Introduction

A bearer of news can be treated especially well, or, as in the case of the Amalekite who brought David the news of the death of Saul and Jonathan, quite badly.

One of David’s greatest accomplishments was breaking the Philistines’ control over Canaan once and for all and shutting them up in the coastal plain (2 Samuel 5:17-25; 21:15-22). But at the time described in today’s text they were raising havoc with the Israelites - so much so, in fact, that Saul and Jonathan were both killed.

When this news was brought to David, he was sad. A lesser man would have gloated over the death of one who had treated him so badly. But David had a continued respect for the memory of Saul and the office he held. A more ambitious man than David would have been equally pleased about the death o…