04.29.2014 Old Testament: 2Sa 21.10-14

To read the Bible in a year, read

Second Samuel 21–22 on April 29, In the year of our Lord 2014

By Don Ruhl

Saul had killed Gibeonites in his zeal for the Lord, but that violated a promise that Joshua and the elders of Israel had made centuries before to spare the Gibeonites, although they were Canaanites, whom the Lord had set for destruction.

Since Saul had done this, the Lord cursed Israel with a three-year famine and when David discovered the reason for it, he approached the Gibeonites and asked what he should do. They said they wanted seven descendants of Saul’s that they might hang them up before the Lord in Saul’s home region. One woman kept the birds away, and David had Saul and Jonathan’s bones buried,

Now Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it for herself on the rock, from the beginning of harvest until the late rains poured on them from heaven. And she did not allow the birds of the air to rest on them by day nor the beasts of the field by night…Then David went and took the bones of Saul, and the bones of Jonathan his son…buried the bones of Saul and Jonathan his son in the country of Benjamin in Zelah, in the tomb of Kish his father. So they performed all that the king commanded. And after that God heeded the prayer for the land (2 Samuel 21.10–14).

While Saul had been wicked, David still honored him, because he was a king of Israel.