Even When It Seems Obvious...

And David inquired of God, saying, “Shall I go up against the Philistines? Will You deliver them into my hand?”

The LORD said to him, “Go up, for I will deliver them into your hand.”

     This lesson is perhaps one of the great reasons why David is "a man after Gods own heart". He was concerned, more for God's glory that he was for his own. In 1 Chronicles 14:10, as David was in the process of ascending to the throne, the Philistines set out to oppose him. Now David has some 225,000 men at his disposal, men-of-war. And we all know the reputation of David as a man of war! He could have, and had he been a man like Saul, likely would have simply gone to face the Philistines.
     But this is not Saul, this is David. The issue at hand is not just defeating the enemy. The issue here is serving his God. And so David must first consult his Master. And so we see here, as we have seen in the past and will see many times in the future, David defeats his enemies and then gives praise to his God, YHWH - the God of Israel - not the god of the peoples round about.
     What is interesting, is that, though the course of action seems to be obvious, David did not make the assumption. There is submission. Though he is King, master over all he surveys, he is not the ultimate Master, and he knows and he readily acknowledges that fact.
     And further, he does so publicly! It is not simply that he consults God privately, and then goes ahead and leads his people to victory and then takes the credit himself. Oh no! He gives God the full glory for having instructed and then enable this great victory. This was the habit of his life. This was why he was a man after Gods own heart.
     Now it is certainly true that David had his failures and his fallings. But it is heartening that those failures and those fallings are presented for us in glorious black and white in the pages of Scripture for all to see. When we remember, in spite of all of this, those terrible failings with Bathsheba and all else, that David is the one who is remembered as the father of our Lord Jesus Christ, our hearts are thrilled. That God used one such as he in that fashion encourages me to think that God might, just might perhaps use one such as me.
     Even when the right course weems "obvious" we need to remember that we are not the Master of the course.  There is a God in heaven Whose will is supreme.  It is He Who has the yes and no over all that we do or don't do and not you and I.  We need to be sure that, not only are we correct in the course that we are following, but that we are observing the truth that God is God and we are not.  We dare not rush ahead.  That was one of Saul's great failings and David was, at least at this point in his life about to make the same one!