And it came to pass, when Abiathar the son of Ahimelech fled to David to Keilah, he came down with an ephod in his hand.
Abiathar was the only priest to survive Saul's slaughter at Nob, and he escaped to David at Keilah carrying an ephod — the priestly garment used to ask God questions. So the way of hearing from God left the king's court and joined the hunted man.
The priest fled to David because Saul had turned on the priesthood. What Saul destroyed, David sheltered. Abiathar brought with him something no band of outlaws could make for itself.
The king's murderous act against Nob drives Abiathar the priest to David (1 Sam. 22:20). Later he comes to him with the ephod in his hand (1 Sam. 23:6). A happy privilege belongs to these wandering men whom the world dishonors and despises. They can approach God, consult Him at any time, and enter into fellowship with Him.
An ephod on its own would be a strange thing to carry while running for your life. Its value lay in what was fastened to it.
The ephod was the garment the high priest wore over his robe. Fastened in it was the breastplate, which held the Urim and Thummim and twelve precious stones, each one standing for a tribe of Israel (Ex. 28:6-21). It was used to ask God questions. The twelve stones stress a vital truth. God will only answer on the basis of His love and care for ALL Israel. He does not answer from a narrow party view, as though He favoured one person over another. Saul could not rightly use it for it was not Israel that he loved, but himself.
David was about to discover that the town he had just rescued would hand him over. The names on the breastplate steadied how he saw those people.
The breastplate belonged with the ephod and could not be parted from it, and it carried the names of all the tribes of Jacob. David was about to learn by bitter experience what the people he had to serve were really like. The breastplate reminded him that the Lord's compassion for them had not changed, however much their circumstances had. Looking at them by their behaviour might have driven him away from them. Seeing them as the Lord thought of them, pictured in this symbol, would deepen his interest in them.
David had already asked God about attacking the Philistines, before the ephod ever reached him.
Abiathar had not yet come down with the ephod; David was still lacking this means ordained by God for consulting Him. The outward resources may be beyond reach, but access to God will never be, for this is free and wide open to all. David speaks with God as with a friend. The Lord stoops down to him and answers. Strikingly, His answer is more intimate and more detailed than when David consults Him with the ephod.
The chapter sets the man with the ephod beside the man without one. Saul is guessing; David is being told.
David asked the Lord for counsel, and then went to Keilah. Contrast Saul and David at this time, and you see the priceless advantage of knowing God's mind. Saul sits under the tamarisk tree at Gibeah, like a man fighting in the dark. He scolds his servants for not telling him that Jonathan is in league with David. Miserable man! He does not turn to God to learn the true state of things, but dark suspicion fills his heart. … The men of Keilah, it turned out, were quite ready to hand their rescuer over to Saul if the chance came. That shameful act was stopped only because David asked the Lord by the ephod Abiathar had just brought. That is how he found out what they intended.
How David asked matters as much as what he asked. The man who owned the throne by God's choice spoke from the lowest place.
When the ephod is brought (v. 6) God answers by the ephod and David receives adequate direction. It is lovely to see him take on the character of a servant here. He, to whom the kingdom belonged, claims only the most humble place before God. "O LORD, the God of Israel, Your servant has surely heard… Will Saul come down, as Your servant has heard? O LORD, the God of Israel, please tell Your servant" (vv. 10-11).
The ephod was God's pledge that His people need never be left guessing. One writer asks what that means for Christians now.
The Urim and the Thummim in the high priest's breastplate were the pledge that Israel need never be in the dark about anything. And is the Christian less favoured today? The Holy Spirit lives in us. The completed word of God is in our hands. A glorified Christ takes an interest in us. So nothing on our path need be unclear to us, down to the smallest detail.
- Driven — Saul's attack on the priests at Nob drove the last priest, and the ephod with him, to the man Saul was hunting.
- Carried — the ephod held the breastplate with the Urim and Thummim and the twelve stones. It was the appointed way to ask God, and He answered on the basis of His care for all Israel.
- Open — God answered David before the ephod ever arrived. Outward helps may be lost; access to God is not.
- Asked — the rightful king questioned God as "Your servant," while Saul, with no such link, moved on suspicion in the dark.
- Kept — the answer saved David from Keilah's treachery. God gives the same certainty today through the Spirit, the completed Scriptures, and a glorified Christ.
And it was told Saul that David had come to Keilah. Then Saul said, God has cast him off into my hand; for he is shut in, by entering into a city that has gates and bars.
Saul hears that David has entered Keilah, a walled town. He reads the report as a gift from heaven: the man he hunts is now boxed in behind gates and bars. The verse raises a hard question: what does it mean when a man uses God's name to bless his own murderous plan?
Saul does not ask God anything. He reads the circumstances and draws his own conclusion.
Saul is completely deluded and has no guidance from God. He sees David's position at Keilah — shut in among people he could influence — as God's act to deliver his enemy into his hand. Malice is so often blinded like this. When the will is working this way, God allows circumstances to appear to favour it. He does so only to prove once more, and more fully, how far all such vindictive bitterness is from His will.
Saul had already heard his sentence from the prophet Samuel. That makes his confidence more than a mistake, and the account answers him a few verses later. (The writers quote Saul's boast from older translations; the ESV reads, "God has given him into my hand.")
Saul in his terrible blindness can say, "God has cast him off into my hand." Yet he had heard Samuel's solemn word: "He has also rejected you from being king!" What hardening of heart! The persecutor of the "beloved one" believes that he knows God and has Him on his side. But he does not know the God of Israel any better than he knows himself. Psalm 2:4 says, "He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision." In the same way, the Word answers here with well-deserved irony: "God did not give him into his hand."
The test of Saul's piety is what he was willing to march for. Keilah was being robbed by the Philistines and he stayed home; now he raises an army.
The report came to Saul that David was at Keilah, and Saul thinks that God was favouring him by putting David in that critical position where Saul could arrest and kill him. This glib talk about God shows how seared his conscience was. He would not go to Keilah to save the people there from the Philistines, but he would take his army there to fight against David, who had been willing to fight for Keilah!
Saul is not merely chasing a rival. He is resisting the kingdom God has already given to another, and he keeps himself going by refusing to admit it.
Saul soon hears that David has come to Keilah. Nobody mentions the essential service David has rendered there. In fact, Saul is quite ready to sacrifice Keilah itself, if only in this way he can satisfy his hatred of David. David represents that higher kingdom which Saul must obey or fall before. In Saul, disobedience has now become a frenzy of despair. He keeps up a hopeless fight with forces he knows are far beyond him, though he will not admit it or act as if it were so. How solemn, how tremendous, is such a struggle of the creature with the Creator! The creature puts out all its power of self-deception to hold off, for a little while, a collapse that is certain. Delay only makes that collapse more total and beyond repair when it comes.
Saul's sentence contains one true word: God was involved. He simply had the purpose backwards.
Saul — religious Saul — hearing that David is in Keilah, hurries to destroy him, saying, "God has delivered him into my hand." He thought there was no escape for David, and said God had done it! What a fool a man becomes when he tries to understand God's ways with His saints while he himself is an enemy! Yes, God did bring David to Keilah, but He also knew how to bring him out of it — not for Saul, but for His own glory and for Saul's shame.
Saul's energy was real. It was just pointed at the wrong target — and that pattern outlives him.
The self-deluded king declares that God has delivered his enemy into his hand. David had shut himself up in a city, so Saul could surround him and besiege him at leisure. Here we see the incurable character of the enmity of the flesh. Saul would not go to Keilah to deliver it from the Philistines. He will go at once to seize David. What shall we say of that spirit which is timid or lazy in the work of the gospel, or in seeking to rescue the people of God from error? Yet it is quick to take up weapons in a fleshly fight with the servants of the Lord! We need not wonder that the work of God languishes in any company where the spirit of envy and strife is present.
- Blindness begins. Samuel had already told Saul that God had rejected him as king, yet he still believed God was on his side — he knew neither God nor himself.
- Blindness reads. Gates and bars looked like a gift from heaven. God may let circumstances seem to favour a hateful will, only to expose it more fully.
- Blindness talks. The man who would not lift a finger to save Keilah from the Philistines now marches on it to kill David. And he calls that God's doing.
- Blindness fights. Saul is resisting a kingdom already given away. He spends all his power of self-deception to delay a collapse he cannot avoid.
- Blindness answered. God did bring David to Keilah, and He knew how to bring him out again — "God did not give him into his hand."
And Saul summoned all the people to war, to go down to Keilah, to besiege David and his men.
David had just rescued Keilah from the Philistines. Now Saul musters a whole nation against the man who saved the town, and he has convinced himself that God has handed him his victim.
Saul looked at David's position inside a walled town and saw the hand of God in it. One commentator explains why events can line up so neatly behind a wrong purpose.
Saul is completely deluded and without divine guidance. He sees David's position at Keilah — shut in among people he could influence — as God's intervention to hand his enemy over to him. Malice is so often blinded in this way. When self-will is at work like this, God permits circumstances to appear to favour it. He does this only to give a further and fuller proof of how opposed all such vindictive bitterness is to His will.
Saul talks about God as though God were backing him. One writer notes what that talk exposes, and sets it beside the rescue Saul never attempted.
The report came to Saul that David was at Keilah. Saul thinks God was favouring him by putting David in that critical position, where Saul could arrest and kill him. This glib talk about God shows how hardened his conscience was. He would not go to Keilah to save the people there from the Philistines. Yet he would take his army there to fight against David, who had been willing to fight for Keilah!
Saul can raise a whole army for this, but not for the Philistines. One commentator asks where the same spirit shows up among God's people.
The enmity of the flesh is shown here to be incurable. What shall we say of a spirit like this? It is timid or lazy in the work of the gospel, or in trying to rescue the people of God from error. Yet it is quick to take up weapons in a fleshly quarrel with the servants of the Lord. We need not wonder that the work of God languishes in any group where the spirit of envy and strife is present.
Saul knew God had chosen David. One commentator names what that makes this siege.
Here is a man who knows full well that God had chosen David. He knows full well, too, that God had rejected him as king. Yet he keeps on plotting David's ruin on purpose. Truly this is not fighting against man, but against God.
Another writer explains what Saul is really up against, and how such a fight ends.
David stands for a higher kingdom, and Saul must either obey it or fall before it. His disobedience has now become a frenzy of despair. He keeps up a hopeless fight against forces he knows are far beyond him, though he will not admit it or act as if it were so. How solemn, how tremendous is such a struggle of the creature with the Creator! The creature puts out all its power of self-deception to postpone for a little while a collapse that is certain. And when that collapse comes, it will only be more complete and beyond repair.
Saul's plan rests on one thing: a walled town holds David fast. One writer sets the two men side by side.
Then poor, blinded Saul thought David was now shut up in Keilah and could not escape. He did not know the Lord, or His power to protect His own. While Saul plotted, David prayed and depended on the Lord. The Lord told him that Saul would come to Keilah, and that the men of Keilah would betray him and his men.
David asked the Lord instead. A priest had come to him with the ephod — the garment worn to seek God's direction. One writer explains what that ephod carried with it.
The breastplate, which could not be separated from the ephod, bore the names of all the tribes of Jacob. David was about to learn by bitter experience what the people he had to serve were really like. The breastplate reminded him of the Lord's unchanged compassion for them, changed as their circumstances were… He made no complaint. He cannot wage war with Israel, with the people whose names were on the breastplate. He can strike no blow at his master, the LORD's anointed. He will not fight.
- Shut in, as Saul saw it. David inside a town with gates and bars looked to Saul like a gift from God. God may let circumstances appear to favour self-will — only to expose it more fully.
- Shut in, by religious words. Saul puts God's name on his own hatred. Such talk shows a hardened conscience, not guidance.
- Shut in, against God. Saul knew God had chosen David and rejected him. So this siege is a creature fighting his Creator, propped up by self-deception.
- Not shut in at all. Saul thought David could not escape; he did not know the Lord's power to protect His own. While Saul plotted, David prayed.
- The test it leaves. Saul's mark is energy kept back from the real enemy and spent against a servant of God. Where envy and strife rule, the work of God languishes.
And when David knew that Saul devised mischief against him, he said to Abiathar the priest, Bring the ephod.
David has just saved the town of Keilah from Philistine raiders, and now Saul is gathering an army to besiege that very town. Shut in with six hundred men and townspeople he cannot trust, David does not call a war council — he calls for a priest's garment.
David asks God before he moves. Commentators trace that habit back to God's own work in him.
God was not only preparing the hearts of the people for David. He was also training David himself in a deepening dependence on Him. "David inquired of the LORD, 'Shall I go and attack these Philistines?' And the LORD said to David, 'Go and attack the Philistines and save Keilah.'" So David is clearly not just the people's favourite, as he had once been their champion. He is the one God hears, answers, and uses for His own praise.
The ephod was part of the high priest's dress. Its design carried a message about how God answers.
David asks Abiathar the priest to bring the ephod. This was the garment the high priest wore over his robe. In the ephod was the breastplate containing the urim and thummim, the twelve precious stones, each of which symbolized a tribe of Israel. It was used to ask God questions. The twelve stones stress a vital truth. God will only answer on the basis of His love and care for ALL Israel. He never answers from a party viewpoint, as though He favoured one person over another. Saul could not rightly use it, for it was not Israel that he loved, but himself.
Abiathar brought the ephod to David just as he was about to find out what the people he had saved were really like.
The breastplate could not be separated from the ephod, and it carried the names of all the tribes of Jacob. David was about to learn the hard way what the people he had to serve were like. The breastplate reminded him that the Lord's compassion for them had not changed, however much their circumstances had. Looking at them in the light of their conduct might have turned him away from them. But seeing them as the Lord saw them, which this picture expressed, would deepen his interest in them. And through the Urim and Thummim he could get the guidance he needed.
Saul faced the same uncertainty without God.
Saul sits under the tamarisk tree at Gibeah like a man fighting in the dark. He scolds his servants for not telling him that Jonathan has taken David's side. Miserable man! He does not turn to God to find out how things really stand. Instead dark suspicion fills his heart. His son, his servants, his relatives all seem to fail him as friends, and Doeg the Edomite is the only one ready to do what he wants.
Saul read the situation as God's gift to him. David asked God about a betrayal that had not yet happened.
Saul had no guidance from God, and he was completely deluded. He saw David shut up in Keilah, among people he could influence, and took it as God's own act to hand his enemy over to him. Malice is often blinded like this. … God prompts the question that only He can answer. David may well have had natural doubts about the men of Keilah. Whatever made him ask, the asking was from God, to keep him out of the trap that was then closing around him.
Earlier in the chapter, David asked God before Abiathar had arrived with the ephod at all.
Abiathar had not yet come down with the ephod. So David still lacked this means that God had appointed for consulting Him. The outward resources may be out of reach, but access to God never is. That access is free and wide open to all. David speaks with God as with a friend. The Lord stoops down to answer him, and — strikingly — He answers in a way more personal and more detailed than when David consults Him with the ephod.
Later David looked to Israel's enemies for safety. Keilah then becomes the measure of his failure.
And why didn't he inquire of the Lord as he had done at Keilah? Rushing ahead, discouragement, forgetting God's word, looking for help from Israel's enemies, trusting his own thoughts instead of seeking God's direction — every one of these weaknesses comes together in David here.
- Ask. David's first move under threat is to ask God. The habit was God's own work: He was "training David himself in a deepening dependence."
- Ask rightly. The ephod carried twelve stones for twelve tribes. God answers on the basis of His love for all His people. Saul loved only himself, so he could not use it.
- Ask early. David asks about a betrayal before it happens, and the answer keeps him out of "the trap that was then closing around him."
- Ask anywhere. The outward means may be out of reach; access is not. David spoke with God "as with a friend" before the ephod ever arrived.
- Keep asking. When David later stopped asking, haste, discouragement and self-confidence filled the space that inquiry used to hold.
Then said David, Jehovah, God of Israel, thy servant hath heard for certain that Saul seeketh to come to Keilah, to destroy the city for my sake.
David had just rescued Keilah from the Philistines. Now word reaches him that Saul is marching on that same town. David does not plan his own escape. He calls for the priest and lays the whole matter before God. That includes the painful part: Saul would wreck a whole city just to reach him.
The report reaching David was not only that Saul wanted him dead, but that Saul would level an Israelite town to get him. David does not treat the rumour as settled; he brings it to God to be confirmed.
David's prayer to the Lord tells us that Saul was willing to go as far as destroying Keilah to kill David. David understood this, but he wanted God to confirm what would happen. His first question is: would Saul come? God answers, Yes, he would come.
David asks through the ephod, the garment a priest wore when seeking God's answer. One writer sees more in it than a way of getting guidance.
The breastplate could never be parted from the ephod, and it carried the names of all the tribes of Jacob. David was about to learn by bitter experience what the people he was going to serve were like. The breastplate reminded him that the Lord's compassion for them had not changed, however much their circumstances had changed. To judge them by their conduct might have made him a stranger to them. But to see them as the Lord thinks of them, which is what this picture shows, would deepen his interest in them... His cry was most solemn, most reverent, most earnest. He appealed again and again to the LORD as the LORD God of Israel, and asked his questions.
reason: unsupported facts moved into quote; trims watery lead-in
It does not appear that he used the priest when he asked counsel about rescuing Keilah. But here, when Saul was secretly plotting against him and he needed to know what to do himself, he tells the priest to bring the ephod. The first time, it was a simple question of whether he should serve others or not. His motives were not in doubt, so he only had to turn to the Lord for direction. But when our own interests are involved, we are much more likely to follow our own will, and to lose our undivided heart and purpose. We are never outside Christ. In serving others we act directly with Him. But when self is in any way involved, we need to realise how fully God accepts us, and to sift our motives. This is where the priesthood comes in.
David asks two things no scout could tell him: what Saul will do, and what the men of Keilah will do. The plainness of the exchange — question, answer, question, answer — is itself the point.
God prompts the question that only He can answer. It would have been natural for David to distrust the men of Keilah. Whatever led him to ask in this way, it was of God, to keep him from the trap closing around him at that moment... But notice the closeness between the Lord and David, and between David and the Lord. It stands out in this incident. He had long been a man of faith. But here he pleads his case in a way beyond anything we have seen before.
Set beside David's prayer, Saul's behaviour stands out. He never once asks God anything.
Saul, sitting under the tamarisk tree at Gibeah, is like a man fighting in the dark. He scolds his servants for not telling him that Jonathan is in league with David. Miserable man! He does not turn to God to learn the true state of things. Instead dark suspicion fills his heart.
God's reply was not comforting. David learned that the town he had just saved would hand him over, and he had to walk away from it.
The Lord makes this humbling truth known to David, and so David escapes from the people he had just befriended. Truly the path of faith is often a lonely one. Sometimes we have to leave the very people we serve, in case they turn their hostility against us. But God is over all. He keeps His beloved servant safe to continue the work he was anointed for.
- Ask — David hears the threat and neither runs nor schemes. He puts a plain question to God, who alone knew what Saul and Keilah would do.
- Ask with the priest — David sends for the ephod when his own safety is at stake. Self-interest needs sifting in a way that plain service does not.
- Ask, and hear back — God answers plainly. David pleads his case with a closeness beyond anything recorded of him before.
- Ask, and see the contrast — Saul never asks. He fights in the dark while suspicion fills his heart.
- Ask, and accept the cost — the answer sent David out of the city he had rescued. He left alone, but God kept him safe for the throne.
Will the citizens of Keilah deliver me up into his hand? will Saul come down, as thy servant hath heard? Jehovah, God of Israel, I beseech thee, tell thy servant. And Jehovah said, He will come down.
David has just saved the town of Keilah from Philistine raiders. Now word reaches him that Saul is marching on the town to take him. Shut in behind gates and bars, with the ephod at hand, he puts two plain questions to God. The answers decide where he sleeps that night.
David's prayer starts from something he had "heard" — a rumour that Saul would wreck an entire town to reach one man. He does not act on the rumour, and he does not dismiss it either.
David however had well learned to be on guard. He called for Abiathar to bring the ephod in order to enquire of God. His prayer to the Lord tells us that Saul was willing to go so far as to destroy Keilah in order to kill David. David understood this, but wanted confirmation from God about what might happen. Would the men of Keilah give David and his men up to Saul? The Lord answered that they would. Their loyalty to David was not as strong as their fear of Saul. Yet their thinking is easy to understand: it was this, or their city would be destroyed. A terrible choice!
Earlier in the chapter David asked God whether to attack the Philistines. That time he did not call for a priest. Here he does. One writer traces the difference to whose interests are at stake.
The first time, the question was simple: should he serve others or not? No one was questioning his motives, so he had only to turn to the Lord for direction. But when our own interests are involved, our own will is far more likely to lead us. Our heart and purpose lose their singleness. We are never outside Christ. In serving others we act directly with Him. But when self comes into it in any way, we need to grasp how fully God accepts us, and we need to sift our motives. This is where the priesthood comes in.
What David held in his hands shaped how he saw the townspeople who were about to betray him.
The breastplate could not be separated from the ephod, and it carried the names of all the tribes of Jacob. David was about to learn the character of the people he had to serve, and to learn it by bitter experience. The breastplate reminded him that the Lord's compassion for them had not changed, however much their circumstances had. To look at them in the light of their conduct might have turned him away from them. To see them as the Lord sees them, which is what this picture expresses, would deepen his interest in them. His cry was most solemn, most reverent, most earnest. Again and again he appealed to the Lord as the Lord God of Israel.
David asks about two things no man could report: what Saul will decide, and what the men of Keilah will do.
God prompts the question He only can answer. David might naturally distrust the men of Keilah. Whatever led him to enquire like this, it was of God, to preserve him from the trap closing around him. He will guide the meek in judgment, and He will teach the meek His way. But notice how striking the closeness is here — the Lord's closeness with David, and David's with the Lord. He had long been a man of faith, but he pleads his case here in a way beyond anything we have seen before. He is the clear type of one who walked in perfect dependence on God.
While David is putting questions to God, Saul is drawing conclusions about God. Set side by side, the two men show what having God's mind is worth.
Saul, under the tamarisk tree at Gibeah, is like a man fighting in the dark, as he scolds his servants for not telling him that Jonathan is in league with David. Miserable man! He does not turn to God to learn the true state of things; dark suspicion fills his heart. His son, his servants, his relatives all seem to fail him, and Doeg the Edomite is the only one ready to do what he wants.
God's reply did not promise a battle or a rescue. It told David that the town he had rescued would hand him over — so he walked out.
He made no complaint. He cannot wage war with Israel, with the people whose names were on the breastplate. He can strike no blow at his master, the Lord's anointed. He will not fight.
The sting of the answer is that the men who would give him up were alive because of him.
God did bring David to Keilah. But He also knew how to bring him out — not for Saul's sake, but for His own glory and Saul's confusion. The base men of Keilah would have handed him over to Saul. But again he seeks direction and finds it. God led him both to befriend the men of Keilah and to flee from their ingratitude. The Lord Jesus met the same ingratitude from those He befriended.
- Ask first. David heard a report and took it straight to God for confirmation rather than acting on it or ignoring it.
- Ask carefully. When his own safety was at stake, not just the service of others, he called for the ephod. Self-interest needs motives sifted.
- Ask God alone. Only God knew Saul's plans and where Keilah's loyalty would land. He prompted the very question He alone could answer.
- Get a plain answer. The reply was short and exact, and it sent David out of the city instead of into a fight with his own nation.
- Expect ingratitude. The town he had rescued would have sold him; the same happened to One greater than David.
And David said, Will the citizens of Keilah deliver up me and my men into the hand of Saul? And Jehovah said, They will deliver [thee] up.
David has just saved the town of Keilah from Philistine raiders. Now Saul is marching to besiege the town, and David asks God what the people he rescued will do. The answer is blunt: they will hand him over.
No one could have told David what the men of Keilah would do. One writer sees God's hand in the asking itself.
God prompts the question He only can answer. David might naturally distrust the men of Keilah. Whatever led him to ask, it came from God, to keep him from the snare closing in around him.
The same writer points to something striking in the way David and God speak to each other here.
The closeness between the Lord and David, and between David and the Lord — one might almost call it familiarity — is very striking in this incident. He had long been a man of faith, but here he pleads his case in a way beyond anything we have seen before. He is the clear picture of a man who walked in complete dependence on God.
David asked God through the ephod, the priest's garment used for seeking His mind. Attached to it was the breastplate, and by the Urim and Thummim the answer came. One writer draws out what David saw there as he asked about people who were about to fail him.
The breastplate could not be separated from the ephod, and it carried the names of all the tribes of Jacob. David was about to learn by bitter experience what the people he was to serve were really like. The breastplate reminded him that the Lord's compassion for them had not changed, even though their circumstances had. Looking at them in the light of their conduct might have turned him away from them. But seeing them as the Lord thought of them, pictured here, would deepen his interest in them. And by the Urim and Thummim he could have the guidance he needed.
Another writer sets Saul's asking beside David's.
Saul asks the Lord only rarely. When he does, he gets no answer, or he gets an answer by lot that passes judgment on his whole behaviour. David has none of the outward help of the appointed forms of worship, yet he talks directly with his God.
The verse does not say the townsmen hated David. It says they would surrender him. One writer weighs what drove them.
We see in this that their attitude to David was not as strong as their fear of Saul. Yet we can understand their thinking, natural as it was. It was either this or their city would be destroyed. Terrible alternative!
David was inside Keilah as its rescuer, and these were the people who would sell him. One writer connects the moment to words spoken by One greater than David.
As it turned out, the men of Keilah were quite ready to hand their rescuer over to Saul if the chance came. It was a shameful act, and only one thing stopped it: David asked the Lord through the ephod and found out what the men of Keilah meant to do. Now he has to learn what One greater than David had to say: "In return for my love they accuse me… So they reward me evil for good, and hatred for my love." (Ps. 109:4-5)
God's answer showed David what the men of Keilah were ready to do, so he never gave them the chance. Notice what he refused to do next.
He made no complaint. He cannot wage war with Israel, with the people whose names were on the breastplate. He can strike no blow at his master, the Lord's anointed. He will not fight, but "David and his men, who were about six hundred, arose and departed from Keilah, and they went wherever they could go."
Keilah's failure is not only Keilah's. One writer turns it round on the reader.
It is sad to see this. The deliverance David won for the men of Keilah did not stir them to gratitude. They would hand him over to Saul, and so he must flee from them. So little does the average Israelite value what has been done for him! And what shall we say of ourselves? Have we rightly valued that wonderful freedom which faith has won for us? Do we value the people the Lord has used to bring us priceless truth — truth that has won the victory over the Philistines?
- Ask. David brought God the one question no man could answer, and the asking itself kept him safe.
- Access. The ephod gave David his guidance. Its breastplate reminded him that God's compassion for these failing people had not changed.
- Answer. God told him the truth: they would give him up. Their loyalty to David was weaker than their fear of Saul.
- Anguish. The town he had just saved was ready to sell him. It is the same wound One greater than David would know: evil paid back for good.
- Action. David made no complaint and struck no blow. He took God's answer and left.