David:  Looking at People God's Way

By Leah Smith | posted 05/24/2001    

Randy is recovering from a migraine and just had physical therapy for his knee, so he asked me if I could "bail him out" this week.  For those of you who don’t know me, I edit this weekly FYI eNewsletter and send it out to all of you (yes, blame me for your cluttered inbox).   I communicate with the staff and leaders during the week via email and after I get my 10 month-old to bed on Wednesday nights, I transform these little bits of emailed information into the FYI.   I really enjoy this job - it's fun to have my finger on the pulse of what's happening at Creekside!  And as a new stay-at-home-mom, this gives me just enough deadline pressure and adult interaction to keep my brain working.  (Well, I guess it's mostly working - don't look too hard for grammatical errors, funky formatting, or broken links!)

Randy suggested that I share something that had inspired me or a quote.  I decided to share from the book I have been reading, Leap Over a Wall: Earthy Spirituality for Everyday Christians, by Eugene Peterson.  (Randy had recommended it to me and I ‘second’ the recommendation!)  This book is about King David and the lessons we can learn from his life.

Even though David was anointed as the future king of Israel, while King Saul was alive he had to live life on the run (see 1 and 2 Samuel in the Old Testament).  David had two chances to kill Saul, and he refused to do it.  “Both times – at En-gedi and Hachilah – David’s wilderness-trained eyes looked on Saul and saw not Saul the enemy but Saul the God-anointed.  In the solitude and silence and emptiness of the wilderness, uncluttered and undistracted by what everyone else was saying and doing, David was able to see God’s glory where no one else could see it – in Saul.” (p. 77)

Eventually, when Saul is killed in a battle and David hears the news, David composes a lament and commands that it be taught to all the people of Israel.  Now if I were David, I would hate Saul.  I would blame Saul for my problems.  When Saul died, I would be glad!  But not David.  As Eugene puts it, “What God did for Saul far outweighed anything that Saul did to David.  And that is what David chose to deal with…God’s grace in Saul’s life, not Saul’s hate in David’s life, is what gave content to David’s prayer and decisions…When he was being chased down by Saul, he prayed his distress and anger and left it with God, Saul’s sufficient judge.  Saul’s hate, instead of narrowing David and reducing him, in fact provided conditions in which he became large, expansive, and generous.” (pp. 116-7)

When Saul died, I would have been exultant! Instead of composing a psalm of lament for Saul’s death, I would have composed a psalm of glory – my glory!  I would have quickly come back to Israel to become the king and would take great pleasure in finally getting my “due”.  Unlike David, I do not become ‘large, expansive, and generous’ when I think someone is out to get me!   When I was teaching, there was one teacher on our team who always seemed to disagree with me.  She put me down in front of others and went out of her way to find flaws in my curriculum.  I did not see God’s anointing in her life.  It was there, for sure, but I was not looking for it.  I was focusing on how difficult it was to teach with her there, undermining my plans.  I was hoping she would transfer to a different school.  Now that I am gone, I can see that even though we did not see eye to eye on things, she had some great ideas and her main goal was to make kids better writers (a very laudable goal).  If only I had seen her through ‘David-eyes’ while I was there.  It may not have made our conflicts any less, (seeing Saul through God’s eyes did not change the reality that Saul was out to kill David), but I would have tapped into the bigger picture and could’ve seen God’s glory.

David is a wonderful example of what it looks like to really look at people the way God sees them.  David saw beyond what Saul did to him and looked at what God was doing.  David could see the big picture.   I want to have ‘eyes’ like that!

In Hope,

Leah Smith 

Love from the center of who you are; don’t fake it.  Run for dear life from evil; hold on for dear life to good.  Be good friends who love deeply; practice playing second fiddle.

Don’t burn out; keep yourselves fueled and aflame.  Be alert servants of the Master, cheerfully expectant.  Don’t quit in hard times; pray all the harder.  Help needy Christians; be inventive in hospitality.

Bless your enemies; no cursing under your breath.  Laugh with your happy friends when they’re happy; share tears when they’re down.  Get along with each other; don’t be stuck-up.  Make friends with nobodies; don’t be the great somebody.

Don’t hit back; discover beauty in everyone.  If you’ve got it in you, get along with everybody.  Don’t insist on getting even; that’s not for you to do.  “I’ll do the judging,” says God.  “I’ll take care of it.”

Romans 12:9-16 (The Message)

 If you want to respond to this message, please send your email to lsmith@ecreekside.com  

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