TotD: King Training

This one will be fairly short.

Reading further into 1 Samuel we see David forced to leave court because Saul wants him dead. This causing David to go to some outskirts cities were those who are not liked by Saul become his men (400 and then 600 after they protect a city).

Eli is disgraced by his sons and his own indulgence in their wrongdoings, but he gets a new joy from the Lord in training Samuel.

Samuel is disgraced by the sins of his sons in their unfair judgments. He finds a new joy in training Saul.

Saul is disgraced by doing things a king, in God's Kingdom, has no right to do such as offering up sacrifices, his new joy in the Lord would not have come from a dynasty but from training David to be King.

Saul didn't do this, he was jealous of David.
David went into exile.

Saul begins to chase David instead of training him to be King.

God always finds a way to make what has to happen happen. In this case he sends a small community to David and David has to hide them from Saul and look after them. He even goes and rescues a nearby town from the looting of the Philistines, an act that could be seen as asserting his authority as King over Saul. God, in the wilds of the Judah and other Israeli hills, has David in a form of King training. All because Saul won't do it, for he is jealous.

Saul comes to do a poo in a cave David is hiding in in 1 Samuel 24. David cuts off a piece of his robe and follows him out of the cave and tells him he could have killed him, but look, he hasn't and doesn't intend too.
Far be it for him, a flea or a dead dog, to harm the Lord's anointed.

In Saul's response we get a picture of what things could have been like. Saul says that David is more righteous than he and will make a fine King for Israel. For a time, David and Saul are reconciled.

This can teach us something. When Saul was using the cave the men told David that the Lord had given Saul into David's hand and that he should kill him, which he was tempted to do. David did not do this and instead learned that God meant this encounter for another purpose. Reconciliation.
Saul pretty much apologised to David on that hill. We can learn something from this. Sometimes it looks like God has given us an opportunity to so something to boost ourselves; we need to check if that is in God's character and plan; killing Saul wouldn't have been good for David, although it appeared God had given him the opportunity to do so. God meant the opportunity to be one for reconciliation though. Perhaps there is something, or will be something similar in your life.