The Greatest Gift: Son of David
(Download this study here.)
By: Peter Bales
No. 6, December 3rd, 2023
King David was king over God’s chosen people, the Israelites. He was known as a “man after God’s heart” even though he was far from perfect. He established a place for the Ark of God’s Presence in a tent in Jerusalem. Today we’re going to pick up the story and see what happens next.
READ 2 Samuel 7:1-17.
David’s Covenant…
- Make David’s name great
- Provide a home for Israel
- Establish Davids offspring forever
- God will be his father.
- What was in David’s heart to do before the Lord gave him this covenant?
- What promises did God make to David here?
This covenant with David is called a grant covenant because there were no conditions. God was simply declaring what he would do. It was a promise that David couldn’t mess up! He is also identifying that his promises to Abraham would be fulfilled through David’s family!
- How do you think you would feel to receive such promises from God?
(You can read about David’s response in 2 Samuel 7: 18-29)
So, what happened? David had a son, named Solomon. He built an amazing temple for the Lord. But it didn’t last. In fact, the nation divided in two after Solomon was no longer king. The temple was eventually destroyed to rubble by the Babylonians in around 586 BC!
The waiting for the fulfillment of the Covenant with David would take around a thousand years! It’s at this point we read in Luke about the angel Gabriel coming to a young girl named Mary.
READ Luke 1:26-38.
DID YOU SEE IT!??
Look at the promises God made to David (above) and then re-read this verse from Luke 1:32-33:
“He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, 33 and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”
- What similarities do you see between David’s Covenant and what Gabriel told Mary?
- What do these similarities mean?
God was going to fulfill his promises through Mary’s baby, Jesus! Can you imagine? A thousand years of waiting! We have trouble waiting very long for anything, let along a thousand years!
It would be easy to think God had forgotten or changed his plan.
But God is faithful.
What was he doing for those 1000 years? He was preparing for just the right time.
While they were waiting, God sent messengers to encourage his people. Isaiah was a prophet who wrote 700 years before Jesus would come. READ Isaiah 11:1-5.
God said that “a shoot would come up from the stump of Jesse.” Jesse was David’s father. The “stump” looks dead, like nothing is happening, but God would bring a new branch! He told them 700 years ahead of time!
- Why do you think God waited so long?
- What are some instances when you feel like God is taking too long?
- What are some areas in your life where things look dead like a stump and you need life?
John 10:10 says, “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”
These stories show us that God is faithful, even if it takes a thousand years! He is at work. The stump looks dead, but the roots are still alive and God can bring new growth to an old stump.
My parents have had an orchard my whole life. One old apple tree was nearly hollow and finally was completely knocked over in an ice storm. Many people might just leave that stump for dead and saw it off, but not my dad. He has the heart of Jesus and knew that there was still a chance for life. Out of that rotten old stump sprang new branches that today yield baskets of fruit! (See picture, right)
This is what God does!
We have to remember these stories and know that God can bring life out of dead bones. He can sprout a new branch out of an old stump.
- What do these stories show us about how God works?
- What makes it hard to see things the way God does?
- What are ways that we can change our expectations?
GO DEEPER> Take some time in prayer and ask God where there are dead places in or around you that he wants to bring to life. Pray for yourself and others to experience his “life to the full!”