Sunday School | David - 2 Samuel 4

So we're in 2 Samuel. We're going to finish up chapter three and also do chapter four today. As you recall, if you've been here for a while, what we're doing is the study exists at a whole bunch of levels. On the one hand, we're walking through 1 and 2 Samuel, but really we're looking at the life of David. But the way that we're looking at the life of David is we really want to understand how it points to Jesus, how the whole thing is all meant to reveal and anticipate and train us to recognize the Messiah when he comes. And as if that's not enough, I also wanted just to help you think about how do you read biblical narrative.

One of the things that I want to look at this morning is a lens to give you: the biblical narrators are not simply telling you what happened in some kind of dispassionate way. It's not meant to just be some non-agenda thing, but rather they are arranging the material. They're choosing a sequence. They are choosing what to include and what to exclude, and they're organizing it all to make a point. So one story might be juxtaposed next to another story, not simply based on straight chronology, but because it's gonna help you grasp things.

You'll find as you read through narrative there's maybe the first level—the most obvious level, and the level at which we tend to read narrative—which is just the plot development. This thing's happening, and it's moving towards this climax. And so we're kind of entering a really key stage because for weeks and weeks and weeks, we've been waiting for David to finally become king, and he's finally becoming king. We're finally right there, really next week, but kind of now. It's a bit of a process.

But in addition to plot development, and you know this from stories that you've read, from fictional stories, there's character development. There are certain things that we want to see. We're coming to understand the author is revealing new facets of a character or he's showing the character in a particular situation or he's letting us see the way that she responds under these circumstances. And when you're reading a story, when you're reading narrative, even a true story, you're watching the plot line, but you're also watching that character development line. And so as we do this today, I think that would be useful to see some of these organizing principles.

Last Week's Content

Last week—do you remember what was last week? Were we not here last week? You weren't. I was. So we were in the first half of chapter three. What was going down in chapter three last week? Too many wives. That's right. We looked at three vignettes. We saw the "Too Many Wives," but there were two other vignettes. Do you remember? What organized that whole cluster of things? After being accused by Ishbosheth that he had been with his father's concubine. Which is similar—we've wives, we've got concubines, and then there's that final, last sad vignette about the one more wife thing, where David's got to go get Michael back. And the cluster is on purpose. We're meant to see: look, man, there's all kinds of issues.

We see that as an organizing principle—really, the seeds of David's ruin were laid in that whole thing. He's a great king. He seeks after God. He's a man after God's own heart. But he has problems when he's engaging with the ladies. Things kind of go badly for him.

Today's Structure

Similar, we're gonna look at two vignettes, two independent narrative arcs, two pieces. And as we go through it, I just want you to notice: what's the narrator's point? There's plot, but there's character to them. What are we trying to see here? And I think it'll be pretty obvious.

So you're gonna ask, as we go through: what's happening in terms of plot and what is being revealed in terms of character development?

As we've been doing lately, remember DJ and the vowels. It's gonna help you keep some of the characters straight. You got David and Joab on the side of Judah. You got Abner and Ishbosheth on the side of Israel. Abner was on Israel's side and he's been on Ishbosheth's side, but he's not anymore.

Remember that? He's got his nose bent out of shape because of this whole insult. And so he tells Ishbosheth, I'm going to sell you out. I'm going to go from your team to David's team. And the opening scene here is going to be the continuation of that. So we're in 3:17.

Coming off all that mess, Abner in 2 Samuel 3:17:

Abner conferred with the elders of Israel and said, "For some time you have wanted to make David your king. Now do it, for the Lord promised David, by my servant David, I will rescue my people Israel from the hand of the Philistines and from the hand of all their enemies."

Isn't that amazing? Once Abner changes alliances and he's no longer on team Ishbosheth, suddenly he finds himself like, well, you know what God said was going to happen all along, right? It's a pretty stunning flip.

When did God say that? Do you know what he's alluding to? Does that have any echo for you? Trying to follow these themes through the whole book. David's anointing. Yeah. Very good. It's very, very early. It's all the way back to the anointing, which was like, what the heck was that? Like fifteen or sixteen years ago? It was a long time ago. It's 1 Samuel 9. You can maybe stay where you're at in 2 Samuel 3. I'll just read you 9:16, and you'll hear the clear correspondence. It's 1 Samuel 9:16:

About this time tomorrow I will send a man from the land of Benjamin. Anoint him leader over my people Israel. He will deliver my people from the hand of the Philistines. I've looked upon my people for their cry has reached me.

And it's going to be a long, long time. By the way, can you think of another time in the Bible where people are suffering under the oppression of a people and God sends a deliverer, but it takes a super long time until it's finally go time? When does that happen? It's Moses, right?

So that's—I think you're supposed to, when you read these, be like, "Oh, this reminds me of that." We're learning what are the patterns by which God redeems. Right? He promises he's going to send the Messiah, someone who's going to rescue his people and deliver them. And it takes a long time for him to come the first time. And I don't know about you, but it seems to me that it's taking a long time for him to come again, right? So this theme of he promises it's going to happen, then you're like, "I don't know if it's going to happen," and then it happens. So again, we're just learning these patterns by how does God do this.

So then it says in verse 19, back to 2 Samuel 3:

Abner also spoke to the Benjamites in person.

Why does he do that? Abner's on the new campaign. He's trading sides. Why does he go speak to the Benjamites? Saul. What is it again? Saul. Do you remember this? Saul is a Benjamite. And so this would be kind of like in American politics when home state presidential candidates—if you don't win your home state, you're awful, right? You're going to win. Even, I mean, bless his heart, when Ronald Reagan campaigned against Walter Mondale, do you remember how many states President Reagan won in his reelection campaign? Forty-nine. What did Mondale win? His state. What is it? Minnesota. That's it. Minnesota. Okay, even Walter Mondale wins his home state. He lost in Washington, D.C., but that doesn't really count. He lost everything else, but he won his home state.

Benjamin is not just a people, it's a state, it's a tribe, it's a place. And so those guys, there's reason to think that they're going to be loyal to Saul. And so Abner's like, "We gotta head over to Minnesota and kind of shore up the base there." Make sense?

So he goes, and here's what happens. He goes to Hebron to tell David everything that Israel and the whole house of Benjamin wanted to do. So he wins. He gets them. He wins their hearts, and they're on team David. And so in verse 20:

When Abner, who had 20 men with him, came to David at Hebron, David prepared a feast for him and his men. And then Abner said to David, "Let me go at once and assemble all Israel for my lord the king, so that they may make a compact with you, and that you may rule over all that your heart desires."

So David sent Abner away, and he went in peace. Okay? It's a lovely little story. Everything's going great. His chief enemy has become his ally. He's winning him other allies, and everything's great. But what's about to happen? Look at the verse. What's about to take place?

Coming back. Okay. Joab—how is Joab going to feel about David having a private lunch with Abner? He's not happy. Why? He's got a whole bunch of reasons. Remember, he's part of the David team. He's been on team David forever. He's not some Johnny come lately. How does Joab feel about Abner? He thinks he's a spy. He thinks he's a spy. This is true. That is absolutely true, and that's what's going to be articulated here.

What's beneath the surface here? Joab stabbed his brother Abner because Abner killed his brother. Of course he's going to view people with trust, even if they're completely trustworthy, because they wronged you. Joab's going to see this whole thing through the lens of the murder of his brother.

His statement is going to be: I think he's a spy. You let him in. He's taking notes. He brought 20 guys, and every one of them was checking out the weakness in the fortress. That's not good.

And then he's got one more very powerful motive. What else would be going on in Joab's mind about Abner? A rival. Abner could be considered the next Joab for David. For Joab, this is a job security issue. What is Abner's job? He's a military commander. What's Joab's job? He's a military commander. We don't need one of those. We have one of those. We have one of me. The last thing we need is this.

Just in the interest of connecting it to last week, I wonder if wife number two or three or four or five or six or seven felt like a rival to wife number one. There's this thing going on. It's like your second born kid. How did your first born kid feel when your second born kid showed up? Like, who brought the jerk? Like, why are you spending all your time with this little cute—this is a very deep thing in our human heart.

So Joab is still mad about his brother getting speared to death. He doesn't trust this guy because he could be spying on us. And if he's wrong about Abner having bad motives and Abner is going to really be a great military commander, that's bad, bad, bad. He hates it all. And so what's he gonna do? He's gonna kill him. Because what else would you do? Just kill him.

David's Response

David sends Abner away, and then his men and Joab return from a raid. They're told that Abner came to the king and that the king sent him away in peace.

Just then David's men and Joab returned from a raid and brought with him a great deal of plunder. But Abner was no longer with David in Hebron because David had sent him away. He'd gone in peace. So when Joab and all the soldiers with him arrived, he was told that Abner had come to the king and that the king had sent him away and that he had gone in peace. — 2 Samuel 3:22-25

Joab goes to the king and says, "What have you done? Look, Abner came to you. Why'd you let him go? Now he's gone. You know Abner. He came to deceive you and to observe all your movements and to find out everything that you are doing."

He is profoundly mistrustful. He thinks he's a spy, and maybe he really thinks that. But he's got plenty of motive to hate him whether he thinks it or not. He's super threatened.

Joab left David and sent messengers after Abner, and they brought him back from the Well of Sarai. David didn't know of it. — 2 Samuel 3:26

Underline that. It's going to be very important to David that you can make note of that.

So now when Abner returned to Hebron, Joab took him aside to the gateway as though to speak with him privately. And there, to avenge the blood of his brother Asahel, Joab stabbed him in the stomach and he died. — 2 Samuel 3:27

Now is where the character development really kicks up. What is David going to do? He's going to mourn. And he does the same thing that he did with Saul. Saul is his enemy. He's been trying to kill him over and over again. But when Saul finally dies, David—for all appearances, as far as we can tell—is genuinely grieving. This was the Lord's anointed, and he grieves and weeps over the death of Saul.

Now he's going to do this again. As this character is being developed and we're watching it happen, we see the way it plays out, and David is going to be above board in all things. He is not gleeful at the death of his enemy. He might have also considered that here's the coalition that Abner's doing for him that's now right out of his mouth, smoke. So now he's not going to talk about that, but there is in his mind, like, Joab feels like he just killed an enemy. But Jesus.

David feels like he just lost an ally. Abner was doing good work for us, and now that whole thing has gone away for sure.

Kelly?

Yes. Isn't his mourning kind of a—I mean, could it have been kind of faked?

Don't know. Yeah. So I don't know. You're absolutely right. There's a lot of things. I don't know that it's fake, but it is absolutely the case that this is to his disadvantage. Not only is Abner's death to his disadvantage, but it is also to his disadvantage to be perceived as being complicit in this plot. We're gonna see that's gonna come very much to the surface. His motive here is to let the whole world know that he is hands clean of this. And we're gonna see that really get unpacked. But even if he's doing the mourning as a political show, like posturing, he does go on to curse Joab, his own guy, which he probably didn't have to do. But that whole thing—let there always be a sore, leprosy or whatever. Yeah. So we're gonna see. And I think as we continue to go through, I think we can make a pretty persuasive case that David is sincere. He is shrewd to be sure. He's recognizing the political moment. But beneath that shrewdness there's a sincerity that he—this is not what he wanted. This is a regrettable act, I think for sure. And we'll see more evidence of that in a minute.

Okay, Bunchy, Jennifer?

He doesn't. Okay. We're gonna see. You guys are all getting ahead of stuff. But I love the fact that your gears are turning. We're gonna see how it all comes together. And just to—we're gonna watch it all play out. There's a lot more data we haven't grabbed yet.

Yeah, Suzanne?

David spent a lot of time in Saul's household, so he probably knew Abner prior to all the running around through Israel being chased by Saul's soldiers. So he probably knew Abner better than we're getting a feel for here. He may have genuinely been sad that he was gone.

Yeah. I think he is. I really think he is. And as strange as it seems, I think he was sad that Saul died. He's a strange man. Right? David is a strange man. But I think he generally grieves over the death of Saul. He generally grieves over the death of Abner. And yes, all these other things are true. He's got motives and there's a shrewdness to it. But I don't think he's being false in any of it. I don't think so.

Yeah. David always respected his anointing.

Yes. I mean, David was the one that—the anointing was removed and given to David. David respected God's anointing the whole time. He really does. David is legitimately kind of, if you don't respect the man, at least respect the office. David's hardcore about that. It's why he will not lay a hand on Saul when he becomes king himself.

Laura Beth?

I don't know if I'm reading this in myself, but I feel like he's grieving that Israel is almost healed here. They're almost united, and there's this—yes, this conflict comes up again. And I think he's grieving as much as the death of Abner is this, "Oh, we were almost there. Can I preserve and continue this healing?"

I think yeah. He loves Israel, and he wants Israel to be—it's a very good insight. Your comment reminds me of Abraham Lincoln as the Civil War is won. He really genuinely wants to bind up the nation's wounds. He wants to reach across the aisle, so to speak, or the border, if you will. And when he gets killed, that all just goes—it gets destroyed. But he wants, like, no, let's come back together. Let's unite the thing. And this is gonna deepen a preexisting fracture for sure.

Catherine?

Tim, isn't it just like Jesus when he wept over Jerusalem? Oh, if only you had let me shelter you. And don't we grieve like a certain relative of mine, that we wish that they had listened and repented, even though we might have hated them?

Yes. Yep. But that's David. I just see Jesus. That's a great point, Catherine. Yes. So in all these things, we're sifting David. He's gonna get a bunch of stuff wrong from this point on. He gets a lot of stuff right. And one of the things you see is he has this love. Even though he is—he's gonna kill a lot of people, right? But he's very selective about the people that he kills. I mean, it's really interesting to watch the way he plays it. He wants there to be this union, and he's grieved. But the whole thing is falling apart for sure.

Jump in. One more and then we'll keep moving.

That's right. That's right. Right? So it's unique among men, and he is super unhappy. So let's watch it actually play. You guys already know the story, but we'll just see it happen. Verse 28.

So later when David hears about this—this being Joab's murder of Abner—he said, "I and my kingdom are forever innocent before the Lord concerning the blood of Abner son of Ner. May his blood fall upon the head of Joab and upon all his father's house."

May Joab's house never be without someone who has a running sore or leprosy or who leans on a crutch or who falls by the sword or who lacks food.

Have you ever said that about somebody in your entire life? May you never be without a running sore. Like, what? What is that? Why this weird list of horrible things that could happen to you?

They're unclean. There's this sense of untouchability—like, oh, you have leprosy, you can't touch you. But what is he doing there? It's an echo of something.

Also, there's an irony that they killed him in Hebron, which is a city of refuge. So David's got to contend with that. Being one of the cities of refuge mentioned in Joshua, they were where people guilty of manslaughter could go. And then he kills them actually in a city of refuge. That's a super, super no-no.

The Curse of Deuteronomy

There's an Old Testament echo here that David is not quite quoting, but he's functioning in the spirit of something else. If you go to the very end of Deuteronomy—like chapters 28, 29, 30—there's this list. It's exceptional. There's this long list of: hey, if you obey, you're going to have this and this and this, all this giant long list of blessings. But if you disobey, strap in. And it's stuff like an itch that never stops itching, like wounds that never heal. It just goes on and on. You're going to plant all this food and then somebody else is going to eat it. And it just goes on and on and on.

That's what he's doing. Some of his lines you could draw right out of Deuteronomy 28. It's not exactly a quote, but it's a creative reimagining of Deuteronomy 28. And essentially what he's saying is: you are under the curse of God. You are what he just said. He's putting it in God's hands to do the punishment. He doesn't do it himself. Although he's going to later. But we'll get to that in a second. It's this sense of: you blew it huge, and we're hands clean. We didn't do it.

The Public Mourning

Verse 30: The narrator reminds us, in case we got lost in the story, that Joab and his brother Abishai murdered Abner because he killed their brother Asahel in the battle of Gibeon. So David says to Joab and all the people with him, "Tear your clothes and put on sackcloth and walk in mourning in front of Abner." So Joab has to go to the funeral of the guy that he killed, tear his garments, and mourn the death of the one that he killed and hates and is still grumpy about.

King David himself walked behind the bier, and they buried Abner in Hebron, and the king wept aloud at Abner's tomb, and all the people wept also. And the king, saying this lament for Abner: "Should Abner have died as the lawless die? Your hands were not bound, your feet were not fettered. You fell as one falls before wicked men."

And all the people wept over him again. Now, doesn't this strike you as somewhat of an extreme response? It is a big show. We're literally having a circus. Why is David so demonstrative about this? It could have been: Joab killed Abner, and David was glad. It could have been: Joab killed Abner, and David wasn't happy. Instead, it's like this giant circus ensues. Why is this such a big deal? You should wonder. Whenever you see things that seem to get a disproportionate amount of attention, you should wonder: this seems more important than I realized. What's going on?

To me it feels like a political foundation. Political foundation, certainly for his kingdom. Absolutely. And in fact, we're going to see in a little bit a statement that's going to be to the same effect of that. He's definitely punishing Joab. I mean, having him parade around is humiliating.

Calling down curses of God on him is humiliating. And then again, there's gonna be a PS to the story later on. But why? Why is this so important? This is murder. That's right. And maybe he's saying, wait a minute. I understand killing your enemies when you have to. But you're gonna murder somebody just for political reasons? It's like, wait a minute. That's right.

I didn't read ahead, so I don't know what he did to Abner after this. Does he do that? Yeah. So what we'll see—you wanna jump in?

I would think also he knew David had said he would be protected. So he's defying David. Absolutely. This is a clear act of defiance. David is the king. We'll see that in a second. As the king, David has the authority to do these things. Joab does not. It is a major—he's playing very much outside the rules.

This is one of the first times in First and Second Samuel where subordinates of David actually acted on something like this. Well, he's got a bunch of salty dudes running around with him in the desert, for sure. Like, this is the kind of thing that his companions are gonna do. But when they did it to Saul, and the guy thinks that he's giving David good news—"Hey, I killed Saul"—David's like, bad idea, and he kills him. So it echoes that. This whole thing—David is absolutely determined that he will be hands clean. He will not let his administration be sullied by this scandal. He is very concerned that everybody knows that he is hands clean. His authority as the king, his right standing before the Lord, he's like, let nobody see it.

The Language of Kingship

Before we keep going, did you notice the language change here in this passage? The narrator has introduced a new term over and over and over again. Did you catch it? The word king is now referred to.

Joab went to the king and said, What have you done? — 2 Samuel 3:24

King David himself walked behind the thing. — 2 Samuel 3:31

And the king wept aloud. — 2 Samuel 3:32

The king sang this lament. — 2 Samuel 3:33

There's a whole bunch of them.

Everything the king did pleased the people. All day, all Israel knew that the king had no part in the murder. — 2 Samuel 3:36

The king said to his men, though I'm anointed king. — 2 Samuel 3:39

King, king, king, king, king, king. It's like we've been waiting and waiting, and he's not been the king this whole time. And in fact, it's kind of funny, truthfully, he still isn't. That's chapter four. But the narrator can't wait anymore. He's like, the king, king, the king, king, the king. Finally, we're meant to see that he is the king. And what I think is as he becomes king, as king elect truthfully, we're seeing that he functions with total integrity, and he will not let his kingdom be rocked by scandal. At least not yet.

They all came and urged David to eat some food or anything else before the sun sets. — 2 Samuel 3:35

Check it out:

All the people took note and were pleased. Indeed, everything that the king did pleased them. So on that day, all the people and all Israel knew that the king had no part in the murder of Abner son of Ner. Then the king said to his men, Do you not realize that a prince and a great man has fallen in Israel this day? And today, though I am the anointed king, I am weak. And the sons of Zeruiah—Joab and his brother Abishai—are too strong for me. May the Lord repay the evildoer according to his evil deeds. — 2 Samuel 3:36-39

Once again, it's the Lord. He's like, I'm not gonna do it, but we're gonna trust the Lord to do it.

David has spent his entire fifteen years avoiding taking by force because war is one thing—it's a fair fight. God chooses who's gonna win in his eyes. But the murder of somebody is taking that by force. He wouldn't take Saul. He wouldn't kill this person. He's not gonna try and manipulate God. That's right.

So what Judy is saying is that this action, while it's big and demonstrative, it's a big scene, it's perfectly consistent with David's behavior the whole time. It's not only consistent with the way that he engaged with Saul, right, Saul's death. But the whole time, he is—if God has anointed him king, then God's just gonna have to install him as king. He's not gonna force the issue. He will not take his throne by blood.

How many—I would really wonder what percentage of people became king in the history of the world through bloodshed? It has got to be a very high number, right? Incredibly high. But not this guy. And he steps in and he's like, dang it. I didn't do that. He's not gonna ever do that, right? And that's very important to David that the Lord places him on that throne and he won't do it by his own manipulations.

I think too, one of the cool things that's going on here is that Abner is kingmaker from a human standpoint. I mean, certainly God has used him in this role, but it's through Abner that we see this transition of Israel from thinking "we gotta go with Saul's descendants" to flip it over to David. And from a human perspective, he's the guy that did it. And so David's kind of mourning a great man, a prince. This is a guy that really is gonna end up putting him on the throne of Israel. And now he's dead, and it's not the way it should have been.

Okay, so far so good? Have we beat that to death? David's final word on this is going to be at the very end of his life, in First Kings chapter two. David is dying, and he says this:

Now you yourself know what Joab son of Zeriah did to me, what he did to the two commanders of Israel's armies, Abner son of Nir and Amosus son of Jethro. He killed them, shedding their blood in peacetime as if in battle. With that blood he stained the belt around his waist and the sandals on his feet. Deal with him according to your wisdom, but do not let his gray head go down to the grave in peace. — 1 Kings 2:5-6

That's basically saying execute him. At the end of his life, David's like, "Enough." And he cuts him off. The point—and we've said it a thousand times—David is a man of peace. He's a man of war for sure, but he's not gonna go murdering people, and he won't let his kingdom be stained by that. And it's really important to the narrator that you get that.

Ishbosheth's Murder

So much so that we're gonna do it all again in chapter four. Let's go.

When Ishbosheth son of Saul heard that Abner had died in Hebron, he lost courage, and all Israel became alarmed. Now Saul's son had two men who were leaders of raiding bands. — 2 Samuel 4:1-2

These two guys, Bana and Rekub, they're the sons of Rimada—I don't know how you say their names. They are not descendants of Saul. They are associates of Ishbosheth. They're thugs, okay? These rough men, these thuggy dudes, they are running around and they're associated with this guy.

Now when these two guys, Rechab and Banno, the sons of Rimmon, set out for the house of Ishbosheth, they arrived there in the heat of the day while Ishbosheth was taking his noonday rest. — 2 Samuel 4:5

Time out. Wouldn't it be lovely if you had a noonday rest? Like, who gets a noonday rest? What's that about?

So they went into the inner part of the house as if to get some wheat, and they stabbed him in the stomach. — 2 Samuel 4:6

Isn't that where—this is like the murder spot, apparently. They stabbed him in the stomach. I just noticed that now.

And then Rekab and his brother Bana slipped away. They'd gone into the house while he was lying in bed in his bedroom, and after they stabbed and killed him, they cut off his head. Taking it with them, they traveled all night by way of the Arabah. They brought the head of Ishbosheth to David at Hebron and said to the king, "Here is the head of Ishbosheth, son of Saul, your enemy, who tried to take your life. This day the Lord has avenged my lord the king against Saul and against his offspring." — 2 Samuel 4:7-8

And you have to wonder if these guys have ever read a newspaper. Right? Like, what do they think is going to happen? War. What do you think is going to happen? Yeah. It's like, my goodness, have you guys ever paid attention? It's the exact same story once again. You just feel sad for these guys. Like, it's just not going to go as they think.

So verse nine, very much true to form. Again, the narrator is doing these back to back. He tells this story, and then he tells this story, in case you weren't paying attention, in chapter three.

As the Lord lives, who has delivered me out of all trouble. When a man told me, Saul is dead, and thought he was bringing good news, I seized him and put him to death in Ziklag. That was the reward I gave him for his news. At which point, perhaps their confidence begins to shake. How much more? When wicked men have killed an innocent man in his own house and on his own bed, should I not now demand his blood from your hand and rid the earth of you? So David gave an order to his men, and they killed them. They cut off their hands and feet and hung the bodies by the pool in Hebron. But they took the head of Ishbosheth and buried it in Abner's tomb at Hebron. — 2 Samuel 4:9-12

Okay. Get it now? It's like, has it settled in? Never bring David the dead body of his enemy. Just never do it.

Chris: I feel like that comment with the city of refuge, Hebron, it's kind of reminiscent of the beginning of David's journey with Goliath and just the absolute god fearing. This is stupid to go and fight you in front of all these armies, and yet I'm going to. In the same way, the cities of refuge are for anyone to go until they're given a fair trial. We're not really given a lot of, if any, instructions for what to do if someone disobeys this. So I'm just going to fear God in this case and say, I need to mourn. I need to fast. I need to be sort of symbol and dedication to him. Then in the same way, hanging those bodies outside of Hebron, like, don't forget guys, this is a sacred city.

Tim: That's right. You're right. And David's response here—David's a complex character because on the one hand he's like, there'll be no unjust death in my kingdom. Kill that guy and cut off his hands. But he is the king. He is not functioning in a separation of powers, American jurisprudence. He is the undisputed king, and it is just for him to execute judgment, in particular against those that have been unjust in the murder of others, thinking that David would appreciate it. And he just really, really doesn't.

Fetz: Any significance to Ishbosheth being buried in Abner's tomb?

Tim: If there is, I don't know what it is. Maybe it's the freshest, most accessible tomb. Maybe it's just the association of these two, these honored men. This is the king and this is this great prince. There may be more than that, but if so, I'm not sure beyond that kind of apparent stuff.

Bob: You got any gears turning on that? No. I just think it's interesting David refers to Ishbosheth not as the Lord's anointed at this point. He just refers to him as an innocent, righteous.

Tim: Yeah. Because he probably wasn't the Lord's anointed. I mean, he's the heir, the son of Saul, but David doesn't give him that distinction. But nevertheless, he is the king and he was murdered in his bed. I think it shows that both were innocent men.

Bob: Yes. That's right. And if you didn't get it the first time, here it is. The putting them together.

Tim: Yes. Yes. So again, we're just learning to see the arrangement of material, right, that it's all here.

Michael: Yeah. Was just going to make a comment earlier about Joe having to go to the funeral and they were making this big presentation. And my thought then was that he had to—he was trying to do this to prevent other people from doing the same thing. Maybe that was why he was making such a deal out of it. Sort of the same thing.

Tim: Oh, for sure. There's a—I didn't read ahead, so obviously it didn't work. Yeah. Well, and it's stunning. I mean, would you really think, have you not been paying attention? The Saul thing was a big deal. This one just happened last week. Like, how are you—I mean, maybe they didn't have the Internet, so maybe they don't have as much access to what's going on, but it doesn't seem like David was hiding this under a bushel at all.

Lily: I was just curious about the cutting off the hands and the feet. Like, is that David?

Tim: Yeah. I mean, like, I will cut off the hands and feet of the wicked. Like, they will know. But you're right. Yes. This has—I didn't—I didn't trace that down, but you're right. It has to be meaningful. It seems like a very particular act. Does anybody know? Anybody have a footnote that says hands and feet represent something or something? You know, like, what's that—are the feet of those who bring good news?

Well, that's actually not a bad thought. Truly. And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. There actually might be something in that. I know you said somewhat tongue in cheek, but it's actually a pretty good point. I will look into that. I should have. I didn't consider where that goes, but it's got to be meaningful. Everything's meaningful.

Plot and Character Development

So here we are. Two lines we're trying to trace. We're trying to follow the plot and the character development. Plot first. What does the narrator want you to capture about the story arc? What's happening? Big picture storyline. Character in a second.

Yeah, Dawn?

David is king. He's going to act like the king.

That's right. Even though he hasn't been officially installed. That's exactly right. That's exactly spot on. David is king, but not really, but he's about to be, but he's already functioning in that role. The enthronement, the inauguration is gonna be in two weeks, because we're not gonna be in here next week. But the inauguration is coming, but he's already functioning in that space. That's the plot story.

Kelly Sue?

Yeah. So that's true. He has been king of Judah, but now he's getting the whole thing. And Judah's kind of a smaller part of the whole story, and God's promise to him was king over the whole thing. So he's been king, but now his kingdom is growing, and he'll have no rivals very soon. At least not within the borders of the nation.

So that's the plot. We're seeing how David became king. Ishbosheth got in trouble with Abner, and Abner sold him out, and all of Israel agreed, and then the Benjamites really agreed, and then Joab killed Abner, and then David got the kingdom. That's the story. But more than that, what's the character development? David has become king and what's the takeaway? He's setting up, he's showing what his kingdom is going to be. He's not just king, he's a righteous king. He's not just in charge, but he's submitted to the Lord.

A Righteous King

And that's what we want to be like, man. David, for you there's something about it. It's fine to be humble and gracious and self effacing when you're out of power. But what about when you're in power? Plenty of promises are made during the campaign. But now that he has the scepter, what's he like? Holy cow. He's the same. Right? He is submitted to the Lord. This was not just a ruse to get there.

And so it is as we close. Right now with Jesus. He's gentle and humble and gracious and good all the way to the cross and forever thereafter. I've quoted this 500 times, but it's still worth saying. John in Revelation is told:

Behold the lamb and behold the lion of Judah, the king.

And he looks and what does he see? He sees a lamb as though slain. Jesus could be flexing in his strength and power, but even still he is meek and humble. Even amidst the throne of his exaltation, he is a lamb still.

David has come to power and he is still good. And that is a rare thing indeed.

Alright. Good enough. Next week, join us here, but it won't be David. We'll be talking about safe families. The week after that, we'll continue David's life.