Transcription of 20ID3371 1 Chronicles 11-20 “The Reign of David (Part 1)” October 14, 2020 Let’s open our Bibles tonight to 1 Chronicles 11 as we continue our study on Wednesday nights through the historical books. Last week we began 1 Chronicles. We are going much quicker through the Chronicles than we did the Kings and Samuel for a couple of reasons. Chronicles is really a recapitulation of everything that you learned there. It covers the same years, the same background. You can remember maybe, if you were with us, that oftentimes you’ll read those words, “the rest of his acts, aren’t they written in the chronicles of the books of the kings?” And so that’s where we are. We mentioned to you last week that oftentimes the Lord, by His Spirit, will give us a big focus of something and then kind of zoom in to give us a more clearly-focused look, like in Genesis 2, where all of creation is listed very quickly and then God looks specifically at the creation of man. So Chronicles is an interesting book because it first focuses on the genealogy that will lead you to Jesus; starts with Adam, goes to Jesus through King David. It focuses a lot on the covenants or the deals or the agreements that God made with man. It turns a lot of attention to the Temple and worship. Ultimately that God’s ultimate desire is that the world would come to know Him through the people that He had chosen, through the Jews. The emphasis of 1 Chronicles, as we’ll see tonight, is primarily upon David; 2 Chronicles kind of whatever follows after him. The most distinctive difference, or the most important, I guess, distinction between Chronicles and Kings is that Kings gives you the history and even the political climate; the Chronicles is more interested in what God thought of the spiritual tone and balance and health of the people. And so the LORD makes a clear distinction. And because of that, Chronicles is kind of God’s report of the spiritual well-being, or lack of it, in the nation during the time that it was split, during the national divide. Kings is man’s point of view politically, historically. This is almost all God’s interest and what He wants us to learn. So, because of that, you won’t find anything about the northern kingdom here because it was a kingdom based on idolatry and rebellion, and it never amounted to much; and God put an end to it after 209 years. There is very little mention of Saul; we only read about his death last week as we ended chapter 10. 1 You won’t read about anything about David’s sin with Bathsheba, although certainly that was a big part of the story. But where God forgives, He also forgets. The Jewish tradition says that Ezra wrote these books during the captivity in Babylon; we don’t know. There are lots of indicators that these two books, along with the Kings and with Ezra and Nehemiah, made up one big volume. And that could have been so; I don’t know. I do know the LORD wrote it. So last week we went through the chronology to David, through whom Jesus would come. And then, in chapter 10 last week, we ended with the death of Saul because he didn’t make much of a splash; he wasn’t a spiritual leader, he was the people’s choice. Tonight we are going to turn to the life of David and to his reign. From the time when Saul died, he came to Hebron to rule the people. After seven-and-a-half years, he moved to Jerusalem, and the entire nation stood with him, and God’s glory was established. The story of David fills the rest of 1 Chronicles, so to the end of these chapters. Next week we will be with David. Tonight we’re going to do chapters 11-20. Because they are overviews, we’ve asked you to read ahead. If you haven’t, shame on you. No, I don’t know. I’ll recap them for you, and you can go back and read them if you want. We’re not going to read every verse. Chapters 11 and 12 are about David and his mighty men – lots of lessons there. In chapters 13-16, David’s relationship with the ark of the covenant and bringing it to Jerusalem as the center place of worship. In chapter 17, David and God’s discussion about the Temple and his desire to build a place for the LORD and what God would do for David instead. And then, in chapters 18, 19 and 20, the battles that David fought to expand the kingdoms and protect the people. So, like I said, Chronicles kind of fills in the details from God’s heart. And so if you put Kings and Chronicles together, you will come away with, I think, a broader view of what you need to know and what the LORD would want you to know. So let’s start in verse 1, chapter 11, “Then all Israel came together to David at Hebron, saying, ‘Indeed we are your bone and your flesh. Also, in time past, even when Saul was king, you were the one who led Israel out and brought them in; and the LORD your God said to you, “You shall shepherd My people Israel, and be ruler over My people Israel.” ’ Therefore all the elders of Israel came to the king at Hebron, and David made a covenant with them at Hebron before the LORD. And 2 they anointed David king over Israel, according to the word of the LORD by Samuel.” So David is becoming king. Now, if you go back to Samuel, you might remember that there were years why David, as a young man, ran from Saul; in fact, seven- and-a-half years of running for your life. When Saul finally died, David thought, “Well, now I’ll be king.” But he wasn’t. Not really. He went to Hebron where really one-and-a-half tribes embraced him while the rest of the nation was still following the Benjamites, if you will, and rebelling against God’s choice of David. That’s all skipped over here. God goes right to David: from Hebron, goes to Jerusalem, and becomes the king. But that’s fifteen years of time between when the LORD first picked David and when he would rule over the nation. Notice, in verse 2 and in verse 3 as well, that the calling of David, according to the prophet Samuel years earlier, was pretty much twofold: David was a shepherd, but he was also a king. He was a king with the heart of a shepherd. You can read a lot of David’s writings about the heart that he learned for the people by watching his father’s sheep. That’s two-thirds, by the way, of Jesus’ ministry. Jesus also came to be the High Priest. He gave His life then to be our Shepherd and our King. So David learned primarily what he was to do as a good king by watching over the flock. It’s always good, I think, when people in ministry find their heart coming from the Lord to take care of the flock like sheep; in other words, to devote yourself and your life to them. A leader should certainly be willing, I think, to pay a price for the saints that he is serving. You might remember Jesus’ discussion with Peter in John 21, where He was restoring Peter to ministry after he had denied the Lord, and the Lord said, three times to him, “Peter, do you love Me?” And basically the response of the Lord each time was, “Then feed the lambs. Shepherd the flock. Take care of My people.” The way you love the Lord is you serve others. When Isaiah wrote about Jesus’ ministry, he wrote “He would feed His flock like a shepherd,” (Isaiah 40:11), which was so against what was going on in those days. I mean, Ezekiel would quote the LORD as saying (Ezekiel 34:2), “Look, woe to the shepherds who feed themselves! They should be taking care of the flock.” And so David was “a man after God’s own heart” (1 Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22). He was a good shepherd, he was a good king, he was God’s choice. Peter would write, in his little book – 1 Peter 5:2, “Shepherd the flock of God which is among you. Do it 3 as overseers. Don’t do it by compulsion. Do it willingly. Don’t do it for any kind of dishonest gain, but do it eagerly. Serve.” And David was certainly that man that God had chosen. He was a man after God’s own heart. It took years for him to come to a place where he was able to lead; it took years for the people to recognize it. But he stayed the course. “And David and all Israel,” verse 4, “went to Jerusalem, which is Jebus, where the Jebusites were, the inhabitants of the land. But the inhabitants of Jebus said to David, ‘You shall not come in here!’ Nevertheless David took the stronghold of Zion (that is, the City of David). Now David said, ‘Whoever attacks the Jebusites first shall be chief and captain’ ” (of the army).