He was a humble man.  Simple, not looking for power or fame.  A humble man from a humble family.  In fact, when Samuel was looking for him to anoint him king before the people he had hidden himself among the stuff.

He was obedient.  When his father lost some donkeys, Saul went to look for them.

He was wise.  “Let’s go ask the man of God,” was his decision in time of consternation of not being able to find the donkeys.

His strengths were humility, obedience, submission to God’s man.

His defining sin was pride, disobedience, and the hijacking of the place of God’s man.  His fall was in his strength.

The Bible called him the meekest man in the Bible.  He saved Israel more than once with his level-headedness.  His reaction to Korah rising up against him was simple – God will decide.  He did not recount the plagues, the Red Sea crossing.  He was not righteously indignant.  He was meek.  Quiet.  Chill.

When his sister attacked him?  Meek.

How did he forfeit his ticket into the promised land?  In anger, he hit the rock twice.  Oh yeah, he killed an Egyptian too.  His fall was in his strength.

He is the prime example of faith in Paul’s book of Romans.  He left his homeland on God’s whim, was willing to sacrifice his son on God’s whim.  He was a man of faith by anyone’s standards including God’s.

Thanks to a period of doubt, he birthed Ishmael by Hagar.  Thanks a lot, Abraham.  His fall was in his strength.

His strength was finances.  He followed the Lord for years.  He obviously had a professional background in money, maybe accounting, because the other apostle chose him to keep the bag.  It was something with which he was familiar and at which he was proficient.  He was not an obvious villain as he is portrayed.  At the last supper, none of the disciples could figure out who would betray him so Judas wasn’t wearing black sulking in a corner.  He was an apostle, for crying out loud.

And then for thirty piece of silver he betrayed the Lord.  His fall was in his strength.

Was there anyone in the Bible more ethical than young David?  His respect for Saul, his father, his lot in life as a shepherd – he did things by the book.  When Saul said, “Give me a hundred Philistines for Michal”, David brought him two hundred.  He wasn’t looking for the easy way.  David did things right.  When Saul tried to kill him, he retained his dignity and way of ethical living.  When God apparently gave Saul into David’s hand in a cave, David would not lift his hand up against the Lord’s anointed.  Twice, that happened.

And then he stayed home from battle while his men were fighting.  And then he took another man’s wife.  Not just any man, but one of his mightiest men.  And then when she was found with child, he tried to cover it up by calling Uriah home from battle.  And then when Uriah would not go home, David got him drunk.  And then when Uriah, in emulation of David’s ethics, would not go to his wife while his brothers were in battle, David sent a letter to Joab by Uriah’s hand to have Uriah killed in battle.  (Sidenote:  if you think that the government killing people stopped with “hero of the faith” David, ummm…you may be mistaken.)

David’s fall was in his strength.

Sometimes we get comfortable in our strengths.  Pride goeth before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.  We begin to rely on our self instead of on the grace of God.  I just want to put this word of warning in print.

Be careful of your strengths.  Use them wisely.  Treat them with respect.  Don’t allow them to detach you from reliance on God.  We need God no matter how proficient we become at whatever it may be.

Don’t fall in your strength.