1 Samuel 20:24-29: a reflection

24So David hid himself in the field. When the new moon had come, the king sat himself down to eat food. 25The king sat on his seat, as at other times, even on the seat by the wall; and Jonathan stood up, and Abner sat by Saul’s side, but David’s place was empty. 26Nevertheless Saul didn’t say anything that day, for he thought, “Something has happened to him. He is not clean. Surely he is not clean.” 27On the next day after the new moon, the second day, David’s place was empty. Saul said to Jonathan his son, “Why didn’t the son of Jesse come to eat, either yesterday, or today?” 28Jonathan answered Saul, “David earnestly asked permission of me to go to Bethlehem. 29He said, ‘Please let me go, for our family has a sacrifice in the city. My brother has commanded me to be there. Now, if I have found favor in your eyes, please let me go away and see my brothers.’ Therefore he has not come to the king’s table.”

It is a small scene: a feast, an empty seat, and a friend covering for the one who is missing. David has hidden from Saul, and at the new-moon meal his place at the table sits empty. When Saul asks where the son of Jesse is, Jonathan steps in with a story to explain David's absence, shielding him.

What makes this remarkable is who Jonathan is. He is Saul's son, the natural heir to the throne, and David is the very man anointed to take that throne from his family. By every worldly calculation, Jonathan should want David gone. Instead he risks his father's fury to protect him. His loyalty to his friend costs him his own advantage, and he pays it gladly.

That is a rare and beautiful kind of love: to protect someone even when their rise means your own loss, to notice the empty seat and stand in the gap for the one who is not safe. Most of us guard our own position first. Jonathan shows a friendship that puts the friend above the self. Is there someone whose empty seat you could cover today, someone you could protect or defend even when it costs you something? Love like Jonathan's does not calculate its own advantage first.

Lord, give me a friendship like Jonathan's, that protects others even at cost to myself and does not guard my own advantage first. Show me the empty seat I can cover today.