📖 2 Samuel 15 : 💎 Before the ark of the covenant, David confesses that the outcome of the struggle rests with God

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📖 2 Samuel 15

💎 Before the ark of the covenant, David confesses that the outcome of the struggle rests with God

📌 The previous chapter (14) centered on Joab

• Joab, having read what was in David's heart, devised a scheme to bring Absalom back,
• Absalom was brought to Jerusalem, but two years passed without his even seeing David's face; after that,
• Absalom wanted to know why, after all, he had been brought back from Geshur.
• Then, by pressing Joab, he meets David again, but not a single word between them is recorded.

📖 2 Samuel 15 : 💎 In the very first verse, the phrase (After this) appears once again.

👉 After returning to Jerusalem and seeing the king, Absalom spends 4 years planning a rebellion 💎

1. Absalom's first move - raising troops

• He provides himself with chariots and horses, and fifty men as a guard.
• Besides the large number of guards, preparing chariots and horses at the same time appears to indicate the raising of an army.

2. Absalom's second move - stealing the people's hearts (v. 6)

• Standing beside the road to the city gate, he intercepts those who came to the king for justice, pretends to set their grievances right, and wins their favor.

3. Absalom's third move - uses a vow as a pretext and gets the king's permission to go to Hebron

📌 After 4 years, he tells the king about his vow, and gets permission by selling the name of the LORD

For your servant made a vow while I lived at Geshur in Aram, saying: If the LORD indeed brings me back to Jerusalem, I will serve the LORD (v. 8)

4. Absalom's fourth move - sends spies throughout all the tribes

• He arranges in advance that, at the sound of the trumpet, they should say: Absalom is king at Hebron.

🔎 He seems to want to show all the tribes of Israel that Absalom has been officially acclaimed king at Hebron..

5. Absalom's fifth move - two hundred invited guests go with him to Hebron

• The text says they were people who knew nothing of what Absalom was plotting and simply went along (v. 11)
  • A ruse so that they would look like participants in the installation of a king

➡️ Absalom's situation afterward

Absalom draws Ahithophel (Ahithophel), David's counselor, over to his side, and as the conspiracy grows stronger, the text records that the people siding with Absalom kept increasing.

➡️ David's situation

A messenger tells David that the hearts of all Israel have turned to Absalom. On hearing this, David orders all his servants in Jerusalem to flee.

• Lest he overtake us, bring harm upon us, and strike the city with the edge of the sword.. David says
• The king's servants answer: Whatever our lord the king decides, we will do, and they follow him.

📌 As he leaves, the king leaves behind 10 concubines to keep the palace, and the king and all the people set out.

😄 An interesting point

• David is a man who has never lost a war
• Jerusalem is a stronghold among strongholds, one no enemy could take.. and yet David flees with his servants.

✔️ One wonders: was it his intention to avoid a war against his son, or was the situation truly urgent?

👉 Those who accompany David, and the ark of the covenant of God

The six hundred from Gath, and Ittai

Six hundred men from Gath (Philistines, foreigners) march past. At this moment David says to Ittai: I am an exile, a wanderer; go back, and take your countrymen with you. But (Ittai answers: wherever my lord the king is, whether for death or for life, there your servant will be) and shows his loyalty, and they all head down the road into the wilderness.

David sends the ark of God back

Zadok and the Levites come carrying the ark of the covenant of God, and Abiathar also comes to David, but he commands that the ark of God be carried back into the city ...

If I find favor in the eyes of the LORD, he will bring me back and let me see the ark and his dwelling place. But if he says, I take no pleasure in you, here I am; let him do to me whatever seems good to him. (David's confession)

✔️ In the end, Zadok and Abiathar return to the city, and from then on they act according to King David's later instructions.

✔️ As he goes up the Mount of Olives, David goes with his head covered, barefoot and weeping, and the people also go up weeping, with their heads covered.

👉 David seeks the LORD

Someone tells David that among those who conspired with Absalom is Ahithophel.

➡️ David says: O LORD, I pray, turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness.. and so he asks for the LORD's help.

👉 To defeat the counsel of Ahithophel ➔ David's own plan

(v. 31) After David asks for the LORD's help... (by coincidence)

(v. 32) When he reaches the summit where God was worshiped, Hushai, David's friend, comes to meet him with his robe torn and dust on his head. But!

➔ David tells Hushai not to stay with him but to go back to the city.

➔ Then he puts words in Hushai's mouth: join Absalom and defeat the counsel of Ahithophel.

➔ And he tells the two priests, Zadok and Abiathar, to report everything that happens in the king's palace, sending the news by their sons; with that Hushai returns to the city, and Absalom also enters Jerusalem.

Closing thoughts - 1

Absalom, two full years after the incident with Tamar.. obtains the king's permission to carry out his plan.

• He invited King David and his servants to come along to the sheepshearing, but David did not go (2 Samuel 13:23-24)
• Then, when his brother Amnon pleaded to go along... King David sent all the princes with him.

📌 Here a quite reasonable question arises: what if David had gone (?) Whether David was included in the murder plan of that time, I do not know.. but Amnon was killed on that occasion.

📌 And now, in chapter 15, he rebels after 4 years of meticulous preparation.

(And)
✔️ Against Absalom's meticulous scheming, the father David's plan (to defeat Absalom's scheme) is beginning.

Closing thoughts - 2

King David, by taking Uriah's wife, knew through Nathan that there would be punishment from the LORD.

• One: the sword shall never depart from your house
• The other: the punishment that your wives would be taken and others would lie with them in broad daylight.

📌 And at the moment he flees because of Absalom, as he sends the ark of God back to the city, these are the words he speaks :

If I find favor in the eyes of the LORD, he will bring me back and let me see the ark and his dwelling place.

✔️ The outcome of this struggle lay before the LORD: this was the moment of that confession. 💎

Closing thoughts - 3

➡️ David has a promise he received before the LORD.

Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me; your throne shall be established forever (2 Samuel 7:16)

➔ It is impossible that David had forgotten this word of promise.

➔ And along with it, he could not have forgotten God's promise of punishment either; given that..

✔️ I find myself thinking: perhaps David knew that what was happening in chapter 15 was a road he himself had to walk.

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