Mount Gilboa

They mourned-" And wept and fasted till evening for Saul and his son Jonathan, and for the army of the Lord, and for the nation of Israel, because they had fallen by the sword.

And then he goes on to say, he, he does this lament where he says, "Mountains of Gilboa, may you have neither dew nor rain.

May no showers fall on your terrace fields.

For there the shield of the mighty was despised, the shield of Saul no longer rubbed with oil."

I want you to be the next king.

God made David the next king, and Jonathan died on Mount Gilboa with his brothers and his dad.

God said there'll be nothing that grows on Mount Gilboa from this day forward.

And you go to Gilboa, nothing grows there.

It's cursed.

So if you ever do tarot cards or speak to mediums, repent before god slices you down in judgment don't commune with devils and demons friends 21st century that's not always known by christians don't do mediums anyway Samuel speaks and prophesies to Saul that he will be destroyed and his nation will fall and his kingdom will die.

And that is exactly what happens at the battle of Gilboa in chapter 31.

Saul and his son Jonathan and other sons die.

And their bodies are desecrated and they are put up on the Philistine city walls and desecrated in the most horrible of ways.

Matthew 4:24, "And his fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto him all sick people that were taken with diverse diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatic, and those that had the palsy; and he healed them." 1 John 4:18, "There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear: because fear hath torment.

He that fears is not made perfect in love." 1 Chronicles 10, "Now the Philistines fought against Israel; and the men of Israel fled from before the Philistines, and fell down slain in mount Gilboa.

And the Philistines followed hard after Saul, and after his sons; and the Philistines slew Jonathan, and Abinadab, and Malchishua, the sons of Saul.

And the battle went sore against Saul, and the archers hit him, and he was wounded of the archers.

So Saul died, and his three sons, and all his house died together.

And when all the men of Israel that were in the valley saw that they fled, and that Saul and his sons were dead, then they forsook their cities, and fled: and the Philistines came and dwelt in them.

And it came to pass on the morrow, when the Philistines came to strip the slain, that they found Saul and his sons fallen in mount Gilboa.

And when they had stripped him, they took his head, and his armour, and sent into the land of the Philistines round about, to carry tidings unto their idols, and to the people.

I chose 1 Chronicles 10, verse 2, which says, And the Philistines overtook Saul and his sons, and the Philistines struck down Jonathan and Abinadab and Malchi-Shua, the sons of Saul.

Why choose today's verse? What's to understand from this tragedy on Mount Gilboa? Saul failed to follow God's instructions and sought his own way.

Sometimes making choices to be loyal has consequences, even to your own family.

I'm not suggesting it would have been easy for Saul's sons or even a commoner in the Israelite army to ignore a call from the first king of Israel, but his own sons weren't spared the consequences, not even Jonathan, who was a good friend of David's.

I knew one thing about the Bible.

I knew David's lament over Saul and Mount Gilboa because my primary school teacher said, this was good literature.

You should memorize this.

So I did, and I still remember it.

So was the mercenary captain who had lived among the Philistines and pretended madness to survive.

So was the mourner who had torn his clothes on the day he learned that Saul and Jonathan had fallen on Mount Gilboa.

All of those men had folded into this one, and this one was a king.

He had done what no one before him had managed to do.

You could be saddened.

David wrote the Song of the Bow after Saul and Jonathan fell on Mount Gilboa.

But you've got to stay to the course rather than abandoning the course.

And I think sometimes people do say, you know, I've had enough.