Day 10 – Saturday -- The Book of Second Samuel

Day 10 – Saturday

The Book of Second Samuel

As in America, there was a North and a South in David’s day. David quickly became king of the South (Judah). But being coronated in the North (Israel) was more difficult. The North tried to secede twice (see chapters 15-18, and 20).

Now Michal, the daughter of the late King Saul, had gone and married Paltiel, even though she had been engaged to David. Instead of a diamond ring, David had given her one hundred foreskins of the Philistines (2 Sam. 3.12-16).  (How she wore them I do not know.) David agrees to make an official connection with the North if he can have Michal as his wife. Michal is snatched away from her husband and taken to David. With this gesture of loyalty to the North (now being Saul’s son-in-law), the elders of Israel meet and agree to crown David king of the North. He was thirty years old when he was anointed king. Jesus was also thirty years old when he was anointed by the Spirit at his baptism.

Now David is king of a united kingdom; the North and the South have one king. David makes Jerusalem the capitol of the united kingdom.

Chapter seven is a key chapter. God tells Nathan to tell David that a son of his will become the king and build God a house.

He shall build a house for my name,

 and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.  

I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me. 

Here is the declaration of the continuance of the Davidic dynasty. (Remember, Jesus will be called the Son of David.) And God uses covenant language: I am yours, and you are mine. This covenant statement runs throughout the Bible in varied forms. Most often: I will be your God, and you will be my people. When Thomas sees the risen Lord he says, My Lord and my God. That is a variation of the covenant statement. You are mine, and I am yours. At the end of the Bible the author of the Revelation says that the One on the throne says,

See, the home of God is among mortals. 

He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, 

and God himself will be with them;

 he will wipe every tear from their eyes. (Rev. 21.3-4)

They will be his peoples. They will belong to each other. The covenant partnership will be fulfilled. It is in Second Samuel that God designates the Kingdom of David as the conduit through which the Divine-Human marriage will be consummated. When the angels announce to the shepherds that a child has been born in the city of David (Bethlehem), the message is not meant to be subtle. This child will carry forward the dynasty of David.

David is the great hero of Israel. But heroes are flawed. In chapter eleven we read, It happened, late one afternoon… 

It begins innocently enough. David is strolling around with nothing to do. He’s seen all the reruns. He looks out from his balcony, and sees that someone has forgotten to pull down the shades. There is a woman, a beautiful woman, taking a bath. David watches. He is not as disciplined as Jimmy Carter. He sends for the woman. Her name is Bathsheba. They have some drinks. She stays late. And you know what happens. His adultery is followed by murder. He has her husband killed. In chapter 12 Nathan tells David a parable. At the end is that famous line: Thou art the man.

It is downhill from there. David’s daughter is raped. His son Absalom tries to take the throne, but is killed in battle when his hair gets tangled up in a tree limb (which Billy Graham always liked to remind us of—in those days when boys began to grow long hair like the Beatles). Bathsheba and Nathan conspire to make Solomon the next king.

There is a famine that lasts three years. One of David’s men kills a relative of Goliath who has six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot. In chapter 22 David composes a beautiful psalm. In chapter 23 the last words of David are reported. We also have the names of thirty-seven courageous warriors who are part of The Thirty—an elite fighting force. (Well, if the Big Ten can have twelve teams, I guess The Thirty can have thirty-seven men.)

In the last chapter God suggests to David that he take a census of the people to see if David would take the bait. David does. A census is taken. Then David realizes that he has made a mistake in counting the people.

In the twentieth century, when the Nazis took Jews to concentration camps, they tattooed numbers on their arms. To be made into a number is to dehumanize a person. Census-taking in ancient Israel was forbidden. Well, sort of. Anyway, by separating individuals out from the group, counting people destroys the unity of the community of faith. David knew he made a mistake.

It seems to me that the philosophy of libertarianism makes the same mistake. It focuses so much on the rights of the individual that it ignores the communal nature of justice and equality.

God is not so much interesting in counting us as she is in being able to count on us.

Finish this sentence: I know I can count on God because…