Peter Barnes | 2 Samuel 3:2-39
SERMON NOTES
WEAKNESS IN DAVID’S COURT
2 Samuel 3:2-39
Abner swaps sides to join David, but Joab murders him.
1. Abner’s duplicity.
– Abner is the strongman of the outfit – 3:6-7; it is not certain whether Abner took Saul’s concubine, Rizpah, as his own. Whatever the case, Abner breaks with Ishbosheth – 3:8-11.
– Abner then joins the opposition – 3:12-21. Like Josephus before the Jewish War against the Romans in A.D. 66-70.
– Abner’s references to the Lord’s will should not fool us (3:9-10, 18).
2. Joab’s brutality.
– 3:22-30; Remember that Abner had killed Asahel, Joab’s brother – 2:18-23. But Joab’s act was not so much revenge as ambition.
3. David’s weakness.
(a) David has six sons from six different women – 3:2-5. It gets worse in 2 Samuel 5:13. God had warned against this in Deut. 17:14-17.
(b) David reclaims Michael – 3:13-14. Calvin preaches that David truly loved Michal, but he seems to have had political motives.
(c) David’s sincere but weak response to Abner’s murder – 3:28-39. Walter Chantry: ‘David would have been cutting off his own right arm to prosecute Joab for the murder of Abner.’
However, this pious ‘leave it to the Lord’ approach surely comes asunder eventually – Eccles.8:11; 2 Sam.20:9-10; 1 Kings 2:5-6. Yet it all looks to something far greater – Rev.21:5-8.