Free Daily Bible Study Podcast

2 Samuel 1 | 1 Corinthians 12 | Ezekiel 10 | Psalm 49

In the opening of 2 Samuel, David learns about the deaths of Saul and Jonathan—a scene that teaches us important principles about the nature of Yahweh’s anointing of his kings. In 1 Samuel 31, we read that Saul had fallen on his own sword to end his life after being wounded (1 Sam. 31:4–6), but here in 2 Samuel 1, we learn a bit more of the story.

Apparently, Saul’s attempt at suicide was not successful, so he pleaded with an Amalekite to finish him. The Amalekite judged that Saul was correct about the impossibility of surviving, so he killed Saul, took Saul’s crown, and promptly went to report what had happened to David (2 Sam. 1:6–11). Now, remember that David had refused twice to kill Saul in 1 Samuel 24 and 26 (despite the fact that Saul was actually trying to kill him), so this news does not please David. Instead, he orders that the Amalekite be executed for putting his hand against Yahweh’s anointed (2 Sam. 1:14–16).

David’s response to the deaths of Saul and Jonathan is significant in two ways. First, David demonstrates again that he values Yahweh’s anointed king more than he does his own life. Saul represented a serious, unrelenting threat to David’s life and yet we see David writing a lament for Saul in 2 Samuel 1:17–27 rather than breathing a sigh of relief. David understood first and foremost that Saul was king because Yahweh had anointed him, which meant that David owed Saul boundless loyalty.

Second, David’s action to execute the Amalekite signals both his commitment to justice and his shift toward becoming the king. God had commanded in his covenant with Noah that anyone who sheds the blood of another human being must be put to death (Gen. 9:6)—and beyond the sin of murder, this Amalekite had murdered the man whom Yahweh had anointed as king. For David to order the Amalekite’s execution, then, was his first act as king, since God calls the state, not individuals, to judge criminals.

These two principles set up the theological foundations of 2 Samuel. If the entire book of Judges was an extended argument on why Israel needs a king, and if 1 Samuel demonstrated that Israel needed a specific kind of king—that is, a king after God’s own heart—2 Samuel will give us a much fuller picture of what Yahweh’s anointed king should look like.

This doesn’t mean that David will be perfect. In fact, we will read in 2 Samuel that David has serious, horrific flaws. But as we study the anointed kingship of David, we will learn more about what God’s ultimate anointed king, the Lord Jesus Christ, will look like—not only in the ways that he must resemble David, but in the ways that he must exceed David as well.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

1 Samuel 31 | 1 Corinthians 11 | Ezekiel 9 | Psalm 48

In 1 Samuel 31, we read about the death of Saul, Israel’s first king. While Saul was troubled from almost the very beginning of his reign, this passage is not written to demonize Saul but to underscore the tragedy of his life. Saul had so much promise initially, but his heart did not follow after Yahweh’s, causing him to rebel against Yahweh with deliberate disobedience—and ultimately, causing Yahweh to rip away the kingdom of Israel from him.

To begin, we should acknowledge the touching gesture of the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead, whose valiant men, when they heard about how the Philistines had desecrated the body of Saul, “arose and went all night and took the body of Saul and the bodies of his sons from the wall of Beth-shan, and they came to Jabesh and burned them there. And they took their bones and buried them under the tamarisk tree in Jabesh and fasted seven days” (1 Sam. 31:12–13). Back in 1 Samuel 11, Saul had summoned all Israel to come to the defense of Jabesh-gilead when they were under siege from the Ammonites. This act of valor to reclaim Saul’s body, then, is a fitting tribute to the memory of what Saul had done for them. But more than that, this story keeps us from forgetting the positive aspects of Saul’s reign.

And yet, we should also remember that the consequences for Saul’s sin were severe, as illustrated by the death of Jonathan in 1 Samuel 31:2. Jonathan knew that he would never be king, since Yahweh had anointed David as king. He did not, however, attempt to take the situation into his own hands by harming David in order to preserve the throne for himself; rather, he rejoiced in the hope that he might sit beside David (1 Sam. 23:17). Instead, Jonathan becomes a casualty of Saul’s disobedience.

In Saul’s life—as in the lives of many of the rest of the kings of Israel—we read a somber warning to persevere. There are so many kings who start off well only to make shipwreck of their faith to varying degrees. All of them, however, force us to remember that there is still much of the battle left to be fought until we come into our eternal inheritance. It is critical that we not allow the actions at the ends of our lives to betray the positive ways in which we began our lives.

Brothers and sisters, let us heed the warning of Saul and keep going. Jesus is worth it. Let us fix our eyes on the prize of gaining Christ on the last day, for he is infinitely better than the weak, corrupt pleasures this world offers us in exchange for the glory of Christ.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

1 Samuel 29–30 | 1 Corinthians 10 | Ezekiel 8 | Psalms 46–47

The narrative of 1 Samuel 30 describes to us the final trial David must undergo as the leader of an underground movement before he becomes the king of Israel. Although Saul has wanted to kill David for quite some time, David has never before faced threats to his life from those around him. But in 1 Samuel 30, David faces persecution even from those who had sought his protection in the wilderness.

In 1 Samuel 29, David is expelled from the Philistines, who had given David refuge in his exile from Saul. If David had gone off to battle, he and his men would not have discovered that the Amalekites had plundered their camp, taking their wives and children captive. But because the Philistines rejected David, he and his men have enough time to pursue the Amalekites and rescue their families.

As we look back on our study of David up to this point, it is clear that God ordained a long period of preparation—that is, a long period of suffering—for David before installing him as king. But perhaps none of the trials were as devastating as this betrayal. We read in 1 Samuel 30:6 that “David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him, because all the people were bitter in soul, each for his sons and daughters. But David strengthened himself in the LORD his God.” In their despair, the people closest to David, those whom David had defended with his life, are now considering whether to stone him!

It is always this way with the leaders of God’s people. The people of Israel were ready to stone Moses (Ex. 17:4), and Jesus pointed out how the people in the capital city of Jerusalem—not in some pagan city in a foreign nation—killed God’s prophets and stoned those sent to it (Matt. 23:37). Ultimately, when Jesus entered this world, he came to be persecuted. His mission was to be betrayed by one of his disciples, despised, mocked, beaten, spit upon, and finally executed on the cross—and all so that he could receive his kingdom from the hand of his Father. The way of the cross is the path by which God prepares his people for glory.

Persecution and suffering, then, are unavoidable components of how God forges his leaders. We have hope, however, in knowing that God is actually accomplishing something real and important through even our most painful suffering. As Paul writes, “For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison” (2 Cor. 4:17). How, then, do you face the suffering in your own life? Do you, like David, “strengthen yourself in Yahweh your God,” or do you seek to rid yourself of suffering by any means possible? What might God be seeking to accomplish through the trials he sends to you?

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

1 Samuel 28 | 1 Corinthians 9 | Ezekiel 7 | Psalm 45

In 1 Samuel 28, we find one of the most vivid scenes from all the Bible. Saul, at the end of his rope, visits a medium to get advice on how to salvage his kingdom. Specifically, he asks the medium to call up Samuel from the dead in hopes that the prophet can give him some piece of useful knowledge from beyond the grave.

One of the main questions surrounding this passage is whether we are actually seeing Samuel or whether this is a demon impersonating Samuel. Everything in this passage suggests that this is indeed Samuel, especially in the fact that Samuel reiterates what he has already spoken to Saul and in the fact that he correctly prophesies that Saul would die with his sons the following day.

There is no doubt that this is an extraordinary circumstance to bring up Samuel from the dead to prophesy to Saul, but we should note that this experience doesn’t really do Saul any good. Saul’s problem is that he wants the kind of knowledge he can wield like a weapon—some insight that will allow him to navigate his life and come out on the other side with success, wealth, fame, and glory.

But that isn’t why God gives us his word. God gives us his word to teach us that he alone is God and that we have no hope outside of him. Saul, however, has had a habit of disobeying the word of Yahweh from early in his reign as king, especially at two critical points: first by offering a sacrifice rather than waiting for Samuel (1 Sam. 13) and second by failing to devote all of the Amalekites to destruction as God had commanded (1 Sam. 15).

Even now, Saul doesn’t repent and seek God’s forgiveness, because he doesn’t really care what God is saying through Samuel. Part of the function of this story is to demonstrate the perfect justice of God in tearing the kingdom away from Saul, because we see that Saul does not have any desire to repent from his sins, to seek God’s forgiveness, or to keep God’s commandments, even when God brings back a prophet from the dead.

Here is the question that faces us from this passage: Do we actually want to hear what God has to say? If so, we will devote ourselves to studying his word, because that is what he has spoken to us. Our desire to hear some additional word from the Lord isn’t a sign of our devotion—it’s a sign of the hardness of our hearts, showing that we are willing to do anything to benefit ourselves apart from listening to God’s word.

So, let us keep striving to love God’s word, and let us repent from any time that we, like Saul, seek out knowledge for our own personal benefit and not for God’s glory in Jesus Christ.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

1 Samuel 27 | 1 Corinthians 8 | Ezekiel 6 | Psalm 44

David’s stay with the Philistines from 1 Samuel 21 until now is one of the stranger storylines in the narrative of 1 Samuel. It is strange that the Philistines would have even allowed David to stay in their midst at all—and remember that David had pretended to be insane in order to seek asylum among them (1 Sam. 21:13)—but it is stranger still that the anointed king after Yahweh’s own heart must spend all this time among the uncircumcised Philistines. Nevertheless, we learn two important principles from this story.

First, David stays with the Philistines out of necessity to preserve his life (1 Sam. 27:1). It would have been far easier for David simply to murder Saul when he had the opportunities to do so in 1 Samuel 24 and 26. Yet, because David chose what was faithful instead of what was easy, he remained in an awkward living arrangement with his sworn enemies.

Many times, we find ourselves in difficult situations not because of any disobedience in our lives but rather because of faithfulness to follow Jesus wherever he might lead us. So, we might support our families through an unfulfilling job, or we might remain in a joyless marriage. In those cases, the easy thing to do would be to walk away and start over somewhere completely different, and yet faithfulness requires us to stay where God has placed us. Be encouraged to press on as you read this chapter from David’s story.

Second, David redeemed his time for the sake of the kingdom of God. Despite the fact that David could not reign openly as king, he nevertheless took every opportunity to do what he would be doing as king anyway—driving the Philistines out of the land of Canaan that Yahweh had given Israel as an inheritance (1 Sam. 27:8–12).

In our own situations, we may find it frustrating that God has put us in ordinary—and perhaps even boring—circumstances rather than in positions of great influence. We would do well to remember, though, the example of our Lord Jesus. The crown prince of heaven chose to enter this world in poverty, and he labored thirty years in obscurity as a common tradesman. But, like David, Jesus was faithful in the small things he received.

In what way is God calling you to faithfulness rather than the easy way out of your circumstances? Remember the promise of the gospel in the challenging places of your life: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Rom. 8:28). In Christ, God has a purpose for your life, and even when specific situations you face are not good in themselves, God will nevertheless work all things together for your good and for the glory of Jesus Christ and his kingdom.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

1 Samuel 26 | 1 Corinthians 7 | Ezekiel 5 | Psalms 42–43

In 1 Samuel 24, David had his first opportunity to strike down Saul when Saul relieved himself in the cave where David had been hiding. There, David refused to reach out his hand against Saul, since Saul was Yahweh’s anointed king (1 Sam. 24:6). Here again in 1 Samuel 26, David does not take the opportunity to strike down Saul while Saul and his men are under a deep sleep from Yahweh (1 Sam. 26:12). In today’s meditation, we will consider these stories not from David’s perspective but from Saul’s.

First, David’s mercy toward Saul brings Saul to sorrowful repentance in both stories as he considers David’s righteousness in light of his own unrighteousness. So, in 1 Samuel 24:17, Saul freely confessed to David, “You are more righteous than I, for you have repaid me good, whereas I have repaid you evil.” Then, in today’s reading, Saul confesses again, “I have sinned….Behold, I have acted foolishly, and have made a great mistake” (1 Sam. 26:21). David continues to fear that Saul might seek to kill him (1 Sam. 27:1), but Saul never again seeks an opportunity against David (cf. 1 Sam. 27:4).

Second, these two events confirm Saul’s deepest fears: that David would become king over Israel. In 1 Samuel 24:20, Saul had said, “And now, behold, I know that you shall surely be king, and that the kingdom of Israel shall be established in your hand.” Now, in 1 Samuel 26:25, Saul says, “Blessed be you, my son David! You will do many things and will succeed in them.” Rather than despairing, Saul asks David to swear that he will not destroy the rest of Saul’s offspring when he takes the throne: “Swear to me therefore by the LORD that you will not cut off my offspring after me, and that you will not destroy my name out of my father’s house” (1 Sam. 24:21).

The tragedy here is that, while Saul has knowledge of the fact that Yahweh has chosen David as king, and while Saul gives intellectual assent to that idea, he continues to rebel against Yahweh and Yahweh’s anointed. Theologians have helpfully explained that saving faith requires more than knowledge and intellectual assent, but also trust.1 In other words, it is not enough to know and to assent to the idea that Jesus came to save sinners in general; I must actually trust that Jesus came to save me. Without trust, a person’s faith is not saving faith.

Do you know the gospel and assent to its truths intellectually? If so, do you also trust that Jesus Christ came, lived, died, and rose from the dead for you? Do not follow in the faithless footsteps of Saul—believe trustingly on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved (Acts 16:31).

1 In Latin, notitia (knowledge), assensus (assent), and fiducia (trust). See, e.g., R. C. Sproul, “3 Distinctive Aspects of Biblical Faith,” July 31, 2013, http://www.ligonier.org/blog/what-faith/. Accessed July 20, 2015.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

1 Samuel 25 | 1 Corinthians 6 | Ezekiel 4 | Psalms 40–41

At the beginning of 1 Samuel 25, the great prophet Samuel dies, an event the biblical author records with characteristic understatement, using just one verse (1 Sam. 25:1). Once again, God buries a workman and carries on his work. The death of Samuel also, however, provides a backdrop to the story of Nabal, Abigail, and David in the rest of 1 Samuel 25. The interesting correlation of these stories arises in that just as Israel’s last judge dies, we meet a man named Nabal, who perfectly represents the foolishness of Israel during the former period of the judges, doing whatever is right in his own eyes (Judg. 21:25). Despite the fact that David had protected Nabal’s shepherds in the wilderness (1 Sam. 25:7), Nabal would not share with David and his men provisions for the feast day that had arrived (1 Sam. 25:9–11). The contrast between Nabal and the priests of Nob is striking—where the priests of Nob generously gave David the only thing they had (holy bread), Nabal will not spare even the smallest amount of his vast wealth (1 Sam. 25:2) in return for the service David provided his shepherds.

But while Nabal unsurprisingly looks foolish—his very name means “fool” (1 Sam. 25:25)—what is surprising is that David isn’t the hero of this story either. David becomes understandably outraged at the disrespect that Nabal had paid him, but he overreacts by commanding his men to strap on their swords (1 Sam. 25:14) with the intent of wiping out every male in Nabal’s midst (1 Sam. 25:34).

Instead, the heroine of the story is Nabal’s wife, Abigail. After hearing what her foolish husband had done, Abigail rushes out to meet David and his men, bows down before David, and begs David to place all the guilt on her despite her complete innocence in the matter (1 Sam. 25:24). In response, David praises her discretion for preventing him from incurring bloodguilt by avenging himself (1 Sam. 25:33), and when Yahweh later strikes Nabal dead (1 Sam. 25:38), David eventually takes Abigail to be his wife (1 Sam. 25:42).

Although David is the king after God’s own heart—from whose line God would raise up his own Son to reign as king over Israel forever—David nevertheless has flaws. In this story, we see a shadow of the greater Son of David not in David himself but in Abigail, who takes upon herself Nabal’s guilt despite her own perfect innocence. Abigail, then, not only foreshadows how Jesus would go to the cross for our guilt but she also demonstrates how we might seek peaceful resolution to conflicts, even when we are not the ones at fault.

Remember the words of Jesus: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (Matt. 5:9).

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

1 Samuel 24 | 1 Corinthians 5 | Ezekiel 3 | Psalm 39

David has two opportunities to strike down Saul stealthily, and in 1 Samuel 24, we read about the first of those two opportunities. Here, Saul enters a cave to relieve himself, but he chooses the very cave where David and his men are hiding from him (1 Sam. 24:3). As Saul does his business, David’s men prompt him to kill Saul, but David refuses to do as they say, and David’s actions here are helpful as we strategize how to fight our own temptations to sin.

Most importantly, David refuses to listen to justifications for sin by recognizing that they are merely half-truths. David’s men quote him Yahweh’s own promises to David, urging him to kill Saul by saying, “Here is the day of which the LORD said to you, ‘Behold, I will give your enemy into your hand, and you shall do to him as it shall seem good to you’” (1 Sam. 24:4). Certainly, Yahweh had given David’s enemies into his hand again and again, but David knows that Saul is still the rightful king of Israel. Yes, David had been anointed as the next king of Israel (1 Sam. 16:13), but Saul had also been anointed: “The LORD forbid that I should do this thing to my lord, the LORD’s anointed, to put out my hand against him, seeing he is the LORD’s anointed” (1 Sam. 24:6). Even something as innocent as cutting off a corner of Saul’s robe strikes David’s conscience afterward, since it represents an attack on Yahweh’s anointed one (1 Sam. 24:5).

Similarly, we can appropriate David’s logic to fight temptations to mistreat other people when we remember that they are created in the image of God. David fought his own temptations by preaching to himself the reality that Saul was the anointed king of Israel, so to sin against Saul would be to sin against the one who had anointed him—Yahweh himself. When we sin against other people, we also sin against Yahweh, the one who made those people in his own image.

Remarkably, God uses David’s mercy to bring Saul to repentance—not a lasting repentance, as we will see, but nevertheless Saul acknowledges his own sin here and praises David’s righteousness in sparing his life (1 Sam. 24:16–22). In the same way, we should remember the way that God brought us to repentance—not through threats and vengeance, but through mercy, as Jesus Christ came not to kill but to be killed in our place for our sin—so that we might become the righteousness of God. For this reason, Paul urges us not to be quarrelsome but kind and gentle to the people who persecute us in the hopes that “God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth” (2 Tim. 2:25).

How might you love your enemies better?

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

1 Samuel 23 | 1 Corinthians 4 | Ezekiel 2 | Psalm 38

In the interactions of David, Saul, and Jonathan, 1 Samuel 23 teaches us much about the nature of true kingship. We learn here what God’s true king should look like—and what it would look like for us to identify with that king covenantally.

David, for his part, has committed himself to protecting the people of Israel from their enemies, regardless of the cost to himself. When David hears that the Philistines have attacked the people of the city of Keilah, he urgently inquires of Yahweh, and Yahweh sends him immediately to their defense (1 Sam. 23:1–5). David is doing what the king of Israel should do by intervening without hesitation as a mighty warrior in defense of his people.

Nevertheless, this act is not without danger for David—and not merely danger from the Philistines with whom he is battling. Once Saul finds out David has come to Keilah, Saul sets out to kill him. David inquires again of Yahweh and learns that the people of Keilah will hand him over to Saul, regardless of the fact that he has just saved their lives (1 Sam. 23:10–12). The rest of 1 Samuel, until the point that Saul dies, is summarized in 1 Samuel 23:14: “And Saul sought him every day, but God did not give him into his hand.”

In this light, it is interesting to read Jonathan’s understanding of his relationship to David. Jonathan knows that he will not be king and that David will be king, despite the fact that Jonathan is the current prince of Israel. In this thought, Jonathan takes joy, saying to David, “You shall be king over Israel, and I shall be next to you” (1 Sam. 23:17). Where Jonathan’s father sees David’s kingship as a threat, Jonathan sees David’s kingship as his hope and his joy, so he enters into a covenant with David yet again (1 Sam. 23:18).

In this story, a picture of Jesus is emerging. Jesus, like David, was the rightful king of Israel, but his own people did not receive him (John 1:11)—and more than that, his own people handed him over to be crucified according to the prompting of the religious leaders, who wanted to cling to their power and influence in Israel. We, then, are called to follow in the footsteps of Jonathan, so we must renounce any claim to the thrones of our lives—Jesus must increase, and we must decrease (John 3:30). Let us put our old, sinful desires to death, so that we may embrace Jesus as king through faith in the covenant he made with his broken body and shed blood.

And in this, we find our hope: if we endure with Jesus in the suffering we face in this life, we will most assuredly also reign with him through eternity (2 Tim. 2:12).

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

1 Samuel 21–22 | 1 Corinthians 3 | Ezekiel 1 | Psalm 37

In 1 Samuel 21–22, David is at the center of three major ethical dilemmas. First, David lies to the priests at Nob (1 Sam. 21:2), and second, David lies to Achish the king of Gath by pretending to be insane (1 Sam. 21:13). Third, David eats the bread of the Presence, which is forbidden for non-priests (1 Sam. 21:4–6). As it happens, Jesus himself specifically addresses the third dilemma, and by studying Jesus’ words, we find help for evaluating the first and second dilemmas.

Intriguingly, Jesus commends David for eating the bread of the Presence, citing this story to defend his own disciples when they were hungry enough to pluck heads of grain on the Sabbath (Matt. 12:1–8; Mark 2:23–28; Luke 6:1–5). Jesus insists that the laws protecting the holy bread have a lower priority than the laws protecting human beings. So, if someone is hungry, it is right to give that person bread, even if the only bread available is holy bread.

This insight helps us to understand David’s lies better, since both of David’s lies protect the people with him from Saul’s murderous wrath. The ninth commandment is not “You shall not lie” but rather “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor” (Ex. 20:16). Accordingly, we see Israel’s midwives in Egypt commended by God himself for lying to protect the male Hebrew children (Ex. 1:18–21), and we see Rahab saved by lying to protect the Israelite spies (Josh. 2:2–5, 14). David himself here does not repent from lying to the priests of Nob, but he does lament that his presence had caused their deaths (1 Sam. 22:22).

The principle seems to be that God’s people have an obligation, first and foremost, to protect the lives of innocent people. So, for example, we should applaud the people who protected Jews in Nazi Germany, even though they had to lie to do so. At the same time, we should never feel justified in telling white lies for convenience, or in telling lies to protect ourselves from trouble—and especially from trouble that arises from our own sin.

Ultimately, this means that our lives should be characterized by love for others—not by a concern for self-preservation or comfort—and our words ought to reflect that love. That is, we ought to protect our neighbors with our words, at a minimum by refraining from bearing false witness against them—but more so by self-sacrificial compassion. Remember that even when Jesus could have used his words to protect himself from the cross, he refused to do so in order to lay down his life for us. There are times to protect and times to suffer, and we need God’s word and God’s Spirit to give us the wisdom to know the difference.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.