Saul's Envy, Anger & Fear (1 Samuel 18:8-12)

6/16/2010 6:52:48 AM

SPIRITUAL DIARY

My Worship Time                                          Focus:  Envy, anger, and fear

Bible Reading & Meditation                                     Reference:  1Samuel 18:8-12

            Message of the verses:  “8  Then Saul became very angry, for this saying displeased him; and he said, "They have ascribed to David ten thousands, but to me they have ascribed thousands. Now what more can he have but the kingdom?" 9  Saul looked at David with suspicion from that day on. 10  Now it came about on the next day that an evil spirit from God came mightily upon Saul, and he raved in the midst of the house, while David was playing the harp with his hand, as usual; and a spear was in Saul’s hand. 11  Saul hurled the spear for he thought, "I will pin David to the wall." But David escaped from his presence twice.

“12 ¶  Now Saul was afraid of David, for the LORD was with him but had departed from Saul.”

            The Proverbs call envy “the rottenness of the bones.”  (Pr. 14:30)

John the Baptist said after he had baptized Jesus in the Jordan River “He must increase but I must decrease.”  He did not have any envy in him at all.

Envy lead Saul to anger and then as Jesus spoke of in Matthew 5:21-26 anger was leading Saul to murder as he tried to kill David two times.  Dr. Wiersbe points out that this probably happened after the death of Goliath, but before he had made David a commander in the army. 

Verse twelve speaks of how Saul became afraid of David from that time on for he was, at best, a very immature believer, and at worst not a believer at all.  When a person is afraid he will do things that he normally would not do.

Spiritual meaning for my life today:  Saul is sliding down hill very fast and probably for the next ten years or so he will be on the hunt for David trying to kill him because of being envious and afraid of him, and yet David will continue to support him even after Saul kills himself, for David will kill two people who said that they had killed Saul just to impress David.

There are many lessons to be learned from the lives of these two OT men, things not to do from the life of Saul, and things to follow from the life of David.  Unfortunately David’s sin with Bathsheba is something that comes to the forefront when thinking of David’s life, and yet it is something that God does not even remember about David.  I surely need to be more like that when dealing with sins that people have committed especially against me.

My Steps of Faith for Today:

1.       Lessons from today’s SD are not to be envious, not to become angry, and not to become fearful, and of course not to murder.

6/16/2010 7:18:53 AM