Some of the most inspiring last words ever uttered came from one of the Bible’s most famous figures, King David.
About 400 years after David died, the prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel recorded remarkable prophecies about him: that he would be resurrected and reign forever (Jeremiah 30:9; Ezekiel 34:23-24; 37:21-25). So although David’s last words are about 3,000 years old, they are from a man about to be resurrected as a ruling spirit being! He likely uttered them mere days or even hours before—to his consciousness—his future rule in God’s Kingdom! In this sense, compared to us, if we live until Christ’s return, David was much closer to the rule of the World Tomorrow than any of us are at this moment. What was on his mind?
2 Samuel 23 tells us. Verse 1 calls David the “sweet psalmist of Israel.” In verses 2 and 3, he credits these “last words” to God Himself: “… He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God. And he shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds; as the tender grass springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain” (verses 3-4).
These verses focus on the God-fearing ruler. This points directly to God’s Feast of Tabernacles. During the Feast, we celebrate the rule of God’s Kingdom in the World Tomorrow. This administration will include not only David, it will be populated by a team of godly rulers like those described in his last words.
“There is no greater poetry in the Bible about God’s loving government,” writes Gerald Flurry in The Former Prophets. He points out that this shows David’s love for God’s government, and that we must love that government too. Celebrating the Feast should help us grow in this love.
David’s poetic statement emphasizes that a ruler must be submitted to God. “We see many examples of devastating failure” in government, Mr. Flurry writes. “But David wanted us to see the fabulous fruits of God’s government of love. So he illustrated what it is like when a ruler submits to God.”
Yes, God sees how much we love His government and submit to it. But He also wants to see how well we administer His government.
As we celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles, we should ask: How well will I do as a ruler in the World Tomorrow? Proper rule is perhaps the most poetically beautiful thing the Bible’s greatest poet could describe!
Let’s explore this poetic passage in relation to our future in God’s government, and how beautiful this will be.
Righteous Rule
Biblical Hebrew poetry is astoundingly economical; each word has much meaning. A transliteration of the Hebrew for 2 Samuel 23:3 reads: moshel ba’adam tzadik / moshel yir’at Elohim. The phrases “rule over man is righteous / rule in the fear of God” are essentially captured in the King James Version. Put more economically: Ruling over men is just, if ruling in the fear of God.
The Hebrew word translated “just,” tzadik, means righteous. It is the origin of the name Zadok.
The word is also found in a proverb that contains a World Tomorrow principle: “When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn” (Proverbs 29:2). The phrase “in authority” would actually more accurately read “multiplied.” Micah 4:1-5 describe a time when the God Family is numerous and ruling the world. When this happens, people will rejoice.
The word for “rule” in Proverbs 29 is the same one David used in his last words. Here it shows the contrast: people mourning because of wicked rule.
Elsewhere this word “rule” has another, seemingly separate meaning: to make like, or to compare. As a noun, it can mean likeness or comparison. Gesenius’ Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon states: “Learned men have made many attempts to reconcile the significations of making like and ruling ….” But God’s people should be able to make sense of this. One in authority is measuring. Judgments are made in comparison to the law. To rule properly, we must compare the action to God’s law and ask: How alike are they?
A beautiful coincidence in English is that our word “ruler” can mean both an authority figure and a measuring stick. David’s language also couples these concepts.
He tells us what exactly makes this rule righteous.
God Family Fear
Righteous rulership and proper measuring require “fear of God.”
Notice that David uses Elohim for God, not another common word like Adonai, yhwh or Most High. We have written at length about the family implications of Elohim. David was clearly describing a family government.
A defining feature of righteous rulers is fear of disobeying God. They are afraid to tarnish the family name. They know that, when exercising their authority, they are accountable to the ultimate Authority.
This prevents a ruler from turning into a tyrant or dictator. Nehemiah, for example, took exception with the way some rulers were exercising dominion, adding: “but so did not I, because of the fear of God” (Nehemiah 5:15).
Godly fear is especially relevant to the Feast of Tabernacles. The command to keep the Feast in Deuteronomy 14:23 ends with “… that thou mayest learn to fear the Lord thy God always.”
Learning godly fear applies to both submission to and execution of godly authority, because God is preparing us to rule the world righteously. In the World Tomorrow, Christ will rule firmly, with a rod of iron, as will resurrected saints (Revelation 2:27). But this requires wisdom and balance. See how He cautioned His disciples about this in Luke 9:52-56.
“To rule in His coming Kingdom, we must rule exactly as God instructs us today,” Mr. Flurry writes. “He will never take a chance on having another sin-saturated world like the one we live in today. We must burn into our minds this truth: We are here to imitate the I Am. That means learning to use authority as He does and learning to submit to it as He does” (John’s Gospel—The Love of God).
There is definitely a wrong kind of fear informed by human reasoning (Isaiah 29:13). But godly fear makes the mind teachable, open to divine revelation (Psalm 25:12-14). We will help build that proper fear within those we govern so they are educated properly.
Light of the Morning
The next of David’s last words offers a stunning simile. And remember, this poetry is meant to help us better understand righteous, God-fearing rulership.
A transliteration of the Hebrew for 2 Samuel 23:4 reads: ukh’or boker yizrakh-shamesh / boker lo avot / minogah mimatar / deshe me’aretz. The italics in the kjv indicate that “he shall be” is not in the original Hebrew, but it is definitely implied in the literal meaning: And it’s like morning light at sunrise / morning of no clouds / from brightness from rain / first grass from the land.
The imagery is morning light, unobscured by clouds, refracting off young, rain-soaked grass. This kind of language appears in several prophecies about the World Tomorrow. As we explore them, remember that this is not just about the beauty of this coming time but the authority that makes it possible.
The Prophet Isaiah used similar imagery to David’s last words, and even the same word combinations, especially in chapter 58: “Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee …. And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noonday” (Isaiah 58:8, 10). Here we have light, righteousness and the light rising. For those God is calling today, this shows how we can come on this world like a sunrise.
This parallels a passage explicitly about the World Tomorrow: “Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall be seen upon thee” (Isaiah 60:1-2). Here is the same imagery as in David’s last words. God is going to rise on us like a sunrise. Before we can rule the world, we must be changed into luminous spirit beings!
The Apostle Peter elaborated on this idea in 2 Peter 1:19: “… until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts.” This refers to the “sunrise of the wonderful World Tomorrow!” Mr. Flurry writes in The Epistles of Peter—A Living Hope. He adds that this is specifically about our change to spirit: “Christ will return, He will meet His saints in the air—and then the day star will rise in our hearts! Christ in us will rise in our hearts, and in a sudden change we will be sons of God who look like Christ, and we will be the Bride!”
David’s last words say the sunrise shines on a cloudless sky. Clouds in the Bible often connote thickness and darkness. But nothing will obscure the light of this sunrise. It is “clear shining.” The Hebrew for this phrase is usually rendered “brightness” in the kjv, as in Isaiah 60:3: “And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising.”
David and Isaiah were obviously referring to the same event. People will be drawn to our light and to the brightness of our rising. We too will rise on this world. Can we truly grasp the resplendent glory that awaits us?
Isaiah 62:1, which uses this word, contains another magnificent image: “For Zion’s sake will I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not rest, until the righteousness thereof go forth as brightness, and the salvation thereof as a lamp that burneth.” “Righteousness” is a form of tzadik, and verse 2 says the Gentiles will see our righteousness. Verse 3 shows the real authority we will be given: “Thou shalt also be a crown of glory in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of thy God.”
Rain on the Grass
David builds even further on the imagery of brightness by adding raindrops on the grass.
Water in the Bible symbolizes God’s Holy Spirit, and rain often pictures God’s revelation. Isaiah 55:10-11 liken God’s truth to rain: When it goes somewhere, like rain it accomplishes something. It generates growth.
Rain is also mentioned as one of the blessings in the World Tomorrow—both physical rain for crop growth and spiritual rain in the form of God’s knowledge filling the Earth.
Isaiah 30 connects this abundance of rain to the ruling Family of God. It describes the teachers of tomorrow no longer being in a corner: “… but thine eyes shall see thy teachers: And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left” (verses 20-21). This passage adds: “Then shall he give the rain of thy seed, that thou shalt sow the ground withal; and bread of the increase of the earth, and it shall be fat and plenteous: in that day shall thy cattle feed in large pastures” (verse 23).
The rain in David’s vision is what makes the “tender grass” more reflective. The Hebrew refers to a young sprouting of grass, “first sprouts of the earth, tender grass, tender herb …. It is different from grass ripe for mowing” (Gesenius’ Lexicon).
Moses uses this word in his poetry, likening God’s doctrine to raindrops “upon the tender herb” (Deuteronomy 32:2).
At the beginning of the World Tomorrow, we will govern new converts to God’s truth. This will require great wisdom and loving authority. Isaiah uses the analogy of a mother nursing an infant (Isaiah 66:12-14).
This statement from The Former Prophets relates to how we will rule in the World Tomorrow and how we should exercise authority today: “God used David to lift Saul’s spirit. There is a lesson here too. Clearly we must learn to control our own emotions and stay positive. But if you’re going to be royalty for God, you must also learn to be encouraging to other people. That’s what a leader does. Are you an encouraging person to be around?”
We find similar imagery in other words of David, also from the end of his life. Psalm 72 (“for Solomon”) appears to be David’s final composition (verse 20). Though this is a king praying for the success of his heir (verse 1), the psalm has rich imagery related to the Son of God ruling in the World Tomorrow.
David uses the word for “righteousness” (from the same root as “just” in his last words) in each of the opening three verses and again in verse 7, which describes how the righteous will bear fruit. Verse 5 connects this to godly fear.
In verse 6 he proclaims: “He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass: as showers that water the earth.” This is the more mature grass, but it is the same imagery found in his last words—the interaction of rain and grass, radiance and growth.
Verse 16 adds: “… they of the city shall flourish like [mature] grass of the earth.” Throughout God’s rule, those we govern will grow, flourish and mature. We are honored to be part of this stunning undertaking!
Some Last Words
David’s last words aged well over 3,000 years because they are an astounding scene of what lies ahead—a time when he will be ruling again. This time, we can be with him.
Always remember the poetic image of the time when righteous, God-fearing rulership is multiplied. A sunrise is coming in us and on this whole world. Brightness is coming, unhindered by clouds—shining off the young grass, figuratively dripping with God’s Spirit and revelation.
Hopefully you agree with Mr. Flurry that there is “no greater poetry in the Bible about God’s loving government.” That poetry, in fact, describes you and your coming rule in this utopia.
How desperately this world needs that! It needs a whole family of Davids. It needs God-fearing, righteous rulers who have learned how to submit to God’s government and how to administer it. The stormy night is almost over. A morning without clouds is coming. The grass will be moist with rain. Soon, you will rise on this world and cause it to truly shine.