David Tells a Lie

When God gave Moses the law, he commanded him not to spread a false report, not to join hands with the wicked as a malicious witness, and not to side with the many in a lawsuit by giving false testimony. The command not to spread a false report means that we must not lie for our own gain. It is needed because people can easily tell any lie to protect their own interests or their own lives.

Exodus 23:7 says to keep far from a false charge and not to kill the innocent and the righteous. Here God declares in the strongest terms that he will judge anyone who, out of selfishness, destroys a righteous person by lies.

Fleeing from Saul, David came to the land of Nob, where he met Ahimelech, who was serving there as priest. Ahimelech was the son of Ahitub and the grandson of Phinehas—that is, the great-grandson of Eli the high priest. Ahimelech knew David to be a valiant man, so he found it strange that he had suddenly turned up with only a few men; even so, he received him courteously. David sensed Ahimelech’s unease and lied, saying that he was on a secret mission from the king and would meet the rest of his men later. He had nowhere left to go in his flight from the king, yet when he saw how flustered Ahimelech was, he ended up claiming that he was on the king’s business. But Ahimelech, seeing David ask for bread and a weapon, must have realized that something had happened to him. The priest gave the hungry David the holy bread that only priests were permitted to eat. This holy bread was the show bread that had been set on the table in the holy place.

Leviticus 24:9 records that this bread shall be for Aaron and his sons, who shall eat it in a holy place, for it is most holy to him of the offerings of Yahweh made by fire, a perpetual statute. There were twelve loaves of show bread, set on the table in two rows of six; they had to be replaced with fresh loaves every week, and the law laid down that bread taken from the sanctuary could be eaten by the priests alone. God ordained that the bread set before him be eaten only by the priests in the holy place so that the holy bread would not be made unclean. And it was this holy bread that Ahimelech now gave to David. It would look as though Ahimelech had broken the word of God and committed high treason by defying King Saul’s command. So the one who witnessed this scene and told King Saul that Ahimelech had defied his orders and helped David was Doeg, the chief of Saul’s herdsmen.

This incident, in which Ahimelech helped David, should make us ask whether we are to read the law literally, or to grasp the will of the God who gave it and act in love and faith. When a nation draws up its constitution, it does not make laws in order to turn people into criminals. Laws are made to protect the righteous, and God, who made the law, had the same heart. Now and then I am asked questions that sadden me—when I meet church members who want to know whether they may go to the market on the Lord’s Day, or eat meat during Holy Week. Such questions come from not understanding at all the purpose for which God is bringing salvation to completion.

In Matthew 12, the disciples were hungry as they passed through the grain fields on the Sabbath and plucked heads of grain to eat, and the Pharisees accused them of breaking the Sabbath. Jesus answered them by pointing to this very incident, when David ate the show bread. He rebuked them: had they not read in the law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath and are guiltless? He was telling them, in effect, that Ahimelech’s giving bread to David was not, as they supposed, a breach of the law but an act of mercy. He told them that one greater than the temple was here, and that if they had known what it means that God desires mercy and not sacrifice, they would not have condemned the guiltless. What Jesus declared is that Ahimelech, in giving David the show bread, did not transgress the law but showed mercy according to the will of God.

Ahimelech, a man of great love, was put to death along with eighty-five priests, all because he had helped David. All he had done was show mercy, with God’s own heart, to David, the man of God; yet because Doeg informed on him to Saul, he was killed. The world is ruled by evil people such as Saul and Doeg; we need to understand, therefore, that we, too, may meet with hardship, just as good men like David and Ahimelech suffered. To think that because I believe in God I ought to prosper in this life, and that because I have served so faithfully I will not suffer, is the faith of a little child.

In this life anyone may cross paths with someone like Doeg and suffer for it. Still, only by living with a good heart, like Ahimelech and David, who held fast to their faith, can we receive eternal life from God as our reward. So you must pray to God to protect you from evil people and evil spirits.

In the eyes of the world, David plainly lied. By deceiving Ahimelech he drove eighty-five priests to their deaths, though he never meant to. If that is so, God ought to rebuke David. But Scripture is silent both when Jonathan lied to Saul for David’s sake and now when David lies to Ahimelech. Priests died because David lied—so why is God silent? That is what I want to look into.

John 8:44

44You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and doesn’t stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks on his own; for he is a liar, and the father of lies.

Lies belong to Satan. He was a murderer from the beginning, and because there is no truth in him, he does not stand in the truth. Lying is the very tool that Satan, having no truth in him, uses to bring down those who live by the truth. The quick wits God’s people may use in a moment of need to keep the word of truth are not the same as the lies of the world. This is because the lie God rebukes is one that hinders his work, puts his people in distress, and twists the truth for worldly gain.

Proverbs 30:6 warns us not to add to his words, lest he reprove us and we be found liars. To lie is to fail to pass on the word of truth as it is, and to add to it human ideas or the world’s morals, ethics, and common sense, so that people are led to abandon the truth. You must therefore discern carefully between the word and the world, and weigh them rightly.

From the very beginning it was with a lie that Satan caused humankind to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and with a lie that he stirred up Cain’s heart and drove him to murder. The people who waved palm branches to welcome Jesus were deceived by the greed and craving Satan put in them, and they cried out the lie that Jesus was a sinner. To this day many people are fashioning another gospel out of human ideas and desires and deceiving others with it, and those without discernment are sinking into death. Satan was a murderer from the beginning; there was no truth in him, and he spoke lies on his own. To set up the abomination of desolation in the holy place, that same Satan mixed lies with the truth and passed it on to souls that could not discern spirits. Knowing that the Lord’s promise to come on the last day will be fulfilled, Satan will labor all the harder to keep souls from being saved, and he will go on mixing lies with the truth to make something that passes for it.

So the apostle John gave a definition of lying: if we say we know God yet walk in darkness, we are lying; and whoever says they know God but does not keep his commandments is a liar, because the truth is not in them. It is fools like Doeg, unable to discern spirits, who will do that work.

When Joshua arrived to conquer Jericho, he had no elite troops to attack with and no weapons, so by human reckoning taking Jericho was all but impossible. But God, the King of Israel, had placed a woman of faith, Rahab, inside Jericho. It was a city that would hardly fall even under attack from outside, but because of Rahab, who held up the light of faith within its walls, Israel was able to win. The two spies Joshua sent into Jericho came to lodge in the house of Rahab the prostitute. Hearing that spies had entered Jericho, soldiers came to Rahab’s house to arrest the two men. To hide Israelite spies could have meant death not only for Rahab but for her whole family; yet she hid them on her roof and even lied to the soldiers that the spies had gone, all to help Israel. In this way, God does not rebuke someone who lies to the world in order to save his people. But the purpose must be the Kingdom of God and the saving of souls.

With the bread and the sword Ahimelech had given him, David fled to Achish, king of Gath. Gath was Goliath’s country, so for the man who had killed Goliath to take refuge there was as dangerous as meeting Saul; still, it was to Gath that David fled. It seems to me that David went to Goliath’s hometown perhaps to show that in this world there is no hiding place for David or for the saints. When Achish’s servants saw David, they grew wary of him, saying that the people of Israel had sung that Saul had slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands. Hearing this, David did something astonishing, almost beyond belief, in front of them all. Before King Achish he suddenly let his spittle run down his beard and pretended to be mad. Those who read this account in Scripture will probably think, how desperate David must have been to live, to go that far. For a man like David, they will wonder, wouldn’t it show far more faith to stand up boldly to Saul than to beg for his life before the king of Gath?

But God had a plan to send Christ through David, and David understood why God had anointed him and made him king. All David could do now was wait for God’s time. David, who could do anything short of betraying God, chose to escape the crisis by feigning madness. When King Achish saw David acting like a madman, he grew angry and drove him away.

For now he may be feigning madness, but when David later became king of Israel by God’s grace, 1 Chronicles 18:1 records that he took Gath and its towns out of the hand of the Philistines. That fact helps us see why David pretended to be mad. Until the time God granted had come, David endured years of hardship with faith and wisdom. It was not for lack of strength that he did not attack Saul; he was waiting patiently until the moment God would give him the throne. You must learn David’s wisdom, waiting patiently for the right time until the moment God acts. If the purpose is the Kingdom of God and the saving of souls, God will not rebuke David for pretending to be mad, as though he had failed to show faith.

Feigning madness to escape the grip of King Achish should not be seen as cowardice; it is the patience of a saint living in the world. David’s feigned madness is what made Achish lose interest in him. Had Achish ordered David to deny God, he would, of course, have kept his faith at the cost of his life. But David needed a place to stay and time, so he devised the ruse of feigning madness, and that gave him a tomorrow to hope for. You too, as God’s own, must be patient like David and live filled with the Holy Spirit. May you ask God for wisdom and understanding, and for a faith that can endure. Here is something we must discern carefully: suffering that comes while we wait for God’s time must certainly be brought to God in earnest prayer until he answers, but suffering that comes from our own mistakes or wrongdoing calls for repentance. Only by discerning this well can we step into a bright future. If you mistake the fruit of your own wrongdoing for persecution by the world, your life will end in failure.

Believers must not compete with the world in lust and greed. They gain nothing even if they defeat the world, so, as David did, in a moment of crisis it is also wisdom to show that they are no rival to the world. That is because to fall out of notice is itself a form of protection. Had David flattered King Achish to win his favor, he would have had to go to war against Israel. Then David would have saved his life by flattering Achish, but he would have been fighting God’s own people, and that could not have been God’s will. By feigning madness instead, David bought time—time to pray, and time to build the strength to face anyone. When they are full of wisdom and have built up knowledge and skill, they can live a life of victory, because God does not put his own to shame.

I hope that you, like David, will have the wisdom to wait for the right time. David endured the disgrace of feigning madness, yet he preserved his precious life and went on to build a united kingdom; like him, may you have the endurance to take up the cross of the Lord even when the world mocks your faith. The reward of the saints who live out their faith is a blessing the world cannot imagine. God will turn every lie you told to keep your faith into a reward. Let us seek the wisdom to keep growing in faith until God acts.

May you live a life of victory and nothing but victory, like David, whose heart was always one with God’s. I bless you in the name of Jesus Christ.

1 Samuel 22:13-23

13Saul said to him, “Why have you conspired against me, you and the son of Jesse, in that you have given him bread, and a sword, and have inquired of God for him, that he should rise against me, to lie in wait, as it is today?” 14Then Ahimelech answered the king, and said, “Who among all your servants is so faithful as David, who is the king’s son-in-law, and is taken into your council, and is honorable in your house? 15Have I today begun to inquire of God for him? Be it far from me! Don’t let the king impute anything to his servant, nor to all the house of my father; for your servant knows nothing of all this, less or more.” 16The king said, “You shall surely die, Ahimelech, you, and all your father’s house.” 17The king said to the guard who stood about him, “Turn, and kill the priests of Yahweh; because their hand also is with David, and because they knew that he fled, and didn’t disclose it to me.” But the servants of the king wouldn’t put out their hand to fall on the priests of Yahweh. 18The king said to Doeg, “Turn and attack the priests!” Doeg the Edomite turned, and he attacked the priests, and he killed on that day eighty-five people who wore a linen ephod. 19He struck Nob, the city of the priests, with the edge of the sword, both men and women, children and nursing babies, and cattle and donkeys and sheep, with the edge of the sword. 20One of the sons of Ahimelech, the son of Ahitub, named Abiathar, escaped, and fled after David. 21Abiathar told David that Saul had slain Yahweh’s priests. 22David said to Abiathar, “I knew on that day, when Doeg the Edomite was there, that he would surely tell Saul. I am responsible for the death of all the persons of your father’s house. 23Stay with me. Don’t be afraid, for he who seeks my life seeks your life. For you will be safe with me.”