LifeWay Explore the Bible Series for November 2: Responding to loss

Last week’s focal passage closed with Saul going his way after having had his life spared by David in the cave (1 Samuel 24).

A similar event takes place in chapter 26, where once again David was presented with a perfect opportunity to slip up on Saul unnoticed and take the life of this man who had been hunting him like an animal. But once again David acted nobly and refused to kill Saul (26:1-11).

Just as he did in chapter 24, David once again called out to Saul and let him know just how close his brush with death had been. And just as he did in chapter 24, Saul felt remorse and apologized to David (26:21). The final verse of that chapter says, “David went on his way, and Saul returned home.”

It was the last time that David would see Saul alive.

The final chapter of 1 Samuel tells the story of the deaths of Saul and his sons, including David’s best friend Jonathan. On Mount Gilboa, the Israelite army was defeated by their Philistine enemies. In the fierce fighting Jonathan was killed (31:1-2) and Saul was critically wounded. Saul took his own life before he could be captured and tortured by the Philistines (31:3-6).

The first chapter of 2 Samuel continues the story which was interrupted at the end of 1 Samuel, but a comparison of the two chapters reveals an apparent discrepancy in the accounts of how Saul died. 1 Samuel 31 states Saul threw himself onto his own sword rather than being captured by the Philistines, but the unnamed Amalekite of 2 Samuel 1—possibly a mercenary soldier in Saul’s army—tells David it was he who came upon a mortally wounded Saul and delivered the death blow (1:1-10). 

Some commentators have resolved the discrepancy by suggesting that while the battle still was raging, the Amalekite came upon Saul after the king had fallen on his own sword, but before he died. The king then asked this man to put him out of his anguish, which he did.

Perhaps a more likely possibility is that the Amalekite was scavenging the battlefield after the fighting was over when he came upon the dead body of Saul, and then stripped the king’s body of its treasures (1:10). This possibility gains support from the fact that it was not until the day after the battle that the Philistines came back to the battlefield to claim the spoils (1 Samuel 31:8), and so the Amalekite easily could have found and robbed Saul’s body before the Philistines returned the following day. 

If this indeed is what happened, then the Amalekite fabricated the story he told David. He might have been attempting to curry favor, thinking David would be pleased he had killed his arch-enemy. Obviously, he was very mistaken (1:14-16).

We might (wrongly) assume David would rejoice at—or at least derive some sense of personal satisfaction from—Saul’s death. After all, this was a man who had determined to make himself David’s enemy and who had on numerous occasions attempted to take David’s life. But there was no rejoicing on David’s part over the death of the king.

In fact, David paid tribute to both Saul and Jonathan with a meaningful remembrance: He composed a song in their honor which celebrated their courage and mourned their death (1:19-27). Without a doubt, David felt a greater sense of personal loss over Jonathan’s death than Saul’s (1:25-27), but he also grieved for his own sake and for the nation’s at the loss of their king.

There is an important lesson here about the honor that is due a human life, no matter who that person is. 

One of the most memorable and meaningful funeral services I have ever participated in was for a homeless man who had been “adopted” by a couple in our church. This man—whose name was Doug—had been discovered sheltering himself in an alley behind a commercial building owned by our church member.

This church member—who was a deacon in the truest sense of the word—provided this fellow with a bed and permitted him to start sleeping inside that commercial building. He also made sure Doug never went hungry, and frequently put him to work on odd jobs. Later on, when Doug’s health began to fail, the deacon and his wife helped get him into a Medicaid-funded nursing home and visited him there regularly.

When Doug passed away, his burial was arranged at a cemetery some 250 miles away, near where he had been born and where a burial plot already had been purchased for him. I went with this deacon and his wife and one other person, and we drove the 500 round-trip miles in a single day in order to stand in the rain for 10 minutes while I read Scripture and prayed at Doug’s graveside. 

He was a lonely homeless man, forgotten by the world—but when he passed away, his friends made sure there were mourners at his funeral service to honor his life and mourn his passing. He deserved that.
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But our focal passage also reminds us of the responsibilities which remain after the death of a loved one. In the midst of the sorrow, there still are important decisions to be made, tasks to be taken care of, and obligations to be attended to. 

Big things were about to take place in David’s life as well as the national life of Israel; the king had perished, and the time had come for David to be established as their new leader. There was important work for David to do, and he couldn’t afford to remain mired in grief.

David knew he was God’s anointed to take Saul’s place on the throne of Israel, but the kingdom wouldn’t be just dropped into his lap. He had to take Saul’s place in Israel’s hearts and amass sufficient support to lay claim to the throne.

David consulted the Lord about where he should go to begin that process, and God answered that David should go to Hebron. He and his men went to that town, and the men of Judah came there to acknowledge David as their new king (2:1-4). In time, David would be accepted as king by the entire nation.

The way David continued to move forward in his own life following the deaths of Jonathan and Saul is a great example to us. Nowhere does the Bible command us not to grieve when someone we love dies, but we are instructed in how we are supposed to grieve—as people who possess hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13). It is alright to experience and express deep emotion, as Jesus himself did at the tomb of his friend Lazarus (John 11:33-36).

But we cannot remain mired in emotion, because our own life’s journey continues, and God  has great opportunity, blessing and challenge yet in store for us.

We honor the memory of the dead by continuing to live responsibly. Living responsibly means that we live in a way which demonstrates personal strength, love for others, and firm commitment to God.