Join us as we explore the dramatic encounters and fateful decisions in David’s life as he escapes King Saul’s clutches time and again. In a story of intrigue and moral conviction, we see David’s loyalty and strategic mind on full display. This episode not only recounts a historic chapter but also deepens our understanding of governance and rightful rule as David protects his path to future kingship.
The CEM Network is pleased to present Ronald L. Dart and Born to Win.
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The Long Pursuit of David by King Saul would make a great movie. It has all the elements, danger, treachery, romance, suspense, the chase. And the characters are all fascinating. Any actor would love these roles. King Saul, who was a depressive paranoid and yet a big handsome fellow. David, of course, redheaded, small, good looking, very well built. Abigail, the intelligent, beautiful woman who became his second wife. Nabal, her brutish husband who died. Doeg, the snitch, the Ziphites who ratted David out to Saul, not once, but twice. No producer could ask for a better story, and there’s even more to come. I feel quite sure the story has been transposed into other times, other places, and other characters because it is so human. And so many authors do that, you know. They’ll read some ancient work and they’ll write a whole brand new story, transpose the whole thing into the present world, and the story is the same. You might not know that if you never read the Bible. It was not easy for David to stay hidden from Saul when he was on the run because every time he showed himself anywhere, All he had to do was be seen by a friend or an enemy, and somebody would tell somebody, and somebody would tell Saul. Not very many people were neutral in those days, even without cell phones. Word traveled fast. And so the Ziphites ratted David out the second time and gave Saul the coordinates of David’s location. And in 1 Samuel 26, it tells us the story. Saul arose. He went down to the wilderness of Ziph with 3,000 chosen men. David, he had 600. Some of them outlaws, a lot of them misfits, and so on they went. Saul pitched in the hill of Hachilah before Jeshimon alongside the road. Now David was out in the wilderness, and he saw that Saul was coming after him, or heard it, and he sent out scouts. And he understood that Saul sure was coming down in very deed and in the flesh. But this time David chose not to run. When his scouts located Saul’s camp, David eased up into an observation point and noted carefully the layout of the camp and who was bedding down where. He took particular note of where a man named Abner was bedding down. Abner was Saul’s military commander. He was a great fighting man with all the qualities that went with it in an age of danger. He was tough, he was strong, and he was very aware. In the legend of the West, we’d call him a big he-coon. He was dangerous. The kind of guy who would wear his clothes out from the inside. He was that tough. So David took note of where Abner would be and where Saul would be, and it was right in the middle of the camp. David hatched a very daring plan, because there’s one thing about David. He just simply wasn’t afraid. He recruited a volunteer to go along with him. The man who stepped forward was one Abishai, the brother of Joab. Joab would in time be David’s military commander, and Joab and Abishai were cut out of the same piece of cloth as Abner. They were all men to be reckoned with. So David and Abishai came to the people by night, and there was Saul snoring away in the center of the group. His spear was stuck in the ground right by his pillow where he could grab it. Abner and the other people were lying around him. Now, if you can imagine this picture, here are two men who are walking carefully right into the sleeping camp, being careful not to step on anybody. No one was on watch. That’s hard to figure. Saul was so confident, but there may be an explanation for that. So Abishai said to David, look at this. God has delivered your enemy into your hand this day. Therefore, let me smite him, I pray you. I can take that spear and I can pin him to the ground in one stroke. I’ll not have to hit him a second time. And David said to Abishai, no, don’t destroy him. For who can stretch forth his hand against the Lord’s anointed and be guiltless? David had a very strong sense of God’s appointment. God had placed Saul in office, and it was no man’s right to remove him. If you think about this for a while, you can see the different effect on subsequent history. If David became king, having killed Saul… A couple of things. One, he would set a precedent that might come back to haunt him for the rest of his life because if it’s okay to kill Saul, it would be okay to kill David. And even his legitimacy as king would be tainted. The people would look at him and say, that’s the man that killed Saul. He killed Saul and took over Saul’s kingdom. And it would give people more to say about why David was somehow illegitimate rather than legitimately being king. And it brings to mind one of the little phrases I use from time to time, and people look at me and they think they have no idea what I’m talking about when I say, had Zimri peace who slew his master? The occasion, much, much later, was when a man named Jehu was riding into town, and Jezebel leans out a window and says those words to him. Zimri had actually assassinated the king before him and had taken his place. And he never had a day of peace in his life and was finally killed himself. And so Jezebel leaned out the window, looked down on Jehu and said, Did Zimri have peace who slew his master? This is what you are doing. David, though, said furthermore to Abishai, He said, this is what’s going to happen, I’ll tell you, as the Lord lives. The Lord will smite him, or his day will come to die, or he shall descend into battle and perish. The Lord forbid that I should stretch forth my hand against the Lord’s anointed. But I tell you, take the spear that’s his pillow, grab that cruz of water, and let’s go. So they did and got away and no man saw it and no man knew it. Nobody woke up. For they were all asleep because a deep sleep from the Lord was fallen upon them. Sometimes I kind of wish I had that kind of sleep at night. They might have set a watch. He also might have gone to sleep. Now, this really had to be true because there was no way they could have made their way in and out of that camp undetected, not with those men. So David went opposite where they were and stood on top of a hill a good way off with plenty of room between them. And he cried across to the people, particularly to Abner, the son of Ner. He said, Abner, Abner, are you not going to answer Abner? And Abner said, Who are you that cry to the king? And David said, Aren’t you a valiant man? There’s nobody like you in Israel. How come then you have not kept your lord the king? You know, Abner was supposed to be the number one A to A in charge bodyguard for Saul. He said, There came one of the people in to destroy the king, your lord. This is not good what you’ve done, Abner. As the lord lives, you’re worthy to die because you have not kept your master, the lord’s anointed. Look around now and see, where’s the king’s spear? And where is the cruise of water that was at his pillow? When all this was going on, Saul recognized David’s voice, and he stood up and said, Is this you, David? And David said, It’s me, O Lord the king. He said, Why does my lord pursue after his servant? What have I done? What evil is in my hand? Now, therefore, I pray you, let my lord the king hear the words of his servant. If the Lord has stirred you up against me, let him accept an offering. But if they be the children of men. Cursed be they before the Lord, for they have driven me out this day from abiding in the inheritance of the Lord, saying, Go, get out of here, serve other gods. This is the mindset of the time. The place where you lived, the god of that country, was deemed to be your god. So go ahead, get out of here, serve some other god in some other land. And you know, I mean, Saul, of course, hated David. Saul wanted him dead. Saul was the main instigator of all this, but… Any time the king gets into this frame of mind, people will line up to tell him what he wants to do, to tell him the bad things about the person he’s trying to get or he has come to hate. They’ll all be there to help him drive David away. Now, therefore, let not my blood fall to the earth before the face of the Lord, for the king of Israel has come out to seek a flea. You’re out here like a man hunting a partridge in the mountains. Then said Saul, I have sinned. Come back, my son David. I will no longer do you any harm, because my life was precious in your eyes this day. Behold, I have played the fool. I have made a big mistake. And David answered and said, Here is the king’s spear. Send one of your young men over to fetch it. The Lord render to every man his righteousness and his faithfulness. The Lord delivered you into my hand this day, but I would not stretch forth my hand against the Lord’s anointed. And behold, as your life was much set by this day in my eyes, so let my life be much set by in the eyes of the Lord, and let him deliver me out of all tribulation. It’s kind of interesting that David says, Your life was much set by in my eyes. He didn’t go on to say, Let my life be much set by in your eyes. That would have been pointless. But he said, Just as I’ve done this, may my life be much set by in the eyes of the Lord. And of course, because he did this, it was. Then Saul said to David, Blessed be thou, my son David, you shall do great things, and you shall also still prevail. So David went on his way, and Saul returned to his place. But David did not believe for a moment that he was safe from Saul. The man’s repentance would last until he was out of sight. Grab a pencil and a piece of paper. I want to tell you about a special offer, and you’ll want to write down our address. I’ll be right back after this message.
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David thought all this over, and he said to himself, that old man is going to get me one of these days. Probably the best thing I can do is to get out of here and get down into the land of the Philistines. Maybe Saul will give up and stop looking for me throughout Israel. Maybe I can escape. So he got up with all of his group of 600 men, and they crossed over into Philistia. And he came down to Achish the king of Gath. He stayed with him for a while, he and his men. They all brought their households with him. Even David brought along his two wives, Ahinoam and Abigail. And it was told to Saul, naturally it was told to Saul, David couldn’t change what he had for breakfast without someone telling Saul. They told him that David had fled to Gath, and so Saul stopped looking for him. David said to Achish, If I have found grace in your sight… Please give me a place in some town in the country that I may dwell there, for why should I stay here in the royal city with you? Then Achish gave him Ziklag, and Ziklag pertains to the kings of Judah to this day. Ziklag was probably one of the towns that had originally been part of Judah and had been taken by the Philistines. So what they were really doing was giving a city back to David that had originally been Jewish. At the time that David dwelt in the country of the Philistines, it was about a year and four months. And David and his men at that time decided on a raid. They went up and invaded three tribes down toward Egypt. One of them, the Amalekites. Amalek, of course, was that group of people who had raided Israel when they were coming up out of Egypt. They hadn’t just come up to the front of the people and fought with the fighters of Israel. They circled around, came up behind them on the aged, the children, the sick, and slaughtered those people. It was really bad news. And God said to Moses, Write this down for a memorial in a book and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua. I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven. And Moses built an altar and called the name of it Jehovah Nissi, God our banner. For he said, Because the Lord has sworn that the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation. And as far as we know, he did put out their remembrance because nobody today knows who they are or where they are. They were a corrupt, vicious tribe of terrorists. And because of what they had done, God himself declared war on them. So David went down, smote the land. He didn’t leave either man or woman alive and took away the sheep, the ox, the asses, the camels, all their clothing and came back to Achish. And Achish said, where have you been today? David said, well, I went against the south of Judah and against the south of the Jeremelites, against the south of the Kenites. And David sees that he didn’t save man or woman alive so that no one could bring tidings to Gath. His worry was that they would tell on us, saying, well, look what David did. He’s going to do that all the time he dwells in the country of the Philistines, which would create an enormous foreign relations problem for the Philistines if they wound up getting war made on them from the south as well as from the east. Well, Achish believed David, saying he has made his people Israel to utterly abhor him. He’ll be my servant. He’ll be one of my guys forever. 1 Samuel 28, it came to pass, though, that the Philistines got their armies together for warfare to fight against Israel. And Achish said to David, I want you to know assuredly that you will go with me to battle, you and your men. Now, the Philistines were no more united then than their namesakes, the Palestinians, are today. They were all able to pull together at times to go to war together. against Judah. And it seems like that was the one thing that would really pull them together. And David said, ah, well, then you will see for yourself what I can do, what your servant can do. Achish replied, very well, I will make you my bodyguard for life. Now, what follows is a very strange incident, and one that’s kind of hard to explain. Samuel was dead. All Israel had lamented for him and buried him in Ramah. He was in the ground. Saul had put away everybody in Israel that had familiar spirits and all the wizards out of the land. He got rid of all those necromancers and what have you. Now, this is preparatory to what follows. The Jews had no belief in the immortality of the soul. They believed that when a person died, he went to the grave. Their word for it was Sheol. Some believed in a resurrection, some did not. Nobody had any idea that anybody went to heaven when he died. The Philistines gathered themselves together. They came and pitched in Shunem. Saul gathered all the Israelites together, and they pitched in Gilboa. And when Saul saw the incredible army of the Philistines, he was afraid. His heart greatly trembled, and he went to inquire of God, and God wouldn’t answer him. Not by dreams, not by Urim, not by the prophets. Well, Saul needed an answer from somewhere. I guess he couldn’t make a decision on his own. So even though he had put out all those that had familiar spirits in the land, now he needed one. So he said to his servants, Seek me a woman that has a familiar spirit, so I can go to her and inquire of her. And his servants said, Well, there is a woman that has a familiar spirit at Endor. Now she wasn’t supposed to be there, but Saul’s servants knew well enough that It’s like all the things that are illegal in any society. Somebody somewhere knows how to find it. Saul may have even had an inkling himself, I think, because he asked for a woman who had a familiar spirit. You just can never get rid of the black arts. You can drive them underground, but if you want them, you’re going to always find them. So Saul disguised himself. He pretended not to be the king. He put on other clothes, and he went. Two men went with him, and they came to the woman by night. And he said, I pray you, divine to me by the familiar spirit, and bring him up, whom I shall name to you. The woman looked at him, and she said, Look, you know what Saul has done. You know how he has cut off those that have familiar spirits and wizards out of the land. What are you trying to do, get me killed? And Saul swore to her by the Lord, saying, As the Lord lives, there shall no punishment happen to you for this thing. The woman said, Who shall I bring up to you? And he said, Bring me up Samuel. Now, I don’t know exactly what the sequence of events are here. The woman, when she saw Samuel, cried with a loud voice, and she spoke to Saul and said, Why have you deceived me? You are Saul. And the king said to her, Don’t be afraid. What did you see? Whatever she saw, he didn’t. And the woman said to Saul, I saw God’s ascending out of the earth. And he said to her, What form is he of? And she said, An old man comes up. He is covered with a mantle. And Saul perceived it was Samuel. And he stooped with his face to the ground, and he bowed himself, the one man that Saul would fear above all others. Now, mind you, Samuel did not come down from heaven. He came up out of the earth, and he said to Saul, Why have you disturbed me to bring me up? Samuel had been sleeping in the grave and seemed somewhat irritated by being awakened from such a sound sleep. Well, Saul told him, I’m in a heap of trouble. The Philistines have made war against me. God has left me. He doesn’t answer anymore by prophets or by dreams. So I’ve called you that you may make known to me what I should do. And Samuel said, Why are you asking of me, seeing the Lord has departed from you and become your enemy? Why ask me? And the Lord has done to him as he spoke to me. For the Lord has torn the kingdom out of your hand and given it to your neighbor, even David. Because you obeyed not the voice of the Lord, because you would not execute his fierce wrath upon Amalek, which David was willing enough to do. Therefore has the Lord done this thing to you today. Moreover, the Lord will also deliver Israel with you into the hand of the Philistines. And tomorrow shall you and your sons be with me. The Lord also shall deliver the host of Israel into the hand of the Philistines. Tomorrow you and your sons will die. Arguments have long persisted over what really happened here, what actually happened here. How was it possible for a woman who practiced the black arts to actually bring up the real Samuel? And was it the real Samuel? Or was it merely an apparition? Whatever it was, it told the truth. Saul fell lengthwise on the ground. He was so afraid. There was no strength in him. He hadn’t eaten any bread all day or all the night before, and he was faint. And the woman came to Saul and saw how troubled he was and said, Look, your handmaid has obeyed your voice. I put my life in your hand, and I’ve listened to what you told me to do. Now you listen to me. Let me set a morsel of bread before you and eat so you can get some strength and go on your way. But he refused and said, I’m not going to eat. But his servants compelled him, along with the woman, She gave them something to eat. They ate and went away that night. How this story came to the author of the book of Samuel, we don’t know. It seems certain that he was not there and only learned about the story from one of the men who was with Saul that night, and probably not from him, but from someone else to whom the story had been told. The story is true enough, but it’s confusing in its parts because of the way in which it was transmitted. Stay with me, and when I come back, we’ll go on with the story.
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Meanwhile, back at Gath, the Philistine lords were getting themselves together, and they were passing by in review before Achish, getting all their act together. And David, they were there right along with Achish. And the princes of Philistine saw them there, and he said, What? What are these Hebrews doing here? You can almost imagine a group of Palestinians saying, What are these Jews doing down here? And Achish said to the princes of the Philistines, Oh, is this not David, the servant of Saul, the king of Israel, who has been with me these years? I have found no fault in him since he defected to me to this day. And the princes of the Philistines were furious. And they said, Send this fellow back to his place where you sent him and appointed him. He’s not to go with us into battle. You’ll never know. You get in a battle, and he’ll turn and fight with us. He might use this to reconcile to his master. I don’t want it to be with the heads of my men. This is David, of whom they sang one to another in dances, saying, Oh, Saul slew his thousands, and David his ten thousands. No way. So Achish somewhat reluctantly called David and said, Look, as the Lord lives, you have been upright, and you’re going out. Of course, he didn’t realize David had lied to him about who he’d been killing, but nevertheless, he said, You’ve been upright. You’re going out and coming in with me, and the host is good in my sight. For I have not found evil in you since the day of your coming to me to this day, but the Lord’s won’t hear of it. So now return and go in peace so that we don’t have an internal problem with the Lord’s of the Philistines. And David sounds like he’s offended. He says, but what have I done? What have you found as long as I’ve been with you that I can’t go fight against the enemies of my lord the king? I have no idea what David’s motive was. Achish answered and said to David, I know that you’re good in my sight. You’ve been like an angel of God. Notwithstanding, the princes of the Philistines have said he will not go up to battle. So get up early tomorrow with your master’s servants that are with you, and as soon as you’re up, have light, depart. So David and his men got up early and headed back toward the land of the Philistines, and the Philistines went up toward Jezreel to battle. But it came to pass, when David and his men got back to Ziklag on the third day, they found that the Amalekites had invaded the whole south of the area, and Ziklag, they had taken the city, burned it with fire, had carried all the women captives that were there, didn’t kill any of them, great or small, they just carried them away. And they went on their way, which, of course, is the Amalekites. Come in behind them. Kill off everybody. Only in this particular case, they decided to save the women alive. So David and his men came to the city. It was burned with fire. Their wives, their sons, their daughters were all gone. And David and all the people that were with him lifted up their voice and wept until they had no more power to weep. David’s two wives were gone, Ahinoam and Abigail. But David was not through. David was a winner.
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