Rebellion Is Put Down

May 3

Now a messenger came to David, saying, "The hearts of the men of Israel are with Absalom." So David said to all his servants who were with him at Jerusalem, "Arise, and let us flee, or we shall not escape from Absalom. Make haste to depart, lest he overtake us suddenly and bring disaster upon us, and strike the city with the edge of the sword," II Samuel 15:13, 14.

David served God with all his energy and with all his might. God was able to say of him that David was indeed, “a man after Mine own heart,” I Samuel 13:13, 14 and Acts 13:22. But David had not followed after the command of the Lord when it came to the living of his personal life.

Amnon, David’s son, was very attracted to his beautiful half- sister Tamar. Amnon concocted a scheme where, because he feigned illness, she took food to his bedroom. Amnon seized the opportunity to rape her, but once having his way with her, he no longer found her to be of any interest to him.

David had not imposed any penalty upon Amnon for his grievous treatment of his half-sister Tamar and this enraged her brother Absalom who was emboldened to take further measures against his father (see II Samuel, Chapters 13-15). The extent of Absalom’s rebellion went so far as to attempt to wrench the Kingdom of Israel from his father.

As we are told in II Samuel 15, David fled because he felt it would be impossible to defeat Absalom while remaining within the City of Jerusalem. David, still a warrior, even in his old age, preferred to fight in the open than to be under siege by his foe.

In II Samuel 18:32, David inquires after his son, for he had commanded that no one harm him. Even though Absalom’s heart was full of vile conceit and rebellion, David still loved him and wanted him to be safe, but that was not to be.

The story of his death is told in II Samuel 18:

Now Absalom happened to meet the servants of David. For Absalom was riding on his mule, and the mule went under the thick branches of a great oak. And his head caught fast in the oak, so he was left hanging between heaven and earth, while the mule that was under him kept going.

When a certain man saw it, he told Joab and said, “Behold, I saw Absalom hanging in an oak.” II Samuel 18:19-II Samuel 19:8.

Then Joab said to the man who had told him, “Now behold, you saw him! Why then did you not strike him there to the ground? And I would have given you ten pieces of silver and a belt.”

The man said to Joab, “Even if I should receive a thousand pieces of silver in my hand, I would not put out my hand against the king’s son; for in our hearing the king charged you and Abishai and Ittai, saying, ‘Protect for me the young man Absalom.’ Otherwise, if I had dealt treacherously against his life (and there is nothing hidden from the king), then you yourself would have stood aloof.”

Then Joab said, “I will not waste time here with you.”

So he took three spears in his hand and thrust them through the heart of Absalom while he was yet alive in the midst of the oak. And ten young men who carried Joab’s armor gathered around and struck Absalom and killed him.

Then Joab blew the trumpet, and the people returned from pursuing Israel, for Joab restrained the people. They took Absalom and cast him into a deep pit in the forest and erected over him a very great heap of stones. And all Israel fled, each to his tent.

Now Absalom in his lifetime had taken and set up for himself a pillar which is in the King’s Valley, for he said, “I have no son to preserve my name.” So he named the pillar after his own name, and it is called Absalom’s Monument to this day.

We can empathize with Absalom who desired revenge for the indignity suffered by his sister yet we know the command to honor one’s father stands even when such ignominy is endured.

We know that had David managed his own household well, had he been faithful to the wife of his youth rather than taking other women to his bosom, his fellowship with God would have been unbroken and his authority over his children would have been fully established.

May we, in our living of our Christianity before our friends and families, take every matter that is of importance to the Lord as our basis for the establishment of our lives and the lives of the precious children He entrusts to us. May we never relent in our effort to assure that we and our children and their children, for all generations that the Lord tarries His return, are committed to the law of God that is immutable (see Psalm 19:7).

May we hold fast to Jesus, who has fulfilled His own perfect law in our behalf and may we go forth into the future in the assurance that our own past rebellion, our thoughts, or words, our deeds, are under the blood of the One who lived a holy life in our behalf.