For many years, David has been one of my favorite Bible characters. He has become a friend to turn to, and his life has encouraged mine. I especially resonate with his earliest years; the ones spent preparing for his leadership role in Israel. Many of those years were spent on the run, and the sweet psalmist of Israel penned many of his best works during that chaotic time. Because the texts explaining his life are precious to me, I am going to write a series of articles on the early years of David's life (1 Samuel 16-2 Samuel 1), with some snapshots of his later years on the throne (2 Samuel 2-24) and I will release these teachings once per month. As always, thank you for reading and I pray God ministers to your heart as we inspect His word. You can find all articles here.
Introduction
Jesus once taught a parable about the kingdom of God. He spoke of a farmer who scattered seed on the ground, and then he went to sleep. And he continued to sleep and rise day after day. One day, the earth produced a blade, then the ear, and finally the full grain in the ear. When the grain was fully ripe, the farmer put in his sickle -- the harvest had come. But, concerning the growth — day after day, night after night growth — Jesus said the farmer “knows not how.” (Mark 4:26-29). He was unaware of the science of it all. He only knew that if he put in the seed, out came a harvest.
This is the way of God, and it was His way with David. Secretly, quietly, and mysteriously, God is planting His seeds and growing His harvest. He prepares you, no doubt, just as He prepared David: privately, quietly, almost invisibly. But the day comes, just as it came for David, when it is time to put in the sickle, for the harvest has come.
God had quietly prepared David for his role as the great king of Israel. For years, God had prepared David's inner qualifications, characteristics which would bring God glory. Throughout David’s life, God would use everything -- consequences, trials, successes, relationships, aloneness, error, folly, betrayals -- to deepen those inner qualifications. But, at the point we pick up David’s story, God has already shaped David within. Quietly, unbeknownst to his own family, David's harvest was ripe. He was ready to be anointed as the future king.
The scene, as the reader approaches it, is steeped in sorrow, for you do not get David until you go through Saul. Near the beginning of all things, God had promised Eve that one day someone would come from her line to erase all pain and heartache. He would come and crush Satan under His feet (Genesis 3:15). Eve waited and wondered if Cain or Abel would be the one to fulfill God’s promise, but neither could. God narrowed His promise to Seth’s line, then Noah's, and then Noah’s son, Shem (Genesis 4:25-26, 9:26-27). Years later, God appeared to a descendant of Shem named Abram, promising it would be through him “all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 12:3). Then God confirmed the promised one would come through Isaac (not Ishmael) and his son Jacob (not Esau). Jacob then had twelve sons and, as their family enlarged over the years, those twelve sons became the twelve tribes of Israel. For decades and centuries, they waited for the coming of the One who would end all the sin and pain. David would not be the One, but the One would come from his line (2 Samuel 7:14).
But before David, there was Saul. Saul, Israel's first king, could have established his throne forever, but he was not interested in building God’s kingdom. Instead, he wanted to build his own name. The first prayer of the poor in spirit and the pure in heart is “hallowed be Your name,” but Saul wanted his own name hallowed. God rejected him and his family line from sitting on the throne forever, saying, through the prophet Samuel, “Your kingdom shall not continue. The LORD has sought out a man after His own heart” (1 Samuel 13:14). That man, the one to replace Saul, the one whose throne would be established forever, would be David.
Eventually, God had to ask the old prophet, Samuel, “How long will you grieve over Saul, since I have rejected him from being king over Israel?” (1 Samuel 16:1). It was time for Samuel, just as it is time for many of us, to move on from past failure into God’s new and glorious plan. Samuel was grieving, but God was going on, so, in obedience to God, he went to Bethlehem, to Jesse’s house, to find the next king of Israel.
God Prepares Inner Qualifications
“When they came, he looked on Eliab and thought, 'Surely the LORD’s anointed is before him.' But the LORD said to Samuel, 'Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.'” (1 Samuel 16:6–7).
Samuel’s arrival in Bethlehem created quite a stir, causing the elders to ask him, “Do you come peaceably?” The man was a mighty prophet, singlehandedly ruling and judging and teaching Israel for many years. God was with him, and none of his words fell to the ground (1 Samuel 3:19). The town's leaders worried he might've come in judgment. However, Samuel had come peaceably to gather Jesse, Ruth, and Boaz's grandson, along with Jesse’s sons, for a great sacrifice and feast (1 Samuel 16:5). One of those sons would be the next king of Israel. Today was the day of their first anointing, a private coronation before family and friends, but mostly before God and His prophet.
When Samuel sat with the gathered family, he gravitated towards the attractiveness of Jesse's eldest son. It is shocking to see Samuel fall for Eliab. Samuel looked to his height and his appearance, forcing God to rebuke him. Israel had made the same mistake at Saul’s selection twenty years earlier. Saul was acceptable to the people because he was handsome, young, and tall -- and, at that moment, God had a mind to give them what they wanted (1 Samuel 9:2). No one would dare say, out loud at least, that kings must be handsome, but ancient Israel sure acted as if this were so. So God interrupted Samuel; “I have rejected him. For the LORD sees not as a man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart" (1 Samuel 16:7). Swiftly, God declared the heart of all humanity, and His own heart, to show us what’s inside.
The way of humanity is to look at outward appearances. Even someone as spiritual and discerning as Samuel leaned towards anointing another tall and handsome man in Eliab. Even though God had made it His business to reject the firstborn time and time again, even though He had often chosen the youngest, Samuel thought the firstborn was the one. Eliab, Samuel thought, looked the part. He thought this because man looks at outward appearances. We are drawn to personality and fame, beauty and celebrity. We tell ourselves we will follow those with the best ideas and the most humble spirit, but then we turn around and choose the most winsome and handsome. We spend our time chasing the attractive, the humorous, the educated, and the polished. But God has another way.
God’s way is to look at the heart. He is looking for the poor in spirit, those who mourn conditions caused by sin. He searches for the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. He pursues the merciful, the pure in heart, and the peacemakers (see Matthew 5:3-9). In the Old Testament, He often chose the last born and the outcast. In the New Testament, He chose fishermen and sinners. And in our modern times, He often moves most powerfully in the developing world and the desperate. For this, God ought to be celebrated because, in a dog-eat-dog world, it is refreshing to find the infinite being gives a chance to all humanity. The attributes He respects are not connected to privileges like fame, wealth, or education. He is not looking for beauty or personality. No, God celebrates qualities any human being on earth -- the poorest, the dirtiest, the most marginalized -- can possess. Anyone on earth can have character, holiness, purity, and love. God looks for qualities such as these.
God had prepared, as we will see in a moment, these attributes in David. God had made David into His man, genuinely spiritual and upright, godly and godwardly inclined. Though the youngest, though outcast, David was beautiful in the sight of God. Perhaps you must trade-in your old value system, the way of man, the way of seeing the outward appearance, for the way of God. Perhaps you need to allow Him to build up your inner quality, but also celebrate the inner quality of others. Perhaps you need to get past, more and more, looking at that which is external and begin to appreciate the inner qualifications God loves.
God Uses the Wilderness
“Then Samuel said to Jesse, 'Are all your sons here?' And he said, 'There remains yet the youngest, but behold, he is keeping the sheep.' And Samuel said to Jesse, 'Send and get him, for we will not sit down till he comes here.'” (1 Samuel 16:11).
After passing through every son Jesse provided him, Samuel asked, “Are all your sons here?” God had rejected everyone present. None were left, so Samuel wondered. Jesse admitted there was one more. David, the youngest, was not invited to the coronation ceremony. Instead, he was out in the fields keeping the sheep. No longer thought of as a son, but as a servant, there was no need for David to attend. Slaves aren't needed at family gatherings. Coming in the spirit of Christ, David would not be the last king rejected at first but widely acclaimed later.
It is not too strong to say David was the family reject, banished to the menial task of shepherding alone in the wilderness. Jesse called him the youngest, a reference to his age, but also to his stature as the smallest and least in the family’s sight. David wrote, “My father and mother have forsaken me, but the LORD will take me in” (Psalm 27:10). Out in the pasturelands, David was forsaken by his father.
Jesse had pushed David away from the family, into the wilderness with the sheep, but in so doing had pushed David to God. Already, in the wild, under the stars at night and the sun by day, God had become David’s. His father had rejected him, one of the great pains of his life, but God had accepted him. God had become His Father. The Lord had become his Shepherd.
God used rejection and the wilderness to craft His man. The final title for Jesus in the Bible is “the Root and Offspring of David” (Revelation 22:16). At some point, Jesus had become David’s root, his foundation. He had spoken to David’s heart, and David had submitted himself to God. The wilderness and the pain and the hurt became useful -- it had driven David to his Lord.
And God wills to do the same for you, to use all the junk and hurt of life to help drive you to Him. “We know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to His purpose,” Paul wrote (Romans 8:28). We read the verse but grasp for a loophole. Perhaps, we think, we don’t fit within the scope of the promise because we do not love God as we ought, but the context disabuses us of that notion. Paul was speaking of a believer’s true and positional love of God, from the new nature they’ve been given. All who are called by God, saved by God, are lovers of God. If you’re justified, you love God. So His promise is for you; He will use all the pain for His purposes and glory, driving you to Him.
Out in the wilderness, David learned to worship the Lord. Alone, he could only turn to God. In a lonely world, modern believers would do well to learn from David’s example. In our wildernesses, we must learn to sing and tune our hearts in a godward direction. The Shepherd’s Psalm came out of this time in David’s life. Can we sing it? Can we say, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want” (Psalm 23:1)? Because he had allowed God to redeem his hurt, David could sing it with passion and faith.
God Anoints for Service
“Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers. And the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon David from that day forward. And Samuel rose up and went to Ramah.” (1 Samuel 16:13).
Samuel, confounded by God’s rejection of every son Jesse brought him, had asked if there were any others. Jesse confirmed: the youngest was in the field, watching the sheep. Samuel told them they would not sit down until he came. David appeared, handsome in his own youthful way -- reddish and with gleaming and innocent eyes. Samuel had anointed Saul with a small vial of oil, but God told him to bring a hornful for David. Seeing David, Samuel poured out the oil upon David’s head. The entire family watched. Josephus, the first-century Jewish historian, tells us the Rabbi’s tradition, that Samuel whispered in David’s ear, “You are the king of Israel.” God anointed David as Israel's next king.
This would not be David’s only anointing, however. Here, as a teenager, privately and without much fanfare, David was anointed. But he was anointed a second time at age thirty when he became the king of Judah, his tribe. Finally, seven years later, David was anointed a third time as king of all the tribes of Israel.
It is here David serves as a beautiful picture of Jesus. In a sense, Jesus is anointed as King three distinct times. Through His life, death, burial, resurrection, and ascension, Jesus is marked by the Father as the King of God’s Kingdom. Then, each time a person believes in Him, He is anointed a second time as their personal Savior and King. But, thirdly, He will one day return, and on His thigh, a name will be written: “King of Kings and Lord of Lords” (Revelation 19:16). All of humanity will regard Him as King. Unfortunately, for many, this recognition will come too late.
Jesus is the Christ, which means “anointed one.” Believers today are to borrow His anointing, to be an extension of Him on earth. The church is referred to as the “body of Christ.” We are an extension of Jesus’ heart and mind. Just as Jesus was the root of David, we are to have Jesus as our root. Just as Jesus was the offshoot of David, so we are to be the branches of Christ. He invites us to abide in Him, the vine, because we are the branches. When we connect ourselves to Him, we grow in intimacy and worship and obedience to Him, His life, ever increasingly, flows into ours. Borrowers of His anointing, His life, His oil, we become impactful for the world around us.
But we cannot dream of borrowing Christ’s anointing, running in His life, if Saul is on the throne. If we dream of our own kingdom, we cannot move forward. How many times is prayer a lifeless experience merely because a person cannot truthfully pray, “Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10)? Until our hearts' first desire is for the hallowing of our Father God’s name, we cannot effectively enter into this new, David-like life. We must get Saul out and David in. We must obtain that heart of quiet worship and adoration of God. When we do, everything changes.
Years passed from David's anointing to his coronation before all of Israel. Those were years of preparation. But, through it all, God had a vision. His like-hearted man, David, would one day serve His people. David would bless God by leading Israel.
And God looks at each of His children today, longing to use their lives. There is only one David, just as there is only one you. David was meant to bless Israel. Who are you meant to bless? Let God prepare you in secret, and one day He will raise you up for His task.
