1 Samuel 26 – The
Ziphites come and report David’s whereabouts to Saul. Saul takes his usual 3000 men to go hunt for him.
When
he learns of the expedition, David sends out spies to find Saul. Ahimelech, the
Hittite and Abishai, son of Zeruiah, go with David to Saul'’s camp by night and
find Saul asleep with a spear stuck in
the ground next to his head. Abishai thinks David should kill him, that God
has given him into his hand once again.
But David asks, “who can raise his hand against the Lord’s anointed, and
be guiltless?” (26:9)
So
they take the spear and a water jar and leave.
When he is far away on top of a hill, he calls to the army and
specifically to Abner to abuse him for not watching carefully over Saul. Saul recognizes David’s voice and again calls
out in an affectionate tone. Again David
asks him why he continues to pursue him, what guilt does he have. Saul, in his most
vacillating way, acknowledges his craziness: “I have done wrong; come back, my son David, for I will never harm
you again, because my life was precious in your sight today; I have been a
fool, and have made a great mistake” (26:21). David returns the spear. He simply expresses the hope that God will
favor him for the good turn he has done to Saul in sparing him (26:24).
1 Samuel 27 – David
despairs of ever escaping Saul’s wrath and runs away to the land of the
Philistines, to king Achish of Gath.
When Saul learns this, he stops hunting for him. David gets Achish to give him one of the Philistine towns to live in—Ziglag, and
David remains for a year and four months.
They
raid the Geshurites, the Girzites and Amalekites, leaving much death and
destruction in their tracks. Achish is
pleased for he thinks it means that David will never find any favor (allies) in
his lands.
Proverbs 30 – Called
the sayings of Agur (no identity confirmed in the note):
“Who has gone up to heaven and come down again. Who has
cupped the wind in his hands? Who has bound up the waters in a cloak – who has
marked out all the ends of the earth? What is his name, what is his son’s name
if you know it?” (30:4).
“[G]ive me neither
poverty nor riches, grant me only my share of bread to eat, for fear that
surrounded by plenty, I should fall away and say, ‘Yahweh—who is Yahweh?’ or
else, in destitution, take to stealing and profane the name of my God” (30:8-9).
Augustine (354-439)
Confessions
31 - But yet, O
Lord, to you, most excellent and most good, Thou Architect and Governor of the
universe, thanks had been due unto you, our God, even had you willed that I
should not survive my boyhood. For I existed even then; I lived, and felt, and
was solicitous about my own well-being—a trace of that most mysterious unity
from whence I had my being; I kept watch by my inner sense over the wholeness
of my senses, and in these insignificant pursuits, and also in my thoughts on
things insignificant, I learned to take
pleasure in truth. I was averse to being deceived, I had a vigorous memory, was provided with the power of speech, was
softened by friendship, shunned sorrow, meanness, ignorance. In such a being
what was not wonderful and praiseworthy? But all these are gifts of my God; I
did not give them to myself; and they are good, and all these constitute
myself. Good, then, is He that made me, and He is my God; and before Him
will I rejoice exceedingly for every good gift which, as a boy, I had. For in this lay my sin, that not in Him,
but in His creatures — myself and the rest — I sought for pleasures, honors,
and truths, falling thereby into sorrows, troubles, and errors. Thanks be
to you, my joy, my pride, my confidence, my God— thanks be to you for your
gifts; but preserve them to me. For thus will you preserve me; and those things
which you have given me shall be developed and perfected, and I myself shall be
with you, for from you is my being.
We lived (Augustine and I)
thousands of years separated in time, in culture, in class, in gender, in
relative importance. But his honest retelling of how he grew up and came to see
the gifts God had given him as part of a different order, that the things of
this world – the competitions, ambitions, sources of pride, competitions for
leadership and power, are all insignificant when set against the goals God
gives us to aspire to – faithfulness, honesty, integrity, kindness, mindfulness
of Him. It is in these things we find our delight and our rest.
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