2 Samuel 23:11-23 – Service in an Unglamorous Situation
We’re not all called to take on the enemy on glamorous battlefields. As if there is such a thing anyway. Here in verses 11 and 12 we have a man called Shammah who takes his stand in a plot of ground full of lentils. I’m sure there are people that we’re all looking forward to meeting in heaven. People from the Bible, great missionaries and others from church history. But has anyone ever said: ‘I can’t wait to meet the guy who defended the lentil field?!’ And yet lentil fields need defended. And God calls most of his followers to serve him in unglamorous situations.
Often, we’d rather not live and serve in a lentil field. But lentil fields need defended. Why? Because God’s people need fed. And if the lentil field isn’t there, they’re going to go hungry. Jesus told Peter: ‘feed my sheep’. He didn’t say: only feed my sheep who live in what the world thinks are significant places.
Another reason to defend lentil fields is because if you lose them to the Philistines, it’s very hard to get them back again. And the challenge is: Are we willing to serve God in a lentil field if that’s where he calls us to serve him? Would we be more committed to the church if there were more people, a bigger budget, and more folk our own age? In verse 11 here, everyone else fled. Everyone else abandoned the lentil field. But Shammah stood his ground. And when the enemy is growing in strength, and humanly speaking prospects are small, people will do that. They’ll say: I’m not going to invest my life in a lentil field. But Shammah did. Either he was going to kill the Philistines, or they were going to kill him. But he wasn’t moving from that lentil field. Jesus said: ‘”If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.’
One thing about small churches is that we lack the resources that bigger churches have. But down in verse 21 we have a man who didn’t have resources. There’s a handsome Egyptian who has a spear. And there’s one of David’s men called Benaiah, who only has a staff. But does Benaiah say ‘he has a spear and I don’t, so there’s no point?’ No, he takes what he has. He takes his staff, and he goes down and snatches the spear out of the Egyptian’s hand.Then he kills the Egyptian with his own spear. Just as David had killed Goliath with Goliath’s own sword. Just as Jesus at the cross used death itself to defeat death. No resources? So what. The cattle on a thousand hills belong to our God.
Question
- What can we learn from Shammah?
Prayer Points
- Give thanks that the Lord Jesus Christ has all the necessary resources.
- Use prayer points from your congregation.
- Pray for family matters.