The Meaning Of Life

https://biblehub.com/nkjv/1_samuel/26.htm

In the days before political correctness, you could watch a black and white western movie and hear the Indians say, “Paleface (white man) speak with forked tongue”, which meant they lied; white man would promise something to the Indians (usually peace), then turn around and do something bad to them. And in this case, “Saul speaks with forked tongue”.

In the last two chapters we saw where Saul went into a cave to empty his bladder, and it was the cave in which David and his men were hiding. David had the opportunity to kill Saul, but didn’t do it, and as soon as Saul found out, he was remorseful (or so he claimed) that he was treating David so badly while David was upright and loyal in return. And we discussed how David still stayed on the lam knowing that Saul really hadn’t changed. I’m sure by now, many people were looking at Saul and judging his mental health.

Here again, the Ziphites came to Saul, reporting the location of David. I’m sure after Saul killed all of the priests he perceived as helping David and undermining the king, no one in the kingdom was taking a chance on being misjudged for fear of the king, and were being proactive about everything. And Saul’s “remorse” left him, and once again, Saul and his army took off in pursuit of David with the intent to kill him.

And once again, Saul made not only himself vulnerable to David, but his entire army as well, including Abner the commander of Saul’s army. David found out where Saul and his army were camped, and sneaked into their camp while they were sleeping and stole Saul’s spear and his water bottle that were laying next to him.

Scripture doesn’t say, but David was either very stealthful (is that a word?) or it was purely the protection of God on his side, because to sneak into Saul’s camp, of over 3,000 men while not awaking anyone, was surely a feat.

And once they returned back to camp, they called to Saul, much as they had at the cave Saul was relieving himself in, and said (I’m paraphrasing), “Look at me, I stole your spear and water bottle. I had the opportunity to kill you, but I did not. I’ve done nothing to you, please stop pursuing me.”

And Saul yelled back at David, confessing that he had sinned, told David he would not pursue him any longer, and he could return home to Saul. And I’m guessing everyone in David’s camp, and likely everyone in Saul’s camp rolled their eyes when Saul said this, knowing Saul’s word had no meaning.

David did not return…by now he was well aware that Saul could not be trusted, so he decided to seek safety with the Philistines. But David wasn’t being quite truthful to Achish, the King of the Philistines, because he pretended to be on the side of the Philistines, going out each day to raid the land of Israel, when in fact he was raiding places right in Philistia. And each day Achish would ask David where they went, and David would make up some story like, “We raided the south side of Judah”, when indeed they had not. And why David was not be truthful, he was doing what he had to do to survive.

By now it appears that everyone in Israel is afraid of Saul, so most are not willing to hide David, and are constantly reporting his location to Saul. But David cannot seek shelter with the Philistines either as he had killed their giant, beheaded him with his own sword, then carried Goliaths sword with him. So is seems as though everyone is against David.

But you know what they say…if you pray for strength, God will give you struggles that you may learn to be strong to overcome, and David was surely getting stronger each and everyday, surviving where he could find no one to trust.

And despite these troubles, David is still faithful to God, and he still refuses to do anything to Saul out of respect for the throne, or in David’s eyes, the one “anointed by God to be king”, which was Saul. David likely knew that if he wanted to be respected once he was crowned king, he had better show respect for the throne himself.

It’s funny how we can shape our own future. All of this could have been avoided if Saul would have simply obeyed God, followed the advice of Samuel the prophet and judge, and prayed to God to make sure he was doing God’s Will.

But Saul ended up being a pawn of Satan in that great battle between good and evil, between our perfect God and his fallen angel Lucifer who is still trying to take God’s throne.