July 11, 2021
First Lesson: Psalm 48:1-2, 9-14
1 Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised
in the city of our God.
His holy mountain, 2 beautiful in elevation,
is the joy of all the earth,
Mount Zion, in the far north,
the city of the great King.
9 We ponder your steadfast love, O God,
in the midst of your temple.
10 Your name, O God, like your praise,
reaches to the ends of the earth.
Your right hand is filled with victory.
11 Let Mount Zion be glad,
let the towns[a] of Judah rejoice
because of your judgments.
12 Walk about Zion, go all around it,
count its towers,
13 consider well its ramparts;
go through its citadels,
that you may tell the next generation
14 that this is God,
our God forever and ever.
He will be our guide forever.
Second Lesson 2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10
5 Then all the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron, and said, “Look, we are your bone and flesh. 2 For some time, while Saul was king over us, it was you who led out Israel and brought it in. The Lord said to you: It is you who shall be shepherd of my people Israel, you who shall be ruler over Israel.” 3 So all the elders of Israel came to the king at Hebron; and King David made a covenant with them at Hebron before the Lord, and they anointed David king over Israel. 4 David was thirty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned forty years. 5 At Hebron he reigned over Judah seven years and six months; and at Jerusalem he reigned over all Israel and Judah thirty-three years.
9 David occupied the stronghold, and named it the city of David. David built the city all around from the Millo inward. 10 And David became greater and greater, for the Lord, the God of hosts, was with him.
The Haitian President, Jovenel Moise, was assassinated in his home this week. His wife was flown to the US for treatment for her wounds. Our embassy there might close, and an emergency UN meeting was called. When a leader is killed, chaos often follows. May we pray for the country of Hatti, its leaders and for the US citizens who have loved ones still there.
Our passage this morning starts after King Saul’s son and successor was assassinated. As you recall, last week, we heard of God anointing David, the shepherd boy, while Saul was king. This was the first of three anointings. Yes, David was anointed three times. Each time David was given more responsibility. In Hebron, David is anointed as King of Judah, his home tribe, where he ruled for 7 ½ years (2 Sam. 2:1-4). But as you can imagine, this did not sit well with Saul; remember David was a member of Saul’s court and now he is a king of a neighboring tribe. There was a kind of civil war between the tribes of Israel, those following Saul and those following David. Saul was struggling with the Philistines, while David was considered a vassal for the Philistines and allowed to rule. Saul had fallen out of favor with Samuel and with God and David was coming into power and more importantly continuing to gain God’s favor.
So when the northern tribes of Israel, the ones who followed Saul, find themselves without a leader, they turn to David. They come to him in his kingdom, Judah, in the city of Hebron and make their case. One commentator writes, “They first acknowledged that David was kinfolk: “We are your bone and flesh” (2 Samuel 5:1). Secondly, they recognized his considerable achievements. “Even when Saul was our king,” they observed, “you were the one who led Israel in battle.” Third, they recognized in him Yahweh’s own choice: “Yahweh said to you: it is you who shall be shepherd of my people Israel, you who shall be ruler over Israel” (2 Samuel 5:2) (Working Preacher, Ralph Klein).
Invoking Yahweh means they are returning to God. Their division ends, they form a covenant, a sacred agreement between David, all the tribes of Israel and God. This is the covenantal moment of David’s third anointing and his becoming King of Israel. First David ruled at Hebron, in Judah, then David ruled all of Israel for 33 years, making a total of 40 years as king. His dynasty endured for 400 years.
One reason for this duration is that David captures Jerusalem, a city between the tribes which was neutral (2 Sam. 5:6-8). Defeating the Jeb’usites, David creates a unifying capital for his new United Kingdom. Much like how the United States created Washington DC rather than an established city in either the north or south. This is his first act as king and the first time Jerusalem is called the city of David. Jerusalem is built on Mount Zion, and our Psalm praises its beauty, great King and the God of Jerusalem. Next week we will see how David brought the Ark of the Covenant to the city of David.
David was not the first king, but he was the one to unify all the tribes and turn the tribal confederacy into a true kingdom. But David was not perfect, even though he is a pillar of our faith. We see his weaknesses and his faults, think of Bathsheba, which we will get to. But David was hailed as the greatest of Israel’s rulers – “a man after God’s own heart.” He was both the architect of the nation and the royal champion of Israel’s faith.
Seeing that David started his reign at age thirty got me thinking about the similarities between David and Jesus. Both start at thirty, were born in Bethlehem, and Jesus came from the lineage of David. David started as a shepherd and became Israel’s king, Jesus is known for being the good shepherd and the King of the Jews. The word shepherd in antiquity was a synonym for king” (Working Preacher, Ralph Klein), making David a template for this dual role. Even David’s name offers a parallel. Unused before now, the name David means “beloved” and as you recall, God calls Jesus his “Beloved Son” at his baptism. Of course, the greatest connection is that David was anointed three times and Jesus is called the Messiah which literally means the “Anointed One.”
Anointing’s are always of God. Samuel anointed young David, setting him apart for his future service. The elders of Judah anointed David to be their king. Here the elders of Israel anointed David after he made a covenant with them before the Lord. Each one marked a chapter in David’s life. I wonder if we have chapters in our lives that are blessed by God as well. I certainly felt like I was blessed in the time of my life when I was a stay-at-home mother. Maybe you can notice chapters in your life by geography or employment or family. Times when you had a strong purpose, like you knew it was where you were meant to be. But even if that is not the case, we all have the same promise from God. God is with us! No matter what you are going through, God is with you! God promised David the same thing: “The Lord the God of hosts, was with him (v.10).
One commentator writes, “The short sentence “I am with you” is at the heart of the good news in the Bible. Moses thought up five excuses about why he should not be the leader in the Exodus. Then God said, “I will be with you” (Exodus 3:12) …Jeremiah argued that he was only a teenager and therefore could not be a prophet. God countered, “Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you” (Jeremiah 1:8). In Matthew’s description of the significance of Jesus, he drew on the old word in Isaiah 7:14, “They shall name him Emmanuel, which means, ‘God is with us’” (cf. Matthew 1:23). And the last word of Jesus in that Gospel is: “And remember, I am with you to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20)
Why is “I am with you” so important? It means that David and all of us later royal and priestly children of God are never alone. (God is with us even when we make mistakes. God is with us even when we go our own way. God is with us, even when we lose faith.) However sinful and lacking in confidence we might be, God is not ashamed to hang around with David, Bathsheba, or us. There is an implicit word of forgiveness in this simple sentence.
Finally, “I am with you” is a word of empowerment. Whether it is the ability to trust, to carry out our day-to-day vocations, or to face all the challenges of life — including our mortality — God’s “I am with you” means that we have the promise of strength and encouragement to do what we have to do.” (Working Preacher, Ralph Klein).
How do we know that God is with us? It all starts with our baptism. When you were baptized in the name of Christ you have been marked with the cross of Christ forever. God is with you; Jesus is with you. It is Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper that says to us in ways that we can taste, touch, and smell, “I am with you.”
We might not be anointed; we might not be a king or queen. We might not do everything that we think we should. But we have a promise from God to be with us, to be with us in our relationship with Jesus, to be with us in our dark times and in our joys. Lean into this promise and allow Jesus to reign in your heart as your king and your companion who is with you always. Amen.
