The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Samuel — Section 19

It was the pride and joy of devout men th&t ler&el'e king governed , }leople chosen ol God for the aseertloti and expcraition of principles superior to those Wliicb obtained in the bea~be~ nations. 'l'he pledge of prosperity had been. given to the chosen people, and their history had demonstrated to the heathen again and again that the God ot Jemel was indeed supreme. The uncircumcised Philistines could not know, or if they knew could not appreciate, the spiritual conditions on which national prosperity WBS guaranteed; but they would be quick to boast over Israel's adversity, and tAl magnify their idols to the detriment of Jehovah's fame. "Tell it not in Gath" was David;a spontaneous expression of the increased anguish of his spirit on account of the failure or Sa~'s life ~n_d work. The possibility of the holy kingdom of God among men being 11 sub.1ect of r1d1cule and blasphemy-the thought of God's honour beincr for a moment treated with scorn by the ignorant heathen-this W'a's trouble upon troubie. A ldndreci sorrow falls on all true hearts when, by the wrecked character and abortive lives of professors of religion, or workers in connection with God's holy kini(dom, there arises the possibility of the scoffing world bringing the name and interests of Christianity into reproach; for every blasphemous word and triumph of joy against Christ is regarded by the loving soul 88 another thrust into his side. Irreligious men can little know the anguish of true Christians whenever occasion is given, by the incom;istencies and apostasies of life, to dishonour the sacred Name. Ill. THE DUE BECOG?,.,:TION OF TIIE MAGNITUDE OF THIS DISASTER DEPENDS ·oN .A SPIRITUAL PERCEPTION OF THE GRAVITY OF OUR EARTHLY LIFE. No doubt many astute men regarded David's great sorrow 88 a sheer extravagance. Nothing in the event, from their point of view, could justify such a wail over ·a bitter foe and ostensible rival. The answer to that reflection on the reasonableness of David's sorrow liols in this-that he looked on Saul's life upon its God ward side, and saw beneath the pohtical and merely terrene aspect a spiritual issue, which issue, affecting as it did ali that is most great and momentous in ma.n, threw all else into the background. It· is only a spiritual perception-a penetration beneath the temporal and material interests to the in,isible and eternal relations and possibilities of human existence-that can enable one thus to judge, feel, and act (1 Cor. ii. 15). Habitual contact with the visible and perishable unfits men for recognizing the true solemnity of life, and the subtle elements that enter into the determination of human destiny. Nominally many may adopt our Lord's view of the bearing of man's present spiritual state upon his future condition (Matt. XL 1-16; x:rv. 1-13, 31-46), and yet practically place a successful issue. of life in the acquisition of knowledge and wealth, and the development of humanly related virtues. Such persons are disposed to think Christ rather hard and unreasonable in pronouncing the man to be a "fool" (Luke xii. 20) who congratulated himself on the fact of his social and material prosperity. For the same reason they deem Christians narrow and uncharitable when they indicate great anxiety for the future condition of those who, while outwardly prosperous and, on the man-ward side, virtuous; pBIIS away without affording evidence of that renewal of nature by which alone· they can come into absorbing sympathy with Christ, and cause the whole tenor of their life to flow in the line of Christ's mission to the world. Saul's failure on the spiritual side was seen by David to lie at the root of his general failure; and those·only who estimate modern issues of life by the supreme test of the spiritual, can see in many lives, other- wise excellent, a woeful miscarriage of life's main purpose and consequent irretrievabli, disaster (1 Cor. i. 18, 19; ii. 6-10; 2 Cor. v. 17, 20, 21; Phil. iii. 8, 9, 18, 19). • The ir,cidental teachings of a great disaster. All events have a teaching function in the Divine economy, and we are exhorted to extract good out of evil. It is possible th.a.t in the general evolution of human interests the immediate, if not remote, effects of disastrous event~ are counterbalanced by the contribution they make to the sum total of instruction, by means of which God ultimately elevates the world in purity and peacE', The sad issue of Saul's life was doubtless a blessing to David, io that. its solemn lessons gave a tone to hie subsequent course, which enabled him· to withstand many of the perils of position ; and we, studying the words of David when the sorrow was fresh upon him, may, in addition to what has already been noticed, gain instruction on several matters which, in its helpfulneBB to our life, shall illustr11te the truth the.\ under the all-controlling hand of God "all things work together for goodt ' on. 1. 1-27.] 'l'J-IF, SECOND BOOK OF SAMUEL. 15