When David returned to bless his household, Saul's daughter Michal came out to meet him and called out, "How the king of Israel honored himself today by undressing himself right in front of his women staff members, just like any pervert would dare to expose himself!"

""The LORD also announces to you: "The LORD will himself build a house for you. When your life is complete and you go to join your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring after you, who will come forth from your body, and I will fortify his kingdom.

"And who is like your people, like Israel, the one nation on earth that God went out to redeem as a people for himself, to make a name for himself, and to carry out for them great and awe-inspiring accomplishments, driving out nations and their gods in front of your people, whom you redeemed to yourself from Egypt?

David made a name for himself when he returned from killing 18,000 Edomites in the Salt Valley.

When Mephibosheth, Jonathan's son and a grandson of Saul, approached David, he threw himself on his face out of respect. "Mephibosheth!" David said as he greeted him. "Hello! I am your servant," he replied.

so David told himself, "I will be loyal to Nahash's son Hanun, since in his loyalty his father showed gracious love to me." So David sent a delegation to Hanun to console him about his loss of his father.

A week later, the child died, and David's staff was afraid to tell him that the child had died. They were telling themselves, "Look, when the child was still alive, we talked to him but he wouldn't listen to what we said. Now what kind of trouble will he bring on himself if we tell him that the child has died?"

At this, David got up from the ground, washed, anointed himself, changed his clothes, and went into the LORD's tent to worship. Then he went back to his palace where, at his request, they served him food and he ate.

"Why, then," the woman asked, "are you planning to act just like this against God's people? Based on what your majesty has said, you're acting like one who is guilty himself, because you're not bringing back the one whom you've banished!

At this, Joab fell on his face to the ground, prostrating himself to bless the king, and then said, "Today your servant realizes that he's found favor with you, your majesty, in that the king has acted on the request of his servant."

Eventually, the king and his entourage arrived exhausted at their destination, and David refreshed himself there.

But the LORD had planned to circumvent the sound advice of Ahithophel so the LORD could bring Absalom to destruction. So Hushai told Zadok and Abiathar, the priests, what Ahithophel had suggested to Absalom and the elders of Israel. He also reported what he himself had proposed. Hushai said,

Meanwhile, when Ahithophel observed that his counsel was not being acted upon, he saddled his donkey, got up, and left for his hometown. Leaving behind a set of orders for his household, he hanged himself. After his death he was buried in his father's tomb.

While Absalom had been living, he had erected a pillar as a monument to himself in King's Valley because he had been telling himself, "I don't have a son to carry on my family name." So he named the pillar after himself it's called Absalom's Monument even today.

Meanwhile, David was sitting between the inner and outer gates of the city. The watchman was up on the roof of the gateway near the walls, looking around, and there was a man running by himself!

The king responded, "If he's alone, he's bringing some news to report." As the man continued to draw near and approach the palace, the watchman observed another man running. So he called out to the gatekeeper, "There's another man running by himself!" The king replied, "He's also bringing some news to report!"