Reading… and Thinking

   During the war between the house of Saul and the house of David, Abner had been strengthening his own position in the house of Saul. Now Saul had had a concubine named Rizpah daughter of Aiah. And Ish-Bosheth said to Abner, “Why did you sleep with my father’s concubine?”
   Abner was very angry because of what Ish-Bosheth said and he answered, “Am I a dog’s head—on Judah’s side? This very day I am loyal to the house of your father Saul and to his family and friends. I haven’t handed you over to David. Yet now you accuse me of an offense involving this woman! May God deal with Abner, be it ever so severely, if I do not do for David what the LORD promised him on oath and transfer the kingdom from the house of Saul and establish David’s throne over Israel and Judah from Dan to Beersheba.” Ish-Bosheth did not dare to say another word to Abner, because he was afraid of him….
   Abner conferred with the elders of Israel and said, “For some time you have wanted to make David your king. Now do it! For the LORD promised David, ‘By my servant David I will rescue my people Israel from the hand of the Philistines and from the hand of all their enemies.’”

— 2 Samuel 3:6-17 (NIV)

Abner was a very capable commander, and also an astute politician. In the wake of Saul’s defeat and death, Abner was well aware that most of the leadership of Israel wanted to be united under David. In this passage he also twice acknowledges that such was the Lord’s will. He was confident he would be able to negotiate an arrangement that would be beneficial to everyone—including himself, because he could count on having a prominent place in David’s court.

So why didn’t he do it? Why, instead, did he keep up a long, losing war against David and Judah, propping up Saul’s weak and ineffectual son Ish-Bosheth?

The key is in the first sentence quoted above: he was strengthening his own position in Israel. By taking Saul’s concubine, he was making a declaration that he was in fact the real ruler. As we see in this passage, Ish-Bosheth was terrified of Abner. Ish-Bosheth was nothing but a puppet; the real power was in Abner’s hands.

And this is why he didn’t want to bring Israel to David. He liked the personal power he had. He would have had some power under David as well, but not the absolute power that he had as the real head of the ten tribes.

It’s unlikely that you or I will ever find ourselves tempted by the kind of power Abner had. But we do find ourselves from time to time in situations where there is a choice between gratifying our own immediate wishes, and doing the right thing. It isn’t that we don’t know what’s right! Like Abner, we know it very well. But doing the right thing sometimes means giving up something we want right now, and we’re reluctant to do that!

Finally, a situation arose that prompted Abner to change his course and do what he should have done long before. The account reads as though he did this just to spite Ish-Bosheth, but it seems likely that there was more involved. There was definitely risk involved in making a total turn-around, very publicly. Maybe Abner was getting tired of the game, and probably he could see that David was eventually going to win anyway. Perhaps he even genuinely repented of his behavior. We don’t know.

What can we learn from this? We should pray that the Lord might similarly bring us to our senses, when we have put immediate gratification above the long term well being of ourselves and others, and above the will of the Lord. And when we do realize what we’ve done, we need to be willing to change courses completely, and set about making things right. If a questionable politician like Abner can do it, then so can I!