Why are we in Need?

“During the reign of David, there was a famine for three successive years; so David sought the face of the LORD. The LORD said, ‘It is on account of Saul and his blood-stained house; it is because he put the Gibeonites to death’"(2 Samuel 21:1).

                Are you in need?  If “yes”, is it financial need, emotional need or mental need or is it all above?  Aren’t you in spiritual need as well?  It seems like everybody is in need of something.  As we all know that the whole world is in financial need.  As a result, so many people are going through some sort of stress due to their financial burdens.  Beside financial need, it seems to me so that of them have mental and emotion need as well.  People are mentally and emotionally unstable.  But I think the most of all is spiritual need.  The whole world is in spiritual need.  People are pursuing some sort of spiritually due to their spiritual emptiness.  I think we are in a state of spiritual illusion.  People are spiritually confused.  There is lack of spiritual discernment.  Why all these things are happening to us?  Why are there all these kinds of famines in our world?      

                When we look at the Scripture, we see the word “famine” appears a lot.  For example, when we look at the Old Testament Genesis chapter 43, we can see that there was severe famine in the land during the time of Joseph (v.1).  Another example is the New Testament Luke chapter 15.  There was a severe famine in the whole country where a prodigal son was living (v.14).  Why there were such severe famines in the lands?  Was it by accident?  Not at all!  Our creator God has His own good purpose why He gives famines in our lives.  And I think His purposes can be group into two: (1) a famine of training and (2) a famine of correction.  I think the famine in Genesis chapter 43 is the famine of training even though to the Joseph’s older brothers it could be the famine of correction as well.  I think God gave the famine not only in Egypt but also in the land of Canaan so that God could bring down Jacob and his family down to Egypt and delivered them from the famine through Joseph so that they might be able to multiply in Egypt.  You see, everything was in God’s perfect good will.  Not only Joseph, but the whole Jacob and his families were able to experience God’s deliverance from the famine so that they were able to put their faith in God more than before.  What a blessed famine!  On the other hand, the famine that the prodigal son, in Luke chapter 15, experienced was the famine of correction.  After he had spent everything, there was the severe famine and he began to be in need (v.14).  That’s why he came to his senses that even his father’s hired mean had food to spare (v.17) and he set out and went back to his father (v.18).  What a blessed famine!  Now what kind of famine are you facing these days? 

                When we look at the today’s passage, 2 Samuel 21:1, we can see the famine of correction that God sent to the land of Israel.  How do we know this?  We know this by God’s answer to David’s prayer saying “"It is on account of Saul and his blood-stained house; it is because he put the Gibeonites to death”.  God sent famine in the land during the reign of David because Saul in his zeal for Israel and Judah had annihilated the Gibeonites who are not a part of Israel but were survivors of the Amorites (vv.2, 5).  It was wrong zeal because it wasn’t God’s will to destroy the Gibeonites even though they were not the Israelites.  The reason because in Joshua’s time, Joshua and the Israelites already made peace with the Gibeonites and made a covenant with them (v. 15) even though the Gibeonites deceived Joshua and the Israelites by saying that they live a long way from the Israelites (v.22).  And it was Joshua’s and the Israelites’ fault that they did not inquire of the Lord (v.14).  But the fact is that Joshua and the Israelites made the covenant with the Gibeonites to let them live (v.15) and no one should destroy them.   But as we know Saul tried to annihilate the Israelites.  As a result, God sent the famine for three successive years during the reign of David (v.1).  That’s why King David summoned the Gibeonites and asked them: “What shall I do for you?  How shall I make amends so that you will bless the Lord’s inheritance?”(v. 3), “What do you want me to do for you?” (v.4). They answered him by asking King David to give them seven of Saul’s male descendants so that they might kill them and exposed them before the Lord at Gibeah of Saul (v.6).  So King David “took Armoni and Mephibosheth, the two sons of Aiah's daughter Rizpah, whom she had borne to Saul, together with the five sons of Saul's daughter Merab, whom she had borne to Adriel son of Barzillai the Meholathite” and “handed them over to the Gibeonites, who killed and exposed them on a hill before the LORD”(vv.8-9).  But he spared Mephibosheth son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, because of the oath before the Lord between David and Jonathan (v.7).  Then, Rizpah daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it out for herself on a rock.  From the beginning of the harvest till the rain poured down from the heavens on the bodies, she did not let the birds of the air touch them by day or the wild animals by night. (v.10). When David heard what Aiah’s daughter Rizpah, Saul’s concubine, had done (v.11), he went and took the bones of Saul and his son Jonathan from the citizens of Jabesh Gilead (v.12).  And together with the seven male descendants of Saul who had been killed by the Gibeonites, King David’s servants buried their bones in the tomb of Saul’s father Kish, at Zela in Benjamin (v.14).  “After that, God answered prayer in behalf of the land” (v.14). 

                As I was meditating on this bible story based on 2 Samuel 21:1-9, I got the answer “Why are we in need?”.  It is because of our sin.  The reason why we are in need spiritually, mentally, emotionally, financially and so on is because of our unconfessed sin before the Lord.  And that unconfessed sin has to do with breaking the covenant with God and/or with other(s).  Of course in David’s case, it was Saul and his bloody household who broke the covenant that was made between Joshua and the Gibeonites.  But I think since the Israelites were involved in killing the Gibeonites, the successor King David had to deal with it so that God might again send rain to them during the harvest (v.9).  Here, I realized that how much our holy covenant God considers important and precious the covenant that we are making between each other in His holy name.  Although the Gibeonites made covenant with Joshua and the Israel by deceiving them and Joshua and the Israelites did not inquire of the Lord, that covenant was still important to God because it was made under His holy Name.  That’s why, in a sense, God had the Gibeonites’ revenge on Saul by letting them to kill Saul’s seven male descendants.  But even this fact humbles me because even though Saul and his household destroyed the Gibeonites, the Gibeonites only asked for seven of Saul’s male descendants.  Those Gibeonites seemed to be more gracious than Saul and his bloody household.  Our God is covenant God who is faithful in keeping His covenant.  He blesses those who keep His covenant; but He curses those who do not.  Likewise, we must be faithful to our covenant that we make before God, whether it is covenant between each other (such as a marriage vow) or it is between God and us (such as a vow that we make to God).  We should not take the covenant and vow lightly.  As God is being faithful in keeping covenant that He made with us in Christ Jesus, we must be faithful in keeping that covenant by obeying His commands.  If not, then God will send “a famine” in our lives.  And we will be in need.  Don’t you wonder why sometimes we are, like Saul, not faithful in keeping the covenant that we made before God?  It is because we have wrong zeal like Saul (v.2).  Having a zeal toward God and His church is good.  But having wrong zeal is dangerous.  Look at what Saul (who became Paul later) did when he had wrong zeal toward God.  He persecuted the church (Phil. 3:6).  You see, King Saul in his wrong zeal tried to destroy the Gibeonites “for Israel and Judah” (2 Sam. 21:2).  He did it for the sake of Israel and Judah.  What a good excuse.  Likewise, so many of us say “I love God and I love His church” and in our zeal we serve His church with our own will rather than God’s will for us.  How dangerous this is to His church and His kingdom!  We may break the church order and peace with our own wrong zeal.  What must we do?  When God makes us to be in need through all sorts of “famine”, we should seek God like King David did (v.1).  And if our holy God reveals our sins, then we must confess and repent our sins to Him.  If we are breaking the covenant that we have made with God and/or with others, we should repent and obey His commands.  We should do so because our God is covenant God who keeps His covenant with us.

As I look to my covenant God who keeps His promise to me and my church,

Pastor James Kim