Day 119: David's Wisdom

1 Samuel 29:1-11 The Philistine leader still believed David was an ally, but the commander of his army demanded that David and his men be sent away. David obliged. His cleverness would serve him well as King of Israel.

Ch 30:1-31 David’s way of doing things reveals many qualities appropriate for a King of Israel: He consulted the Lord first, laid out a plan that shows good and prudential judgement, and was fair-minded in distributing the spoils of battle. (CCC 1806-1807, 2579)

Ch 31:1-13 The Philistines defeated Saul’s army, and then displayed the remains of Saul until some men of Israel stole them away to give him a proper burial. No one can claim that David played any role in Saul’s death since David and his men were too far from the battle. Saul’s death by suicide is not justifiable according to the New Covenant, but at that time they had not received the grace from Christ’s Redemption to understand fully all the ramifications of the Mosaic Law. (CCC 2280-2283)

Psalm 18 God is our protector and has power over life and death. With the aid of grace, obedience to the Commandments makes us righteous in God’s sight. God always blesses us with his help to fulfill our tasks and every mission entrusted to us.

Head of the nations: As God’s anointed, the King of Israel was also the king of all nations, especially since his authority came directly from God. (CCC 1949, 1960, 1963, 1972)

(*The Didache Bible RSV-CE Ignatius Edition, 2006)

• Saul’s life ends in crushing defeat at Mount Gilboa, in which all three of his sons, Jonathan, Abinadab, and Malchishua, are slain. 

• Fearing torture from the Philistines, the wounded Saul falls on his own sword, and the legacy of Saul is extinguished completely (1 Sam 31).

(*Walking With God: A Journey Through the Bible by Tim Gray and Jeff Cavins)

• Psalm 18 is such a good psalm

• If you ever pray these psalms and ever get lost, they can be long, short, or even come out of left field

• We don’t always have a context when we read them

• The subtitle of the psalm can give us a certain context

• Today’s subtitle is 

“A Psalm of David the servant of the Lord, who addressed the words of this song to the Lord on the day when the Lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul…”

• Sometimes, if you are not reading along and praying along with your eyes as well as with your ears, it can sometimes seem to go on and on and we don’t know where we are going next

• When it comes to the psalm, it might be helpful to go back at another time of the day, take out your Bible, and just let your eyes match up with your heart in a sense

• Go back and allow yourself to follow along, because it may be a new way to pray for you

• One of the things that sticks out about Psalm 18:19 

“He brought me forth into a broad place. He delivered me because he delighted in me.”

• There’s something so powerfully true about his

• When we ALLOW THE LORD TO LOVE US

• When we ALLOW THE LORD TO DELIGHT IN US

• SOMETHING RADICALLY CHANGES

• A lot of us hold on to this idea that we HAVE TO PERFORM in order to PLEASE THE LORD

• Psalm 18 says No, he saved you because he delighted in you.

• He saved David because he delighted in David

• He saved you BECAUSE HE LOVES YOU

• You do NOT need to PERFORM in order to be PREFERRED

• THE LORD ALREADY DELIGHTS IN YOU

• THE LORD ALREADY LOVES YOU

• Here are a couple of things that reveal the WISDOM OF DAVID

• David goes to fight with the Philistines but they don’t trust him

• Acshish trusts David because David has been lying to him the whole time

• David has been telling Acshish that he has been raiding the Israelites but he hasn’t been

• David realizes that the Amalekites have raided his city and taken all the people away

• David first shows his WISDOM by saying he donned the EPHOD, the clothing of the priest, and he goes before The Lord and he asks God if he should pursue the Amalekites

• HE ASKS DIRECTIONS FROM THE LORD

• David has LEARNED TO ASK GOD FIRST IF HE SHOULD GO INTO BATTLE

• David goes after them and routs the Amalekites

• The second time David shows WISDOM was when he had a party of 600 men

• At some point, at the Brook of Besor, 200 of those men were so exhausted they could not go any further

• They stayed back and guarded their supplies

• The other 400 went on and defeated the Amalekites

• The 400 who fought refused to give the spoils of battle to the 200 who did not fight

• David said the 400 did a service by FIGHTING

• David said the 200 did a service by GUARDING THE SUPPLIES

• EVERYONE GETS THE SPOILS

• David makes it an ORDINANCE

• By doing this, David KEEPS THE MEN UNITED

• EVERYONE SERVES A PURPOSE even if everyone is NOT going into battle

• Those who stay home are SERVING A PURPOSE AS WELL

• The third thing that shows David’s WISDOM is that he sends presents to the ELDERS OF JUDAH

• David is a hair’s breadth away from uniting ALL THE TRIBES OF ISRAEL

• King Saul dies in 1 Samuel 31 so David is on the verge of becoming the next king

• David sends gifts to all the elders to show them that he will take care of them

• David has the HEART OF A KING

• David has the HEART OF A TRUE LEADER

• David is a MAN OF PRAYER by asking GOD FIRST

• David is a MAN OF JUSTICE by giving the spoils to ALL HIS MEN

• David is a UNITER of the Tribes of Israel to make a KINGDOM OF ISRAEL

• We start 1 Chronicles tomorrow

• FYI, we are going to have A LOT OF NAMES in the first chapter ;)

• This community is PHENOMENAL

• PRAY FOR EACH OTHER

• PRAY FOR FR. MIKE

Prayer by Fr. Mike: “Father in Heaven we give you praise and glory. We thank you so much for this opportunity to listen to listen to your word and to see the end of Saul and to have followed him, the one who was anointed first, the one who was anointed by you and called and consecrated to be a king, to fight for the people of Israel. And we are honored that you revealed not only the fact that you called Saul, but also the way in which our choices, even in the midst of being called can either raise us up to you or can lead us away from you. Lord God, we just ask you to please help us to be people who have been anointed but say yes to you. People who have been chosen by you and then are faithful to you, because every one of us has a heart like Saul. Every one of us has a heart that can turn away and we just ask you to please, please always keep us in your grasp. Always keep us near your heart and never let us wander away. Never let us die alone apart from you, but always allow us to walk with you and to die in you. We ask this in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.”