Lecture 7 - United Kingdom

[Music] [Music] who was my keys a deck where he come from the book of Revelation just scares me does anybody really understand all those symbols the judges like do they really matter I've never understood which book came first is there a way to read the Bible so makes sense [Music] we'd like to welcome you to our Father's plan it's good to have you with us I'm Jeff Cavins and I'm here with dr. Scott Hahn distinguished professor from Franciscan University and I might add a very good friend of mine he's had a quite an influence in my life and bringing me back to the Catholic Church as I'm sure many of you have heard his tapes you've read his book Rome sweet home well we're in the midst of a series our fathers plan and we're investigating the scriptures we're reading through the Bible together and we're discovering that our Father does indeed have a plan for us so we're excited that you have joined us today if you'd like to read through the Bible with us we are reading through using a little memory device and you can call the right EWTN to find out how you can obtain your own Bible timeline band simply a little memory device to help you read through the Bible there's 73 books in the Bible and we broke it down into 14 historical books to take you through in chronological order we're going through 12 historical periods so if you'd like to obtain yours go ahead and give us a call here at EWTN right now we're on the purple bead we're approaching the sixth and seventh historical book that's first and second Samuel and before we get into that we're gonna talk a little bit about judges where we left and we're going into first and second Samuel now what's called the United Kingdom but you know dr. Hahn if viewers are there listening right now and they're saying I don't have a Bible I've never read the Bible but I would like to from what you have said in the past programs I'm excited I want to get into it as a Catholic what do we have as far as options well there are a lot of options and I would say don't look for the perfect version because no version is perfect in terms of English translations but there are lots of good ones if you have the old Douay Rheims that might do you're just really fine the confraternities are two older versions that many Catholics have around and they'll pick up and find that they're readable and reliable the most common bible now for catholics in english translation is the new american bible that's also a good one there's the Jerusalem Bible the one I recommend most highly is the Revised Standard Version Catholic that the Ignatius press puts out for instance under the name the Ignatius Bible it's also available through scepter press in Princeton New Jersey and I think it's probably the most most consistently reliable translation for my money that's good so people can go to their local Catholic bookstore look in the Yellow Pages find a Catholic bookstore and go and obtain a copy right and if you're looking for study tools I'd also like to recommend the Navara Study Bible or just it's really the Navara Bible it isn't one volume yet it's actually twelve volumes that covers the entire New Testament kind of all voluntary exactly all 27 books of the New Testament are covered in 12 volumes you have the Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition on the top of the page and then you also have commentary taken from the writings of the early church fathers Church councils commentaries by the doctors of the church and lots of other sources that apply the scriptures to your own everyday life and open up the Word of God to for your contemplation I think it's important to say also that once you obtain a Bible you know somebody asked me one time what's the best Bible translation and the best Bible translation is the one you'll read you know you need you need to get into it once you buy a Bible don't just set it down on the coffee table begin to read it it might seem a little bit difficult at first but you know over the months and over the years you become you get to a point where you discover your Father's plan right and if you have two or three versions maybe even four I find that whenever I want to get in close to a passage I will look at the translation of that text through the lenses of two or three or maybe four or five translations and you always get an interesting insight by looking at different translations that's great well let's get into our study we we left off in our last program talking about the book of Judges and we want to sort of build a bridge between the book of Judges or the period of the judges now we're going to move into the United Kingdom now we we talk about people like Saul and David and Solomon and so why don't you build a bridge for us it well actually the the text of the Old Testament does it for us because the closing verse of the book of Judges is verse judges 21:25 in those days there was no king in Israel every man did what was right in his own eyes and that isn't the first time that sentence is found in the book of Judges in fact it's used as a continual refrain in judges 17:6 eighteen one nineteen one and here twenty one twenty five four times this verse appears in the book of Judges as a warning signal the things are not alright in Israel because there's a lack of holy leadership and there is also a lack of fulfillment with respect to the Covenant of Deuteronomy that we discussed so much in the last few weeks the Deuteronomic covenant led you know stipulated that Israel should go into the Promised Land and conquer it but in the process of conquering it and gaining arrest they should also expect the rise of kingship and we can get into the various reasons why they would expect that later on but the absence of a king represents the absence of holy leadership and so the judges were only an interim measure in effect who weren't they were capable of bringing together the unity and solidarity that God wanted to see in his family which really isn't which isn't established until the rise of David in 2nd Samuel so that's the bridge that the scripture itself provides us that's great so we're going to take a look at the book of 1st Samuel and 2nd Samuel and we're gonna be back in just a moment and I'm gonna kind of give you an overview of this historical period the United Kingdom we're gonna take a look at Saul we're gonna take a look at David and we're gonna take a look at Solomon it's an interesting period it's a fascinating period and I'm sure you're going to enjoy it we'll be back right after this [Music] welcome back to our Father's plan in this segment of the program we're going to take a look at the period of the United Kingdom if you look behind me on our 14 chronological books of the Bible chart right now we are going to be looking at book 6 and 7 that's 1st and 2nd Samuel so out of the 14 chronological books or the 14 historical books that take us through the Bible in chronological order we're on number 6 and 7 now if you look on the other chart with me here on our Bible timeline we are in the United Kingdom period this comes right after judges and this is an interesting period in Bible history we're gonna be taking a look at King Saul and King David and also King David's son King Solomon it's an interesting period the period of the judges ended with as dr. Hahn just mentioned a few moments ago everyone did what was right in his own sight at the end of the book of Judges there was a man by the name of Samuel God raised up Samuel for that time he's really considered the 13th judge well Samuels sons were also judges but they didn't serve the Lord they didn't have a heart like their father Samuel and as a result of that we turned to the book of 1st Samuel chapter 8 where the people of Israel after a couple of centuries of living in city-states and dealing with their enemies and going through this cycle of sin they finally cry out and they say we want a king we want a ruler we want someone who will rule over us you remember back in our study a couple segments ago if you were with us Deuteronomy chapter 17 said that God had made provisions for a king but these people wanted a king like all the other nations they wanted the right thing but for the wrong reasons they wanted a king to rule over them which was right but they wanted a king like all of the other nations well this bothered the prophet Samuel would call Samuel a prophet and a judge it bothered him he was he was hurt by this and God spoke to Samuel and he said Samuel this isn't against you this is against me but then God warned Samuel to warn the people he told Samuel to warn the people about really about two things he told them to warn them about a king number one they're gonna cry out once they have a king like all the other nations they're gonna cry out and God will not hear and second of all he warned them about the manner of a king the manner of a king is this Samuel said if you want a king this is what's gonna take place he's gonna use you for manpower and for his own military number one number two he's gonna take your land he's gonna take your land he's gonna use it number three he's gonna tax you it's gonna take taxes from you a tenth for the purposes of running the kingdom and number four he's gonna take your sons and daughters and they're gonna become bakers and and they're going to come into the Kings into the Kings service and the people said well we want a king we want a king and so that brings us to the United Kingdom period the first king of Israel was King Saul from the tribe of Benjamin and it's sort of a political move also because the tribe of Benjamin was right in the middle of the country very small tribe but very powerful tribe and it acted as a sort of a peacemaking tool between some of the other tribes that weren't getting along between the north and the south of Israel well Samuel anoints King Saul but King Saul doesn't work out he has a rough job his job is to unite the kingdom and he has a couple of downfalls he's disobedient and as a result of that the kingdom is is wrenched out of his hands and is given to someone who has a heart after God and that someone was King David the son of Jesse the great-grandson of Boaz and Ruth remember back in the book of Judges we studied them well King David was anointed privately as the new king of Israel and after King David was anointed he then had this incident where he fought Goliath you probably remember the story very famous story of David and Goliath the underdog takes on the champion any wins well at that point everybody in Israel is excited about David David they said that Saul has killed his thousands and David his ten thousands well this drove Saul crazy and at that point he wanted to kill David well David ended up ruling from Hebron for about seven and a half years and then later on he ruled over all of Israel for 33 years for a total of 40 it's an easy way to remember the United Kingdom period it's 120 years Saul reigned 40 years David reigned 40 years and then his son Solomon reigned 40 years for a total of 120 well David was a powerful King and David expanded the kingdom and then God made a covenant with with God God made a covenant with David and this is the fifth of our covenants as we study through the Bible you may remember back from earlier shows we talked about Abraham and Jeb's Genesis chapter 12 where God made three promises to Abraham land a royal dynasty in a worldwide blessing well the second promise has been upgraded by a covenant in Genesis chapter 17 a covenant of circumcision and it's fulfilled with David here in 1st Samuel actually in 1st and 2nd Samuel were covering both of those books well David's reign came to an end and his son Solomon was next in line Solomon was going to be the next king of of Israel and Solomon had the job not of expanding the kingdom but of maintaining the kingdom he was maintaining the kingdom and he undertook a couple of very very aggressive building projects number one was to build a temple for God and for God to dwell in a permanent temple in Deuteronomy it talked about in chapter 12 the the place that David that the children of Israel were to come across the river and that they were to establish God's dwelling into the place and that's Jerusalem well Solomon built that temple took him seven years he also built a palace for himself that took 13 years to build well Solomon was the wisest man in the world people came from all over the world to talk to Solomon but Solomon had a problem and that is that he really disobeyed the rule of the king and what a king should be involved in you see when we start reading about Solomon in the book of first kings we see that he has a downfall he has a downfall he made many alliances with other countries but with these alliances came many marriages and he had hundreds hundreds of wives and concubines as a result of this the wives brought in foreign religions into Israel and so while Solomon started off very great he ended in disaster and he was very rough on the people he did everything to the people that Samuel said a king would do the tax using their children the land and so forth very difficult on the people and the people grew disheartened they were disgruntled over this situation and this is going to lead to our next period which is the the divided Kingdom now we've given you sort of an overview of this period we're going to come back in just a moment and we're gonna talk to dr. hon dr. Scott Hahn he's going to go into some of these concepts of theological concepts that we need to explore in this period so we'll be back right after this [Music] welcome back to our Father's plan well we just gave you a little bit of an overview of what we call the United Kingdom period which takes the books of 1st Samuel and 2nd Samuel and a little bit of first kings and that tells us a little bit about these three major Kings and that's King Saul and King David and King Solomon and once again we want to welcome dr. Han with us we're gonna discuss this period this is a fun period we know and when you're a child reading Bible stories or you're at church and you hear all these different Bible stories you hear about King Saul in the great battles you hear about David and Goliath you hear about Solomon in the temple it's there's so much happening in 1st 2nd Samuel and kings and what we want to do is focus in on a few of the the major themes of this period yeah this really is Israel's Golden Age and oftentimes we idealize it and in fact there's a lot of evidence to suggest that this was idealized and antiquity by the Jews themselves held up as a kind of prototype of the coming kingdom of Messiah and with good reason but as you mentioned you know there are lots of very human elements a lot of you know sins being committed by all of these these heroic figures all along the way what I like to do now is in shifting from the chronological to the theological perspective I'd like to take a step backwards and look at where the Davidic covenant falls in the overall scheme of salvation history because as we as we've seen this is the fifth and really the final covenant that God makes with his people in the Old Testament this is the this is the covenant that really sets the stage for the new covenant that Jesus ratifies going back to the beginning we have a marriage covenant with Adam and then we had the household covenant with Noah we had a tribal covenant with Abraham then we had a national covenant with Israel which is God's family but now all of a sudden Israel is no longer just simply a nation God has elevated Israel to the status or to the level of being a kingdom now you might think what's the difference between being a kingdom or being a nation well I Kingdom is a nation that rules other nations and city-states and islands and colonies and so on so at this point in time God has taken Israel his firstborn son remember from exodus 422 the father has taken Israel this firstborn son nation and elevated it to a stature where it can really begin to exercise greater influence over the Gentile nations precisely because he has found a man in David a man after his own heart through whom he can work to bring these nations back to the realization that God is their father back to the to the the glorious discovery that they are called to be part of God's own covenant family so if you look at it this way you can see just how climactic the Davidic covenant really is it's also helpful to remember how in the third covenant the covenant with Abraham we saw that one covenant broken down into three parts you can almost detect three distinctive covenants that God makes with Abraham there in Genesis 15 in Genesis 17 and in Genesis 22 in 15 it was a covenant regarding the land a covenant that's already been fulfilled now through the Mosaic Covenant because through Moses and Joshua and the judges the land that God promised has now been delivered so God has proven good on that promise the second covenant that he made with Abraham was in Genesis 17 the Covenant of circumcision and their God specifies Canaan as the land in which Abraham's seed will bring forth royal kingship so now at last in the period of the kings and especially with the covenant that God makes with David you have the fulfillment of this second this penultimate the second to last covenant that he established with Abraham this anticipates of course Genesis 22 because it was in this chapter that God swore a covenant oath with Abraham as an award as his grant to reward him for passing the test of obedience he had called Abraham to offer up your only son the son whom you love so Abraham offered up his only beloved son Isaac as a Holocaust that's the technical term for it as a sacrifice there atop Moriah god interrupts that sacrifice and the aims of the Lord says he declares this covenant oath I swear by myself says the Lord that through your seed the seed of Abraham all the nations of the earth will be blessed now something similar is going to be sounded now in the Covenant that God establishes with David because the Davidic covenant points forward to the fulfillment of this third Abrahamic covenant in Genesis 22 because ultimately it isn't just the seed of Abraham that will bless the nation's it's also going to be the seed of David or the son of David so we have this continuous family line that the covenant genealogies trace for us so that the world might know where to look to find the Messiah the Savior the Redeemer the one who is going to bring the blessing of God the Father to the entire family of Nations the Abrahamic seed and the Davidic sea that's interesting because we right when you said that it reminded me of the way the whole New Testament opens up in Matthew chapter 1 now the opening version the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ remember the Toledo indeed the the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ the Son of David the son of Abraham so what you're saying is really important you're giving us a like a superstructure or a framework using covenants throughout salvation history and you're saying that the covenants are really key and the covenants must be seen in the in the context of family and a God is a worldwide family yeah this goes back to the very foundational themes of the entire series our fathers plan set out a few basic themes for instance God as her father this becomes explicit in 2nd Samuel 7 I will be his father he will be my son but not just God as father but salvation as divine sonship nowhere else is this explicitly given by God to an individual prior to the Covenant that he seals with the son of David in 2nd Samuel 7 verse 14 so the gift of divine sonship as the salvation is really unveiled here in this period of salvation history more explicitly more clearly more profoundly than anywhere else exciting the Third Point was that the Covenant really is the overarching theme of the Bible and the key for interpreting salvation history well if that's the case then we shouldn't be surprised that studying the continuity of God's covenant plan is what makes the most sense out of the significance of the davidic period of the rise of kingship the fourth principle the further the fourth foundational principle was that the church is the the family of God and the culmination or climax of salvation history and we're gonna see in fact I would suggest our primary focus ought to be on how the Davidic Kingdom was established not by David not by Solomon but by God himself to serve a very important albeit limited purpose the purpose the theological purpose of the Davidic Kingdom was that for 1,000 years for an entire millennium the Davidic millennium God would set up on earth a prototype of the real kingdom that he truly wishes to establish with us the Kingdom of Heaven the heavenly Jerusalem where the son of David Jesus Christ reigns as our heavenly high priest and King I think that's an important point to bring out again at this point with David we're talking about 1000 BC approach right we're about a thousand BC and just say that again what you just said about there the millennia for 1000 years God has a covenant purpose for Jerusalem especially but for the Davidic line here in Jerusalem through the the dynastic line of David God is establishing an earthly model or prototype of the coming kingdom that the real son of David is going to establish okay namely the Messiah because Jesus is going to take this prototype this earthly model and fulfill it and completed but transporting it to our eternal home to the only place where we're really setting our hopes and that is heaven so the heavenly Jerusalem the heavenly kingdom or the kingdom of heaven where Jesus is depicted as seated at the right hand of the throne of majesty where he reigns as our high priest and King like you know after the order of melchizedek come home all of those word pictures are taken right from the material presenting the Davidic covenant and so in order to appreciate the New Testament in order to grasp the significance of Jesus the Christ the Anointed One the Messiah The Anointed priest King we're going to find that the majority of those titles those word pictures are drawn straight from this material here in the davidic period oh here we see a good example of how the Old Testament in the New Testament are really linked with one others like they're hidden in each other yes in fact in Vatican two the dogmatic Constitution on divine revelation quotes from Saint Augustine who spoke of how the New Testament is hidden in the old and the old is really unpacked in the in the new he says that the that the New Testament is concealed in the Old Testament but the Old Testament is revealed in the new and I mean that really encapsulate the Catholic approach to the unity of the Bible the unity of the Testaments the unity of God's plan and the faithfulness of her father in fulfilling his promises we have we worship we love we serve a father who keeps his promises it's exciting it really is now in order to set the stage for this I think it might be helpful to take a trip back into first Samuel before David is really introduced because in 1st Samuel chapter 2 verse 35 this unhhhh this unknown prophet he's not named announces to the priest Eli that something much greater than Eli's priesthood is soon to emerge in verse 35 the Lord speaks to this unnamed prophet and announces I will raise up for myself a faithful priest in contrast of course to Eli's sons who have proven their worthlessness who is Eli at this point Eli is the priest and Israel at this point in time but Eli is going to see both hophni and Phinehas die his two sons are going to die before his very eyes so he is going to be assured in advance that his priestly house is going to collapse and that God is going to do something new I will raise up for myself a faithful priest and he goes on to say I will build him a sure house so unlike the house of Eli which is set to collapse God is going to raise up a new house now you might think well what is this this is a priestly house this is on a kingly house but already God is preparing us to recognize something distinctive that is present in the Davidic covenant in the Davidic Kingdom that isn't present in the first form the kingdom takes in Saul although Saul is the first king in Israel Saul was only a king he was not a priest king we're gonna see that when God establishes his covenant with David the son of David becomes the dynastic heir through whom this Davidic Kingdom is maintaining Lee Solomon that's right Solomon the son of David God swears an oath to David saying I will raise up your son and I will build him a house and it will last forever this is the shore house that the unnamed prophet is announcing beforehand it is the house of David established through the son of David and what's so unique about the son of David is that at his coronation Psalm 110 is sung and it's described as a psalm of David and so from a canonical perspective we read Psalm 110 as though it's a psalm that was sung by King David at the time when his own son Solomon was about to be crowned to become the new king and he says you Solomon are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek God has sworn an oath now there's a rumble strip oh man alive is there effort what is a rumble strip rumble strip in Pennsylvania in Ohio is what you drive over late at night right before you come to a a toll booth and that's designed to wake you up so that you slow down and you pay your toll and in reading the Bible I think the narrator's guided by the spirit put these rumble strips in there not just in Psalm 110 but other places too so you're driving along you don't fall asleep at the wheel yet gotta slow down because this passage calls for a special attention it's going to give you special insight but only if you slow down and give it special attention gotta pay the toll so what do we wake up now we see that we see that Solomon is hooked on to Melchizedek somehow that's back in Genesis 14 what are we supposed to be seeing here yeah we're getting a little ahead of ourselves but that's okay because we've seen in 1st Samuel 2:35 the fact that God is setting the stage to raise up a king who is not just a king but a priest king well the last time there was a priest king in the Bible goes all the way back to Genesis 14 where you had Melchizedek Melchizedek name literally means king of righteousness but he is the first priest mention in the Bible and he was priest in Salem now from Psalm 76 verses 1 & 2 we discover that Melchizedek Salem is the exact same place as David's guru Salem so you know the Melchizedek connection is going to become even more interesting as we study these passages so here in 1st Samuel 2 verse 35 God announces through the unnamed prophet his intention to raise up a priest a faithful priest for whom God will build a sure house now the Prophet doesn't say who it will be he doesn't give us any more of a description than that and so you really have to go to 2nd Samuel to see how this royal priestly house of David actually is established by God it begins in 2nd samuel chapter 5 where all 12 tribes agree David you're gonna be our King and it begins in verse 1 then all the tribes of Israel came to David of Hebron and said Behold we are your bone and flesh that's a covenant formula we've seen the connection between covenant and family so bone of my bone flesh of my flesh you David are our bone and flesh you are covenant kin with us so you can be our spiritual father you can be our king in our Shepherd and it describes how you know the you shall be Shepard you shall be Prince verse 3 so all the elders of Israel came to the king at Hebron and King David made a covenant with them and he brought before the Lord and they anointed David King over Israel he had reigned over Judah for seven years and from this point on he reigned for thirty three more years not just over his own tribe of Judah but over all 12 tribes of Israel now once the narrator describes how he is king over all twelve tribes he then goes right into a description in verses 6 to 16 of how David conquers Jerusalem it's as though Jerusalem is the last stronghold holding out against the Israelites so David captures Jerusalem and as soon as the description of David's conquest of Jerusalem is given in chapter 5 the narrator the narrator goes on in chapter 6 to describe how how David without without batting an eyelash without any further thought immediately gets the Ark of the Covenant which we've discussed before as the holiest thing the holiest object in ancient Israel he takes the Ark of the Covenant and he brings it up to Jerusalem now why Jerusalem what is the importance of Jerusalem well you could look at Jerusalem and understand its strategic importance militarily or politically militarily speaking Jerusalem is a is settled in a very nice spot that is defensible an ideal fortress city in the mountains but another aspect would be politically speaking it's situated in a kind of neutral zone so you know he would have secular reasons for wanting to establish Jerusalem as his own political capital but he's doing something much more than building his political capital here he is establishing Jerusalem as the spiritual covenant center of God's family not just his political Empire now you got wonder why would he do that well you go back to Deuteronomy and you remember that when God gives you rest from your enemies roundabout go to the place where the Lord your God chooses for his name to dwell and there build him a central sanctuary I think it's clear that David had that passage in the back of his mind really you know canonically speaking the the David we hear about the David we read about here in 2nd Samuel 6 seems intent upon establishing something very special and I would suggest that he's intent upon restoring something very ancient he looks back to the time of Melchizedek where Jerusalem was called Salem and he sees a king who's more than a king he sees a priest king and he sees more than a priest king he sees the high priest and the king who reigned over the human race at a time when it was still unified before its rupture and this unification so in Genesis 14 we have the golden age of the patriarchal period where there is one man Melchizedek who was ruling over people before the Jews had been segregated or isolated from the rest of the Gentiles so it almost gives us a picture of what God the Father wants for Humanity a unified family a unified covenant people and their unified under not just a political leader a king but a political leader who serves as a priest remember going all the way back to Genesis Adam the firstborn son of God in the human race the the father of humanity was made a king on the sixth day when he was gimmicked given dominion over all the earth but in as much as he shares in the blessing of the seventh day he's consecrated not just as king but as high priest of humanity so what Adam was called to but fell from Melchizedek reom buddy and so David I think longs for a time when Israel and all the nations are going to come together under God's fatherhood and form one covenant family again now this is this is an ideal but it's something that the Covenant that God establishes with David is intent upon doing and when we come back in just a minute I think we're gonna see in second Samuel 6 and 2nd Samuel 7 and other key texts just how God goes about doing it we'll come back in just a minute welcome back to our Father's plan and we are in the midst of an exciting discussion right now if you just joined us we're going through the Bible in chronological order we're in 1st and 2nd Samuel we're in the period called the United Kingdom where we're studying Saul David and Solomon and we're talking with dr. Scott Hahn from Franciscan University dr. Hahn this whole period as we discussed earlier is a fascinating period there's there's so much that we've heard a lot of these stories and then when you you you come to the New Testament you hear so much about David you hear about Solomon and so forth let's talk a little bit about some of the connections between this period the United Kingdom specifically David and the in Solomon and the New Testament yeah we find in 2nd Samuel 6 and 7 several seeds being planted that really don't sprout and bear their fruit until the New Testament because we hear language here about how the son of David will be adopted and become the son of God but he's not really the Son of God except by adoption but it points forward to the real eternal son of God entering into the human family entering into the stock of Abraham and identifying himself with the line of David so that the eternal son of God really becomes the son of David and he also comes into history as a king who is a high priest and he comes to Jerusalem but he establishes Jerusalem in a much greater way he establishes an everlasting a heavenly kingdom a heavenly Jerusalem we're gonna see how Jesus comes to fulfill many other aspects of the Covenant with David he is the one who builds the temple of God that lasts forever he is the man with endowed with divine wisdom like Solomon but he is a greater than Solomon as we find described in Matthew 12 and like Solomon he's a man of peace he's a he's the Prince of Peace and we also see how he's not just the king of Israel but like Solomon he reigns over the Gentiles as well in one unified covenant family but all of this has to be found in the text itself and we we see this being laid out for us as we look at 2nd Samuel 6 we've already mentioned how in the beginning of second Samuel 6 David conquered Jerusalem and immediately brought the Ark of the Covenant up to Jerusalem so that Jerusalem was not just the political capital but the spiritual and covenant center of God's people but the way David brings the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem is striking because he takes off his his his kingly regalia instead of wearing his royal garments we discovered that what he's bringing the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem second samuel 6 verse 14 talks about how he was dancing before the Ark of the Lord with all of his might and David was girded with a linen ephod which is the uniform worn not by kings but by lowly or Levites doing their priestly service so here is David the glorious king who prefers to enter Jerusalem wearing the garb of a Levite priest and not only that we go on to read about how David offers sacrifices there in verse 17 David offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before the Lord that is not a kingly chore that is a priestly duty not only that but where does he do it in that same verse 17 we read about they brought in the Ark of the Lord and set it in its place inside the tent which David had pitched for it now if you go back to the law of Moses the Levites were the ones responsible for pitching the tabernacle and leading the Ark of the Covenant so David seems intent upon identifying himself in the presence of the people not only as their king but as a priest King that's his preference it's almost as though he would prefer to be in the house of God than being in his own royal dynastic palace now you and I are not you but maybe I may be reading that wouldn't recognize that but the people of that day standing around recognized it yeah I wonder why Michael Saul's daughter was bothered by it yeah you read in verse 20 how David returned to blesses his household but Michal the daughter of Saul who is also the life of David came out to meet David and said how the king of Israel honored himself today uncovering himself today before the eyes of his servant servant maids as one of the vulgar fellows shamelessly uncovers himself in other words she's thinking back to the glory days of her father King Saul who had never been seen in this linen ephod worn by the Levites no he was too grandiose she doesn't capture the vision in David's heart he does not long for earthly dominions so much as priestly minister ministry before the Lord is God that's good he is a man he is he's a man with the heart after the Lord he is a he has the heart of God that helps me understand personally what it means to be a man after God's own heart that's right right there sure it does but a couple of the details that we might skip over we might miss in 2nd Samuel 6 verse 18 we also read when David had finished offering the burnt offerings and the peace offerings he blessed the people in the name of the Lord of hosts once again you go back to the law of Moses in the Book of Numbers it was the priests responsibility to bless the people but here's David the king dressed like a Levite offering burnt offerings and peace offerings like a Levite pitching the tent like a Levite leading the Ark of the Covenant like a Levite and then blessing the people in the name of the Lord like the priests were supposed to do and then the cap it off in verse 19 after blessing them he distributes to them a cake of bread and then the Hebrews a little obscure here probably it's to be translated a cake of bread and a portion of wine after blessing the people he gives them bread and wine now wait a second at this point there's a converging of themes here's a priest king in Salem oops I mean Jerusalem you know who is dressed like a priest ministering and functioning like a priest blessing the people like a priest and then he's giving the people bread and wine hello yeah wake up and smell the coffee it looks as though David is aspiring to be a new Melchizedek in the old city of Melchizedek so a new Melchizedek in the new Salem establishing sort of like the Golden Age of the patriarchal period once again as the human family has grown much larger it has grown disunited but now just just maybe God in His mercy and grace will use Israel's King David to restore the unity of the human family of God that's a good way to remember this period the United Kingdom that that word United that it's more than just bringing the Kingdom of Israel together but we're talking about the whole human race there's an attempt here to bring the whole human race back right and you know this suggestion I think is made even more reasonable by the opening verse of 2nd Samuel 7 and by the way 2nd Samuel 7 is perhaps the most important chapter in this entire section of Scripture because this is where we find Nathan's Oracle Nathan the Prophet delivers an Oracle from God to David announcing God's covenant with the son of David we'll look at that more closely in a minute but the opening verse reads now when the King dwelt in his house and the Lord had given him rest from all his enemies round about wait a second a bell goes off that's more than what Joshua had given the people Joshua had given them that given them rest that is he had conquered the land so that they could live there but this is something more this is God giving rest from all the enemies round about this is exactly what Moses spoke about in Deuteronomy 12 when God gives you rest from all your enemies round about then and only then but then you establish a central sanctuary you go to the place where the Lord your God will choose for his name to dwell and you build them a sanctuary and there is where you bring all of your offerings and sacrifices so David is aware of the fact that the final stage of the Deuteronomic covenant has arrived we haven't just conquered Canaan we haven't just established kingship it is now time for the central sanctuary to be built in this grand old ancient sacred site of Salem only now it's Jerusalem and so David asks the Prophet Nathan look I dwell on a house of cedar but the Ark of God dwells in a tent can I build him a house and at first nathan says go to work do whatever's in your hearts but then Nathan goes to bed that night and receives a word from the Lord and Nathan delivers that word from the Lord to David the next day and says hold up not so fast there's something more in mind here the Lord says to David through the Prophet Nathan you're not gonna build me a house I'm gonna do it for you because I rescued you i empowered you I delivered you I have done all these things and so verse 10 I will appoint a place for my people Israel and I will plant them and it goes on in verse 11 here's where we come to the heart of the matter the Lord declares to you that the Lord will make you a house you're not gonna build him a house that's a wonderful aspiration but first the Lord is going to build you a house now what does it mean that God's gonna build I'm not gonna come down as a carpenter and build him up no it isn't that at all the word house by ethan hebrew means three things it means family but it also means dynasty like the house of David or the House of Bourbon or the Habsburg dynasty was the House of Habsburg this is the house of David that God is going to build by giving him a son and making him an heir that is I'm gonna build you a dynasty but the third meaning of house as we will discover in a few verses is temple so God is going to build David a house by enlarging his family by giving him a son Solomon then Solomon is going to be the one who builds God a house Solomon is going to be the one who gets to do everything his father David longed to do but first God says the Lord declares to you that the Lord will make you a house how does he do that when your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your father's I will raise up your offspring your seed after you who shall come forth in your body and I will establish his kingdom at Solomon he shall build a house for my name what is that well that's the temple so God will build David a house by giving him a son who will be a dynastic heir establishing a dynastic house and then the son of David will turn around and build God a house he shall build a house for my name which is the temple and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever so the day the Davidic dynasty is going to be divinely established eternally through Solomon yeah in a provisional way but through the real son of David that Solomon prefigures typologically foreshadows that is Jesus that is where we're gonna find this covenant really being fulfilled he shall build a house from my name when I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever I will be his father and he shall be my son once again that is fulfilled provisionally in Solomon who is adopted by covenant to be the son of God but it's fulfilled perfectly in Jesus who is from all eternity the son of God the Father I will be his father and he shall be my son so the son of David isn't just the son of David he's gonna be the son of God as well and it goes on to describe in verse 16 and your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me just like the unnamed prophet had announced back in 1st Samuel 2:35 this house shall be sure for ever before me your throne shall be established forever in accordance with all these words and in accordance with all this vision Nathan spoke to David and David then flipped out he just goes nuts he cannot believe that the Lord would bless him in this way the next verse King David went in and sat before the Lord and said Who am I Oh Lord God that's a humble man after God's own heart ins I am nothing but your everything and you can do whatever you want through the lowly likes of me Who am I Oh Lord God and what is my house that you have brought me so far and yet this was a small thing in your eyes Oh Lord God David goes on to say you have spoken of your servants house for a great while to come and you have shown me and here's where the RSV I think slips a bit in a mistranslation they say you have you have shown me future generations but they're kind enough to give us a footnote there the footnote says the Hebrew this is the law for man and in fact verse 19 is just that the Hebrew Torah Adam is literally Torah law or laws for Adam meaning man mankind and so David is saying you're not just blessing me you're not just blessing my son you're not just blessing my family you're not just blessing my dynasty you are blessing all Adam you are giving through me and my son a Torah our covenant law for all Adam professor Walter Kaiser of Gordon Conwell seminary has an article the the covenant with David a charter for Humanity in which he gives us a good argument to show us that what God's doing here is nothing less than revealing a covenant plan to encompass all humanity other words what Moses gave to Israel at Sinai God is going to give through David to all Adam so God gave the law the Torah to Israel through Moses but God is now going to give the Torah for Adam God is going to give a covenant law for all humanity through David in the son of David you know what what you're talking about here this is beautiful this is good this is USDA stuff I I was thinking of the the New Testament connections as we were speaking earlier and you know that what you're saying right here is really what the angel came and told Mary you know looking in Luke in Luke chapter 1 the angel said do not be afraid Mary for you have found favor with God and behold you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and you shall name him Jesus he will be great and will be called the son of the Most High and the Lord God will give him the throne of his father David and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever and his kingdom will have no end yes that's beautiful in fact we're gonna get into this in just a little bit but Mary and Jesus are a Davidic connection they really are that is the theological significance in Revelation 12 for instance that woman who appears is a great sign and heaven clothed the Sun the moon under her feet on her head a crown of twelve stars who is this woman well there's a lot of speculation is the synagogue's the churches at Mary well the Pope's have said that it is a symbol but it's a symbol rooted in the Blessed Virgin Mary she is the Queen Mother who brings forth the Messiah in revelation 12 verse 5 she brought forth a male child one who's to rule all the nations with a rod of iron now that's a quotation taken straight from Psalm 2 verse 9 a Davidic Song and so in Psalm 2 we discover the paradigm the model for Mary and Jesus we discover the model for the Davidic Kingdom because in Psalm 2 we read about how the Lord has established the son of David he says this I have set my King on Zion my holy hill verse 7 I will tell of a decree of the Lord he said to me you are my son today I have begotten you ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession you shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a Potter's vessel so therefore o Kings be wise be warned o rulers of the earth you see the Davidic King was to be honored revered and obeyed by all the other kings Solomon in effect rules over all of the kings of the earth ideally an accord with this covenant that God establishes so Psalm 2 establishes God's United Nations program in the Davidic covenant all the nations will be united under the Son of David to form a covenant family and this is really the secret to understanding the link between the Davidic covenant here and the New Testament because in Jesus we see the son of David who is the of God by God's own oath he also becomes the king of Israel and he establishes a heavenly kingdom the kingdom of heaven is what he comes to announce and he does that when he ascends into heaven and sits at the right hand of God the Father as this priest king after the order of melchizedek there he builds for us the everlasting temple there he establishes for us the true worldwide Kingdom of All Nations there he reveals to us a new covenant upon new law what a plan what a plan and there we also discover what we find in the Blessed Virgin Mary because when Solomon took the throne he established in first Kings 219 his own mother to be the gabbie rock the Queen Mother who sat down at the right hand of the son of David and carries petitions to the King on behalf of his subjects Wow and and and there we find in the gabbie rah the Queen Mother the prototype of what Mary is to be as well in the heavenly Jerusalem she is enthroned at the right hand of her son as Queen Mother in the you know I am so never been more excited about the scriptures since I have returned to the Catholic Church and become a Catholic oh I tell you it makes so much sense you know and and this opens up the Bible for us because through the son of David God gives the nation's a law by which they can walk in righteousness we find in the law of Moses the Torah for Israel but we find in the wisdom literature the Torah by which the nation's can walk in truth and righteousness the wisdom that God give to Solomon is not just the wisdom to build the temple it's the wisdom that the nations will gather together in the temple to hear for out of Zion shall go forth the law and all the nations shall stream design and hear the word of the Lord and that's not just talking about the earthly Jerusalem for a thousand years that served merely as a prototype of the heavenly Zion the heavenly Jerusalem and all the nations shall come to the church which is the heavenly Jerusalem for out of the church shall flow the law the Torah the wisdom by which we can all walk uprightly before the Lord this is the Covenant plan this is the Catholic Church this is the Catholic faith and when you dig deep into Scripture it comes alive I can't encourage you enough to dig into the Bible and study it the way the Church teaches it because this is where you really discover the beauty of being a Catholic we'll come back in just a week and discuss this even more god bless you [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: Our Father's Plan

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Length: 55min 29sec (3329 seconds)

Published: Sun May 17 2020