling that Ahimelech is not willing to defame the character and reputation of David.
34:42: Unlike Michal.
34:44: What did she say? Remember when they came to get him? She said, hold on.
34:50: He said he was going to kill me if I didn't let him out the window.
34:54: So what does she do? She throws her husband under the bus, basically.
34:58: In this case, he doesn't say he was deceived.
35:01: He doesn't say he was lied to, although he was.
35:05: David deceived Ahimelech to get food and provision when all he had to do was come in there and say, dude, I'm on the run.
35:13: Here's the situation.
35:16: Me being the anointed king, I can't be in a battle with King Saul.
35:20: I'm not to take the throne by force.
35:22: But that's not what he did.
35:24: He did what he did.
35:26: One, running for his life.
35:28: We can say it was out of fear.
35:30: And David was trusting in himself at that point.
35:32: He was trusting in himself.
35:34: I'm going to trust in my wit and my way of doing things.
35:36: He did the same way when he went to Achish.
35:38: What did he do? He trusted in his slobbering beard and acting like a madman and doing graffiti on the gates.
35:47: And he says, who is more faithful than David? No one.
35:51: That's the answer.
35:52: Check this out.
35:54: He's even your son-in-law.
35:58: Think about that.
35:59: He is willing to kill his son-in-law and make his daughter a widow.
36:08: That's the disdain and hate.
36:10: That means you've really got to hate somebody and say, you know what, I'd like to make the most faithful servant I have, the one that has taken care of me, he has taken care of my daughter, and I'm willing to make him or her a widow because I hate him that much.
36:28: He said he was even your bodyguard.
36:30: He says, who is honored in your house more than David? And who was? Nobody.
36:38: I mean, even Jonathan honored David more than himself, and he was the crown prince.
36:43: Remember? He stripped him of his robe.
36:46: What was the robe? A representation of his authority and distinguishment as the one who was next in line.
36:51: He gave him his belt.
36:53: He gave him his sword.
36:54: He gave him his shoe.
36:54: He gave him everything.
36:55: He said, here.
36:56: And then he does respond to the question or the statement by Dowag in verse 15, did I just begin to inquire of God for him today? In other words, would this have been the first time that David's ever come to me as your representative or as a man of captain over thousands of, commander over thousands and hundreds, would this have been the first time he would inquire to the Lord for me? And what's the answer? No.
37:32: No.
37:33: Far be it from me.
37:35: And he says, do not let the king impute anything to his servant or to any of the household of my father for your servant knows nothing at all of this whole affair.
37:44: In other words, hey, if he was setting an ambush on you like you're saying, I had no idea.
37:50: I had no idea.
37:51: He's been faithful to you.
37:52: Why would I have thought he came to me to set an ambush? But the king said, surely you will die, him elect, you and all of your father's house.
38:03: And the king said to the guards who were standing there, turn around and put to death the priest of the Lord, put to death the priest of the Lord at this time because their hand is with David and because they knew that he was fleeing and did not reveal it to me.
38:18: Okay.
38:19: You see a shift in what Saul has learned.
38:24: He wasn't setting an ambush, right? But now why does he want to kill the priest? First it was an ambush.
38:32: Now what? Because he didn't tell him he was running from him.
38:37: You see, it was done deal for him.
38:40: It didn't matter if he was running.
38:41: It didn't matter if he was inquiring.
38:43: It didn't matter if he actually came for food.
38:45: What's that? From right here? Yeah, but I don't think he wanted him elect dead at this point.
38:54: I think now he is so inflamed with anger because he feels like it's a conspiracy.
39:01: He is so inflamed with anger that he's going to do whatever he's got to do to get some revenge for them not holding David as Doeg was detained before the Lord.
39:12: I can just imagine him going, man, why didn't you detain him the way you detained Doeg on that day? And he said, where's that? But the servants of the king would not be willing to put their hands to attack the priests of the Lord.
39:30: And the king then turned to Doeg.
39:33: He said, you turn and attack the priest.
39:36: And Doeg the Edomite turned around and attacked the priest, and he killed on that day 85 men who wore the linen ephod.
39:47: Two things here.
39:50: One, we see there should be a warning as we have been going through this when we got to the thing with Saul.
39:56: Did we not see the progression of the prototypical apostate Saul? You see that? Let's go back.
40:06: Saul was anointed king, prophesied by the spirit, given three loaves of bread, jug of wine or jug of water.
40:14: Then he makes a great deliverance at Jabesh Gilead for the people.
40:19: He then makes his ascent to the kingdom.
40:24: He's put in as established as the monarch of the kingdom, and then he begins to sit on his hands for two years, and his son goes out.
40:34: So now we're seeing that progression.
40:36: Then when he went out to battle, he was supposed to wait for who? To come make a sacrifice? Samuel.
40:44: And what did he do? He did it himself, and he did it early.
40:50: There was still time because he didn't believe.
40:53: He didn't trust.
40:55: He didn't think that was any big deal.
40:57: He didn't think that was no big deal at all.
41:00: Then what do we see? He gets more instructions on how to kill Amalek.
41:07: You go in there, and you wipe them out.
41:09: Man, woman, boy.
41:10: I mean, just utterly destroy them.
41:12: And what did he do? He did it his own way.
41:15: Disregard for the word of God.
41:17: Actually, if you go back and you read that, it says that Saul rejected the word of the Lord.
41:25: Rejected the word of the Lord.
41:27: Rejected the word of the Lord.
41:28: That has been the consistent pattern from that point on of his life.
41:34: He rejected the word of the Lord.
41:36: He rejected the word of the Lord.
41:38: Rejected the word of the Lord.
41:40: Saul cares nothing about himself.
41:43: He is also an anti-Christ type of person.
41:49: Okay? Saul is God's anointed king and servant.
41:54: He is an anti- doesn't mean always in place of, but he is opposed to the servant of the Lord.
42:02: What does the anti-Christ do? Remember, there's many, and there's going to be one at the end of the age and all of that.
42:08: But anti is one who opposes the word of God, who opposes God's servant, who opposes the Messiah, who opposes the anointed king.
42:18: That's exactly what Saul's doing.
42:20: And now, not only is Saul opposing the anointed king, Saul now is going to take, and I've got to close, he is now going to make the last stand and he is going to strike down the voice of God at all in his life.
42:43: This is it.
42:44: This is the only- Look, he is standing before the priests, 85 of them that were in Nob, and what is he fixing to do? He is fixing to kill every one of them, and he's going to silence the voice of God in his life forever.
42:58: This is it.
43:00: This is a point of no return.
43:03: He has the opportunity, standing before the priest of God, to repent of his hatred towards David.
43:08: He has the opportunity to repent of his disobedience.
43:10: You understand, he has never repented.
43:12: He has never said, Hey, what I did, not destroying Amalek, make an atonement for my sin.
43:20: Now, he did say, Hey, follow me into the city and we'll make it okay together.
43:26: And Samuel said no.
43:28: Saul has now, as this is unfolding, has sealed his doom.
43:35: So do you think, as David is a picture of Christ, that Saul could be a picture of Israel, as they persecuted Christ during that time? As a what now? Like, as Israel as a whole, when they turned Christ in, they crucified him and everything.
43:49: Yeah, he's prototypical of that.
43:51: Yeah, and why? But they hated Jesus.
43:54: If you remember, when he stood before Pilate, he said, Pilate says, I know why you're going to give him over.
44:02: It's not like, dude, he was going out, he was doing nothing but good.
44:05: What has David done here? Nothing but good, okay? He's done nothing but good.
44:10: There's no guilt within David.
44:12: Even Pilate said that.
44:14: He's done no wrong.
44:16: He says, you're giving him over to me.
44:18: You're going to put him in the hands to be crucified.
44:20: For what? Remember the word? Envy.
44:23: Yeah, jealous.
44:25: Envy.
44:25: Same thing.
44:26: Envious.
44:27: Envious.
44:27: Yes.
44:30: We'll pick up...
44:33: We'll probably pick up back in 16, so we can walk through the rest of the chapter next week.
44:43: Yeah, that's where we'll pick up, 16.
44:45: Mike, you'll close us with a prayer? Yeah.
44:49: Lord, we thank you for your word.
44:51: We thank you that you've preserved it for us, even to this day.
44:54: We thank you for faithful preaching and teaching of it.
44:57: We pray that you would use it to make us more like Christ and less like the world.
45:04: We pray that you would be with our brother Keith as he brings your word this morning.
45:10: We pray that you would fill him afresh and anew with your spirit and use him as your instrument to bring forth the gospel of Christ.
45:17: We pray.
45:18: Amen.