“David, nowhere man, living in a nowhere land”
1 Samuel 29:1-11
Vs. 1-5 What are these doing here?
Vs. 6-11 Return now and go in peace
Intro.
In Psalm 18:35-36 David would write “You have also given me the shield of Your salvation; Your right hand has held me up, Your gentleness has made me great. You enlarged my path under me, So my feet did not slip.” If there was ever a time that these words of David fit, it would have been in this season of discouragement while he wandered away from the land of promise and sought friendship with the world. David had let discouragement drive him away from the presence and promise of God. But how was he to get back to the land? Merely walking back is the right direction but doing so with the enemy beside you will not suffice. No we must heed the word of the Lord to Nehemiah in 1:9 “but if you return to Me, and keep My commandments and do them, though some of you were cast out to the farthest part of the heavens, yet I will gather them from there, and bring them to the place which I have chosen as a dwelling for My name.”
This is the battle in which according to 31:3-5 Saul and his sons will be killed and this chapter reveals to us how it was not David’s righteousness that sustained him from the battle but rather the hand of God. David is in a real dilemma but even here the Lord is about to work in spite of him. Psalm 34:18 says, “The LORD is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves such as have a contrite spirit.” Such helplessness brings about God’s graciousness to work in our deliverance from self.
Vs. 1-5 What are these doing here?
Vs. 1 Based upon David’s deception recorded in the 27th chapter, Achish now expected David to go out and fight against his own countrymen and David even confirmed that he would be saying, “Now you will see for yourself what we can do.” (28:2) The Philistines camped at Aphex “strength or fortress” a place where we are told chapter 4:10 that 90 years earlier the Philistines defeated Israel at this very spot. No doubt the Philistines were keenly aware of Saul’s declining kingdom, and David was living with them on their side of the world.
The increasing numbers of men that were coming to David (1 Chron. chapter 12) indicated that there was a growing dissatisfaction with Saul as king. So they took advantage and struck deep into the land of Israel and encamped at the fountain of Jezreel (God will sow). So geographically the Philistines came in their “strength” while Saul and the Israelites were about to reap what “God will sow”!
With the Philistines intent on delivering a death-blow to Israel, and the two armies squaring off in anticipation of a battle, where was Saul? The night before, Saul sought the help of a spirit medium, wanting to hear from God. Through a strange appearance of the prophet Samuel, God told Saul he would die the next day in battle. Instead of humbling himself in repentance before the LORD, Saul simply resigned himself to this fate. Seeing no way in which he will get what he wanted to remain king, he gives up on what the Lord wanted, his heart right with Him.
Ah but David finds himself in a place he thought he would never be; among the ungodly, ready to fight against God’s people! Hey Christian when we sin, when we backslide, when we turn away from the things of God, we may soon find ourselves in a place we never thought we would be.
Vs. 2-3a The troops paraded their readiness before five commanders and all was fine until David came up with the king as his personal bodyguard. David’s deception was so good that Achish actually defended David and his men before his own commanders.
In 1 Chron 12:1 we are told of David’s mighty men that “they were among the mighty men, helpers in the war, armed with bows, using both the right hand and the left in hurling stones and shooting arrows with the bow.” They were men we are told in verse 8 that were “trained for battle, who could handle shield and spear, whose faces were like the faces of lions, and were as swift as gazelles on the mountains:”
Some of which in verse 15 we are told were “the ones who crossed the Jordan in the first month, when it had overflowed all its banks”. They were the kind of men we are told in verse 18 that said to David, “We are yours, O David; We are on your side, O son of Jesse! Peace, peace to you, And peace to your helpers! For your God helps you.” Why do I mention them in this story, not about David and his wanderings? Yes but these men gave up all, they were loyal, strong and courageous. They were David’s men without question, they had left Saul and sided with David and it had cost them and made them as wanted a man as he was.
His wandering was their wandering; these were not fair weather friends. I say that, not in defense of David or of these men, but rather to understand these gallant men who though misguided thought that in supporting God’s man they were supporting God. Apparently they never realized that God’s man needed only be supported by God and that their unwavering support kept him 16 months longer in the world than needed be. Loyalty is a great quality in friends but if it supplants our loyalty to God and His word then we do neither ourselves nor our friend any good. Oh yes do not abandon your friend but do not keep him in the world either and sometimes the best way to be loyal to him or her is not to go support them in a decision where they have wandered into the world!
The Philistine leaders could see what David was blinded to. David had started to think and act like a Philistine, and was ready to fight with them against the people of God. But the Philistine leaders could see that this wasn’t right, even when David couldn’t! David would have never slipped into this sinful place if he had remembered who he really was, and what His destiny was. This is a sad example of a time when we wish David had the wisdom of the Philistines! It is very terrible when the children of the world have a higher sense of Christian integrity and holiness than Christians themselves, and say to one another, “What are these Hebrews doing here?”
Vs. 3b “David”, Achish said, “Was as good in my sight as an angel of God” (verse 9) he so trusted him that he had made him and his bodyguard his royal escorts. It is a sad thing that a Philistine ruler will defend David so confidently! David has identified himself so much with the ungodly, that Achish knows he has David in his pocket. “Don’t you know this fellow David has converted from the people of God to the people of the world?” To hear an ungodly ruler say, “David has been with me” and “I have found no fault in him” and “he defected to me”.
These words should have been a great wake-up call to David. It would be as if an ungodly coworker insisted to others that you really weren’t a Christian after all, because they had seen how you live! David had said as much in 1 Samuel 28:1-2 and Achish had every reason to believe that David would fight on his side. And with every step of their march from the world back into the Promised Land the steps must have grown heavier and heavier.
Hey friend, there is always a lightness in our steps as we come back into the presence of God having left Him for the things of this world. Yet if we wander in from the world but allow it to come with us in our hearts then our steps back into the things of God will be awkward and heavy. Why? Well because we have not truly left the world we have taken the enemy with us.
Vs. 4-5 The other Philistine leaders were not in agreement with Achish at all. They didn’t trust David, and they feared he would turn against the Philistines in battle, to bring himself back into Saul’s favor. The Leaders were thinking what better way could he make up with Saul, then in the midst of the battle, turn and cut our heads off! “No way will we allow him to go into battle with us!”
The song of David’s victory has come back to haunt him again, the song is growing old.This is not the first time this song has got David in trouble! When the song first hit the charts in chapter 18: 7-8 it made Saul angry, when it reached the Philistines in 21: 11 it angered them and drove David to drool (pretend to be insane).
But now in verse 5 the song has gotten a little old and the leaders don’t want to listen to it or see David who it was sung about. But you know what is cool, this song was an expression of God’s greatness in spite of David’s failure and the Lord uses this little ditty to rescue David from his wandering in the world. If there was a theme song for David it would have to be this one but each time it was played it meant something else:
- It was sung as a rock song upbeat in tempo, to show what God can do through a man who Love’s the Lord and shows it by being strong and courageous.
- It was sung as a blues song mournful to show what happens when we face discouragement and forget what the Lord has done.
- Here it is sung as a love song ballad to show that God never gives up on a man even though the man has given up on everything and everyone else.
David was about ready to do the right thing,“go to war” but on the wrong side! He found himself in the wrong camp amongst the wrong people having lowered his standard and excused himself by saying he was still engaged in the things of God but yet in so doing he had to mimic the world to accomplish the things of God.
But the world always knows when we are fake and asks, “I thought you were a child of God?” Yeh I am! “Well, why are you here and why are you doing the things the way that we do them?” What led David to take the armies of the enemy to attack the people of God? Discouragement which leads to compromise! To make matters worse his compromise had only fooled himself, his men and Achish it had not fooled the princes of this world. Those that were his friends believed the best about him but the world saw him only through his compromise. Their word is correct, “Make this fellow return,” (verse 4). There are far too many of God’s people who like David were leaving the things of God for the things of the world and there is not much difference between them and those of the world. We are to be in the world, we have no choice in this matter, we are in the world but we are not to be of the world.
Vs. 6-11 Return now and go in peace
Vs. 6-7 “As the Lord lives” is the unexpected oath from Achish who no doubt was being courteous to David in not swearing by Philistine gods. Though Achish pleaded on behalf of David and his men it was to no avail as “the princes of the Philistines” were not his friends as he had thought and they knew he didn’t belong amongst them.
David thought he couldn’t be happy or at peace in the land of Israel (Now I shall perish someday by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than that I should speedily escape to the land of the Philistines, 1 Samuel 27:1). Now he finds that his “Philistine friends” won’t accept him either. David has no home; he is trying to live in both worlds, so he has a home in neither world. David didn’t like being rejected by the Philistine rulers. Not many people like rejection, but God would use the rejection of ungodly people in David’s life. Many people are hesitant to live out-and-out for Jesus Christ because they are afraid of the rejection of the ungodly. How much better it is to be all out for Jesus, and to trust that if the ungodly reject us, God will use it for good. David is in the worst place for any child of God. He has too much of the world in him to be at peace in the LORD, and he has too much of the LORD in him to be at peace in the world.
David used to “displease the lords of the Philistines” all right; he used to be a mighty warrior for the cause of God, and he used to strike fear in the heart of every enemy of God. David has made friends with Achish who is only concerned about displeasing the lords of the Philistines! Could you imagine someone coming to David before a battle, and saying, “Excuse me David, I don’t think you should do that? You might “displease the lords of the Philistines.” In James 4:4 we are asked, “Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.”
Vs. 8-10 David seems genuinely disappointed that he will not be able to fight for the Philistines against Israel. “But what have I done?” cried David in protest but he should have wept unto the Lord “What have I done?” in reference to his 16 months away from the Lord and the land of promise. Thank God for the princes of the Philistines who rose up in protest at his compromised life by saying “What are God’s people doing here amongst us?” David has sunk so low, that he now calls God’s people his enemies. David says, “ He is ready to go and fight against the enemies of my Lord the king”, and announces that Achish is his Lord, his king. He’s ready to fight against the enemies of Achish instead of the enemies of the Lord.
The sad, tragic thing is that many times, when a person turns away from the path of God, he never intended to go as far as he does. He didn’t intend for it to get him this involved. He didn’t intend to get so far immersed in that sin, that one day he would turn his back upon God, and become an enemy to God, or to the people of God. Finding himself now in that position of fighting against the people of God, he has come to rock bottom.
Vs. 11 David was outside of the will of God for 16 months but not outside the working of God. Instead God sent David and his men back to slay the enemy who had raided a city that was supposed to be where God’s people dwelt. We fail to inherit the land because we compromise and allow the enemy to stay in areas purchased by our Lord! God brought David back 30:1 to attack those who had taken the innocent captive and it is always a compromise that leaves lives burned (30:1).
In 1 Chron. 12:20-21 we are told when David turned back God added to his men “those of Manasseh who defected to him…. captains of the thousands.” Don’t miss this as it is the Lord’s way that when we turn to him in the areas of our own lives He grants us victory and increases our blessings.
If we only had the Psalms, and didn’t have all of these other things about David’s life, we’d think, “Wow! Wouldn’t it be great to be like David, so God could use me!” But I know God can’t use me, because man, you know I’ve told lies, and I’ve failed. God points out that David had his flaws, in fact some of them, at least as bad as ours, yet God used David. May God guard us against despair and discouragement, as it is the lack of trust in the promises of God that drives us to try to do things in our own strength.
The Bible tells us in 2 Tim. 2:13 that “God is faithful even when we are faithless”. And that is what we see as God stepped in to save David from himself and from making a tragic mistake that would have changed history and how the nation would have seen David. Hey, Christian you can’t trust in the circumstance, you can’t trust in your ability but you can always and all times trust in God who only does good! “God takes the worst things, the things that leave us broken and feeling discarded and He in His greatness uses those very things as the doors for the best things he has for our lives!”
In Luke chapter 4 as Jesus came into His home town of Nazareth and went into the temple he grew up in the they handed him the book of Isaiah and He looked for the passage found in chapter 61 where He read, “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon Me, Because the LORD has anointed Me To preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives, And the opening of the prison to those who are bound; To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD”.
But the passage that Jesus read from goes on to say something wonderful about His life as it says that He will “comfort all who mourn, give them beauty for ashes, The oil of joy for mourning, The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness” As I think of such things I am amazed at His ability to take and make beauty from my ashes, Oh dear sweet Lord forgive me for doubting You as you are the only One who continually gives me beauty for my burned out ash heap of a life, in spite of me Lord I have been anointed with the oil of joy from your Spirit and I am wearing Your garment of praise instead of heaviness!
God does not look at us taking a record of who’s been naughty or nice and rewarding us based upon our performance. No, He according to the words of David in psalm 103:14 “He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust.” There is none of us that are what we should be, do what ought to do or be where we could be. But in Heb. 11:6 we are told “without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”