10/2/2010 9:42:28 AM
SPIRITUAL DIARY
My
Worship Time Focus: Joab gives thanks to the king
Bible
Reading & Meditation Reference: 2Sam. 14:21-27
Message of the verses: “21 ¶
Then the king said to Joab, "Behold now, I will surely do this
thing; go therefore, bring back the young man Absalom." 22 Joab fell on his face to the ground,
prostrated himself and blessed the king; then Joab said, "Today your
servant knows that I have found favor in your sight, O my lord, the king, in
that the king has performed the request of his servant." 23 So Joab arose and went to Geshur and brought
Absalom to Jerusalem. 24 However the
king said, "Let him turn to his own house, and let him not see my face."
So Absalom turned to his own house and did not see the king’s face. 25 Now in all Israel was no one as handsome as
Absalom, so highly praised; from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head
there was no defect in him. 26 When he
cut the hair of his head (and it was at the end of every year that he cut it,
for it was heavy on him so he cut it), he weighed the hair of his head at 200
shekels by the king’s weight. 27 To
Absalom there were born three sons, and one daughter whose name was Tamar; she
was a woman of beautiful appearance.”
Joab
had many fault that are recorded in the Scriptures but in this case, and one
other I can see a side of Joab that is good, for he truly wanted to see the
king and his son reunited and after what was probably a long time talking to
David Joab finally convinced his to bring his son back to Jerusalem.
What
was the reason that the king would not see his son after Joab made the 160 mile
round trip to bring Absalom back home?
He may have trying to see if Absalom was truly sorry for what he did so
there was a time before David would see him.
David may have wanted to show others that he would not pamper
Absalom. One thing that just came to my
mind is that there was a punishment for rape which Amnon had never received,
which the king should have made sure that this happened. I believe that the person who raped a woman
had to pay the father a sum of money and then after that he had to marry her
and never divorce her, but in the case of Amnon this would have also been against
the law for she was his half sister. In
the case of David’s sin death was the only punishment according to the Law of
God, but God showed mercy to David and so perhaps he should have done the same
to Absalom.
The
next part of this section speaks of the popularity of Absalom and how handsome
he was and how the people of Jerusalem kind of made an idol out of him because
of his appearance and his long hair which weighed five pounds at the end of a
year. I am wondering if he had got some
instructions from his grandfather who was king of Geshur on what to do in order
to steal the kingdom from his father, for after all he was the crown prince.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Appearance can easily affect how a person
responds to another and this makes me think of two important people in the
Scriptures who it is said of them that their appearance was nothing to take
notice of. Jesus is one of them for
Isaiah speaks of this in his prophecy of the Messiah and it told of Paul that
he was not a good looking man, for he was very short, perhaps less than five
feet tall, and he had an eye problem.
Listening to a sermon by John MacArthur, he spoke of reading from a book
written by a person in the second century who told this of Paul.
Idols
are something to stay away from and the appearance of a person should have no
affect on how I react to them of think of them at all.
My
Steps of Faith for Today:
1. I
must trust the Lord to continue to work out all of the details of Sandy and I
going over to Hawaii, or trust the He will close the door if He sees fit to do
so. Her illness is something to be
concerned about, for this could keep us from leaving on Wednesday and I must
pray like the Lord Jesus Christ did in the garden that the will of the Father
be done, and also that we will have the grace to live with that will.
10/2/2010 10:23:43 AM
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