Articles
God Is Faithful
Trusting the LORD
God promised to 'build a house for David' (2Sam. 7). Short story, Jesus is the Son of David and has been given all authority in heaven and earth (Matt. 28:18). He is the rightful heir of David and sits on the throne (exercises all authority) of David. But, it is indeed an interesting story of how we get here.
David's kingdom / lineage is a story of intrigue, attempted coups, mayhem and murder. This is what the LORD promised when David sinned with Bathsheba: "Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.’ Thus says the Lord, ‘Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house. And I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun. For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun.’" (2Sam. 12:10-12).
The usual practice in the Old Testament times (and even into our 'modern' era) is to kill off all the old party when you take over. There were many attempted overthrows of David's kingdom. Even before David is anointed the true king, there is the battle with Saul's family (Ishbosheth) to take the throne and preserve Saul's lineage (2 Samuel 2). Surely if the house of Saul had prevailed, David's seed would have been eliminated.
While David is alive we see the prophecy of Nathan coming true. It begins with rebellion of Adonijah (1Kgs. 1). Then came Absalom. Even though it proved untrue, the report came to David that Absalom had killed all the royal seed (Absalom had only killed Amnon - 2 Sam. 13:23-33). We see that David's sons were often killed as Amnon (13:29), Absalom (18:15), and Adonijah (1 Kings 2:25) all will die by the sword.
Later, when Jehu took over as king of the northern kingdom, he proceeded to assassinate Ahaziah (2 Kings 9:27. Jehu then met the 'relatives of Ahaziah" and proceeded to slaughter 42 of them (2Kings 10:13-14). Things look bleak for the house of David, but it gets worse.
The queen mother (the mother of the king who dies takes over as the ruler), Athaliah, attempts to take over. We read: "Now when Athaliah the mother of Ahaziah saw that her son was dead, she arose and destroyed all the royal family" (2 Kings 11:1). The good news is that Jehosheba (Ahaziah's sister) took courage and protected Joash the son of Ahaziah. With this brave action the seed of David survives.
YET, in each instance there is at least one godly person who steps up and with courage protects the line of David. Of course behind such people is God - keeping His promise.
Even through the Babylonian captivity and the 400 years after that when there was no real kingdom / authority / ruler, God kept the lineage alive. It is no small thing to read "The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham" (Matthew 1:1).
God is faithful. You can trust Him to keep His promises.
