'And David longed, and said, Oh that one would give me drink of the
water of the well of Beth-lehem, which is by the gate! 16. And the
three mighty men brake through the host of the Philistines, and drew
water out of the well of Beth-lehem, that was by the gate, and took it
and brought it to David: nevertheless he would not drink thereof, but
poured it out unto the Lord. 17. And he said, Be it far from me, O
Lord, that I should do this; is not this the blood of the men that went
in jeopardy of their lives? therefore he would not drink it. These
things did these three mighty men.'--2 SAMUEL xxiii. 15-17.
David's fortunes were at a low ebb. He was in hiding in his cave of
Adullam, and a Philistine garrison held Bethlehem, his native place. He
was little different from an outlaw at the head of a band of 'broken
men,' but there were depths of chivalry and poetry in his heart.
Sweltering in his cave in the fierce heat of harvest, he thought of his
native Bethlehem; he remembered the old days when he had watered his
flock at the well by its gate, or mingled with the people of the little
town, in their evening assemblies round it. The memories of boyhood
rose up radiant before him, and as he was immersed in the past, the
grim present, the perils that threatened his life, the savage, gaunt
rocks without a trace of greenness that girded him, the privations to
which he was exposed, were all forgotten, and he longed for one more
draught of the water that tasted so cool and sweet to memory. Three of
his 'mighty men,' bound to him by loyal devotion and unselfish love,
were ready to die to win for their chief a momentary gratification. So
they slipped away from Adullam, 'brake through the host of the
Philistines,' and brought back the longed-for draught. David's
reception of the dearly-bought, sparkling gift was due to a noble
impulse. The water seemed to him to be dyed with blood, and to be not
water so much as 'lives of men.' It had become too precious to be used
to satisfy his longing. It would be base self-indulgence to drink what
had been won by such self-forgetting devotion. God only had the right
to receive what men had risked their lives to obtain, and therefore he
'poured it out unto the Lord.'
The story gleams out of the fierce narratives in which it is embedded,
like a flower blooming on some grim cliff. May we not learn lessons
from it?