1 Samuel 29

Hey, hey, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. This morning we are going to find out more about David and does he actually become a Philistine? He's gone to find refuge, trying to escape from Saul by living with the Philistines. David? David. Will he actually become a Philistine? Even fight against his own people?
I don't know. Let's have some coffee. We'll pray. Get into God's Word. Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for the blessing it is that we get to read your word. Thank you for giving us time together. Lord, we pray that as we read your word, you would help us to understand it. In Jesus' name, amen. All right. 1 Samuel, chapter 29. We're just going to go paragraph by paragraph. Go ahead.
Then the Philistines gathered together all the armies of, I want to say Apec. Apec. and the Israelites encamped by a fountain, which is in Israel. And hundreds... And the lords? And the lords of the Philistines passed in my view by hundreds and by thousands. But David and his men passed in my view at the rear with Achish. Then the Philistines said, what are these Hebrews doing here? And Akish said to the princes of the Philistines, Is this not David, the servant of Saul, king of Israel, who has been with me these days or these years?
And to this day I have found no fault in him, since he defected to me. But the prince of the Philistines was angry with him. So the princes of the Philistines said to him, make this fellow a term that he may go back to his place which you have appointed for him. And do not let him go down with us to battle, lest in the battle he become our adversary, for with what could he reconcile himself to his master, if not with the heads of these men? Is this not David, of whom they sang to one another in dances? Saul has slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands. Then Achish called David and said to him, Surely, as Jehovah lives, you have been upright, and your going out and your coming in with me in the army is good in my sight.
For to this day I have not found evil in you since the day of your coming to me. Nevertheless, the lords do not favor you. Therefore, return now and go in peace that you may not displease the lords of the Philistines. So David said to Akish, But what have I done? And to this day, what have you found in? So as long as I have been with you that I may not go and fight against the enemies of my lord, the king. Then Akish answered and said to David, I know that you are as good in my sight as an angel of God.
Nevertheless, the princes of the Philistines have said, he shall not go up to us or he shall not go up with us to the battle. Now, therefore, rise in the morning with your master's servants who have come with you. And as soon as you are up early in the morning and have light, depart. So David and his men rose early to depart in the morning to return to the land of the Philistines. And the Philistines went up to Jezreel. So we need to ask ourselves, A, what is this about? B, what's the... Beth, what's this about? And what do we C, called to do? Right, so what's this about?
This is about David, the Philistines are marching on Israel, and David's in the back of the line of the army. And the Philistines are like, what, what? Something's not adding up here. I don't like this. So he's like, okay, let's get him out of here. Cause like, he starts attacking us. There's been some things said about this guy. And then like, imagine we have Israelites coming this way and this guy behind us, like what? We might not have a good chance here. So let's just like send him back. Yeah. Right.
So they're, they're worried that they know that he's fleeing from Saul. And so he's defected, right? And so they're worried about, well, if he goes into battle, how is he able to prove his loyalty to Saul? Kill the Philistines. And so they're like, no, no, no. He may be faithful with you, right? And so the enemy of our enemy just happens to be your friend, but don't mean we trust him. That's why Akish brought him, was willing to shelter him and stuff like that. I was like, well, he's obnoxious to Saul now, so I'm going to keep him alive.
So there's political maneuvering going on here. So you imagine the whole army marching in front of the princes in this parade almost. So they're able to inspect all the troops and see if they're ready. And the princes, there's five main cities of the Philistines. And so the princes of the cities are watching and they're like, whoa, stop the parade. Who's that? What are those Hebrews? We're gonna war against the Hebrews. What are Hebrews doing?
And that's when Akish is like, oh, he's my dude. He's good. Don't worry about him. And so he says, here comes David. What is David's response? He's like, hey, you got to go home. What? What have I done? He's like, no, no, no. You're good. You're good. You're like an angel from God to me. You're good. Don't worry about it. But the other guys, they don't like you too much. Just go home. It'll be OK. So he goes home, and it says he... That's it. He departed in the morning, returned to the land of the Philistines, and the Philistines went up to Jezreel. Section two. All right.
So, give me, in one sentence, what would you say this is about? Um... We are about to see who's... what... who's... see David, actually. Well, I don't. We didn't actually get to see that because he was saying back home. No. OK, so I might say if I was to summarize this.
God spares David from a. Precarious situation with the Philistines and Hebrews at war. That's a long sentence, but the point is, right? I mean, literally, they were ready to actually join the army and go to battle. Now, it doesn't tell us what David's intent was or not with this, right? But David is finding himself like, I got to keep me and my men alive. What do we do? And think about that, they're Hebrews, they're Israelites, and they're about to, they're in the marching line to go kill other Israelites.
Could David have ever come back from that as a king? Imagine what that would have done to his reputation forever. It wouldn't be a very good reputation. Yeah, so maybe the Philistines were onto something here. David's reputation precedes him. They know that he was Saul's right-hand man and now he's disgraced and defected. Maybe they already know. I don't know if they do or not, but maybe they know that he's the next messiah.
Or they can just tell like, this is not a good idea. Yeah. Sometimes people can just use logic. They're like, well, I love the part where they're like, isn't this the guy who like, they were saying like Saul killed thousands, but this guy killed ten thousands. And the thing is they killed his tens of thousands. Is David killing Philistines? Yeah, kind of like that seems a little odd to me. Exactly. All right. So what's your Sikh calling? Are you going to go join the the Royal Guard in Iran and go fight for them because you're going to flee from me? No. No? What are you called to do?
Part of me wants to say that part of me wants to like, look at this like, God can use things that seem long or odd to fulfill his purposes. And that's, and so like, kind of like we Every time, like, we might do something that we're not supposed to. David probably wasn't supposed to do this, but even if he did, God would have used it in a way that would fulfill his promise. Oh, okay, so you could just do whatever you want in sin and God's gonna use it for his good?
Yeah, but that doesn't, for Christians, that would be, it's not showing repentance. May it never be. then it's kind of showing that you really don't care. Paul and Romans would essentially, his answer to a question like that I just gave would be, God forbid. No, may it never be. Don't even let that idea come to your mind. The point is God can do this. It doesn't mean that that's what we should do. Just, oh, I can sin because grace will abound. No. He still hates it and yet we know that God does amazing things.
So yeah, there's all sorts of parts in David's life and these stories that you're like, man, what in the world is going on? How could this ever be possibly for good? And yet, God or the spirit of Samuel has just told Saul he's going to die in the battle. And the kingdom is going to be ripped from him.
And so, right? God is fulfilling his purpose even here. So yeah, there's a certain amount that even when there's horrible atrocities and moral ambiguity, there's a certain comfort that we can have. And that's a faith, right? Trusting that I don't know everything going on here. And I don't think this was easy for David or anybody else in these situations. And yet they can so trust the Lord.
God, we thank you for giving us Jesus Christ, the only person in all of the Bible that we can look at and not have questions with moral ambiguity. Lord, we thank you for giving us a perfect Messiah and King, one even better than David. We thank you that in our lives We can trust you even when there are horrible and hard things that make us scratch our heads. But please let us trust you and love you in Jesus' name. Amen. May God bless you. May you walk in the peace, comfort, and joy of Jesus Christ. We'll see you next time. Bye.