I wish for your life to be filled with God’s love and blessing. Now I want to share the grace with you through the message entiled with “Good Heart of Jonathan.”
Jonathan was the firstborn of Saul, the first king of Israel. He was expected to sit on the throne after Saul. But God anointed David as the next king of Israel.
From the fleshly viewpoint, David was a rival or an enemy to Jonathan. But Jonathan loved David like his life. It was possible because Jonathan had good heart. What kind of good heart, then did Jonathan have?
First of all, Jonathan followed the will of God without any selfish desire. Jonathan was told that God had anointed David as the next king because his father Saul committed many evils before God. He received this without any complaint or ill-feelings and rather helped David sit on the throne willingly. He was so willing to abandon his honor and glory for the fulfillment of the will of God.
Next, Jonathan did his best to hinder the other from committing sins. When David saved the country from the battle against the Philistines, many Israelites applauded and put David in favor. But King Saul became so jealous and later sent his soldiers to the house of David t kill him.
Jonathan knew that he would be hurt if he came before his father Saul, but boldly came to Saul and tried to advise him of wrongdoings. If you wrongfully judge and gossip against your seniors because their opinions are not agreement with your, it proves that you are not good and lack love. And if you avoid from your seniors who commit sins and go astray, you cannot be deemed good, either.
If you just keep silent because it is not easy to give an advice to your senior or you are afraid of some loss by him, it is not the duty of man and not right in the sight of God. Above all, you have to possess the confidence to tell your senior the truth and at the same time you need to give him an advice with the heart of goodness, love and service without offending his heart.
Lastly, Jonathan fulfilled the duty of children for Saul until the last moment. A good-hearted person may feel afflicted when he sees someone doing evils, so he does not want to stay beside evil men. But Jonathan fulfilled his duty of a son for his father Saul even though he suffered pains because of Saul. He stayed with his father up to the moment of death at the battlefield.
I do not mean that it is a kind of goodness to stay with an evil man to the last moment. Jonathan knew evilness of his father Saul and a few times advised him not to sin anymore. But he could not turn away his eyes from his father, so he stayed beside him. But he never partook in evil actions of Saul.
Therefore, may you take after the goodness of Jonathan who followed the will of God without selfish desires and did his best to stop his father from sinning and reach complete sanctification so that you can possess the blessings God has prepared, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ I pray!
