Who was Mephibosheth?

Son of Jonathan, the son of Saul. When five years old he fell from his nurse's arms or shoulder, and became lame on both his feet. When David came into power he inquired if there were any of Saul's descendants to whom he could show the kindness of God for Jonathan's sake, and Mephibosheth was found. All that had been Saul's possessions were given to Mephibosheth under the care of Ziba as his servant, and Mephibosheth was made to sit at the king's table continually. David and Jonathan had made a league together as to their seed. 1 Sam. 20:15, 42. David fully respected this and far exceeded it, for it was true grace in him to bring Mephibosheth to sit at his table.

When Absalom revolted, Ziba brought presents to David, and slandered Mephibosheth, saying that he sought the kingdom. David thereupon gave to Ziba all the possessions of Mephibosheth; but on hearing subsequently Mephibosheth's explanations, David divided the inheritance between them. His doing this, and the way he answered Mephibosheth, "Why speakest thou any more of thy matters? I have said, Thou and Ziba divide the land," makes it doubtful whether David was quite convinced of Mephibosheth's innocence. While the king was away Mephibosheth had not dressed his feet, nor trimmed his beard, nor washed his clothes; and when David decided that the land should be divided, he said, "Yea, let him take all, forasmuch as my lord the king is come again in peace." When Saul's descendants were required for a recompense to the Gibeonites David spared Mephibosheth for Jonathan's sake, nor was he mentioned when the king died. 2 Sam. 4:4; 2 Sam. 9:3-13; 2 Sam. 16:1-4; 2 Sam. 19:24-30; 2 Sam. 21:7. In 1 Chr. 8:34; 1 Chr. 9:40 he is called MERIB-BAAL, 'Baal contendeth.'

Son of Saul and Rizpah: he and his brother Armoni were among the seven given up to death, on account of the famine that God brought upon the land because Saul's sin against the Gibeonites had not been atoned for. Rizpah protected the bodies by day and by night, until David caused their remains to be buried with those of Saul and Jonathan. 2 Sam. 21:8-14.

David made a promise to his covenant friend Jonathan that he would endeavour to show kindness to Jonathan's relatives (1 Sam. 20:15-17). The time came when David was able to fulfil his promise. After Saul, the king of Israel and his son Jonathan were slain on mount Gilboa it was obvious that David, God's anointed, would become king over Israel. Jonathan had a son named Mephibosheth. He was five years old when the news came to Mephibosheth's nurse that Saul and Jonathan had been killed. She presumed that David would avenge himself on Saul's relatives. In her haste to protect the young boy she let him fall as she hurried away to safety. Mephibosheth became a permanent cripple because of the injuries to his legs (2 Sam. 4:4). After a few years David became the undisputed ruler over all Israel and it was laid upon his heart to fulfil his promise to Jonathan. David made enquiries to see if any of Saul's family were alive. A relative of Saul's, Ziba by name, informed David about Mephibosheth. David sent for him, allayed his fears and gave instructions to Ziba that all the property belonging to Saul was to be given to Mephibosheth, and Ziba and his family were to serve Mephibosheth. Ziba declared his obedience to the king's command. Mephibosheth was given a place of honour at the king's table where he was to eat continually. He was in fellowship with the king. We might say “so far, so good” but “uneasy lies the head that wears the crown” and David entered into a painful and humiliating experience. His son, Absalom, rebelled against him (would David remember Nathan's message from God?) and David fled from Jerusalem. The crafty Ziba took David's discomfiture as an opportunity to ingratiate himself with David. He took a substantial amount of food to David and misrepresented Mephibosheth to the king. He told lies about Mephibosheth. David accepted Ziba's story and never made any enquiries as to its truth or otherwise.

David's troubles were overcome and he was restored to his rightful place in Jerusalem. When Mephibosheth went to meet David he was in a neglected condition. He had deliberately neglected his person and clothing as a sign of mourning for the absence of the rightful king. He told David that Ziba had lied to him as well as to the king. David curtly dismissed Mephibosheth's explanation and answered that he and Ziba should share all. David failed in enquiry and discernment and showed no appreciation of faithful Mephibosheth (2 Sam. 19:24-30). It is to David's credit that later he spared Mephibosheth's life (2 Sam. 21:7).

In verse 4 a note is inserted to tell of Saul having another son, Mephibosheth, who had become lame on both feet when his nurse had dropped him in her haste to escape when she heard of the death of Saul and Jonathan. The boy was five years old at this time. We shall hear of David's kindness to him a little later (ch.9).

If you turn to the fourth chapter and fourth verse of Second Samuel, you will find he was the son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, both now dead; that he had fallen, and become lame; and that since his fall he had been hid, lame on both his feet, in Lo-debar; which Hebrew word means, a place of no pasture. Being of the house of Saul, the enemy of David, he concluded, no doubt, that David would be his enemy; and therefore hid away from his presence.

The story of Mephibosheth is to me exceedingly interesting, because it shows in a picture what man is in his natural ruined state, and how the grace of God can meet a man where he is, and what the effect of that grace will be upon the heart that has tasted it. The first thing we get in his history is when Mephibosheth was a child of five. Tidings come from Jezreel of the death of Saul and Jonathan. His grandfather and father were ignominiously slain on the mountains of Gilboa by the Philistines, and when the tidings came, "his nurse took him up, and fled: and it came to pass, as she made haste to flee, that he fell, and became lame" (2 Sam. 4:4).

Why did she fly? Why did that nurse take up that child of five years old, and fly? She reasoned exactly in the same way as man does about God. She reasoned from the conduct of Saul to David, as to what the conduct of David would be to the posterity, the offspring, of Saul. We have seen, on a previous night, how Saul had persecuted David, how he had hunted him like a partridge on the mountains. She knew that Saul hated David. She inferred that David would hate Saul, and that he would hate all the offspring of Saul. She argued, — Here is the real heir to the throne: Saul is gone, and Jonathan is dead. The direct heir to Saul's throne is this child, Mephibosheth; and now David will certainly get to the throne, for all Israel knows that David is marked out for the throne by God; he will be sure to cut off Saul's posterity; but I will save this child from his vengeance. She took him from wrath, as she supposed, and in her haste she dropped him. He was injured, and crippled for life.

Saul had been the enemy and bitter persecutor of David, and this desire is the expression of grace indeed, although, as he says, there is one for whose sake he acts, and to whom he had pledged himself in covenant. But this covenant itself was the fruit of love alone. Jonathan had made no great sacrifice for David, — had not shared his fortunes, nor procured for him any mitigation of his sufferings. But David is faithful to his oath and to his love: he could not have been in any wise the figure even of our David, had he not been so.

His question elicits a reply from a certain Ziba, a servant of Saul's house: "Jonathan has yet a a son who is lame of his feet." And in answer to further inquiry, he learns that he is in the house of Machir the son of Ammiel in Lodebar. Thus Mephibosheth is introduced to us.

Mephibosheth, in perfect harmony with what we hear from him on this occasion, means "shame out of the mouth." He is the picture of one convicted and self-condemned, impotent and corrupt, as his own figure is, "a dead dog." His impotence is still further emphasized in his lameness, — lame of both feet. In his infirm and solitary condition, he is a perfect contrast with the servant Ziba, with his fifteen sons and twenty servants, but who is still himself, as is the legalist ever, a servant only; and with that curious ambiguity about his name, which Scripture uses so often and so forcefully; for this may mean "planted," or as two words, "drought comes": and this is the legal contingency.

Mephibosheth is of the house of the failed Saul, and yet the son of Jonathan, whose name, "Jehovah has given," reminds us of the unrepenting call and gifts of God, who calls still the "weak things of the world," yea, the base, the despised, and "things that are not," so that he "out of whose mouth" is the confession of his "shame" is still the Mephibosheth, the heir of the covenant of grace.

He is found in the house of Machir, "one who recollects," (and so comes really to himself) the son of Ammiel, of "the people of God," in Lodebar, where "the word is his" — applies itself, and comes home to him. Brought into David's presence, he hears the word of restoring grace that enriches him, and bows his heart in gratitude. His place is henceforth to be at the king's table, as one of his sons. This is the communion to which God brings us as His people; while the mere servant remains the servant. How beautiful in its simplicity is the repetition at the close of this story, "Mephibosheth dwelt at Jerusalem: for he did eat continually at the king's table; and he was lame in both his feet."

The story of Mephibosheth is the first thing mentioned after the government of David had been fully established. Typically it reveals the gospel in a beautiful way, and dispensationally the kindness of God which will be manifested in the coming kingdom. Mephibosheth is a type of the sinner and the condition which he is in. He was helpless, being lame of both feet. How he became lame is found in chapter 4:4. He fell and became lame, a helpless cripple. It reminds us of the fall of man and the helpless condition into which sin has put man. Therefore he could not come to David. He had to be carried into the king's presence. The sinner cannot come of himself to the Saviour; He has to seek him out.

And David wanted to show him "the kindness of God" for Jonathan's sake. "Thus the kindness and love of God our Saviour toward man hath appeared" (Titus 3:4). God for Christ's sake shows His great kindness to sinful man. Mephibosheth means "shame out of the mouth"; when he hears from David's lips what kindness was prepared for him he confessed with his mouth his own shame and nothingness. "What is thy servant that thou shouldst look upon such a dead dog as I am?" And what words of grace came from David's lips! Surely the kindness of God is here fully made known. He is lifted from his low place of shame to take a place at the King's table "as one of the King's sons." It is the kindness of God as made known in the gospel of His Son our Lord Jesus Christ. He takes us out of our shame and makes us one of His sons. "So Mephibosheth dwelt in Jerusalem ; for he did eat continually at the king's table; and was lame on both feet." When the kingdom has come the King will show such grace and kindness to the poor and needy (Isaiah 11:1-5; Ps. 72:1-4).

Another individual of a different character (though also of Saul's house) now comes to David. Mephibosheth had been evidently able to find help to enable him to come down to the Jordan to meet David. He had not cared for his lame feet nor trimmed his moustache nor washed his clothes during all the time that David had been away. This itself was fullest proof before David's eyes that Ziba's report of Mephibosheth had been false. Mephibosheth had no aspirations whatever to be king. When David questions him as to why he did not go with David (v.25), his answer is quite simple. He had told his servant Ziba that he wanted a donkey to ride to follow David, but Ziba deceived him, so that he was given no means of coming to David at that time. What he says as to Ziba's slandering him is plainly true, and he declares his deep appreciation of David himself, as though he were an angel of God, remembering that David had shown him unusual grace at a time when Saul's house was in danger of extermination (v.28). He tells David therefore that he has no right to expect anything of him.

David's answer to Mephibosheth was sadly lacking in grace and truth. Evidently David was irritated because he did not like to admit his blunder in accepting Ziba's slander of Mephibosheth. He ought to have apologized to Mephibosheth for this, and to have faced Ziba with the seriousness of his falsehood, but he dismissed Mephibosheth with no real courtesy, and told him he had decided that he and Ziba should divide the property that actually belonged to Mephibosheth, but which David had assigned to Ziba when he brought his false report. Though David is a type of Christ, yet in this case he badly misrepresented the righteousness of the Lord Jesus in the administering of his kingdom.

In contrast to this, David desired to show kindness to someone of the house of Saul who remained living (v.1). He proposed this "for Jonathan's sake," whose attachment to David was not to be forgotten. This history is a beautiful picture of the gospel of the grace of God, and reminds us of God's showing kindness to sinners "for Jesus' sake." A servant of Saul's house is found, named Ziba (v.2), whom David asks if there is one left of Saul's family to whom he may show the kindness of God.

Ziba knew of one son of Jonathan, lame on both his feet (v.3). We have read of him before in 2 Samuel 4:4, which tells us that he was crippled through a fall. This is spiritually true of all mankind. Because of Adam's fall, all his children have inherited his crippled, sinful condition. The man, Mephibosheth, was living at Lo Debar (meaning "no pasture") (v.4), in other words, a place of desolation with typically no food for the soul. We have all been at one time in this place, needing the grace of God.

The meaning of Mephibosheth's name is "shame out of the mouth." When the gospel of grace is preached, it is this "shame out of the mouth" that people usually strongly resist. They justify themselves rather than confessing the shame of their sinful condition. Their unseemly pride becomes the great hindrance to their being sinful condition. Their unseemly pride becomes the great hindrance to their being saved. When Mephibosheth was brought before David he did not act with the bold defiance of human pride, but fell before him prostrate (v.6). This is the only becoming attitude for anyone to assume before the face of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God. David addressed the cripple man by name, and he answered, "Here is your servant." No doubt he was afraid, when summoned into the king's presence, that he might even be put to death. Similarly, when we who know we are sinners are called to face our Creator, we are fearful of the eternal consequences. Just as Mephibosheth did not know the heart of David at first, so a guilty sinner does not at first realize how great is the love of God in Christ Jesus.

In verse 4 an event following Saul's death takes us yet further back into the past. Mephibosheth's nurse had fled, carrying this five-year-old child in her arms. This story is the same as that of the Beerothites: the very same misapprehension of the son of Jesse, the very same feelings so natural to man's heart. David, learning of the death of Saul and Jonathan, had mourned and lamented over them, but it does not enter this poor woman's mind that he might not execute vengeance on his friend's son. She flees rather than running to the one who had sworn to Jonathan and even to Saul that he would not wipe out their descendants. She does not trust in David's love and sure word any more than sinners trust in the grace and word of Christ. The result was that Mephibosheth “fell, and became lame.” David finds him later, afflicted and lame as a consequence of the lack of faith of this woman who had not taken advantage of the favorable moment to entrust her burden to the hands of Jonathan's friend.