1 Samuel 20 From Spears To Arrows: How David Learned Submission While Saul Chose Resistance

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Now, our focus has been on the life of David, his ascent to the throne, but it's so much more than that, isn't it? It's the building of character, the building of character in his life. Now, I'll remind you that there's a long ascent here in 1 Samuel. It's gonna take 10 to 12 years. It's David's 20s. And they're spent generally running from Saul. Primarily, these years have been and will be a wilderness experience. And God was building character into David to make him the man he wanted him to be. As we pass to chapter 20 from chapter 18, we might fly over chapter 19. It's not that it's bad, but it exemplifies this time of David's life. Um, it shows Saul's escalating attacks from spears and court to invasions into David's own home. And finally, David's flight to Samuel there at the end of chapter 19. Uh, David is being hounded. Uh, chapter 19 is uh really an example of that relentless attack that he's facing, literally running from Saul. Now, today we're gonna jump into chapter 20 and we're gonna consider two things in this character: resistance and submission. So, two things: resistance and submission. Saul will be really good at resisting. David will show us what it means to submit. Uh, let's read chapter 20. We'll skip a few verses as we go along, but follow along. 1 Samuel chapter 20, starting in verse 1. Then David fled to Naoth in Rama and went and said to Jonathan, What have I done? What is my iniquity? And what is my sin before your father that he seeks my life? So Jonathan said to him, By no means, you shall not die. Indeed, my father will do nothing, either great or small, without first telling me. And why should my father hide this thing from me? It is not so. Then David took an oath again and said, Your father certainly knows that I have found favor in your eyes. And he has said, Do not let Jonathan know, lest he be grieved. But truly, as the Lord lives and as your soul lives, there is but a step between me and death. So Jonathan said to David, Whatever you yourself desire, I will do it for you. Now, after this, the plan is for Jonathan to go and figure out Saul's intent toward David. Skip to verse 12. Then Jonathan said to David, The Lord God of Israel is witness, when I have sounded out my father sometime tomorrow, or the third day, and indeed there is good toward David, and I do not send you and tell you, may the Lord do so and much more to Jonathan. But if it pleases my father to do you evil, then I will report it to you and send you away, that you may go your way in safety, and the Lord will be with you as he has been with my father. And you shall not only show me kindness of the Lord while I still live, that I may not die, but you shall not cut off your kindness from my house forever. No, not when the Lord has cut off every one of the enemies of David from the face of the earth. So Jonathan made a covenant with the house of David, saying, Let the Lord require at the hand of David's enemies. Skipping down to verse 19, the plan there, once uh David, or rather, Jonathan finds out Saul's intent. Verse 18, and Jonathan said to David, Tomorrow is the new moon, and you will be missed, because your seat will be empty. And when you have stayed three days, go down quickly and come to the place where you hid on the day of the deed, and remain by the stone of Izel. Then I will shoot three arrows to the side, as though I shot at a target, and there I will send a lad, saying, Go find the arrows. If I expressly now listen, if I expressly say to the lad, look, the arrows are on this side of you, get them and come, then, as the Lord lives, there is safety for you and no harm. But if I say thus to the young man, look, the arrows are beyond you. Go your way, for the Lord has sent you away. And as for the matter which you and I have spoken of, indeed, the Lord be between me and you forever. So Jonathan then goes and tests his father Saul to see what his intent is. And he comes back with bad news. Note verse 32, as talking to his father. And Jonathan answered Saul his father and said to him, Why should he be killed? What has he done? Then Saul cast a spear at him to kill him, by which Jonathan knew it was determined by his father to kill David. So Jonathan arose from the table in fierce anger and ate no food the second day of the month, for he was grieved for David, because his father had treated him shamefully. And so it was in the morning that Jonathan went out into the field at the time appointed with David, and a little lad was with him. And he said to the lad, Now run, find the arrows which I shoot. And the lad ran and shot an arrow beyond him. Then the lad came to the place where the arrow was, which Jonathan had shot, and Jonathan cried out after the lad and said, Is not the arrow beyond you? And Jonathan cried out after the lad, Make haste, hurry, do not delay. So Jonathan's lad gathered up the arrows and came back to his master. But the lad did not know anything. Only Jonathan and David knew the matter. And Jonathan gave his weapons to the lad and said to him, Go carry them to the city. As soon as the lad had gone, David arose from a place toward the south, fell on his face to the ground, and bowed down three times, and they kissed one another, and they wept together, but David more so. And Jonathan said to David, Go in peace, since we have both sworn in the name of the Lord, saying, May the Lord go between you and me, and between your descendants and my descendants forever. And he arose and departed, and Jonathan went into the city. So a dramatic turn of events here. Um Saul most definitely angry at David, tries to kill his own son, Jonathan, and there's this resistance going on. And we really see that here, these two key characteristics, resistance and submission. Let's look at this. So defining the concepts, resistance. Uh resistance is the refusal to accept or comply with direction. We've all been right, a little resistance to some direction. Although here it's a negative character of Saul, we are in fact commanded in the Bible to re resist a few things. And let's look at a passage that shows us well. James chapter four. Turn to James chapter four, verse seven. Hold your place here in First Samuel. James chapter four, verse seven. Says this. James says, therefore submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. First we consider here resisting the devil. We're called to resist the devil. Uh the word resist in the Greek is and and oh man, anthotismi. Most commonly, this is a military term that means to stand your ground. So picture it, to stand your ground in battle, resist the devil, right? Something we don't do enough, resist the devil. Ephesians chapter 6, verse 11 says, put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. That idea of standing against the wiles of the devil is a related word. Stand, resist. It's an active word. We need to resist the devil and his schemes to stand strong. It's good when we're talking about evil, but bad when we're talking about God. Stephen in Acts chapter 7 says this to the religious people who were just about to stone him. He says this, you stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. So Stephen here says to the people, you resist the Holy Spirit. You're defying him, you're refusing to submit to the Holy Spirit. Stubbornly resist his commands to us. And Saul is the epitome of resisting God. It started way back in 1 Samuel 13. Don't leave James yet, but uh it started back in 1 Samuel 13. Not wanting to wait for Samuel for the offering, he stubbornly did what God told him not to do. Even more in chapter 15. He stubbornly resists God's command to kill every Amalekite, as well as the king, as well as the animals. And he resists that command, and that's why God rejected him, that disobedience and that resisting. Saul is the essence of resistance. Now, submission here, notice in James 4, 7, therefore, submit to God is the direct opposite of resist. Submit. In English, it's the voluntary yielding or deferring to another's authority, will, or leadership. In the Greek, it's also a military term. Huposimai, something like that. It means to submit, to yield, to place oneself under someone else's authority. Like a soldier places himself under the authority of a commanding officer. And it's a good picture, right? God, I'm submitting to your authority. I'm putting myself under your authority. Now, check it out. We look at the Old Testament and the New Testament, the ideas of resist and submit. We're told two to one, submit. Submit is twice as common as the idea of resisting. So it's an important thing. Let's be honest though. The idea of resistance fits way better in our American narrative, doesn't it? We are all about resistance, resisting the authority of the king. We gained our independence. We celebrate those who stood stubbornly against authority. We say, don't tread on me. And this idea of resistance is kind of in our core character as Americans. Now I get it. I get it. There's a place for resistance, especially as it concerns evil and wickedness. But resistance is kind of one of those things, comes naturally to us, but the opposite is what God really wants from us. Two to one submission. We're called to submit in marriage, right? In relationships. Ephesians 5.21 says that all believers are to submit to one another in the fear of the Lord. Submit to one another. God instructs wives specifically in Ephesians chapter 5, verse 22, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. So wives are to put themselves under the authority of their husbands, their covering as well. We see that in the end, that means that ultimately you trust, put yourself under the trust of your husband, ultimately to trust God. That's what it comes down to. Wives should respect their husbands and submit, is without qualification. But to trust yourself to Him because you trust God. That really is it. As husbands, we don't always have the answers, but wives trust them as you trust God. Now, it's the same thing with our relationship to the government. We submit ourselves, Romans 13, to the governing authorities because God's put them there. Now, Saul exemplifies resistance. David exemplifies submission in this chapter, chapter 20. Now let's go back and look at it a little bit. Chapter 20, we see David there, waiting then at the rock there, Ezelle. He's waiting for the direction. Jonathan's arrow. You remember what he said. I'll shoot the arrow. If I tell the lad it's beyond you, you've got to run. My father's gonna try to kill you. If I say it's it's near, then stay because um he doesn't have it out for you. You're wrong. Um, now ultimately, it wasn't Jonathan's direction. Now, listen, ultimately, it wasn't Jonathan's direction that he was waiting for. It was God's direction. David was waiting for God's direction through the arrow shot. He's having to trust God. God, you know what I need to do. Oh, I want to stay. You know that he had to have looked at it and said, Oh, I sure hope that nothing, I'm just wrong and I can go home and it can be life is normal. That's what I want. But essentially waiting there at that rock, he had to come to the conclusion: God, whatever you want me to do, I'll do it. If it's stay, I'll stay. If it's go, I'll go. And I think his submission was determined before he knew the answer to what God was going to say. And it involved trust the same way. Submission involved trust. God, you're my shepherd. I want to go wherever you lead me. And it always involves trust. We trust the Lord with all of our hearts. We don't lean on our own understanding. Understanding is not always necessary, but trust is necessary to submission. And we see that in chapter 20 demonstrated as David is waiting for God's direction in his life. Now, no one demonstrates submission like Jesus, the perfect example of submission. John 6, 38 says this. Jesus says, For I have come down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. In John 5, verse 30, he says, I don't seek my own will, but the will of the Father who sent me. Jesus was submitted to the will of the Father in the garden when he said, Father, let this cup pass from me, but not my will be done, but your will be done. And he was in full submission to the Father. Now, Jesus' submission was the ultimate act of resistance. If we bring these two together, the ultimate act of resistance for Jesus was submission and the submission of the cross. Jesus resisted self-preservation on the cross. One of the things that keeps us from submission is self-preservation. Maybe it's our life, maybe it's just our will, right? It's our desire for something. And we said, God, I don't want to miss out on that. Preserve myself, you know. And yet Jesus demonstrated how submission annihilates selfish preservation. Um, in the wilderness there, Jesus was tempted, and the devil said to a very hungry Jesus, have these stones become bread for yourself, feed yourself. And Jesus countered that with submission. Now, so not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. And so he laid down selfish preservation in submission to the Father. Um, Jesus considered death, we read in Hebrews chapter 12, and the shame that went along with it. He despised the shame, but it was the joy that was set before him to do the will of the Father, to submit to the Father in the cross. In that, he resisted selfish preservation, he resisted satanic shortcuts. In the wilderness again, you'll remember Satan came a second time and he said, Hey, throw yourself down from the temple. Everybody will believe in you. And Jesus countered there. Um, don't tempt, don't put the Lord your God to the test. I'm not gonna do that. I'm not gonna put my life on the line for that. It's not the Father's will. The enemy is constantly giving us shortcuts, joy in marriage versus a cheap imitation of sex without marriage, a seeming shortcut to what we want, yet it never results in what we really truly want success without integrity, the shortcuts in business. Um He puts these shortcuts in front of us. I can do this the easy way. And yet, submission will always do things God's way, no matter the cost. And Jesus shows us that. Salvation would come through perfect submission. Um, perfect sacrifice, no shortcut, no easy way out, but doing the long, painful thing that the Father had for him. Through submission, Jesus resisted worldly power. The final thing that the devil comes to Jesus with there in the wilderness is bow down and worship me, and I will give you all the kingdoms of earth. And it says there, he showed him in a moment those kingdoms. Um, temptation, all the kingdoms of earth. Now, was it a draw for Jesus? I don't know. I really don't know. But he looked at it and he put it in the weight of the scale there and and and said, you know what? All that the world has to offer versus what the father wants me to do, and he submitted to the will of the father, and he defeated it. He defeated all those things. There was severe resistance through submission. And Jesus shows us that better than anyone. It all came down to trusting the Father and entrusting his life to the Father. Um, resistance through submission, that's the key for us too. We're tempted to preserve self, self-will, even our own body. We're tempted to take shortcuts through the goodness that God has us for us in in some other cheap way, sin. And we're tempted by worldly treasure and power, all that this world has to offer us, but yet true resistance stands and says, God, whatever you want, I'll do it. I'll submit to you and your power and your authority. This moment for David was key, it was a turning point. From this time on, he's on the road, he's running through the wilderness, he's hiding in caves. And it's a good chunk of time. Six, seven years, maybe more. And yet, at the will of the Father, he did it. Whatever God has for you this week, um, I encourage you, submit. Follow the shepherd wherever he leads. Let's close with the song, and I'll probably leave a couple minutes where the camera's on. If you guys have anything you need to say to one another, it's the closest thing to fellowship we have, but let's pray. God, thank you. Um, not just that you give us a bunch of things to do. That's not what it is. Um, God, it's not just about taking our character and being better, although you work in our hearts and in our lives, but God, it's what you've done for us at the cross. That you, Jesus, submitted yourself perfectly to the will of the Father to save us. God, we want to just offer our lives to you, a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable. When we look at everything that you've done for us, it just makes good sense. So, God, work these things into our heart. Give us power by your spirit to offer our lives completely to you. Uh, not just in word, but in reality. We pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.