The Bible in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 127: Kindness for the House of Saul (2023)

Episode Date: May 7, 2023

Fr. Mike draws our attention to David's kindness towards the house of Saul, including Jonathan's lame son Mephibosheth. We learn that even though Saul persecuted David, David continued to honor his descendants. Today's readings are 2 Samuel 9, 1 Chronicles 12, and Psalm 28. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/bibleinayear. Please note: The Bible contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.

Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz, and you're listening to the Bible in a Year podcast, where we encounter God's voice and live life through the lens of Scripture. The Bible in a Year podcast is brought to you by Ascension. Using the Great Adventure Bible timeline, we'll read all the way from Genesis to Revelation, discovering how the story of salvation unfolds and how we fit into that story today. Today is day 127. We are reading from 2 Samuel chapter 9 and 1 Chronicles chapter 2. We're also praying Psalm 28. I know yesterday was kind of a long episode,

so shorten it down. I mean, not that we did it on purpose, but it is only three chapters basically today. We're reading, as always, from the translation called Revised Standard Version, 2nd Catholic Edition. I'm using the Great Adventure Bible from Ascension. Also, if you want to download your own Bible in a Year reading plan, you can visit ascensionpress.com slash Bible in a Year. And if you've not yet subscribed to this podcast, you can subscribe to this podcast whenever you'd like to subscribe to this podcast. Subscribe to this podcast. It's day 127. We're reading 2 Samuel chapter 9, 1 Chronicles chapter 12, and Psalm 28. The second book of Samuel, chapter 9, David's kindness to Mephibosheth.

And David said, is there still anyone left of the house of Saul that I may show him kindness for Jonathan's sake? Now there was a servant of the house of Saul whose name was Ziba. And they called him to David. And the king said to him, Are you Ziba? And he said, Your servant is he. And the king said, Is there not still some one of the house of Saul that I may show the kindness of God to him? Ziba said to the king, There is still a son of Jonathan. He is crippled in his feet. The king said to him, Where is he? And Ziba said to the king, He is in the house of Makir, the son of Amiel, at Lodebar. Then king David sent and brought is in the house of Machir, the son of Amiel, at Lodebar. Then King David sent and brought him from the house of Machir, the son of Amiel, at Lodebar.

And Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, son of Saul, came to David and fell on his face and did obeisance. And David said, Mephibosheth. And he answered, Behold, your servant. And David said to him, Do not fear, for I will show you kindness for the sake of your father, Jonathan, and I will restore to you all the land of Saul, your father, and you shall eat at my table always. And he did obeisance and said, what is your servant that you should look upon a dead dog such as I? Then the king called Ziba, Saul's servant, and said to him, all that belonged to Saul and to all his house I have given to your master's son. And you and your sons and your servants shall till the land for him and shall bring in the produce that your master's son may have bread to eat. But Mephibosheth,

your master's son, shall always eat at my table. Now Ziba had fifteen sons and twenty servants. Then Ziba said to the king, According to all that my lord the king commands his servant, so will your servant do. So Mephibosheth ate at David's table like one of the king's sons. And Mephibosheth had a young son whose name was Micah. And all who dwelt in Ziba's house became Mephibosheth's servants. So Mephibosheth dwelt in Jerusalem, for he ate always at the king's table. Now he was lame in both his feet. The first book of Chronicles, chapter 12, David's followers in the wilderness.

Now these are the men who came to David at Ziklag, while he could not move about freely because of Saul, the son of Kish. And they were among the mighty men who helped him in war. They were bowmen and could shoot arrows and sling stones with either the right or the left hand. They were Benjaminites, Saul's kinsmen. The chief was Ahiezar, then Joash, both sons of Shemaah of Gibeah, also Jeziel and Pellet, the sons of Asmaveth,

Barakah, Jehu of Anathoth, Ishmael of Gibeon, a mighty man among the thirty and a leader over the thirty, Jeremiah, Jehaziel, Johanan, Josabath of Gedorah, Eluzai, Jeremoth, Bialiah, Shemariah, Shephathiah the Harophite, Elkanah, Isshaiah, Azarel, Joazer, and Jashobam the Korahitesites, and Joela, and Zebediah, the sons of Jeroham of Gidor. From the Gadites there went over to David at the stronghold in the wilderness mighty and experienced warriors, expert with shield and spear, whose faces were like the faces of lions, and who were swift as gazelles upon the mountains. Ezra the chief, Obadiah the second, Eliab third, Mishmanah fourth, Jeremiah fifth, Atai sixth, Eliel seventh, Johanan eighth, Elzabad ninth, Jeremiah tenth, Machbanai eleventh.

These Gadites were officers of the army, the lesser over a hundred and the greater over a thousand. These are the men who crossed the Jordan at the first month, when it was overflowing all its banks, and put to flight all those in the valleys, to the east and to the west. And some of the men of Benjamin and Judah came to the stronghold to David. David went out to meet them and said to them, If you have come to me in friendship to help me, my heart will be knit to you. But if to betray me to my adversaries, although there is no wrong in my hands, then may the God of our fathers see and rebuke you. Then the Spirit came upon Amasai, chief of the thirty,

and he said, We are yours, O David, and with you, O son of Jesse. Peace, peace to you, and peace to your helpers, for your God helps you. Then David received them and made them officers of his troops. Some of the men of Manasseh deserted to David when he came with the Philistines for the battle against Saul. Yet he did not help them, for the rulers of the Philistines took counsel and sent him away, saying, At peril to our heads he will desert to his master Saul. As he went to Ziklag, these men of Manasseh deserted to him, Adna, Josabad, Jediah El, Michael, Josabad, Elihu, and Zelathai, chiefs of thousands in Manasseh. They helped David against the band of raiders, for they were all mighty men of valor, and were commanders in the army. For from day to day men kept coming to David

to help him, until there was a great army, like an army of God. David's army at Hebron. These are the numbers of the divisions of the armed troops who came to David in Hebron, to turn the kingdom of Saul over to him according to the word of the Lord. The men of Judah, bearing shield and spear, were 6,800 armed troops. Of the Simeon Lord. The men of Judah, bearing shield and spear, were 6,800 armed troops. Of the Simeonites, mighty men of valor for war, 7,100. Of the Levites, 4,600. The prince Jehoiada, of the house of Aaron, and with him, 3,700. Zadok, a young man, mighty in valor, and 22 commanders from his own father's house. Of the Benjaminites, the kinsmen of Saul, three thousand, of whom the majority had hitherto kept their allegiance to the house of Saul. Of the Ephraimites, twenty thousand eight hundred,

mighty men of valor, famous men in their father's houses. Of the half-tribe of Manasseh, eighteen thousand, who were expressly named to come and make David king. Evisachar, men who had understanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to do, 200 chiefs and all their kinsmen under their command. Of Zebulun, 50,000 seasoned troops, equipped for battle with all the weapons of war, to help David with singleness of purpose. Of Naphtali, a thousand commanders, with whom were thirty-seven thousand men, armed with shield and spear. Of the Danites, twenty-eight thousand six hundred men

equipped for battle. Of Asher, forty thousand seasoned troops ready for battle. Of the Reubenites and Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh from beyond the Jordan, one hundred and twenty thousand men, armed with all the weapons of war. All these men of war, arrayed in battle order, came to Hebron with full intent to make David king over all Israel. Likewise, all the rest of Israel were of a single mind to make David king. And they were there with David for three days, eating and drinking, for their brethren had made preparations for them. And also their neighbors, from as far as Issachar and Zebulun and Naphtali, came bringing food on donkeys and on camels and on mules

and on oxen, abundant provisions of meal, cakes of figs, clusters of raisins, and wine and oil, oxen and sheep, for there was joy in Israel. Psalm 28, prayer for Help and Thanksgiving for It. A Psalm of David. as I cry to you for help, as I lift up my hands toward your most holy sanctuary. Take me not off with the wicked, with those who are workers of evil, who speak peace with their neighbors while mischief is in their hearts. Repay them according to their work and according to the evil of their deeds. Repay them according to the work of their hands. Render them their due

reward, because they do not regard the works of the Lord or the work of his hands. They will break them down and build them up no more. Blessed be the Lord, for he has heard the voice of my supplications. The Lord is my strength and my shield. In him my heart trusts. So I am helped, and my heart exalts, and with my song I give thanks to him. The Lord is the strength of his people. He is the saving refuge of his anointed. Oh, save your people and bless your heritage. Be their shepherd and carry them forever. Father in heaven, we give you praise and thank you so much. Lord God, we thank you for this day. We thank you for this season of our lives.

We thank you for guiding us and speaking to us for the last 127 days and shaping our eyes, our hearts, our minds by your word and by who you truly are, who you are calling us to be. We ask you to please fill us with the spirit of courage, fill us with a singleness of purpose, fill us with the wisdom to be able to know which actions to take and to know which actions to refrain from taking. We make this prayer in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Okay, here we go. Gosh, this is so good. Okay, so in 2 Samuel chapter 9, we have this young man named Mephibosheth. So Mephibosheth, right, we know who

that is. This is the grandson of King Saul. He is the son of Jonathan. And even just this chapter, chapter 9, starts off with David asking this really important question. Now, we just had, in 2 Samuel chapter 7, we just had David ask the question, what can I do for God, right? And he says, I want to build a temple. Here I am living in Jerusalem. I live in this really nice house, a house of cedar, and the ark of God is dwelling in a tent. So what can I do for God? I want to build him a temple. And of course, Nathan says, no, someone else is going to do that. So TBD on that one. But here in 2 Samuel chapter 9, David's asking the question, okay, what can I do? What kind of kindness, not can I show to the Lord, but what kind of kindness can I show to others right now? And he wants to honor the covenant that he made

with his blood brother, right? His covenantal brother, this friend of his, this deep friend of his, Jonathan. And so he asked, you know, are there any sons, any family of Jonathan left? And there's one son, Mephibosheth. And so if you remember that story, we kind of glossed, not glossed over it, but we just, we didn't touch on it a couple of weeks ago when we read the story where Mephibosheth with the family of Saul, family of Jonathan, they're all racing away and Mephibosheth's nurse dropped him and he became lame in both feet. So unable to walk well, he was hurting. And yet here's David who says, no, restore to him, restore to this young man, even though he is the

grandson of my enemy, he is the son of my blood brother. He's the son of my friend with whom I made this covenant. And so, you know, Mephibosheth would think that here is David. If this is going to be a dynasty, if Saul is going to have a dynasty at all, that would mean that Mephibosheth would be David's natural born, like literally born enemy. And yet David did not treat him like an enemy in the same way that David so often did not treat Saul like an enemy and definitely did not treat Jonathan like an enemy, but he treated him like a friend. In fact, he treated him like his own son. He said he would eat at the king's table as one of the king's sons. Now Mephibosheth would come before the King David with the notion that,

okay, here it is. This is the last day of my life on this planet because it makes sense. The new king would kill any descendant of the old king. David shows his wisdom here. He just shows so much wisdom and so much compassion. He shows the kindness of the Lord by saying, no, I do not want to do that. I want to destroy you. In fact, I want to elevate you and honor you. Now, I've heard people, other people talk about, here's David, you know, keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer. And that's what David is doing here with Mephibosheth, keeping him in his household, basically, and letting him be moved around and have some honor.

But, you know, keeping him under his thumb. But that doesn't strike me as David's MO, right? That's not his modus operandi. David's MO here is I'm going to honor King Saul because he was anointed. I'm going to honor Jonathan as my friend. And so, of course, I'm going to honor in a real way, not in a kind of duplicitous or manipulative way, this young man, Mephibosheth. Truly, scripture just seems to indicate that David's intention was to give honor or to give kindness. You know, as he says, is there anyone still left in the house of Saul that I may show him kindness for

Jonathan's sake? And this is the question we get to ask ourselves as well. Is there anyone around me right now that I can show kindness to for the Lord's sake? Now, last quick thing in 1 Chronicles chapter 12, with all these numbers, I get turned around. But in First Chronicles chapter 12, one of the things that we see is, of course, we're introduced to David's army and these continue, these mighty men of David. Now, this is his anointing. This is David's being made king. And in First Chronicles, it's kind of summing up the story, kind of remember if we talked about when we talked about Deuteronomy

and Exodus happening at the same time, where we have, sorry, Deuteronomy and Numbers happening at the same time, and Deuteronomy is looking back over the story and kind of giving a bird's eye view of this. First Chronicles is kind of giving us a little bit of a bird's eye view of the events that we heard just a couple days ago when it came to David being named king and David bringing together all of the tribes of Israel into one united kingdom, no longer a loose confederation of tribes, but actually a united kingdom. But it talks about these men who were part of David's army at Hebron. And if they have anything in common, they have in common

their bravery, their valor, they have in common their bravery, their valor, they have in common their singleness of purpose and their wisdom. Now, every one of them is described as being brave, right? They're all described as having valor. Their faces were like lions. They have character, right? But they're also wise. This is an interesting thing.

It says that of the tribes of Benjamin, it says, of the Benjaminites, the kinsmen of Saul, 3,000, of whom the majority had hitherto kept their allegiance to the house of Saul, it says, of the Benjaminites, the kinsmen of Saul, 3,000, of whom the majority had hitherto kept their allegiance to the house of Saul. And that makes sense. And you see how David would value that. Benjaminites, Saul was a Benjaminite. And David would value the fact that, no, these Benjaminites were hitherto faithful to the house of Saul because David also recognized the legitimacy of the house of Saul. And so it makes so much sense that David would not only notice this, but would honor that kind of thing. Later on in verse 32 in chapter 12, it also says, of Issachar, men who had understanding of the

times to know what Israel ought to do. Again, the same kind of thing. These men of wisdom, they're not only brave and have valor, they're men of wisdom. The men who had understanding of the times, meaning that the men of Issachar also were faithful to Saul while Saul was king. And now they're faithful to David while David is king. And again, keep that in mind that this isn't just someone shaving their own skin, at least not as is chronicled in first Chronicles. This are a people, the people of Issachar who have wisdom and they knew when Saul was king will be faithful to the king. When David's king will be faithful to the king. And that's so good.

Last little quality that these, these soldiers, these, this army had, not only were they brave and had valor, not only did they have wisdom, but they also had a single mindedness of purpose. It goes on. The scripture says here that they have this dedication and perseverance where they're able to focus in on, here is what my job is to do here. My job is to defend the king. My job is to defend and fight against those who are enemies of the people of Israel. And they had that singleness of purpose. Not only that, I guess the one last quality, they were very good at what they did, right? They were men of valor who were good with spear and shield. In fact, some of them

are described as being able to do a bow and arrow and a sling with both their left and their right, which is just pretty awesome. They can not only sling a stone with their right hands, but also with their left hands ambidextrous when it comes to battle, which you can see how that would be so, so incredibly important as they move forward and have to defend Israel against the Philistines and those other nations around them. So here we are on day 127 with 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles and just getting the story and getting the story of David, the king going, because the story of David, the king, going. Because the story of David the king is now going to unfold for the majority of the rest of 2 Samuel and the rest of 1 Chronicles

as we learn the story, hear the story of King David, and then in the story of King Solomon as we move forward on this journey through the Bible. You guys, oh my goodness, what an incredible gift it is to be able to journey with you. That's why I'm praying for you every day, because it is an honor. It's an honor to be part of this community, this Bible in a year community. I know that you're praying for each other, and that is massively important, because if we're not praying for each other, we just happen to be a bunch of people who are listening to one podcast on a regular basis. But this community is more than that. It is a community because we don't just listen to the same word, the word of God. We're also lifting each

other up before that same God, that God who loves everyone who's listening to these words. If you're these words right now, that means that God is reminding you of how much he loves you. And there are people in this world right now who are praying for you and you are not alone. I am praying for you. Please pray for me. My name is Father Mike. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless.