S5: Day 93: 2 Samuel 16–18

0:00Hey, thanks for listening to a year in the Bible with Daily Grace. We're walking through the entire Bible in a year. We are journeying day by day, chapter by chapter, and today we're in second Samuel 16 through 18. And we talked about how David was on the run from song. David was put on throne. He was no longer on the run. And David has this moment of sin and of judgment. And now we find David on the run again, right, TV from his own son, yes, exactly. So then as he's on the run, he meets these two characters, which are going to be key in the coming chapters. He meets a guy named Ziba, who, if you remember, is Mephy Boscheth is servant, and Mephy Boscheth is Jonathan's son, Saul's grandson, and Ziba here claims that Mephy Boscheth is treasonous and that he's like Absalom, and he wants to take over David's throne.

1:01And Ziba, again, is trying to ingratiate himself with David for telling him this. So David thanks him for alerting him to this, and he gives him all of Mephy Boscheth this estate. That's hard to say with an ass on the end. You did great. And then David travels along still, and he's still fleeing, and he meets another man of Saul's house named Shime, and he comes cursing and throwing stones at David. And this man says, the Lord has repaid you for all the bloodshed of Saul. And we're going to return to these two people, because how they ultimately responded, David is going to be interesting. But for now, it's important to know that Ziba seems to be on David's side, and Shime seems to be against David. Okay. Okay. So we'll come back to that. We'll come back to that. Okay. So then noting that we'll come back to that, what happens next? So now Absalom has entered Jerusalem, and through the advice of a foolish counselor, he decides to enter into his dad's concubines. In other words, this is sort of a show of power to show that he has usurped his father.

2:04And as brutal as this is, this is also part of Nathan's prophetic oracle about what's going to happen to David's house, is that in the same way that David took another man's wife, David's wives are going to be taken from him, sadly from his own son. Again, a brutal story, but that is the reality of it. And then we have two people who are trying to give advice to Absalom. And this man named a heath of hell wants to pursue David and kill him. But Hushai, whose David's loyal counselor says, don't do that, don't do that. That's a bad idea. Because again, he's on David's side, and he wants to give David time to flee. And the first man, a heath of hell, so distraught that his plan was foiled by Hushai that he hangs himself. He actually kills himself. And this reminds us, in a weird way of Judas in the New Testament, a man who wanted to betray God's anointed, ends up taking his own life. And I think that that kind of shows, well, the gravity of the situation, and yeah.

3:07So okay, so you've kind of taken a side step from Absalom, but getting back to him, what ends up happening to him in this story. Okay, so then David's men go out to battle against Absalom's men. Again, there's sort of a civil war, which is sort of a theme that we've seen since judges and kind of moving through. And David wants to go fight, but his men say, you can't go fight, we can't risk your life. So David says, okay, I won't fight, but you need to be kind to my son, Absalom. I know he's a usurper, but you can't kill him. He's my son. But during the battle, Absalom is riding away from David's men, and his hair gets caught in a tree. Literally his pride ends up being his downfall. The thing that he was most proud of his looks is, ends up being his downfall. And Joab, who again is David's guy, wants to strike down Absalom, but the man who found Absalom says, no, David said, we can't kill this guy. And Joab and two other men end up just taking matters of their own hands and stabbing Absalom

4:08and killing him. And David weeps and mourns for the death of his son. Sad story overall. We're still just seeing Nathan in his words. Those words come to pass. Right in front of us. Let's back up a little bit though from what's happening in these chapters and ask, what do we learn about God or how do we see Christ in these chapters? Well, I think what I see is I see even where God was preserving the life of David after he was initially anointed back in first Samuel 15, or I guess would have been 16. And we saw how God preserved his life against or preserve his life from salt. We see the same sort of thing here, but we actually have the covenant in place now. So in other words, God is saying no matter what happens, I'm going to preserve David. Even if there's a usurper in his own house, even if I've already judged David for the things that he's done, my promises hold true.

5:09And I think there's a lot to be said for that in our own lives that we can we can trust God with his promises. He promises to give us new life when we turn to the Lord, we follow the Lord, despite what we do, despite our own shortcomings, despite the things we've done in the past and the consequences that we're still still experiencing for those things. He's faithful. Yeah, I think that's a great takeaway. I think one thing that I took away as I was going through these chapters is we really see the folly and the limits of human wisdom here. We saw people looking for the advice of those close to them throughout these chapters, but true wisdom is seeking the Lord. And I think Psalm 14 to just says it so clearly, it says the Lord looks down from heaven on the human race to see if there is one who is wise, one who seeks God. And so I have a wonder and we'll never know, but had any of these men turn to the Lord for wisdom instead of their other advisors, what may have been different.

6:12Yeah. And it's an encouragement to me in my own life to seek the Lord's wisdom when I need wisdom and help. Great. So, okay, that's 2 Samuel 16 through 18, just two more days in the book of 2 Samuel and then we'll kind of wrap up this whole journey through the Samuel. Yeah. We're getting close. Thanks, CJ.