"Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister (serve to bring up) questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith " (1Tim. 1:4)

King David's Values and Contradictions part 3 - May 13, 2023 - Dr. David Antion

The Proverb says, and this is Proverbs chapter 17, verse 13, evil will not depart. I'm reading from the Complete Jewish Bible.

Evil will not depart from the house of him who returns evil for good. And then the revised version reads this way, whosoever rewards evil for good, evil shall not depart from his house. And Proverbs 17, verse 13 in the Good News for the World's version goes, whoever pays back evil for good, evil will never leave his home.

Now, David understood God's purposes, and David understood many things about God. We'll talk about that in a minute. But he did return evil for good to Uriah.

That proverb, I believe, came from David's experience with Uriah when Nathan said, evil will never depart from your house. And so as we finish here a little bit, I want to turn back to First Kings, chapter two. And David is old.

He's drawing near to his age. We saw how Nathan went to David went to Bathsheba. Nathan went to Bathsheba.

Never said anything bad about her. He didn't say anything bad. He just went ahead and talked to her and asked her for her help, because he said, did you know Adoniga has claimed to be the king? So we saw last time he got mapshewi to go to David.

David then made Adenaija king. We made Solomon king, and Adenaija fled because he feared Solomon. But Solomon said, just behave yourself.

Then in chapter two, David draws close to death. And here is a strange thing. So David said to him, he tells Solomon to keep the commandments and statutes of God, that you will succeed when you do that, and you don't turn don't do that.

Don't turn away from God, and don't turn away from God's statutes. But now, in chapter two of First Kings and dropping down to verse five now, he said, you also know what Joab, the son of Jeremiah, did to me, what he did to the two commanders of the armies of Israel to Abner, the son of near and to Amassah, the son of Jaithur or Jethr, whom he killed. He also shed the blood of war in peace.

In other words, he was acting like war. When the war was over, he was continuing, and he put the blood of war on his belt, about his waist and on his sandals, and on his feet. In other words, Joab was a warrior.

He just couldn't stop being a warrior. So he says, So act according to your wisdom and do not let his gray hair go down to the grave to Sheol in peace. What that meant was he's got to be murdered, he's got to be killed, he's got to be executed.

He's not going to go down. When people die, they often say it's from natural causes. Natural causes mean just you get old, you got maybe a disease or something or something breaks down in you, your heart fails or your kidney fails, your liver fails or something and you die, that's natural causes.

But when somebody kills you, shoots you, stabs you, hangs you, that's not a natural cause. That's not going down to the grave in peace. But David says, I don't want his gray hairs going down to the grave in peace, but show kindness to Brazilian.

Now, he wants you to kill Joab. But look, let's ask the question. How come David can't forgive Joab? He wants him killed.

And Joab was the person who stood beside David. He was the person who carried out David's orders. He always wanted to give David whatever David wanted.

When David wanted Absalom back, Joab set up a scheme to get Absalom back. He knew David was crying for Absalom after he'd fled after it killed Amnon. But then he got him back by having a woman pretend to fake it and said, I had a son, and so on.

So David got Absalom back. Well, then when Absalom turned against David, Joab was on David's side and he ended up slaying Absalom. I wonder if David never got over that, because Joab had to take David aside and say, stop it.

David's crying. Oh, Absalom, my son. Absalom would kill Absalom because he was trying to kill you.

And then Joeb said, you better get out there and speak to all these people who fought for you or this will be the worst day. The things coming up to you will be worse than all the other days that you've ever had. Get out there and say good things.

So finally, David listened and he did. And then when David was going to number Israel, Joab stood against him, and said, don't do that. Why do you need to do that? But David went ahead and numbered against Joab's good advice.

Joab did side, however, with Adonijah, but Joab basically always sided with David, whatever David wanted. And I think Joab had sort of such admiration for David that he didn't want any of these other men like Abner and Amassa and so on. He did not want these men to come up and be the right-hand man.

He was so jealous, he wanted to get rid of them in a way. And so he did kill them. He did walk up to Abner and stab him and so on.

But why couldn't David forgive that? David killed Uriah and a few other soldiers went with him. I don't know. This is strange. And then David dies.

But he also told Solomon about Shimmyai. Shimai, the child from Saul, and so on. And to show you how nice, I think, Math, Sheba was a nice person.

You see here now in verse 13, 1st Kings, chapter two, verse 13. Now Adonijah, the Son of Hagueth, came to Bathsheba. Now, Bathsheba is Solomon's mother.

Solomon is now king, but he comes to Solomon's mother. He's got a mother. He comes to Solomon's mother and he says and she says to him, do you come peacefully? Because you might have antagonism toward me because my son is king? And you were.

Do you come peacefully? He said yes. It's peaceful. That's verse 13.

Then he said, I have something to say to you. And she said, well, go ahead, say it. Speak.

And he said, you know that the kingdom was mine and that all Israel expected me to be the king. However, the kingdom has turned about and become my brothers, your sons, in other words. For it was his.

From the Lord. I realized that Yahweh, the eternal God, gave it to him. I understand that now.

He says in verse 16 I'm making one request of you, of you. Do not refuse me, please. I'm just going to ask you one favor.

I know it was mine, but God gave it to your son. And she said to him, we'll speak. Tell me, what do you want? Verse 17, 1st Kings two.

Verse 17. Then he said, Please speak to Solomon, the King, for he will not refuse you. He thinks so much of you, you're his mother, that he may ask him that he might give me Abbasag the Shunamite as a wife.

Now, Abbasag was the young girl that they found in Israel, the virgin girl that slept beside David, in David's bed to keep him warm. They didn't have electric heaters, something like that. So she came in and kept him warm.

At night he got cold. Maybe they didn't have enough down blankets. Or maybe his thyroid may have been really lowered.

His adrenal glands were worn out. He just didn't have the kind of heat that his body produced. So she came in and lay with him, but did not sleep with him.

There was no sex between them. She was just there to keep him warm. Bathsheba said, Very well, I will speak to the king for you.

She's a nice person. I don't think she thinks very much in the political world. She doesn't know the political world.

She's not aware of it. So she says verse 19. So Bassema went to King Solomon to speak to him for Adenaija on Adenige's behalf.

No hard feelings. You were trying to take over the kingship, but we got it now, and no hard feelings. Now, the king already told Adonijah, you need to behave yourself.

If you're behaving yourself, you don't have anything to fear from me. I'm not going to exact any retribution. You see that in chapter one.

But here in verse 20. So then she says, I'm making a request of you. Do not refuse me.

She says, don't refuse me. She didn't see anything wrong. And the king said to her, ask my mother.

Ask for I will not refuse you. Whatever you want, ask me, for don't have to worry. So she said, Let Abbasag the Shunamanite be given to Adonijah, your brother, as a wife.

Now, Solomon had been imbued with good wisdom, insight, and understanding. Right away Solomon understood where this was going. Right away he understood what Adonijah was up to.

And King Solomon answered and said to his mother, why are you asking Abbasag the Shunammite for Adonijah? Ask for him the whole kingdom too. Why don't you just ask for him to be the king? For he is my older brother, even for him. For Abiathor the priest, and Joab the son of Zariah.

Why don't you just ask for all of them the way they had set it up in the beginning? Then King Solomon swore by the Eternal, saying, may God do so to me and more if Adonijah has not spoken this word against his own life. He came to you to manipulate you. So you would manipulate me, thinking that I wouldn't see through this manipulation.

And what he's trying to do is become the king because he's going to be sleeping with Abbasag from I mean, he's going to have Abbasag as his wife. And Abbasag has slept with my dad, and my dad probably confided in him many times and so on in her many times. So what would happen now therefore, as the eternal lives, who has established me and set me on the throne of David, my father, and who has made me a house as he promised, surely Adonijah shall be put to death today.

So King Solomon sent a couple of people and that took care of Adonijah. Joab was executed. You see, in verse 28, Joe Abran again, I'm thinking to the altar and try to do it.

Shimmyai was executed. You'll see in chapter two, in verse 36, shimmy was the man who cursed David, cursed you, a man of blood, you this, and you were no good, and so on. They wanted to take his head off early.

He was told, don't leave Israel if you stay around, if you don't go out. But where does he go? He goes to Akesh, the same guy that David went to. And the Philistines.

And Shimiya lived there in Jerusalem for many days. And then he went to see this Achesh and Shimiya rose and saddled his donkey and so on. When Solomon found he had left according to what David had told him, you use your good wisdom and keep an eye on him because he's a problem.

And Solomon then had him put to death. So David was not done. He gave almost like the Godfather of Corleone.

There was a movie called The Godfather. He's giving these directions, these things to do. But Solomon now has become king.

Solomon was begotten according to Matthew one. And verse five, verse six. And Jesse fathered, King David fathered Solomon by Uriah's wife says the complete the Christian Standard Bible and the new International Bible goes like this and Jesus, the father of King David, David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah's wife.

But it's not past tense. It doesn't even have a verb in there. It just says by her of Uriah.

By her of Uriah. The statement really is a defense of Bashiba, really. Now, with all David's problems, with all David's murders, and Uriah being one of the top ones, and then numbering Israel and some of the problems he had, how does he become a man after God's heart? Well, one number one, you remember when Nathan came to David, he gave a little story.

This one man had one little lamb. This guy who was rich in the city takes his lamb instead of all the ones. And David said, that man ought to die for that, he has no mercy.

And Nathan said you're the man. And he goes on to say, after he finishes, he says, I have sinned against the eternal. Not like Adam, who said, well, it's this woman you gave me.

Not like the woman who says, well, it's that dragon in the tree there, that Nakash, that was called serpent in the tree. Not like Saul said, I did do it. And he said, no, you didn't do it.

He said, kill it all. Well, I did kill them all, I just saved the best ones. I did follow God's orders.

And they said he said, no, you didn't. David knew David was a man after God's heart, his mind, and his feelings. He understood god.

He understood what God wanted. And you see in these beautiful psalms, like Psalm 103, look at this, Psalm 103, a psalm of David. Bless the everliving, bless the eternal, o my soul and all that is within me.

Bless his holy name. What does that mean, bless his holy name? You say good things about God. His name is who he is, and you say good things about him.

Blessing a blessing. How are you going to give God a blessing? Tell me what you do when you give God a blessing. You're blessing his name because you're saying good things about God.

You're praising him. You're saying how wonderful God is. And so here you see it.

He blesses his name here. Bless the eternal, my soul, and forget not and forget none of his benefits. Now, this is all in Hebrew poetry.

Now again, who pardons all your iniquities, who heals all your diseases, this is Hebrew poetry. It's meant to be exaggeratedly, strong because it's praising God for everything. And anybody who's healed, we tribute it to God, don't we? Whether whatever disease you got over you got, the flu, you got over you attributed to God.

And we would say that about somebody who's not a believer in God, who redeems your life from the pit, who, you know, you escape death. You've been close to death a couple of times, you almost fell off a mountain, you almost got lost, you almost starved. Who crowns you with loving kindness and compassion? God crowns you with all his loving kindness and his compassion.

A beautiful statement. Who satisfies your years with good things? Again, this is the praise of God.

Has God blessed us? Has God blessed you? Has he been good to you? Have your years been good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle now, do we just stay young forever? No, we get old. It's an exaggerated, poetic thing, praising God, blessing his name for all that God does. Okay, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle.

Well, do we renew our youth? Well, you know, there's a period of time in all of our lives when we seem to stay the same. You go from your teenagers to from thirty s to fifty s. Most people seem to stay the same.

They're still young enough, they're still hardy enough, and they can go out and work. Sometimes they play golf, basketball or something. They usually give up basketball after 30, but anyhow, they play things.

They can play softball or bowling or horseshoes or a little bad mitten or something, or little tennis or something. My son is 60 over 60, and he still plays paddle ball. He can still play.

So there's a period of time you stay fairly young for a long time, and then age creeps up and you realize, I can't do that anymore, can't play basketball anymore. So, yes, there's a period of time your youth is renewed like the eagle, but it doesn't stay there forever, because you do get old. I get old.

You will get old. The eternal performs righteous deeds and judgments to all who are oppressed. Really? For every single person.

You can't take that literally. There are a lot of people who are oppressed and they never get out of it. But God performs righteous deeds and judgments for all who are oppressed.

Maybe someday in the millennial rule, maybe the people are going to have to pay for what they've done to the oppressed people. But does he do it right? Now you don't see it, not all some definitely, but this is showing god is so merciful to the oppressed people. He has made known his ways to Moses, and his acts to the sons of Israel.

The eternal is compassionate and gracious. That's one of the great themes of the Old Testament. A lot of people think in the Old Testament, God is cruel.

In fact, there's one of the New Testament. Early New Testament. Heretics was Marcion by the name of M-A-R-C-I-O-N.

Marcion believed that the God of the Old Testament was not the God of the New Testament. He believed that the God of the Old Testament was cruel and hateful and allowed people to die, asking Israel to kill all these people in the land of promise and go in and kill every man and woman, and child. In some cases, God was cruel.

But the God of the New Testament is love like Jesus is forgiving and loving and kind and so on. And they quote the example. Many Christian churches do this.

They quote the example of Elisha when he's going up, walking up to this place. And the Bible. King James calls them children.

The children cursed him. They were saying, Go up, you old bald head. Go up, old baldy, old bald guy.

And he turns around and he curses them. Now, what does he curse them? He just said you guys are disrespectful, you're little punks. Now, the Bible says many translations of children.

But we can see, I can see that these are not little kids. As Jesus said, suffer the little children to come to me. These are teenage no goods.

These are people who are sons of Biliol. They're worthless. They're becoming worthless in their character.

They're mean, they're hateful like Saturday live gangs and so on and all that. So dropping down to verse ten. Now, he has not dealt with us talking about God according to our sins.

Boy, if anybody knew that David knew. That right. This is a psalm of David.

It's meant to be sung in great adoration to the eternal, to the ever-living God. Yes, it's meant to be sung and praised and glorify God. He has not dealt with us according to our sins.

I could say that. Absolutely, and probably you could. Nor has he rewarded us according to our iniquities.

See that's Hebrew poetry. You see the same thing written here. He has not dealt with us according to our sins.

The back part of this verse. Nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. That's what they mean by Hebrew poetry.

For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his loving-kindness or those who fear Him. Though the parallel there. As high as the heavens are above the earth, that's how great his lovingkindness is to those who fear Him.

As far as the East is from the West, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. Just as a Father has compassion on his children, so the eternal has compassion on those who fear Him. He himself knows our frame.

He is mindful that we are dust through the parallel, he knows our frame. He's mindful that we are dust. Yes, he is mindful we are so blessed to be able to worship the ever-living God and all of the blessings that he gives us continuously.

These psalms of David explain, and they explain the purposes of God. David was not only a man after God's heart, he did despicable things. I agree with you.

He did despicable and evil things. But he was, after all, a man. After God's understanding, he gives us understanding.

He is a prophet. The Bible calls him the prophet. So in these psalms, we have prophetic utterances about the Messiah Jesus continuously, many times quoted from the psalms.

Many times they were on his lips. But listen to this psalm which is taken in the New Testament and gives us the very purpose of life. This is Psalm eight for the choir director on Gideth, a psalm of David.

O eternal our Lord. O Yahweh our Adonai Jehovah. It's God's.

O eternal, our Adani, our Lord. The Everliving is not only the Creator God, but the Everliving is our Lord, our Master, the one we bow to, the one who provides for us, and so on, our Lord. How majestic is your name in all the earth your name is majestic.

You see it all, your creation, everywhere. The great mountains, the beautiful seas, the sunsets, the moon, the stars on all the earth. How majestic is your name and all the earth who have displayed your splendor above the heavens, you've displayed your splendor.

When you look up into the heavens, God's splendor is everywhere. From the mouth of infants and nursing babes, you have established strength because of your adversaries to make the enemies and the revengeful cease. You're going to make all these people cease when I consider your heavens the work of your fingers, the moon, and the stars which you have ordained.

Now, if you're a sheep herder, if you're one who's watching over your dad's sheep at night, and you can't leave them alone, you're watching they go out and you're going to looking for them, making sure they're okay. You would be aware of any wolf or lion or something or bear trying to get them. You would look at those up in the heavens.

No street lights, no lamp lights, no building lights, no downtown lit up, it's dark. And you will see the stars and the solar system and the patterns, the Big Dipper, the Little Dipper, all these things. You'll see them very clearly at night.

So David did the moon, the stars you have ordained. I see these heavens, the work of your fingers. And verse four, when I consider that, what is man, that you take thought of him? This is again all poetic, these are all poetry.

What is a person that you, God, who made all that vastness, beyond vastness? What is man? And the Son of man. See here's the poetic statement in verse four. What is the man that you take thought of him and the Son of man, that you care for him saying the same thing?

You take a thought of somebody and you care for somebody. It's basically the same thing. You have made him, yet you have made him a little lower than Aloeim.

It's translated ages in something. You made us a little lower than Aloem, the God. You have crowned him with glory and majesty.

Now, by the way, that is taken into the New Testament, out of the Septuagint and quoted in the Book of Hebrews for what the purposes of our lives are, you made him rule over the works of your hands. You have put all things under his feet, humans, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heaven, the fish of the sea, whatever passes through the paths of the seas. O eternal our Adonai how majestic this is such a beautiful psalm.

It starts in verse one, the same words. It ends in verse nine, same words. He's telling you this statement.

O eternal our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. And he explains it. This is quoted in the book of Hebrews, and it's quoted as You have made us a little lower than the angels.

It's quoted as angels in the book of Hebrews, we're made a little lower than the angels. We're made VA vastly lower than the Eternal, than Elohim, but we're made lower than the angels. For what purpose? That we become just like God.

And Jesus said, you accuse me, you were mad at me for saying I'm the Son of God. And the scripture says you are Elohim. You are Elohim you are Gods.

By the way, early church fathers knew what that meant. That meant that the purpose of our lives was to become deified. Deification.

The purpose of our lives is to become deified. Now, you see these psalms, a psalm. Let's take a look at Psalm 110, the most quoted psalm in the Bible.

Jesus used it to stump some of these people in his day. This is Psalm 110, verse the Eternal said to my Adonai, now you have the Eternal as Adonai in Psalm eight. But the Eternal said to my Adonai, Adonai, actually, it's just dawn.

Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. So Jesus asked him, well, I want to ask you whose son is when you say son, I mean, whose great grand great grandson whose lineage is the Messiah? And they said, oh, it's from David's lineage. Well, how is it that David calls him? Because this was taken as a messianic statement.

How is it that David calls him Lord, saying the Eternal? The Lord said to my Lord and in the New Testament, it translates doesn't translate the Eternal as the Hebrew. It uses curios. The Courios said, Jamaicourios, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your seat.

Who would that be? That would be the Messiah sitting in God's right hand. The Eternal will stretch forth your strong scepter from Zion, saying, rule in the midst of your enemies. Your people will volunteer freely in that day of your power in the holy array from the womb of the dark.

Your youth are to you as the dew. The Lord the Eternal has sworn and he will not change his mind. You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

Now, strangely, this is the first time you talk about Melchizedek since the Book of Genesis, and yet becomes a big thing in the book of Hebrews. The Eternal is at your right hand, and he will shatter kings in the day of wrath. He will judge among the nations, he will fill them with corpses.

He will shatter the chief men over the broad country. He will drink from the brook by the wayside, therefore, he will lift up his head. So this is talking about the Messiah.

The messiah's rule. God's rule. David understood that.

He understood the purpose of life. He understood what is man. You made us a little, but you crowned us with glory and honor.

You set us over the works of your hands. We're over everything. We're called aloem, translated angels a little lower than the angels, but at one point you are a louim.

Okay? And if you see here how David what kind of a man he was, he evidently was some really terrific leader of men. We'll talk about this in our next sermon. We'll talk about David, why he's a man after God's own heart.

How come he could do these despicable things? And he just says, you have not rewarded us according to our sins. That is absolutely certain. And he knew it better than anyone that he should have died.

He took a man's wife. He should have been killed when they came to Jesus. Now, this is a fictitious thing.

It's not really in the Bible, but we caught her in adultery. She should be stoned. Well, both of them should be stoned according to the law of God.

The adulteress and the adulterer both should be stoned. But the Bible doesn't go after. Bathsheba doesn't do that.

Why? Because she was taken. If you are a woman, there is your king and he wants you. Now, you can't just take anybody's wife because that would society even then, what would stop you? But when you're the king, you can do whatever you want.

You can have whatever you want. You're the ruler. You go and take what you want.

Who's going to stop you? There's nobody. Your servants go down. I want her.

Bring her up here. They went to her house and as the scripture says, they took her. He made a promise to her after her first child died.

He made a promise your son will sit on the throne. He will be the king in my place. Solomon was and David's lineage continued to the Messiah.

Our Lord Jesus Christ. And the coming when he will sit on the throne of David completely. David was and we'll see more why he was a man after God's own heart.

Even though he made many mistakes. It should be encouraging to you that a person who could do what he did and you better never do what he did anywhere near. But whenever our sins, whatever foibles, whatever mistakes, whatever trips, whatever way we stumble, god is so merciful.

He has not rewarded according to our sins or judged us or punished us according to our iniquities. He has not. You can thank God all day and all night for that statement.

Join me as we end today and give God thanks not only for our blessings, but. For many mothers. If you had a good mother, you should give thanks to God for that too.

But I guess it's the luck of the draw. Some people have not had good mothers. I'm so sorry.

I thought I had a good mother. Not a perfect mother, but a good mother, a wonderful mother. So if you've had one, you know the blessings are great, and it's time to honor well, they put Mother's Day, but you need to honor your mother every day of the year.

Join me in prayer. Father in heaven, we approach Your wonderful omnipotent, and glorious throne. We know that you have set your son, Jesus Christ, our Lord, and Savior, as High Priest to hear our prayers, to tend to us in times of stress and times of difficulty, in times of need, because he experienced everything, every form of troubles that we have, whether it's rejection, physical pain, any kind of suffering, being called names.

And he has also experienced respect and happiness and good things. He knows what a good mother is. So, Father, we give you thanks today to all the mothers all over the world.

I sorry that some of them are maybe deranged or something, that they're not really taking care of their kids. But the vast majority of mothers do. The vast majority.

So we can say almost all mothers love their children, raise their children, and care for their children. We thank you for that. You established it that when they have the baby, they are flooded with oxytocin that neurotransmitter in their brains, and they establish a very close and loving relationship.

And mothers never get over it. They can never, ever get over loving their children and being protective of them, and wanting to come to help them. It is a very difficult thing for a mother to do.

Thank you, Father, for giving us that. Thank you for the blessing of the motherhood that you give. To all of us who had wonderful mothers, we praise your name.

We thank you for Jesus, our Lord. We thank you for the prayers that are going up to you. On behalf of each of our brothers and sisters who suffering and trying to overcome certain obstacles and difficulties and physical ailments, we give you the praise and glory through Jesus Christ our Lord.

In his name, we pray. Amen.