Read Time: 9 minutes1 Samuel 24
Here at last the thread that has run through all the chapters of flight comes to its head: David, hunted to the wilderness of Engedi — the fountain of the kid — is given his persecutor’s life and will not take it. Saul, pursuing with three thousand chosen men, turns aside into the very cave where David and his men are hidden, and David’s men whisper that Yahweh has delivered the enemy into his hand — “behold the day of which Yahweh said unto thee, Behold, I will deliver thine enemy into thine hand.” Every reason of self-preservation, every promise of the throne, every cry for justice says: strike now. And David rises — but only to cut off the skirt of Saul’s robe — the hem that bore the ribband of blue, the covenant-fringe every Israelite was commanded to wear (Num 15:38) — and even that smites his heart, for to nick the token of the office was to touch the very thing he would not seize.
The restraint is the whole point, and David names its ground without hesitation: “Yahweh forbid that I should do this thing unto my master, Yahweh’s anointed, to stretch forth mine hand against him, seeing he is the anointed of Yahweh.” This is the principle the saint must hold and the world cannot understand — that the office is Yahweh’s, the appointing is Yahweh’s, and the unworthiness of the man who holds it does not loose the hand of the one who fears Yahweh. Saul is faithless, murderous, rejected, and yet still the anointed, and David will not lift his hand against what Yahweh has set up. He will wait for Yahweh to remove him; he will not seize by his own hand what is not his to take, the same patience that refused to force the matter that Saul could not refuse.
It is one of the clearest types of Christ in all the histories. David is the true and rightful king, anointed, hunted by the very kingdom he will save, given again and again the power to destroy his persecutors — and he will not. He honors the appointed order even where its holder is unworthy, committing his cause to Yahweh who judges righteously, exactly as the greater Son of David “when he was reviled, reviled not again… but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously” (1 Pet 2:23). The Lord Jesus too could have called twelve legions of angels; he too was given over to a faithless authority; and he too would not stretch out his hand, but yielded himself to the Father’s appointing. The anointed who spares the anointed is the deepest picture of the King who would not save himself.
David then stands forth and calls after Saul, holding up the skirt of the robe as proof: “see… there is neither evil nor transgression in mine hand… yet thou huntest my soul to take it. Yahweh judge between me and thee… but mine hand shall not be upon thee.” And Saul, undone for a moment, weeps and confesses, “Thou art more righteous than I… Yahweh reward thee good for that thou hast done unto me this day.” The persecutor is forced to confess the righteousness of the one he hunts, and to own that David will surely be king. The cut robe answers the torn robe of chapter 15 — there the kingdom was rent from Saul; here David holds the piece he would not use to seize it, the man who could take the kingdom by force refusing, waiting for Yahweh to give it.
David will not stretch out his hand against Yahweh’s anointed, though the unworthy king hunts him and the throne is in reach — the office is Yahweh’s to give and remove. As the greater Son of David reviled not again but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously.
Jeremiah 1
The reading opens a new prophet — Jeremiah, the weeping prophet of the long decline, called to pronounce judgment on a people racing toward exile and to hold out, beyond the ruin, the promise of a new covenant. Among the four great prophets Jeremiah holds the place of the Ox — the cherubic face of patient, laborious service, answering to Mark among the Gospels as Isaiah answers to the Lion, Ezekiel to the Man, and Daniel to the Eagle. The ox bears the yoke and plods faithfully under the load, and so does Jeremiah: he carries the weight of the word and the grief of his people through forty years of rejection, labouring on under a burden that never lifts, the suffering servant-prophet who bears what he is given to bear. And his call is the call of one ordained before he existed: “Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.” The choosing is before the forming — Yahweh’s purpose runs ahead of the man, as it ran ahead of Jeremiah’s own birth, the same foreknowing love that chose the prophet and chooses the saints before the foundation of the world.
Jeremiah shrinks from the charge — “Ah, Lord Yahweh! behold, I cannot speak: for I am a child” — and Yahweh answers not by denying his weakness but by promising his presence and putting his words in the prophet’s mouth. “Say not, I am a child… whatsoever I command thee thou shalt speak. Be not afraid of their faces: for I am with thee to deliver thee.” And “Yahweh put forth his hand, and touched my mouth… Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth.” The unfit are made fit by the word given them; the trembling child is sent because the word is Yahweh’s, not the prophet’s, and the One who sends is with him to deliver. It is the same answer given to Moses at the bush and to every servant who pleads his own insufficiency.
Two visions seal the call. The first is the rod of an almond tree — and the word turns on a pun: the almond, shaqed, is the tree that wakes first in the spring, and Yahweh says “I will hasten (shoqed) my word to perform it,” I am watching over my word to do it. The God who speaks is awake and watching to bring his word to pass; nothing he has spoken sleeps. The second is a seething pot, facing from the north — out of the north the evil shall break upon the land, the Babylonian flood Yahweh is summoning against a faithless people. The watching God and the boiling judgment from the north: the word will surely come, and it is a word of breaking before it is a word of building.
And the commission is given in the great double charge that frames the whole book. “See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.” Four words of tearing-down, two of building-up — the prophet’s hard work of pronouncing the ruin of the old before the planting of the new, the same order as the seething pot before the new covenant. Yahweh makes him “a defenced city, and an iron pillar, and brasen walls against the whole land” — they will fight against him but not prevail, “for I am with thee, saith Yahweh, to deliver thee.” The weeping prophet is made an iron pillar by the presence of the One who sends him.
Before the womb Yahweh knew and ordained him; the trembling child is sent with the word put in his mouth. The almond-rod: Yahweh is awake, hastening his word to perform it — to root out and to pull down, and at the last to build and to plant.
Matthew 12
Matthew is the Gospel of the Lion — the cherubic face of the King, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, answering among the Gospels to Isaiah the Lion among the prophets. It opens with the royal genealogy, proclaims the King born of David’s line, and sets out the law of his kingdom; and throughout it the Son of David moves as the Lion-King, asserting an authority that the powers of the old order cannot withstand. The chapter is a gathering of conflicts in which the King’s authority is set against the hardening religion of the Pharisees, and it turns first on the Sabbath. When they accuse his disciples of plucking corn on the Sabbath, the Lord answers with David eating the shewbread — “have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred” — the very scene we read days ago, the rejected anointed and his men fed with the holy bread. The hungry anointed and his followers stand above the ceremonial letter; “the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day.” And he heals the withered hand on the Sabbath, asking which of them would not lift a sheep out of a pit on that day — “how much then is a man better than a sheep?” Mercy is the Sabbath’s true keeping, as Isaiah’s true fast was mercy; the Pharisees, watching to accuse, go out and take counsel to destroy him.
Matthew then reads the Lord’s withdrawal and his gentleness as the fulfilment of the Servant of Isaiah 42. “Behold my servant, whom I have chosen… he shall shew judgment to the Gentiles… A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory. And in his name shall the Gentiles trust.” The King who could destroy his accusers withdraws and heals quietly, not striving nor crying, not breaking the bruised reed nor quenching the dim wick — the same restraint as David sparing Saul, the gentleness of the One mighty to save who will not crush the weak. The Servant gathers the Gentiles and the bruised, exactly the ones the proud despise.
The center of the chapter is the sharp conflict over the source of his power and the unpardonable sin. When the Pharisees say he casts out devils by Beelzebub, he answers that a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand — “if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is come unto you.” And he warns of the sin that cannot be forgiven: the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, the deliberate calling of the Spirit’s work the devil’s, the heart so hardened it names light darkness. “By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned” — for the mouth speaks out of the abundance of the heart, and the tree is known by its fruit, the same test as the discourse on the mount and Samuel’s to obey is better than sacrifice.
The chapter closes on the sign of Jonah and the true family of the King. To the scribes seeking a sign he gives only the sign of Jonah: “as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth” — the burial and resurrection foretold, the one sign that answers all. And the prophet’s name itself whispers it — Jonah is yonah, the dove, the very form the Spirit took at the Jordan; the dove-prophet three days in the deep foreshadows the One the dove descended on, three days in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh and the queen of the south will rise in judgment against this generation, for they repented at less and a greater than Jonah and Solomon is here. And when told his mother and brethren stand without, he stretches his hand toward his disciples: “behold my mother and my brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.” The true kindred of the King are not the natural ties but those who do the Father’s will — the doing that proves the heart once more.
The Son of man is Lord of the sabbath, and mercy is its keeping; the chosen Servant breaks not the bruised reed. The sign of Jonah is the only sign — three days in the heart of the earth — and his true kindred are those who do the Father’s will.
Synthesis and Exhortation
The day sets the restraint of the anointed at its center and lets it answer across all three readings. David, given his enemy’s life, will not stretch out his hand against Yahweh’s anointed — he honors the office Yahweh appointed even on an unworthy head, and commits his cause to the One who judges righteously. Matthew’s King, accused and watched and plotted against, withdraws and heals quietly, the chosen Servant who will not break the bruised reed nor quench the smoking flax. And Jeremiah is sent not to seize or to strike but to speak the word given him and be made an iron pillar by Yahweh’s presence. The sparing king, the gentle Servant, and the trembling prophet all refuse the way of force and commit themselves to Yahweh — the meekness that is the deepest strength.
The type of Christ in David’s restraint is the heart of the day. The true and rightful king, anointed and hunted by the kingdom he will save, given the power to destroy his persecutor and refusing it — this is the clearest picture of the One who, when reviled, reviled not again, who could have called twelve legions of angels and would not, who yielded himself to a faithless authority and committed his cause to the Father. David holds the cut skirt he would not use to seize the throne; the greater Son of David holds the power he would not use to save himself. The kingdom is not grasped by the strong hand but received from Yahweh’s, in his time — the same patience that the whole Saul-and-David story has been teaching from the first forced sacrifice at Gilgal.
The hope keeps its shape — appointed, awaited, sure. Jeremiah is ordained before the womb, the word hastening to perform itself, the God who is awake over his word; yet the building and planting come only after the long rooting-out and pulling-down. David is confessed righteous by Saul and assured of the throne, but the throne is still years and a wilderness away. The King of Matthew gives the sign of Jonah — the death and resurrection still ahead — and gathers a kindred who do the Father’s will against the day of judgment when Nineveh and the queen of the south shall rise. The saint lives committing his cause to the righteous Judge, speaking the word given, waiting for the kingdom received and not seized.
So the exhortation gathers to restraint, to the word, and to doing the Father’s will. Do not stretch out your hand to take by force what Yahweh alone can give; honor the order He has appointed, commit your cause to the One who judges righteously, and wait. Be the bruised reed he will not break, and be gentle toward the bruised as he is. Speak the word given you even when you feel a child, for the God who sends is awake over his word to perform it, and will make the trembling an iron pillar. And prove your kindred to the King not by natural tie or empty profession but by doing the will of the Father — for the tree is known by its fruit, and a greater than Jonah is here.
Do not seize by force what Yahweh alone can give; spare the anointed, commit your cause to the righteous Judge, and wait. Speak the word given though you feel a child, and prove your kinship to the King by doing the Father’s will.