[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"\u002Farticles\u002Fmighty-men":3,"\u002Farticles\u002Fmighty-men-surround":71},{"id":4,"title":5,"author":6,"bibleBooks":8,"body":13,"columnName":53,"date":54,"description":19,"extension":55,"image":56,"meta":57,"minRead":58,"navigation":59,"path":60,"postType":61,"publication":62,"publicationUrl":56,"seo":63,"stem":64,"topics":65,"__hash__":70},"blog\u002Farticles\u002Fmighty-men.md","Mighty Men",{"name":7},"Dave Faust",[9,10,11,12],"Hebrews","Psalms","1 Samuel","2 Samuel",{"type":14,"value":15,"toc":49},"minimark",[16,20,23,26,29,32,35,38,46],[17,18,19],"p",{},"One Saturday afternoon when I was in college, a group of friends persuaded me to go spelunking with them. Spelunkers, they explained, explore caves and underground caverns.",[17,21,22],{},"I barely knew a stalactite from a stalagmite, and I wasn't sure I'd like being underground. After arriving at Carter Caves State Park in eastern Kentucky, one by one my friends disappeared through a tiny opening in the ground. I took one last gulp of fresh air and followed them into the cave.",[17,24,25],{},"At first we walked, then we stooped, and as the cave continued to narrow, we crawled on our hands and knees along the smooth cold rock. I will never forget my relief when I finally saw a flicker of sunlight ahead and squeezed through a small opening into the great outdoors. No offense to spelunkers, but my idea of a good time is not to spend a claustrophobic afternoon in a dark, damp cave.",[17,27,28],{},"David probably didn't like caves either. He was a shepherd accustomed to the open fields. On the other hand, he must have known Judea's caves quite well. Shepherds often took shelter there in rainy weather. Young David and his brothers probably played in the caves near their home in Bethlehem.",[17,30,31],{},"According to 1 Samuel 22, David fled to a cave called Adullam, which some think was a network of underground caverns. It became David's unofficial headquarters while he was on the run from King Saul. The cave's gloomy surroundings fit David's mood. Saul's heart was as unyielding as the cave's cold walls. If you've ever been so discouraged you felt like crawling in a hole, you can appreciate David's state of mind. Eventually he would become king, but at the moment he could hardly show his face in public.",[17,33,34],{},"Yet, God uses spiritual spelunking to build our faith. Even great heroes of faith \"wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground\" (Hebrews 11:38). An explanatory note above Psalm 57 says David wrote it \"when he had fled from Saul into the cave.\" When David was \"most low,\" he cried out \"to God most High\" (v. 2).",[17,36,37],{},"A group of followers came to David there in the cave. \"All those who were in distress or in debt or discontented gathered around him, and he became their leader. About four hundred men were with him\" (1 Samuel 22:2). Who wants a support group like that? These 400 guys were not the rich and popular who had everything together. They were dysfunctional with a capital D—in Distress, in Debt, and Discontented! They were misfits, failures, malcontents, castoffs—living proof that misery loves company.",[17,39,40,41,45],{},"But notice what happened when they gathered around David: \"",[42,43,44],"em",{},"He became their leader.","\" David didn't say, \"I'm too good to associate with you,\" or \"Look, I have enough problems of my own.\" He saw past their problems and recognized their potential, and as time passed, under David's leadership this makeshift army was clever enough to protect him from the much larger army of Saul. It's likely some of these brave souls eventually were included in the group of heroes nicknamed \"David's Mighty Men\" (2 Samuel 23:8-39).",[17,47,48],{},"The truth is, without Christ all of us are dysfunctional with a capital D—distressed, discontented, and owing a debt of sin. Never underestimate what the Lord can do. He turns losers into winners, sinners into saints, and misfits into Mighty Men—even when he finds us down in a cave.",{"title":50,"searchDepth":51,"depth":51,"links":52},"",2,[],"First Look","2005-05-15","md",null,{},3,true,"\u002Farticles\u002Fmighty-men","column","The Lookout",{"title":5,"description":19},"articles\u002Fmighty-men",[66,67,68,69],"Biblical Theology","Church Leadership","Christian Unity","Spiritual Formation","aRynIpc68C0j4r7ACq11uFe6TLn46R-iuVQBQNe5Dyw",[72,77],{"title":73,"path":74,"stem":75,"description":76,"children":-1},"Midnight Songs","\u002Farticles\u002Fmidnight-songs","articles\u002Fmidnight-songs","Was the apostle Paul a tenor, a baritone, or a bass? The Bible doesn’t say, but we know that he and his friend Silas were singers.",{"title":78,"path":79,"stem":80,"description":81,"children":-1},"Ministering by Night","\u002Farticles\u002Fministering-by-night","articles\u002Fministering-by-night","Are you more productive during the daylight hours or after the sun goes down? Someone joked, “I could be a morning person if morning started around noon.” "]