34. The Death Of Ishbosheth Series

The Death of Ishbosheth

December 17, 2025

Dr. Bradford Reaves

Crossway Christian Fellowship

2 Samuel 4

When God’s Will Is Used as an Excuse for Sin

One of the most dangerous phrases a Christian can utter is this: “God understands why I had to do it this way.” Those words have justified betrayal, slander, manipulation, abuse of power, and spiritual shortcuts for centuries. They sound spiritual. They feel practical. And they are almost always wrong.

Second Samuel chapter 4 is a sobering warning to anyone tempted to “help God along.” It shows us what happens when fear replaces faith, when ambition overrides conscience, and when people wrap sinful actions in religious language and expect God’s blessing in return.

As we close out 2025, this chapter presses a final question upon us—not about prophecy, or kings, or ancient politics—but about integrity: Will we trust God to accomplish His promises in His way, or will we grasp for outcomes at the cost of obedience?

God’s Promises Never Require Sinful Shortcuts. God does not accomplish His promises through sinful shortcuts. He establishes His kingdom in righteousness, judges treachery, and honors those who trust His timing rather than grasping for outcomes.

A Kingdom Already Cracking

By the time we reach 2 Samuel 4, the house of Saul is already in decline. Saul is dead. Jonathan is dead. David has been anointed king over Judah and reigns from Hebron. Yet the nation remains divided. Abner—Saul’s former commander—has installed Ish-bosheth as king over the remaining tribes of Israel.

Everyone knows this arrangement is temporary. Even Abner knew that David was the Lord’s chosen king (2 Samuel 3:9–10). But knowledge does not equal submission, and power rarely relinquishes control without resistance. When Abner is murdered by Joab—not for righteousness, but revenge—the last support beam holding Ish-bosheth’s throne in place collapses. Chapter 4 opens not with strategy or repentance, but with fear.

I. Fear Reveals False Foundations

When Ish-bosheth, Saul’s son, heard that Abner had died at Hebron, his courage failed, and all Israel was dismayed. 2 Now Saul’s son had two men who were captains of raiding bands; the name of the one was Baanah, and the name of the other Rechab, sons of Rimmon a man of Benjamin from Beeroth (for Beeroth also is counted part of Benjamin; 3 the Beerothites fled to Gittaim and have been sojourners there to this day). (2 Samuel 4:1–3)

These verses expose the heart of Ish-bosheth’s reign. His courage does not merely weaken—it fails. The Hebrew word implies collapse, melting, dissolving. Why? Because Ish-bosheth’s confidence was never rooted in calling or conviction. It was borrowed strength.

David Guzik captures this precisely: “Ish-bosheth was weak because he trusted in man.”

Abner put him on the throne. Abner propped him up. Abner defended him. And when Abner died, Ish-bosheth knew—instinctively—that his reign was finished. Abner was the engine. Ish-bosheth was the hood ornament.

If your security is built on human strength, your peace will always be conditional. When the person, position, or platform disappears, fear rushes in to fill the void. What is sustained by flesh will always crumble by flesh.

II. A Different Kind of Weakness

Jonathan, the son of Saul, had a son who was crippled in his feet. He was five years old when the news about Saul and Jonathan came from Jezreel, and his nurse took him up and fled, and as she fled in her haste, he fell and became lame. And his name was Mephibosheth. (2 Samuel 4:4)

In the middle of political collapse, the narrator pauses to introduce an unexpected figure: “Jonathan, the son of Saul, had a son who was crippled in his feet…” (v. 4)

This is not a footnote. It is a theological interruption. Mephibosheth was five years old when news of Saul and Jonathan’s deaths reached Jezreel. His nurse panicked, grabbed him, fled—and dropped him. He became lame for life, but it might actually be a kind way of saying that he remained like a big child.

David Guzik makes a crucial distinction here: Ish-bosheth is weak because of misplaced trust. Mephibosheth is weak because of circumstances beyond his control. Mephibosheth did not choose fear. He inherited it. His injury came not from rebellion, but from another person’s panic. And there is more: Mephibosheth was the last male descendant of Saul with a legitimate legal claim to the throne. Humanly speaking, if succession law mattered most, the future belonged to a crippled boy.

Much later, king David wondered if there were any survivors of the house of Saul whom he might honor, and a man named Ziba told him about Mephibosheth. Though lame and stripped of his honor, Mephibosheth appears to have managed to acquire himself a wife, because when David reinstated him, Mephibosheth had a young son named Mica. The author probably mentions him to indicate that the house of Saul was not wiped out but was allowed to continue (2 Samuel 9:12, see 1 Chronicles 8:35 and on).