Thursday
Samuel was written before the exile and Chronicles was written after the time of the exile, so when you are reading the story for the second time, quite often you will find the emphasis is on exile and restoration. The writer will often include the historical facts, but he will also use that history as a metaphor for life as it relates to the community and its spiritual relationship with the Lord. Yes the Israelites were in a true and historically documented exile, but they and we are also in a spiritual exile, awaiting the coming of Jesus. We can relate, because we are foreigners in a foreign land waiting for the second coming of Christ who will take us to our permanent home.
So in our reading today, we see this story from a pre-exile and a post exile perspective.
Are there any subtle differences in these two stories? What are they? Why do you suppose they are there? I’ll let you work on that for a little while and we will get back to this subject on a later post.
On a different note, Hanun had to have been an idiot. What was he thinking? David was offering him a hand of friendship and he listened instead to some pretty bad advice. Be very careful of whose advice you listen to. There are many out there who want to tell you the wrong thing to do. Be sure to ask God for direction and listen to Him. As you can see in our story today, bad advice can get you into a world of hurt.
Blessings
Pastor Kathy