The Value of David
I find it fascinating how much power David had over his people. I’m reading 2 Samuel right now and there are many parts where it becomes apparent how valuable David is to his people. One such instance is in 2 Samuel 18: 2-3: “And the king said to his men ‘I myself will also go out with you.’ But the men said, ‘You shall not go out. For if we flee, they will not care about us. But you are worth ten thousand of us. Therefore it is better that you send us help from the city.’”
This type of loyalty is amazing to me and it got me thinking about what people are willing to do for someone who they perceive to be more valuable than themselves. How do we go about assigning values to people’s lives. We can see this type of loyalty (and sometimes fear) on a smaller scale in the case of Prince Harry going to war against great opposition from the British government. He is thought of as being more important than the other soldiers which made him more of a target to the enemy. These are the same types of thoughts going the the heads of David’s people in 2 Samuel. This got me thinking, if David is worth that much, how much more worth did Jesus’ life hold? It says in Romans 5:7 that “one will scarcely die for a righteous person–though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die.”
Even with cases of loyalty like David’s, it is impossible to compare that to Jesus and his loyalty to us. Although Jesus didn’t have a worldwide following in the billions while he was alive, he took on the sins of every man and died so that they might live. The only thing that we can say is that Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection are worth everything. That is so hard to comprehend and I have trouble thinking about that sometimes; His life is worth everything that has ever been and ever will be.
For that, we should give him all the glory. Or in the words of my friend Dave Werner, “it’s like…whoooooaaa.”
June 26 2008 07:31 am | Bible and God
