David driven from his home and throne by Absalom
David’s partiality for Absalom had yet other and more painful results, and heavy chastisements. It is painful to see the conqueror of Goliath driven from his home and his throne by his beloved son, and that under God’s hand. For if God had not allowed it, who could have driven God’s elect from the royal seat in which Jehovah had placed him? The sword was in his house; the Word of God, sharper than a two-edged sword. How just is Jehovah! But whom He loves He chastens. Accordingly, while all this is a manifestation of the righteous rule of God, it is to David an occasion of deep heart exercise, and of a more real and more intimate knowledge of God; for his heart was truly and eternally bound to God, so that all his sorrows bore fruit, although they were occasioned by his faults.
David’s confessions and humiliation expressed in the Psalms
In this respect also, although the cause of his grief was so widely different from that of the Lord’s grief, he becomes the type of Christ in suffering, and the vessel of the expression of His sympathy for His people. This is even so much more the case, because with a faithful heart, and in a certain sense with perfect integrity towards God, the king’s faults and transgressions gave rise to those confessions and to that humiliation which the Spirit of Christ will produce in the remnant of Israel; so that on the one hand he speaks of his integrity, while on the other he confesses his faults. Now that is what Christ causes His people to say, and what He says for them.
Nevertheless we must remember it is not David himself, as a godly man, who speaks in the Psalms; it is by the inspiration of the Spirit he utters them; and it is a very precious thing for us that, in circumstances where faith might fail and the heart be discouraged, the Word supplies us with language suitable to faith, and to faith in one who has perhaps been unfaithful: a precious testimony that, even in this condition, God does not cast us off, and that Christ sympathizes with us, since He furnishes us with expressions and sentiments adapted to such a condition.
The principle of the Psalms
The Psalms supply this, and in special suitability to the remnant of Israel in the last days. They are characterized by integrity of heart and confession of sin. The Spirit of Christ gives the sentiments, and assures of His sympathy. Psalm 16 gives us very strikingly this position of Christ. His goodness extends not to God. It is not His divine place, “equal with God,” which He is taking. He calls Jehovah His Lord; but of the saints on earth He says, “In whom is all my delight.” By His baptism, which was the expression of this, He connected Himself, not with Israel in their sin, but with the first movement of the Spirit responding in the remnant to the condemnation of the people as such. This is the principle of the Psalms-the upright and faithful man in the midst of the perverse nation, the object of the counsels and purposes of God. The book opens with this distinction drawn by God; it next presents us with the King in Zion according to the decree of God, rejected by the nation and hated by the heathen who oppress the people. All this develops itself through a variety of circumstances, and all the relationships of the remnant are there depicted, as well as all affections of the heart. All connected with it is gone over by the hand and the pen of God, and according to the Spirit and the sympathies of Christ.
David reestablished on his throne in peace
Chapter 20 ends this part of David’s history, and his history in general. He is reestablished on his throne, and has overcome the efforts of his enemies and the rebellion of his own people. The order of his court and officers is restored in peace. Sundry details are added by the Spirit of God.