Saul’s Jealousy : Stews and Brews

During the days right after David took down Goliath and started serving in Saul’s army, everyone loved everything David did. Well… almost everyone.

Saul could see that God’s Spirit was with David now, and not with him. Do you think Saul was happy to see God’s Spirit on someone else? Do you think Saul humbly thought, “God said this would happen when I disobeyed Him, but I’m glad that God’s People now have this good-hearted man, David.”?

No, sadly that’s not what Saul thought at all. Saul’s response was the opposite of Jonathan’s. When Jonathan saw God’s Blessing and the Anointed-Life shining on David, he loved it.

But when Saul looked at this same blessing and Anointed-Life on David, Saul let his insides get all knotted up with jealous hatred. He let jealous thoughts sit and stew and brew and bubble and boil inside him.

Did you know?

Do you know what it means for something to stew or brew? It’s when you let something cook for a long time until it becomes bitter tasting or a big pot of boiling mush.

To let bad thoughts “stew and brew” in your heart and mind means that when a bad thought popped into your mind and emotions, you didn’t say, “No way! I will not think that ugly thought, God.” Oftentimes, if you don’t kick that yucky thought out of your mind, it will stew and brew and bubble and boil until it bubbles over or turns bitter tasting. This is what is happening to Saul. Watch how his jealous thoughts bubble over.

Saul didn’t want David around anymore, so he made David go out and fight at the head of his army. Saul was hoping to get rid of David this way.

But God helped David lead the army out to win every battle.

Saul also gave David extra hard jobs to do to try to make him get hurt by his enemies. That’s terribly mean, huh? David probably knew Saul was doing that on purpose. Do you think that could have felt hard? Maybe. Sometimes it’s easy to get mad or sad when people are purposefully mean to you. But do you want to know how David handled it? When Saul gave David a super hard job, David did DOUBLE the hard job. When Saul asked David to do something 100 times, David went and did it 200 times!

When God’s army and Family saw this… they loved David for it. They would sing songs in the streets, “Saul is good, but David is 10 times better!”

Saul’s daughter Michal liked David too. She even became David’s wife.

All these things made Saul even more and more jealous of David. He thought, “He’s trying to steal my kingdom. People like him more than me.” With those yucky thoughts the jealousy stewed and brewed in his heart and mind — it turned him into a crazy person!

He went so crazy that he tried to throw a spear at David while David was helping him by playing the harp. Then he tried to get his servants to kill David.

You can imagine how Jonathan felt when he heard his dad had tried to kill David. He went and talked to King Saul about it. “Dad, David has only ever helped you and risked his life for you. God has given him victories to help the whole Family. Why are you sinning against him like this?!”

Saul promised Jonathan he would not try to hurt David anymore.

But Saul didn’t keep his promise. Awhile later, David won another big battle, and Saul’s jealousy and anger started stewing and brewing just as before. One minute he was listening to David play music on the harp for him, and then out of the blue he tried to pin David to the wall with a spear… again! But David wasn’t hurt and got away fast.

Think about it…

That all sounds pretty rough, doesn’t it? But, David was very soft to God about it.

Did you notice that even when David started doing really well and could see that God was with him…

And even when Saul’s own son Jonathan became David’s closest friend…

And even when Saul was mean to David…

And even when Saul tried to get David killed…

David never said, “I think it’s my turn to be king now! Move out of my way, Saul, because you’re a bad king.”

No. David still humbly and patiently waited, waited, waited for his turn. He didn’t grab after it.

After Saul tried to hit David with his spear, he sent soldiers to hide around David’s house to try to kill him in the morning. But David’s wife found out about it and helped David escape in the middle of the night through a window.

So David left, and went to stay with Samuel.