The Japanese samurai sword is thought by many to be the best in the world. It can take 15 men, 6 months to make 1 sword—a sword that can be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars! Why does it take so long and cost so much? Well you can’t just go out into the mountains where there are iron deposits and find samurai swords scattered here and there like so many diamonds that only need polishing. Such swords must be forged from two kinds of iron—one soft and one hard to get a blade that is both sharp and durable. One of the most arduous parts of making a samurai sword is repeatedly heating, beating, and folding the iron on an anvil until all the impurities have been removed. One sword maker compared that process to squeezing water out of a very hard sponge!
Just as samurai swords aren’t found in iron deposits already sharpened and ready for use, great people of faith are not born that way. They are forged by God on the anvil of affliction. Over the last few weeks we’ve pursued a sermon series entitled: Agents of Grace. It’s about the people God used in David’s life. We’ve seen how God used Samuel to mentor David, and how he used Goliath for the one-time purpose of catapulting David into fame. Today we’ll see how God used King Saul like an anvil on which he pounded David for 13 years. God’s purpose was to forge David into a sharp, durable leader. Let’s find out how David’s experience connects to ours.
The last time we left David we learned how he had been anointed king, but remained unkown until he defeated the giant Goliath when he was but a teenager. David didn’t take over as king at that point however. Saul was still in power, but just barely. The Goliath challenge had weakened Saul. For 40 days Goliath had defied the ranks of Israel, and every day Saul refused to do anything to counter Goliath, he looked more coward than king. But then David removed the embarrassment when he killed Goliath. Saul was glad about this (1 Samuel 19:5), and made David a commander in his army. But Saul’s joy quickly turned into jealousy when the people started to sing David’s praises more loudly than Saul’s.
But Saul couldn’t just dismiss David and send him back to the obscurity of shepherding sheep. Saul’s own son, Jonathan, had become David’s best friend. And then David married Saul’s daughter, Michal. It was as if God had tied David and Saul together at the wrist and threw them into a cage so the two would have to keep dealing with each other. For his part, Saul failed miserably in his relationship with David. Instead of nurturing and mentoring David to get him ready to take over as king, Saul let his envy of David build until it burst into petulant violence, like when a child angrily kicks at a piece of furniture he thinks has tripped him even though it didn’t. Only Saul didn’t kick at David, he actually tried to kill him by pinning him to the wall with a spear. David realized that he couldn’t hang around the king anymore, so he fled. At first David went to Samuel, his mentor, but when Saul continued to pursue him, David fled into the wilderness and remained on the run for 13 years!
But if God had already rejected Saul as king, why did he allow Saul to chase David at all, let alone for 13 years? Can you imagine a situation like that in the workplace? Your current manager is doing a horrible job. Everyone knows it. So the owner of the company has appointed you to take over the position, but doesn’t tell you when the change will take place. Instead, you continue to have to suffer under the current manager’s poor leadership. And to make matters worse, she is now out to make your life especially miserable because she knows you’re in line to take her job!
But perhaps God wasn’t so hands off about the matter in David’s life as it might initially seem. In our sermon text you heard how on one occasion when Saul was pursuing David, he ducked into a cave to relieve himself. Unbeknownst to him, David was farther back in that same cave hiding with his men! David’s men were certain that God had engineered this opportunity for David to kill Saul and rid himself of the menace. But David refused to do it. He even felt guilty for cutting off a piece of Saul’s robe to prove to the king that he could have killed him while he was in the cave.
Why didn’t David act? Because he took God’s Word seriously. You see, David knew how God said that we are to honor those in authority. For David, that included Saul because he was still the reigning king. It didn’t matter that Saul was wrong about David. It didn’t even matter that David had already been anointed to be the next king. David trusted that God would give him the throne when God was ready to do so. David believed that it would have been wrong to “help” God along in his plans to make him king.
In that way David is such a better example for us than Abraham. Do you remember how he once tried to help God out with his plans? God had promised Abraham that he would have a son with his wife Sarah. But after 16 years went by and he still had no son, Abraham thought he needed to take matters into his own hands. And so he slept with his wife’s maid, Hagar, and had a son named Ishmael. But this hadn’t been God’s plan. He didn’t want that believer to dishonor his wife and Hagar by engaging in sexual immorality. The result was animosity between Ishmael and Isaac, the son Sarah would bear. This tension continues today between the descendants of Ishmael and Isaac who are the Arabs and Israelis.
So why did God force David to deal with everything Saul dished out? Because he wanted David to learn humility and to get into the habit of turning to him in prayer when trying to figure out the best way to handle Saul. Consider this psalm David wrote after his encounter with Saul in the cave. “Have mercy on me, my God, have mercy on me, for in you I take refuge. I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings until the disaster has passed. I cry out to God Most High, to God, who vindicates me. He sends from heaven and saves me, rebuking those who hotly pursue me—God sends forth his love and his faithfulness” (Psalm 57:1-3).
Do you see how David doesn’t complain that God is treating him unfairly, or that God has seemingly gone against his promises? David simply throws himself on God’s mercy and expresses his trust that when God is ready, he will vindicate David, that is, he will prove David’s innocence in his dealings with Saul. God answered that prayer with a yes when Saul himself declared David’s righteousness. That happened after the cave incident. Saul confessed in the hearing of David’s men and in the hearing of his own men that he had been wrong to pursue David. That confession was important for Saul’s men to hear so that when David did take over as king, they could follow him with a clear conscience and not feel as if they were ditching their loyalty to Saul. But Saul’s repentance toward David was always short-lived and for 13 years he would keep pursuing David. Saul continued to be the anvil on which God would pound out of David the impure attitudes of revenge and self-sufficiency.
Can you understand what David went through? As far as I know, no one has been trying to kill you for the last 13 years, forcing you to live in the foothills of the Rockies, moving from campsite to campsite. But perhaps God has thrown you into a cage with a difficult boss or co-worker. This person may have lied about you to get you demoted or even cause you to lose your job. Or perhaps it’s the teacher who loves to make fun of Christians and their faith. Or it could even be a family member who thinks you’re nuts for going to church and often lets you know that. You can’t just walk away from these people to get rid of the problem. God has bound you to them. So what are you to do? Do what David did. Continue to honor and respect these people while entrusting yourself to the one who knows what’s going on. Cry out to the Lord, not to others around you, at least not in a way that would give the impression that you are angry and bitter. David could have easily done that. He could have poisoned his friend Jonathan’s relationship with his father, but he didn’t. David knew the truth that the Apostle Paul expressed like this: “…our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all” (2 Corinthians 4:17).
But it’s hard not to lash out when we’re treated unfairly. If a boss or teacher doesn’t know what he’s doing, we think that’s a green light for us to make fun of him behind his back. But it isn’t. Just as David honored Saul, we will want to honor all those in authority. And yes, this may mean having to suffer for a time under their leadership. We can speak up and point out the truth of the matter, but we will do so in a respectful way, as David did.
There still must have been times when David wondered if God really knew what he was going through. But God would one day experience first-hand what David had. In the person of Jesus, the Son of God endured unjust treatment at the hands of the chief priests and the Roman soldiers when they nailed him to the cross. But Jesus quietly endured the pain and rejection, entrusting himself to the one who could help. But here’s the thing, God refused to help Jesus! He too rejected Jesus at the cross because he was charging Jesus for our sins. If anyone had a right to complain, it was Jesus. But he didn’t. He was like the motorist in accident who takes the blame and also the responsibility of paying for the damage even though none of it was his fault.
It’s this Jesus in whom we have put our trust for eternal salvation. But we often have a hard time fully trusting Jesus to rule our lives for our benefit. Like Abraham, we take2 matters into our own hands and try to solve them through our sinful cunning. So don’t be surprised when God pounds you against an anvil like King Saul. He might even do that for years! It doesn’t mean that God is angry with you or has forgotten about you. Quite the contrary. It means that he loves you enough to keep working on you so that you too may become a person of great faith just as David became.
Pray this week that God gives you patience as you figure out how best to show honor to that difficult parent, spouse, boss, or whomever it is that God has called you to honor. Pray that you keep your sinful nature in check so that you don’t lash out in anger, or plot revenge. Pray that you set a good example for those who are watching you—an example which confesses: I know my God is in control, that’s why I don’t have to overreact to this difficulty. Pray that God makes it clear to you when you should speak up and take a stand. And when you should be quiet and simply take the abuse that’s being heaped on you. You’re not weak if you take that approach. You’re actually much stronger because you are entrusting yourself to the one who can protect you better than you could ever protect yourself. That is what it means to be a person of great faith. Amen.
SERMON NOTES
King Saul was an anvil on which God pounded David for 13 years. How?
David’s men thought he was nuts for not killing Saul when he had the chance. What motivated David’s restraint, especially considering he had already been anointed as the next king?
In what way had Abraham failed to show David-like patience with God’s plans in his life?
How did Jesus show David-like patience with God’s plans in his life?
How might God be pounding you on an anvil right now? Write a prayer to help you through this difficult time. Incorporate into that prayer some of the truths you learned in today’s sermon.
