1 Sam 16:1 And when David was a little past the top of the hill, behold, Ziba the servant of Mephibosheth met him, with a couple of asses saddled, and upon them two hundred loaves of bread, and an hundred bunches of raisins, and an hundred of summer fruits, and a bottle of wine.
The past week for me has been a rather difficult one, it has seemed in my fleshly view that as much as I try and take one step forward I am forced to take 5 steps back. Details aside and left for a later post I can only relate that the roadblocks I have had to face lately have been taking their toll on me. I wonder who else has ever, or currently does feel the same as I do? Have you ever felt that you were trying the best you can to do what God would have you to do but as soon as you go to do what He has laid on your heart to do, you come up against roadblock after roadblock after roadblock?
That is the place that I have been in and from that place I came and cried out to the Lord asking Him to help me understand what is going on. As I was praying to Him He began to speak to me about David, He asked me to put myself in his shoes and then the Lord put 1 Samuel 16 on my heart. I may have spoken about this in the past, but the way many of my prayers go is that I pray to God and then at some point what seems like a random Bible verse or chapter comes to mind and then I go read it. I can only say that this is 100% God doing this because how often my prayers and the “random” verse or chapter match up is beyond comprehension.
I want to lead you thru what my prayers were and what God showed me in His Word, I want to give to you the Hope and Peace that He gave to me that night because I am sure if we are all honest we all have been or are at a place where it seems that no matter how much you try and go forward there are roadblocks all around you. If that is you or has been you then I pray that you read on and that God blesses you in the same manner He blessed me.
The other night my prayers were revolving around the many situations I am facing, which you can read in more detail in a later post which I will link here when it is finished. In short they revolved around two main things, the fact that I am going through a separation with my wife and trying to walk out the ministries God has recently laid on my heart. In both of these things it seems that anytime I try and move forward I run into massive roadblocks that are preventing me or stopping all the momentum needed to reach the goals that I am aiming towards. That is when God began to speak to me and lead me to the chapter quoted above and as I said it is amazing how directly related these events in David's life mirror aspects of my life and moreover, the hope that God showed me when He took me through this period in David's life.
I want to give a very brief context to the events we see in this chapter for those who may not be aware of what was going on in David's life at this time. In the preceding chapters we come to find out that David's own son Absalom had been conspiring to kill David and take the throne from him. Absalom started by preventing the people of Israel from getting to David when they had problems, he told them not to bother David but that he would help. He was working to undermine David's authority and love of the people as they began to look towards Absalom for help instead of David. Once Absalom had undermined David's authority and as the Bible says stole the heart of the people of Israel, he came to devise a plan to literally overthrow and kill David and take the throne for himself.
David comes to hear and understand that Absalom had stolen the hearts of the people and that he was in the midst of trying to assassinate him and at that point David runs from his home and runs for his life from his own son. It is at this point that God really began to speak to my heart and asked me to put myself in David's shoes. While I can not relate to the literal fear of having my life taken from me, I can definitely relate to the feelings that David must have had of rejection and betrayal from his own family. As will be related in that other post, over the past 9 months I have felt a massive amount of rejection and betrayal from my own family, I never in my life thought that I would be facing what I am facing especially from the people who are supposed to be closest to me.
Here is David on the run in the wilderness fearing for his life, being betrayed by the people whom he trusted and loved the most and man I can relate so incredibly much to that, and I wonder can you? Have you ever felt that way? I hope you haven't but I feel that most of us have and God laying this specific chapter and event in David's life shows me that God understands exactly what it is like for us to be in these situations. However God didn't just leave David there and God won't leave us there.
God then opened my eyes to what Davids reaction was to these events and then what the final outcome was as well, which is what I want to bring to your attention as well because I know God sees us and God isn't going to leave us there to perish, however there is something we need to follow in the pattern David laid out for us to follow. So here is the first thing David did once he found himself in that position of being on the run for his life and betrayed by his own flesh and blood:
1 Sam 15:30 And David went up by the ascent of mount Olivet, and wept as he went up, and had his head covered, and he went barefoot: and all the people that was with him covered every man his head, and they went up, weeping as they went up.
31 And one told David, saying, Ahithophel is among the conspirators with Absalom. And David said, O Lord, I pray thee, turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness.
32 And it came to pass, that when David was come to the top of the mount, where he worshipped God, behold, Hushai the Archite came to meet him with his coat rent, and earth upon his head:
It is interesting to see where exactly David went when he found himself in this position, he could have gone literally anywhere in the world but where did he go? The Mount of Olivet, does that ring a bell to anyone?
It should and here is why:
Matt 24:3 And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?
It is from this mount that Jesus gave one of his most well known sermons, and it is a place that has been recorded that Jesus went to often during His Earthly Ministry. And what was it that David was doing on this mount? He wept, prayed and worshipped God. Many many times when I face a roadblock I let it take my eyes off of Christ, I lose focus, I get upset, I let it turn my heart from God and allow it to get me into a place of isolation, fear and anger.
However that isn't what I ought to be doing, I need to follow the pattern that David laid out, come before God weeping and being honest in my feelings, fears, anger and doubts. I need to pray to Him being more specific in what it is that I am asking for, as David had a very specific prayer and I need to also worship Him, knowing and having faith that God understands, sees and He is there to help. David went to where Jesus was, we too need to go to where Jesus is, up to the top of the mount, crying, praying and worshiping.
Once I came to God in that manner, once I got over my feelings and doubts and gave it over to God that is when He began to encourage me through His Word and speaking to my heart and I want to do the same for you today, show you exactly what God showed me. That leads us to the verse I quoted to begin, the one in which all of this post is based upon:
1 Sam 16:And when David was a little past the top of the hill, behold, Ziba the servant of Mephibosheth met him, with a couple of asses saddled, and upon them two hundred loaves of bread, and an hundred bunches of raisins, and an hundred of summer fruits, and a bottle of wine.
David went to the top of the Mount of Olives, he cried, prayed and worshiped the Lord and what is it that happened right afterwards? Immediately he comes upon Ziba, the servant of Mephibosheth. Now there is so very much one could talk about concerning the man that David happened to come upon, it's absolutely amazing to understand all the events that had to transpire in order for that specific man to be the one that was there and I encourage everyone to go read up on Mephibosheth and David's relationship. To say that this is Divine Providence is a massively underwhelming understatement.
However apart from the miracle of the specific person that met David what God wanted me to focus on was two different things. First is the fact that the man was there, again knowing who he is, then the fact that he was able to find David, and lastly the exact moment in which he showed up. God spoke to my heart and showed me that He knows all about what I am going through, He knows all about what you are going through as well and He not only knows about it but He wants us to see and know that He is going to send exactly what we need at exactly the right place and the exact right time.
He also wanted me to recognize what it was that Ziba brought to David, I am not going to go into all of the details of what each thing represents but notice what he brought. He brought a donkey or transportation, he brought bread and fruit to eat and wine to drink. Each one of those have a different Spiritual meaning to them but the overall thing we ought to recognize is that God provided for David literally everything he needed to get him past this situation. I am going to stand on Faith believing that God is also going to provide you and me the things we need to get us past the situations we are facing or will face in the future.
And finally the last thing God revealed to me is that from that point on things began to work out to where David was finally led back to his home, back to his throne and no longer was under threat of losing the kingdom. That is not to say that David didn't deal with other problems from this point on in his life, but if you read the Word you can see clearly that this was the turning point in David's life that led him to rest on the throne in peace which clearly he had never done prior.
All of that is to say that regardless of what my Flesh my say, regardless of what the circumstances seem like, regardless of what doubts and feelings I am dealing with, I am going to stand on Faith believing that God will provide to me just as He did to David and that what I am going through is leading me to get just a little past the top of the hill, where I will be meeting the Providence of God that is going to lead me to the end place of being near the throne in peace. If you are reading this, then I believe He is doing the same for you as well, so let us come to the Mount crying, praying and worshipping because our God is a Mighty God who can and does provide!!!
I love you all, have a great day and blessed day in the Lord!
If you need prayer or anything else please feel free to reach out to me and I will help you the best I can and if I can't help I know one man that can, this man named Jesus!
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2 Samuel 22:47 The Lord liveth; and blessed be my rock; and exalted be the God of the rock of my salvation.