All right, well, this lesson 20 is on the United Kingdom of Israel. Part two, part one was last lecture. We discussed Saul, which was the trans, Saul was the first king of Israel, but was this transition under Samuel from the period of the Judges into the United Kingdom. We had discussed how Saul was unworthy, even though he looked perfect on the outside, his resume had all the great points, okay?
Look great on paper, so to speak. He had not, he did not have the heart, he did not have the heart for the Lord. And so God picked out a king after his own heart, a king that would love the Lord and serve the Lord and serve the people on behalf of the Lord. And that was King David.
And so we saw the transition, again, broad strokes of how Saul committed grave sins and plummeted down to a very, very sad demise at the end of first Samuel. And now David is king, he is anointed king in Hebron over Judah for seven years. And where we left off was with King David being anointed king over all the tribes in 2 Samuel, chapter five verses one through five. So that's exactly where we're picking up with this lesson, part two.
Now that David is king over all of Israel, all 12 tribes, he is the leader, he is the royal bridegroom. The first thing that he needs is a capital. And that brings us to chapter five verses, verses six and following, where David makes Jerusalem his capital. He needs to attack it because Jerusalem is not in, is not conquered by any of the 12 tribes at this point.
It's still under the control of, or known as the Jebusites, they're one of these nations in Canaan. They control the city at one point, it did belong to Israel, but no longer. So David decides to attack Jerusalem and conquer it and make it his city. And of course he did it because, as it says in verse 10 in so many other places, the Lord the God of hosts was with him and he became greater and greater because of the Lord's blessings.
Well, Jerusalem is a very significant city. It's not randomly chosen by David because there is no other better choices. This was the best choice. And there's a number of reasons why that's the case.
Politically speaking and practically speaking, it was a very neutral location. It was very central to all the 12 tribes and it was independent of all the 12 tribes as well. Think of like Washington DC, the District of Columbia, it does not belong to any of the states. So therefore, it really couldn't show much favor.
It doesn't show much favor. It doesn't any of the states, it is independent and it should remain independent for that matter. So the same kind of parallel is going on here with Jerusalem. It doesn't belong to any particular tribe.
And so David can reign from Jerusalem kind of indiscriminately. He can serve everybody in the same way. Right. So that's politically, practically speaking, then religiously speaking, historically speaking, in terms of salvation history, this is where Melchizedek, the priest king of Salem once ruled.
If you remember that back in Genesis chapter 14, verses eight through 20, you have a very short appearance of this very mysterious character Melchizedek. His name is a throne name. It means king of righteousness. Tradition held him to be shem.
If you remember our lesson way back when it helped him to be shem, this was Jewish tradition. It has come into many of the church fathers of Christianity. And that would be really interesting because if Melchizedek is shem, and so therefore Melchizedek is the throne name for shem, he partook of the original model of the firstborn priesthood. Right.
So if you remember the priesthood belonged to the firstborn sons of the family. And so he would belong to that original model, the priesthood. And in a special way, the royal blessing that came from Adam, then it was passed down to Seth, and then to Noah, and then to Shem. Okay.
So you've got that royal lineage that that golden thread, the bloodline that's going to ultimately go from Adam all the way to Jesus. So it'd be very interesting if Melchizedek was indeed shem. We don't know for sure. It's not a teaching of the church by any means, but it would make a lot of sense.
Now, the Salem means peace. So it comes from the root Shalom. Many people know that's the very famous greeting of the Jewish people. Shalom, which means peace.
It's more, it's a very profound peace. As Paul will say, the peace that surpasses all understanding and Philippians. So Salem means peace. So that means Melchizedek is the priest king, the righteous priest king of the city of peace.
All right. Now then he blesses Abraham in the story of Genesis 14. He blesses Abraham because Abraham is now the kind of king of the hill, right? He defeated five of five other kings and delivered his nephew Lot from slavery, from bondage, from capture.
Then Melchizedek offers a thank offering, a thanksgiving offering of bread and wine. Okay. So if you remember all of that, this all happened here in the city of Jerusalem. I'm explaining to you why, if it was Salem once before, why is it now Jerusalem?
That's where we're going next here in the notes. So this exact same spot was also where Abraham offered his son Isaac up to God on Mount Moriah. Do you remember that story in Genesis 22? The binding of Isaac.
Because Isaac was bound. He allows himself to be bound. Isaac to offer himself up. Isaac is both priest and victim.
Well, here, Mount Moriah, where this takes place is the same place where Jerusalem is. And we got an amazing verse. We went in the distance in 2 Chronicles chapter 3 verse 1 and it says, Solomon began to build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the Lord appeared to David as father at the place that David had appointed. So it's very explicit here in 2 Chronicles chapter 3 verse 1, when they built the temple, Solomon and the people built the temple, it was on Mount Moriah, which is exactly where Abraham took Isaac, you know, to be sacrificed.
Same exact location. And so in that story, as they're walking along, if you remember, Isaac asked his father, father, where is the lamb? And Abraham said, God will provide the lamb. Or the Hebrew could be God will provide himself with the lamb.
So God will provide himself the lamb or God will provide the lamb himself. Both are actually accurate because they're two aspects of the same offering when pointing forward to God and Jesus Christ, of course. Well, that expression God will provide is gyra in Hebrew. So if you add the prefix gyra, God will provide to the city where Abraham was offered or bound to Salem, you get gyra, Salem or Jerusalem.
So the origin of the city's name, Jerusalem, really connects these two profound mysteries of Melchizedek's offering, his Thanksgiving offering of bread and wine, and then the prophecy of Abraham through the story of the binding of Isaac that God will provide himself the lamb of the sacrifice. Okay, so what that means is God will ultimately provide peace. Gyra'sa lemence, God will provide peace through the offering of his lamb. And obviously, this points forward to Jesus in amazing ways and what can make those connections in just a second.
So Jerusalem's important politically and practically speaking, yes, it's historically significant because of Melchizedek and the binding of Isaac. But what's also fascinating is that there's a Jewish tradition that comes to us that says that Jerusalem is where the Garden of Eden was believed to be. Now, we don't know that for a fact. You will find it in various commentaries or scholars will mention this and discuss it.
I'm not going to weigh in on this myself, but it would be very interesting and very awesome if that were the case. And I'm going to actually share it why that would be the case when I get at the end of this lecture to the construction of the temple with with Solomon. Okay, all right, so here is all everything that's happening with the conquest of Jerusalem, why it's important. And now that's what David does.
He conquers it. This is where he rules. The next thing that he needs to do is bring the arc to Jerusalem. All right, now he wants to make it his political capital is the sorry, excuse me, his religious capital.
It is his political capital. Now he wants to make it the religious capital of all the people of Israel. And this is a very interesting story. So flipping the page here in chapter six, now that David is firmly established in Jerusalem, it says in chapter six verse two, and following he wants to bring the arc to Jerusalem, he goes to a hill city of Judah to get the arc and they put it on a new cart and then they bring it to Jerusalem with lots of celebration and dancing.
But in verse six, it gives a little detail, a little accident happens. It says, when they came to the threshing floor of Nicon, Uza, this poor chap, Uza, puts out his hand to the ark of God and took hold of it for the oxen stumbled. You would think this would be a good thing. He's like, good job, Uza.
I mean, you really have love of the ark. You don't want the ark to fall in the mud or fall and break off one of the wings of the cherubim or something like that. So that was a really good thing. Good job, Uza.
However, in verse seven, the anger of the Lord was kimbled against Uza and God struck him there because he put forth his hand to the ark and he died there because beside the ark of the Lord because he touched it. You think David was angry about this and he was afraid in verse nine, he's afraid of the Lord that day and he said, how can the ark of the Lord come to me? So he was not willing to take the ark into the city of David but took it aside to the house of Obadietam, the Gittite, and left it there for three months. So this was a very unfortunate beginning to the story where, well, number one, the first mistake is not supposed to put it on a cart.
Back in first Samuel, during the time of Samuel when he comes to rule the people, this is kind of what the Philistines had done. They put the ark on a cart and sent it back to Israel, but that's not how you're supposed to treat the ark. Levites were supposed to carry it on golden poles, right? So that way, this kind of thing wouldn't happen.
It's interesting because it would have been better for the ark to hit the ground because when Uza touches it, he's a sinful man, right? And the ark of the covenant is the most pure, sacred, immaculate object of all of Israel. This is the the throne of God Almighty, the mercy seat. So it would have been better for it to touch some simple dirt than it would be for it to touch a sinful man.
So this is what we call a learning moment, right? An opportunity to learn from one's mistakes. And that's what David does. He's like, wow, okay, we're not messing around here.
How can the ark of the Lord come to me? He puts it aside for three months. All right. Now, interestingly, after three months, the house of Obadietam is being blessed, right?
Babies are being born. The flocks are multiplying. Lots of produce on the land. The stock market portfolio options are just raising through the roof.
And Obadietam is doing great. And David scratches his beard. Okay. All right.
I think I think it's time. Let's try this again. And that's what he does in verses 12 and following. Let's see here.
Verse 12, so David went and brought up the ark from the house of Obadietam to the city of David with rejoicing. And when those who bore the ark of the Lord had gone six paces, he sacrificed in ox and a fatling. And David danced before the Lord with all of his might. And David was belted with a linen ephod.
So David and all the house of Israel brought up the ark of the Lord with shouting and with the sound of the horn. And it goes on to saying verse 16, he was leaping and dancing before the Lord. And they brought the ark of the Lord and set it in its place inside the tent which David had pitched. And then he begins to offer burn offerings and peace offerings before the Lord.
And he finished offering the offerings and blessed the people in the name of the Lord and distributed to all the people, the whole multitude, both men and women, to each a cake of bread. And it says here in my new revised standard version, a portion of meat. But the footnote here is as Hebrews, uncertain, leading scholars to debate about that. And you'll find in some commentaries here that the Hebrew could be a flag of wine.
So that's fascinating. David's offering sacrifices and distributing to the people, bread and wine. Interesting. But at this point, the careful reader of scriptures, like wait a second, time out here.
I remember when Saul got in big trouble for offering sacrifices without Samuel and same what comes along and slaps his hand and says, now the kingdom's gonna, your dynasty's gonna be torn from you. That was his first big mistake, if you remember from last lecture. Why is it that David here gets off scot free? He's offering a ton of sacrifices.
Hundreds of animals are implied in these sacrifices. Why doesn't he get in trouble? Well, interestingly enough, it's because he's not acting like a priest in the order of the Levites, which is what Saul had done. He is acting like a priest king in the order of Melchizedek.
That's the difference. He is offering a different kind of sacrifice and worship and blessings to the Lord, not like the Levites, but in the order of Melchizedek. Why is this okay then for him or how is he in the order of Melchizedek? Well, there's a couple of things to point out.
Number one, when David conquered Jerusalem, which was once Salem, the city of Melchizedek, when David conquers it, he automatically becomes Melchizedek's political successor. And therefore, David now is ruling as a priest king himself by right of law. As Melchizedek successor, he becomes priest king. So that's one consideration.
The second consideration is that if Melchizedek is Shem, as we were talking about earlier, right? If he's Shem, then that makes David his sit air and his successor to the royal priesthood by blood because it goes from Noah to Shem to Abraham, then Isaac and Jacob, then to Judah, then all the way down the line to David. It means that David is the recipient of the Adamic royal blessing that passes all the way down. So now this blessing goes from Adam all the way to David here at this point in history.
And I probably think, personally, that it's both. David is not only the son and heir, the great, great, great grandson, right, and heir of Melchizedek of Shem and Abraham and so on and so forth, but he's also the political successor. So in both senses, David is a priest king in the order of Melchizedek. As we don't have a lot of time to discuss this, but Psalm 110 makes this very, very clear.
He is the priest king in the order of Melchizedek, right? We'll have to talk about a lot of that, those details at another time, but I think it suffices to prove the point here. All right, so the typology is very, very obvious here. How it is all of this point forward to Christ?
Well, ultimately, Jesus is the new David, right? He's the new son of David. He's the new king of Israel, which means he too, as Hebrew says, is a priest king in the order of Melchizedek. He's a new Melchizedek.
He's a new David, and he is right there in Jerusalem going to fulfill the prophecy of Abraham, where he will provide himself as the Lamb of sacrifice. And when he provides himself as the sacrifice to bring peace to all the nations, he offers this up to us, sacramentally in bread and wine, okay, in a sacrifice of thanks giving, which in Greek is Eucharistia. All right, so I know I did that really quickly, but it really shows, I hope you're tracking with me, how it connects all of these different mysteries, the Melchizedek of Abraham, of David, and in Jerusalem, which means again, God will provide peace, right? Shira, so on, God will provide peace, and he's going to do it through the sacrifice of the Lamb, which Jesus is.
He's both Lamb, but he's also the righteous priest king of Jerusalem himself. So it's beautiful. It's beautiful connections, and you're not going to understand all of that in the New Testament. Again, if you don't understand the old, that's why we're spending so much time looking at these broad strokes, 30,000 foot view here of salvation history, because Jesus fulfills the law and the prophets.
As he says in self, and this is our mind on the Mount, right? Matthew chapter 5. Okay, so this is great here. We've made those connections, but there's another connection to make as well more typology, not just of Jesus, as the new David, as the new Melchizedek, as the new Isaac, right, offering himself up and giving us himself and bread and wine and the new Passover, beautiful stuff.
It also teaches us something about his mother. And in fact, we're gonna have a couple of really cool moments of typology here with Mary as well. So you'll notice a couple of things that I read to you in chapter six. David goes and travels to the hill country of Judah, and then he's very scared, and angry, he's like, whoa, how can the Ark of the Covenant come to me?
He leaves in the house of Obadietum, the Gittite for three months. And during this whole time, both in the first attempt and the second attempt, he is leaping and dancing for joy before the Ark of the Covenant. All right, we know elsewhere. Here's another couple of details that's not in second Samuel, but it's elsewhere with the Ark back in Exodus chapter 40, as we're going to see later on in first Kings of chapters five and six, well, really seven through nine.
We're going to see how the Holy Spirit overshadows the Ark of the Covenant. When the tabernacle was completed in Exodus 40, the glory cloud, the Shekinach, the Holy Spirit comes down overshadows the Ark. Okay, that's a very important detail that pertains to the Ark, and then finally another important detail is the contents. What is in that Ark?
Number one, you've got that Tupperware char of manna. If you remember, Moses was commanded to put the manna in the Ark. Two, you've got the tablets of the law, the Ten Commandments. And then three, you have Aaron's rod that butted, and we saw that story back in numbers as well.
So the contents of the Ark are the manna, the tablets, and Aaron's rod. All right, well, interestingly enough, when you read Luke chapter one, and many, many scholars will Protestant and Catholic have pointed this out here. If you grab your Bibles and you go to Luke chapter one, and you read the story of the visitation, you're going to see a lot of interesting parallels and kind of wondering, well, what is Luke doing here? What's the Holy Spirit really as the author of scripture?
What is he doing? And I just want to read a few verses chapter one verse 39 to Luke. It says, in those days, Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country of Judah, and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the child leapt in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, and she exclaimed with a loud cry.
She shouted with a loud cry, blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me, or behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my ears, the child in my womb leapt for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her through the Lord. And at that point, Mary sings her famous magnificat, which I shared with you in the last lecture is really an echoing or a fulfillment of Hannah's prayer back in verse Samuel chapter two.
But after her magnificat, there's a detail in verse 56, it says, Mary remained with her for about three months. All right, so this is fascinating. You're going to read it, read it, read them side by side. Second Samuel chapter six with Luke chapter one, you're going to find all these parallels, which I basically broke down here in your notes.
Mary travels to the hill country of Judah just as David did. Elizabeth cries out to Mary, how can the mother of my Lord come to me, which is pretty much almost verbatim with what David says, how can the Ark of the Lord come to me? Mary remained with Elizabeth? Absolutely, yes, three months, just like the Ark remained with the house of Obedetim for three months.
If John left in Elizabeth's womb before, of course, Mary with Mary's greeting, just like David is leaping and chanting for joy before the Ark. And then it's interesting not in the visitation, but in Luke chapter one verse 35, if you flip back to the New Testament, Mary asks the Archangel Gabriel, you know, how shall I conceive? I know not man. And we'll talk about that another time she's taken a perpetual vow of virginity.
And the angel responds, the Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. It's the exact same Greek word, Ebbitskyatse, as the Greek Old Testament uses for the Shek'inach, the glory cloud though, God himself, the Holy Spirit coming down and filling the Holy of Holies in the tabernacle and in the temple. And then you've got this last point about the contents of the Ark. Well, all of that points to Jesus.
So the contents of the Ark, the man of the tablets and the priestly rod, all point forward to Jesus. He is the bread of life. He is the new law of the new covenant. And he is the eternal High Priesthood.
Then you have to wonder, okay, if the contents of the Ark point forward to Jesus, what about the Ark itself? What does that point forward to? And according to all these parallels, it seems pretty darn clear that the Ark points forward to Mary, because Mary has Jesus Christ within her womb. She is depicted as a new Ark, which means she is also, well, put it this way, if the Ark was holy, if the Ark was the most sacred archer of all of Israel, it was the glory of the people of Israel because it was the seed of wisdom or rather the seed of mercy of God.
And it was immaculate, right? No sinful man could touch it. All of these little hints tell us that Mary too must be these things if not greater, because the fulfillment of a type must be greater than the type itself. Right?
Just like the man of the tablets and errands rod is not as great as Jesus. Jesus is greater than those things. Same thing with Mary. She is the fulfillment of the Ark.
She is pure. She is holy. And she is, I dare say, the immaculate conception. All right, there's a lot more to say there, but I think that I'm sure you get the connections here how Mary truly is the new Ark of the Covenant.
Beautiful typology. There's more about Mary to come.