Tag: David

Seeking Answers (I Samuel 28-31)

Monday, October 17th

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By Nathaniel Johnson

For Saul, his main method of communicating with God, was through Samuel, the prophet. Unluckily for Saul, Samuel died and the Lord stopped supporting him. When Saul saw the army that he was supposed to fight, he got scared. He was so afraid of the army that he tried to ask God for help and that’s a great first step! But when Saul didn’t get an answer right away, he went looking for another way to get help. That’s where he went wrong. He went to Endor to ask the Ewoks for help. Just kidding, but he did go to Endor to see a medium. When he finally got the medium to bring Samuel up from the grave, Samuel was not happy. He reprimanded Saul for disturbing him and only brought bad news. Saul and Israel would be handed over to the Philistines. That’s the worst kind of news possible. Saul was going to die.

For David, his way of talking to God was by wearing the Ephod and following the proper ceremonies. When David came back to his city and found his wives and people missing, he was as distraught as any of us would be. He and all his men “wept until they had no strength left to weep.” The men who were with David wanted to stone him but he remained calm and found strength in God. He asked God what he should do and then he listened. He heard God’s answer and then acted upon it.

For us, we have Jesus, which means we can talk to God through prayer (1 Timothy 2:5). If we don’t get an answer from God right away like Saul, we shouldn’t go and seek answers from the wrong sources. All that led Saul to was death. We should be like David. He wept and then he “found strength in the Lord his God.” We should not let our emotions cause us to run off and take matters into our own hands before we consult with God. “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10). If we don’t get an answer to our prayer immediately, like Saul, we should be still like David and wait for direction from the Lord.

The Choice is Yours: Honor or Shame (I Samuel 25-27)

Sunday, October 16

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By Nathaniel Johnson

When we read the story of Abigail and Nabal, it should be obvious that Abigail is our good example and Nabal is our bad example. Nabal’s first mistake was insulting David. When he said “Who is this David,” he didn’t mean that he didn’t know who David was. After all, “Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands” (1 Samuel 18:7). Of course Nabal knew who David was, but he chose to be rude and disregard the help that David had given him throughout his life. Nabal’s second mistake was his greed. Even though he owned thousands of animals, he couldn’t spare any food out of his wealth for David’s men.

Abigail on the other hand, dealt with the situation that her husband created with wisdom. Abigail goes through a series of five steps that we all should follow to act with wisdom. First, she recognized that David was a holy man, a man of God (Proverbs 9:10). Then she took steps to avoid bloodshed (Proverbs 14:16). That is, she gathered food for David’s men. When she set out to find David, she didn’t tell her husband Nabal. She decided to keep the matter quiet until it was resolved (Proverbs 29:11). Once she got to David, she offered her gift and held nothing back (Proverbs 10:5). After she had taken all of these wise actions, she was rewarded by David and was taken in as his wife. “The wise shall inherit honor, but fools he holds up to shame” (Proverbs 3:35). If we act with the same wisdom as Abigail, we too will receive honor. But if we act rash, rude and selfish, we will get nothing but shame.

(Our writer this week is Nathaniel Johnson.  Thank you to Nathaniel and to Kayla Tullis who introduces Nathaniel for us.  Kayla writes: “Nathaniel Johnson, a 20-year-old born and raised in Minnesota, is currently a student at St. Scholastica with the ambition of one day teaching mathematics. Nathaniel has been a member of Pine Grove Bible Church for years. You may recognize him during worship services playing the bass guitar. He enjoys the outdoors, Nordic skiing, anime and much more. Nathaniel has a heart for God and is looking forward to growing with you each day through the FUEL devotions.”)

Awful Choices (I Samuel 21-24)

Saturday, October 15th

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by:Terrence Raper

In the chapters we read today, the violence between Saul & David continues to increase. There are a lot of lives taken by both sides out of vengeance and fear. We have a term for all this extra violence “casualties of war”. What a strange way of putting it. As strange as “friendly fire”.

 

Back to David and Saul. Both of these men were ordained as king at some point. We know that David was ultimately the true king, and a man after God’s own heart. However, there had to be behavior during these chapters that even David was ashamed about. I have really been struggling to add some positive takeaways from these chapters in 1 Samuel. I feel like it is important as a historical account of what happened, but I would really be reaching to make a connection our personal experiences in 2016.

I do think it is important for us to consider the way in which we go about achieving our goals. It is easy to look at Saul, and even David in these chapters, and realize that they made some awful choices out of necessity, or desperation. We have heard the term “the means justify the ends”. I believe this to be helpful for those people who are driven, and don’t want to be bothered with caring for others on the path to conquering their goals. However for Jesus followers, we know how important people are to God. God cares about how we treat others. So as followers of Jesus, and a people obedient to God-we must adopt a more Gandhi-esque approach. Gandhi taught the means must express the end that we desire.

(By the way the Gandhi (1982) movie is certified fresh at 88% on rotten tomatoes… I haven’t seen it.)

 

Anointing (I Samuel 16-17)

Thursday, October 13th

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By Terrence Raper

Saul has some good moments, but eventually fails to follow God. Samuel is tasked with secretly anointing a new king behind Saul’s back. This process for choosing the next king laid out in this chapter has always been interesting to me. God tells Samuel it’s going to be one of Jesse’s sons, and God speaks to Samuel as each one passes by. I can remember God talking to people in the Bible, and I can remember examples of people casting lots. In Chapter 16 it seems like Samuel is doing both in real time. That just stuck out to me.

Samuel’s connection to God in this moment of choosing the next king, reminds me a lot of Paul’s final instructions in 1 Thessalonians 5:17. Paul tells them to “pray continually”- Which was “pray without ceasing” in the King James, the original way I heard the scripture. I have always thought of Paul’s instruction in terms of literal and nonliteral. I believe Paul was asking the Thessalonians to be faithful, and prayerful: reminding them it is important to submit to God in all things.I also think Paul was talking about a mindfulness. I don’t mean mindfulness in a new age kind of way. I think Paul was asking them to think of everything in terms of Godly wisdom. I believe this to be a step in the process of obedience to God between belief and actions.
So Saul heard the voice of God in real time. This is not impossible, but it hasn’t been a part of my experience of God. I have had to begrudgingly ask myself what truths do I know about God, and in turn how would God like me to act, react, respond in this scenario. What does Godly wisdom tell me about this scenario?