What happened after Moses? Moses dies at the end of the Book of Deuteronomy. His successor, Joshua, then leads the next generation of the people of Israel into the promised land. They enjoy peace under Joshua and Joshua’s immediate successors. After that, there is the period recorded in the Book of Judges. In this period, the people of Israel fall into a cycle of disobedience to God, followed by punishment, then crying out for deliverance, which God would answer by saving them. Then the cycle would repeat itself. Sin, suffering, supplication, salvation; sin, suffering, supplication, salvation.
What is the meaning of that cycle? The people of Israel would depart from following God’s law. They’d fall into sin. As a result of this sin, they’d become weak, become the prey of their enemies, and experience suffering.
The Time of the Judges
In that situation of suffering, they would call out to their God, the God of Israel. They’d make supplications to God and He would send them salvation through a “judge.” That’s why the book of the bible containing this period is called the “Book of Judges.” A judge would be a savior-figure who would lead them and restore them to peace and to prosperity. Unfortunately, once they were comfortable again, the people of Israel would fall back into sin. That’s the cycle going on for really multiple centuries in the Book of Judges. That cycle of the people of Israel is not really broken until King David.
King David
David is introduced in 1 Samuel 16 at a very pivotal moment in salvation history: the prophet Samuel, who is the last of the judges sent by God to save the people of Israel, is now told to go and look for a king.[1] He goes to Bethlehem, to the sons of a certain Jesse, and goes through all eight of them. Finally, the last son, the youngest son, is the one marked out by God. The prophet Samuel anoints David with a horn of oil and the Spirit of God “rushed” upon David from that point forward.
That really makes David out as a very unique person in the Old Testament. He’s the only Old Testament figure who had the permanent possession of the Holy Spirit. No other figure in the Old Testament had that. Interestingly, such an amazing gift is associated with the new covenant. Through baptism, the Holy Spirit is given to us on a permanent basis and doesn’t leave us unless driven out by mortal sin. One might almost say that David was living in the new covenant in advance. The Scriptures call him a “man after God’s own heart.”[2] He’s a man filled with God’s Spirit.
God arranges this Spirit-filled man to become king and David finally conquers the capital city of Jerusalem. He makes it his capital[3] and establishes himself securely as king over all of Israel. The people of Israel have up to this point proven themselves unwilling to live as God’s children. The plan of God at this point is that the disobedient people of Israel will now, at least, be blessed indirectly through their king who, filled with God’s Spirit, does live as a child of God — just as the son of God, Adam, was filled with the Spirit.[4] David is therefore a kind of new Adam figure — anointed to be what Adam was supposed to be: a spirit-filled head of God’s people. David is raised up to bring a period of blessing to the nation of Israel.
In 2 Samuel 7, God makes a covenant with David, where God welcomes David as His own son and promises that all of David’s heirs will also be the sons of God. God promises that He’s going to establish David’s dynasty forever and also that the dynasty will build and maintain a house for God, a temple for God’s presence. Furthermore, this godly kingdom of David will spread over the whole earth — David’s heirs will lead all the nations back to God. That begins to happen under David and his son Solomon, but then, sadly, it goes awry in the later years of Solomon’s life.
After the death of Solomon, furthermore, the descendants of David who rule on the throne are largely a bunch of rascals. As a result, the kingdom of David enters into a 400 year period of decline. This decline ultimately ends in the people of Israel being led out into exile, just as Adam and Eve were forced to leave the Garden when they sinned. The people of Israel are forced to leave their land and they’re taken to the territory of Babylon. This is called the “Babylonian Exile.”
The Davidic Covenant and Davidic Kingdom had great potential. Sadly, however, it too did not live up to the potential God had intended for it.
Relation to Evangelization
What’s the relevance of the Davidic Covenant for evangelization? This covenant is the background for the Kingship of Jesus Christ. The New Testament, in fact, begins with a royal genealogy of Jesus. Jesus, in His human nature, is the Son of David. Jesus’ kingdom restores the kingdom of David. Also, Jesus is the son of God, therefore His kingdom is the kingdom of God. The royal nature of the new covenant explains why there’s a hierarchical structure of the Church; and why our bishops wear crowns. The miter of the bishop is really an ancient form of a crown that represents the bishop’s role as a kind of prince in the kingdom of David, which Jesus has restored and made into a spiritual empire which fills the whole earth.
To evangelize, then, is to spread David’s kingdom, the kingdom of the Son of David; to invite people to become subjects of Jesus Christ the King. It’s really the background of “the Great Commission,” that wonderful statement of Our Lord, “All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, make disciples of all nations ….”[5] When Jesus said “all authority has been given to me,” He’s really claiming His right as the heir of the covenant of David. In Psalm 2, God promises kingship over the whole earth to David and to his heirs. That is realized in Jesus Christ; the Great Commission is really a royal commission where Jesus claims His rights as King. He sends us out as His royal ministers and royal heralds to announce to the world that it’s time to be subject to the true King, the son of David. That kingdom is made manifest in the Holy Catholic Church.
[1] By this point, Samuel had already anointed the first King of Israel, Saul. Saul, however, had not obeyed God, and was going to be replaced by David, a “man after God’s own heart.”
[2] 1 Samuel 13:14; Acts 13:22.
[3] 2 Samuel 5.
[4] Genesis 2, when God breathed into Adam the breath of life.
[5] Matthew 28:16-18.