Lessons from David- 1 Samuel 23
What do you do when you see someone in trouble? Do you deliberately ignore them? Do you actively help them? Or are you too obsessed with your own problems to even notice?
In this chapter, we see two very different responses to a troubled situation. Keilah, evidently a walled city and a vulnerable population, is being looted by the Philistines. David's reaction is to ask God what to do. Saul's reaction is to make a plan to besiege David at Keilah.
God gives victory to David, as He promised, and answers David's prayers concerning Saul's plans. It is in a sense a hollow victory, because God tells David that the people he saved would give him up to Saul.
From the highpoint of victory, David is forced into the desert hills to hide from his pursuer. Saul is so obsessed with finding David and killing him that he ignores everything else- at the end of the chapter he is forced to face a Philistine attack. Saul is so deluded he even thinks he can bless people in God's Name for giving him the information he wants. He has followed his obsession and become so far steeped into his sin, that he has lost the ability to see what's plainly in front of him: he is being a rubbish king and a rubbish believer.
It's only when we depend on God for victory that we can be truly successful. And successful in Bible terms does not always mean luxury comforts (David wasn't getting any of those), but a close intimacy with God. That's what we should all crave and aspire to.
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