Friendship and Honor

This section helped me learn what it means to be a good friend and how to follow our leaders.  David was a wise example of how to respect "the Lord's anointed."

Reading: 1 Samuel 18-26 and coordinating commentary from the Institute Student Manual (1 Samuel 24:10, 1 Samuel 26): 

Traits of each of these men: 

David: wise, selfless, grateful, courageous, confident, leader, considerate, loyal, respect, tender-hearted, people-oriented, cheerful, compassionate, benevolent, merciful.

Jonathan: generous, loyal, prudent, faithful, considerate, kind, perceptive, compassionate, protective

Saul: afraid, jealous, selfish, foolish, tricky, dishonest, skeptical, reactionary

In 1 Samuel 18:1, Jonathan’s and David’s hearts were “knit” and Jonathan “loved [David] as his own soul.”  Jonathan was the son of Saul, the king of Israel and David was to be the next king.  Saul gave one of his daughters to David for a wife and yet became jealous of David.  When Saul sought David’s life, Jonathan helped protect him in 1 Samuel 19: 2-5 by warning him of Saul’s wishes to kill him and promising to help him.  Then he went to his father, Saul and tried to talk him out of it.  Later, Jonathan fled to the fields with David to hide from Saul when he sought to kill David again in chapter 20, verse 11.  Verse four of chapter 20 sums up the willing heart of Jonathan to befriend David and serve him righteously:   Then said Jonathan unto David, Whatsoever thy soul desireth, I will even do it for thee.  The word desireth has an LDS footnote that leads to a scripture in Doctrine and Covenants.  It says:  123  See that ye love one another; cease to be covetous; learn to impart one to another as the gospel requires (D&C 88:123). 

Jonathan was truly committed, I think to serving the Lord and recognized the truth that “when ye are in the service of your fellow beings, ye are only in the service of your God” (Mosiah 2:17). 

Later, in 1 Samuel 24 and 26, Saul is delivered into David’s hands and he has an opportunity to kill him.  Both times David refuses to kill him. 

Today, the Lord’s anointed are most especially the prophet and his counselors and apostles, but I think also any church leader all the way down to specific ward callings.  The example of David suggests that it is not our job to impeach the Lord’s servants if they are not living up to their calling properly.  It also shows us a tremendous example of mercy and humility to the Lord’s will.  David exhibits an understanding of the fairness in the judgments of God and decided to leave up the judgment between Saul and himself to the Lord.  We can uphold and respect the leaders over us in all capacities by not speaking ill of them or bringing them down, sustaining them, following their righteous heed, and leaving judgments up to the Lord like David did.