2 Samuel Chapter 21:1-12

A lot of times we hear just a piece of the story and then we make our decision about what's going on. That's why, you know what, when we do marital counseling, both people have to be there. If we ever met with just one of them, they would come in and go, well, I'll tell you who the problem is. It's them. It's my husband. It's my wife. It's not me. You know, and then the other person comes in and go, well, I'll tell you who the problem is. It's the other person. It's not me.

But when we set them both down together, then it's more constructive. Welcome to Cross the Bridge with David McGee, senior pastor of The Bridge in Kernersville, North Carolina. Today, Pastor David's teaching through 2 Samuel chapter 21, and we have as our guest in the studio one of David McGee's associate pastors. Welcome, DA.

Hey, Bob. Excited about being here. Want to pray for a few cities in our listening audience today.

In Arkansas, we have Fort Smith, Huntsville, Jonesboro, Paragold, Paris, Pine Bluff, and in California, we have Barstow. Lord, thank you for these cities. We pray that many would tune in and listen to your word today. God, we pray for those who are sick and battling different ailments. We pray that you would please heal them for your glory. God, we pray that many will put their hope and trust in you for their salvation today. We pray for revival in these cities, that everyone would get excited about following you. And Lord, we pray for the churches and pastors in these areas, that they would stick to your word, look to what your word has to say, make application of it, and then others would be drawn to that as well as they follow you. In Jesus' name, amen. Thank you, DA. Appreciate your prayers for our listeners. As Pastor David teaches through this chapter, we're going to see a lot of battles and suffering that goes on, and yet even in those things, there are life lessons we can take out that are very encouraging to us. DA, can you share some of that with us? Hey, Bob. Today, we're going to learn about how God's Word teaches us not to make quick or rash judgments about anything, and especially about people who could really distort a situation and do much more harm than good.

That sounds good. So let's jump right in as David McGee continues teaching through 2 Samuel 21. Turn with me to 2 Samuel, chapter 21. We're looking at the life of David. We're beginning really to wrap up the life of David.

We've got a few chapters left with David, been through a lot of things, learned a lot of things. And as we get into chapter 21, let me point out something that's not obvious, but these last few chapters, they don't necessarily follow the timeline of the rest of the book. Up till now, 2 Samuel, 1 Samuel has been in sequence, okay, meaning, you know, one event after the other, and they're reported just as they happen. When we get to chapter 21, that changes. It's almost like there's kind of an appendix, if you will, that the author wanted to include a few more events and put them on the end of 2 Samuel. So let's understand that, because if you don't understand that, you look at this and you go, wow, well, this is happening right after this. Especially the first 14 verses, uh, go somewhat back into the early part of the reign of David and 15 through 22 go a little bit later into the, uh, to the reign of David.

So give you that background. 2 Samuel chapter 21 says, now there was a famine in the days of David for three years, year after year. And David inquired of the Lord and the Lord answered, it is because of Saul and his bloodthirsty house because he killed the Gibeonites. So the king called the Gibeonites and spoke to them. Now the Gibeonites were not of the children of Israel, but of the remnant of the Amorites and the children of Israel had sworn protection to them, but Saul had sought to kill them in his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah.

So let me remind you, and you can go back. You don't, we're not going to do it now, but if you want to go back, read Joshua chapter nine, what happens when they come into the land, the Gibeonites hear that, you know, the children of Israel are just awesome and powerful and they're defeating other armies and wiping people out. And the Gibeonites say, we need to go make a treaty with these guys. So they disguise themselves like they came from this really long journey and they come up to them and say, Hey, we want to have a treaty with you.

We're from really, really far away. And Joshua doesn't ask the Lord. He doesn't inquire of the Lord.

Doesn't seek the Lord. And he goes, okay, well, we'll have a treaty with you. Well, then he discovers that these are, these people are from right down the road and they deceived him, but Joshua does something very noble and a lot of integrity, even though they deceived him. Joshua says, you know what? I made this treaty. I'm going to honor my word.

I'm going to honor my word. Not even put Joshua in a difficult place because he was really supposed to get everybody out of Israel. And here we have these people much later in time causing all these problems.

Why? Because Joshua without inquire of the Lord had this treaty with him, but he did say, you know what? Here's, what's going to happen though. We're going to have a treaty with you, but you're actually going to serve the people of Israel and you become woodcutters and stuff and you can read it Joshua chapter nine.

So that's what happened. And so all throughout history, Israel had honored these treaties until they got to Saul and Saul and his zeal, it says sought to kill him. When you look at the life of Saul and of course, in, in looking at first Samuel, we took a very in-depth look at the life of Saul. It's interesting because here we have a guy who, you know, it seemed like at times he was zealous, but usually he was being, he was misdirected in his times of zeal. He would come up with these edicts and say, Hey, absolutely anybody who eats today in the middle of this battle, we're going to put them to death. He'd come up with these weird things. He was zealous at the wrong time. And he was not zealous when it was appropriate. When Samuel said, look, this is what I want you to do. And God has spoken to me.

I want you to do it in this way. Saul wouldn't listen to that. It wouldn't be zealous in those times, but he would be zealous in times that he shouldn't have been. Now it has nothing to do with anybody that's here tonight, but I'm just mentioning this.

No. Why? Because you understand we're often zealous in times we shouldn't be. Where are we zealous? I can tell you one place where every one of us is zealous when it comes usually to the sins of others. We're zealous. You shouldn't do that.

You shouldn't do that like that. Look at those people over at just wrong. Where are we not zealous when it has to do with our sins and our failures, then we're not as zealous. Zeal is a very, very good, it's a good thing, but it's like dynamite.

You know, it's a good thing, a very powerful thing when used correctly, but it can be disastrous when it's used incorrectly. Now the Bible talks about zeal in a couple of places. John chapter two, verse 16, 17 says, and he said to those who sold doves, take these things away.

Do not make my father's house, the house of merchandise. Then his disciples remembered that it was written zeal for your house has eaten me up. So Jesus obviously had a real problem there. They, they had something, they had like a cafe bookstore up with on the temple mount or something. I don't, I don't know about what was going on there, but, um, and they were selling doves and, and we've got the, um, that's, that wasn't the problem Jesus had was they were ripping people off the money changers. You had to get the shackles to go to the temple. People were, were ripping people off at those tables.

They're ripping them off as we, as they sold them the doves. And that's part of the reason Caiaphas got really upset about Jesus is Jesus was saying, this is all bad. And it says the zeal for your house has eaten me up zeal for going to church. It's awesome thing. It's a really good thing to be zealous, to be in the fellowship and to be in church. It's a good thing that you guys probably have friends and perhaps family that don't understand your zeal to go to church.

That's okay. Because at one time you were just like them. You, you, when you talk to somebody and they were going to church, like, man, didn't you, didn't you go to church like last week?

You going again? Is there something wrong with you, man? Is there, you know, it's a good thing to be zealous for God's house. What's something else the Bible says zealousness is good for Titus chapter two, verse 14 says, talking about Jesus says, who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for himself, his own special people, zealous for good works. So being zealous for good works, great thing.

That's an awesome thing. Being zealous for the house of God, being zealous for good works. There's a good thing.

A couple of other things. Galatians chapter four, verse 18 says, but it is good to be zealous in a good thing always. And not only when I'm present with you. So it's good to be zealous for a good thing. First Corinthians chapter 14, verse 12 says, even so you, since you are zealous for spiritual gifts, let it be for the edification of the church that you seek to excel. So zealous for spiritual gifts. Often when I'm praying for somebody, I'm praying for leadership. I pray that God will give them the gifts of wisdom and the gifts of knowledge so that we can help lead people and teach people and instruct people and counsel people. Why? Because we should be zealous for these spiritual gifts.

The Bible says that we should be, but zealous to destroy your enemies. It's not good. That's not good. Zealous to point out what's wrong with the other person. That's not good.

That's not good. We see Peter in the garden being real zealous when he pulled out the sword and cut the guy's ears off or his ear off. It's interesting that, you know, you understand, and it's a really interesting study if you ever, and as you read the gospel of John note, something Peter and John, there was like a healthy competition going on with them. The thing that I told you about the garden, understand Matthew doesn't mention who cut the guy's ear off. The gospel of Mark doesn't mention who cut the guy's ear off. The gospel of Luke doesn't mention who cut the guy's ear off.

The gospel of John tells us it was Peter. And not only that, it says that it was the guy's right ear. I don't know if you've thought about this. If I pull out a sword and I'm going to cut your ear off, I'm right-handed, which ear am I going to cut off? I'm going to cut off your left ear. This is just theory.

Peter may have been standing behind the guy and reached out with a sword and went as he was turned the other way. Just a theory, but I just want to toss that out there. That's not a good time necessarily to be zealous. Passion.

I'm using zeal. Some of you don't use zeal in your normal everyday speech. Passion would be another place. There's places that passion is good. Passion for the Lord. Passion to serve others. Passion for good works. Passion for the house of God.

Obviously there's places that passion is not good. Verse three. Therefore, David said to the Gibeonites, what shall I do for you? And with what shall I make atonement that you may bless the inheritance of the Lord. And the Gibeonites said to him, we will have no silver or gold from Saul or from his house, nor shall you kill any man in Israel for us. So he said, well, whatever you say, I will do for you.

Now this is interesting. Notice the question that David asked in verse three. And with what shall I make atonement? Atonement in the Hebrew kophir, to cover.

What shall I do to cover this wrong doing? The Gibeonites say, you know what? It's not silver or gold. Now this is, this is, this is interesting stuff. And we're going to kind of stair-step this, but they say, you know what?

Silver or gold is not going to do it. And then David opens himself up and says, whatever you say to do, that's what we're going to do. They continue verse five. Then they answered the King as for the man who consumed us and plotted against us, that we should be destroyed from remaining in any other territories of Israel. Let seven men of his descendants be delivered to us. And we will hang them before the Lord and Gibeah of Saul whom the Lord chose. And the King said, I will give them. Now at first glance, you look at this and go, that is really harsh. That is really, really cruel.

Let's back up. Saul wanted to wipe all of them out in retribution. They didn't say, okay, we want to wipe everybody in Saul's family out. They said, we want, we want seven people.

It could be that these seven people or the seven people were involved in these battles and maybe they took from the spoils of war. We don't understand. David says, what?

We'll make an atonement. And really, if you think about what the Gibeonites said, they said, silver won't do it. Money won't do it. In other words, riches won't do it. Finances won't do it.

Nothing of material value will do it. And then they say, what will do it? The blood of those people involved, which is consistent with the teaching in Deuteronomy. It talks about eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, life for a life. These men had murdered many of these Gibeonites and they're saying, you know what? We want justice and we want justice in the form of the blood of the relatives, which is kind of interesting because I have to wonder when I see that if they hadn't been very influenced over, you know, from Joshua to David's hundreds of years, if they hadn't been a fluent influence, the Gibeonites hadn't been influenced by Judaism and Jewish culture.

Why? Because there was the concept of the blood atonement. We're told in Leviticus chapter 17, verse 11, there's no covering of the sins without the shedding of blood. That's why it's so important to understand the Hebrew scriptures. So important to understand the Old Testament.

Why? Because if you can't understand the Old Testament, you cannot understand the New Testament. You cannot figure out what Calvary and the cross and Jesus is about till you understand that concept in Leviticus that somebody's blood has to be shed for the forgiveness of sins.

But there's actually even, even something deeper going on here. There's a Hebrew term. We talked about when we were going through the book of Ruth, there's a concept of it's called Goel, G-O-E-L, Goel. It means Kinsman Redeemer. There's a beautiful picture and we're not doing the book of Ruth tonight, so I'm not going to go into details on it, but there's a picture there when Boaz is redeeming that two things have to happen for Kinsman Redeemer. Number one, they have to be a willing participant in, in desiring to redeem somebody.

And then the second thing is they have to be related to them, have to be related to them. This is another picture of understand the Hebrew scripture. So you understand the New Testament. Why did Jesus come? Why was Jesus born of Mary? Because the Goel, the Kinsman Redeemer had to be related to us.

It's interesting. Jesus called himself son of man, 712 times. It was his favorite term for himself.

You think about that. He's the son of God. Why would he use the term son of man?

Because he wanted to be associated, related to us so that he could be the Goel, the Kinsman Redeemer. You're listening to Pastor David McGee on Cross the Bridge. He'll be back with more in just a moment. But first, if you haven't been to our website at crossthebridge.com yet, what are you waiting for? Go to crossthebridge.com to learn more about how listeners like you are helping get the life-changing truth of God's Word to more people through the radio, internet, and mobile technologies. At crossthebridge.com, you can also check out our broadcast schedule, listen to more teaching from Pastor David, and sign up for Pastor David's free daily devotional.

And there's more there too. So visit crossthebridge.com today. Something else I really like about the ministry is that there's a team of hundreds of people that will pray for somebody to be saved. You have a loved one that needs to know Jesus as Savior. You need people to pray for them. You need someone to present God's Word to them. Every day we're presenting God's Word to them here on Cross the Bridge with Pastor David McGee. We can pray for them as well just by simply going to crossthebridge.com and click on the Pray for the Lost button.

All you need to do is put in the first names of the people you love that need to know Jesus as Savior, click on submit, and immediately hundreds of people will begin praying for your lost loved ones. Now, here's Pastor David as he continues sharing verse by verse. Verse seven, but the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, because of the Lord's oath that was between them, between David and Jonathan, the son of Saul. So we remember that.

This chapter encapsulates so many different things from preceding chapters and preceding books. Mephibosheth was the son of Jonathan. Jonathan was the son of Saul. David made a pact with Jonathan.

He would look after him in his house forever. After Jonathan was killed, David inquired if there was anybody left of the house of Saul. He found Mephibosheth, and during the time somebody had ran with Mephibosheth, they had dropped him, he was lame, and he found a place at the table of David for the rest of his life. David looked after him. Now, we've talked about the fact that David is a picture of Jesus. There's a lot of parallels in there that David is a picture of Jesus and actually from the line of Judah from, you know, we see we see Jesus coming from the lineage of David on both sides as far as Mary, and then when you finally follow the genealogy, Joseph was not his father, God was his father, but also Joseph was of the line of David. So David is a picture of Jesus. Who is Mephibosheth a picture of?

Picture of us. And our inability to follow God, walk after God in our own human effort, and God in his graciousness allows us to sit at the king's table. But let's remember something. Saul was an enemy of David. David was not an enemy of Saul, but Saul was an enemy of David. David would have been within his rights to wipe out everybody in Saul's house because they could claim, and some of them did claim, to write to the kingship. So David would have been within his rights to eliminate Mephibosheth, but he didn't.

He didn't. Parallel in the New Testament, Jesus tells us to love our enemies and to pray for them, because he says, you know what? Even the Pharisees, they love people that love them.

That's easy, isn't it? Well, actually it's hard sometimes to love people that even love you. It's really difficult to love people that don't like you or hate you or speak ill of you. The life lesson here, be gracious, loving and kind to all people, even to our enemies or those connected with our enemies. Be gracious, loving and kind to all people, even to our enemies or those connected with our enemies. Now, the Bible paints a picture that people who follow Jesus are supposed to be filled with love, grace, and mercy. And through our lives and through what we do, people will be convicted of how they live. Now, sometimes we've got to use words to do that, but people ought to see the way that we live on a daily basis and think, you know what? I don't have what that person has.

I desire what they have. And part of that is being gracious and loving and kind, even when people are being ugly to us, you certainly see that in the life of Jesus. You see Jesus weeping over Jerusalem days before he used to be crucified in Jerusalem. You see Jesus hanging on the cross, asking the father to forgive them because they don't really understand what they're doing.

That is the kind of grace and mercy and love that we're to show the world, not to love the world as a, as a something outside of our spirituality and our following of Jesus, but to love the people, love the people. Verse eight. So the king took Armoni and Mephibosheth, the two sons of Rizpah, the daughter of Ai, whom she bore to Saul, and the five sons of Michal, the daughter of Saul, whom she brought up for Adriel, the son of Barzilliah, the Mahalithite.

Now, let me mention something. Michal didn't have any children. If you remember, when, when David was bringing the ark into Jerusalem and he was dancing and he was worshiping God and his wife, Michal, um, you know, sat up there and said, Oh, I can't believe you embarrassed yourself and just tried to rebuke David. And then we're told in that passage, second Samuel chapter six, verse 23 says, therefore Michal, the daughter of Saul had no children to the day of her death. These children were probably the children of Merab.

Merab was the daughter of Saul that Saul had promised to David when he killed all the Philistines and then Saul didn't carry through with his promise. Verse nine. And he delivered him into the hands of the Gibeonites and they hang them on the hill before the Lord. So they fell all seven together and were put to death in the days of harvest and the first days in the beginning of the barley harvest.

This seemed grizzly and harsh, but let's remember something. We don't even have half the story. We don't know what happened with Saul. We don't know what Saul was doing when he chased the Gibeonites. We don't know what all actions he took when he was trying to wipe them out. Now we can know that Saul did not inquire of the Lord before he did this with the Gibeonites.

Why? Because God's upset about it. If Saul had inquired of the Lord, God had said, no, don't do that. Joshua made a treaty with these people.

Leave them alone. So Saul didn't inquire of the Lord. He went and did what he wanted to do.

Then years later, his relatives are still paying for it. So we don't have the whole story. There's two words we get confused on. One is discernment and one is judgment. Discernment is looking at something and going, gee, I think that's of God or I think that's not of God. The Bible encourages us in discernment. The Bible discourages us in judgment. In judgment, we look at people and go, absolutely God would never have anything to do with that person. That's absolutely not God. They're never going to get saved.

There's just no hope in Jesus for them, et cetera, et cetera. That's a dangerous place. Why? Because we don't have all the information. We don't have all the information.

Who has all the information? God does. So who's the appropriate one to judge? God is.

Who's an inappropriate one to judge? We are because we don't have all the information. Let me ask you a quick, how many times have you heard something or read something or somebody, you know, told you something and you arrived to this snap decision in judgment about what the situation was and what the person was going and that whole thing. And then later he found out you were wrong. Somebody had given you misinformation.

Somebody give you faulty information or somebody had just left something out. And yet we made this decision in this vacuum. Most of the times we are ill-equipped for to pass judgment on people in situations. I've been in situations where I've talked to people in counseling and whatnot, and I get all the information and I say, Hey, you know what?

That is just simply wrong. You got to quit doing that because I've sat and I've got all the information, but that's one of the things we need to do is acquire the information. But you know what we usually do well immediately as we hear something, we make this rash judgment, next life lesson, never make rash judgments about anything or especially any one, never make rash judgments about anything or especially any one. I didn't say never make judgments. I didn't say never discern.

I said, never make rash judgments because what happens a lot of times we hear just a piece of the story and then we make our decision about what's going on. That's why, you know what, when we do marital counseling, both people have to be there because you know what we found out if we ever met with just one of them, they would come in and go, well, I'll tell you who the problem is. It's them. It's my husband. It's my wife. It's not me. You know, and then the other person comes in and go, well, I'll tell you who the problem is. It's the other person. It's not me. But when we set them both down together, then it's, it's more constructive. Don't make rash judgments.

Whenever you make a decision, get all the information you can and try to make the judgment prayerfully inquiring of the Lord. Again, it could have been that these people profited from the spoils of the battle. We don't know. Now Rizpah, the daughter of Ahad took sackcloth and spread it for herself on the rock from the beginning of harvest until the late rains poured on them from heaven. And she did not allow the birds of the air to rest on them by day nor the beast of the field by night. And David was told what Rizpah, the daughter of Ahad, the concubine of Saul had done. Then David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan, his son from the men of Jabesh Gilead, who had stolen them from the streets of Bet Shean where the Philistines had hung them up after the Philistines had struck down Saul and Gabola.

So again, time some pieces in. Saul, one of his first actions when he became king was go to the rescue of the men of Jabesh Gilead. These men, when Saul had been killed by the Philistines, they took him and they displayed Saul and his sons at Bet Shean. Bet Shean is still there. We visit it whenever we take trips to Israel. This is the place. We know it's the place. This is the place where Saul and his sons were displayed. So the men of Jabesh Gilead went and got Saul and his sons and brought them and buried them to honor them because he had come to the rescue. Friend, do you know for sure that your sins have been forgiven?

You can know right now. I want to lead you in a short simple prayer simply telling God you're sorry and asking him to help you to live for him. Please pray this prayer with me out loud right now. Dear Jesus, I believe you died for me that I could be forgiven and I believe you were raised from the dead that I could have a new life and I've done wrong things. I have sinned and I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things. Please give me the power to live for you all of my days. In Jesus' name.

Amen. Friend, if you prayed that prayer according to the Bible, you've been forgiven. You've been born again. So congratulations friend.

You just made the greatest decision that you will ever make. God bless you. If you pray that prayer with David for the first time, we'd love to hear from you. You can visit crossthebridge.com to receive our First Steps package with helpful resources to help you begin your walk with Christ.

Or you can write to Cross the Bridge at P.O. Box 12515, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, 27117, and share how God is working in your life. Well, DA, before we go, what are some ways that we can bless our listeners? Each day you can wake up with encouragement from Pastor David through the Word of God with his email devotional, life lessons to consider, a daily reading plan, and a thought to meditate on throughout your day from the heart of David McGee.

That sounds good, Pastor DA, and again, it's been great to have you with us on the program today. But tell us, what else can our listeners find on crossthebridge.com? If you're not able to make it to your home church this Sunday, why not join us for our live stream at 10 a.m. Eastern Time, or on Thursday nights at 7 p.m. Eastern Time? Just visit crossthebridge.com and click on our live stream link. There you'll experience a live service from Davis Home Church, The Bridge in North Carolina. Again, that website is crossthebridge.com.

Those are terrific, and it's easy and it's free. So folks, sign up today at crossthebridge.com. And thank you for listening. We hope you'll join us again next time as we continue studying verse by verse through Second Samuel.