Sermon Tone Analysis

CLOUDY DAYS AND DARK NIGHTS 1 Samuel 27

INTRODUCTION

I. CLOUDS AND DARKNESS COME 1 Samuel 27:1-7.

A. The cause v1.

It is often after periods of great victories or success that the darkness comes.

Chapter 26 ends with what appears to be reconciliation between Saul and David but David has lingering doubts which are expressed in 27:1.

After the visiting preacher finished, a woman came up and said, "You were much better than the preacher we had last Sunday.

He spoke for an hour and said nothing." "Thank you," the visiting preacher replied.

"Yes," she continued.

"You did it in fifteen minutes."

1.

A humanistic viewpoint.

All of David's efforts were from a human viewpoint.

There is no reference to his talking to God in this chapter.

In chapter 22 God has given him the word to go to Judah and stay there.

Now he is considering disobedience to this word.

*Fly by the seat of one’s pants-to pilot a light aircraft by feel rather that by reliance on instruments-as if sensing the planes attitude by the feel of one’s buttocks against the seat*.

David had become tired of running from Saul and was willing to do anything to be able to get out from under the pressure he faced.

In essence he began to doubt God's ability to keep him safe-did he think God had anointed him as future king of Israel only to let Saul destroy him?

In Psalm 27:1 he wrote, "Whom shall I fear?" *David could not put his finger upon any entry in his diary, and say of it, “Here is evidence that the Lord will forsake me,” for the entire tenor of his past life proved the very reverse.

He should have argued from what God /had/ done for him, that God would be his defender still*.

Charles H. Spurgeon, /Morning and Evening : Daily Readings/, Complete and unabridged; New modern edition.

(Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 2006), October 17 AM.

2. Pessimistic reasoning.

He feared being destroyed=*to be swept away*.

The word is usually used in a hostile sense.

If David stayed in Israel he would be swept away.

Saul would be sure to find him and end his life!

There was a hopelessness and despair that David experienced.

His future looked bleak.

The hand is used to mean *by the power of or under the control of*.

Zig Ziglar calls this stinkin' thinkin'.

3. Rationalistic logic.

The best thing to do was to run!

Put facts together and came up with the wrong conclusions.

To escape=*the most prominent facet of meaning is of deliverance or escape from the threat of death*.

He went to the enemy.

You may remember that Goliath had come from Gath!

Where he had once been defeating them, he was now joining them.

He no longer made decisions based on his trust of God but rather on the fear of Saul.

He was certain that Saul wouldn’t take on the Philistines to get him.

David was a man after God's own heart but right now he was acting like an unbeliever.

He was relying on the five fallible human senses which leaves no provision for spiritual insights.

Same word for --To escape and slip out.

B. The extent of the darkness v2-3.

\\ All 600 men and their families followed David.

All of them involved in compromise and deception.

What a responsibility David had as their leader!

Since there was a considerable hardship to find the rebels, Saul gave up the search.

C. The consequences of David’s actions v4-7.

1.

A false sense of security was created v4.

In 21:11-12 Achish gave David cause to fear.

David sought momentary and immediate relief.

Not like Moses who chose to endure ill-treatment rather than enjoy the pleasures of sin temporarily.

David's perception was correct: Saul gave up the earnest seeking of David's whereabouts.

When David made this move, he never considered the cost of seeking this relief.

I hasten to add that security, peace and blessings are not necessarily a sign of God's approval!

2. The adversary’s cause was adopted v5.

David called himself Achish's servant.

His loyalties appear to be shifting from Saul and Israel to Achish and Philistia.

Achish thought he was providing himself with someone to attack various unruly peoples on his southern flank.

David appears to have lived in the royal city for a short time but then he realized that he was not comfortable there.

He preferred to live in the country, away from the scrutiny of the king.

3. A period of compromise was begun v6-7.

Ziklag originally was part of Judah, given to the Simeonites in the time of Joshua.

It was located about 25 miles southwest of Gath.

David lived there for about a year and four months.

During this time there is no evidence David wrote any songs.

It was not a pleasant time for him.

Raided=*to strip off clothing and to invade*.

*The Geshurites, Girzites, and Amalekites were under the ban commanded by the Torah* (Deut 20:16–17); *none of them was to be spared by the Israelites in warfare*.[1]

Robert D. Bergen, vol. 7, /1, 2 Samuel/, electronic ed., Logos Library System; The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2001, c1996), 262.

David, despite his waywardness, was carrying out God's instructions.

II.

WINDS AND STORMS INCREASE 1 Sam 27:8-11.

There were three characteristics of this period:

A. Duplicity v8-9.

\\ Inside David was an Israelite, but on the outside he was a Philistine.

This is hypocrisy or duplicity.

Merriam-Webster: *contradictory doubleness of thought, speech, or action /esp/ : the belying of one’s true intentions by deceptive words or action*.

Inc Merriam-Webster, /Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary./,

Includes Index., Eleventh ed.

(Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, Inc., 2003).

You pretend to have one set of feelings while acting under the influence of another.

He was pretending to be an enemy of Israel while actually being an enemy of the Philistines.

He appeared to be helping the Philistines which was certainly not God's will for him.

*O, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive*.

This wasn't just once but repeated action.

I was running a few weeks ago when something snapped in my left hip.

One minute I was loping along, the next I was yelping in pain.

I had to hobble home.

Within days, that tiny hairline break at the top of my femur threw my entire body off.

My left hip hurt, sure, but so did the right one.

When I biked, my knee started screaming.

By the time I was evaluated by a physical therapist, I was hugging banisters to negotiate stairs, trading heels for sneakers, and chugging Aleve.

What in the world was happening?

"Compensation," said the therapist.

My right hip hurt because I was covering for the injury in the left one.

Likewise, my left knee hurt from diverting stress on my hip.

The entire band of muscle stretching from my left hip to my knee had even tightened to protect the injury.

How like sin in our lives.