Gittites

1 Chronicles 13:13 KJV

So David brought not the ark home to himself to the city of David, but carried it aside into the house of Obededom the Gittite.

As a sort of sequel to yesterday's Devotion is this. I noted yesterday that there were among those mighty men of David A Hittite and a Moabite. These men were not only forgiven but favored. And here the Ark of the Covenant goes to the home of Obed-edom who is a Gittite. The Gittites were the people of Gath, Philistines and of the same place as Goliath whom David had slain so many years earlier. David had dwelt with the inhabitants of Gath for a brief period and when he returned to Israel after the death of Saul six hundred Gittites followed him.

We find here the Ark of God once again in the hands of a Philistine but in this case the home is blessed. God's grace extends to anyone who will follow Him. I can't help but think of the battles between the Philistines and Israel, of the many terrors that they had inflicted upon God's people. But when one family of them turns from their ways to follow a man whose heart is after God, they were blessed.

(Obed-edom is mentioned again in chapters 15 and 16 and is there called a Levite and the son of Jeduthan. Several explanations are offered as to these differences. I think there is at least two men by this name, one a Gittite, the other a Levite. There is the potential of a third, that Obededom the Levite and Obededom the son of Jeduthan are different men as well.)