Replacing David’s Enemies

Acts 1:16-22

“Brothers, the Scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke beforehand by the mouth of David concerning Judas, who became a guide to those who arrested Jesus. For he was numbered among us and was allotted his share in this ministry.”

(Now this man bought a field with the reward of his wickedness, and falling headlong he burst open in the middle and all his bowels gushed out. And it became known to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the field was called in their own language Akeldama, that is, Field of Blood.)

“For it is written in the Book of Psalms,

“‘May his camp become desolate, and let there be no one to dwell in it’; and ‘Let another take his office.’

“So one of the men who have accompanied us during all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day when he was taken up from us—one of these men must become with us a witness to his resurrection.”

D. A. Carson, For the Love of God (Vol. 1)

In the context of Psalms 69:25 and 109:8 [the verses Peter quotes], David is seeking vindication against enemies—once close friends—who had betrayed him. Peter’s use of these verse belongs to one of two primary patterns. Either: (a) Peter is indulging in indefensible proof-texting. . . . Or: (b) Peter is already presupposing a fairly sophisticated David-typology. If this sense of betrayal and plea for vindicating justice play such an important role in the experience of great King David, how much more in David’s greater Son? . . . During the previous forty days Jesus had often spoken with his disciples (1:3), explaining in some detail “what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself” (Luke 24:27). Certainly the David-typology crops up in the Gospels on the lips of Jesus. Why should we not accept that he taught it to his disciples? (July 14)