And He Was Lame in Both Feet??

Hi Everyone
It's been a while and I have been busy...

I have been reading a lot about Mephibosheth lately. I really identify with this man in so many ways.
The part that I have been focusing on is 2Samuel 9:3-13.

I have noticed that the whole narrative of Mepihbosheth happens within the framework of one sentence repeated; He was ‘lame in both feet’.

Many times I have sat down and asked the Lord why the passage ends with the same sentence as it begins. Up to now I have had a few different understandings of it but there is one personal application I find genuinely significant for myself.

 In the beginning of this passage Mephibosheth is sought out by the king because of a covenant the king made with Jonathan, Mephibosheth’s father.

The whole thing is initiated by the king, not Mephibosheth. (There’s a sermon in there.)

He is referred to only as the ‘son of Jonathan who is crippled in both feet’. His suffering is on public display and is known far and wide. He was the crippled one, the one who would never amount to much because of some tragic events in his past.

Can you see where I’m going with this?

Mephibosheth wasn’t responsible for the things that happened a long time before but he had to live with the consequences of it nonetheless.

So when he is called before the king to receive the blessings of a covenant made before he was born, his shame is ever before him. His description of himself reveals his innermost thoughts of himself; 2 Sam9:8 “What is your servant, that you should regard a dead dog like me?” Oh how often I feel the same words rise in my heart. I sometimes feel so aware of my lameness that I am overawed that the King might notice me in my distress.

But whether I understand it or not, God is King and He willingly seeks me out to bless me under a covenant made long before my birth. Hallelujah!

God provides a place for Mephibosheth at His table; a place where they can be together and have fellowship together continually. All Mephibosheth had to do in this situation was to receive what the king had provided. He moved from Lo Debar (the barren land), to the house of the king in Jerusalem, the city of God.

So all the while I have been reading this I have seen how God has taken me from a barren land to live in His house and to fellowship continually with Him. I relate so much with Mephibosheth, as do most Christians (I hope) when they read this story. However, I have always been troubled by the last line which reads ‘So Mephibosheth lived in Jerusalem, for he ate at the king’s table regularly. Now he was lame in both feet.’

Why does it not read ‘so Mephibosheth lived in Jerusalem…and the Lord healed his lameness and all was well with him’? Why is Mephibosheth still lame at the end of the passage?

Well here’s where I’m going to a bit technical wordwise. Stay with me please.

I went to my Strong’s concordance to find the original meaning of the word ‘lame’ and to my surprise the writer uses two different words to describe ‘lame’. At the beginning ‘lame’ is defined ‘maimed but also figuratively, dejected’ At the beginning we are introduced to a man that has a physical disfigurement but also a mental or emotional crippling. But at the end of the passage we see the word ‘lame’ defined as lame-physically but with no figurative meaning suggesting dejected.

Somewhere in the midst of being sought by the king, the revelation of the covenant promises and Mephibosheth’s receiving the blessings provided for him, he loses his dejected state. He is now seated at the table of the Lord and the blessings are showering down upon his head.

I have been talking with the Lord about the mental/emotional crippling that we sometimes carry because of past events and I believe strongly that one application of this passage is this: though I have been sought by the King (Jesus), and blessed beyond comprehension at being able to sit at His table, in His presence, continually welcomed, there are scars leftover from the lameness I received at the hands of others. Scars are just marks of where healing has occurred in the body. After a time, they no longer hurt or caused us to feel lame.

Whilst sitting at the table, my crippled legs are beneath the tablecloth, so to speak. They remain but they are hidden in the blessings being poured out upon me. They will never go away. Now understand me correctly, that’s not faithless, it’s what God has spoken to me. The events that have lamed me are not going to disappear. They are part of my story and my life. They are a testimony to the grace, mercy, tenderness, love, kindness, faithfulness, of my King. When I look to Jesus my focus is off myself. I lose myself in His awesomeness and holiness and I no longer have eyes to see my lameness. My heart is full of gratitude and there is no room for bitterness or pain. He has changed me and is changing me from glory to glory. I have a choice about what to gaze upon; under the table at my lameness, or looking up into the face of my King and Saviour.

God is a God of power. He has the power to make all things new, to heal and to save. God has done a miracle in my heart and I know it well.  But I wanted to wake up one day and see that God had taken my past from me. But that’s not what God does. He doesn’t give us amnesia, He deals with the hurt and dejection, sits us at His table for a continual feast of His presence and enables us to keep our eyes on Him. How great is our God??

Interestingly the passage tells us before closing that Mephibosheth had a son named Mica. Mephibosheth means ‘dispelling the shame’ and Mica means ‘who is like the Lord’.
Mephibosheth has come from the barren place and become fruitful in the house of the king.
The fruit of Mephibosheth’s dispelling the shame and accepting the king’s invitation was someone who is like the Lord. I can only pray that one of the fruits of my accepting God’s invitation to salvation and dispelling the shame is children that are like the Lord!!