Sunday Sermonette: Soldier of Fortune

The story now takes a very weird turn. Although Saul has pledged twice not to kill David, David doesn ' t believe him. So he takes his 600 men and -- ready for it -- goes over to the Philistines. And he starts committing random acts of genocide for the Philistine king. Among the people he massacres are the Amelekites, which is hard to explain since, as you may recall, Saul exterminated them just a few years ago in Chapter 15. In fact, it was Saul ' s failure to also kill the Amalekite king, along with a few animals, that cost him God ' s favor. Samuel cleaned up and took care of killing the king and the animals. But here they are again. In any case, we know what the Bible has to say about the sanctity of human life.27 But David thought to himself, “One of these days I will be destroyed by the hand of Saul. The best thing I can do is to escape to the land of the Philistines. Then Saul will give up searching for me anywhere in Israel, and I will slip out of his hand.”2 So David and the six hundred men with him left and went over to Achish son of Maok king of Gath.3 David and his men settled in Gath with Achish. Each man had his family with him, and David had his two wives: Ahinoam of Jezreel and Abigail of Carmel, the widow of Nabal.4 When Saul was told that David had fled to Gath, he no longer searched for him.5 Then David said to Achish, “If I have found favor in your eyes, let a place be assigned to me in one of the country towns, that I may li...
Source: Stayin' Alive - Category: American Health Source Type: blogs