David - Savage or Saint?

  

I

like pirates, I cant help it! I understand well enough that they were a violent, blood thirsty lot who destroyed people’s lives wherever they travelled. But there is still something of the savage in me that resonates with these wayward men, sailing the high sea’s in search of treasure, adventure and mayhem. Maybe its the same part of me that resonates with King David also. After all, he was a savage right? Or do we prefer not to talk about that?

David, son of Jesse was a King, an adulterer, a murderer, a psalmist, a worshipper and a harpist the list goes on. But perhaps most importantly of all, David was the only man in the course of the Bible to ever be called, a man after God’s own heart. This always confused me when reading about David, because to be totally honest, he came across to me completely uncivilised and practically feral. The man killed wolves and bears with his bare hands and some stones, protecting his flock from a very young age. And he only killed the biggest threat to the army of Israel of his day, the giant Goliath! Not to mention after killing him he chopped off his head and paraded around with it! Bad winner anyone? In order to win Saul’s daughters hand in marriage he cut off the foreskin of 200 dead Phillistine men and laid it at Saul’s feet (I doubt my dad would be too impressed by that). He stole a mans wife, got her pregnant then had him killed in battle to cover up what he’d done. He danced like a crazy man in his underwear before the Ark of the Lord,.. the list goes on. He was a warrior, David knew war, he knew the battle, he was a fighter, a savage. He knew how to kill and how to do it well. So how on earth did he win the much coveted title of, ‘Man after God’s own heart?’.

I’ve read books on this subject and heard sermons preached about this very topic, explaining why David was ultimately called ‘A man after God’s own heart’, but the explanations always leave me unsatisfied, they are so sugary sweet and all wrapped up in a neat little bundle but there is something that still doesn’t sit right with stories the Bible tells about this man. Could it be as Christians that we over spiritualise David? When in reading the Scriptures we see that he was a broken person, like the rest of us. That David was a man, no more or less human than we, no more or less flawed than we, but still a man who sought the heart of God, a man who longed to know the inner workings of the heart of God and perhaps, at that time, David was the closest thing to being a man after God’s own heart that there was? That God looked down, saw David and saw a man who was a little wild and a little savage, but had a heart that was for God and a heart that was willing. Willing to be used by God, willing to be challenged and changed. Willing to step out into what others would consider terrifying, dangerous and just plain not worth it. Willing to give it a go, even if he made many mistakes, and willing to do what it took to make it right again in the eyes of God?

I really hope so, because to be honest, that’s how I feel a lot of the time. And I’m not so sure that the rest of you don’t feel like this most of the time either. Maybe there have been times where people might have come up to you and told you the reasons why God is using you, the reasons why you’re getting the opportunities to serve the way you do. Maybe its your faithfulness, your perseverance, your passion for the lost or your tremendous humility.  When in actual fact, if you were truly honest with yourself and them, you’d be telling them that actually, most of the time you feel like an absolute savage, a feral. That for a lot of the time you feel so uncivilised you can barely breathe in such a civilised world. But you’re willing,.. you have a heart that is willing to be used and challenged and softened and changed and even tamed by God if that’s what he so desires of you.

And its amazing what God will do with a heart like that.

 

Writer: Sally Joy Morgan’s life maxim is, ‘Dream, Risk, Create’, in fact the entirety of her passions and hopes both past and present can all be summed up in just those three words. Determined to always walk the road less travelled, Sally is passionate about two things, God and humanity and endeavours to give her life for both. Sally is a keen preacher and writer and looks forward to investing more time in these areas in the future. After serving for two years at Gympie Salvo’s as the Assistant Church Leader and Youth Pastor, Sally is back home with her family and friends in Brisbane where she attends North Brisbane Salvo’s.

2 Comments to David - Savage or Saint?

1. I think the example of David is an example of the importance of cultural context. In fact, when I read most of the OT, I see a people that by todays standards, are so evil, corupt, imoral etc. A violent people. And their God demanded the most cruel and bloodthirsty acts - that today we would be appalled at.

   The key is to realise that they were different times, a different culture, and God spoke to them in a way they could understand. Which means, when we read those accounts, we need to bear that in mind. For his time, David was the epitomy of spirituality and holiness - but by our standards, he was a savage, murderer etc.

   Yours in Christ,
   Graeme Randall
Graeme Randall on August 16th, 2010

2. Like Sally, I take some measure of comfort in knowing that a flawed yet noble and idealistic human being such as David was numbered in the ranks of those God loved and even patted on the back, going by the biblical record.

   I’m reminded that Abraham pimped his wife Sarah out to various pharoahs/potentates on demand - out of a lack of faith in God or arguably out of the human capacity for self-preservation. Comparisons with biblical figures can easily be made with folks such as Mother Teresa, or Bill Clinton, Diana Spencer, Martin Luther King Jr, or JFK, or Australia’s former PM Bob Hawke, or Tony Blair, etc. etc. etc.

   Human frailty is a given; we are not going to be ‘free’ of our humanity (as if we want to be free of what makes us ‘us’) until we are reunited with God. That’s why the Apostle Paul, in one of his many human moments, whinges about his thorn in the flesh; that’s why we are heavenly treasures in earthenware (clay) jars.

   The problem with writing off David’s track record as a cultural issue is that it puts God in the position of being an amnesiac whose inconsistency suggests senility. If God ‘changes not’ then we have to admit that it’s we human beings who are growing up and recognising our faults as a species. We are growing more into the likeness of Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit and the grace that enables us to both reason and to believe. They are not incompatible tasks, thank Christ!

   Scriptures are sometimes, I suggest, an evidence of how we have tried to twist God into our own image. A much more mature approach - one i suggest that can be held with more intellectual and spiritual integrity - would be to acknowledge that the biblical record is a human one that was divinely inspired. History is always written by the victors. What makes the Bible unique is that the victors don’t get it all their own way. there is no whitewash. Instead, we see the ugliness and we see God’s grace and forgiveness shining through.

   David doesn’t get to build the temple, because he is a man of blood. The prophet Nathan shames David throughout the land and prompts him to sincere repentance.

   We need more prophets, not of doom but of deliverance. Prophets who deliver the truth of God’s grace, God’s righteousness, God’s justice and God’s mercy.

   Barry G.
Barry Gittins on August 17th, 2010

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