2 Samuel 2: God’s Not Finished

2 Samuel is the second part of the start of Israel’s early Kingdom. Originally, Samuel was one big book. In 1 Samuel, we see how the kingdom began and were introduced to its first king. 2 Samuel shows us the greatest king of Israel, King David.

From Chuck Swindoll on how to apply 2 Samuel, “David is known as a “man after [God’s] own heart” (1 Samuel 13:14) because, though he sinned greatly and made mistakes, he acknowledged those failures and repented before God. Repent means to turn away from sin and turn toward righteousness. Our Father knows we are not perfect. So His Son, Jesus Christ, paid the price for our sins so that we can become righteous in God’s sight through faith. And although our salvation is secure, our daily sins can hinder our relationship with God. When we confess our sins, turning to the Lord in humility, He will forgive us and restore our relationship with Him.

The apostle James has written what might be an appropriate epitaph for David. It can be yours, too: “Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you” (James 4:10).”

Overall Theme: God Qualifies the Called

Key Verse: 2 Samuel 7:16, “Your house and your kingdom shall endure before Me forever; your throne shall be established forever.” (God establishes an eternal covenant with those who are His. He is with us always.)

Let’s read it together.

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The More We Dig. The More We Find.

Scripture quotations taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation (NLT).
Copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation.
Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome & Big Idea: God’s Not Finished
• 1:55 Community, Reviews, and Study Together
• 3:16 Setting the Scene: Saul’s Death, David’s Next Step
• 4:40 David Anointed in Judah, Not All Israel
• 6:00 Rival Kingdom: Ishbosheth Rises with Abner
• 7:30 The Pool of Gibeon: Clash Begins
• 9:10 Azahel’s Pursuit and Tragic Death
• 11:10 Ceasefire, Casualties, and Fallout
• 12:40 Takeaway: Promise Requires Process

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:01

Hey everyone and welcome to the Bible Breakdown Podcast. In this podcast, we will be breaking down the Bible one chapter a day. Whether you are a new believer or have been following Christ for a while, we believe that you will learn something new and fresh every single day. So thank you for joining us and let's get into breaking down the Bible together.

SPEAKER_01: 0:23

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the Bible Breakdown Podcast with your host, Pastor Brandon. Today, 2 Samuel chapter 2. And if I give this one a title, it would be God's Not Finished. God's Not Finished. You ever went and looked at something when it wasn't quite done yet? I did this before one time and I embarrassed myself big time. I went over to a friend's house and he was painting a portrait. And when I went and looked at the painting, I could not tell what he was doing. It just looked like a big old mess of paint. Now, it is also worth saying I have a really hard time with colors, and so I couldn't really tell. And I was like, I was trying to be encouraging. It's like, man, that's that's really something, isn't it? Boy, you did a job, you know, just trying to come up with any kind of like I don't want to lie and say that I think it looks horrible, you know, but I didn't I didn't know what I'm looking at anyway. And he finally looked at me and he said, you know, I'm not done yet, right? Oh, thank goodness. I'm really glad. Wait a minute. How far are you from being done? Because I didn't want him to say he was like 99% done. He's like, no, no, I'm like, I'm like 50% maybe, 40%. Oh, okay, good. Thank you. Turns out all I had really seen was the backdrop he was painting. He hadn't painted any of the specifics yet. And by the time he was finished, it was a beautiful work of art. What we're gonna see today is David is now gonna start the process of becoming king. But when you look at this chapter, you go, well, is that it? Is that all that's gonna happen? And the answer is no. Still got a lot more to go. And if you still got a lot more to go here, maybe we can look at our lives and get a little bit of perspective as well. And before we get into that, as always, if you like what we're doing here, make sure you like, share, and subscribe to this podcast and YouTube channel. Make sure you leave us five-star reviews. It really does help us get the word out. And also make sure you join us at the Bible Breakdown Discussion Group on Facebook. That is where we all gather together and we interact with God's word. And I love this idea of us creating community together where we can just interact with God's word, see what God's Word has to say to us, and let us know. If you've ever studied this chapter before, if you have information on this, you've done some deep dives on things, post it in the comments of some of the devotions that we're doing. Because, man, I'm gonna tell you something. The more we dig, the more we find. And I love learning something new about the Bible. That's kind of the goal of this. I kind of see myself as your friendly neighborhood Bible tour guide. As we walk through God's word together, stop along the way, and just enjoy God's word together. Because, man, I'm gonna tell you something, not only the more we dig, the more we find, but also as we learn about God's word, we're learning about the character of God. Now, as we're gonna see throughout this, it's so important to say, what the Bible reports, it doesn't always support. And so the way God's Word works, especially in the Old Testament, is it will teach us things through story. God will show us the stories of what happened and then teach us through this. Help us to realize, well, maybe I don't want to do what they did, or maybe I do want to do what they did. And we're gonna see that all throughout 2 Samuel. So if you have your Bibles, you want to open up with me to 2 Samuel chapter 2. Yesterday we found out that Saul is now dead. Well, David has been anointed king for a long time at this point, and now it's time for him to figure out if he can actually assume the throne. So let's jump in and see what happens. 2 Samuel chapter 2, verse 1 says, After this, David asks the Lord, Should I move back to one of the towns of Judah? Yes, the Lord replied. Then David asked, Which town should I go to? To Hebron, the Lord answered. David's two wives, Ahinoim from Jezreel, and Abigail, the widow of Nabal from Carmel, uh that's where their wives names. I don't know. I thought I was going somewhere there. Okay, here we go. So David and his wives and his men and their families all moved to Judah and they settled in the villages near Hebron. I got like so tongue-tied right there, but now we're back on track. Here we go, verse four. Then the men of Judah came to David and anointed him king over all the people of Judah. When David heard that the men of Jabesh Gilead had buried Saul, he sent them this message. May the Lord bless you for being so loyal to your master Saul and giving him a decent burial. May the Lord be loyal to you in return and reward you for his unfailing love. I, too, will reward you for what you have done. Now that Saul is dead, I ask you to be my strong and loyal subjects, like the people of Judah who have anointed me as their new king. But Abner, the son of Nur, the commander of Saul's army, had already gone to Mahineim with Saul's son Oshbasheth. There he proclaimed Isbosheth king over Gilead, Jezreel, Ephraim, Benjamin, and the land of Ashurites, and the rest of Israel. Ishbosheth, Saul's son, was forty years old when he became king, and he ruled from Mahenim for two years. Meanwhile, the people of Judah remained loyal to David. David made Hebron his capital, and he ruled as king over Judah for seven and a half years. So what just happened? Well, David goes back to Judah and he goes, that was uh the town ancestral tribe where he was from, and he goes, and they say, You're gonna be our king. Well, unfortunately, that's one out of twelve. Okay. Well, then he goes to Jabesh Gilead and he says, Will you be my subjects as well? So he's got Judah and Jabesh Gilead. So he's got a small little segment of Israel, whereas the vast majority of Israel now is under Saul's son Ishbosheth. So you would go, Well, God did anoint David king. I kind of thought it'd be overall Israel. Well, wait. But still, if you were to just see David for the first seven years of his rulership, you would think, wasn't quite the way I thought it would turn out. But it's not done yet. Verse 12. One day Abner led Isposheth's truth, troops, from Mahenim to Gibeon. About that time Joab, the son of Zariah, led David's troops out and met them at the pool of Gibeon. The two groups sat down there, facing each other from opposite sides of the pool. Then Abner suggested to Joab, Let's have a few of our warriors fight hand to hand here in front of us. All right, Joab agreed. So twelve men were chosen to fight from each side, twelve men from Benjamin, representing Ishbosheth, son of Saul, and twelve men representing David. Each one grabbed his opponent by the hair and thrust his sword into the other so that all of them died. So this place at Gibeon has been known ever since as the Field of Swords, and a fierce battle followed that day. Abner and the men of Israel were defeated by the forces of David. So they went for like a competition to see who was best, and everybody died. And so they go into some major battle. Verse 18. Joab, Abishai, and Azarel were three sons of Zariah, and they were among David's forces that day. Azahel could run like a gazelle, and he began chasing Abner. He pushed him relentlessly, not stopping for anything. When Abner looked back and saw him coming, he yelled out, Is that you, Azahel? Yes it is, he replied. Go fight someone else, Abner warned. Take on one of the younger men and strip him of his weapons. But Azahel kept right on chasing Abner. Again Abner shouted to him, Get away from here. I don't want to kill you. How could I ever face your brother Joab again? But Azahel refused to turn back. So Abner thrust the butt end of his spear through Azahel's stomach, and the spear came out through his back. He stumbled to the ground, and there he died. Everyone who came to that spot stopped and stood still when they saw Azahel lying there. When Joab and Abyssai found what had happened, they sent out or set out after Abner. The sun was just going down as they arrived at the hill of Ammah near Gia, along the road to the wilderness of Gibeon. Abner's troops from the tribe of Benjamin regrouped there at the top of the hill to take a stand. Abner shouted out to Joab, Must we be killing each other? Don't you realize that bitterness is the only result? Will you not call off your men from chasing their Israelite brothers? Then Joab said, God only knows what would have happened if you hadn't spoken. We would have chased you all night if necessary. So Joab blew the ram's horn, and the men stopped chasing the troops of Israel. All that night Abner and his men retreated through the Jordan Valley. They crossed the Jordan River, traveling all through the morning. They didn't stop until they arrived at Mahenim. Meanwhile, Joab and his men also returned home, and when Joab counted his casualties, he discovered that only nineteen men were missing, in addition to Azahel. But three hundred and sixty of Abner's men had been killed, all from the tribe of Benjamin. Joab and his men took Azahel's body to Bethlehem and buried him there in his father's tomb. Then they traveled all night to reach Hebron at daybreak. Well, as we see, war is beginning. And it's also worth noting that Joab is the leader of David's army. Abner is the leader of Ishbosheth, you know, Saul's son's army. And these are also the greatest warriors on both sides. So nobody wants to mess with Joab and nobody wants to mess with Abner. Well, turns out Azahel wanted to mess with Abner and he got what he got. Not a very good way to die. But that's part of why Abner was saying, hey, don't mess with me because I don't have to face your brother. Well, now he's going to have to at some point. So just kind of keep that in the back of your mind because Joab's going to have his day at some point. But the overall idea here, and what we can get from this chapter, is that many times we think that because God has qualified the called, we're good. All we got to do is just sit back and wait. But if you read the book of Joshua with us, the same idea still applies. In the book of Joshua, God said, I've got a plan. That plan is to prosper you. That plan is for you to go and to take over the land. So go fight. Wait, what? I thought the plan was for me to take over the land. It is. I'm giving you an opportunity. So go. And a lot of times that's what we have to realize God does in our life. He's like, you know what? I got a big idea for you. I want you to have a wonderful family. So go be a dad. Go be a mom. I want you to have a successful business. So go to school and get your degree. Or go work for somebody else and learn how. Wait a minute, God. I thought you qualified the called. Well, how exactly do you think I qualify them? Not by some supernatural, you know, divine, you know, just deposit of knowledge. No, I'm going to be with you through every trial, through every step. I'm going to open the right doors, I'm going to close the wrong doors, and slowly but surely, you are going to just step into the plan I have for you. And I just want to encourage you with that today. God told David, yes, you're still going to be king. So he goes in and he becomes a little bit of a king. And then he starts to slowly take over ground. And can I tell you that as I've had the opportunity to walk with so many people through so many different seasons of life, what I have noticed most of the time is that God's plan is a long-term plan. God calls you to do something. And then over time, he develops it in your life. Because God is more interested in your character than in your comfort. And so he wants to develop your character so he can keep up with what he's wanting to do in your life. What I can guarantee you is that you have been qualified by God to do something for him. What I can also guarantee you is that that process is going to take a long time, but it's always worth it. Let's pray together. God, thank you so much for today. Thank you, God, that you are with us and you are for us. Thank you that all your promises are yes and amen. And those promises mean that we don't get just a get out of jail free card. We've got to work for it in our life. But we know, God, that you are with us and you're always moving us in the right direction. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. And remember the promise that God gave David in 2 Samuel 7. Your house and your kingdom shall endure before me forever. That's what God wants for you. God wants an eternal relationship with you. And he wants to qualify you to do great things for him. I love you. I'll see you tomorrow for 2 Samuel chapter 3.