Dr. Manny Arango (0:00)

Hey, Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango and I'm your host for the Bible department podcast powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the Journey family. We used church candy for our new church plant the Garden, and the response blew me and my team away. At our new church plant the Garden, we ran simple invite ads through none other than church candy. And hundreds of people responded. Seriously. People who had never even heard of us, who had never met me or heard me preach. They saw an ad on Facebook or Instagram. They showed up to a launch party or launch team training. Some of them have joined our team. Here's the best part. A good amount of them have started giving and tithing, which means the ads have paid for themselves. Our church plant is growing and it's because we chose the right partner. We didn't have to figure out marketing strategies or spend hours tinkering with ad settings. Church candy handled it all and it worked. You might not be planting a church, but if you're a pastor who wants to see more new faces on Sunday. And by the way, I've never met a pastor who doesn't want to see more faces on Sunday. It's time to check them out. How about you go to churchcandy.com Manny and book a discovery call, Let their team show you what's possible when the right people hear about your church family. Welcome to day 153. We are honestly embarking upon one of my favorite chapters of the entire bible, which is 1st Samuel, chapter 17. I. I love this passage so much. I have a tattoo of David killing Goliath on my arm. Okay. I absolutely love this story. I love the story of David killing Goliath. It is a iconic story. It's a great story. If you're watching this and it. If you're just listening via audio and you did not just witness me pull up my shirt, but if you're watching the video, then you could see my amazing tattoo of David slaying Goliath. It's a good tattoo and it's a good story. So like always, if you've done the reading, I'm proud of you. Let's go. We're in First Samuels, chapter 17, 18, 19 and 24 chapters. Action packed chapters. So not hard to read. And if you haven't done the reading, yo, you're missing out. Go do the reading. Stop the audio, stop the video. Go do the reading. So very, very, very first thing that we got to do is we gotta give context clues. Okay? So the first context clue is actually going to come from First Samuel, chapter 13, verse 19. And it says this. Now, there was no blacksmith to be found in the whole land of Israel. For the Philistines had said the Hebrews must not make swords or spears for themselves. So all Israel went down to the Philistines to sharpen their plowshares, maddoxes, ackles and sickles. The charge was 2/3 of a shekel, the plowshares and for maddoxes and one third of a shekel for sharpening the axes and for setting goads. So on the day of the battle, okay, on the day of the battle, neither sword nor spear was to be found in the possession of any of the people with Saul and Jonathan. But Saul and his son Jonathan had them. Okay, right there. That's. That's all the context that we need, that David grows up in a generation with no swords, no spears, no weapons, no blacksmiths. And so I would actually say the thing that's motivating David is not some vendetta against giants. I think so often when we preach or teach 1st Samuel, chapter 17, we make it all about giants. But Goliath could have been normal height, and he still would have died that day because David was adamant that he was going to win a sword for himself. So that's context. Okay, Context. Let's like, kind of keep kind of going into context. All these chapters 17 to 20 is really going to highlight the conflict between David and King Saul. If you're Saul, you're happy that there's, like, this, you know, brave young man who's going to fight a giant that I don't want to fight, but not of your Saul. David is immediately cast into the national platform and is going to get attention and fame and glory that Saul thinks he should have. And a narcissistic leader is never gonna celebrate the wins of the people on their team. So Saul should be celebrating the fact that somebody stepped up to the plate, that there is a Israelite brave enough to fight Goliath, but he does not. Instead, he is going to see David as a rival. He's gonna compete with David. He's gonna attempt to kill David. And there's three people who are gonna continue to save David, who are gonna essentially be on David's team. That's ironically enough, two of these people are gonna be Saul's kids. So Michael is Gonna be Saul's daughter, Jonathan, Saul's son, and then Samuel, who's the prophet to the king. So one of the characters that's gonna get highlighted, Eitan, in these four chapters is Jonathan. Okay, Jonathan is just a hero, guys. He is. Just talk about a standup guy, and we'll get into him a little bit later. So let me round out all the context. Okay, so the context is David grows up in a generation with absolutely no swords. The context also is David is. Has been privately anointed to be king, but there has not been a testing or confirmation. So he is anointed to actually be king. But remember a couple days ago we talked about the threefold process of an Israelite king actually coming into power. So let's get into some nerdy nuggets. Okay, Number one, the text is creating a deeply layered and complex character in David. I would actually say that David is probably the first truly gray character that we've encountered in the biblical text. There's a lot of characters who. The text is showing us that they are good characters. Noah, Moses, Abraham. Good characters. One who do some shady stuff here and there. Who, you know, good characters, but who fall into temptation. Good characters, but who are complex human beings. And so they end up doing things that are questionable, that are sinful, that aren't moral. And then we have David. And David doesn't just do stuff that's shady. David's kind of shady. David's. David's. David's the most complicated character that we've really encountered thus far. Even his motives for wanting to kill Goliath on one hand, he's like, yeah, like, I come. You come against me with the sword, spear, and javelin. I come against you in the name of the Lord God Almighty. So there's this one part of David's heart that wants to defend the honor of Yahweh. But then there's another part that's like, wait, the person who kills Goliath don't gotta pay no taxes? Yeah, I'm not trying to pay no taxes. Let's go. Like, Like. Like, there's this. There's just. There's just always the flip side to the coin with David. And we're gonna see that from now all the way through Second Samuel, that David's killing people on his deathbed. David is. David is a complicated character. And I think that the text wants us to not. Okay, I think the text wants us to fight our urge to just make it neat and tie a bow on it. And the text wants us to fight Our desire to resolve the conflict. There is conflict in the text on purpose, and I don't think it's there for us to resolve it. I think it's there so that we can sit in the tension and go, all right, like, how do I hold intention? The fact that it's a man after God's own heart, but this is a man who probably raped a woman and killed her husband. And not probably killed her husband. Definitely killed her husband. There's debate around whether or not this is rape or whether or not this sexual experience between. Between David and Bathsheba is consensual. So that's this. I just want. I'm going to throw that out there. We're going to keep coming back to that theme now that David has been introduced to the character. Next kind of nerdy nugget. Okay, there is a person that should be fighting Goliath. His name is Saul. Okay? Saul is described as being head and shoulders above everyone else. He's taller than everybody. Okay? So if there is a person that really should be fighting Goliath, it is Saul number one, because he's king number two, because he's actually comparable height to Goliath. Which then sets us up to go. Yeah, Goliath is actually the easiest giant that David's ever gonna face. The. The next giant that David has to face is Saul, who's gonna throw spears at him, who's gonna want to kill him. And Goliath is a relatively easy giant in comparison or in relation to the giant of Saul. Okay, Next kind of nerdy nugget. Jonathan and Saul continue to be contrasted. So remember back in chapters 1314, Jonathan and his father Saul, or Saul and his son Jonathan are contrasted. Well, that's going to continue in how they interact with David. So Jonathan is fully prepared to throw his support and his weight behind David as king. Jonathan cares more about the king being anointed by God than the king being himself. So let's think about it. Jonathan is the heir apparent to the throne. And Jonathan, through wisdom and discernment, knows that David is going to be the next king and wants David to be the next king. So we're going to get a little, you know, deeper in. In terms of chapter 18. And Jonathan is going to make a covenant with David. And this is radical. There's no way that an heir apparent should be making a covenant with the person who's actually going to take over as king. Like, that's just not normal. If anything, they should be rivals. They should be violent towards each other. And Where Saul is violent towards David, Jonathan recognizes the spirit of the Lord on David and recognizes the call of God on David's life and will throw his support at David. So Jonathan and his father continue to be contrasted with each other. Jonathan is essentially giving David the kingship. So those are the three nerdy nuggets that we'll really focus on. I'll maybe give you one more. So let's go to chapter 20 really quick. First Samuel, chapter 20, verse 28, 34. David has asked for permission. Jonathan and David have, you know, devised a plan to figure out what's going on with. With Saul and whether or not Saul's trying to kill him and whether or not the. The king's court is safe for David. And I want you to see chapter 30. Sorry, verse 30 of chapter 20. It says, Saul's anger flared up at Jonathan, and he said to him, you son of a perverse and rebellious woman. Don't I know that you have sided with the son of Jesse to your own shame, to the shame of the mother who bore you. As long as the son of Jesse lives on this earth, neither you nor your kingdom will be established. Now send someone to bring him to me, for he must die. Okay, The Hebrew language here is just insanely strong. Like, I mean, like, sauce cussing Jonathan out. Like, this is. This. Is. This is strong to the level of profane. Like. Like, there's no way for me to overemphasize just how angry Saul is at this. I'm trying to think, like, what. What version? That's NIV. What does NRSV kind of say? Chapter 20, verse 30. Yeah, I mean, to the point that Saul almost kills his son Jonathan. Like, this is just wild. Jonathan got up from the table in fierce anger on that second day of the feast. He did not eat because he was grieved at his father's shameful treatment of David. Just Jonathan's moral compass is just absolutely incredible to me. All right, let's leave you with a timeless truth. Okay, so the big Context clue is First Samuel, Chapter 13. There's one more comparison. There's not just a comparison between Saul and Jonathan, but there's also a comparison going on between Saul and David. It's actually in chapter 16. I'll bring you there briefly. I know that was yesterday's reading, but I think this is really, really important. So in first Samuel, chapter 16, verses 1 through 13 are Samuel and David, and then chapters 14 and 23 are Saul and David. Okay? And there's some words here that are really, really Important. So this is what God says to Samuel, says, see one of Jesse's sons, okay? See? Which is like, see to it. So that word see should immediately bring us back to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. That the serpent showed the woman the tree and said, see, like it's good. Like, look upon it, it's good. Okay? Which. So the nature of temptation is trusting my own eyes as opposed to trusting God's perspective. That's like the foundational nature of temptation. Family, the wait is over. My brand new book, Crushing Chaos, is out now and available everywhere. Books are sold. Literally. Today I walked into a Barnes and Noble and I signed a bunch of copies at a physical location. So you can grab this book at a physical Barnes and Noble or you can go to a Books A Million or Amazon or anywhere books are sold and grab a copy. If you enjoy reading the Bible from an ancient perspective, if you understand that the beauty of scripture is actually knowing it in context, then you'll love this book. And if there's any chaos in your personal life, I think that reading the Bible from an ancient perspective can actually help to crush the chaos in your life. I think this book is going to be a New York Times bestseller. I really do. I think we wrote a good one. I think you should get a copy today. All right, back to the episode. So first Samuel, chapter 16, verse 1, verse 7. There's a C look theme going on which culminates in verse 12 of chapter 16 with David being the smallest or the youngest, Red with beautiful, beautiful eyes. Okay. And that's just like, man, that there's something about David that chooses to see things the way that God sees things, instead of seeing things the way that he wants to see things. Now this is going to come full circle when David later on his life sees Bathsheba and has a moment of downfall, a defining moment of downfall. So just wanted to kind of point that out. The other thing that I think is really, really important that I feel like nobody ever points out, is that David brings Goliath's head to Jerusalem. So there's a. There's a part of this decapitation that's good. David is portrayed as a serpent crusher. Now, the. The way that Goliath's armor is talked about, there's a Hebrew word used here called kaskasim, which is scaly. Okay? So Goliath's armor is described as being scaly, which means that Goliath is being depicted as a dragon, as a serpent, as a snake. And by hitting Goliath in the head with a stone. Killing the snake in the head and then decapitating that snake portrays David as the ultimate serpent crusher, the Messiah. But then he decapitates the head and he begins to do something that actually Yahweh forbids Jewish soldiers to do, which is to keep trophies. And the number one way that kings would keep trophies is they would keep. They would decapitate another king and then take their head and make a chain out of it and wear the decapitated head to essentially, you know, intimidate anyone who was around. And some kings would have just a belt of just multiple heads of people they had killed or multiple heads. And there's actually tribes in South America who do the same thing, but they shrink the heads. Now, like, this is not something that that Israelite sodas are supposed to do. You're not supposed to be fighting for your own glory or to intimidate people. You're supposed to be fighting on behalf of Yahweh, who sees even fallen enemy soldiers as image bearers. And so again, there's this tension. David's a great character. On one hand, he's the serpent crusher who's able to deal definitively with this serpent, who's supposed to remind us of the serpent in Genesis 3. He's a messiah figure. He's a pre figurement of the Messiah to come. But on the other hand, he's keeping decapitated heads as trophies. And this is no bueno. This is not good. But there's a complex character, and that's as many nerdy nuggets as I got time to give you. As we move into a Thomas truth, I want you to focus on the fact that David and Jonathan have now come into covenant with one another. And a covenant friendship is the opposite of two things. A covenant friendship is not a contract, and a covenant friendship is not convenient. Okay, so a covenant friendship is a very, very, very special thing. Jonathan really is the hero of this entire section, chapter 17 to chapter 20. And the covenant that he makes with David is completely countercultural and incredibly admirable. The text really does juxtapose Jonathan in his paranoid and wicked father. So if you're lucky enough to have any covenant friendships in your life, guard them with your heart. Guard them with everything you have. Because covenant friendships are hard to come by. And we don't live in a society that really rewards or platforms or talks about covenant friendships. We live in a world of clout chasing and people will be your friend because they think that there's something they can get out of it for themselves. But genuine, genuine covenant friendship is a beautiful thing when it can be pulled off. And Jonathan and David have that. And, man, I think it should be the model, especially for male to male relationships. We need more covenant relationships. All right, tomorrow we got day one 54 and we are in First Samuel, chapter 21 to 24. Uh, we got 21, 22, 23, 24. Four more chapters tomorrow. I'm proud of you. If you got a streak going, don't break it. If you don't have a streak going, all you gotta do is two days in a row and then don't stop. So I'll see you right here tomorrow. I love you so much. Till next time. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the show at the Bible Department and on Instagram Hebible Department. If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into the Bible, you can get free access to our library of courses@thebibledepartment.com we'll see you back here tomorrow.