From what we have seen of Saul, it is clear that he wanted David for personal advantage; as an officer of or attendant upon the king, a member of his official family and one of his soldiers; the glory of Saul should shine more brightly because of David's killing the Philistine giant. With Jonathan it was different, although he was Saul's son; his soul was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul. There was a covenant between these two young men—the son of the rebellious king, and the one whom God had chosen, and who had been so wonderfully victorious over the enemy of Israel.
And Jonathan, lost in admiration of David, stripped himself of his robe (literally, mantle), and gave it to David, and his garments (literally, long robe), even to his sword and to his bow and to his girdle. David, we may say was everything to him; self was forgotten.
In Jonathan we see a foreshadowing of the remnant of Israel which clung to Jesus in the time of His rejection; but in his attachment to David is a lovely picture of the devotion of heart to Christ which should mark every one redeemed with His precious blood. Is He not the altogether lovely One, dear Christian reader, the alone worthy One, worthy of homage and of praise, exhaustless theme of heavenly songs? O, how our hearts should go out after the Lord! May it be so increasingly with us who love Him because He first loved us.
The rejoicing in Israel was however not to Saul's liking at all; he became very angry and presently undertook to kill David. So was it with David's antitype, the rejected Son of Man, when He trod this earth. The Jews hated Him, conspired to kill Him, took the guilt of His death. ("His blood be on us, and on our children" Matt. 27:2525Then answered all the people, and said, His blood be on us, and on our children. (Matthew 27:25)).
David was to learn by the things which he suffered to depend upon God alone. Painful indeed were the exercises of heart through which he passed after he was anointed to be king, and much of his distress is told in the Psalms. There too we find his subjection to God; the 23rd Psalm was written after David had been put through trial, and it has been of great comfort to many of God's people who have gone through difficulties.
Note that in the dangers and sorrows which beset David at this period, God was with him, though perhaps it did not look that way to him at times.
"The Lord was with him, and was departed from Saul" (verse 12).
"And David behaved himself wisely in all his ways, and the Lord was with him" (verse 14). "And Saul saw and knew that the Lord was with 'David." (verse 28).