Useful Bible Studies > 2 Samuel Commentary > chapter 7
When God chose Israel to be his special people, he did not choose a great or powerful nation. Rather, he chose one of the weakest nations on earth. In fact, we can hardly call them a nation at that time. They were a group of slaves from the family of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who lived in Egypt. They did not own their own land and Egypt’s army, the most powerful army in the world, controlled them.
God made Israel into a nation when, in a powerful and extraordinary manner, he rescued its people from Egypt. He did it, David says, to make a name for himself - in other words, for his own honour. God had made promises to Abraham about the future of his family (Genesis 15:13-16; Genesis 22:17-18) - so, at the time of Moses, God acted powerfully to carry out those promises. He brought them out of Egypt; then, at the time of Joshua, he brought them into their own land. It was not Israel’s people who defeated their enemies - rather, it was God who overcame those enemies for them (Psalm 44:1-8). He established them in their own land and, several centuries later, he chose David to be their king.
Now, David had seen that God’s promises to his people had not ended. For his own honour, God had made promises to David about the future of his family. Israel must never be like other nations, that depend on their own strength. From David’s family would come the Messiah, God’s future king over Israel, whose perfect rule will never end.
Next part: Israel in the plans of God (2 Samuel 7:24)
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