April 2, 2022: Day 71 – I Samuel 26-31 and Psalm 57

We find ourselves in the waning days of King Saul with a story that somewhat repeats itself.  Once again David is pursued by Saul, even though previously when David spared Saul’s life he said to him: You are more righteous than I.  But that doesn’t prevent him from going after him again.  He gathers thousands of his men and then goes to sleep and David sneaks up and takes his spear and water jug.  He then goes and chastises those who were guarding Saul and Saul once again says how much he admires him, but he still is not going to stop pursuing him.

As a result David decides to go and live in the land of the Philistines which would prevent Saul from pursuing him, and as a result king Achish, of the Philistines, agrees to house David and they are faithful to each other.  But then these same Philistines decide to go into battle against Israel and Saul and David agrees to go into battle against them on the side of the Philistines.  As they get closer to each other the other Philistines leaders start to worry about David and if he would remain faithful to the Philistines, or use this as an opportunity to curry favor with King Saul.  They basically kick him out and send him home.

Once they get home they realize that their camp has been raided and their town burned and their women carried off.  They pursue and gather back all of their goods while parallel to that Saul is in battle against the Philistines and he loses and he is killed along with his sons, not to mention his son Jonathan, the one who was bound to David’s soul.  That is going to leave a mark on David which we will see later.

The Psalm is one written when David was hiding in the cave away from Saul and when the Lord delivers Saul into his hands and he cuts off a piece of his robe to demonstrate his faithfulness to Saul.