1 Samuel 21 today....... 1_Samuel 22 tomorrow...

Read it.
Sandj


Chapter 21: verse 1... why would Abimelech be scared that David was alone?
verse 2... I get 'why' David lies to Abimelech, but why give this lie, and really, why lie at all?
verse 3-6... I suppose it would be wise for the men to be 'kept from women' during all their missions so that their minds were fully on the matters at hand and they had no distractions to make them falter... the study notes make reference to Leviticus 24:9, Matthew 12:1-4, and Luke6:1-5, as further insight into this topic of 'laymen' eating 'consecrated' bread... in the New Testament verses, I think Jesus is saying that helping people is more important than following the ritual, which makes sense since we keep seeing throughout our readings how God is much more focused and concerned with the 'heart' of people than He is with their 'actions' and 'ceremonies'... so, here, Abimelech would have been doing a service for David and his men, which would have made this action (usually only reserved for the priests), made it ok to do... also, it was good of Abimilech to still show honor to God by making sure the men were not 'unclean', as was a requirement of the priests also, I believe... basically, I think this applies to us today, too, in the idea that, when we approach God or take part in His blessings and His service, we should check ourselves and make sure that we are right with Him by 'cleansing' ourselves through confession and repentence of our sins... not that we can make ourselves pure, as only Jesus can do that and has done that for us... but we are just allowing that pureness, which was given to us by Jesus, to shine through yet again, and reconcile us again with God... to show Him honor and to allow us to be fully cleared of anything else, so we can be fully filled with God and used by Him without hinderances.
verse 7... uh oh...
verse 8-9... interesting that David's obedience and trust in God at one point in his life (), ends up helping/blessing him later in his life... maybe even when he needs it the most... something for us to think about when we are feeling like something is too hard or too big or whatever, for us to accomplish... I think that even if we don't get Goliaths sword later in life, we do build up character traits that will help us in our future 'battles' so we become stronger in God and stronger in our faith (see Paul's words about this in Romans 5:1-5)... James and Peter also talk about this in their books (James 1:2-18, James 5:7-13, 1 Peter 1:3-16, 2 Peter 1:3-15)
verse 10-15... Psalm 34 and 56 were apparently written based on these events (according to the study notes for both of these Psalms)
verse 10... interesting that Gath is Goliath's hometown... David is fleeing from Saul, with Goliath's sword to Goliath's hometown... kind of ironic... I am kind of wondering why David thought that was a good idea... didn't he think about his possible reception by the people who he humiliated and defeated?... just curious...
verse 11-12... maybe David is now realizing that going to Gath might not have been the best option because of his history with these people?
verse 13... curiouser and curiouser... anyway, study notes ask "Why does David feel it necessary to act like a madman? What sort of 'marks' does he make?"... I was going to ask similar questions so I don't fully know the answers to these, but I will attempt to say something about them... maybe David feels like his best hope is to 'counteract' the men's lofty ideals of him, either to make them think that he is not David, or to make him appear as a 'non-threat'... obviously though, it is so he can escape... as for the marks, I do not know for sure what they were... when I first read this I was thinking he was like scratching the doors like an animal or something, maybe trying to get out?...but maybe, since it was specifically noted to be on the doors of the gate, maybe it was that he was making writing marks on the doors like he was putting some unintelligible curse or some such on them, or whatever... I guess I am thinking of movies or something I saw where 'crazy' people drew 'aliens' or 'codes' or whatever on paper, walls, etc, and mumbled things about the future or past events or warnings or whatever... anyway, I guess really, I have no idea what 'marks' David made, just conjectures on it... maybe David was just playing tic-tac-toe, who knows :)... probably not though... have to say the drooling thing is kind of gross though. :)
verse 14-15... ok, these verses totally crack me up!... I love it "am I so short of madmen...?"... sometimes I wonder this myself (often including myself in the count) :)

and so, on that totally untheological note, I move on to blogging on the next chapter :)
sandJ