SERIES: Leadership in Hard Times
The Wilderness: A Difficult but Wonderful Place
SPEAKER: Michael P. Andrus
Introduction: I have a strange fascination with the wilderness–whether you’re talking about the rainforest of Brazil or the barren mountains of Sinai or the Badlands of South Dakota. I love getting away from the trappings of civilization and enjoying nature as God created it. If I could spend a month anywhere in the world, I would probably choose southern Utah. There are places there where you can drive for 60 miles and not see a single sign of civilization other than the road you’re on. And when you go off-road, you find yourself experiencing exactly what native Americans experienced 500 or 1000 years ago. There is something wild and wonderful about the canyons, the rock monuments, and the desert shrubbery. I feel more alive, closer to God and more open to His voice in the wilderness than anywhere else.
David knew a lot about the wilderness–not by choice but by necessity. The murderous jealousy of King Saul drove him into the wilderness. In my trips to the Holy Land, I’ve had the privilege of visiting the Cave of Adullam and several other wilderness spots identified as David’s hideouts in 1 Samuel, and they frankly aren’t that different from the high desert of Utah.
Of course, it is one thing to visit the wilderness as I do, with a cooler in the back of a 4-wheel vehicle and a cellphone on my hip, and it’s quite another to survive on foot while being chased by a mortal enemy. That’s how David experienced the wilderness. And it wasn’t for just a few days, or even a month; he was in survival mode for years as he tried to escape from the deranged King Saul. But despite the difficulties he faced, David too found the wilderness to be a wonderful place, a place where he came to know the living God in a way that would have been otherwise impossible. Many of his most profound and powerful Psalms, as we are going to see this morning, were written while in the wilderness.
I want to talk about the wilderness today as a difficult but wonderful place. But we’re not going to focus on the topography of the wilderness, because that’s almost incidental. We’re going to focus instead on the various kinds of trials David encountered there. We are likely to face every one of these trials at some point in our lives, no matter what the topography where we live.
We’re going to start in 1 Samuel 21 where we find that David’s first stop in the wilderness was the little town of Nob.
David at Nob: The wilderness of physical deprivation (21:1-9, Psalm 23)
You know, you can learn a lot about a person by observing where they turn in times of trouble. When David first ran from Saul, he headed straight for the prophet Samuel at Ramah (19:18-24). This time he goes to Nob because there was a sanctuary there, presided over by Ahimelech the priest. Having barely escaped from Saul’s last effort to kill him, David and his small band of brothers need rations and weapons. So, he comes out of the hills alone and approaches Ahimelech seeking food. Ahimelech is skeptical as to why David is traveling alone, for he is well-known as a member of the king’s court by this time. David dispels the suspicion by claiming to be on a secret mission for the king.
Ahimelech has no ordinary bread to give to David; he has only consecrated bread–sort of like communion bread. But he gives that to David because of the urgency of the situation. (Jesus, by the way, refers to this incident in Matthew 12. His disciples were hungry and stopped to pick some heads of grain on the Sabbath. When the Pharisees saw this, they complained to Jesus, but He answered, “Haven’t you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread–which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests.” Under normal circumstances, Jesus implies, you shouldn’t generally break religious rules, but people are more important than things, and one must live by the spirit of the Law, not the letter). David also asks Ahimelech if he has any weapons he can borrow. As it turns out, the sword David had once used to cut off Goliath’s head is sitting in a museum there at the sanctuary, and Ahimelech gives it to David.
The point I would like to draw from this little vignette is that we too may experience a wilderness of physical deprivation. For us it is probably not going to be caused by hunger or a lack of ammunition. It will more likely come in the form of financial disaster or a medical emergency or loss of employment. Sometimes these trials come one on top of another and can be overwhelming. The world calls it “bad luck,” but that is the vocabulary of fatalism, not faith. If there is a sovereign God, what others call “luck” is really His providence being worked out according to His perfect plan.
But why does God include the wilderness of physical deprivation as part of His plan? Sometimes it may be discipline for disobedience in our lives. But more often, I think, God brings trials across our paths to test our metal and strengthen us for what lies ahead. David, for sure, was not experiencing hunger in the wilderness because of sin in his life; on the contrary, he was there because he was a righteous man running from a wicked king. But all the while God was preparing Him for greater service. Brokenness, as a matter of fact, is a requirement for exceptional service, and there’s no place like the wilderness to experience brokenness.
I don’t know when David wrote the 23rd Psalm, but this and many other Psalms provide his answer to the wilderness of physical deprivation:
The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters,
he restores my soul.
He guides me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil, for you are with me;
your rod and your staff, they comfort me.
You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.
Do you know the Lord as your shepherd, your guide, your protector, your provider? He’s always available when you find yourself in the wilderness of physical deprivation. He may not relieve the pain immediately, but He will walk with you through it and teach you lessons you probably could learn in no other way.
David’s second wilderness stop is Gath, and here he enters the wilderness of fear and shame.
David at Gath: The wilderness of fear and shame (21:10-15, Psalm 56)
Gath is a city, one of the five cities of the Philistines, so it is not wilderness in the ordinary sense of the term. But it is certainly a spiritual wilderness. David is looking for a place to survive, and he is counting on the old saying that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Since the Philistines are at war with Saul, and since Saul is trying to kill David, he is hopeful that the Philistines will accept him and provide him sanctuary.[i]
But no sooner does he arrive than advisors to Achish, king of Gath, raise an alarm. “Don’t you know who this is? This is David, a tribal chieftain of our enemy, Israel. This is the guy about whom the women sing: ‘Saul has slain his thousands and David his tens of thousands.’” This is now the second time this song has gotten David into trouble, but it won’t be the last. We read in verse 12:
“David took these words to heart and was very much afraid of Achish king of Gath. So he pretended to be insane in their presence; and while he was in their hands (in their custody) he acted like a madman, making marks on the doors of the gate and letting saliva run down his beard.”
Well, David must have been a pretty good actor, because the ruse worked. There is a fair amount of humor in the next paragraph:
“Achish said to his servants, ‘Look at the man! He is insane! Why bring him to me? Am I so short of madmen that you have to bring this fellow here to carry on like this in front of me?’”
Achish has his quota of numbskulls around him. He doesn’t need one more, so he dismisses David as a harmless nutcase.
I see two trials here for David: fear and shame. He is genuinely afraid for his life because he has been identified as an enemy and is in the custody of the ruthless Philistines. But then to escape he resorts to a shameful deception. There are times when we, too, will encounter the wilderness of fear, and perhaps even of shame. The fear may be caused by an enemy or by a circumstance that overwhelms us. We may be sidelined by the fear of the unknown, or maybe the fear of failure. And sometimes to escape from fear we will do shameful things. Forgetting that God is for us, we may choose to fight fear in our own power.
I have counseled with young people who had such a fear of loneliness that they would violate every moral standard they held deeply just to obtain or keep a relationship. I know adults who have such a fear of poverty that they will do shameful things to gain financial security. And I know people of every age who have such a fear of being hurt that they will hide who they really are from everyone else so that no one can ever love them deeply enough to hurt them.
There is a Psalm David wrote at the time he was in the custody of the Philistines in Gath. I want you to turn to it with me–Psalm 56. The headings of the Psalms are very ancient, and in the absence of good evidence to the contrary, I think we should assume they are historical. This one says that David wrote it “when the Philistines had seized him at Gath.”
“Be merciful to me, O God, for men hotly pursue me;
all day long they press their attack.
My slanderers pursue me all day long;
many are attacking me in their pride.”
That describes the situation, but then David gives the answer to fear, and it seems obvious that he has learned a lesson. He doesn’t tell us, “When you find yourself in a fearful situation, act like an idiot as I did at Gath.” He now says, instead,
“When I am afraid, I will trust in you.
In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust; I will not be afraid.
What can mortal man do to me?”
The appropriate response when facing the wilderness of fear and shame is to trust in God. Put your faith in His Word. Recognize that no mortal man can shave one day off your life, because your days were all numbered in God’s book before one of them came to be (Psalm 139:16), and no one can guide or defend you like He can, because He is our light and our shield (Psalm 27:1, 28:7).
The next stop in the wilderness finds David at the Cave of Adullam.
David at Adullam: The wilderness of difficult relationships (22:1-2; Psalm 57)
Chapter 22 opens with these words:
“David left Gath and escaped to the Cave of Adullam. When his brothers and his father’s household heard about it, they went down to him there. All those who were in distress or in debt or discontented gathered around him, and he became their leader. About four hundred men were with him.”
Sometimes in the wilderness you meet weird people—people who are either escaping reality or running from responsibility. The men who gather around David at the Cave of Adullam include those who are oppressed, in debt, or otherwise bitter at the cards they have been dealt.
I imagine David said to himself more than once, “What did I do to earn friends like these? I can hardly feed myself and my family, and then 400 needy people of every sort find their way to my cave.” I suspect he wanted to say, “Buzz off!” But he didn’t. David seemed to have a unique ability to face a situation with the attitude, “Well, I’m not sure what God has in mind here, but he brought these people around me, so I’m going to make the best of it.” And David begins to introduce some discipline and responsibility into this rag-tag group. Before long he has a band of loyal fighters who are willing to lay down their lives for him–a personal army that becomes an important ingredient throughout his rule over Israel.
Every one of us will enter the wilderness of difficult relationships from time to time. We may encounter what are sometimes called VDP’s–very draining people, individuals who are emotionally needy and tend to drain every ounce of energy from us. We can blow them off, or we can tell them off, or we can say, “OK, God, I don’t know why you brought this person into my life, but show me how to love them well, as you do.”
I know that I personally tend to give up on people too soon. I value hard work, discipline, and competency; I disdain laziness and carelessness. But what I have had to learn over the years (and I’m still learning it) is that these values of mine have a lot to do with the fact that I tend to be a perfectionist and a workaholic, and these are not necessarily godly characteristics. I need to give people a lot more leeway to be who God created them to be. If they don’t measure up to my standards, they may yet measure up to God’s, and that’s more important.
There is another Psalm of David, the superscription of which tells us it was written “at the time David fled from Saul into the cave”–Psalm 57. We cannot be certain this is the Cave of Adullam because David lived in several caves, but there is much here that fits the Adullam experience. Look particularly at verse 4:
“I am in the midst of lions; I lie among ravenous beasts–
men whose teeth are spears and arrows, whose tongues are sharp swords.”
I have a feeling that David is not talking about the enemies who drove him to the cave in the wilderness, but rather about the motley crew that has gathered around him. And what is his response to being surrounded by these troubled relationships? He says in verse 1:
“Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me,
for in you my soul takes refuge.
I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings.”
When surrounded by difficult relationships, David takes refuge in the mercy of God. He also finds strength in praise. Twice, in verse 5 and again in verse 11, he says: “Be exalted, O God, above the heavens; let your glory be over all the earth.” I think that’s still the wisest approach for us to take when facing troubled relationships–appeal to God’s mercy and find strength in praise.
David at Mizpah: The wilderness of family responsibility (22:3-5; Psalm 63)
Look at chapter 22, verse 3:
“From there (the cave of Adullam?) David went to Mizpah in Moab and said to the king of Moab, ‘Would you let my father and mother come and stay with you until I learn what God will do for me?’ So he left them with the King of Moab, and they stayed with him as long as David was in the stronghold.
As long as David was running from Saul, his family was at risk. Saul was the kind of king who wouldn’t hesitate to use David’s family as pawns to get to him. If he could kidnap David’s parents, for example, he could hold them ransom, forcing David to surrender. So, David has the added burden of trying to find a safehouse for his folks.
Few of us will ever face the exact situation David is facing here, but virtually all of us will find ourselves at some point in the wilderness of family responsibility. It will more likely be the responsibility of rearing young children or caring for aged parents or both, but these situations can also seem like a wilderness. The needs and demands on our time and emotional energy can be enormous.
Psalm 63 says it was written “when David was in the desert of Judah.” We can’t be sure, but this may have been right after his agreement with the king of Moab to protect his parents, for immediately following that account in 1 Samuel 22, we read in verse 5: “But the prophet Gad said to David, ‘Do not stay in the stronghold. Go into the land of Judah.’”
At any rate, this Psalm opens with very powerful words of submission to God and trust in Him:
“O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you,
in a dry and weary land where there is no water.”
That’s the kind of total dependence on God we need when we are facing overwhelming family responsibility. There are times when we are totally helpless in and of ourselves. If God doesn’t do something, the situation would be hopeless. But frankly, that’s not a bad place to be. That’s where David found himself, and he survived. In fact, he prospered.
David in the forest of Hereth: The wilderness of false guilt (22:5-23, Psalm 52)
In chapter 22:5 we read, “The prophet Gad said to David, ‘Do not stay in the stronghold (Moab). Go into the land of Judah.’ So David left and went to the forest of Hereth.” This is where David is when the rest of the story of Ahimelech and the priests of Nob unfolds. Back in chapter 21, verse 7, we were told that while David was talking to Ahimelech, there was a sinister figure lurking in the shadows of the sanctuary. His name is Doeg (the name even sounds evil, doesn’t it?), and he is an Edomite and Saul’s head shepherd. We don’t hear of him again until chapter 22:9 when Saul is holding a pity party, complaining to his officials that his intelligence services are failing to give him accurate information about David’s whereabouts.
Doeg sees an opportunity to gain favor with Saul, so he tells him what he saw that day at the sanctuary at Nob when Ahimelech gave food and the sword of Goliath to David. This leads, tragically, to the slaughter of all 85 priests at Nob, plus their wives and children and animals. In fact, Doeg is the one who carries out the execution, because Saul’s soldiers refuse to participate in the dastardly deed.
Only one priest escapes from Nob, and he comes and tells David what happened. And David’s response is essentially, “I saw Doeg there the day I was at the sanctuary. I knew he was up to no good. I am responsible for the deaths of all these people.” Tremendous guilt was experienced by David, but it was false guilt. David had no way of knowing what Doeg would do.
There are times when we will face the wilderness of false guilt. We will be overwhelmed by either the knowledge or the suspicion that we could have done more than we did, and harm has come to others as a result. This has been a common experience among those firefighters and policemen who survived 9/11 in New York City. Because they were unable to save their colleagues a huge burden of guilt has overcome many of them. I’ve seen the same thing in parents whose children have suffered abuse; they will flagellate themselves for not protecting their children better. I know a man who was a victim of a con artist and saw his family’s financial security vanish–and guilt overcame him.
I think Psalm 52 is instructive here, particularly when we feel guilty for harm that has come to others because of our actions or even inaction. This Psalm has a superscription that tells us it was written “when Doeg the Edomite had gone to Saul and told him: ‘David has gone to the house of Ahimelech.’” Notice that David has gotten over his self-blame and he now puts the blame right where it belongs:
Why do you boast of evil, you mighty man?
Why do you boast all day long, you who are a disgrace in the eyes of God?
Your tongue plots destruction; it is like a sharpened razor, you who
practice deceit.
You love evil rather than good, falsehood rather than speaking the truth.
You love every harmful word, O you deceitful tongue!
Surely God will bring you down to everlasting ruin;
He will snatch you up and tear you from your tent;
he will uproot you from the land of the living.
I find this Psalm very instructive for times when we are suffering from false guilt. We can be honest with God and put the blame where it belongs. The firefighters can blame the terrorists, not themselves. The mother can blame the molester, not herself. The man can blame the con artist, not himself. They can be confident that God will eventually bring the wicked to justice, and the righteous will eventually be vindicated. Furthermore, it’s OK to express our anger to God and to even ask Him to judge the wicked.
David at Keilah and Horesh: The wilderness of betrayal (23:1-29, Psalm 54, 55)
Chapter 23 tells the story of David’s experience at two places called Keilah and Horesh. In both places he experienced betrayal. Quickly let me tell you the story of Keilah. David got the message that the Philistines were attacking a little Israelite town called Keilah. He inquired of God and God told him to go and save Keilah. His men didn’t want to do it, but David once again inquired of the Lord, got the same answer, and so he did it. We are told, “He inflicted heavy losses on the Philistines and saved the people of Keilah” (23:5b).
The betrayal came into play when Saul got word that David was at Keilah. David worried that Saul would come and massacre the people of Keilah, as he had done at Nob. So again, he inquired of the Lord, and the Lord warned him that if he stayed there the citizens of Keilah would betray him to Saul even though he had saved them from the Philistines. So, David, forewarned by God, left and went to Desert of Ziph to a town called Horesh. We are told in 14b that “Day after day Saul searched for him, but God did not give David into his hands.” It was here, by the way, that Jonathan and David rendezvoused for the last time, and here it is that Jonathan helped David find strength in God.
But at Horesh David was betrayed again. Listen to chapter 23:19ff:
The Ziphites went up to Saul at Gibeah and said, “Is not David hiding among us in the strongholds at Horesh, on the hill of Hakilah, south of Jeshimon? Now, O king, come down whenever it pleases you to do so, and we will be responsible for handing him over to the king.”
The only thing that kept Saul from capturing him was a report that came to Saul that the Philistines had sent a raiding party, and Saul had to abandon his search for David to protect his flank.
The wilderness of betrayal is one of the most difficult we can face. David talks about it in Psalm 54 and 55. The superscription of Psalm 54 tells us that it was written, “when the Ziphites had gone to Saul and said, ‘Is not David hiding among us?’” Listen now to the opening words of this Psalm:
“Save me, O God, by your name; vindicate me by your might.
Hear my prayer, O God; listen to the words of my mouth.
Strangers are attacking me; ruthless men seek my life–men without regard
for God.”
But it is the next Psalm that really gets to the heart of betrayal–Psalm 55:12-14:
“If an enemy were insulting me, I could endure it;
if a foe were raising himself against me, I could hide from him.
But it is you, a man like myself, my companion, my close friend,
with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship as we walked with the
throng at the house of God.”
A man was sharing with me just this past week about an employee of his who attended this church and who betrayed him. This was someone who was given a job when he was desperate, who was taught the business, who then began to secretly bid on jobs against his own employer, and even used his boss’s equipment to service those clients. Unbelievable! There’s pain whenever anyone betrays us, but when it is done by a friend or by a family member, the betrayal is hurtful to the extreme.
What’s the answer? The Psalm goes on in verse 16: “But I call to God and the Lord saves me.” Again, in verse 22 we read, “Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you; He will never let the righteous fall…. As for me, I trust in you.”
Conclusion: The wilderness has many faces and takes many forms. We have seen at least six different kinds of trials in this short period of David’s life–that of physical deprivation, fear and shame, difficult relationships, family responsibility, false guilt, and betrayal.
The wilderness can be a difficult place–lonely, fearful, and threatening. But it can also be a wonderful experience, where the distractions of a busy life are minimal, where we are often alone with God, and where we find that the faith we say we have is real. When we accept grief and distress as faith’s frequent companions, then our faith becomes our bedrock. And that bedrock births the authority to lead, which is, of course, God’s plan all along.
Gene Edwards writes of David’s sufferings in a powerful fictional account called A Tale of Three Kings. One of David’s rebel band, now an old soldier, tells a questioning young man how David’s rule started.
“The clearest memory I have of my king, when we lived in the caves, is that his was a life of submission…. David taught me losing, not winning. Giving, not taking. He showed me that the leader, not the follower, is inconvenienced. David shielded us from suffering; he did not mete it out…. David had authority, but I don’t think that fact ever occurred to him. We were six hundred no-goods with a leader who cried a lot. That’s all we were!” [ii]
But that was a lot. I would rather be a no-good following a leader like David than to be a general in Saul’s army. Edwards calls David “the greatest hymn writer and the greatest comforter of broken hearts this world shall ever know.”[iii] With a bowed head and a grateful heart, I thank God for the wilderness experiences of David, which help make my wilderness experiences tolerable and even profitable.
DATE: August 1, 2004
Tags:
Fear
Shame
False guilt
Betrayal
[i] This is exactly what happens later on in chapter 27 during David’s second experience with Achish. We read in 27:12 that “Achish trusted David and said to himself, ‘He has become so odious to his people, the Israelites, that he will be my servant forever.’”
[ii] Gene Edwards, A Tale of Three Kings, 49-50.
[iii] Edwards, 30.