Bible Commentaries
2 Samuel 15

Verses 19-21

2 Samuel 15:19-21

I. We have in this passage a remarkable instance of the spirit of true patriotism, all the more remarkable because, in one sense, patriotism is not quite the word to apply to Ittai, for he was a stranger and an alien, though a naturalised Israelite. In him we have a singular instance of that devotion to a person which will always be the leading characteristic of the Christian life. The legalist may be devoted to a system; the moralist may be devoted to an idea; the real Christian will be devoted to a Person, to the person of a living Christ.

II. Ittai was the kind of man that David wanted, and he is the kind of man that Christ wants now. There are many people ready enough to make the Lord Jesus Christ a kind of stepping-stone to help them into heaven. If they can make a convenience of Him and He can serve their purpose in a dying hour, it is all very well. It is not such as these the Lord wants. The "citizens of heaven" are men who are partakers of their Master's nobility.

III. It was the fact that David had received him as an exile that first bound Ittai's heart to him. We also are strangers and exiles. Christ gives us a home. Our adoption into His family should be a motive power which will bear us through all the shocks of the battle of life and make us "more than conquerors through Him that loved us."

W. Hay Aitken, Mission Sermons, 1st series, p. 168.

Verse 21

2 Samuel 15:21

Foremost among the little band who followed David from Jerusalem came six hundred men from Gath Philistines from Goliath's city. These men, singularly enough, the king had chosen as his bodyguard; perhaps he was not altogether sure of the loyalty of his own subjects, and possibly felt safer with foreign mercenaries who could have no secret leanings to the deposed house of Saul. At all events, here they are, "faithful among the faithless," as foreign soldiers surrounding a king often are, notably the Swiss guard in the French Revolution. David's generous nature shrinks from dragging down Ittai with himself. Generosity breeds generosity, and the Philistine captain breaks out into a burst of passionate devotion, garnished, in soldier fashion, with an unnecessary oath or two, but ringing very sincere and meaning a great deal. As for him and his men, they have chosen their side.

I. Look at the picture of this Philistine captain, as teaching us what grand, passionate self-sacrifice may be evolved out of the roughest natures. Ringing in his words we hear three things which are the seed of all nobility and splendour in human character: (1) a passionate personal attachment, (2) love issuing in willing sacrifice that recks not for a moment of personal consequences, and (3) a supreme, restful delight in the presence of him whom the heart loves. This capacity, which lies dormant in all of us, will make a man blessed and dignified" as nothing else will. The joy of unselfish love is the purest joy that man can taste.

II. These possibilities of love and sacrifice point plainly to God in Christ as their true object. We are made with hearts that need to rest upon an absolute love, with understandings that need to grasp a pure, a perfect, and a personal truth.

III. Observe the terrible misdirection of these capacities in the sin and the misery of the world. There is nothing more tragic than the misdirection of man's capacity for love and sacrifice. We must lay ourselves on Christ's altar, and that altar will sanctify both the giver and the gift

A. Maclaren, Christ in the Heart, p. 145.

References: 2 Samuel 15:21 . J. M. Neale, Sermons in Sackville College, vol. iii., p. 420; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxvi., No. 1512. 2 Samuel 15:23 . Ibid., Morning by Morning, p. 152. 2 Samuel 15:30 . J. Van Oosterzee, Year of Salvation, vol. ii., p. 463. 2 Samuel 16:10 . Expositor, 2nd series, vol. i., p. 244. 2 Samuel 16:12 . Parker, vol. vii., p. 239. 2 Samuel 16:13 . Ibid., p. 240. 2 Samuel 16:15 . W. M. Taylor, David King of Israel, p. 238. 2 Samuel 16:16 . R. Lee, P enny Pulpit, No. 491.