is to the end of 1 Samuel. Actually, we only have a few more chapters left. Don't worry, we'll continue the life of David in 2 Samuel once we finish with 1 Samuel. But this evening, we're not to the end. We're only in chapter 27. 1 Samuel chapter 27. If your Bible has chapter headings, you'll see this is when David flees to the Philistines. It's 1 Samuel 27, beginning in verse one. This is God's word, let us pay attention to it. Then David said in his heart, now I shall perish one day by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than that I should escape to the land of the Philistines. Then Saul will despair of seeking me any longer within the borders of Israel, and I shall escape out of his hand. So David arose and went over, he and the 600 men who were with him, to Achish, the son of Maok, king of Gath. And David lived with Achish at Gath, he and his men, every man with his household. And David with his two wives, Ahinoam of Jezreel, and Abigail of Carmel, Nabal's widow. And when it was told Saul that David had fled to Gath, he no longer sought him. Then David said to Achish, if I have found favor in your eyes, "'Let a place be given me in one of the country towns "'that I may dwell there. "'For why should your servant dwell "'in the royal city with you?' "'So that day Achish gave him Ziklag. "'Therefore Ziklag has belonged "'to the kings of Judah to this day.' "'And the number of the days that David lived "'in the country of the Philistines "'was a year and four months. "'Now David and his men went up and made raids "'against the Geshurites and the Gerzites "'and the Amalekites. For these were the inhabitants of the land from of old, as far as Shur, the land of Egypt. And David would strike the land, and would leave neither man nor woman alive, but would take away the sheep, the oxen, the donkeys, the camels, and the garments, and come back to Achish. When Achish asked, where have you made a raid today? David would say, against the Negev of Judah, or against the Negev of the Jeromelites, or against the Negev of the Kenites, And David would leave neither man nor woman alive to bring news to Gath, thinking, lest they should tell about us and say, so David has done. Such was his custom all the while he lived in the country of the Philistines. And Achish trusted David, thinking, he has made himself an utter stench to his people Israel. Therefore, he shall always be my servant. And thus far, the reading of God's word. Will you please join me in prayer? Our Lord and our God, Thank you once again for your word that you have given to us. We ask that you would use it to teach us, instruct us, correct us where we need correction. Use it, oh Lord, we ask to thoroughly equip us for every good work. We pray, Lord, that as we come to this chapter in 1 Samuel, you would reveal more of yourself to us and that you would direct our gaze more to the Lord Jesus Christ. We ask these things in his name, amen. Well, it's a sad and distressing thing, isn't it? When you see men and women throughout history who have these periods of incredible Success, fame, fortune, whatever. Athletes who do amazing things on the field or on the court. Actors who rise to heights and fame and perform excellently in whatever they're doing. Musicians who compose fantastic songs and play them well for huge crowds. And the heights of success, as it were, and then all of a sudden everything comes crashing down. And these people who once were at these high levels are all of a sudden very low. That's a sad and distressing thing. It's even more sad and distressing, is it not, when this kind of things happens spiritually. When men and women. are having great success, as it were, and following after Christ. They're growing in godliness. They're spending time with the Lord, growing in union and communion with Christ, and then all of a sudden, it seems like something happens, and it's as though they trip and fall face first into the mud. And we look at this and we say, what happened? What's going on? And it's somewhat distressing when people fall into some spiritual decline. as it were, and this evening, as we come to this chapter in 1 Samuel, perhaps we feel a bit of the same thing in the life of David. As we see him, after he has had all of these successes, as it were, after he has had the protection of God demonstrated to him over and over and over again after he's seemingly grown in grace after the whole Nabal incident and then he doesn't take revenge on Saul in the last chapter as we saw. It seems like David's grown and then all of a sudden we get to verse one of our chapter and we see that David seems to have in part at least lost a little bit of his trust in God. fallen a little bit. It's a stark reminder to us of the fact that while the books of 1st and 2nd Samuel and even the books of 1st and 2nd Kings are showing us the different kings of Israel, the main point of them all is actually this isn't the king you're looking for. We saw that in the life of Saul over and over again and we see it in the life of David as well. David, in spite of his godliness, in spite of his greatness, isn't the king that we're looking for. The people of God need a king who always relies upon his heavenly father. The people of God need a king who always relies on his heavenly father. But even in the midst of all of this, we still see God's hand in the life of David. David flees to Philistia. in verses one through four. He settles in Philistia in verses five through seven. And then he makes raids from Philistia in verses eight through 12 this evening. And while he's doing all of these things, even though it's not explicitly mentioned in the text at all, God is still protecting him and preserving him because he is still the anointed of God and God still will have David upon the throne of Israel, and God will still have David be the ancestor of the king whom we all need, the Lord Jesus Christ. With those divisions of our text in mind, the fleeing, the settling, and the raiding, let's go to this chapter from God's word and plummets depths as much as we can this evening. David flees to Philistia in the first part of the passage. Our text starts with an internal conversation. Doesn't it? David is having an internal conversation with himself. David says in his heart, now I shall perish one day by the hand of Saul. There's nothing better for me than that I should escape to the land of the Philistines. You probably have conversations in your heart as well, or we might consider them conversations in our head, in our mind. We frequently probably discuss things silently in our minds. We are looking in our closet in the morning and we talk to ourselves and say, well, is it the blue shirt today or is it the white shirt today or what am I going to choose, right? We have those conversations in our head. Well, David's conversation is a little more serious, isn't it? Or a lot more serious. David is having this deep conversation with himself. A serious internal conversation because David is perceive that he is in a situation in which there's only one route for escape. He says, I'm going to die by the hand of Saul if I remain in Israel. No doubt about it, I'm gonna die. The best thing that I can possibly do for myself, for those around me, is to run to the sworn enemies of Israel. Saul's not going to quit, might as well run to the Philistines. Now, David here is, in essence, preaching to himself. Dale Ralph Davis is the author of one of the commentaries that I frequently consult when looking through 1 Samuel, and he reminds the reader that what we preach to ourselves can have great effect on our thinking and action. David is preaching to himself, a false gospel, as it were. He's saying, Saul's going to kill me. It doesn't matter that the Lord has promised good to me. It doesn't matter that I'm anointed. It doesn't matter that God has delivered me over and over again. I can see from all of these times that Saul has attacked me. He's just not going to quit. Saul said that he'd stop attacking me, and then the Ziphites came to him and said, well, David's down there in the wilderness, and Saul came again. Saul won't give up. David preaches this to himself. It's a message of hopelessness here. Instead of trust in God, it's I better figure out how to save myself. And this idea of preaching to ourselves is very important for us, isn't it? What do you preach to yourself each day? Are you preaching an anti-gospel each day to yourself? As it were, are you saying, well, God could never forgive me of this sin. It's too big or I've sinned it too many times. Are you saying, well, I can't be certain that God loves me and will fulfill his promise that if I trust in Christ, he'll save me. He's saying, I don't know that God will take care of me as he says he will. Are you preaching these kinds of things to yourself or are you preaching the gospel to yourself daily? It is so absolutely vital for us that we preach the gospel to ourselves day in and day out. to constantly remind ourselves of who Christ is and what he has done. It is so important to say to yourself, yes, I am a sinner. Christ came to save sinners. Christ promises that if I come to him for salvation, if I trust in him, he will give me salvation, he'll save me from my sins. It's so important to remind yourself that Christ has promised He will not reject you if you come to Him. He will never cast you out. He will hold you fast. This is what we need to be reminding ourselves of day in and day out. We never outgrow our need to hear the gospel. No matter how much we mature in the Christian life, we never outgrow our need to hear the gospel. and we need to hear the gospel each and every day, pointing us back to the Lord Jesus, in whom alone we have salvation. David is preaching this kind of sense of hopelessness to himself. He is in deep distress. Now, while it's right for us to look at David's lack of faith here in his grasping onto his own wisdom, to worldly wisdom even. While it's right for us to look at that and say, well, this is wrong. David should have trusted God. At the same time, we can also look at David with quite a bit of sympathy, can't we? You will probably have experienced things in your own life where it's just the consistency of it drives you to distraction, makes you begin to question, well, does God love me? Does he care for me? Is he taking care of me? You remember the Apostle Paul even has this thorn in the side and he's constantly crying out to God to remove it from him. God says, my grace is sufficient for you. So we have these issues maybe in our lives that keep at us, it's like, water dripping on a rock which causes erosion. That's what's happening to David, and that's what is at the root of David's lack of faith here. The unrelenting nature of Saul's pursuit is making David think, well, it's never going to end. We say, well, David, trust in God, but we can also sympathize with David and realize that this kind of suffering is real suffering. There's real discouragement and despair that comes with these unrelenting attacks. And this should remind us of the great need which we have for one another and the great task which we have to minister to one another, to deal with our brothers and sisters in gentleness and grace, to help them through these things, to point them to Christ in gentleness and grace. And we must do it with gentleness and grace. You're probably all fairly aware that if you have a brother or sister who's grieving, it's probably not a good idea to go to them and in a very cheerful voice say, well, God works all things together with good. The appropriate response is to sympathize with them and to come alongside them and to treat them with gentleness. And yes, we can and we should remind each other of what the scriptures say, but we must do so in the appropriate way with the proper gracious tone which each circumstance requires. Sometimes when our brothers or sisters are sinning and they need to be admonished, sometimes they need a firm admonition, don't they? Sometimes they need a gentle admonition. And it takes the wisdom of the Holy Spirit to know which is appropriate in that situation. And so we must do these things, but we must rely upon the Holy Spirit to help us in these situations, to help us to appropriately minister to one another in whatever circumstance we find ourselves in, sympathizing with them. David has this whole conversation in his mind, and then he takes action. He not only says, I should move to Philistia, but he goes ahead and he does it, doesn't he? He jumps ship as it was. As a result of the propaganda that David is constantly putting up in his own mind, he says, well, let's go. So he takes his wives and all of his men and their families and they go over to Philistia. And the way it's phrased, he went over or he passed over, almost gives the sense that perhaps it's felt like David is defecting. to the Philistines, like he's abandoning his people. Maybe that's what people thought. It's not what happens, as we'll see later on in this chapter, but David goes to the land of the Philistines, and it seems as though his whole entire plan works. Saul hears that David is in Philistia, and he gives up the chase. As soon as Saul hears that he went to Gath, he no longer seeks him. Now, Saul might have thought that the matter of chasing 600 men in the wilderness is perfectly fine for me in my 3,000, but to invade a foreign country to get David is something I don't want to undertake. Or Saul might have thought, well, David's gone and joined the Philistines, and so I don't have to worry about him trying to seize the throne anymore. Whatever the case may be, Saul is not willing to chase David anymore, and so it seems that David's plan is a success. But David has leaned on his own understanding here, hasn't he? That will actually end up having consequences for David in the long run. Because David no longer, not only, excuse me, just runs to the Philistines to hang out there for a little while, but he actually settles in Philistia for a while. We see in verse five, David makes a bold request to Achish, the king of He says, if I found favor in your eyes, let a place be given me in one of the country towns that I may dwell there. Why should your servant dwell in the royal city with you? So David makes a bold request of Achish for permanent housing in the land of the Philistines. He says, you can just let me go live in one of the country towns, it's far off, but let me stay here in this land. And the basis for David's appeal is twofold, isn't it? On the one hand, David says that if I've found favor in your eyes, you should do this for me. And the way this is phrased, it seems that David assumes that he has found favor in Achish's eyes. He's not unaware that Achish is pretty excited that David and his 600 men are in Philistia. And indeed, Achish should be. in some ways, excited that David's there. Here's the hero of Israel who kicked the Philistines out of the city of Keilah not too long ago and rescued them. Here's David, the hero of Israel who killed Goliath of Gath. Here's this hero of Israel who's just come to Achish and said, well, the king of Israel's been trying to kill me, so I'd like to come live here. Me and my men won't try to attack you anymore. This is good news for Achish. So David has found a favor in his eyes. We can also determine that David has found favor in the eyes of Achish from the fact that he hasn't had to pretend he's crazy this time when he comes to Gath. You remember David has gone to Gath before thinking I'll flee to Gath and find protection there and things did not turn out well from him. Nobody wanted him there and so David had to pretend to be a madman and ended up fleeing Gath. Well this time he doesn't have to do any of that and so we can surmise from that as well that David has found favor in the eyes of Achish. He's not had to play crazy and he hasn't been chased out of Goliath's hometown. But David also gives Achish a second reason why he should be allowed to settle in one of the country towns. And that's, David says, is so that we won't just keep living off of your generosity. Why should we stay in the royal city with you? Akish, why should you have to pay for all of my meals and all of the meals of my men? Wouldn't it be so much more convenient for you if you just gave me a country town and I could go live there, be a good Philistine citizen, and you wouldn't have to pay me for anything? My men and I will raise our own funds. And Akish accepts. Your terms are good. You can have the town of Ziklag. David receives this town, it ends up becoming a royal holding for all of David's descendants. A Philistine town belonging to the kings of Judah. Now we see here, God in his providence is already handing over enemy territory to his anointed David. Comes through David doing something unwise and sinful and fleeing to the Philistines and yet God is still in his sheer grace and generosity to David, giving him this town, which will become a town belonging to the kings. David stays in this area for quite a long time, doesn't he? Verse seven, the number of days that David lived in the country of the Philistines was a year and four months. So David fled to Achish for protection from Saul, but then David goes to him and asks for a town to be given to him, He receives the town and stays in the land of the Philistines for close to a year and a half. David is not just hiding in Philistia, he's now settling in Philistia. David is remaining there, separated from his people, separated from the ability to go to the tabernacle to worship God. Now that was all difficult for him to do when he was hiding in the wilderness, surely, but now he's in a foreign land. There's a big difference between just visiting a place and settling there isn't there. You go on vacation. whether you go to the mountains or you go to the beach, you go for a short amount of time. And while you're there, you might think, well, this is nice. I could get used to staying here for a long time. When the vacation ends, you think, well, it's good to get back home. And besides, I don't have a job down at the beach. I don't have friends down at the beach. My church isn't down at the beach. It's good for me to get back home. But here is David, not just vacationing, as it were, and the land of the Philistines, but staying there for over a year. And while he stays there during this time, he has to deceive Achish in order to stick around. David begins to raid from the land of the Philistines. On the one hand, this is a good thing. David is using this town that the Philistines gave him as his base of operations to attack the enemies of Israel. This is a good thing for the Israelites. It's keeping these enemies from coming against them. It's a good thing for David as we see he's getting wealth from it in a sense. But it's also a bad thing. And that David constantly has to lie about what he's doing. and he has to act in some quite brutal ways in order to maintain his lies. David raids from the town of Ziklag. He makes raids against the Geshurites and the Gerzites and the Amalekites for these were the inhabitants of the land from of old as far as sure to the land of Egypt. Now, we are told here that these are Canaanite peoples. We're probably far more familiar with the Amalekites, right? These are descendants, actually, of Esau, Esau's grandson, Amalek. These are historical enemies of the people of Israel. These are a people who came up against Israel during the time of the Exodus, attacked them without any provocation, tried to wipe them out. God delivered his people, Israel, but said, well, these are basically your lifelong enemies. And the Amalekites continue to be enemies with Israel, continue to make raids against them and attack them and persecute them in all sorts of ways. And you remember back in chapter 15 of 1 Samuel, God ordered Saul, the king of Israel, to destroy the Amalekites. But Saul didn't. He didn't obey the Lord fully. He was half-hearted. He saved the Amalekites' cattle, the sheep, said, well, I was gonna use them for a sacrifice, but at the end of the day, he did not do what he was supposed to do. He didn't obey God and devote everything to destruction. So there's still some Amalekites around during this point in David's life, and David, during his self-exile, is able to go and raid them, is able to continue to press the attack against these enemies of God's people. The Geshurites and the Gerzites are less known to us. The Geshurites perhaps were originally from kind of northern Canaan and had moved south. The Gerzites, this is the only time we are really told about them. But suffice it to say, these are all Canaanites who have been at war with Israel through the time of the judges. People who have worshiped false gods and have dealt in much iniquity. And now, David, as the anointed of God, is going out and making war on them. He's protecting God's people by doing this. But as I said, there's a problem with this. While David is able to provide for the needs of his people, and pay a tribute to Achish, he has to lie to Achish constantly for a year and four months about what he has been doing. See, every time David goes out and makes a raid, he strikes the land, leaves neither man nor woman alive, but takes the sheep, the oxen, the donkeys, the camels, the garments, and comes to Achish, and Achish says, where have you made a raid today? And David can't say, well, I raided the Amalekites, or I raided the Geshurites, or I raided the Gearsites. He says, I raided Israelites. He says, well, I went against the Negev of Judah. I went and attacked my own kinsmen and raided them and took their belongings, or I raided the Negev of the Jeromelites, or I raided the Negev of the Kenites. David has to constantly tell Achish, I went and attacked the people of God. He can't be honest. If he starts being honest at this point, Achish might just turn against him. David has to make Achish like him. He has to bring Achish tribute and make Achish think that David really has become a Philistine in every way, shape, or form. David ran to Gath for safety. And it turns out there really actually isn't safety and an earthly sense for him here. He has to put up deception constantly so that he can stay in the land of the Philistines. And what's more, David has to cover up his tracks. He lies to Achish and in order to perpetrate the lie, to keep it going, he kills all of the men and all of the women of the places that he raids, so no one can come back and bring a report to Achish. See, David isn't just using a room to sweep his tracks away so no one can follow him, he's covering his tracks with blood, as it were. No survivors, no one to report the truth of what's going on. It says, Sad, to say the least, that David is having to do this. Yes, these are the enemies of God and his people. These Canaanites are wicked, evil people, but the way the text portrays this, David isn't doing this because God has commanded him to put a ban on these people. David is doing this to save his own skin. And yet, In spite of this, in spite of this, we still see the hand of God protecting David, don't we? God doesn't protect David because of his lies and what he's doing here. God protects David in spite of it because Achish buys it. Hook, line, and sinker. Achish trusts David completely and says he's made himself an utter stench to his people Israel, therefore he shall always be my servant. Akish does not have an opportunity to send out his own men with David to say, we'll check up on him and see if what he's doing is actually what he says he's doing. Akish doesn't get any reports from anybody else who might have seen what was going on. David is protected by God through this entire time. Akish doesn't have a chance to say, David's actually a faithful Israelite. We should get rid of him. Akish instead thinks, David really has come over to our side. Wow, I can't believe Saul would push out this guy who's so willing to bring tribute to his king, who's so willing to support the nation in every way conceivable. Akish thinks David really is a Philistine convert story. Right? This is the guy that we parade around to all of the other nations and see this guy, he actually came over to our side. He's a true convert. No way Israel will ever take him back. David will always be my servant. From this brief application, I think, this is a reminder to us of God's faithfulness. A reminder of God's faithfulness to us even when we are faithless. See, God preserves David in spite of lies and cover-ups and all of this. And it's a lesson to us, not that we can just go ahead and do whatever we want and it's fine. This isn't a lesson that we're to continue in sin that grace may abound. It's a lesson to us that God is far more gracious to us than we deserve and far more gracious than we could ever imagine. Here is David participating in all of these things and yet God is still preserving him. God is still being merciful to David. God is still merciful to us in Christ. We're called to follow after the Lord Jesus. We fail daily. God is still merciful to us. He's still faithful to us in spite of our faithfulness, and that should greatly encourage us. It should cause us to look to Christ even more in faith and love, trusting in Him as our Savior. Well, it's sad to end here in the passage, isn't it? With this declaration of Achish saying, he's a true Philistine, Israel will never take him back. As I said, the point of this, the point in showing David's failings is a reminder to us that we need a better king than David. David is He's a good king, he's a great man as far as men go. There is a reason why he is included, albeit briefly, in the Hebrews 11 hall of faith. He is a man who fears God and seeks to serve him, but he's still a man. And texts like this, passages like this, are huge, flashing signs to everyone reading them, this is not the king you were looking for. There's a better king. There's a true king, one who is faithful and righteous. One who does not flee to the enemy of God for help. There is a king who, in the days of his flesh, offered up prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to him who was able to save him from death. And he was heard because of his reverence. A king who, although he was a son, learned obedience through what he suffered and relied fully by the Holy Spirit upon God his Father. Texts like this remind us that God's people don't need a king who runs to the Philistines. We need one who has endured all things for us. One who sympathizes with us, yes, but one who conquered for us. One who gives us refuge and safety through all life's ups and downs. One who preserves us and keeps us in spite of our sin against him. And we have such a king in Christ Jesus. The one that we are pointed to by David's falling. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Our Lord and our God, we thank you for this passage even though it is disheartening in ways to see David flee to the Philistines and to, in many ways, act in a manner which he ought not to have acted in, yet we are thankful that we're reminded that a better king is needed and a better king has been given in Christ Jesus. We ask that you would continue to point us to him, that we would be reminded of him in all of the scripture. We pray that you would strengthen our faith in him. And we thank you that you hold us fast even when we are faithless. Remind us of all of these things we pray in Christ's name, amen. Let's take a few moments to meditate on this passage and to even think of Christ the greater David.