Welcome back to the Word on Fire show. I'm Brandon Vat, the host and the content director

at Word on Fire. Bishop Aaron is not with us again this week, but I promise it'll be

the last week. Next week he'll be back in studio with us for a brand new episode of the

show. But this week we're going to finish up the episode we started last week, which

was based around Bishop Aaron's talk titled David Dancing Before the Ark. The talk focuses

on David, the kingly figure at the heart of first and second Samuel in the Bible. Bishop

Aaron wrote his own commentary on second Samuel as part of the Brazos Theological Commentary

series. And you can pick up your copy of that book today for a special discount. If you

visit the website wordonfire.org slash Samuel, that's wordonfire.org slash Samuel, and

then use the coupon code Sam 5 during the checkout. That's S-A-M-5. You'll say $5 when

you order your copy of the book today. So sit back and enjoy this second half of Bishop

Aaron's great talk, David Dancing Before the Ark.

The sheer weirdness of God's act would help to explain why, quote, David was angry because

the Lord had burst forth with an outburst upon Usa, it's 2 Samuel 6 A. Robert Alter renders

the Hebrew here as afraid of the Lord and the ambivalence is eloquent. For both anger

and fear would indeed be understandable reactions to the disorienting sublimity of God. To be

sure in a pastoral context, the Christian minister often discovers that anger, wrath, and

fear of God are very common states of soul among those who are striving to believe in God.

But counter this anger, fear, David resolved not to bring the Ark into his capital and instead

headed sent, quote, to the house of Obed Edom the Githite, close quote, most likely a

Philistine from Gath who would attest himself to David during the time when David was a

vassal of the King of Gath. In the earlier sections of the so-called Ark Narrative, the presence

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