Browsing Tag

David

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Looking up!

Posted on April 4, 2025

Writing this early morning about David, particularly about the darkest months of His life, I decided to go open the window of my room. In some years on writing week, I’ve been able to look out the window at a huge American flag, a lush green meadow or a serene, but beautiful, cemetery. This week, I’m up high, and when I pull up the shade, I am looking down at the back of a gas station. No great writing vibes are making their way up here from Fuel City, Shell, or Chevron…all within view when I draw up that shade. SO I have been looking lots in the Word and not much out the window.

This morning, as I thought about the hurt in the life of the man of God who immersed himself, for a time in guilt and pain, I went to the window and, this time, I looked up. Just let me tell, you…it’s a whole different world out there when you are looking up. At first the sky was dark and foreboding. But I waited for a second and then this:

I had to go ahead and talk to Him. I said, “Oh my God. You are wonderful and worthy and you do amazing things in the darkest of times. Help me to love you more!” He not only made that big ball of fire that just moved out of the darkness and illuminated my world,  but He IS the light that comes out of life’s darkest clouds of sorrow for His people. As the Psalm that I’m studying this morning says, “Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, you righteous; and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!”

Looking up makes all the difference!

 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

On the Tenth day of Digging Deep…

Posted on August 15, 2024

On the first day of Digging Deep, this digger got to  see… A new deluxe edition for me…

On the second day of Digging Deep, this digger got to see…two swag orders and a new deluxe edition for me. 

On the third day of Digging Deep, this digger got to see …three posted dig-a bits, two swag orders and a new deluxe edition for me.

On the fourth day of Digging Deep, this digger got to see …four sample screen-prints, three posted dig-a-bits, two swag orders, and a new deluxe edition for me.

On the fifth day of Digging Deep, this digger got to see…Five Golden Crowns!!!!…four sample screen prints, three dig-a-bits, two swag orders, and a new deluxe edition for me.

On the sixth day of Digging Deep, this digger got to see…Six sheep-a-grazing…Five Golden Crowns!!!…four sample screen prints, three dig-a-bits, two swag orders, and a new deluxe edition for me.

On the seventh day of Digging Deep, this digger got to see… Seven ladies waiting…Six sheep-a-grazing…Five Golden Crowns!!!…four sample screen prints, three dig-a-bits, two swag orders, and a new deluxe edition for me.

On the eighth day of Digging Deep, this digger got to see, eight laughing locals …Seven ladies waiting…Six sheep-a-grazing…Five Golden Crowns!!!…Four sample screen prints, Three dig-a-bits, Two swag orders, and A new deluxe edition for me.

On the ninth day of Digging Deep, this digger got to see…Nine crown photos…eight laughing locals …Seven ladies waiting…Six sheep-a-grazing…Five Golden Crowns!!!…Four sample screen prints, Three dig-a-bits, Two swag orders, and A new deluxe edition for me.

On the tenth day of Digging Deep, this digger got to see… Ten women on the rooftop…Nine crown photos…eight laughing locals …Seven ladies waiting…Six sheep-a-grazing…Five Golden Crowns!!!…Four sample screen prints, Three dig-a-bits, Two swag orders, and A new deluxe edition for me.

Ten women on the rooftop is a fitting picture to think about as we get very close to the end of the study. If the old covenant had been perfect there would no place have been sought for a new one (Hebrews 8:7). In no passage do we see the “better-ness” of our Christian covenant and our King Jesus, than in 2 Samuel 16, where David’s concubines on the rooftop were violated by his own son Absalom. What wretchedness that David even had concubines at the palace. What an awful state of things when his own son Absalom was willing to, at the counsel of Ahithophel, abuse them sexually in the sight of all of Israel. I hope you can ascertain here that the pinnacle of that house of the King was not at all like that of the House of our King, the church, today.  That rooftop was the point of instigation for David’s great fall with Bathsheba and it was the place of this heinous situation with the deserted concubines. I know, from this and other instances,  that you can see, with me, that David’s reign was far inferior to the reign of our King Jesus.  We praise Him for the perfection–the completeness–of our crowned sovereign! We anticipate being in the presence of our King through a perfect and endless reign!

 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Guest Writer: Leslie Hamby–“There is no ‘kinda’…”

Posted on June 25, 2024
This little excerpt from a pre-school/kindergarten  Bible class in Pulaski, Tennessee last Sunday is rich. I did NOT get permission from my friend Leslie Hamby to post this here, because I know Jake and Leslie well enough to know that anything that encourages people toward heaven is public domain. They are a light to me and to everyone who knows them. Their four little girls are rich and perfect blessings from God. Jake and Leslie are determined to give them all right back to Him! If you’d like top know Leslie, better, join us tonight  (7/25/24) at 7 CST for the Digging Deep podcast. She’ll be with me to discuss the rich and detailed study of David and Jesus as mighty prophets. I can’t wait. Here’s Leslie:
Yesterday, in my 4,5,K Bible class, we talked about the specific way that God had commanded the ark of the covenant to be moved. We then discussed King David’s plan to have it moved to Jerusalem, which led to Uzzah’s demise. I asked the kiddos if David and all the men moving the ark on the cart had obeyed God’s instructions. Somebody said “kinda…because they weren’t touching the ark.” Ellie Foster spoke up and said “There is no kinda. You either do or you don’t, and they didn’t.” She’s so right.
In our class, we have a little saying, “obey God’s way, today, all the way.” In other words- His way is the only way, don’t put off obeying to a day we’re not sure will come. Obey His will fully now.  I pray she’s always that convinced and convicted.
It didn’t matter that Uzzah’s attempt to save the ark from falling was a demonstration of his reverence or that his intentions were good. If he’d simply obeyed God’s instructions, he would never have been in that position to begin with. We too have to be careful that we’re relying on obeying His word and not on our own good intentions on our journey to THE capitol city.
Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Digging Deep Correction: 1 Samuel 27…Raids, not Roads.

Posted on March 18, 2024

The KJV in 1 Samuel 27:10 has Achish asking David “Whither have you made a road today?” More correct, for our vernacular today is “Where have you made a raid today?”  The latter is how almost all other translations state the question. 

The definition of the Hebrew phrase for made a road/raid is:

pâshaṭ, paw-shat’; a primitive root; to spread out (i.e. deploy in hostile array); by analogy, to strip (i.e. unclothe, plunder, flay, etc.):—fall upon, flay, invade, make an invasion, pull off, put off, make a road, run upon, rush, set, spoil, spread selves (abroad), strip (off, self).

So, David was pretending, to the king of the Philistines, that he was out gaining territories for the Philistines…raiding towns in Israel, when, in reality, he was killing and plundering the enemies of Israel…the sub-tribes of the Amalekites. 

Special thanks to Song Nicholas of the group in North Mississippi, for catching this. I try to dig in more than one version, but, for this question, apparently I was stuck in the KJV, which contains an obvious mistranslation of this phrase. 

Month 7, Question 12, should read:

When Achish thought David was making raids for the Philistine nation, he was actually empowering Israel by destroying key enemies that should have already been destroyed. What enemies did he kill and plunder? 

…And thanks for your patience with this fellow-digger!

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

DD: Have You Killed God’s Anointed One? (The Crown, Chapter 6)

Posted on February 29, 2024

In 1 Samuel 24, David had this amazing opportunity to kill his foe. Saul went into a cave to relieve himself. At the risk of being graphic, it looks as if, in doing this, that he was squatting or sitting. Afterward, he rose up. Before he did rise up, though, David, who was apparently already hiding in the cave, stealthily crept over and whacked off a piece of Saul’s clothing. 

Here we have the morally faltering king of Israel, caught by the one He’s zealously trying to kill—caught quite literally with his pants down—and finding that he was utterly at the mercy of David for his life in that cave. It’s an incredible story for your family Bible time!

You remember the reason for David’s restraint. He told his men, who wanted him to complete the fatal task, “I will not put out my hand against my lord, for he is the Lord’s anointed.”

The Lord’s anointed. David, the one revered by the Pharisees (and all Jewry) even today, would not put his hand on Saul’s life because He was God’s anointed. Yet the Pharisees lived in the Judean world with the most highly favored, anointed One that God had ever chosen (Acts 10:38). Jesus was prophet, priest, and King of kings. He was God. And the Pharisees could not wait to get Him to the Roman cross. Had it not been for the Roman rule over them (and the prophecies to be fulfilled), they would have likely killed King Jesus long before Calvary. They killed the anointed One.

You and I can do it, too.

Hebrews 6:4-6:

For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt.

Have you once been enlightened about the Lord? Do you know His story? Have you tasted salvation? Have you known just how good the Word of the Lord is in your life? Did you once rest in knowing the power and sovereignty of the anointed One?

What happened? Have you remained loyal to the Anointed? Or have you walked away? If you have walked away, as scores that I know have done in recent years, you have “put out your hand against the Lord’s anointed.”

You have crucified Him afresh.

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

DD…Let’s Not Skip Over Doeg!

Posted on February 28, 2024

I’d like to take the next couple of blog posts to tie up loose ends in the February Digging Deep study. We will talk more about the “persecution” aspect of the lives of David and the Messiah in March, but I wanted to notice a couple of things from Month 6 that are powerful in their applications for us. 

We had come to the end of our video podcast time before we even got a good mention of Doeg. Let’s take a minute with this incredibly destructive man and make some applications. His story is found in 1 Samuel 22:6ff. 

Doeg is the man who saw the priest, Ahimelech, give David the showbread from the holy place to eat as a common meal. He became a self-appointed spy for King Saul when he saw that exchange.  He saw Ahimelech give David the sword of Goliath that was in the “vault” under the protection of the priests at Nob. Ahimelech had been deceived by David to believe that David needed these things in the service of King Saul, when, in reality, David needed these things to protect himself from Saul. 

Doeg went directly back to Saul to report David’s confiscation of Goliath’s sword to Saul. Consequently Saul called for Ahimelech’s death. His footmen would not put their hand against the priest of the Lord. 

Once again, Doeg to Saul’s rescue! He ran the sword through 85 priests of God on that day. Eighty-five innocent anointed men perished at the hands of Saul, the sword being administered by Doug, that day! It’s hard to even think about the impaling of 85 men—the blood, the stench, the entrails, the cries of their families and then, the unthinkable…Nob’s women, children and animals were smitten and killed with the sword . There’s no telling how many people lost their lives that day at the hand of Saul, because of his envy of David. 

Who killed the innocent people that day? 

  1. David was involved. He chose to lie to Ahimelech about being in the service of Saul. (1 Samuel 21:2). David was also aware that Doeg was going to “tattle” to Saul (22:22). He knew he was going to tell the wrathful king. Yet, David continued on the self-protective path. David had a part in these deaths. David’s murder motive was self protection. (He was also ignoring the fact that God was/is sovereign and He would not allow the taking of the life of His anointed, himself—the future king of Israel.) We can also be sure that David, when the lie was told, did not envision the severe consequences. Mark it down: Sin is always worse than the sinner expects it to be. Oh, the devastation we could prevent, if we could think of this fact BEFORE the sin is committed.
  2. Saul killed these men, women and children. By command, he was directly responsible. His motive was wrath and envy against David. 
  3. Doeg killed these innocents. His motive was a desperate need for the approval of Saul. He was a small man. (A son of Esau—another man who could become very wrathful.)

The lesson for us is so clear. We can easily become complicit in destructive behaviors, even spiritual deaths. Every time we bend the truth, we elicit possible, even probable harm in the lives of other people…and we do it without any possible way of knowing how far our lie may go in its final consequence. 

Further, we don’t have to always be the one who is the direct tempter in order to be complicit in sin. When I fail to teach my children and they, in turn, influence others to do wrong or even to abandon the Lord, I am complicit. When I support my children in sin, I am complicit in their continuance in that sin—all the way to hell. I am complicit in their bringing others, possibly my grandchildren, with them to that ultimate tragedy. When I give my dollars to venues of sin I am complicit in the behaviors that result. When I am a leader in the church and I look the other way, rather than addressing, I am complicit. 

When I become too attached to any human being (thus unequally yoked—2 Corinthians 6:14-18) I become tempted to do things I might otherwise find unconscionable. I do not want any part of Doeg behavior on my conscience as I stand before the Lord on the final day. May I bypass all impressive people in my attempts to be pleasing and make my strong desire for approval to be ever heavenward. Then, in a providential turn, the people who are worth pleasing will be pleased with my life and choices.

God is so good to us in the examples of the Old Testament that are for our learning (1 Corinthians 10:11).