Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Evening Sermon Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/ev/ev20020421.htm

1 AND 2 SAMUEL: GOD'S SOLUTIONS TO PROBLEMS IN OVERSIGHT
Part XXIV: Yielding To God's Permitted Hard Isolation From Supporters For Personal Growth
(1 Samuel 20:1-42)
  1. Introduction
    1. In living by faith, we can find ourselves becoming painfully isolated even from good, supportive friends.
    2. At first glance, we might think we are out of God's will due to this isolation, and try to change our path.
    3. However, in God's plan to develop us, He may allow such painful isolation, and we need to yield to this direction though we may not understand why at the time. 1 Samuel 20:1-42 in its context reveals this:
  2. Yielding To God's Permitted Hard Isolation From Supporters For Personal Growth, 1 Sam. 20:1-42.
    1. In the midst of his growing problems with Saul, David had a wonderful supporter in Saul's son, Jonathan:
      1. We have seen in 1 Samuel 18:7-19:24 that king Saul repeatedly try to kill David as he felt David's growing popularity with the people of Israel threatened his reign as Israel's king.
      2. However, Jonathan, Saul's son, fully supported David as Jonathan loved him as himself, 1 Sam. 18:1.
      3. Jonathan was a great supporter as he was also a man of faith used of God to deliver Israel, 1 Sam. 14.
    2. Nevertheless, in God's plan, it was necessary for David's and Jonathan's respective paths to PART:
      1. God had rejected Saul from being Israel's king for his disobedience to God's directives, 1 Sam. 15:28.
      2. In the process, this meant Saul's lineage was equally exempt from Israel's throne, cf. 1 Sam. 13:13-14.
      3. Accordingly, though Jonathan, Saul's son, was a great man of faith whom God had used to give Israel victory over the Philistines in 1 Samuel 14, Jonathan could not become Israel's next king!
      4. Instead, God chose David of the tribe of Judah to be king in place of Saul, 1 Samuel 16:1, 13.
      5. Well, since Saul hated David, and Jonathan belonged to his father's court, and as David needed to part from Saul's court for his own protection while God also wanted to begin exchanging the leadership influence over Israel from Saul to David, Jonathan and David needed to part in their respective paths.
    3. Hence, as painful as it was for both men, David and Jonathan had to experience a difficult parting:
      1. Troubled at Saul's spiteful actions toward him, David asked Jonathan for insight on Saul, 20:1.
      2. Jonathan at first denied David's claim he thought Saul was out to kill him, saying Saul always confided in him on such plans, and that he had not heard any word from Saul about killing David, 1 Sam. 20:2.
      3. David claimed Saul knew of Jonathan's love for him, and that it might have kept Saul from telling Jonathan of his plans to kill him (20:3), so Jonathan agreed to David's test of Saul's motives (20:4):
        1. David planned to be absent from a significant feast in the court, hiding himself from Saul, 20:5.
        2. Jonathan would attend the feast and view Saul's response to David's absence: (a) if Saul mildly wondered about David, that response would expose no inherent plans to destroy him, 20:6-7a. (b) However, a very angry response in Saul would expose a premeditated plan to kill David gone amiss, and warn Jonathan Saul planned to kill David, 1 Sam. 20:7b. (c) Jonathan finally agreed to the plan to set David's mind at ease, and agreed to test his father at the feast and come out to the place David was hiding and signal him either to flee or return safely to the court, 20:8-15, 18-23. (c) Nevertheless, Jonathan made an oath of protection for himself and his family when David would take the throne in case he had to part company with David as a result of this test, 1 Sam. 20:12-17.
      4. In the test itself, Saul exploded with rage at David's absence, saying some awful things in that culture about his son, Jonathan and his personal support for David, 1 Samuel 20:24-32. In fact, he even threw his javelin at Jonathan, revealing Saul's unjust hatred of David was irreversible, 1 Samuel 20:33-34.
      5. Accordingly, Jonathan put his devotion to David ahead of his own future advance as a king, and signaled David to flee by the sign involving an arrow shoot and retrieval, 1 Samuel 20:35-37.
      6. Thus, in great pain, these great friends in God parted company to fulfill God's will in their respective lives: Jonathan went back to the court with his ungodly father, and David fled to function as an outcast from the court en route to being developed into Israel's great, godly ancestor of the Messiah, 20:38-42.
Lesson: Though it was HUMANLY very unfair and painful, the great and godly friends, Jonathan and David, NEEDED to part their lives' ways for God's will of David's ADVANCE as KING to occur.

Application: We must NOT view the PRESENCE of GOOD SUPPORTERS as the BEST SIGN of God's WILL, for God may want to DEVELOP leaders by ISOLATING them from GOOD supporters!