BOLD Daily Devotional- A Man After God's Own Heart

So as I mentioned a little earlier, we are going over 2 Samuel chapter one.

I'm gonna take us a couple chapters back just as a recap, um, you know, as the Bible turns and all of that jazz.

Um, just so we can kind of remember where we were because we went through our wonderful 21 days of prayer.

Um, but with 2 Samuel, and I did have a question, um, as if you were following along with this, you know, that Samuel dies in 1 Samuel.

So quickly, I just um 2 Samuel is a book um with an anonymous writer, kind of similar to Hebrews.

Um, some scholars think that either Nathan, who we'll see later on, and or dad, who we'll see later on, um, were the authors of this book.

But neither here nor there, it's the word of God, and we'll continue to kind of dive in on it.

Um, so before we jump into 2 Samuel, as I mentioned, there are two chapters that I kind of wanted to spend a little bit of time in.

Um, so in 1 Samuel 28, Saul goes and meets with the medium.

So he breaks God's law, he breaks his own law, and to go ahead and try to get a sneak peek on what is going to befall him.

I'll just go ahead and kind of read off of that verbatim.

Um, and then that'll just kind of help catch us up.

Um, so at this point, as I mentioned, um, Saul is speaking with a medium.

And when he speaks with the medium, he requests to speak with Samuel.

So I'm gonna read what happened from there.

Samuel replied, Why ask me, since the Lord left you and has become your enemy?

The Lord has done just what he said he would.

He has torn the kingdom from you and has given it to your rival David.

The Lord has done this to you today because you refused to carry out his fierce anger against the Amalekites.

What's more, the Lord will hand you and the army of Israel over to the Philistines tomorrow, and you and your sons will be here with me.

The Lord will bring down the entire army of Israel in defeat.

So going into battle, Samuel, I mean, sorry, Saul knew that this was the end for him.

So as we're kind of close, as we were kind of closing out first Samuel, we're shifting into spoil alert, David becoming king.

So I just kind of wanted to recensor us, and then I want to um take us to 1 Samuel 31 just to kind of seal things off, and then we'll go ahead and jump into 2 Samuel.

Um, and there'll be a reason why, because with a part of what I'm kind of going over today, why I wanted to spend a little bit of time in uh chapter 31 as well.

Um, so chapter 31 is titled The Death of Saul.

Now the Philistines attacked Israel, and the men of Israel fled before them.

Many were slaughtered on the slopes of Mount Gilboah.

The Philistines closed in on Saul, his, and his sons, and they killed three of his sons, Jonathan, Amenadab, and uh Malachusha.

The fighting grew very fierce around Saul, and the Philistine archers caught up with him and wounded him severely.

Saul groaned to his armor bearer, Take your sword and kill me before these pagan Philistines come and run through me and taunt and torture me.

But his armor bearer was afraid and would not do it.

So Saul took his own sword and fell on it.

When his armor bearer realized that Saul was dead, he fell on his own sword and died beside the king.

So Saul and his three sons, Saul, his three sons, his armor bearer, and his troops all died together on that day.

I'm gonna skip down to verse 8 and read until verse 10, and then I'll jump into 2 Samuel.

The next day the Philistines went out to strip the dead.

They found the bodies of Saul and his three sons on Mount Gilboah.

They cut off Saul's head, stripped off his armor, they proclaimed the good news of Saul's death in their pagan temple and the people throughout the land of Philistia.

They placed his armor in the temple of Asheroths, and they fastened his body to the wall in the city of Belshan.

So I know that was just a bit of a recap, but the reason I wanted to read that off was because as I was going over chapter one of 2 Samuel, there was a message that came to me.

Um one about kind of deciphering the news that comes to you and figuring out whether that news is from the place of the Holy Spirit or whether it's just something that's coming from either the enemy himself or just someone else's kind of personal ambition or whatever type of motivation that they have in the current moment.

Because as we read through chapter one, um, we'll see an example of someone who is lying, firstly.

And secondly, it looks like they're doing that with the purpose or the ambition of gaining favor to their side, but we'll see that it actually has the opposite effect.

So, you know, as I mentioned, you know, I've mentioned those other parts.

So kind of specifically try to remember the details of how those things went down.

So David learns of Saul's death.

After the death of Saul, David returned from his victory over the Amalekites and spent two days in Ziklag.

On the third day, a man arrived from Saul's army.

He had torn his clothes and put dirt on his head to show that he was in mourning.

He fell to the ground before David in deep respect.

Where have you come from?

David asked.

I escaped from the Israelite camp, the man replied.

What happened?

David demanded.

Tell me how the battle went.

The man replied, Our entire army fled from the battle.

Many of the men are dead, and Saul and his son Jonathan are also dead.

So pausing here, this is all true.

Um, so one thing I do want to say, sometimes we can receive the truth or a true story or something that sounds like the truth from a source that is not particularly reputable.

So we have to make sure we're tuned in with the spirit and make sure that we're not getting too deep in our own heads or too deep in our own desires.

So when we hear something that's true, we automatically just ride along with it and start moving forward without consulting the spirit.

One thing I will say that's been really admirable that I've realized about David as we're kind of going over this and how we get to see that he's a man of God's own heart is that he at his best, he consults the Lord in times where a lot of other people wouldn't.

Like, you know, we go back and see that, you know, his family has been taken.

He consults the Lord before he goes ahead and does it.

Now, obviously, the Lord, you know, wanted him to get his family back.

He wanted him to defend his people, defend his reputation, etc., etc.

Uh, but like most of us may or may not have done that.

We most of us may have just jumped into action.

So we see that David is a man after God's own heart.

He focuses and puts that, you know, that he he he takes it to the Lord and at his best, you know, we still see a couple other examples of him not, but at his best, he takes his he takes his issues up with the Lord immediately.

So this man in the this first part of this first chapter, he is uh he is telling the truth, but there are other intentions moving forward.

So how do you know Saul and Jonathan are dead?

David demanded of the young man.

The man answered, I happen to be on Mount Gilboa, and there was uh Saul leaning on his spear with the enemy chariots and um and charioteers closing in him.

When he turned and saw me, so here's where the lies start.

When he turned and saw me, he cried out for me to help to come help him.

How can I help?

I asked him.

He responded, Who are you?

I am an Amalekite, I told him.

Then he begged me, Come over here and put me out of my misery, for I am in terrible pain and want to die.

So I killed him, the Amalekite told David.

For I know he couldn't live.

Then I took his crown and armband and I brought him here to you, my Lord.

So pausing here, and if we kind of go back and remember from chapter 31, the only person that would have had that true point of view of that circumstance would have been uh Saul's armor bearer.

So there's two things that that's going on here.

I am from looking at the scripture, I was about to call it an assumption, but from looking at the scripture, this person is definitely anatomy.

At best, he's an Amalekite, and those were the folk that just ran off with David's people, and David just wiped them all out.

At best, he is who he says he is and he's lying.

At worst, he's a Philistine.

And when you kind of we look back at the other chapter and we chapter 31, and we kind of realize like, hey, they had Saul's body, they had his armor, they had his belongings, and they were, you know, basically they paraded him around.

So this man, you know, maybe he was a spy, maybe he was just somebody after his own ambition, but he's coming to David with half-truths.

And my general purpose of today is, and we'll see how David handles uh receiving this half-truth in a few in a few moments, but we have to be careful with that.

We have to be careful with people that may pretend or seem like they are kind of, you know, working with the word of God or they're working with truth and other natural aspects of life.

But, you know, we have to be careful with that access that we give to them and how much access we give to them, you know, in our physical space, but most importantly in here and here.

If you're not looking, I'm pointing at my head and my heart.

But we we have to be careful with that because this man, he has given David the truth.

He has delivered important news, but he's not doing it in a truthful way.

So David kind of recenters here.

And he so and what once again, so I killed him, the Amalekite told David, for I knew he couldn't live.

Then I took his crown and his armband, and I brought them here to you, my Lord.

David and his men tore his clothes in sorrow when they heard the news.

They mourned and wept and fasted all day for Saul and Jonathan and the for the Lord's army and the nation of Israel, because they had died that day by the sword.

So here we do see another glimpse of David's um just character and his connection, in my opinion, to the Lord.

Because we do know that um, you know, when Saul was cast down as king, Saul mourned.

Um, the Lord was with Saul and comforted Saul as he mourned.

So these this this fall of Saul, not to rhyme, but his fall is an emotional thing for the people for the people of Israel and for um it was for Samuel and it was for um you know David as they you know just that they're processing it.

So instead of him saying, okay, now I'm finally in a moment where I can be lifted up, now I'm finally in a moment, wow, I've been waiting for that to happen, et cetera, et cetera.

Um, David is taking the proper stance and processing his feelings.

So, you know, sometimes we can have something good happen to us, we can have something life shifting, and you know, maybe it's a situation for a promotion, et cetera, et cetera.

But in this moment, David is taking time to mourn and to feel all the feelings.

And, you know, like I said, as him being in the proper stance, you know, he's he's taking a kind of solemn view of that.

Then David said to the young man who had brought the news, and this is, you know, maybe not literally, but it is good to kind of probe and figure out when we have people bringing news to us and people trying to get close to us, etc.

So he brought the news, where are you from?

And he replied, I am a foreigner, an Amalekite who lives in your land.

And he turns around and he asks him, Why were you not afraid to kill the Lord's anointed one?

David asked.

And then David said to his men, kill him.

So the man thrust his sword through the Amalekite and killed him.

You have condemned yourself, David said, for you've confessed that you have killed the Lord's anointed one.

So even after death, um, after the death of Saul, David is still conducting himself as a loyal subject of Saul and also the Lord.

He's he's there's not much ambition going right now.

David knows that he's been anointed, he knows why Saul's after him, et cetera, et cetera.

But even in this moment where he has achieved something that looks like a victory, there's not much gloating, there's not much, you know, thought inward.

He's thinking on just continuing his duty.

And with that, I will yield.