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Study the Word. Meditate on it and let it be your delight and holy guide.
Youth Ministry
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2 Samuel 16-24
Chapter 16-17
The text knows that God is partisan and on King David’s side. Absalom does not stand a chance in his coup attempt, although he temporarily occupies the royal palace. Absalom doesn’t know what the text knows, though. He turns to Ahithophel, a trusted friend and defector, for advice. Ahithophel urges Absalom to act like a king: seize David’s concubines (16:20-23) and go public with the rebellion, killing David - “the life of only one man so all the people will be at peace” (17:3). Absalom asks his other trusted friend, Hushai, for collaborative advice. Hushai offers a different plan, suggesting that all of Israel would fight on Absalom’s side against David, with Absalom leading the battle. The text tells us God caused Absalom to follow Hushai’s ill-fated advice (17:14).
David was forewarned of the coming military action, and mustered an army, dividing them in thirds under his generals - Joab, Joab’s brother, and Ittai. David then declared he too would go into battle, but his generals forbade it. They wisely reasoned that “you are worth ten thousand of us.” King David then urged, “Deal gently for my sake with the young man Absalom” (18:5). Notice that David avoids calling Absalom his son, though his heart bore the truth.
Absalom was riding on his mule, the text tells us, when his head somehow got caught in a tree and he hung there, “between heaven and earth” (17:9). One of David’s soldiers spotted him, but remembered David’s request to “deal gently.” General Joab willfully ignored David’s appeal. We can wonder whether or not he’d been hardened by war or by David himself. It was David, after all, who told Joab not to be troubled by the murder of Uriah. Joab the general went back to where Absalom hung to kill him. He thrust three spears into Absalom’s heart, and then ten others struck Absalom again until he died.
The messenger sent to deliver the news to David declared, “Good news!” Political spins are an old tradition! “The Lord has delivered you from the hand of the rebels!” (17:31). In this moment, King David was suddenly more father than king. “Is it well with Absalom?” he wanted to know. The news crushed David’s heart. He went to the gate and wept, “O my son Absalom, my son, my son…” O the ways of humanity, that too often we hold each other afar and resist reconciliation until it is too late. Absalom did not get to hear his father call him “son,” nor hear his dad declare, “Would I had died instead of you…”(17:33). The genius of the text is that it knows in this moment David is both supremely father as well as supremely king; the one does not supplant the other.
Chapter 19-20
The victory is turned to mourning. The people grieved in solidarity with their king. They knew a family tragedy when they saw one! Joab doesn’t grieve, though. He doesn’t cater to the father-son relationship. He complains that the king has embarrassed and ashamed all those who fought for his victory. “You love those who hate you and hate those who love you!” Joab grumbled. “You have made it clear that we are nothing to you…and you’d be happy if we were all dead” (19:6). Joab warned David if he didn’t get up immediately in support of his soldiers, they would desert him, and there would be more trouble “than all the evil that has come upon you from your youth until now” (19:7). So David pulled in his grief and took his seat before the people to receive them.
The civil war is now over and the different constituencies must be reconciled. Shimei, Mephibosheth and Barzillai all represent different important groups. The united kingdom is far from stable. Sheba, a Benjaminite, leads a separatist movement. The tribe of Benjamin had been loyal to Saul and had not bought into the Davidic throne. Sheba goes into the city Abel, and Joab decides that the city must be destroyed in order to destroy Sheba. This is not atypical military strategy, and thousands of years later we are still following it. But a wise woman intervenes to save the city. She reminds him that the city is “a mother in Israel,” a place where Israel has learned and grown. It should not be destroyed in hot pursuit of one enemy. The woman’s wisdom stands in stark contrast to Joab’s pitiless perspective. Remarkably, her wisdom prevails. The city is saved, and something of the humanity and sanity of David’s kingdom is saved as well.
The last verses of chapter 20 are almost a review of the royal bureaucracy. The action is over, now the bureaucrats can analyze and categorize and make lists. But notice! Verse 24 tells us a well-kept secret. There has been forced labor in this kingdom - it has not all been covenant (see 5:1-3).
Chapter 21
There are mixed reviews on the hidden messages behind this chapter. Is the story told to give David a rationale for violence against the house of Saul? Is David ridding himself of a further Saulide threat? Or is David in fact enacting God’s response to Saul’s guilt? Is David faithfully fulfilling his office as king or is he acting in self-interest? Both are possible! In the end, however, David buries the bones of Saul and Jonathan, and one cannot help but to know that at least part of that burial reflected a tender moment of a sensitive memory - David, who suffered the deaths of his beloved sons, also had loved Jonathan whom he too had lost.
Do you remember the story of David and Goliath? Here we are with the Philistines again. One more time David can slay giants (21:22).
Chapter 22-24
1 Samuel 2:1-10 sings Hannah’s song. Here it sings David’s, with a life full of history in between the two songs to God. (David will become even more like Hannah by the 17th verse of the 24th chapter, emptying himself before God.) As you look back on your life, what song would you sing to God? Hopefully, you can be a little more honest with yourself than David was in verse 24: “I was blameless before him, and I kept myself from guilt.” David leans a little too closely to the self-righteous Pharisee found in the Gospels who thanks God he’s not a tax-collector. “The Lord rewarded me according to my righteousness,” David sings. At least, though, he recognizes a little more reality in verses 29 & 30: “You are my lamp, O Lord, and my God lightens my darkness; By you I can run against a troop and by God I can leap over a wall…” What song would you sing to God in reflection over your life?
The 23rd chapter continues the singing oracle as in the 22nd. The remainder of the chapter is a list of the men who joined David in that bloodly, violent, politically charged world - a world like ours.
The final chapter tells us that God is angry once again withIsrael. God incites David to hold a census, but the census is a sin. By verse 10 David, on his own accord (no prophetic or female help this time!), realizes it is a sin and begs forgiveness. It is not comforting to think of God provoking us to sin in order to teach us about sin. It is even less comforting to read about the pestilence God sent on Israel. David again picks up his role as shepherd and pleads on behalf of the sheep for mercy (v. 17). In his repentance, David returns to being one “after God’s own heart” (1Sam. 13:14). Notice how the text implies God’s answer to David’s prayer for mercy. David is directed to build an altar. Building the altar and worshipping is part of the answered prayer. Making an offering is part of the answered prayer. Implicit in this is a covenant relationship - God will be merciful; the people will worship and bring offerings. The covenant is commanded and demanded; it is also grace. “David built and altar to the Lord and offered burnt and peace offerings. So the Lord responded to the plea for the land, and the plague was averted from Israel” (24:25).
copyright 2002 Carrie Scott
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