Ammon and Aram Defeated
10 Now it happened afterward that the king of the Ammonites died, and his son Hanun became king in his place. 2 Then David said, “I will show kindness to Hanun the son of Nahash, just as his father showed kindness to me.” So David sent [a]some of his servants to console him about his father. But when David’s servants came to the land of the Ammonites, 3 the commanders of the Ammonites said to their lord Hanun, “[b]Do you think that David is simply honoring your father since he has sent you servants [c]to console you? Has David not sent his servants to you in order to explore the city, to spy it out and overthrow it?” 4 So Hanun took David’s servants and shaved off half of their beards, and cut off their robes in the middle as far as their buttocks, and sent them away. 5 When messengers informed David, he sent servants to meet them, because the men were extremely humiliated. And the king said, “Stay in Jericho until your beards grow back, and then you shall return.”
6 Now when the sons of Ammon saw that they had become repulsive to David, the sons of Ammon sent messengers and hired the Arameans of Beth-rehob and the Arameans of Zobah, twenty thousand foot soldiers, and the king of Maacah with a thousand men, and the men of Tob with twelve thousand men. 7 When David heard about this, he sent Joab and all the army, the warriors. 8 And the sons of Ammon came out and lined up for battle at the entrance of the [d]city, while the Arameans of Zobah and of Rehob and the men of Tob and Maacah were stationed by themselves in the field.
It had to be a shock to David to hear what Hanun had done, after his father Nahash had been such a wise and generous man. Either Hanun was a fool, or he was listening to foolish war-mongering men, and didn’t realize their wickedness. Which still makes him a fool. But that’s not really the point I want to bring out.
Rather, this is something that happens far too often in our world. Someone who gains great wealth, and is generous with that wealth, and shows wisdom in handling it, leaves it to children ill-equipped. The parent did so well with finances (and probably many other areas), but neglected to raise their own children properly.
It is a sobering reminder to all of us as parents, to raise our children well, especially when they are young. Otherwise, they might grow up to be fools, arrogant, lacking common sense, or worse.
Raise your children to love people, to be generous, to love God, and when they are older, they’ll have a dickens of a time trying to be anything other than what you taught them (with a nagging conscience to boot).