June 28, 2009 - Proper 8, Year B (RCL)
You could have forgiven David
if he had celebrated
at the death of Saul.
Because they were enemies, or as good as.
A lot had happened
since David fought the giant Goliath
and won the admiration of King Saul and all the Israelites.
It all began with that fight. Once David had won,
Saul was determined to keep him.
So he refused to let him go home,
and instead
brought him into his court, treated him, in effect
as a member
of the royal family.
And David and Saul’s son Jonathan
became the closest of friends.
And Saul gave David
a job,
commander
in the army,
and David led them into war against the Philistines
and time after time
came back victorious.
until the people were singing his praises in the streets,
“Saul has killed his thousands,
and David his ten thousands.”
Not something a king wants to hear.
Especially a king
prone to fits of anger and madness.
And Saul got jealous,
and next time David was in the palace, back playing his harp
for Saul’s benefit,
Saul took a spear and threw it at David.
And missed.
And did it again,
and missed again.
And Saul was afraid.
He’d been a great warrior in his time;
why couldn’t he get rid of this kid?
So he sent David back out to war;
maybe the Philistines would do what he couldn’t
and kill David,
or else David would kill them; either way
it would be a good thing.
But all the while
it niggled at him. Because the more success
David had,
the more the people treated him as a hero,
and the less secure
Saul felt.
So he came up with a new plan.
Marry David off to his older daughter
as a kind of public reward, and then send him off to fight even more dangerous battles.
But David
wasn’t so sure. “I’m just a farm boy; what business do I have
marrying the kind’s daughter?”
And went back to battle,
and Saul gave his daughter
to someone else.
But next time David came back from the war
it emerged that he had actually fallen in love with Saul’s other daughter, Michal,
and to honest, that served Saul
just as well.
You see, it was expected
that the groom would bring gifts to the bride’s family,
and David had nothing fit for a royal dowry,
which put him entirely
in Saul’s power.
And Saul said
“I’ll waive the normal dowry, if you just bring me
proof that you yourself have killed
a hundred
Philistines.”
Assuming, of course,
that David would never be able to do it, and would be killed in the process.
So David headed back out to battle,
and came back
with the required evidence.
And Saul grudgingly let him marry Michal
but secretly swore
that he was his enemy.
And so it continued,
David going off to battle and winning, and coming back
to great acclaim.
Saul silently seething, and plotting.
Until it was clear
that to survive
David had to leave.
And so, with the help of his wife, he sneaked out one night and hid,
and when Jonathan reported
that Saul no longer hid his anger,
David became
a refugee, forced to live
among his former
enemies.
And Saul, having effectively got rid of him,
married Michal off
to somebody
else.
But now, of course, Saul, with no David to command the troops, was forced to lead his own battles,
and in the course of the campaigns,
twice
David had the opportunity to kill him;
twice
he chose not to.
He lived in the territory of the Philistines, and fought for them, except when
they were attacking Israel.
Then
he stayed home,
unwilling to fight
against his own people.
Until eventually
the inevitable happened.
Saul led his army into battle, with Jonathan at his side.
And they were defeated.
Jonathan was killed, along with his other brothers.
Saul was critically wounded,
and when he realized
he was going to die,
chose to kill himself, rather than be a hostage and be taunted by the enemy as the life bled out of him,
killed himself.
And the Israelites fled,
except for a few brave men
who rescued the royal corpses
and gave them an honorable
burial.
Meanwhile,
David was still living in Philistine territory.
he was in the town he had made his home,
when an Amalekite, another of the traditional enemies of Israel, stumbled into the camp with the news that Saul and Jonathan
were dead,
even claiming that it was he himself who killed Saul, though we know that wasn’t actually true.
He expected David to welcome him,
perhaps even honor him as a hero,
working on the principle that my enemy’s enemy is my friend.
And instead,
David was devastated.
Because no matter how bad his relationship with Saul, had become,
he had originally pledged his allegiance to Saul.
David still remembered the good times, the promise,
the way that Saul
had led his people, had led them well,
bringing prosperity and pride
and a sense of identity as a nation
where before they had just been
a loose affiliation
of tribes.
Saul had been a good king
until the lust for power took over,
and fear of anyone who might challenge him,
and he began to forget about God, and with him, God’s people who were his people.
And got distracted
by fighting the enemies that he thought were within his kingdom
while the real enemies
were massing on his borders.
Saul had been a good king for much of his reign, and what’s more, he was the anointed one, the first king of Israel,
appointed
by God.
And his son Jonathan,
closer to David
than perhaps anyone else his whole life,
closer even
than David’s wife, Jonathan’s sister, Michal.
I wonder whether David didn’t sigh
a huge sigh of relief
when he got the news about Saul and Jonathan.
Because as complex as those relationships were,
there must have been a sense of release
when he no longer had to negotiate them.
But also the grief.
And he mourned Saul and Jonathan,
putting together the words of lament
that we heard today.
It’s powerful, passionate poetry,
expressing the full depth of David’s grief.
Because he knew that something precious was gone with that first king,
not just the king’s life, but all the history and hope embodied in him.
And something precious gone from his own life, that close relationship with Jonathan.
David looked past his own history with Saul
of deception, rancor and rage,
to speak of what was true and best remembered.
Often we see bible stories as simplistic moral tales, a bare outline
that just doesn’t correspond
with the complexities of our lives.
But the story of David isn’t like that.
Times and time again
he gets himself caught up in situations as complex
as the ones we find ourselves in.
We can imagine ourselves in his shoes.
And today is one of those times.
Most of us have complex relationships.
There are people we love,
but they drive us crazy.
There are people we - well, kind of hate -
but we can see the good they’ve done.
And there are all the people in between.
Sometimes they’re members of our family;
sometimes members of our church.
Sometimes bishops or clergy;
sometimes people we work with.
We joke about killing them,
we fantasize about escape.
And at the same time, we’re bound to them,
because no one is all bad
or all good.
And when they die, or perhaps we or they move on
so that our lives no longer intersect,
there is grief.
Grief about a relationship that can never be fixed.
About the hopes that were never quite fulfilled.
About the loss of someone
who did many good things,
along with some not so good.
Sometimes we’re aware of it, sometimes not.
But whether we realize it or now, that grief
can paralyze us.
It’s really hard to move forward
to find a new future
if you’re clutching onto the past --- or if it is perhaps
clutching onto you.
It’s so important
to mourn our losses,
to say goodbye to both good and bad.
And David’s lament was that,
acknowledging the loss of Saul and Jonathan, and everything they represented,
honoring their memories for the good they did,
giving voice to the agony
that living in an imperfect world
brings to our lives.
Lament
is powerful.
It gives us the chance to speak out
our deepest feelings and fears, to name our losses,
whether they are people or hopes,
even to name our own parts in those failures.
And then to move on, to more forward, into something new.
Perhaps it is not accident
that our Psalm today
is a lament,
one traditionally used in prayers
for the faithful departed.
Out of the depths have I called to you, O LORD;
LORD, hear my voice;
let your ears consider well the voice of my supplication.
If you, LORD, were to note what is done amiss,
O Lord, who could stand?
For there is forgiveness with you;
therefore you shall be feared.
I wait for the LORD; my soul waits for him;
in his word is my hope.
My soul waits for the LORD,
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning.
O Israel, wait for the LORD,
for with the LORD there is mercy;
With him there is plenteous redemption,
and he shall redeem Israel from all their sins.
(Psalm 130)
© Raewynne J. Whiteley 2009