The biblical kings David and Saul both had their good and bad, but David is celebrated and credited as Israel’s greatest king while Saul ended up being rejected by God. David had some serious sin including adultery and murder, yet despite punishing David God never rejected him as king. Why does David get away with doing some of the exact same things as Saul and yet only Saul is punished? Saul was rebuked for offering a sacrifice before the battle, being frustrated with the long wait for Samuel to arrive. David put on a priestly ephod however and also ate the shewbread which only priests are permitted to do. It seems that David often got away with all sorts of things that others were punished for.
1 Samuel 14:8-14
Then [Saul] waited seven days, according to the time set by Samuel. But Samuel did not come to Gilgal; and the people were scattered from him. So Saul said, “Bring a burnt offering and peace offerings here to me.” And he offered the burnt offering. Now it happened, as soon as he had finished presenting the burnt offering, that Samuel came; and Saul went out to meet him, that he might greet him.
And Samuel said, “What have you done?”
Saul said, “When I saw that the people were scattered from me, and that you did not come within the days appointed, and that the Philistines gathered together at Michmash, then I said, ‘The Philistines will now come down on me at Gilgal, and I have not made supplication to the Lord.’ Therefore I felt compelled, and offered a burnt offering.”
And Samuel said to Saul, “You have done foolishly. You have not kept the commandment of the Lord your God, which He commanded you. For now the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever. But now your kingdom shall not continue. The Lord has sought for Himself a man after His own heart, and the Lord has commanded him to be commander over His people, because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you.”
It was the priest’s job to make the special offering, but because Samuel was delayed, Saul felt pressured to make the offering happen. Israel did not have a professional standing army. The soldiers were just ordinary citizens. Seeing no battle and no action, they were deserting the army, returning to their farms to do necessary work. Saul feared that waiting longer for Samuel would result in the rest of his army trickling out; an understandable concern. Despite this, Saul ended up angering God with his offering and being rejected rather than obtaining a blessing for battle.
Let us consider David on the other hand:
1 Samuel 21:3-6
[David to the priest:] “Now what do you have at your disposal? Give me five loaves of bread, or whatever can be found.”
The priest replied to David, “I don’t have any ordinary bread at my disposal. Only holy bread is available, and then only if your soldiers have abstained from sexual relations with women.” David said to the priest, “Certainly women have been kept away from us, just as on previous occasions when I have set out. The soldiers’ equipment is holy, even on an ordinary journey. How much more so will they be holy today, along with their equipment!”
So the priest gave him holy bread, for there was no bread there other than the bread of the Presence. It had been removed from before the Lord in order to replace it with hot bread on the day it had been taken away.
Many of the translations miss the Hebrew humor here. Most say “the vessels” or “the bodies” of the young men are holy while the actual Hebrew uses the word “Keli” (Strongs #3627 meaning thing/apparatus/equipment/weapon) of the young men, a euphemism for the private parts. When asked if his soldiers had recent sexual relations, David assures the priest that the soldiers cocks are consecrated, replying “the young men’s junk is holy.” The priest then allows them to eat the shewbread, the sacred bread of the temple which only priests are supposed to eat.
Jesus brought up this story when the Pharisees accused him of failing to follow the religious law:
Matthew 12:1-4
1 At that time Jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn; and his disciples were an hungred, and began to pluck the ears of corn and to eat.
2 But when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto him, Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the sabbath day.
3 But he said unto them, Have ye not read what David did, when he was an hungred, and they that were with him;
4 How he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them which were with him, but only for the priests?
Both Saul and David broke the religious rules. Why was Saul punished while David was celebrated for the same thing?
Saul’s main sin was not in the act itself of a king making the offering instead of a prophet/priest. His sin was that he offered from a fearful, impatient, and angry heart and with no foundation of a relationship with God. This is why the passage said God is looking for “one after his own heart” to replace Saul. The heart is the issue. Thus Saul’s offering took on the nature of Cain’s who was more focused on competition with his brother than on pleasing God. Saul also only waited the seven days agreed upon with Samuel and was unwilling to consider allowing an eighth day for Samuel, since it was easy to be delayed in foot travel in those days. Also lack of compassion and consideration that Samuel was an old man and travelling would be difficult for one at his age.
We have to look at their heart attitudes. Saul was probably full of anger while offering due to Samuel being delayed, thus an offering from a contemptuous heart offended God rather than being pleasing.
Who is to Blame?
[Read through the full chapter 15]
God gave Saul a mission, to completely destroy the Amalekites and everything belonging to them, including the cattle.
1 Samuel 15:1-3
1 Samuel also said to Saul, “The Lord sent me to anoint you king over His people, over Israel. Now therefore, heed the voice of the words of the Lord. 2 Thus says the Lord of hosts: ‘I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, how he ambushed him on the way when he came up from Egypt. 3 Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them. But kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.’ ”
Saul did not exactly agree with these instructions. Why was there a need to slaughter the animals? These animals would not be any kind of threat to Israel. By keeping the animals not only would the nation be enriched, they would also be able to use these animals as their sacrifices instead of their own livestock. This would remove the pain of the sacrifice, making it convenient. David in contrast was offered a sacrificial grounds for free but replied to the owner, “No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price; nor will I offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God with that which costs me nothing.” (2 Samuel 24:24). A sacrifice has to cost us. If it is free or very easy than it is not a real sacrifice. Jesus once spoke that a poor widow who offered two pennies had given more than the rich men. Her offering might cause her to have to give up eating that day, while the rich ones offering would not have to alter their lifestyle after their donations. It would not make a dent in their income.
1 Samuel 15
:9 But Saul and the people spared Agag and the best of the sheep, the oxen, the fatlings, the lambs, and all that was good, and were unwilling to utterly destroy them. But everything despised and worthless, that they utterly destroyed.
:13-21
13 Then Samuel went to Saul, and Saul said to him, “Blessed are you of the Lord! I have performed the commandment of the Lord.”
14 But Samuel said, “What then is this bleating of the sheep in my ears, and the lowing of the oxen which I hear?”
15 And Saul said, “They have brought them from the Amalekites; for the people spared the best of the sheep and the oxen, to sacrifice to the Lord your God; and the rest we have utterly destroyed.”
16 Then Samuel said to Saul, “Be quiet! And I will tell you what the Lord said to me last night.”
And he said to him, “Speak on.”
17 So Samuel said, “When you were little in your own eyes, were you not head of the tribes of Israel? And did not the Lord anoint you king over Israel? 18 Now the Lord sent you on a mission, and said, ‘Go, and utterly destroy the sinners, the Amalekites, and fight against them until they are consumed.’ 19 Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you swoop down on the spoil, and do evil in the sight of the Lord?”
20 And Saul said to Samuel, “But I have obeyed the voice of the Lord, and gone on the mission on which the Lord sent me, and brought back Agag king of Amalek; I have utterly destroyed the Amalekites. 21 But the people took of the plunder, sheep and oxen, the best of the things which should have been utterly destroyed, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal.”
Something else we notice is that as soon as Saul is confronted with his error, he immediately blames “the people” for keeping the livestock. “I have obeyed the voice of the Lord” Saul proclaims. “The people took of the plunder….”
When David made his mistake, he requested God punish him directly rather than the innocent people:
1 Chronicles 21:17 And David said to God, “Was it not I who commanded the people to be numbered? I am the one who has sinned and done evil indeed; but these sheep, what have they done? Let Your hand, I pray, O Lord my God, be against me and my father’s house, but not against Your people that they should be plagued.”
Daniel in contrast (Daniel 9:3-19) fell on his face in identificational repentance for the nation of Israel’s sin even though he was one of the most righteous individuals. He constantly uses “we” when mentioning the nation’s sin, not “they.”
Behind the Scenes
Before David ever had a chance to become king, he worked in the field as a lowly shepherd. During his free time he developed a relationship with his God, worshipping continuously and gaining skill on musical instruments for worship. Rather than complaining that he felt like a loser as an ordinary shepherd, David was laying the foundation his future would be built on. God would come through for David again and again; He would never forget the time David invested time for God when David was still nothing. The Bible does not contain a book named "book of David," but more than half of the Psalms are his work and the New Testament authors quoted these Psalms authoritatively. Here is one of David’s Psalms:
Psalm 144:1 Blessed be the Lord my strength which teacheth my hands to war, and my fingers to fight.”
This Psalm is so profound. David did not just value his skills with the sword (“hands to war”), he put equal emphasis on the spiritual warfare of his praise and worship in playing skillfully on the harp (“fingers to fight”). Before a building can be constructed upwards, the builders must first dig downwards to prepare the foundation beneath the visible layer. This is your private time with God when you are still a nobody. Your prayer life; the times you help others in secret or work behind the scenes; your efforts in ministry which did not seem to bear huge fruit. God values all of this. These small beginnings which may feel like failure are actually the foundation for your capacity to build and grow in God. This is the foundation principle: you have to go down before you can go up.
Saul did not have a firm relationship with God and did not worship and pray in the field like David did. For Saul, interacting with the nation’s God was just a duty that came along with kingship, not something he would ever pursue of his own accord. When Saul was first chosen to be king he was buried in material baggage, and would not come out from the “stuff” to answer God’s call:
1 Samuel 10:22 (KJV) “Therefore they enquired of the Lord further, if the man should yet come thither. And the Lord answered, “Behold he hath hid himself among the stuff.””
Sometimes God searches for us but we are buried in material values and mammon, the “stuff” and God cannot find us. A spiritual awakening often begins with a call to leave everything behind. From what I can see, PRACTICALLY ALL of the major Bible figures, Adam, Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, David, Elijah/Elisha, the disciples and Jesus, had a point in their life, usually near the start of their spiritual journey, where they had to leave all of their material belongings and what was closest to them in order to make space for their encounter with God. Saul in contrast was “hidden among the stuff”; He did not want to leave his comfort zone of material possessions under which his soul was buried.
The Heart Posture of Repentance
Saul never once repented for any of his mistakes. When he was caught in the wrong, he just invented excuses to justify himself. God really hates when we attempt to “establish our own righteousness” rather than confessing sin and repenting to Him. When David sinned by numbering Israel, he immediately took ownership and blamed for the situation, even wishing he would be punished directly rather than the people. He offered sacrifices to God and made sure it cost him, refusing to get the resources a man offered without paying that man.
Saul on the other hand, even after being rebuked for keeping king Agag alive, still refused to kill him. Samuel had to do the dirty work and he was not even a soldier. Samuel was an old man, the last person who should have to swing a heavy metal sword.
God’s forgiveness is only limited by our failure to accept it, choosing to create self-justifications and make excuses rather than just accept that we are wrong, repent and ask forgiveness.
Manasseh was the most wicked king in Israel and God forgave him when he repented (2 Chronicles 33:13, also the “Prayer of Manasseh” in the Apocrypha). The reason God was unwilling to forgive and restore Saul is that Saul was unwilling to repent or even ask for forgiveness.
In 1 Samuel 15:17, Samuel rebukes Saul for his disobedience, beginning with the line: “When you were little in your own eyes....” That is to say, Saul started out with the humility to understand his own smallness and the insignificance of his own strength. But after adjusting to the kingship, Saul began to credit the success to himself and to his human wisdom. This pride hardened Saul's heart so that he would not humble himself to repent.
Turning the Other Cheek
One thing we see over and over with David is that he was an early example of Christ’s teachings, in that he always forgave his enemies and treated them well, even when it seemed ridiculous to do so. This is impressive, since David lived during the Old Testament time, many hundreds of years before Christ would teach on this topic. This means David received this knowledge by direct revelation, due to his close relationship with God, being a constant worshipper. When a random Amalekite tried to take credit for killing Saul, thinking David would be impressed and give him a reward, David instead ordered his execution. Likewise, normally a victorious warrior would gloat over the death of his archnemesis, but David rent apart his clothing and created a song of mourning to help restore Saul’s honor after his death. This attitude of forgiveness is one reason which allowed David to become so powerful in God.
David made every attempt to reconcile with his enemies, even when he was in a position of power to easily destroy them:
1 Samuel 24:10-11 Look, this day your eyes have seen that the Lord delivered you today into my hand in the cave, and someone urged me to kill you. But my eye spared you, and I said, ‘I will not stretch out my hand against my lord, for he is the Lord’s anointed.’ Moreover, my father, see! Yes, see the corner of your robe in my hand! For in that I cut off the corner of your robe, and did not kill you, know and see that there is neither evil nor rebellion in my hand, and I have not sinned against you. Yet you hunt my life to take it.
2 Samuel 18:5 Now the king had commanded Joab, Abishai, and Ittai, saying, “Deal gently for my sake with the young man Absalom.” And all the people heard when the king gave all the captains orders concerning Absalom.
18:33 Then the king was deeply moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept. And as he went, he said thus: “O my son Absalom - my son, my son Absalom - if only I had died in your place! O Absalom my son, my son!”
David had plenty of opportunities to kill his archenemies Saul, Absalom, and Ish-bosheth yet he ordered that they be treated kindly. In fact, when some assassins took out David’s enemies to please the king, he instead punished them rather than rewarding them. Why? Because he knew he had his own sins and understood that if he forgave others, God would forgive him also. This is one reason why God treated David so much better than Saul despite David having made just as many mistakes as Saul had made.
Ultimately, David turning the other cheek foreshadowed Christ. God freely forgave David because David freely forgave those who had wronged him. This was David’s secret to maintaining his relationship with God. It is not that Saul was sinful and David was holy. Both men had sin. David had a heart of repentance and forgave his enemies, while Saul made excuses instead of admitting his error. By forgiving those who have harmed us, especially other believers, we can experience full forgiveness of God and have our relationship restored with him rather than being rejected like Saul.
Matthew 6:14-15
14 For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you:
15 But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~