Saul and his sons died in the battlefield. They chopped off their heads, and hung them up on a wall.
The men of Jabesh Gilead went in the middle of the night, took the bodies down, took them back and gave them a proper burial.
David said: Because you did this thing, may the Lord show His blessing upon you. I will repay you for it too.
His heart was to bless people and show kindness to those who acted honorably.
IntroductionThe Bible tells us that we are kings; that we have an area that God wants us to have dominion over. For some of you, that area of dominion will be your money. If you can't get dominion over your money, forget about the world! We're called to be kings, to have dominion. You're designed for that. You're designed for dominion. You're designed to express the love of God, and to bring the values, the life and the victory of heaven into the earth; to take dominion.
There's no place in the kingdom of God for people who are passive, who are victims in their thinking, or waiting for something to happen. God calls you to connect with him, arise, and begin to advance his interests in the earth.
Acts 13:22 – “When He had removed Saul, He raised up David as a king, saying: I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man after My own heart, who will do all My will.”
David was raised up by God. He said: he's a man after My own heart. He was a man with a passionate desire to know what God is like. A lot of people know about God, which is different to knowing Him personally. He can be known, as you search the word of God.
If search for 'delight' and 'desire' in the Bible, and look for what the Lord delights in, and what He desires, you will be amazed what you can find out about Him. There are things that He loves, and hates. If you want to walk with the Lord, begin to discover what He loves - and love that; begin to hate what He hates, and you will to find your fellowship with the Lord increases. You are starting to become more like Him in your thinking, and the way you run your life.
There are some things God really loves. He delights in mercy, justice; delights in things being done right. There are things He hate - a proud look, a lying tongue, someone who sows discord. David had a heart to discover what God desired. He had a passionate heart for God.
God said of him: “I've raised him up for them”. David was raised up, not just so he could be a great man, but he was raised up for a purpose.
Acts 13:36 – “after David served his generation, by the will of God…”
1) He had a passionate desire to know and to walk with God. That was the driving force behind his greatness.
2) He was committed to serve his generation; to do something with what he had.
If you're going to walk with God, it will always be that He will raise you up for someone else. The call of God on your life is not for you. You are called to represent God, to touch the lives of people. When God raises you up, and gives you a role, a gifting, etc. - it's not for you. You are to bring that, to touch the lives of people.
Everything that God gives us, somehow overflows to be a blessing, and a benefit, to people. We must not only build the vertical dimension of our love for God; we must have a heart to be able to serve the people that are around us, to bring God to them.
The key problem in Saul's failure as a king… think about this: God did not hate him. God loved him. God gave him opportunities. The problem with Saul was, he never actually found out what God delighted in. In many ways, he just listened to what people want, and he feared how people thought about him, so he lived his life subject to the pressures of people around him and disqualified himself from a great role. We tend to think of Saul as a man who failed - but he was a person anointed by the Spirit of God - raised up. He could have been a great king. He just chose a wrong path.