ISAIAH 55:4 - "David's Song"

"I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me." (Phil 4:12 & 13) When we read David's Song, which is found in 2 Samuel 22, we may wonder if David is forgetting some things about his life; or maybe he is looking at his life from God's point of view. In verses 21 & 22, we see the following statement: "The Lord rewarded me according to my righteousness; according to the cleanness of my hands hath He recompenced me. For I have kept the ways of the Lord, and have not wickedly departed from my God." As we read this, we might wonder about the sin David had committed against God with Bathsheba, and how David could say that he had not wickedly departed from his God, or how he kept the ways of the Lord; but you must realize that this is a song of God's greatness, and God's provisions to meet all of David's needs; and all of our needs also. This is also a song about the Messiah, because it is more than a final farewell, but it is like the final blessing of Jacob in Gen. 49. Just like these next two verses in Isaiah 55 are also more about the Messiah than anything else, but they can partly be attributed to the life of David. If you remember that Jesus was referred to several times as the 'Son of David'; this was based on the promise given to David that from his seed would come the Messiah. If we look at verse 4 which says: "Behold, I have given him for a witness to the people, a leader and a commander to the people."; this is a verse that can definitely be spoken of David's life. If ever we needed a good witness of how God can have mercy, forgive of sin, and consider someone to be a saint; even though there was sin in there life; it is through David's life. There are some things that just have to be experience to really understand; but I pray that I never have to experience the need to ask forgiveness for sins like David committed. There is really a point to an old saying: "The bigger they are; the harder they fall"; because for David, this was more than a reality. Power can corrupt, and ultimate power corrupts ultimately; for the sin David committed, he really could not have been able to do without the power that God had placed him in. Oh, he could have sinned against God by committing the act of adultery, but commanding that Uriah be placed in the front lines of the battle, and then that those behind him retreat so that he and others would be killed; that took power. In 2 Samuel 24, we see another example of yielding power, and the cost of not yielding to God's Perfect Will. It is hard to determine why David took the census in Israel and Judah, because in verse one it says: "And again the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and He moved David against them to say, Go, number Israel and Judah"; but I am under the belief that he was motivated by pride. Maybe not at first, but he definitely was by the time he was done, because in verse 10 it says: "And David's heart smote him after that he had numbered the people. And David said unto the Lord, I have sinned greatly in that I have done: and now, I beseech Thee, O Lord, take away the iniquity of Thy servant; for I have done very foolishly". There was a very big price to pay for what David did, and God gave him the choice of three forms of punishment; one involved seven years of famine, another was to be flee three months from his enemies, and the third was three days of pestilence; David choose the three days of pestilence, because he said: "Let us fall now into the hand of the Lord; for His mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man". Seventy thousand men died in a three day period; God stayed the hand of the angel that destroyed the people, as soon as it came upon Jerusalem. And as David saw the angel getting ready to smite at the threshingplace of Araunah the Jebusite, he cried out to God: "Lo, I have sinned, and have done wickedly: but these sheep, what have they done? Let Thine hand, I pray Thee, be against me, and against my father's house". David was told by the prophet Gad, to put up an altar unto the Lord in the threshingfloor of Araunah; which David did after purchasing the property from him. This was also the place where Solomon built the Temple, and became the most holy place in all of Israel. Here is the bottom line to all of this: God is in control!!! You have to realize that He will bring about His will; it really matters how we want to be used in the way He brings it to pass. Do we want to do it His way, or do we want to do it our way? Either way, He makes it into His way; but one of the ways will beat us up pretty bad along the way. Even when God is punishing us, we know He has our best interest in mind, and we can trust Him.