David a man after Gods own heart.
To have the commendation of hearing God say that David was a man after His own heart was a remarkable statement.
At the end of this life only the commendation of God will be that which really counts.
We can have all the applause of men and still have failed to fulfil and live up to Gods highest purpose for our lives.
Conversely we can have made many mistakes (and will) have suffered many defeats and yet end our course more on fire for Gods purpose in our lives and more changed in our character and more single hearted to the purpose for which we were born if we learn our lessons well, and become overcomers this side of eternity.
David was an overcomer and did learn his lessons well.
He also possessed certain qualities in his character which commended him before the Lord, which if we can recognise what they are, we to can seek Gods face to have developed in our own lives and character.
The next quality which David possessed which made him a man after Gods own heart was that he had a heart of great generosity.
How can anyone who has truly claimed to know the Lord and been impacted by his grace not reflect his heart and nature in an attitude of generosity?
I believe that one of the most sad misrepresentations of the nature of God that we can present before men is to be mean spirited and stingy.
Davids generosity towards king Saul is something that I have written about the previous blog,but was essentially seen in his refusal to become bitter at the man who so mistreated him.
There are few places where we see this generosity expressed more sincerely than in David,s response to hearing the report of King Saul's demise.

1 Sam 1 v19 David takes up and teaches this song as a lament
"The beauty of Israel is slain on your high places!
How the mighty have fallen!
Tell it not in Gath,proclaim it not in the streets of Ashkelon-
Lest the daughters of the philistines rejoice,Lest the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph.
Saul and Jonathan were beloved and pleasant in their lives,And in their death they were not divided;
They were swifter than eagles,They were stronger than lions."v 23
How could David possibly describe Saul as beautiful and beloved?(the niv says gracious)
Simply because he saw him as he once once and was called to be.He saw him with a heart of kindness and of generosity.
Make no mistake the Lord will also test every one of us as to how well we respond to those who treat us unfairly to see whether we will respond with bitterness or with generosity.
And the response we have will determine whether we will advance further on in the purpose of God for our lives.
David response of generosity was not just to king Saul but also towards his men as is evidenced in an incident recorded in 1 Sam 30.
David returns to his village to discover that his wives and children and the wives and children of all of his men have been kidnapped by an Amalekite raid and all his property taken.
David goes in pursuit of the raiding party after enquiring of Lord with 600 of his men to recover their families and goods.
In verse 9 we are told that
 "David went he and six hundred men who were with him,and came to the brook Besor,where those stayed who were left behind
.But David pursued, he and four hundred men; for two hundred stayed behind,who were so weary that they could not cross the brook Besor."
Later when David successfully returns from the campaign we read that,
"Now David came to the two hundred men who had been so weary that they could not follow David,whom they also had made to stay at the brook Besor.
So they went out to met David and to meet the people who were with him.And when David came near the people,he greeted them.
Then all the wicked and worthless men of those who went with David answered and said
"Because they did not go with us,we will not give them any of the spoil that we have recovered except for every mans wife and children, that they may lead them away and depart."
"But David said,
 "My brethren you shall not do so with what the Lord has given us,who has preserved us and delivered into our hand the troop that came against us.
For who will heed you in this matter?But as his part is who goes down to the battle,so shall his part be who stays by the supplies;they shall share alike."
And so it was from that day forward;he made it a statute and an ordinance for Israel to this day."
The men who had stayed behind at the brook Besor were staying to guard the supplies and as such doing an invaluable job.
In reality their hearts were to go and engage in the battle but through sheer exhaustion they found themselves unable to continue.
Those here described as "wicked men " wanted on their return from the victory over the Amalakites to "punish" those who had been left behind and sought to introduce some false distinction as to who they thought merited greater reward and a greater share of the victory spoils of war.
David would have none of it.
Firstly he attributes all of the victory and their military success only to the Lord and established it as an unchangeable military law that those who stay and guard get the same as those who went to fight.
What was it that motivated David to want to honour those who could not physically go on in battle with the same reward? Generosity of heart.
David,s generosity was not limited to that of his family or his closest friends either.Rather his generosity was towards all of Israel as well.
Consider the occasion when the ark of the covenant was coming back into Jerusalem and David was filled with joy and danced before the Lord with all of his might.
The bible tells us that
"When David had finished offering burnt offerings and peace offerings,he blessed the people in the name of the Lord of hosts.
Then he distributed among all the people among the whole multitude of Israel both men and women,to everyone a loaf of bread,a piece of meat,and a cake of raisins.So all the people departed everyone to his own house.Then David returned to bless his own household."2 Sam 6 18-20
David,s heart is so filled with joy over the ark of Gods presence returning to the city of Jerusalem, Zion that he worships and offers up burnt offerings and sacrifices in reverence and thanksgiving to the Lord.
But it does not end there.He also wants to bless all the people of Israel; every adult man and woman with provisions of food and impart to them a blessing.
David did not have to this he wanted to do this.
Sometimes I think that Christians can be governed by a sense of what they feel they are obligated to do rather than to give free expression to want they want to do to bless others with giving.
We should not tithe merely because we feel we have to, but because we want to.We should not give to the widows and the poor and the orphans because we are commanded to but because we really want to.
Davids generosity of heart was not merely limited to a nation or to a king but came to to the level of the lowliest individual as well.
In closing this piece I would be remiss if I did not mention possibly the greatest single example of David,s generosity, which is that of his kindness towards Mephibosheth in 2 Sam ch 9.
David had expressed his desire to show kindness to any left of the house of Saul, not knowing of the existence of a son of Jonathan's who had been living in exile from the presence of the King all of his life and was lame in both feet.
After some enquiry Mephibosheth is brought in before the King, who does not know of his existence until now.
"Now when Mephibosheth the son of Jonathan,the son of Saul,had come to David,he fell on his face and prostrated himself.
Then David said,"Mephibosheth?"  And he answered,"Here is your servant!"
So David said to him,
"Do not fear,for I will surely show you kindness for Jonathan your fathers sake,and will restore to you all the land of Saul your grandfather;and you shall eat bread at my table continually."
Then he bowed himself,and said,
"What is your servant,that you should look upon such a dead dog as I?"
David calls in Ziba and establishes the fact that all of the land that formerly belonged to Saul would now be restored to Mephibosheth, and that Ziba and his fifteen sons and twenty servants would now tend the land for him but concerning Mephibosheth,
"As for Mephibosheth said the king,"he shall eat at my table like one of the kings sons"  v 11
David was in reality fulfilling a promise which he had made to Jonathan when he was still alive that he would continue to show kindness to Jonathan's family even when Jonathan was dead.
David took this oath very seriously, however he was motivated by something more than a bond of loyalty,as important as that was.
David also was driven and compelled by a love a bursting desire to do good to the descendants of Jonathan to whom he had pledged his loyalty.
Notice how David responds to Mephibosheth and you begin to gain an insight into the measure of his generosity of nature.

Mephibosheth comes to David as a broken man and David immediately pronounces restoration of all that Mephibosheth had lost of his inheritance.
Then he reinforces this restoration.
The bible says that David went and "fetched "Mephibosheth,he did not wait for him to come at some mutually convenient time.
No he diligently sought him out, and found him,in order that he might do great good to him.
Mephibosheth saw himself as totally unworthy of being the recipient of this lavish generosity that David was showing towards him in this encounter, but David paid no attention to his objection
"What is your servant that you should look upon such a dead dog as I?"
In the mind and heart of king David Mephibosheth is no more a servant than he is a dead dog, he will be treated like royalty and he will sit at the kings table. He will "sit at my table like one of the kings sons."
When we read a passage like this it is not difficult to see the strong parallels with the gospel.
We come to God through Jesus without a plea, with nothing "dead dogs" as to our ability to contribute anything of righteousness or holiness that would commend us to God.
We fall down upon our faces before the heavenly King and hear him saying "Stand up my son," or" Stand up my daughter!"
We hear him pronounce forgiveness upon our lives as he holds out his sceptre of righteousness in his hand and declare us royalty, and a brand new creation, an heir of the God of heaven and a joint heir with Jesus Christ.
We listen in awe as he utters the words,
 "Come and sit with me upon my throne and I overcame and sat down together with my Father upon his throne".And he bids us to come and sit down and his banqueting table through this life in the very sight of our adversaries.
What a revelation of Grace this passage gives us.
However it is perhaps more challenging to us when we now view our responsibility to give this kind of grace and show this generosity of heart towards others.
Jesus said "Freely you have received now freely give."
Some Christians are still bound by fears in this area of giving.
"What if they take advantage of me?"  What if they come to look to me instead of God?"  "I would give more but I just do not have the time, money, energy and so the list goes on.
The real truth is that our giving to others is a reflection of how real our love is for God.
If someone says,"I love God,"and hates his brother,he is a liar,for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen,how can he love God whom he has not seen?
And this commandment we have from him that he who loves God must love his brother also."1 John 4 v20
Someone might say "I do love my brother, I do them no harm and I pray (occasionally) for them.",
Listen again to what John says
By this we know love,because he laid down his life for us.And we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.
But whoever has this world,s goods,and sees his brother in need,and shuts up his heart from him,how does the love of God abide in him?"
My little children,let us not love in word or in tongue,but in deed and in truth.
And by this we know that we are of the truth and shall assure our hearts before him." 1 john 3 16   19.
"By this we know love" Gods measuring standard is quite different from that of our own.
And it is clear that their can be no real love shown without some practical measure of help given.
By this we shall assure our hearts before him, we all know deep down in our consciences that real love always gives.
It is therefore a real tragedy when the body of Christ does not show this kind of generosity of spirit because it is such a witness to what the nature of God is like.
God is not a mean God therefore his children should never be mean also.
I believe that we need to "lift the bar" in our conception of the kind of generosity and kindness we are called to give to christian and non christian alike.
The world is still waiting to see what the grace of God in action really looks like.
In David we have a wonderful example of this in action, may we learn and be inspired and so do likewise.