#431 Don't Forget Who God Is

David went to Nob, to Ahimelek the priest. Ahimelek trembled when he met him, and asked, “Why are you alone? Why is no one with you?”

2 David answered Ahimelek the priest, “The king sent me on a mission and said to me, ‘No one is to know anything about the mission I am sending you on.’ As for my men, I have told them to meet me at a certain place. 3 Now then, what do you have on hand? Give me five loaves of bread, or whatever you can find.”

4 But the priest answered David, “I don’t have any ordinary bread on hand; however, there is some consecrated bread here—provided the men have kept themselves from women.”

5 David replied, “Indeed women have been kept from us, as usual whenever I set out. The men’s bodies are holy even on missions that are not holy. How much more so today!” 6 So the priest gave him the consecrated bread, since there was no bread there except the bread of the Presence that had been removed from before the Lord and replaced by hot bread on the day it was taken away.

7 Now one of Saul’s servants was there that day, detained before the Lord; he was Doeg the Edomite, Saul’s chief shepherd.

8 David asked Ahimelek, “Don’t you have a spear or a sword here? I haven’t brought my sword or any other weapon, because the king’s mission was urgent.”

9 The priest replied, “The sword of Goliath the Philistine, whom you killed in the Valley of Elah, is here; it is wrapped in a cloth behind the ephod. If you want it, take it; there is no sword here but that one.”

David said, “There is none like it; give it to me.”

David at Gath

10 That day David fled from Saul and went to Achish king of Gath. 11 But the servants of Achish said to him, “Isn’t this David, the king of the land? Isn’t he the one they sing about in their dances:

“‘Saul has slain his thousands,

and David his tens of thousands’?”

12 David took these words to heart and was very much afraid of Achish king of Gath. 13 So he pretended to be insane in their presence; and while he was in their hands he acted like a madman, making marks on the doors of the gate and letting saliva run down his beard.

14 Achish said to his servants, “Look at the man! He is insane! Why bring him to me? 15 Am I so short of madmen that you have to bring this fellow here to carry on like this in front of me? Must this man come into my house?” 1 Samuel 21 NIV

Oh no, we think, why has he shown up here? He is hated by the most powerful man I know, and though not for good reason, or reason enough, yet he is hated and before my face. If I help him, what will the king think of me? If I talk to the prostitute, she washes my feet with her hair, I eat with the tax collector, touch the leper, what will they say of me? David has been anointed, but here he comes to the priest a beggar, and we have a high priest, but it was not at first a bold approach. I did not have anything to offer him that he cannot get better from the rocks. He comes a sinner for sure, a wonderful thing about God's word, you can find yourself in every story, because it does not cover it's heroes in their own blood. There is the sacrifice and the blood of lambs, looking forward to that perfect covering. David comes in here a beggar and a liar, this priest is not Christ, but rather superstitious, yet even in his imperfection can see that he should have mercy over sacrifice. David is given 5 loaves of bread, and we know how far that can be stretched when we read the gospels. He takes the sword of Goliath as well, and that must be a strength to him, the memory of boy against a giant. He carries this into the land from which he took it for sometimes the enemy of your enemy may become your "friend". Saul would not be welcome amongst the Philistines, but neither is the man with the giant's sword, who has slain 10,000. Why do the wicked prosper and God's servant begs for bread? Where can the shepherd king lay his head? He is an imperfect foreshadowing of the Son of David, of God coming from heaven into the lineage of this king. He cannot see so clearly or so far, but this too will pass. He becomes afraid and pretends as less than who he is; he seeks the charity and compassion that befits a madman, it is humbling but not humble. The king already has his quota of madmen, of the insane, the delusional. A lion without teeth can still roar, a lion with teeth can crouch quietly. Not everyone who smiles at me or shakes my hand is believable, and humility has a counterfeit as well. I think David goes too far here, this is not faith, but I am merely noticing, not pretending that I haven't postured up, bared my teeth or bluffed my way. Before the priest and the king you may be able to fake it till you make it, but not before God Almighty, Omniscient, there is no poker face before the One Who looks upon the heart. Lord, thank you for the blunt honesty of your word, please help me to have rule over my thoughts, that they be brought into submission to you. Let me not seek the approval of men, for that can be bought, but let my eyes stay upon you. 

And they did not dare to question Him any further. 41ThenJesus declared, “How can it be said that the Christ is the Son of David? 42For David himself says in the book of Psalms: ‘The Lord said to my Lord, “Sit at My right hand… Luke 20:40-42

At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath. And His disciples were hungry, and began to pluck heads of grain and to eat. 2 And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to Him, “Look, Your disciples are doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath!”

3 But He said to them, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: 4 how he entered the house of God and ate the showbread which was not lawful for him to eat, nor for those who were with him, but only for the priests? 5 Or have you not read in the law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple [a]profane the Sabbath, and are blameless? 6 Yet I say to you that in this place there is One greater than the temple. 7 But if you had known what thismeans, ‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless. 8 For the Son of Man is Lord [b]even of the Sabbath.” Matthew 12: 1-8