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In Christ, Mark
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Saul was told that David had gone to Keilah, and he said, "God has handed him over to me for David has imprisoned himself by entering a town with gates and bars." And Saul called up all his forces for battle to go down to Keilah to besiege David and his men.
When David learned that Saul was plotting against him, he said to Abiathar the priest, "Bring the ephod."
David said, "O Lord, God of Israel, Your servant has heard definitely that Saul plans to come to Keilah and destroy the town on account of me. Will the citizens of Keilah surrender me to him? Will Saul come down, as Your servant has heard? O Lord, God of Israel, tell Your servant."
And the Lord said, "He will."
Again David asked, "Will the citizens of Keilah surrender me and my men to Saul?"
And the Lord said, "They will."
So David and his men, about six hundred in number, left Keilah and kept moving from place to place.
When Saul was told that David had escaped from Keilah, he did not go there.
1 Samuel 23:7-13
This ends our reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
How many times do we wrongly assume things in life?
Too many, I’m afraid and I know I’ve made this mistake more times than I can remember…or want to.
Yes…assumptions can get us in trouble because we move forward with a false understanding on whatever matter we might be taking on…and more often than not, we find ourselves failing because we didn’t take the time to truly seek and find the real truth or right guidance before moving forward.
You see, assumptions are bad enough when we wrongly think we know what another person is thinking or wanting but they become even worse when we make assumptions about what God wants us to do without first consulting Him. The bottom line is that we’ll never truly know what God wants unless we ask Him and then submit to whatever He calls us to within whatever circumstances we might find ourselves in.
In today’s passage, we find a great contrast on the matter of assumption as we see in one case what we shouldn’t do…and in the other, what we should.
It should be of little surprise that we see Saul as the one who shows us what not to do, particularly in regard to failing to consult God. For Saul’s reputation for being self-absorbed proceeded him as we have already seen him consistently rely on his own understanding, even it led to failure time after time.
In these verses from 1 Samuel, chapter 23, we see where Saul is still after David, wishing for nothing less than finding and killing him. Such was the jealousy and hatred that burned within him.
You’ll remember that earlier in this chapter, David had rescued the people of Keilah against a Philistine attack after God assured him that He would hand the opposing forces over to him. We see where word of this battle traveled quickly, reaching Saul who hoped to find out David’s location and after hearing David was in Keilah, we see where Israel’s evil king made the mistake of assumption, saying:
“God has handed him over to me for David has imprisoned himself by entering a town with gates and bars."
And so feeling he had David right where he wanted him, Saul “called up all his forces for battle” and prepared to “go down to Keilah to besiege David and his men”.
We should note Saul’s serious error in judgment here for we never read where he ever consulted the Lord as to whether he should go to Keilah and attack David and his men. Perhaps, Saul had already made another assumption, an assumption that God would say, “No”, if he did ask Him, an answer that wouldn’t have been acceptable to him. Whatever his reasoning, we see where Saul makes the call to go after David and get rid of him once and for all.
Now, let’s look at the opposite of Saul in David…a man not only after God’s heart (1 Samuel 13:14) but a man who we see was after God’s guidance.
For the scriptures show us that Saul wasn’t the only one getting intelligence on the movement and whereabouts of opponents…David was as well. For we see that he “learned that Saul was plotting against him” and so he had Abiathar, the son of Ahimelech and David’s appointed priest, to bring him the ephod he brought from Nob.
As soon as he received this, David turned directly to the Lord for direction saying:
“O Lord, God of Israel, your servant has heard definitely that Saul plans to come to Keilah and destroy the town on account of me. Will the citizens of Keilah surrender me to him? Will Saul come down, as your servant has heard? O Lord, God of Israel, tell your servant."
Here, we see David showing how he knew the only right way to face his uncertain future was to turn to the One, the Lord, who knew what his future held. There was no one else could help him outside of God because no one else knew.
As Christians today, we need to keep this in mind as well as we deal with our own life circumstances. For just as with David, no one but the Lord knows what we are going through and what we will go through before it even happens. And what a blessing it is to know that when we do go to Him, we can always trust His advisement as truth because He never lies. It was this truth that David sought and that’s what he received as God let him know that Saul would indeed come after him.
So David knew that Saul was coming for him but there was one final thing he needed to know…whether he could trust the people of Keilah…the very people he had defended when fighting the Philistines.
We read where David goes to the Lord and asks whether or not the people of Keilah would surrender him and his men to Saul and sadly, the Lord revealed that they would. And so by seeking God for the truth, he (David) knew that he and his men were doomed to be betrayed and captured by Saul if they remained in Keilah. So they (David and his men…now numbering about six hundred) “left Keilah and kept moving from place to place” to keep from being discovered and attacked.
Meanwhile, Saul “was told that David had escaped from Keilah” and so he called off his attack and “did not go there”, leaving David and his men safe again…delivered to that place by the Lord.
So to sum things up…
Saul thought he knew the Lord’s will and was wrong because He didn’t ask for God’s counsel. His actions resulted in the negative results that we see mentioned in the following New Testament scripture passage in James:
What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. 4:1-3
When it came right down to it, Saul didn’t succeed because of the evil within him…a sinful murderous obsession with killing David that caused him to rely on himself and turn away from God’s wisdom. He didn’t get what he wanted because he didn’t ask the Lord and even if he did, I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have received the answer he wanted because he would have been communicating with God through the wrong motives…seeking to kill David to satisfy his jealousy.
Conversely, David knew exactly what needed to do as well as what was to come because he asked the Lord. He realized that God was the only genuine source of truth he had and he trusted Him explicitly. As a result, he was rewarded for his faithfulness when he and his men were spared from the hands of Saul and the people of Keilah, and able to flee to safety. David’s actions were supported by this passage from James:
If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does. 1:5-8
When it came right down to it, David believed in God and His ability to impart perfect direction in any and all circumstances…and in return, God granted him what he needed…just when he needed it.
So which of these two examples will we follow?
Will we decide to rely on ourselves and go through our days assuming what God wants us to do instead of asking Him so to ensure we’re carrying out His will fully?
Or will be like David, fully trusting and relying on God to guide and lead us through our circumstances, whatever they might be?
That decision really comes down to one more question…
How will we know what God’s will is for our lives unless we seek it from Him?
The truth is…we’ll never know unless we ask. Thankfully, our Lord is always waiting to hear from us and just a prayer away.
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.
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