David The King Series

INTRODUCTION

We’re in a series titled ‘Learning from David.’ Today’s talk is on David the king. I think today’s talk is the most important talk in this series. That might seem surprising to you. We’ve had ‘David: man of prayer.’ We all hopefully pray. We can relate to that. We’ve had David the musician. We can relate to musicians. We’ve had David the warrior. We can relate to that. We know what soldiers do. But David the king? That’s hard to relate to.

We probably don’t have much to do with kings. But a more serious point is that kings today are almost all in ceremonial roles. Kings today don’t function like kings of long ago. David was a king 3,000 years ago. How can it help us to know what he was like as a king?!

My answer is that, first, David shows us qualities of leadership that are vital for any leader, not just a king. And second, David shows us qualities of Jesus which we haven’t seen yet.

Let me explain – or at least, explain about qualities of leadership. I’ll come back to qualities of Jesus later.

There are lots of people in the world today who we think of as leaders: people like Sir Keir Starmer, Volodymyr Zelensky, Bill Gates, Elon Musk or Greta Thunberg. Lower down the rungs there are leaders too. The senior sister in charge of a hospital ward is a leader. The coach of your kids’ football team is a leader. A king is also a leader.

Different roles need different skills and qualities.

If you want to be a worship leader, you should know something about music. If you want to run a food kitchen, you need to know the food safety rules. If you want to be a king, some qualities are going to be especially important. But what are they?

We can learn about the particular qualities that a leader has to demonstrate by looking at David, one of the outstanding leaders in the Bible. This will help us if we’re in a leadership role. It will also help if, for example, we have to choose a leader. So, it should be helpful to consider what kind of king David was. This is what I’m going to look at in the first part of this talk.

The second thing I plan to talk about is how David shows us qualities of Jesus which we really haven’t seen yet. I believe that this is an even more valuable thing we can learn from looking at David as king. That will be the second part of this talk.

PART 1: WHAT DAVID WAS LIKE AS KING

The Old Testament has lots of historical records about what David did in the time when he was king. He led military campaigns. He organized temple worship. He had lots of wives and children. But the historical records don’t show us much about the qualities David displayed as a king.

However, the Bible tells us that two foundational qualities are needed to be a king. And it tells us that David had those.

What would you guess those two foundational qualities are? Love? Faithfulness? Mercy? Creativity? Honesty? Those are all great qualities. But the two foundational qualities needed to be a king – according to the Bible – are righteousness and justice. Where do I get that from?

The qualities of righteousness and justice often appear as a pair. They come up over and over again in the Old Testament. And they’re often linked with kingship. For example, the psalms tell us in two places that righteousness and justice are THE FOUNDATION OF GOD’S THRONE [Psalm 89:14 and 97:2]. These are not simply good qualities. They are the foundational qualities that God’s throne – God’s kingship – rests on.

If those two qualities are the foundation of GOD’S throne, then it’s a safe bet that they’re the foundation of ANY throne. They are the foundational qualities that any king, or for that matter, any leader, must display.

If you want to be a worship leader, you need to know about music.

If you want to run a food kitchen, you need to know the food safety rules.

But if you want to be a king, you need the qualities of righteousness and justice.

Did David demonstrate these qualities? The Bible cautions us against judging. But we can accept the Bible’s view of David. The Bible clearly tells us that David displayed these qualities of justice and righteousness. Here’s 2 Samuel 8:15:

‘So David reigned over all Israel; and David administered JUSTICE and RIGHTEOUSNESS for all his people.’

1 Chronicles 18:14 is word-for-word the same.

The Bible tells us, twice, that David administered JUSTICE and RIGHTEOUSNESS.

So, we know that justice and righteousness are the foundational qualities to be a king – and David demonstrated them. But what exactly are these qualities? And why are they so important, especially for a king?