Spiritual Realms & the Supernatural: Thresholds and Threshold Guardians Part 2
In Part 1, we discussed two particular giants who were threshold guardians. While their flesh was conquered, the spirit within them, especially “the spirit at Nob,” remains.
You can read Part 1 here: https://emergentarmyministries.co/2023/07/03/spiritual-realms-the-supernatural-giants-and-thresholds-part-1/.
Understanding and Deciphering the Context Part 1
Nob, the Location
Nob is a Biblical location that serves as a container of people.
1 Samuel 21 tells us David went to this city while fleeing King Saul. Nob was the city of priests or of the priesthood.
As discussed in Part 1, Nob was a high place.
The priests kept the showbread, a part of the articles for worshiping God.
The priests kept Goliath’s prized sword there.
The priests observed and worshiped God, guarded His presence, and more than likely helped facilitate the worship (or other religious duties) of the people unto God.
It was a sacred place unto God and a city of refuge for David and his men.
It was a place people visited to inquire of the Lord, seek the Lord, or request the priests to mediate between this realm and the heavenly one to God on their behalf.
Excerpt from Smith’s Bible Dictionary
https://biblehub.com/topical/n/nob.htm
Nob
(high place) (1 Samuel 22:19; Nehemiah 11:32) a sacerdotal city in the tribe of Benjamin and situated on some eminence near Jerusalem. It was one of the places where the ark of Jehovah was kept for a time during the days of its wanderings. (2 Samuel 6:1) etc. But the event for which Nob was most noted in the Scripture annals was a frightful massacre which occurred there in the reign of Saul. (1 Samuel 22:17-19).
The Gift of the Land
As humans have gifts, land also has gifts resident within it from God – redemptive purposes. We just covered a few for Nob.
There’s evidence replete in Scripture, but as we see in 1 Samuel 21.
Seemingly, the land was yielding its fruit successfully or doing what it was supposed to. That’d make sense since the priests were guarding the presence of the Lord.
Nob has a deeper root meaning of fruitfulness; flourishing; increase. It lived up to its purpose quite well.
Defilement: The Inversion of the Gift
Still, just as the gift can be released to yield to the people, ultimately serving God, its gift(s) can be inverted.
During David’s time in Nob, an Edomite solider of Saul was presumably fulfilling religious duties or his version of serving God, that is.
David noticed him and it was then he requested a weapon to which Ahimelech offered the sword of Goliath the Philistine to David.
David knew Doeg would definitely report his sighting in Nob to the king. He might have also been preparing himself for a fight with Doeg.
Later in 1 Samuel 22, Saul confronted the tribe of Benjamin, his tribe, about not telling him of David’s whereabouts. Then, Doeg, who David saw in Nob, spoke up.
Having heard Doeg’s side, Saul summoned Ahimelech and his household (the priests). Here enters the bitter violence.
Still, remaining true to, well, truth, and true to the land’s gift, Ahimelech defends David’s honor before the king and his throne.
Saul ordered all of the priests’ death.
Doeg: He Who Shall Be Feared
Saul’s soldiers refused to touch the holy men, so he turned to Doeg who didn’t bat an eye, requesting that he slaughter the priests.
1 Samuel 22:18-19 NKJV
Then the king said to Doeg, “You, turn around and attack the priests!” And Doeg the Edomite turned around and attacked the priests, and he killed on that day eighty-five men who wore the linen ephod. He also struck Nob the city of the priests with the edge of the sword, both men and women, children and infants; he also struck oxen, donkeys, and sheep with the edge of the sword.
Doeg’s name means “fearing”; to put fear in; to be afraid of or make fearful; to cause anxiety.
Doeg took his inverted gift with all of his fleshly anger and violence to Nob and unleashed it on the inhabitants there.
Numbers 35:33-34 tells us that innocent bloodshed is one factor that brings iniquity to land and time (along with Leviticus 18:25 and Jeremiah 2:7).
Doeg’s assassination of God’s holy men (the priests) and the people in Nob was not only unjust, but it caused the purpose of the land to be turned backward and upside down.
The land that was meant to be fruitful and yielding an increase of the presence and glory of God, a land of peace, and a land of safety, had now become a land that devours the priesthood, assassinates holy warriors, and violently takes away life.
This was a perfect precursor for Ishbi-Benob.
Understanding and Deciphering the Context Part 2
The Spirit at Nob
The giant, Ishbi, took on the land’s name, adding it to its own to represent (1) dominance and (2) the “spirit of the land,” also known as the gift within the land.
With the land now inverted, Ishbi’s control was amplified.
Further investigation of Ishbi-Benob’s name means the violent oppression against the priesthood OR the savagery of the saints of God.
Ishbi-Benob was a descendant of the Rephaim (or Rapha). In its nature was the inversion of healing. Instead of fruitfulness, waste and desolation. Instead of increase, barrenness.
The real war at Ishbi-Benob and what the lingering “spirit at Nob” brings is twofold: (1) a covenant war and (2) jealousy.
In his epistle, the apostle James, stated that jealousy opens the door for every form of evil. King Saul was overwhelmingly jealous of David.
That jealousy was transferred to those loyal to the king, and Doeg took it and ran with it.
It’s a covenant war because the giants and Saul opposed the man David to whom God had extended a covenant with him and his seed (1 Samuel 22:8).
1 + 1 = 2
You read all of that to discover, in the end, that the spiritual war(s) you and I will face – and are facing in 2024 – are due to jealousy because we are sons of covenant, a holy generation, a royal priesthood.
And wouldn’t you know this year, you’re going to come face to face with the covenant God gave you and how you must guard it?
Tests happen at the threshold.
Covenants are made at the threshold.
Happy hunting!
