In my Sunday class, we have been studying David, Saul, Samuel, Nathan and next week Jonathan.  I find teaching history very difficult.  So many people besides the main characters, and so many funny sounding towns.  And funny sounding battles.

I like to teach application, and I didn't think there would be much of that in these historical stories--but I was wrong.  I guess when you look at the lives of people and their successes and failures, there is an application to be made.  Saul was really a sad case.  Anointed by God, he left the truth of how he got to where he was as King of Israel, and put God on the back burner.  He forbade sorcerers and fortune tellers, but when he needed help, that's who he went to.  So sad.  A sad story of a man who had it all, but forsook God and ended up with nothing that really mattered.

And David.  Good heart, faithful to Saul as God's anointed, but weak when it came to choices.  In his favor, he was always repentant.  ("Sorry" is not repentant.  Sorry means you got caught.  Repentant means you won't do that again.  Ever.)  Even though God had taken his blessing away from Saul, and anointed David, David didn't overstep, but waited for Saul's death before he tried to unite the nation and claim the crown.  He appealed to Saul's army to accept him as King--by treaty, not war.  It worked.  And then there is his mid-life crisis--Bathsheba.  That mistake cost him the life of a son and the lost respect of another son--a son he adored.  You may be forgiven, but there are consequences.

And Saul's son Jonathan.  How difficult it was for him to believe that his father would want to kill David.  He just didn't believe it until the proof was right in front of him.  David and Jonathan were friends.  Best friends.  David wasn't about to go after Jonathan's father and retaliate--even though he had a right to do so.  Anointed by God, David waited.  On God.  On God's timing.

That is the hardest thing I have to do as a Christian.  Once I know what I am going to do, I barge ahead.  Even though I know what I am doing is the right thing, the thing I am doing is not being done at the right time.  I get ahead of God.  All the time.

Good thing God doesn't give up on us.