There are many
scriptures which clearly teach that God leads people through simple obedience
to parental authority. When God was to bring David before Israel as the giant
slayer how did He go about it? Jesse told his
son David, "Take for your brothers this half-bushel of roasted grain and
these ten loaves of bread and quickly take them to your brothers in the camp..." David got up early in the morning, left the
sheep with a keeper, took the supplies, and went as Jesse had directed him. He
arrived at the encampment as the army was going out to the battle line,
shouting the battle cry1Sam
17:17, 20(ISV). It was in this
errand in obedience to his father that coincidentally he arrives just as
Goliath is making his daily boast and taunting Israel’s armies (actually it was
no coincidence but God ordained programming). All the while he had been going
to Saul but was not revealed to Israel as warrior or deliverer. David would go back and forth from Saul to tend his
father's sheep in Bethlehem1Sam
17:15(ISV). It’s not David
this started with.
Did you notice
this was exactly how obedience to his father’s authority brought opportunity to
Saul? This was how God brought him to Samuel in the first place. The donkeys belonging to Kish, Saul's father, were
lost, and Kish told his son Saul, "Take one of the young men with you, get
up, and go look for the donkeys."1Sam 9:3(ISV). Saul’s father had servants he could send.
Saul also was most likely married by now, yet he obeys and does not “sublet”
the instruction to another son or the servants. God was at work. Again this was
in no way a coincidence because one day before
Saul's arrival, the LORD had revealed to Samuel: "About this time tomorrow I'll send you
a man from the land of Benjamin, and you are to anoint him as
Commander-in-Chief over my people Israel1Sam 9:15-16(ISV). That God used the same method again to bring
the next king to prominence surely means He will use it again and again.
Let not the point
miss you. Saul and David were men of destiny. Each chosen by God for national
assignment; and it pleased God to use simple obedience to a father’s directive
to bring them to opportunity for greatness. "Honor your
father and mother" (this is the first commandment with a promise),
"that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the
land." Eph 6:2, 3 (ESV)
Does this
principle apply only to covenant sons? Consider Anah a seed of Sier: Anah discovered the hot springs in the wilderness
while grazing his father Zibeon's donkeys Gen 36:24 (ISV). This is not a chance thing, and that it
happened with a man not descended from Abraham, a man outside of the covenant
means to me all men can key into it. It is a truth as far as I am concerned; as
much as Prov 22:29(KJV) Seest thou a
man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand
before mean men.
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