Scripture Daily

Context No. 2122 of 4322 · 2 Samuel

Context · Reflection

2 Samuel 15:19-30: in context

19Then the king said to Ittai the Gittite, “Why do you also go with us? Return, and stay with the king; for you are a foreigner and also an exile. Return to your own place. 20Whereas you came but yesterday, should I today make you go up and down with us, since I go where I may? Return, and take back your brothers. Mercy and truth be with you.” 21Ittai answered the king and said, “As the LORD lives, and as my lord the king lives, surely in what place my lord the king is, whether for death or for life, your servant will be there also.” 22David said to Ittai, “Go and pass over.” Ittai the Gittite passed over, and all his men, and all the little ones who were with him. 23All the country wept with a loud voice, and all the people passed over. The king also himself passed over the brook Kidron, and all the people passed over toward the way of the wilderness. 24Behold, Zadok also came, and all the Levites with him, bearing the ark of the covenant of God; and they set down God’s ark; and Abiathar went up until all the people finished passing out of the city. 25The king said to Zadok, “Carry God’s ark back into the city. If I find favor in the LORD’s eyes, he will bring me again, and show me both it and his habitation; 26but if he says, ‘I have no delight in you,’ behold, here I am. Let him do to me as seems good to him.” 27The king said also to Zadok the priest, “Aren’t you a seer? Return into the city in peace, and your two sons with you, Ahimaaz your son and Jonathan the son of Abiathar. 28Behold, I will stay at the fords of the wilderness until word comes from you to inform me.” 29Zadok therefore and Abiathar carried God’s ark to Jerusalem again; and they stayed there. 30David went up by the ascent of the Mount of Olives, and wept as he went up; and he had his head covered and went barefoot. All the people who were with him each covered his head, and they went up, weeping as they went up.

As Absalom's rebellion drives David from Jerusalem, the king flees in grief, weeping as he climbs the Mount of Olives, barefoot and with his head covered. The priests bring the ark of God to go with him, but David sends it back to the city, and in doing so he speaks words of remarkable submission. If I find favor in the LORD's eyes, he says, he will bring me back and let me see it again; but if he says, I have no delight in you, here I am; let him do to me as seems good to him. In the depth of his loss, David places his fate wholly in God's hands.

David's words in this hour of loss are a model of submission to God's will. He is fleeing his own city, betrayed by his son, stripped of his throne, weeping as he goes. He could have clutched the ark as a talisman to force God's favor, or demanded that God restore him. Instead he sends the ark back and submits himself entirely to God's will: if God delights in me, he will bring me back; but if not, let him do to me as seems good to him. David does not demand a particular outcome; he holds his fate open before God, accepting whatever God wills, trusting God's goodness even in the worst case. This is a hard and high kind of trust: submission to God's will even in deep affliction. It is one thing to trust God when we can dictate the terms, when we are asking for a good outcome we expect. It is another to say, in the midst of loss, let God do as seems good to him, holding even our deepest desires open before him, accepting his will whatever it proves to be. David did not know whether he would be restored; he placed that in God's hands and submitted to either outcome, trusting God's goodness regardless. Not my will, but yours, Jesus prayed in his own hour of anguish; and David's submission points toward that deeper submission of the Son. This searches the quality of our trust in affliction. When we are in loss and grief, do we demand a particular outcome from God, trusting him only if he gives what we want? Or can we, like David, submit to his will, holding our fate open before him, saying, let him do to me as seems good, trusting his goodness even if the outcome is not what we would choose? It is the LORD, said Eli; let him do what seems good to him. This is not passive resignation but active trust: a placing of ourselves in God's hands, accepting his will because we trust his goodness, even when we cannot see or choose the outcome. David, fleeing and weeping, submitted his fate to God; and in our own afflictions we are called to the same trust, holding our desires open before God and saying, here I am, let him do to me as seems good to him, resting in the goodness of the God to whom we submit.

When I am in deep affliction and loss, do I demand a particular outcome from God, trusting him only if he gives what I want, or can I learn from David, who in the midst of his grief submitted his fate wholly to God, saying, here I am, let him do to me as seems good to him, holding my desires open before God and accepting his will because I trust his goodness, even when I cannot see or choose the outcome?

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