The Following Message Has Been Transcribed And Edited For

Clarity, Continuity Of Thought, And Punctuation By

The CCK Transcribing & Editing Team.

 

 

This is about David, the famous King of Judah, who carried the anointing of Almighty God. What does that mean? That means that David was a throne through which the Spirit of God sat upon. David was the vehicle through which Almighty God manifested His will towards the nation of Israel and to the people that Israel interacted with.

 

Now David is an excellent example. I don't know if I want to say an excellent example, because we all know the condition of David was that he was a sinner. We all know that, because most people know what happened between David and Bathsheba, that David coveted a married woman and committed adultery with her, impregnated her and to cover up the crime, had her husband murdered in the guise of being killed on the battlefront. So this is adultery, this is murder, this is scheming and conspiracy.

 

In our courts, today, it would be called a conspiracy because David called in one of his generals and assigned his general to make sure that Bathsheba's husband, Uriah, was placed in a position where he was sure to be killed. So in other words, there is now another person involved, so a conspiracy is present. Now David was a great sinner, but he always repented. He always repented and humbled himself before God and started over again. Every time we repent, we clean the slate with God and we start all over again. But what isn't well known in the church today is that when God forgives us, that means we're saved from death because if there's no forgiveness from God, the judgment is death.

 

See, I was dying when the Lord called me. I started to become sick unto death at about eleven years old. I know that I'm forgiven because I'm not dying anymore. I expect to live to at least an average age and my hope is that I will be privileged to partake of the new world when it comes down to the earth. In other words, I'm hoping for immortality in the flesh. I believe this is the season for it and that's my hope.

 

Excuse me while I stumble my way until I get a lead from the Lord here. I know that a lot of people in the church have been devastated when Pentecostal preachers or any kind of Christian preachers have publicly sinned, run off with a secretary, had an experience with a prostitute, robbed the church and ran away with the money or any such thing. A lot of people become disillusioned with God when they find these unfortunate situations where men, that God has entrusted with His word, involve themselves in such sins.

 

Whenever I have the opportunity, I tell people that what's happening in the church today is that God is choosing sinful men to manifest His Spirit because we're all sinners and we're all fallen. First of all, when the Lord picks a man to start up a ministry, He doesn't think like we do. I'm putting it in terms that you can all understand. First of all, the Lord would sit down with paper, pencil and a plan, and He says, Now what are the primary requirements that I need in this preacher who is going to run this ministry for me? What qualities are needed that are absolutely essential?" He has to be a man who believes in God and who is serving God. Okay, he has to be a man who is a business man and who has a business head. The way the church is today, every ministry has a business side to it. You have to have some business skills. You have to have some ability to manage money, and you have to have some ability to deal with the people, although a lot of preachers have problems with the people because the people are a problem.

 

So that's what the Lord does. He looks for a man who's in God, who also has business skills and basically speaking, someone who is going to be able to do the job. He will place His anointing on that man as long as the man is faithful to Him. Some men make it all the way through and other men don't, but it's no disgrace to God. I mean it doesn't change God if the man fails. We see that David failed, not only with Bathsheba, but I hope to show you in this message some very human traits of David. David failed over and over again, and I'm sure the few occurrences that I have to show you in this message are not the only weaknesses and failures that David manifested. I just have a few because this is the way the Lord led me with this message.

 

Now listen, this message is not to put down David. This message is not to criticize David. This message is to free God's people. You see, we are being challenged in this hour to face the truth about ourselves, about our families and about our loved ones because, in Christ, the truth will set you free. See, the truth will not necessarily set you free in Pentecost because in Pentecost you're still a carnal person under the influence of the Holy Spirit, and that's the condition that David was in. He was a very carnal man under the anointing. The anointing rested upon him, but he had all of the passions and sins of other men.

 

It is only when you are converted, when Christ begins to be formed in you and Christ swallows up your carnality (or your old man, as Paul put it) and your whole nature changes, that is when preachers will stop disappointing you. But, of course, this process is not just for preachers, it's for everybody. So until Christ is formed in you and swallows up your carnal nature or clothes upon your fallen nature, until that happens to you, in each of you individually, until that happens to you, you are not converted. We're all being challenged to face the truth about ourselves, about our wives, about our husbands, about our children, about our mothers and fathers, and about our heroes in the Scripture because the word of the Lord is that the truth will set us free.

 

To see the truth with condemnation won't do it. No condemnation. Objectively, just look at the truth and believe the truth. Then, of course, the next step is forgiveness. Look at the truth and don't be disappointed, don't be happy, don't be sad, don't be glad. Just face the truth because the whole world is in denial. The whole church is in denial, and we're all under curses. The Lord said there are going to be curses broken today, curses broken on the nation of Israel, curses broken on this country, curses that came into play through our ancestor, David. These are curses that are still affecting Israel and the church today.

 

The reason that the curses have not been broken yet, the Lord tells me, is that nobody to date has been willing to face the truth about David so that the curses could be broken. What are the curses? God said He forgave David, but David's ancestors are still reaping what David sowed, so the curse is the reaping and the sowing judgment. The curse is the consequences for the act. If God didn't forgive us, we'd be dead. If God didn't forgive David, all of his descendants would have been wiped out, so forgiven we are. But we want to stop the consequences from rolling, and the consequences are not just behaviors. The consequences are manifesting in this generation, all these thousands of years after David, as spiritual and moral weaknesses. There are spiritual and moral lapses, weaknesses and inabilities in the people of God and the Lord wants to build us up. He wants us to be moral. He wants us to be ethical. He wants us to be outstanding examples of righteousness.

 

So the Lord comes with all His teaching and all His power, but why isn't the church standing in righteousness? Because of moral weakness that is opposing the healing move of the Lord Jesus Christ.

 

So the Lord says, I want the curses broken. Well Sheila, who do you think you are? Why do you think you're the one that God is using to break these curses when the church has been around for two thousand years? I don't think I'm the first one the Lord has come to. I think He has come to many, many, many people before me, many of which have refused, many of which have failed. I've been saying that for a long time. This ministry just got back from a conference at Hegewisch Baptist Church, which is the church that the late Win Worley established. He was a tremendous figure in bringing deliverance to the people, both in ministry and in written works. They told us Win Worley used to say the very same thing. He said he was sure that the Lord had gone to many people before him and they all said no. I've also told you for years that I believe God went to many people before Abraham and they all said no. Abraham was the one who said yes.

 

So tonight, in an official capacity, anointed by the Lord Jesus, we're going to be exposing the sins of King David, the beloved of God, for the specific purpose of facing the truth about this man's lower nature, as well as facing the truth about his anointing. He was two men. I don't have the Scripture right now and if the Lord doesn't show it to me supernaturally, I won't be able to show it to you again because I don't know where it is. But I've been reading in 1Samuel and 11Samuel these last couple of weeks and it was there. It was two paragraphs in a row. First the Lord commended David. This may not be the exact Scripture, but just to get the idea across to you, I'll say He commended David as the great caretaker of the sheep. He names him, David, the great caretaker of the sheep. In the very next verse, there's no name, just the personal pronoun he, and the naive mind thinks the Scripture is still talking about David. But the second Scripture calls him God.

 

Now the Lord just reminded me of that. The first verse commends David, the great caretaker of the sheep, and the next verse says, yes, he who is God. These Scriptures are talking about Christ in David. The Scripture first addresses the mortal man, David, and in the very next verse, addresses the Christ within him.

 

Christ doesn't even have to be grafted to us, but everyone that has Christ functioning and manifesting His life through us, is two people. We're all two people. You need to know that. Therefore, if you are a pastor who's preaching to your people that they cannot sin because he who is born of God cannot sin, you are in error. The one who is born of God that cannot sin is Christ in you, your hope of glorification, but you can sin. Now James clearly talks about the double minded man, but I don't really think it's readily understood in the church, so it's time for a change. The Lord is calling His people forward and everyone who will come will go forward and those who won't will stay behind. God is not killing them. He's not sending them to hell. He's not punishing them. They'll live out their life and they'll die. I don't even believe there would be any condemnation on it.

 

The Lord knows that we are but dust and He's looking for a company of people who will follow Him, and He will have a company of people who will do that. He will always have a remnant who will follow Him, and we will take the victory for all of humanity. That's just the way it is.

 

I haven't even decided what to name this message yet, because people are going to get very upset and talk about me condemning or criticizing King David. But no, we're just going to look at the reality of King David. We're going to expose the weaknesses of human nature that was in that man, and we're going to expose what he has done to bring down the judgment upon him, and that judgment is written in 11 Samuel, Chapter 12, Verses 10 thru 14. This is Nathan, the prophet, speaking to David. Nathan is now speaking for the Lord because David has despised the Lord. "Now therefore the sword shall never depart from thine house because thou hast despised me and has taken the wife of Uriah, the Hittite, to be thy wife. Thus saith the Lord, behold, I will raise up evil against thee, out of thine own house, and I will take thy wives before thine eyes and give them unto thy neighbor, and he shall lie with thy wives in sight of this sun, for thou did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun."

 

And David said unto Nathan, "I have sinned against the Lord," and Nathan said unto David, "the Lord also hath put away thy sin. Thou shalt not die, howbeit, because by this deed, thou has given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child, also, that is born of thee, shall surely die."

 

Now until the Lord showed me this, I always thought that all of these judgments were the reaping and sowing of David's adultery. Let me repeat it again. Verse 10, "therefore the sword shall never depart from thine house." I hope to show you tonight that, that is a judgment, not for the adultery, but this is a judgment for sins of attitude in heart that David had committed leading up to this sin of adultery. As a matter of fact, I hope to show you that David actually abused his power. Please bear with me as I'm having trouble putting this message together, but I will get it done, and I will show you what happened. Right now I'm just giving you the overview.

 

David was defeated. David was rejected. David was mocked and scorned, and he turned around and his reaction to that mocking and scorn and rejection was to turn around and abuse his power as king. Now to go on with God, you have to also be involved in psychology. As everybody in this ministry knows, we are required to look into our own heart, into our own internal workings and to begin to understand ourselves so that we can begin to understand other people so that we can be dealing with sins before they manifest in the natural. Can you hear what I'm saying? The sons of God operate in the spiritual plane.

 

They made a movie about this recently. It was not too good a movie, and I can't remember the name of it. It dealt with the future where the police will arrest you because they have this machinery and these computers that help them determine that you are about to commit a crime. They go and they lock you up before you commit the crime. But what the sons of God do, we perceive the sin as it's gestating in the back of your mind, and we go and explode it so that it never manifests. That's what we're called to do, not to take the people and lock them up and put them in jail before they do the crime, but to save them from doing the crime. So following after God in a mature way cannot be separated from psychology. I will show you in these Scriptures how David was defeated.

 

Listen, when we're defeated it causes us pain. When we're rejected it causes us pain. Now those of us who are stoic and very brave may think we don't feel anything, but all that we're doing is controlling our emotions with our mind and are in denial about what we're really feeling. As I tell you all here, this is admirable in a fallen society because there's nothing you can do about your pain. There's nothing you can do about the person rejecting you, so you ignore it and go on, and it festers inside of you and that's why everybody on the face of the planet has some kind of emotional problem. But in Christ, you can't be doing that because it comes out.

 

In all humanity, you think you're burying it, but it comes out in another way. It comes out in a nasty remark. It comes out in a side remark. It could come out two years later, you're disappointment, or the hurt that, that person caused you. Your reaction to it, your retaliation towards it can manifest two years later and someone will say to you, why did you make that cutting remark and your answer is I don't know. Now people that have power over other people like kings, like your employer, like husbands, like pastors, anyone who exercises authority over another person, must be aware that it is the tendency of the fallen nature to scapegoat the people under you when you have been hurt. You need to know that so that you can guard against doing it.

 

Mothers, you have to know that you have a tendency to hurt your children when your husband hurts you, but that you're blind to what you're doing. All of you mothers, I challenge you to be honest with yourself and look back over your memories. Was there never one time that your husband gave you a hard time and you turned around to your child tugging on your skirt and shouted stop that? If your husband had not given you a hard time, you would have said, now don't do that, dear. But because your husband just aggravated you, you turned around and said, now stop that! Is there anyone here who can say they've never had a situation like that? You can't deny that because that's life in the fallen world, you see.

 

Now David was defeated, mocked and his overtures of peace were rejected. David's overtures of peace were rejected, and the way he dealt with that pain was that he went out and he committed adultery. He took another man's wife and he committed adultery. That was how he relieved himself. In this ministry, we would call that spiritual masturbation. See, the whole world does this. We all do it. Everyone doesn't commit adultery. Some people go and take a drink. I used to work in Manhattan, and there are a lot of men out there and women too, they won't commit the adultery, but they'll flirt with the women. One man actually said to me, you could lay your plans to go away for the weekend with that woman, go all the way to the airport to get on the plane, and change your mind and you're guiltless. They get the woman. It gives them their spiritual organism. The woman was willing to go with them, and they stop it there. They got what they needed.

 

See, all human beings, we all need to feel good and we all need to counteract the pains that fall upon our hearts continuously in this fallen world. We think that we're strong. I don't have any doubt in my mind at all, that when David got the news that his overtures of peace were rejected, that he said, well tough on them, we'll get them, send the armies out to get them. If I were a betting person, I'd bet you anything that David didn't have a clue that while his mouth spoke the bold military response, that he never even recognized that his wounded heart turned around looking for a way to make himself feel good. He went up on the roof, and he saw this woman bathing and he said, I'm going to take that woman.

 

He abused his power as king to throw off the rejection that was hurting him. This is what the Lord has shown me. It wasn't just that the child from Bathsheba died, but there was a war with Ammon that went on because of this. As a result of this, the Lord said to David in Verse 10, "Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house." What kind of a righteous judgment is that for adultery, that the sword will never depart from your house? No. I'm going to read you the Scriptures. I'll get there.

 

David sent a peace offering to the new King of Ammon. He said, let's be friends and the advisors of the king said, no, don't trust him, and they took the men that David had sent to them and they shaved their beards off and humiliated those men and sent those ministers of peace back to David utterly humiliated. There was war between Israel and Ammon for years after that because David yielded to his rejection. Not only did he yield to his rejection in the military sense, but he healed his own wounded feelings by taking another man's wife and murdering the man. So the child died because of the adultery, but the nation would be at war. Therefore the sword shall never depart from your house because you are a violent man, not violent for God, not violent for righteous judgment. It's not like where God sent the Hebrew children after the Philistines. That's not what the Lord is talking about.

 

David used his power as a violent man; therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house. Also, thus saith the Lord, "behold I will raise up evil against thee out of thine own house and I will take thy wives before thine eyes." Well, that's because he stole Uriah's wife.

 

Now this word, sun, is very interesting. We know that in Malachi, we have the Scripture, "the sun of righteousness shall arise." I don't think the prophet meant the sun that was in the sky. Does anyone know who our spiritual sun is? We all have a spiritual sun and a moon. Who are our spiritual sun and moon?

 

COMMENT: I'll say Jesus is our sun, and Satan or the devil is our moon.

 

PASTOR VITALE: Well it was a good try, but no. There was no Jesus in the Old Testament, anyway. Anybody else want to try?

 

COMMENT: I'll say Abel is the sun and Cain is the moon.

 

PASTOR VITALE: Well that's a good try and it's closer, but in the fallen man, Satan is our sun and Leviathan is the moon. In the new man, it's not the Lord Jesus but Christ Jesus in us, which is a mature manifestation of Abel, so you were close. The Spirit of Christ in us is the sun, and Abel becomes Christ when Christ grafts to him. Christ Jesus is the moon. Christ Jesus is the mature manifestation of the anointing that dwells in the left side of our heart center, which is above the power and authority of Satan, who is in the lower or the right side of the heart center. So that's Christ Jesus. Christ alone is grafted to Abel down in the belly. So we have Christ Jesus and Christ within us. The Spirit of Christ is the sun and Christ Jesus is the moon.

 

So in this case, I'm not even sure who the prophet is talking about. I don't know whether he's saying, "therefore thou did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun." My guess would be that the Lord is talking about Satan. I'm not really sure. I shouldn't be guessing. I don't know whether that would be Satan. You see, David had an imputed anointing. He had an imputed Spirit of Christ in him. "Thou did this sin secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before this sun." My guess would be that this would be done before Satan, showing Satan that righteous judgment is being executed. But that's not the Lord telling me that. I could be mistaken. That's just what I'm feeling right now.

 

So let me try to get on with my message. I am having some trouble getting started here.

 

Basically, what I'm telling you once again is that these curses appearing in 11 Samuel, Chapter 12 are from God. I hope you all know that God curses. You see, any pronouncement upon somebody for evil is a curse; therefore, God does curse, but God curses righteously. God curses righteously. God is the author of the sowing and reaping judgment and the enforcer of the sowing and reaping judgment is Satan, but it is God's righteous law. So therefore God does curse, but He curses righteously, if you can hear that. This is the curse that's still on Israel today, and I believe the United States is the modern day Israel.

 

I do not believe in replacement theology. I don't believe we have replaced the Jews or the natural nation of Israel, but we are adopted. We are the spiritual Israel. We are the Israel of God. So therefore these curses are flowing on us today. They're flowing also on the nation of England because England has been spiritual Israel for years. They were a mighty force in bringing the Gospel to the world and now they're languishing. I hear all their churches are closing down. I have heard that from people that live in England.

 

But I was encouraged the other day to see on Pat Robertson's CBN a charismatic (not Catholic charismatic) but I don't like to say Pentecostal because the gifts can be present in other denominations also. I'm talking about a ministry manifesting the gifts in England and it was on Pat Robertson's show. So I'm really glad to see that there is a revival coming to England. Great Britain is under a severe attack. They were a tremendous force for the defense and the spreading of the Gospel. The United States is under a severe attack, and the nation of Israel is under a severe attack. The Lord wants to even the playing field because the truth of the matter is that Satan's crowd is much stronger than we are, and that includes me. Satan's crowd is stronger than we are. Until somebody stands up in full stature, we need extra help from the Lord Jesus Christ, and I believe He intends to give it to us through the preaching of this message tonight.

 

Let me tell you this because when I first came to the church, I didn't understand how preaching a message could change the course of a nation. So let me tell you, just for those of you who don't know what's happening in this nation. We have some elections coming up Tuesday. There's a force that's rolling along, and this force is called time, and it's controlled by Satan because this is a fallen world and Satan is the prince of this world.

 

See, there's a writing. The history and the future of this world and of this country is written, and it's rolling forward. What I'm seeing in the spirit right now is a kind of roll that you see for a player piano, where you see cut outs in the roll that's unrolling and it's just moving forward. Time continues. Nothing stops it. It goes tick, tick, tick. Nothing can stop this time from just rolling forward, nothing known to man. Nothing outside of God can stop it, but God can stop it, you see. So the Lord Jesus Christ comes and makes a decision. You see, the Lord Jesus Christ is the Supreme Court. He's like the United States Supreme Court. He's the last chance to change what's happening. People and Christians all over the country have been praying, actually for years, to save this nation from the path that it's on because the path that it's on is out to utterly shut down Christianity.

 

The Lord has begun to move. He began to move with the election of George Bush, and I believe He intends to influence this election coming up on Tuesday. So in order for the Lord to bring His will to pass, He must interfere with space- time that's moving forward, tick, tick, tick, for whatever the plans are to put people in control of our government that do not honor Godly people.

 

So the Lord wants to interfere with this tremendous force that's moving forward. How does God do that? He preaches a message. You see, it sounds so simple that it's hard to believe. He raises up a preacher and a congregation to listen to Him because this is body ministry. If you're listening and receiving in your spirit, this preaching is body ministry. It's not just me, it's all of us. He preaches His word, and He preaches His will, and, in this case, He's showing us sin. This is not at all uncommon for me. I don't know how familiar the people reading the transcript or listening to the tape are with the Lord's ways, but it's very common when the Lord sends people to me for help, that He will show them their sins. They will be required to confess their sins, and then He'll break a curse on them, and then He goes forth and brings deliverance into their life.

 

So the Lord is telling us tonight that this curse that was put on David is for the violent retaliation that he showed against Ammon. It's not that Ammon was good, or not that Ammon was not an enemy of Israel, but David's heart was carnal. It's because of David's hard heart that this curse is on Israel and the United States and Great Britain today. As long as this curse is manifesting, we can only prevail and then get knocked down, prevail and then get knocked down and prevail and then get knocked down.

 

During World War 11, the whole Christian world was threatened. We prevailed, but now we're knocked down again.

 

This is going to be the last time we're knocked down because Messiah is manifesting. He's manifesting His power in the earth. This time, when He sets Christendom up on its feet and Israel up on its feet and brings them to a knowledge of their own Messiah, we're not going to get knocked down. Therefore, we who are here tonight and whoever is reading this transcript or listening to this message, we are God's vehicle to look at the truth of David. I don't think it would be anyone else besides us by next Tuesday's elections. We are to look at the sins, the human sins of the heart that David manifested and that he acted upon, sins he didn't restrain himself from.

 

I've been preaching to all of you for years here, you must look inside of your heart. You must see the attitudes that come from the carnal mind. The unconscious part of your carnal mind is Satan, and the subconscious part of your carnal mind is pride, Leviathan. You must look inside your heart and see these hidden sins and refuse to act on them. Did David have the ability to do this? I don't know, but he didn't. The church and Israel and the whole free world is laboring under Satan's power all of these thousands of years because of this curse. That's what the Lord told me tonight.

 

The curse will only break when a group of honest people will look at the truth of David's flaws and admit them without condemning him. That's how the curse breaks. Isn't that crazy? We're sitting here in this house tonight, and we're not a large group and we're going to preach this message. We're going to face this truth about David, and we're going to influence the upcoming elections, but it's the truth. Earlier we were watching a video of another preacher on TV, who the Lord had given a commission to do something very difficult. He was sitting on TV with a big platter in front of him, which held a Bible, holding a knife and a fork. Didn't he look silly? I told you all that if the Lord hadn't instructed me in the past to do similar absurd things, I would have thought, isn't that preacher silly, sitting there saying this is what the Lord told me to do, but I believe it.

 

So you see, the ways of God look foolish to the carnal mind, but they're not foolish. They change times and seasons. It's so simple that it's hard for men to believe.

 

Okay, I'm going to try to get on with this. I think we have two or three occasions, all in the books of 1 and 11 Samuel, showing David's character flaws. We're going to start with the earliest one, which is his mistreatment of his wife Michal. 1 Samuel, Chapter 18, starting with Verse 6. This is about David and Saul. Remember, David's wife, Michal, was the daughter of Saul. Verse 6, "And it came to pass as they came, when David was returned from the slaughter of the Philistine, that the women came out of all cities of Israel singing and dancing to meet King Saul with tabrets, with joy and with instruments of music. And the women answered one another as they played and said, Saul has slain his thousands and David his ten thousands. And Saul was very wrought and the saying displeased him and he said, they have ascribed unto David ten thousands and to me they have ascribed but thousands. What can he have more but the kingdom?" In other words, Saul is now afraid of David. Now let me ask you a question. This message is really not Kabbalah, but this is a Kabbalistic question. What did these women mean by, "Saul has killed his thousands and David his ten thousands?" Do you really think they were talking about David killing ten thousands of people? Remember, in this year, in this time, it was all hand-to-hand combat with knives and swords. Do you think David killed a multiple of ten thousands of people? That's not even reasonable to think about.

 

What is the Scripture talking about? Does anybody remember? Nobody knows, so let me get on with this.

 

One thousand refers to Chokhmah and ten thousand refers to the Keter. The Keter is the highest of the Ten Sefirot and the Chokhmah is right under him. So what the people are saying here is that David has more power than Saul, not that David went out and killed something like thirty thousand people, which I don't even think was humanly possible back then. The people were recognizing that the anointing on David was a greater anointing than the anointing on Saul, which is the truth. We all know that. Anyone that's a Bible student knows that David was more anointed than Saul. David was the true heir. Saul was only the temporary heir because the people were clamoring for a king. So Saul recognized what the people were saying was true, that David was more powerful than he was and Saul was afraid that David would take his kingdom away.

 

What is it that James said? Be sure that you don't go sitting in the first row when you come into a church because when a greater one than you comes in, you will be embarrassed when you're asked to step backwards or go to the back of the church. Don't ever think that you're more than you are because you never know when a greater one will come along. Now if you're in a ministry and a greater one does come along, you have to get out of that person's way, you see. The Lord will continue to minister to you and through you. He's not going to take your ministry away from you. Your ministry will be anointed as long as your heart is right, but you will have to accept that someone with a greater anointing has come forth.

 

So we see, Saul is threatened and says the people have ascribed to David ten thousand. They have ascribed Keter to David and to me (Saul) they have only ascribed Chokhmah and what can he have more but my very kingdom. In verse 9; And Saul eyed David from that day forward. He watched him. He was afraid of David. Verse 10, "And it came to pass on the morrow that the evil spirit from God came upon Saul and he prophesied in the midst of the house and David played with his hand as at other times and there was a javelin in Saul's hand and Saul cast the javelin, for he said, I will smite David even to the wall with it. And David avoided out of his presence twice." This is verse 12. "And Saul was afraid of David, because the Lord was with him (with David) and the Lord was departed from Saul. Therefore Saul removed David from him and made David his captain over a thousand, and he went down and came in before the people. And David behaved himself wisely in all his ways and the Lord was with him. But Saul is lying in wait for him." Verse 15, "Wherefore when Saul saw that David behaved himself very wisely, Saul was afraid of David. But all Israel and Judah loved David because he went out and came in before them. And Saul said to David, behold my elder daughter Merab, her will I give thee to wife, only be thou valiant for me and fight the Lord's battles. For Saul said, let not mine hand be upon him, but let the hand of the Philistines be upon him."

 

So we see into Saul's nature. He offered David his daughter for wife, and he said all that I want you to do, David, is go to battle. It sort of sounds like what David did to Uriah. It's very close. Isn't that interesting? So Saul made an offer to David. It sounded good, but Saul had ulterior motives and David said to Saul, "who am I and what is my life or my father's family in Israel, that I should be a son-in-law to the King. But it came to pass, at the time when Merab, Saul's daughter, should have been given to David, that she was given unto Adriel the Meholathite to wife." We don't have any more information about it, at least in the first book of Samuel.

 

So David went into battle. He didn't get killed, and Saul just broke his word. He just didn't do it. Then the very next verse says, Verse 20, "And Michal, Saul's daughter loved David and they told Saul and the thing pleased Saul. And Saul said, I will give her to David that she may be a snare unto him and that the hand of the Philistines may be against him. Wherefore Saul said to David, thou shalt this day be my son-in-law in the one of the twain." In other words, with Michal instead of with Merab.

 

We're not told why Saul broke his promise concerning Merab. Maybe she didn't like David because the very next verse says, "and Michal loved David, so Saul said, I'll give you Michal." So maybe Merab didn't care for David. I don't know. But we see that Saul's motives are evil, not only towards David, but what a wicked thing to do to your own daughter. Now please note, we don't read anything about David's feelings about Michal. We don't read that David loved Michal. Listen to what happens next. Verse 22, "And Saul commanded his servant saying, commune with David secretly and say, behold, the king hath delight in thee and all his servants love thee, now therefore be the king's son-in-law. And Saul's servants spake those words in the ears of David. And David said, seemeth it to you a light thing to be a King's son-in-law, seeing that I am a poor man and lightly esteemed? And the servants of Saul told him saying, on this manner spake David. And Saul said, thus shall you say to David, the king desireth not any dowry, but an hundred foreskins of the Philistines, to be avenged of the king's enemies. But Saul thought to make David fall by the hand of the Philistines."

 

So this is the second daughter that Saul is promising to David, both times hoping that David will die before the marriage comes to pass.

 

Now there's one thing I must interject here, which really has nothing to do with this message. I must tell you that for years I read these Scriptures and I thought, isn't that strange that Saul wants foreskins, the foreskins of the Philistines, a hundred foreskins of the Philistines. That's sort of bizarre for a nation that's supposed to be higher than the pagans or the idol worshipers of the day. It's like close to the American Indian taking the scalps of their victims. That's an odd thing to ask for. But as I studied Kabbalah in the Zohar, I found that there is a spiritual application to the word foreskin. Anything that covers is called a foreskin or a klipot. In the Zohar we're told that the physical body is a foreskin because the real man is inside this physical body.

 

The truth is that the physical body is just the horse that the real man rides upon. But we, humanity, have been horses without a rider for thousands of years. We read about that in the book of Zechariah, in Chapter 6, the four riderless horses. At the end of one of the chapters, the angel stands there and says, "this condition will not continue forever." Why? Because when a horse has no rider, we go into destruction. This herd of humanity that we are, we're not capable of living a positive existence without a rider. We don't know how to take care of ourselves. We're all given over to destruction.

 

So this physical body is the horse, and the real man is inside. So when Saul said, "give me a hundred foreskins of the Philistines," he was speaking Kabbalistically or metaphorically saying, "give me one hundred dead bodies." I don't even know if he was asking for one hundred dead bodies because one hundred signifies which Sefirot? What is one hundred?

 

COMMENT: Binah.

 

PASTOR VITALE: Yes, Binah signifies one hundred, and Chokhmah is one thousand, and the Keter is ten thousand.

 

So what was Saul asking of David? He was asking David to take down the Philistines that were manifesting the spiritual power on the level of Binah of the other side. The spiritual power of Binah is immortality. Saul was asking David to go and get a giant, if that's how you want to interpret it. I don't particularly think that Saul was asking for one hundred dead bodies, but if that's what you want to think, it's okay. I just gave you an alternate suggestion. But we see that Saul was very evil, and Saul was anointed king by the Lord. Look at this wicked man. At this point, we don't read anything at all about David's caring for either daughter, Merab or Michal.

 

All David is thinking about is, who am I that I should be a king's son-in-law? David is completely thinking about himself. You know, it may have been the times where women may not have been thought of very much in those days. That's a possibility, but the bottom line is still that David was thinking one hundred percent about himself even though Michal loved David. We don't know that David knew that Michal loved him, but this is the information we have from the Scripture.

 

So we're up to Verse 26, "And when his servants told David these words, it pleased David well to be the king's son-in-law and the days were not expired." Now what's manifesting in David? It pleased David well to be the king's son-in-law. What's manifesting in David?

 

COMMENT: Pride.

 

PASTOR VITALE: Absolutely. He's flattered. David is accepting this wife because he is flattered.

 

Now remember, in these days, a man could have more than one wife. So why not take the wife and be a son-in-law of the king? So apparently David was naive. I think David would have known that Saul was not his best friend, but here he is accepting this flattery. Let's go on. Verse 27, "Wherefore David arose and went, he and his men, and slew of the Philistines two hundred men and David brought their foreskins, and they gave them in full tale to the king, that he might be the king's son-in-law. And Saul gave him Michal his daughter to wife. And Saul saw and knew that the Lord was with David and that Michal, Saul's daughter, loved him." Saul knew that David had the Lord on his side and that he had Michal on his side. Verse 29, "And Saul was yet the more afraid of David and Saul became David's enemy continually. Then the princes of the Philistines went forth and it came to pass after they went forth, that David behaved himself more wisely than all the servants of Saul, so that his name was much set by." I think we're going to skip a few verses here.

 

We're picking up with 1 Samuel 19:8, "And there was war again and David went out and fought with the Philistines and slew them with a great slaughter and they fled from him. And the evil spirit from the Lord was upon Saul, as he sat in his house with his javelin in his hand and David played with his hand. And Saul sought to smite David even to the wall with his javelin, but David slipped away out of Saul's presence and he smote the javelin into the wall and David fled and escaped that night." Well, I guess David got the message that Saul hates his guts and is trying to kill him. Verse 11, "Saul also sent messengers unto David's house to watch him and to slay him in the morning and Michal, David's wife, told him, saying, if thou save not thy life tonight, tomorrow thou shalt be slain." So Michal chose her husband over her father, which one would expect, but you never know. Michal was faithful to David.

 

Remember, we still have read nowhere that David has any feelings for this woman at all. Verse 12, "So Michal let David down through a window and he went and fled and escaped. And Michal took an image and laid it in the bed and put a pillow of goat's hair for his bolster and covered it with a cloth. And when Saul sent messengers to take David, she said, he is sick. And Saul sent the messengers again to see David, saying, bring him up to me in the bed that I may slay him. And when the messengers were come in, behold, there was an image in the bed with a pillow of goat's hair for his bolster."

 

"And Saul said unto Michal (the father says unto the daughter) why hast thou deceived me so, and sent away mine enemy, that he is escaped? And Michal answered Saul saying, he said unto me, let me go; why should I kill thee? Let me go, why should I kill thee?" In other words, I'll kill you if you don't let me go. So David fled and escaped. I want to tell you that I have researched this out and I could not find any Scripture that would indicate David made any attempt to contact his wife after this. We know he was in the wilderness. We're told that he had wives and concubines in the wilderness, but he never called for Michal. The next thing that we hear is that Saul gave Michal to another husband.

 

I'll show you that Scripture. It's 1 Samuel, Chapter 25, Verse 42. For those of you who are not familiar with this Scripture, Abigail is the wife of a churlish man who was arrogant towards David and refused to help David, and this wife brought David and his men food even though her husband told her not to do it. So for all you ladies that are dealing with very carnal men, we see that there are occasions where wisdom and righteousness would have you disobey your husband, but you better make sure that it's the Lord, if you're disobeying him. But you have to stand up for righteousness if your husband is doing something that is going to hurt you, and it's wrong and you've tried to reason with him and to talk to him, and you've done everything that you could do, you have to stand for righteousness.

 

So Abigail saved their whole town when David was going to attack it because Abigail's husband wasn't willing to give food or lodging to David and his men when they came peacefully. I think they were even willing to pay and the man just wouldn't help them. So Abigail, by her wisdom, saved her town from a military slaughter and then her husband died and David called for her to marry her. So verse 42 of 1 Samuel Chapter 25, "And Abigail hasted and arose and rode upon an ass, with five damsels of her's that went after her; and she went after the messengers of David and became his wife." Verse 43, "David also took Ahinoam of Jezreel, and they were also both of them his wives. But Saul had given Michal, his daughter, David's wife, to Phaltiel, son of Laish, which was of Gallim."

 

So David is out there, and he doesn't seem to be missing Michal very much and I'm sure that the Scripture is not making it clear, but that he has had concubines all along. You know, David was a rough guy. These Israelites of the Bible days were a rough, tough bunch. Maybe it's not true of Israel today, but I think the stereo type Jew is someone who doesn't want to fight or someone who is a scholar. They're interested in learning. That's the positive stereo type of them, certainly not a scrapper or a brawler or a soldier; although, there are many Jews that were in the army. But the typical stereo type is the scholar who's not interested in anything like that. So I don't know how we got from the Israelites in the Bible days to the stereo type Jew today, but, of course, that stereo type is changing in Israel. Of course that's just a generalization, and we know that all nations have all kinds of people in them.

 

We see nothing to indicate that David even appreciated what Michal did for him. The next thing we read about Michal is that she was given to another man. I'll give you the Scriptures that we're going to enter into in a couple of minutes. They show David, after I don't know how many years have gone by, with Abner, who was the captain of the hosts of Saul's armies. After Saul died, he was still the captain of the hosts of the descendant of Saul, who was ruling over those armies, and he comes to David with an unGodly proposal.

 

I've read this thing over and over, and I really believe I have the word of the Lord on it and the man's motive for coming to David. Now remember this was Abner, the captain of the hosts of Saul's armies. That's the enemy of David, okay. David's general that was very loyal to him was called Joab. Those were the two mighty generals of the Northern and Southern kingdoms in those days. Abner becomes angry at the king who was descended from Saul. This is a weak king. We'll read the Scripture so we'll get the details more clearly.

 

This is a weak king that has taken over the kingdom, and this weak king points out to Abner that he has done something wrong, that he has sinned. This again is typical of human nature. This great mighty general, Abner, in so many words, rises up to the king and says, "who do you think you are telling me that?" You may have the title of king, but I know that you're just a nothing. Abner goes around and talks to all of the ten tribes and gets a lot of the people to abandon this king (whose name I can't remember, but we'll read it in the Scripture in a minute) and then Abner goes to David and offers him a deal.

 

"I'm going to give you authority over all of these Israelites who are willing to come over to your side and let you be their king." Now if you were the leader, if you were a king of a nation, a great and mighty warrior like David (God's anointed) and somebody came to you, and you knew that they were offering you something that was more or less illegal, the fruit of a rebellion against their own king out of spite, what would your reaction be to his offer? What would your reaction be to his offer? All of you, please get an answer ready. What would your reaction be to his offer?

 

COMMENT: I would think he was up to no good.

 

PASTOR VITALE: Would you trust him to come and be a general in your army? Would you? Would you?

 

Well, David made a deal with him and David said, "there's just one condition, I want my wife Michal back." After all these years, after these other women, after however many sons that he's had, David says to this general Abner (who was to me, as far as I could see, a man who certainly was not to be trusted) "alright, I'm going to make a deal with you, if you go into Saul's kingdom and do whatever you have to do and give me my wife, Michal, back." Michal is now remarried and I would imagine she has children. We're not told whether she had children with this man or not. But we are told that the husband of Michal loved her and I'll show you that in the Scripture.

 

We are in 11 Samuel Chapter 3. I'm going to read you Verses 15 and 16 and then we'll read the whole account of which I have just given you a synopsis on. Now David had demanded his wife, Michal, back. The name of the king at the time was one of Saul's sons named Ishbosheth. Verse 15, "And Ishbosheth sent and took her (Michal) from her husband, even from Phaltiel the son of Laish. And her husband went with her along weeping behind her to Bahurim. Then said Abner unto him, (her husband) go and return and he returned." They just ripped her away from her family.

 

Her husband followed after, crying and weeping. To me that means her husband loved her, and I believe that she loved her husband. Why do I believe that she loved her husband? Because later on (and we'll get to these Scriptures) we read some cryptic Scriptures about Michal despising David when he was dancing before the Lord and everybody thinks that Michal had some anti-Christ spirit and despised David because she was embarrassed that he was making an open display of himself.

 

But I want to suggest to you that, that is not the reason at all. Michal hated David because she loved him to the point that she betrayed her own father for him and he abandoned her. Then after she found some happiness in life (because of David's own pride that she was property) he wanted his property back. Without any thought or caring for her or her husband or her children (and I believe she had to have children) he literally ripped her out of her life and forced her, without asking her, just ripped her out of her life and had her brought to him. She hated him. First, for abandoning her when she was his wife and then for destroying the happiness that she had found. She despised him, not because he was rejoicing in the street before the Lord and she was embarrassed.

 

I believe that she got the result that she wanted from David. We're told for that reason Michal had no child. She had no child by David, you see, which is exactly what she wanted. She did not want him touching her. David was hard, hard of heart, cold, without feeling, insensitive, and cruel. Amen.

 

Let's read this account that I have just given you a synopsis on. We're in 11 Samuel Chapter 3 starting with verse 1, "Now there was long war between the house of Saul and the house of David, but David waxed stronger and stronger and the house of Saul waxed weaker and weaker. And unto David were sons born in Hebron and his firstborn was Ammon, of Ahinoam the Jezreelitess. And his second, Chileab, of Abigail the wife of Nabal the Carmelite, and the third, Absalom the son of Maacah the daughter of Talmai, king of Geshur. And the fourth, Adonijah the son of Haggith and the fifth, Shephatiah the son of Abital. And the sixth, Ithream, by Eglah, David's wife. These were born to David in Hebron. And it came to pass, while there was war between the house of Saul and the house of David, that Abner (that's the general) made himself strong for the house of Saul. And Saul had a concubine, whose name was Rizpah, the daughter of Aiah and Ishbosheth said to Abner, wherefore hast thou gone in unto my father's concubine? Then was Abner very wroth for the words of Ishbosheth and said, am I a dog's head, which against Judah do shew kindness this day unto the house of Saul thy father, to his brethren, and to his friends, and have not delivered thee into the hand of David, that thou chargest me today with a fault concerning this woman?"

 

Have you ever come up against somebody like that? You tell them they're doing something wrong, and they turn around and say, what's the matter with you accusing me? They put the blame right on the other person. That's what the whole world does, but God's people don't do things like that, you see. This is a fault that's found in Israel, but it's not acceptable to God. For those people going on to have their nature converted into the nature of Christ, you must make a choice to stop doing these things because Christ doesn't do things like that. Only a carnal mind does things like that. So every time you (the personality) must shut your mouth and not speak the words, you see. Every time you agree with your carnal mind who wants to react like that, you have to put Christ down under your carnal mind to do it, you see.

 

In order for your carnal mind to speak through your mouth, you have to sacrifice Christ. You have to put Christ down under your carnal mind because Christ is not in agreement that you're going to say this. So when your personality agrees to speak the words of your carnal mind, you kill Christ for that moment, and He goes down under the feet of your carnal mind. See, you can't have it both ways. You cannot have Christ developed in you and be acting and talking like the world.

 

So if you want the new order ministry of Christ Jesus, you're going to have to recognize the activities and the forms of communication of your carnal mind and you're going to have to resist Satan whispering in the back of your head and choose the way Christ would go. It's an active choice. Eventually, the way Christ thinks will become second nature to you, but, initially, it will be alien. The way Christ thinks, and the way Christ reacts will be alien to you. You'll be tempted to say, well I don't think I'll do it that way or I've always done it that way. That's just your carnal mind. You have a choice. You can keep that way or you can have the nature of Christ formed in you. But you can protest all that you want, and there's no way you're going to convince the Lord or me that you're right doing and talking and sounding like Satan and Leviathan.

 

Even though the world accepts it, the Lord does not honor it. Do you still have a relationship with the Lord? Of course. Are you forgiven? Of course. You're forgiven for the sin that caused the fall, but you will reap what you sow when you engage in unGodly methods of dealing with human problems. What you're going to reap in this instance that I've just described is that you're hindering the formation of the Christ nature in you because every time you choose to deal with a problem Satan's way (Satan is the unconscious part of your carnal mind) Christ is sacrificed. See, you're shooting yourself in the foot. We have to be instructed how to think and respond as Christ because it's alien to us.

 

We're told in the book of Daniel, Chapter 7 (at least in our Alternate Translation it came out this way) that Christ, the character and the nature and the communication methods and just everything that Christ is, is so different than the carnal mind that the people manifesting Christ look deformed. The good carnally minded people in the church think you're crazy if you're living like Christ, if you're thinking like Christ, if you're communicating like Christ and you're reacting like Christ. That's how different Christ is from the carnal mind so, therefore, we must be instructed on how to be Christ because He's so different. Then after we're instructed, we must make a choice to not act that way. It's an unnatural inclination to give that up and to make an active choice to say something different, to think something different, to do something different.

 

As you wage this warfare against your gut reactions, if you continue to resist them and curse them (someday or one day you'll be pleasantly surprised) you will have a reaction in a particular circumstance that will be Christ and you will not have had to fight a war to have that Godly reaction. It will just come up naturally. This is your conversion. See, you're not converted when you answer an altar call. You're just reconciled to God, which is the impartation of the power to be converted, but conversion is not that easy.

 

Let's say you were a Hindu, and now you want to convert your religion to become a spirit filled Christian. There's a process, you have to train, you have to learn, you have to read the Bible, you have to study, you have to learn everything that we learn. You can't be converted by answering an altar call. That's not conversion. Praise the Lord.

 

I didn't mean to get off like that. I want to read this verse 8 again. "Then Abner was very wroth with the words of Ishbosheth (Saul's son, the weak king) and said, am I a dog's head, which against Judah do shew kindness this day unto the house of Saul thy father?" See what Abner is doing here; he's mocking Ishbosheth. Abner was very wroth. Ishbosheth was righteous. He said, you shouldn't be doing that. Apparently, even though Saul was dead, it's wrong for Abner to be having sexual relations with Saul's concubines. I think in those days you were supposed to just go into celibacy. You weren't supposed to have anything to do with anyone again.

 

So Abner was very wroth for the words of Ishbosheth and said, "am I a dog's head, which against Judah do shew kindness this day unto the house of Saul thy father, to his brethren, and to his friends, and have not delivered you into the hand of David, that you chargest me today with a fault concerning this woman? So do God to Abner, and more also, except, as the Lord hath sworn to David, even so I do to him." To translate the kingdom from the house of Saul, and to set up the throne of David over Israel and over Judah, from Dan even to Beersheba.

 

See, Abner who was a military general, is bitter that David won the war and that the kingdom of Saul was really broken up. Abner is despising him and saying to him, "You" are going to tell me that I did something wrong? Me, the military hero who was in all of these wars, you're going to tell me that I did something wrong?" That's what he's saying to him.

 

Verse 11, "And he (Ishbosheth) could not answer Abner a word again, because he was afraid of him." So Ishbosheth had authority, but no power. Verse 12, "And Abner sent messengers to David on his behalf, saying, whose is the land? Saying also, make thy league with me and behold my hand shall be with you to bring about all Israel unto you." You see, when David won the war, all of Israel was not united. The whole twelve tribes were not united because the people were still faithful to Saul. So Abner is saying," I'm a leader of the people. The people will follow me. I'll bring the tribes of Israel under your kingdom and you will rule all of Israel, all twelve tribes." That's what Abner was offering him.

 

Verse 13, "And he said, well, I will make a league with you, but one thing I require of you, that is, thou shalt not see my face except you first bring Michal, Saul's daughter, when you come to see my face. Don't come without Michal." He hasn't thought about her in all of these years. Verse 14, "And David sent messengers to Ishbosheth, Saul's son, saying, deliver me my wife, Michal, which I espoused to me for an hundred foreskins of the Philistines." Not the woman I love, not the woman who saved my life, but the woman that I paid for. Send me my property.

 

David was a hard man. You know, the Scripture says that Judah is cruel. There's cruelty in the genes of Judah. Send me my property, not how is she, does she prosper, is she well, is she happy, is she safe, does she ever ask about me? Just send me my property that I paid for.

 

Verse 15, "And Ishbosheth sent, and took her from her husband, even from Phaltiel, the son of Laish. And her husband went with her along weeping behind her to Bahurim. Then said Abner unto him, get out of here and go home. She's not yours anymore." Wow! Every word we speak and every attitude of our heart will reap a reaction to us and to our ancestors. You know, the first time I heard that Scripture in the New Testament that said every word we speak will be judged, I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe it because I related it to doctrine. We were all into doctrine in that church at the time. I said, wow, if I make a mistake in doctrine, I'm going to go under judgment for that. Not really.

 

But every word you speak to another human being, you will reap what you have sown. Every hardness of heart, even if you didn't know it was wrong at the time, there is a judgment on every word you say and every thought that you think. There is a judgment on every hidden attitude of your heart, and the fact that you are blind to what's going on inside of your heart doesn't stop the judgment. The only thing that's going to stop the judgment is you facing the truth about what's in your heart and refusing to yield to it anymore. That's the only thing that's going to stop the judgment.

 

If you have a critical spirit, you will reap criticism for the rest of your life and your only hope of stopping that judgment is by looking into your own heart and confessing each sin. It cannot only be a general confession that you're critical, but confession of every instance that the Lord brings back to your mind or every time someone in a right spirit tells you that you've been critical. By facing it and stamping out that attitude of your heart, not just the words that you say, that's the only way you could stop that judgment. If you don't do that, you'll pass it on to your children. So the exposure of sin is a mercy, a mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ. I was going to say, even if the exposure of sin is done incorrectly. But even if someone exposes your sin with a wrong motive, you can lay hold of that truth given with the wrong motive and still benefit from their sin.

 

We do not escape from the consequences of the attitudes of our heart by denying them. Not only do we not escape, but we pass this judgment on to our children and our grandchildren and our great grandchildren and our great, great grandchildren.

 

We're seeing these qualities in David and in Abner, and we'll be hearing about Joab shortly. I could see them. I see them in myself. I see them in my relatives. I see this hardness of heart. The Lord told me a long time ago, Judah is cruel, at which point I started praying for loving kindness to pour into my heart because I don't want to be cruel. But if I cannot admit that I had tendencies towards cruelty, I would not have any reason to be praying for loving kindness to pour into my heart. We must face what we are if we have any hope of becoming something better. This is what righteous judgment is all about, becoming something better through the exposure of what we really are. We must face what we are.

 

Tonight we're facing our ancestor. We're facing what our ancestors were because we're the same people, you see.

 

So Abner delivered Michal to David and then we're told in Verse 17, Abner, this ruthless general had communication with the elders of Israel saying, "ye sought for David in times past to be king over you. Now then do it, for the Lord hath spoken of David saying, by the hand of my servant David will I save my people Israel out of the hand of the Philistines, and out of the hand of all their enemies. And Abner also spake in the ears of Benjamin and Abner went also to speak in the ears of David in Hebron all that seemed good to Israel and that seemed good to the whole house of Benjamin. So Abner came to David to Hebron and twenty men with him and David made Abner and the men that were with him a feast. And Abner said unto David, I will arise and go and I will gather all Israel unto my Lord the king, that they may make a league with thee, and that you may reign over all that thine heart desireth. And David sent Abner away and Abner went in peace."

 

Now in the surface reading of this Scripture, and I've read the Bible many times, I never saw this until God showed it to me. The surface reading of the Scripture is that Abner did a good deed. He unified all of Israel.

 

Now what's wrong with that? Doesn't the Lord want Israel unified? What's wrong with David striking a deal with Abner? Scripturally speaking, what's wrong with that?

 

COMMENT: Actually, he's coming under Abner's command and control and suggestion. I think David should have the say in it all and not Abner.

 

PASTOR VITALE: Well I think it was an agreement. I think it was an equal agreement.

 

You were hitting all around it, but I don't think that at this moment that David was under Abner's control, and it certainly was an agreement on both sides. I think maybe you just didn't express what you were really trying to say. I believe that Abner's ultimate motive was to control David. I believe that, but at this moment, he wasn't controlling him. Was that what you meant to say? That it was Abner's intention to get control of the kingdom? Anybody else got anything to say about that? There is something more to say about it. What was really wrong about that?

 

COMMENT: Abner's motives were impure. He had deceit behind it. He wasn't doing it with a righteous spirit.

 

PASTOR VITALE: That's true, but what's really wrong here is that the Lord is supposed to unify Israel. The Lord will unify Israel.

 

It's the same principle as David going to build a house and the Lord having to come to David and say," you really think you can build a house for me?" Remember that whole exhortation that the Lord gave to David? "Who do you think you are? You really think you can build a house for me? You're not going to build a house for me. Your son will build it."

 

So here's David taking matters into his own hand, and what sin is that? That is the sin of pride. Now this is a very great tendency for people who have authority in God. They have a real problem recognizing where their local authority ends because God gives us local authority. The way the Lord explains it to me is that I have authority over this household. I don't have to ask the Lord if I want to buy paper for the copy machine or if I need some piece of hardware for the computer. I don't usually ask Him. I have a budget here. Anything greater than this household, I have to ask the Lord.

 

So David went out, and he made a league with the general of the enemy armies to unify Israel and what does the Lord have to say about this? I don't think the Lord was consulted at all. Why wouldn't David consult the Lord? Because David wanted the league. Why did David want the league? I guess he wanted Michal back. I'm just reading into it at this point, and the Lord didn't tell me this. You know, David was a really tough military commander. He was no little wimp. Maybe he knew that Abner had an impure motive, and it was going to be a battle of the wills. Maybe David's pride just wanted to be king over all of Israel and he was tired of waiting for the Lord to bring it to pass. So he said, well, I know that Abner really can't be trusted, but he's going to bring Israel over to me. I can handle him, something like that, you know. High pride. He's the king of a nation and he's making a league, making a contract with someone who was the enemy of his people without even asking the Lord what He thought about it.

 

Now this is God's anointed. This is the man the Scripture tells us many times, that the people loved David. The people loved him, and look at how he treated his wife Michal. Isn't that common knowledge to most married women? The people love my husband, they should live with him. Right? There are a lot of men out there that everybody loves, and they mistreat their wives. So we see David had two sides to him. The people loved him and God loved him, despite all these character flaws, pride and cruelty and selfishness and hard heartedness. When the Lord called him to task, he repented and did what he was told and, therefore, he was a man after God's heart, which means he manifested the life of God.

 

In other words, when the Lord came to him and said, "David, this is what I want you to do, he did it." But if the Lord wasn't actively speaking to him, he was this carnal man. That's the whole church today with the Holy Spirit, you see. But in this ministry, the Lord is trying to help encourage us and teach us how to work with Him, to do our part to have our nature changed so that we won't be in this condition anymore, a carnal man under the influence of the anointing. He wants to make us the anointing. Isn't that exciting? It's not easy, but it's doable. But we have to do our part.

 

So let's go on with this story about David. Wow, he was some rough character here. I wouldn't want to be on his wrong side. So David made a league with Abner. He got all of his will coming under his power, and he got his wife back. Now before I start reading with Verse 22, let me just give you a synopsis of what happened here.

 

Joab is the general of David's army. I've looked up the word Joab in about four different Bible dictionaries. So I'm going to take this opportunity to point out to you how the opinions of the reference work writer could vary and how we have to be very careful to not be influenced by the opinions of the writers. We could listen to them and consider them, but not take them as fact. So I'm not going to read you everything because there's a lot written about Joab. But right now I'm reading from Forsett's Bible Dictionary, just the highlights. He says that Joab joined David early. David, his family and relatives were not safe from Saul at that time. Joab joined and became the captain of David's host. I want to tell you of myself, from all I read, that Joab was very faithful to David for years, a faithful, faithful general.

 

Joab, David's general, encountered Abner, Saul's general, at the pool of Gibeon by the challenge of the latter and defeated him. There was a battle at this pool of Gibeon. What this is saying here is that Abner was a very reasonable man. He was a military man, but if you surrendered, he was kind to you. He wasn't cruel to you.

 

I don't have any details here in Forsett's, but Joab had a brother called Asahel. In general, the story is this. There was a battle and Abner and his armies were winning this battle against Joab's forces. Joab's brother, Asahel, started to pursue Abner, and the young man was no match for this general called Abner. Abner pleaded with the other man to stop pursuing him because he did not want to kill him. He knew he was Joab's brother, and he was a young man, and he did not want to kill him. But Asahel overtook Abner and would not back off, and Abner killed Asahel against Abner's will. He didn't want to do it, but the young man attacked him, and he wound up killing Asahel.

 

Really, the reason Abner didn't want to do it was he didn't want Joab to have a vengeance against him for killing his brother. Abner really didn't want to kill this kid, but the kid wouldn't stop chasing after him and Abner killed him against his will. It says here that up to the time of Abner's involuntary slaughter of the fleet footed Asahel who was chasing after him, Abner's relations with Joab had not been unkindly. It was all business so to speak. Abner didn't want any personal vendetta with Joab, but the young man left him no choice. Now this author, Forsett says, but Joab cherished revenge for his brother's death. I couldn't find anything in the Scripture that says this. This is a conclusion that the writer has drawn.

 

Joab cherished revenge for his brother's death, and on his return from pursuing a troop, finding that Abner had been favorably received by David, Joab broke out into a reproof of the king, suggesting that Abner had come as a spy. Then by messengers, he recalled the unsuspecting General Abner, who thought he had to deal with David and taking him on the side, killed him. That's true. We're going to read about that next. That's what happened. Joab came in after David had made this league with Abner and he got a hold of Abner and he killed him.

 

Now this author, Forsett, is saying that the reason that Joab did that was vengeance for Abner killing his brother, Asahel. Apparently it was very common in Bible days to wait years before you took your revenge. If somebody killed a relative of yours, it was nothing to wait two or three years or just wait for the right moment, and then you kill the person. So that's what Forsett says. I don't agree with him. I believe the Lord has told me otherwise. That is a conclusion that Forsett has drawn.

 

Now we're reading from Nelson's Bible Dictionary and he says, when Asahel (that's Joab's brother now) when Asahel was killed by Abner, Joab got revenge by killing Abner. But the truth of the matter is that Joab never went after Abner until Abner made his league with David. Something in this league had to set him off.

 

Something had to make Joab decide to kill Abner now, see? When David and his army went to Jerusalem in an attempt to capture that city, David said, as the leader of the armies, whoever attacks the Jebusites first, shall be chief and captain. Joab led the assault at the storming of the Jebusites stronghold on Mt. Zion, apparently climbing up into the city by way of the water shaft. The city was captured and Joab was made the general of David's army. That's how Joab became the general of David's army. It was a reward for valiant bravery in the battlefront. We're told when Absalom revolted against David, Joab remained loyal to David. Soon after, however, David gave command of his army to Amasa, Joab's cousin. Overcome by jealous hate, Joab killed Amasa.

 

Now I'm getting ahead of myself. So we see that Joab killed. The points that I'm going to be making very shortly is that Joab, the general of David's host, killed two men, specifically two men, Abner and this man, Amasa. When we get to it in its place, we're going to find out that when David dies on his deathbed, David really instructs Solomon, his son who is becoming king, to kill these two men. David never took vengeance against them in his lifetime, but that was Solomon's legacy from his father; make sure you kill Joab and Amasa.

 

I was really amazed as I did this study. You know, most of these men in all of this intrigue were their relatives, their half-brothers, because there was polygamy. They're half-brothers, they're cousins, and they're killing each other like there's no tomorrow. They're just assassinating each other and wiping each other out without blinking an eyelid. I was just fascinated as I did this study. Hard, tough, merciless, ruthless people that God loved and the people loved. Does that sound like a contradiction to you? No. We've all seen that.

 

Remember when John Gotti was arrested, put in jail for life because he's a murderer of many, many people? He was a mafia head and the people of his neighborhood were cheering him as the police took him away because he was good to the people of his neighborhood. He gave them money, helped them and gave them jobs, but he was a murderer and people loved him. Life is strange, is it not?

 

Okay, I'll read you that later because right now I want to focus on this murder of Abner. Now I'm looking in Unger's Bible Dictionary. All Unger says about this event is that Abner was defeated in battle. In his flight he killed Asahel, Joab's brother, who was pursuing him and then Joab avenges Asahel. Okay, now this is Unger's report. Joab was greatly angered at the death of his brother, but he postponed his revenge. Well, I'm sure that was true. Abner, quarreling with Ishbosheth came to David in Hebron in order to enlist in his service. We see that Abner came to enlist in David's army. Returning from a raid, Joab was informed of Abner's visit. He chided the king, accused Abner of treachery and then sent messengers after Abner to kill him. Then we have an account here, before this happened, of a battle between Joab and Abner, and it's showing that Joab was a fair man. It says that David's army was winning, and when Abner surrendered, Joab did not kill them. He let them go. This is the International Standard Dictionary and he attributes a bad motive to Abner's visit.

 

Okay, let's see what else we have here. I think that was the last one. Well let me read you the King James account, and then I want you all to have an opinion about why Joab killed Abner. I've just told you about Joab. Joab was very faithful to David. He was a rough, general, a tough, rough, ruthless man, very faithful to David. He had battles with Abner's forces. There was nothing personal until Abner involuntarily killed Joab's brother. You're going to see that Joab comes back from wherever he was to find out that David had made a league with Abner, and Joab goes out and kills Abner. We're going to try and figure out why he did that.

 

Okay, I'm starting to read at verse 22, 11 Samuel, Chapter 3, "And behold, the servants of David and Joab came from pursuing a troop and brought in a great spoil with them, but Abner was not with David in Hebron, for he had sent him away and he was gone in peace. When Joab and all the hosts that was with him were come, they told Joab saying, Abner the son of Ner came to the king and he has sent him away and he has gone in peace. Then Joab came to the king and said, what have you done? Behold, Abner came unto you, why is it that you have sent him away and he is quite gone?" In other words, why didn't you kill him or put him in jail? I don't know that they had any jails in those days. Why didn't you kill him? "Thou knowest Abner, the son of Ner, that he came to deceive you and to know your going out and your coming in and to know all that you do. And when Joab was come out from David, he sent messengers unto Abner, which brought him again from the well of Sirah, but David knew it not."

 

"And when Abner was returned to Hebron, Joab took him aside in the gate to speak with him quietly, and smote him there under the fifth rib, that he died, for the blood of Asahel his brother." Now what that means to me is that Joab had a legitimate reason to kill him, because Abner had killed his brother. Joab had a legitimate reason to kill him because Abner had killed Asahel. Verse 28, "And afterward when David heard it, he said, I and my kingdom are guiltless before the Lord for ever from the blood of Abner the son of Ner. Let it rest on the head of Joab, and on all his father's house; and let there not fail from the house of Joab one that hath an issue, or that is a leper, or that leaneth on a staff, or that falleth on the sword, or that lacketh bread."

 

Do you hear this curse? This is David cursing the general that had been faithful to him for years, that won the position of the general of his armies by bravery on the battlefront, who had proven himself over and over and over again, of his faithfulness to David. David has given this man up in favor of the general of Saul's armies, who just rebelled against Ishbosheth because Ishbosheth rebuked him for committing incest. David has turned over this faithful general for this reprobate general.

 

I don't see any record of Joab being in any kind of sin. I don't see him accused of incest or disrespect. What is wrong with David? What is wrong with this king? He has cursed his faithful general. Listen to this again. David says, "I'm not guilty, I am not guilty of this murder. It all rests on the head of Joab and all of his father's household that there not fail from the house of Joab one that has an issue (that means sickness) or one that is a leper (that's a curse) or one that leaneth on a staff (that's one who is crippled) or one that falleth on the sword (one who dies in battle) or anyone that lacketh bread (that's starving to death because they don't have bread.)" What is wrong with this king?

 

Verse 30, So Joab and Abishai, his brother, slew Abner, because he had slain their brother Asahel at Gibeon in the battle. "And David said to Joab, and to all the people that were with him, rend your clothes, and gird you with sackcloth, and mourn before Abner. And king David himself followed the bier." That's the burial casket. Verse 32, "And they buried Abner in Hebron and the king lifted up his voice and wept at the grave of Abner and all the people wept. And the king lamented over Abner, and said, Died Abner as a fool dieth? Thy hands were not bound, nor thy feet put into fetters: as a man falleth before wicked men, so fullest thou. And all the people wept again over him."

 

In other words, David says, you fell before wicked men. He's calling Joab and his brother wicked. Your hands weren't bound, your feet weren't in fetters, you weren't captured, you fell before wicked men. He is completely giving up Joab, calling him wicked.

 

Verse 35, "And when all the people came to cause David to eat meat while it was yet day, David aware, saying, So do God to me, and more also, if I taste bread, or ought else, till the sun be down. And all the people took notice of it and it pleased them; as whatsoever the king did pleased all the people." So we see nobody in Judah is judging righteous judgment. Whatever the king does is okay. See, now here's the line. You're not supposed to be criticizing the king. You're not supposed to be criticizing the pastor. You're not supposed to be criticizing the president, but if somebody in authority is really engaging in some bizarre behavior, you are supposed to see it and recognize it and go before the Lord and say,"Father, what is wrong with our king? What did our pastor just do? Help him. What is this problem? This is not right. There is something very wrong here."

 

Our king has just cursed the hero of Judah, a heroic general of our victorious armies. Our king has just cursed him and his whole progeny and embraced the general of the enemy forces. I don't even know if David knew anything about him. If David did know anything about him, he knew that the man was reprobate. He knew that the man was wicked and was not to be trusted. If David didn't know that, then he was embracing somebody that he knew nothing about. What's going on here?

 

You know what this means, that whatever the king did, it was okay with the people. It means nobody acknowledged that the king was in sin, and the curse that came on the nation of Israel because of that sin is still manifesting today. Those qualities are still in Judah and in the church today, and all of Christendom and Israel are reaping the fruits of this wicked compromise, which is the sin of pride. Why is it the sin of pride? Because compromise is always for selfish motives. Why would David do this? The Lord taught me this years ago, when something doesn't make sense, it makes sense to the person doing it. The reason it doesn't make sense to you is because you would never be doing what they're doing. You're not thinking like they're thinking, so it doesn't make sense to you, but it makes sense to them.

 

Why would David be doing this? David wanted the league because he wanted to rule over all of Israel, and he knew that this murder of Abner, the general of Saul's host, could start a war. It could start another war between the Northern and the Southern kingdom. He didn't want a war, he wanted to be king over all of Israel, so he gave up his good friend, his trusted advisor. That's nice, isn't it? Nice man, huh? "And all of Israel loved him and the Lord was with him. All the people loved him and he was a very wicked man."

 

That's wicked, and what he did to Micah was wicked. The end of the whole thing is that, on his deathbed, he sics Solomon on Joab to kill him. You know how Joab dies? He dies hanging on to the horns of the altar. What does that mean? He's asking God for mercy because Solomon sent the soldiers to drag him out of the temple or the tabernacle, wherever the altar was in those days. They dragged him out, and they killed him with Joab hanging on to the horns of the altar. That was him saying, I'm innocent. But God didn't intervene. Solomon's soldiers killed him at David's request. Nice, huh? "And all the people loved him and God was with him." But Israel and all Christendom are reaping the fruit of his sins to this very hour.

 

Brethren, this country is going into the hands of reprobate people because of all the Christians that have compromised because of their pocketbook or because they thought their candidate would promote the rights of their race. You have to vote for God. You have to vote for righteousness, not for your own personal interests. This country is going down the tubes because of all the Christians voting their own personal interests. They're doing the same thing David did. Praise the Lord.

 

Verse 37, "And all the people and all Israel understood that day that it was not the king who slew Abner the son of Ner. The king had nothing to do with it. And the king said unto his servants, know ye not that there is a prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel?" A great man fell and a prince who just committed incest with Saul's concubine and who utterly humiliated Ishbosheth, Saul's son, who tried to tell him it wasn't the right thing to do. A prince alright, a prince of the power of the air. A great man? I don't know about that. What about Joab, the great man Joab? What about him, what about that great man?

 

Verse 39, "And I am this day weak, though anointed king; and these men the sons of Zeruiah be too hard for me: the Lord shall reward the doer of evil according to his wickedness." I'll tell you, that sounds to me like David was completely blind to his own motives. Listen to what he says. "I am this day weak." In other words, he didn't think he was strong enough to punish Joab. Joab was a soldier, you know. I believe from other readings that the army was with Joab, that David knew he could never get the army to follow him against Joab, not for a reason like this, anyway.

 

So he says, "I'm too weak, even though I'm king and these sons of Zeruiah (that's all of Joab's family, they're all the sons of Zeruiah) they're too tough for me. I won't be able to bring them down, but the Lord shall reward the doer of evil according to his wickedness." Oh really? How come when you're on your deathbed, David, you command his execution? If you're really leaving this in the hands of the Lord, what are you siccing your son, the new king, on Joab for, to put that blood on his hands? I want to tell you, brethren, that most people at some time have sold somebody down the river for their own personal reasons. You ask the Lord to show you. You ask the Lord to show you in your life where you have sided against someone who was in the right for a wrong reason. You may be surprised at what He has to show you because we all do it.

 

I know I have done it, and I still weep over the particular thing that I have in mind right now. I can't believe I did it, but I did it. It's our fallen nature, you see, and as sons of God we're called to judge righteous judgment. What is righteous judgment? Sitting here today saying how wicked King David was towards Joab is righteous judgment. Well Sheila, haven't you just condemned David? No! Condemnation is a spirit, you see. No, I haven't condemned him. I'm in the Spirit of Truth. The truth is that what David did was very wicked. That is the truth, wicked. But no, I don't condemn David. But if you can't understand that, then you have to ask the Lord for understanding.

 

Condemnation is a spirit. It's an attitude of your heart that is literally a curse on the person because you think they did something wrong. This is righteous judgment. This is speaking the truth that will ultimately bring deliverance because truth is confession, you see. Truth is confession. When you speak the truth, then repentance comes forth and deliverance to all of your progeny and tonight we're told, to all of Israel and the church. The Lord is about to do a great thing, and this is required before He moves.

 

We're going to go through Chapter 4. We're going to see some of the reactions, some of the fruit of what has happened here in Israel, and we will see that what was behind David's motives was that he wanted to be king over all of Israel. That was what the whole thing was all about. Let's see what happens here in Chapter 4 of 11Samuel. "And when Saul's son heard that Abner was dead in Hebron, his hands were feeble, and all the Israelites were troubled." Now this is Ishbosheth, Saul's son, that told Abner he was doing something wrong and who Abner criticized. It says all the Israelites were troubled. That means there's war in the air. That's what happened and it's still happening today, you know, you smote our general. Would you believe they were not legitimate?

 

11 Samuel Chapter 10:5, And they told it unto David, and he sent to meet them because the men were greatly ashamed, and the king said, "tarry at Jericho until your beards be grown and then return. And when the children of Ammon saw that they stank before David." In other words, David was angry at them and had no use for them for what they had done. The children of Ammon sent and hired the Syrians of Bethrehob and the Syrians of Zoba, twenty thousand footmen and of King Maacah, a thousand men and of Ishtob, twelve thousand men. So what has really happened here when the Ammonites saw that David was angry, they figured David was going to attack them. So before David could attack, they hired the Syrians as soldiers of fortune to fight against Israel. We're not going to read the rest of this chapter, but I will tell you that Israel defeats the Syrians. Let's see, this was Chapter 10.

 

So at the end of Chapter 10 we read, "And so the Syrians feared to help the children of Ammon no more." Right after this in Chapter 11, we see David's transgression with Bathsheba. As I told you at the beginning of this message, I fully believe that David had a military reaction to Ammon as a big macho man, but that soft underside that every tough soldier has, was wounded and I want to suggest to you that, that wound in his feelings and in his emotions made him vulnerable to adultery. This is so common today.

 

It used to be mostly men, but it's women today too, when they're wounded in their marriage or when they're hurt or rejected and it doesn't have to just be in your marriage. See, it's all in your head. We have to get a revelation of what we do when we're hurt. If you don't recognize when you're hurt, you've got a real problem because everybody is doing something when they get hurt to make themselves feel better, and you need to know what it is.

 

You're probably not drinking or drugging. The people listening to me are probably not committing adultery, but you're very likely being sharp to your children or your husband or your wife or your mother or your employees and that is sin in God's eyes. It's called scapegoating. If you release your frustration by abusing your power over other people, if you abuse the checkout clerk in the supermarket, that is the sin of pride. It's not just what you say, it's the thoughts of your mind. It's the attitude of your heart. It could be very subtle. You don't have to violently open your mouth against the person. You could just be unkind. It could be a border line thing.

 

You have an opportunity to be kind to somebody and you decide not to do it. That sin has manifested from your heart and the way you can tell, when you're sensitive enough to do it, is by testing whether or not you are relieved from your anxiety after you do this act. But you have to be inside of your own head looking at yourself to know if something that you just did relieved your anxiety. Anything that we do to relieve our anxiety that is not of God, is idolatry. We're supposed to go to God when we're hurt or wounded or upset. How could you do that if you're not admitting when you're wounded and upset. You can't.

 

So Chapter 11 has to do with the account of Bathsheba, and we will go over that. But I want to jump for the moment to the end of Chapter 12 of 11 Samuel. I'm just going to read you that last verse right now. David sends his general, Joab, to attack the city that refused his overtures of peace. Let's start reading at verse 29, "And David gathered all the people together and went to Rabbah and fought against it and took it." Now it was their king and his counselors that rejected David. The common people had nothing to do with this. David has attacked the whole city. Verse 30, "He took their king's crownlets from off his head, the weight whereof was a talent of gold with the precious stones: and it was set on David's head. And he brought forth the spoil of the city in great abundance. And he brought forth the people that were therein." Now listen to this. "The people of the city, he put them in harrows of iron and under axes of iron. He axed them and he made them pass through the brickkiln. He put them through the fire. And thus he did unto all the cities of the children of Ammon." That's vicious, brethren. He tortured these people. He sawed them, he axed them, he burnt them and the reason for this warfare was that their ignorant king refused his overtures of peace. That's not acceptable to God, you see. There are righteous wars. I believe that the judgment that came down on David, which we read at the beginning of this message, the first verse of that judgment (let me see if I can find it).

 

Well, I don't have it right here, but when Nathan the prophet (here it is right here). Well, maybe not. I guess I don't have that Scripture. But when Nathan the prophet says, "you shall have continual war," I believe it was a judgment for what David did over here. So I think that David's encounter and affair with Bathsheba was the emotional release for the rejection of David by the king of Ammon. The warfare and the brutalization of the people of Ammon was David's macho or military release and that when the prophet Nathan pronounced that judgment on David, included in that judgment in addition to the judgment for adultery and murder of Uriah, was the judgment for what David did to the people of Ammon. "You shall have war continually because of what you've done, because of what he did to the people of Ammon in retaliation because of rejection, and evil will arise in your own house."

 

That was because of the adultery and whatever the third part was, that was because of the murder of Uriah. I used to read this Scripture and I used to say, wow, that's so strange, you know David was just walking on his roof one day and he just happened to see this gorgeous woman, and he just had her brought to his house. It doesn't even make any sense, you know. He could have had any woman that he wanted. He could have had any woman in the kingdom that he wanted. He just happened to see this beautiful woman, and he was smitten with her?

 

No brethren, it was more than that. I believe it was an abuse of power, you see. He was wounded. He was hurt. He was upset and this was his way of releasing himself. It's the same mechanism as if when you're upset, if you go take a drink or if when you're upset you go shopping, or if when you're upset you eat what you shouldn't be eating. It's that same internal wound, that whether we face it consciously or not, we're all looking to heal. Now there are healthy ways to deal with pain. The best thing to do is admit that you're hurt and then ask the Lord to heal you. Then you go forward. You study the Word, you pray, you do something that you enjoy doing, you paint or you play your music.

 

There are legitimate ways to deal with your pain. But the way human nature is, the only people that I see dealing with this kind of pain in a legitimate way that's acceptable to God are people who are enlightened. They are people who understand and know what I'm talking about, people who are willing to face what they're feeling and direct their frustration in a healthy channel. People who will not face that they're hurt, invariably discharge this pain in an unGodly way. If they have to wait two weeks to get that knife in with just a snide little remark, to just put the knife in that person, at which time you don't even remember why you're doing it. That's the knee jerk reaction, to turn around and be harsh with your kids. That's the knee jerk reaction. When you become enlightened, when you realize why you're doing these things, why you are harsh to that person, that's when you could stop doing it. But it's a very rare person that directs these frustrations in a Godly channel without first being enlightened. You have to be willing to face what you're feeling.

 

So we all know about Bathsheba. I don't think I'm going to spend too much time on Bathsheba. We all know what happened there. Well let me read you the first few verses of Chapter 11 which shows David's military response. "And it came to pass after the year was expired at the time when kings go forth to battle, that David sent Joab and his servants with him and all Israel and they destroyed the children of Ammon and besieged Rabbah (that was the city of Ammon) but David tarried still at Jerusalem." So David sent a military reaction, but his personal problem, this Ego, his Ego, his pride, was wounded in a manifestation of rejection.

 

Verse 2, "And it came to pass at eventide that David arose from off his bed and walked up to the roof of the king's house." He was restless. He was in bed already, but he rose up because he was restless. He probably didn't recognize what he was dealing with. From the roof, he saw a woman washing herself and the woman was very beautiful to look upon, and David sent and inquired after the woman and one said, "is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite? And David sent messengers and took her and she came unto him and he lay with her."

 

So we don't hear anything about her resisting him. She just did it, and she conceived and the rest is history. David arranged to have her husband killed because of her husband, Uriah, being at the battlefront.

 

It could not have been Uriah's child, which means that Bathsheba would have been branded an adulteress. So David had Uriah killed, which was the perpetuation of the lie that the child in Bathsheba's womb was Uriah's child, you see. That is the child that the Lord did not let live. That would have been some cursed child coming in under that lie. The next thing we see in 11 Samuel, Chapter 12 is that God sends Nathan the prophet. You see, apparently David wasn't even aware of what he had done and the Lord sends Nathan the prophet (I'm not going to spend too much time on this) to convict David and then David repents. David always repented. He had this grace to repent. Nathan the prophet says to him in Verse 10 of 11 Samuel, Chapter 12, "Now therefore the sword shall never depart from thine house because thou hast despised me and has taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be thy wife."

 

Now every judgment is supposed to be related to the crime. What kind of a judgment is this that, "the sword will not leave your house and the sword shall not depart from your house because you have despised me and taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite?"

 

I want to suggest to you that the reason this judgment has come down is because the real motive for David doing this was this rejection by the king of Ammon for which David sent out an army to destroy all of the cities of Ammon and even that wasn't enough. He had to go and take another man's wife to discharge his frustration. That's my opinion. It's an educated opinion. I believe the Lord has told me this, that David sent an army out to destroy a nation because the king rejected his peace overtures, and, for that reason, the sword shall never depart from your house.

 

Brethren, natural Israel is in a battle every day. The sword cannot depart from their house until this curse is broken. This was an unrighteous military campaign that wiped out a town and tortured the people of the nation. The curse says that the sword shall not depart from Judah's house. The sword shall not depart from your house. It doesn't say all of Israel, from Judah's house, because you have despised me. Now remember, this is the King James Translation, "because you have despised me, and you've taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite unto your wife."

 

I'm not going to take the time to look at the Interlinear Text, but it probably says something like, "now therefore the sword shall not depart from your house because you have despised me. You've destroyed a nation of people that haven't harmed you, that have not militarily harmed you. They just hurt your pride and then you also went out and committed adultery to make yourself feel better. For that reason the sword will never leave your house and also I will raise up evil against you out of your own household and I will take your wives away from you and give them to your neighbor and he shall be with your wives in the sight of this world system, in the sight of this sun. For thou did it in secret, but I will do this thing openly."

 

So we all know the account of David and Bathsheba. I think I've made my point.

 

I would like to deal with one more of David's sins before we close out this message. We're in 11Samuel, Chapter 13, and we're going to comment on the account of David's son, Ammon's rape of his half-sister, Tamar. So just off the top of my head, what I see to be very interesting is that David commanded Bathsheba be brought to him and apparently she completely submitted. Ammon desired his half-sister, Tamar, and she was not willing to submit without marriage. Ammon was not married.

 

I've read this Scripture many times, and we're told that after Ammon forced himself on Tamar (he raped her for she would not agree to it) so we see that David's son, Ammon, goes one step deeper into sin than David. He raped the young lady when she said no. It says that Ammon hated her after he raped her. He hated her. I could never really understand that. He lusted for her so that he tricked her into coming into his quarters and then why would he hate her and throw her out? But for the purpose of this study, the Lord had shown me that the reason Ammon hated Tamar was because she resisted him and she called him a fool.

 

She told him what he was doing was foolishness. So after the act was over, the Scripture says he hated her more than he loved her. His pride was so high that when this woman that he had lusted for, for so long, when he finally had her in his grip, when she stood for righteousness and told him what he was doing was wrong and foolishness, his pride was so high that he hated her more than he loved her and he abused her more in his treatment after the rape than during the rape. He cast her out like she was a common harlot. But the worst part of this whole thing, which I never saw before God gave me this study, is where was David in all this? Was David really that blind as to why Ammon wanted Tamar to come to his apartment? Did he not have a clue or was he in such complete denial because ...we don't really read that David loved his son, Ammon, but Ammon was the presumptive heir to the throne. He was the oldest son.

 

The Scripture says he was the presumptive heir to the throne. I don't know if the Scripture says that. One of the Bible dictionaries said that. What does that mean? He was the oldest son, so one would presume that he was the heir to the throne. But we see that David promised Bathsheba that Solomon would be king.

 

I did a little research on this earlier today and you know I could not find one Scripture where God said to David that Solomon was to take the throne. Now some of the Bible dictionaries state that Solomon was God's choice, but I couldn't find it in the Scripture that Solomon was God's choice. I couldn't find it anywhere in the Scripture. So if Solomon was not God's choice, then we might say, why did David let Ammon get away with this? Why didn't David see his motives? Why didn't David punish him when he did it? Could it possibly be that David knew that he sold his oldest son down the river because of Bathsheba, whom apparently he seemed to favor as his wife from the moment she came to live with him? Huh? Huh? Was he guilty towards Ammon because he knew he was betraying him, and that it was Ammon's birthright to be king and David promised Bathsheba that he would give it to her son, Solomon? Isn't that an interesting thought?

 

You know, I could never really understand it. David just moaned and groaned when Absalom killed Ammon and there should have been some righteous judgment executed there. Tamar was David's own daughter. We don't even read that he reprimanded Ammon. He took no action at all, nothing.

 

Then when Absalom killed Ammon and David moaned and groaned and carried on. It sounds like an emotionally unstable person to me. He was filled with guilt, but apparently not caring anything at all for Tamar. I say to myself, well look at how he treated Michal and now look at how he treats Tamar. At first I said to myself, well maybe in those days women were just chattel and all men just didn't care anything about women at all. But I can't believe that because we're told that Absalom, Tamar's brother, loved her. He took vengeance on Ammon because of her and that she spent the rest of her days in Absalom's house under his protection. In those days she was ruined. No man would marry her. Absalom also had a daughter who he named Tamar. So Absalom really loved his sister. So all men weren't like that. David was ruthless towards women. Isn't that interesting? We'll read the account briefly.

 

It's late and I know that we're all tired, and I think most of us are familiar with this account, but what I would like to read to you are the verses where Tamar resists him. Let's not start at Verse 1. Let's start at Verse 11. I guess I should read to you the verse where David gives his permission. Let me do that. First of all, we see in Verse 5 that Jonadab, Ammon's friend, was the one who even suggested this wicked plan to him. So we see wickedness in the household here. Verse 6, "So Ammon lay down and made himself sick." He lied. He acted like he was sick. And when the king was come to see him, Ammon said to the king, "I pray thee, let Tamar my sister come, and make me a couple of cakes in my sight, that I may eat at her hand. Then David sent home to Tamar saying, go now to thy brother Ammon's house and dress him meat."

 

So David either completely failed to recognize the plot or offered up his daughter. Now I have no problem believing he would have offered up his daughter because he already offered up Joab, his faithful military commander. He already offered up Michal and all of her happiness, and I'm convinced she left her children behind, so I don't have any problem believing he could have offered up Tamar. Nice guy, huh? Nice guy, huh? "And all the people loved him and God was with him."

 

So let's pick up here in Verse 11. "And when Tamar had brought them unto him to eat, he took hold of her and said unto her, come lie with me, my sister. And she answered him." See, she didn't do what Bathsheba did. "She answered him saying, nay my brother, do not force me, for no such thing ought to be done in Israel, do not thou this folly. Don't do foolishness. And I, whither shall I cause my shame to go? What will happen to me? And as for thee, thou shalt be as one of the fools in Israel." Can you imagine she said this to Ammon, the heir presumptive to the throne? If you have your way, you'll be a fool in Israel. "Now therefore, I pray thee, speak unto the king; for he will not withhold me from thee."

 

So apparently marriage was an option in those days, even though they were half-brother and half-sister. It would not be legal today. "Howbeit he would not hearken unto her voice, but being stronger than she, forced her and lay with her. Then Ammon hated her exceedingly, so that the hatred wherewith he hated her was greater than the love wherewith he had loved her. And Ammon said unto her, arise and be gone." She told him the truth. She showed strength and she called him a fool.

 

Verse 16, "And she said unto him, there is no cause, this evil in sending me away is greater than the other that thou didst unto me. But he would not hearken unto her." Listen to this. "And he called his servant that ministered unto him and said, now put this woman out from me and bolt the door after her." My God! "And she had a garment of divers colors upon her, for with such robes were the king's daughters that were virgins appareled. Then his servant brought her out and bolted the door after her. And Tamar put ashes on her head and rent her garment of divers colors that was on her and laid her hand on her head and went on crying. And Absalom her brother said to her, Hath Ammon thy brother been with thee? But hold now thy peace, my sister, he is thy brother, regard not this thing. So Tamar remained desolate in her brother Absalom's house. But when King David heard of all these things, he was very angry. And Absalom spake unto his brother Ammon neither good nor bad; for Absalom hated Ammon, because he had forced his sister Tamar." We heard that David was very angry, but he didn't do anything.

 

It's not really clear what he was angry about. I don't know what he was angry about. When David heard of all these things, all what things? All these things; plural. He heard about the rape. He heard about Absalom. He heard about Tamar running down the street crying and putting ashes on her head. I want to tell you, I want to suggest to you, that you do not draw the conclusion that David was angry at Ammon. He may very well have been angry that Tamar told Absalom.

 

If David was angry at Ammon, why didn't he do something about it? Come on, we have to be worldly and wise as the Serpent. It does not say that David was angry at Ammon. It says he was angry about all these things; that Tamar talked, maybe he was angry that Ammon was stupid enough to put her out and bolt the door so that she talked, so that she put ashes on her head so that everybody in the local area knew. David didn't do anything. He didn't rebuke Ammon. And Absalom waited two years, two years. This just blows my mind how common this was.

 

You know, my father used to tell me all the time, if you do something that gets people really angry at you, they'll get you one way or another. They'll wait their time and they'll get you. He used to tell me that all the time. I'm not familiar with that kind of subtlety, but I see that kind of subtlety is in Judah. It's in the church. So Absalom decided to make a party, and he invited all of the king's sons. That was how he got himself around Ammon. In verse 28 Absalom says, "Now Absalom had commanded his servants saying , mark ye now when Ammon's heart is merry with wine, and when I say unto you, smite Ammon, then kill him, fear not; have not I commanded you? Be courageous and be valiant." See, he believed he was doing the right thing and maybe for that time he was. It sounds like for that time and season, this vigilante type justice was acceptable.

 

"And the servants of Absalom did unto Ammon as Absalom had commanded. Then all the king's sons arose and every man got him up upon his mule and fled." So Absalom took vengeance for his sister Tamar. Absalom acted whereas David would not act. Then we're told that Absalom fled. He fled the country because he was afraid that David would have him killed, I guess. I don't know what the punishment would have been.

 

Then as the story goes, Absalom was away for quite a few years, and Joab was still David's faithful general and good friend. So Joab is still faithful to David even after that horrible betrayal concerning Abner, where David made a big public show to all of the people, saying how innocent he was and cursing Joab and his progeny, Joab is still faithful to this man. What's in my mind right now and I hadn't thought of this when I was studying, so this must be the Lord telling me this, Joab actually accepted this kind of betrayal understanding that David wanted the kingdom. He actually accepted that. How could David say what he said about Joab, curse his progeny and keep Joab as the general of the army? How could he do that? It was all a big show and Joab knew it, and Joab accepted it. He took the heat for his boss because he loved him. He was more than a general. He was faithful, a faithful companion, bodyguard, whatever.

 

So we see that Joab looks at David. David is languishing. Absalom has left. So David lost his oldest son, Ammon, and Absalom ran away and Joab recognizes that David is languishing.

 

See, here's another witness to me, that what Joab did concerning Abner was defending the kingdom and the king. He sees that David is languishing because he has lost two sons. So Joab decides to take action, and he goes and finds a woman. He sends this woman to talk to David, to go to David in the form of a petition asking for help from the king. The woman winds up giving the message to David that it's okay to forgive, that he should forgive his son and let him come back. It's okay to do it. Let me find those Scriptures for you.

 

11Samuel, Chapter 13,Verse 39. "The soul of King David longed to go forth unto Absalom for he was comforted concerning Ammon, seeing he was dead." I just looked up that word, comforted, and I think in this context it means that he was sad or even feeling sorry for himself that Ammon had died, so he was longing for his other son. Now Joab, David's good friend and faithful servant, the son of Zeruiah, perceived that the king's heart was toward Absalom. "Joab sent to Tekoah and fetch thence a wise woman and said unto her, I pray thee, feign thyself to be a mourner and put now on mourning apparel and anoint not thyself with oil, but be as a woman that had a long time mourn for the dead and come to the king and speak on this manner unto him. So Joab put the words in her mouth. And when the woman of Tekoah spake to the king, she fell on her face to the ground and did obeisance and said, help O king and the king said unto her, what ails thee? What do you need from me? She answered, I am indeed a widow woman and mine husband is dead and thy handmaid had two sons and they two strove together in the field and there was none to part them, but the one smote the other and slew him."

 

See, she's making up a story that's really the account of what happened between the two brothers, David's two sons. "And behold, the whole family is risen against thine handmaid and they said deliver him that smote his brother that we may kill him for the life of his brother whom he slew and we will destroy the heir also and so they shall quench my coal which is left and shall not leave to my husband neither name nor remainder upon the earth." She's saying, I have two sons. One killed the other and now the other family members are wanting the life of the killer, and I'm going to be left without any sons and I don't want that to happen, even though the one son killed his brother. I don't want to be left without any sons. The king said unto the woman, "go to thine house and I will give charge concerning you. And the woman of Tekoah said unto the king, my Lord, O king, the iniquity be on me and on my father's house and the king and his throne be guiltless. And the king said, whosoever saith ought unto you, bring him to me and he shall not touch you anymore. Then said she, I pray you, let the king remember the Lord thy God that thou wouldest not suffer the revengers of blood to destroy anymore, less they destroy my son."

 

You see, David said, in your case I'm going to cancel the order. I'm going to make an order that the family cannot kill the murderer. I'm not going to allow that. She is saying to him now as she relates it back to him. Remember what you said, that you canceled the law that says the revengers of blood, the family members, have a right to kill him. You said that they won't be able to destroy anymore so that they won't destroy my son.

 

Please note at this point that this is a repetition of the account of Cain and Abel, that Cain slew Abel in the field and Cain said, when Yahweh put Cain out of the immortal side of the Garden of Eden, Cain said, "everyone that sees me will slay me and Yahweh put a mark on Cain's forehead saying, no, you can't be destroyed." This is a Cain and Abel thing. So she said, remember king, you just gave your word that you're going to cancel that death order and the king said, "as the Lord liveth, there shall not one hair of thy son fall to the earth. Then the woman said, let thine handmaid, I pray thee, speak one word. Let me be honest with you, king. And the woman said, wherefore then has thou thought such a thing against the people of God, for the king does speak this thing as one which is faulty in that the king does not fetch home again his own banished."

 

In other words, she is saying, what you just agreed is the right thing to do for me, you won't even do it for yourself or against the people of God. You won't even do it for the people of God. Your pride is stopping you from bringing Absalom home. So the woman is going through this whole thing. You know what she's really doing? She completely buttering up this king to get him to do what is best for him.

 

Now watch this faithful Joab. Watch what Joab does here. I'm reading in verse 19. And the king said, "is not the hand of Joab with you in all of this? Didn't Joab put you up to this? And the woman answered and said, As thy soul liveth, my Lord the king, none can turn to the right hand or to the left from aught that my Lord the king has spoken. In other words, you said it king and now it's done, for thy servant Joab, yes he bade me and he put all these words in the mouth of me your handmaid, to fetch about this form of speech hath they servant Joab done this thing and my Lord is wise according to the wisdom of an angel of God." Look at her flattering him. "My Lord is wise, according to the wisdom of an angel of God to know all things that are in the earth. And the king said unto Joab, behold now, I have done this thing. Go therefore and bring the young man, Absalom, again."

 

And Joab fell to the ground on his face, bowed himself and thanked the king and Joab said," today thy servant (meaning himself) knoweth that I have found grace in your sight, my Lord O king, and that the king has fulfilled the request of his servant. Thank you for doing this for me, king. Thank you for bringing your son home, who you are longing for, which you could not face or admit to yourself or you couldn't find the strength to rise up and do what needed to be done. So I went and did it for you. I now thank you for granting me this request." Do you see this, this faithful Joab and this prideful king, this prideful immature king? So this just reinforces my belief to me, that Joab just completely accepted that David completely sacrificed him in that fiasco with Abner. He knew all about his king. He knew his weaknesses, he knew all about him and he loved him and was devoted to him unto death and let the king use him like that. Joab was the strength behind the throne.

 

So Joab arose and went to Geshur and he brought Absalom back. Okay, we're not going to stop reading the Scripture here. He brought Absalom back, but when Absalom came back, David wouldn't talk to him. He couldn't forgive him.

 

He could not forgive him, so he would not talk to the young man and eventually Absalom says to Joab...I don't think he talked to David. He must have said it to Joab. "What's the point of bringing me back if he's not going to talk to me? There's not going to be any relationship. What did he bring me back for?" So we're told that even though the soul of David was...well I looked up that Hebrew word that says David was comforted because of Absalom. That Hebrew word could mean that he was in self-pity for Absalom. It could be translated to mean he wanted revenge against Absalom or it could mean that he was missing Absalom.

 

Now I'm starting to think that the correct translation of that word was that David really wanted revenge. Maybe he really did want revenge against Absalom. If David hadn't given his word, David would have really killed Absalom. Perhaps that was the reason he wouldn't talk to the man. He brought him back and wouldn't talk to him, would not forgive him. Something very wrong is operating in the man's heart, you know. The end of the story is that Absalom destroyed the cities of Ammon because of rejection. Now Absalom, David's son, who was rejected by David, goes out to retaliate against David.

 

Here's the reaping and sowing right here. Both of them rejected. Absalom raises up and tries to get the people to follow after him. Absalom goes out to win the hearts of the people to follow after him. He actually raises up an army and splits the people. I don't know what the percentage was, but enough people of Judah...David was over all Israel at this point. Enough of the people were willing to follow Absalom not only to make this a war, but David got up and fled the city. David ran, which means he was afraid of Absalom's army. At this point, this is where Absalom comes into town, into David's house and has sex with all of David's concubines on the roof. So here we see the prophesy coming to pass on the roof of David's house. David is completely humiliated by his son having sex with all of his concubines.

 

I don't really have it clear in my heart, in my head, what David was feeling towards Absalom. I just know that there was self-pity and unforgiveness. See, here we go right here. Here's our proof. If David is taking this attitude towards Absalom, he could not possibly have condemned Ammon for the rape, you see. So it says when David was very wrought when he heard all of these things, he must have been angry at Tamar for telling Absalom because Absalom didn't do anything at that time.

 

So David obviously was not wrought at Ammon. He was wrought at Tamar. Maybe he was even wrought at Tamar because she called the presumptive heir to the throne a fool. It says that when David heard of all things; maybe he heard the story from Ammon. He says, "why did you do that Ammon?" Ammon said, "well she called me a fool." I'm going to be king and she called me a fool. So David was mad at Tamar. He was not mad at Ammon. That's nice, isn't it? "And all the people loved him and God was with him and he was a very wicked man."

 

Okay, we're going to close out this study by reading the Scriptures whereby David commissions Solomon, his chosen heir, to murder Joab and Amasa. I will read that Scripture and then take a couple of minutes to tell you who Amasa was and what happened over there. Well the next account that I would like to comment on is the end of David's days and Adonijah's move to take the throne. Now as I told you earlier, I could not find one Scripture where the Lord said that Solomon was to inherit the throne after David. When I first started researching this, I thought that the Lord had ordained it. I said to the Lord, could you explain that to me? Why would you choose the child of the marriage that started off in adultery? Why would you take the child of that marriage to be the heir? I did look up the names of David's sons. Solomon was the fourth son born to Bathsheba as recorded in 1Chronicles 3:5.

 

Let me see if I have that with me. Obviously, the oldest, Ammon was dead and Absalom was gone. I see I don't have those notes with me, so I'll have to do it from memory. Well Adonijah was there and there was Daniel, the son of Abigail.

 

I'm looking in the new Unger's Bible Dictionary right now. Unger says that when Ammon and Absalom were dead, David's son, Adonijah, became heir apparent to the throne. But this order had been set aside in favor of Solomon, who was born while his father was king over all of Israel. Now I don't know if that's what's behind this. I could not find any Scripture where the Lord said Solomon would be king, just that David promised this to Bathsheba. So what's interesting here is that Nathan, the prophet, and Zadok, the priest, were on the side of Solomon becoming king, but faithful Joab was on the side of Adonijah. Now how am I going to make my decision as to what was righteous judgment at this time. I don't have enough information to know what was righteous at this time. I don't know very much about Nathan. I thought Zadok was a faithful priest. I know mostly about Joab, who was a faithful servant and would do anything to preserve Israel. So, apparently, whether Joab was right or wrong, I would say that he believed that Adonijah was the true heir to the throne. Yet the prophet and the priest seemed to think otherwise.

 

At the moment I don't know what the Lord thought. I don't have any word from the Lord, and I cannot discern it from the Scripture, although I would be inclined to say that the prophet and the priest would be representative of God, but I don't know. So I'm going to try and finish up this message because I am recovering from a bad cold, and I'm very tired and yet I don't feel to go to a part 2, so I'm just going to do this as fast as I can. What I wanted to point out to you was that first of all, David was letting it go. Adonijah stood up and declared himself heir apparent to the throne as David was old and getting ready to die. David wouldn't do anything about it. But the priest and the prophet, Nathan and Zadok, came to David and Bathsheba. David was very weak lying in his bed and they said to him, remember you promised Bathsheba that Solomon would be king.

 

Now this Bible dictionary writer really suggests that Solomon altered the order because Solomon was born when David was king over all of Israel. Well maybe he has a point there, but all that I read in the Scripture is David's promise to Bathsheba. I don't read anything about Solomon being chosen king because David was king over all of Israel, just that David promised it to Bathsheba. That's all that I read. She's the one wife, out of all his wives, that has a taint to their relationship. So in any event, I see a weakness in David, that he was letting it ride. Adonijah was taking what he perceived to be his rightful place and according to Unger, Adonijah probably could have carried it because he was good looking, and he was very liked by the people. He was handsome, and he was very likely to win the people over, and he had all of his brothers on his side.

 

Adonijah waited until David seemed to be at the point of death and he called around him all of his brothers except Solomon and other influential men and he proclaimed himself king. All of the brothers went along with it, except Solomon.

 

Let's go back to Absalom's rebellion. The Lord just reminded me to tell you that the end of Absalom's rebellion came to pass when Joab killed Absalom. David had given a strict commandment to not harm the young man and Joab willfully killed him, as I think in those days, the leader of a rebel army should have been killed. So Joab was doing what was right for Israel right down the line and when necessary he was opposing David and when necessary, he was willing to take the heat for David. So I think Joab was a hero and a lover of Judah. All of Israel, when they were together and when the kingdoms were divided, he was a lover and a patriot of Israel. So I have to believe that Joab sided with Adonijah because he believed that, that was the right thing to do.

 

What I can't understand is why the priest and the prophet would be on the other side. I don't understand that. The only thing that comes to my mind right now is that maybe the Lord was saying Solomon should be king and Joab, being a soldier, couldn't understand that. Joab was going according to right order and wanting to do what was right and it may have looked to Joab like David was making a mistake because of his weakness for Bathsheba. But the sign that the priest and the prophet were with David and Bathsheba and Solomon leads me to believe that it was the Lord who had altered the order, but it's really very iffy. So this is David's charge to Solomon on David's deathbed.

 

I'm in Chapter 2 of 1Kings, verse 1. Now the days of David drew nigh that he should die and he charged Solomon his son, saying, "I go the way of all the earth: be thou strong therefore and show thyself a man and keep the charge of the Lord thy God to walk in His ways, to keep His statues and His commandments and His judgments and His testimonies, as it was written in the law of Moses, that thou mayest prosper in all that thou doest and withersoever thou turnest thyself that the Lord may continue His word." Now this is David's exhortation to Solomon, that the Lord may continue His word which He spake concerning me saying, "if thy children take heed to their way to walk before me in truth with all their heart and with all their soul, there shall not fail thee (said He) a man on the throne of Israel. Moreover thou knowest also what Joab the son of Zeruiah did to me."

 

Listen to this. This is what he is telling Solomon. Now you know what Joab did to me, how he harmed me and what he did to the two captains of the host of Israel unto Abner, the son of Ner, and unto Amasa, the son of Jether, whom he slew and shed the blood of war when it was peaceful.

 

I want to tell you who Amasa was. Amasa was a general that was the general over Absalom's troops when Absalom rebelled against David. I believe he was a relative. This is the son of Jether of Ithra, an Ishmaelite, and Abigail was his mother. His name was Amasa. He was the general of Absalom's troops and then David defeated Absalom. I really didn't get into that very much, but the bottom line is this. God was on the side of David because rebellion is not of God. It could be that the Lord would raise up someone to overthrow a sitting king. I guess God could do anything that He wants, but God didn't raise up Absalom to overthrow David and therefore Absalom had to lose the battle.

 

You see, the people loved David and God was with him. With all this wickedness, David was God's chosen and God's anointed, and the rebellion against him failed and Absalom was killed by Joab. The point there is that even if the preacher is manifesting wickedness, you better make sure that God has forsaken him before you turn on that preacher. As long as God is with a preacher or with any authority, if you turn on that authority, you are in rebellion and you are the one who is guilty. You cannot judge another man's servant. As long as God is with that man, you've got to just hold your peace because maybe there's something you don't understand there.

 

So Absalom made Amasa the captain of his hosts, and then Absalom's armies were defeated and David wanted to mend the rift and make peace for the whole nation to go on in peace. See, David was a warrior in his earlier days, but I think as the years went by, he really didn't want to fight. He just wanted peace and there's nothing wrong with wanting peace, but peace at the price of compromise does not please God. So what do you think David did? He wanted to make peace with the general of Absalom's rebel troops. So what do you think he did? I'll give you a hint. David took Amasa into his own armies and gave him a position. Whose position do you think he gave him? He gave him Joab's job. (Laughter) He gave him Joab's job and all the people loved him and God was with him and he was a very wicked man. Listen to this. 11Samuel, Chapter 19:12,"And David says to Amasa, look you're my brethren. You are my bones and my flesh, wherefore then are you the last to bring back the king? Come on, take me back as your king and say to Amasa, are you not of my bone and of my flesh? God, do so to me and more also if you be not captain of the hosts before me continually in the place of Joab."

 

Joab, who was faithful to him through the whole rebellion (laughter) defended him, took the blame, was abused by him, did what David didn't have the guts to do. Joab, who acquired his office because of valiant soldiering on the field, had David take his job away and gave it to a man that was not nearly as qualified as Joab, yet as for David, all the people loved him and God was with him and he was a very wicked man. Just to make it fast, because I really have to close this out tonight, Joab submitted to this. He submitted to this and Amasa tried to lead the troops, but the people and the hearts of the soldiers were really not with him.

 

Then an event arose which required action. It resulted in David sending the troops out. He sent out Amasa with the troops, and Amasa was not doing the job. Possibly he wasn't that competent, but a lot of it was that the men were very reluctant to follow him. They had been with Joab for years. It was wrong. Not only had they followed Joab, not only was Joab their general, but what David did was wrong. It was very, very wrong. So when Joab saw that Amasa wasn't going to be able to take the victory on behalf of Judah, he took the household God because the soldiers had gone with Amasa.

 

He took the local household God, and he went after them and he killed Amasa. He killed Amasa. Now we can all judge righteous judgment here. A lot of these dictionary writers are saying that Joab killed Amasa because of envy. Well, I'm asking you, did he kill Amasa because of envy or did he kill him because Judah wasn't going to take the victory? The armies were going to be defeated with his leadership. So with all that you know about Joab, why did Joab kill him? Did he kill him because of envy, or did he kill him on behalf of Judah? I would say he killed him to save Judah. That's what I would say.

 

So David on his deathbed says to his son, Solomon, go get Joab, my faithful general and friend of years and years and years. Go get him because of what he did to me and because he killed Abner and Amasa. Well, what does that mean? What did Joab do to David that was so terrible? First of all, he killed Abner for a righteous reason. He killed Amasa for a righteous reason, to cover up David's flub. Well what did Joab do to David that led David to say, "go get Joab because of what he did to me?" What did Joab do to David? What did he do? Anybody? What did he do that was so terrible?

 

The only reason David didn't try to kill Joab while David was alive was he thought he wasn't militarily strong enough to do it. What did Joab do? Does anybody have any idea what his crime was? Well, he killed Absalom. Didn't David say, don't anybody touch a hair on the boy's head? Even though David wouldn't talk to Absalom for two years, David would have never brought him back if it wasn't for Joab, and still David wouldn't talk to him for two years. Well the young man finally rebelled and raised up an army to take the kingdom away and slept with all of David's concubines in front of everybody. David's army went out to put down the rebel forces, and David still said, don't touch a hair on his head.

 

You may recall the account of Absalom. I don't know, it sounds like metaphor to me. He was riding on a horse, and the battle was in a wooded area in a forest, and he had thick, thick hair and his hair got caught in the boughs of a great oak tree, and the horse went out from under him and he was hanging there by his hair. I find that hard to believe. It must be some kind of metaphor. The soldiers under Joab wouldn't touch him because the king said don't touch him. Joab said to the soldiers, go kill him, he's the head of the rebel army, go kill him, and they wouldn't do it. So Joab went over and he killed him, himself.

 

So for all of a whole lifetime of laying down his life for David and for David's kingdom, David put a death execution on him, a death sentence on him. (Laughter) and Solomon carried it out as soon as he became king. Now Joab was already on Adonijah's side. I wonder if this was the one time that Joab did not do what was best for Israel, but Joab did what was best for himself, because Joab knew that when David made Solomon king, he would be killed. He must have known that David was going to command Solomon to kill him, so when Solomon became king, Joab did not serve him. Let's just read those few Scriptures. We have about ten minutes left on the tape.

 

Actually there were several other charges that David had given Solomon that I didn't read. Picking up with Verse 28, we see that tidings came to Joab for Joab had turned after Adonijah. Now that's the brother that declared himself king, which had to back down when David came out and publicly announced that Solomon was king. 1 Kings, Chapter 2:28, Then tidings came to Joab for Joab had turned after Adonijah. Well, I wonder if what David meant by "after what Joab did to me," did he mean it was because Joab went after Adonijah at this point or was it because of Absalom? All I know is after a whole lifetime of service you would think some mercy would be given to Joab. But tidings came to Joab for Joab had turned after Adonijah, though he turned not after Absalom and Joab fled unto the tabernacle of the Lord and caught hold of the horns of the altar. That means Joab believed he was a righteous man and he did not deserve to die. And it was told King Solomon that Joab was fled unto the tabernacle of the Lord and behold he is by the altar. Then Solomon sent Beniah, the son of Jehoiada, saying, "go fall upon him and Beniah came to the tabernacle of the Lord and said unto him, thus saith the king, come forth. And he said, Nay, but I will die here."

 

In other words, I'm going to die in God's arms. And Beniah brought the king word again saying, thus saith Joab and thus he answered me. And the king said unto him, "Do as he hath said and fall upon him and bury him; that thou mayest take away the innocent blood which Joab shed from me and from the house of my father." Well what innocent blood? What innocent blood?

 

Now listen to this. This is Solomon speaking. "And the Lord shall return his blood upon his own head, who fell upon two men more righteous and better than he (Joab) and slew them with the sword (Amasa who was the head of the troops that rebelled against David) my father David not knowing anything about it, to wit, Abner the son of Ner, captain of the host of Israel and Amasa the son of Jether, captain of the host of Judah. Their blood shall therefore return upon the head of Joab and upon the head of his seed forever, but upon David and upon his seed and upon his house and upon his throne shall there be peace for ever from the Lord." Well has that come to pass? Maybe upon his seed, but not upon his throne and upon his house. They've been dispersed. They've been brutalized. And the king put Benaiah, the son of Johoiada, in his room over the host: and Zadok the priest did the king put in the room of Abiathar.

 

That's all that we're going to read today. Wow, Solomon said Joab killed the innocent blood. We have a couple of minutes left on the tape and I want to look for that account of Joab killing Amasa. I'm not going to go to another tape so we may get cut off, but I'll do the best I can to show you what happened. There was some kind of military problem in Judah, and David sent Amasa who was now the captain of the host.

 

We're in 11 Samuel, Chapter 20:4, "Then said the king to Amasa, assemble me the men of Judah within three days and present yourself here." Verse 5, "So Amasa went to assemble the men of Judah, but he tarried longer than the set time which he had appointed to him." This is a military campaign and the man is late. So David says to Abishai (that's Joab's brother) now shall Sheba the son of Bitchie do us more harm than Absalom did. "Take thou thy Lord's servants and pursue after him lest he get him fenced cities and escape us." That's because Amasa is not doing the job, so David sends Abishai, Joab's brother, to do the job.

 

Verse 7, And there went out after him Joab's men. So Joab must have heard from his brother and decided to join the forces. And there went out after him Joab's men and the Cherisites and Pelasites and all the mighty men and they went out of Jerusalem to pursue after Sheba, the son of Bitrie.

 

Joab's joining the army. After all that David has done to him, he's still fighting for Judah. "When they were at the great stone which is in Gibeon, Amasa went before them. Amasa appeared. Joab's garment that he had put on was girded unto him and upon it a girdle with a sword fastened upon his loins in the sheath thereof and he went forth and as he went forth it fell out and Joab said to Amasa, art thou in health, my brother? And Joab took Amasa by the beard with the right hand to kiss him, but Amasa took no heed to the sword that was in Joab's hand, so he smote him there within the fifth rib and shed out his bowels to the ground and struck him not again, but Amasa died. So Joab and Abishai, his brother, pursued after Sheba, the son of Bitrie." Now you judge. Did Joab do this out of envy or did Joab do this because an incompetent general was in charge of the troops?

 

Now this part I really don't understand. Let's see if the Lord gives me some revelation at this point.

 

Verse 11, "And one of Joab's men stood by him and said, he that favoureth Joab and he that is for David, let him go after Joab." One of Joab's men stood by. I guess Amasa, the dead Amasa, and said, he that favors Joab and he that is for David, let him go after Joab. Follow Joab as your leader because the men didn't know what to do. Amasa was their general and Joab had just killed him. So one of Joab's men said,"if you're on the side of David and you're on the side of Judah, don't look at what happened here, just follow your general and go fight the war that David has sent his army to fight. And Amasa wallowed in blood in the midst of the highway and when the man saw that all the people stood still, he removed Amasa out of the highway into the field and cast a cloth upon him, when he saw that everyone that came by him stood still." That was because the men didn't know what to do.

 

I don't really know what to say here about Amasa. I want to say he wasn't a bad guy. What do you mean he wasn't a bad guy? What do you mean he wasn't a bad guy? He was the head of the rebel forces. He was the head of the rebel forces, so Joab killed him. But all the soldiers didn't know what to do. So everybody that came by and saw Amasa laying there on the ground, they stood still. They were in confusion.

 

So the man who was Joab's associate, he removed Amasa off of the highway. When he did that, all the people followed on after Joab to fight for Judah, to pursue after Sheba, the son of Bitrie. He went through all the tribes of Israel unto Abel. Now we're going to see in this very account of the battle that Joab was leading the armies to, one more witness that Joab was a righteous man. This is what happens. Now they came to the city. See, they're looking for this man. I can't even tell you what he did because I'm not up on it, but this man is supposedly an enemy of Judah. Joab is taking the armies of Judah to destroy this whole city of this man who David said is going to do more damage than Absalom did. So there had to be a rebellion going on. We see in verse 15, "And they came and besieged him in Abel of Bethmaachah and they cast up a bank against the city and it stood in the trench and all the people that were with Joab battered the wall to throw down the wall to attack the city of this man who was threatening Judah."

 

Verse 16, "Then cried a wise woman out of the city, hear, hear, say I pray you unto Joab. Come near hither that I may speak with you and when he was come near unto her, the woman said, are you Joab and he answered I am he. Then she said unto him, hear the words of thy handmaid and he answered, I'm listening. Then she spake saying, they were wont to speak or they said in old times saying that they would surely ask counsel at Abel and so they ended the matter."

 

In other words she was saying, this is a wise city. Going all the way back, people came here looking for counsel, and I am one of them, one of the peaceable and faithful in Israel, and you seek to destroy his city and a mother in Israel. Why would you swallow up the inheritance of the Lord? Why are you attacking this city? Why are you doing this? This is a city known for its wisdom. Joab answered and said, "far be it from me that I would swallow up or destroy." The matter is not so, but a man of mount Ephraim, Sheba the son of Bichri by name, has lifted up his hand against the king even against David. Deliver this man alone and I will leave your city in peace. We don't want to destroy the city. We just want the offender. And the woman said to Joab, "behold his head shall be thrown to you over the wall. Don't destroy the whole city."

 

Verse 22, "Then the woman went unto all the people in her wisdom and they cut off the head of Sheba the son of Bitrie and cast it out to Joab and Joab blew a trumpet and he and his armies left the city. Every man to his tent and Joab returned to Jerusalem to the king. Now Joab was over all the host of Israel and Benaiah the son of Jehoiada was over the Cherethites and over the Pelethites." That's just telling you who was over who. Joab was a patriotic. You have to realize this was a day of blood and guts. That was what life was like. You killed the people that were endangering your city. He was a reasonable man. He just wanted the guilty man. He let the people of the city go. He killed Amasa, and he killed Abner because he believed he was preserving and protecting Judah and he must have believed that Adonijah should have been the king and that was why he went with Adonijah. He was a faithful man to the death, murdered hanging on to the horns of the altar. That's like running into a church for protection and the army coming right in and killing you right in the church.

 

So concerning David, they all loved him and God was with him and he was a very wicked man. We pray that by preaching the truth, deliverance will come forth by exposing the lie.

 

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