Cage stage of another sort
He also went down and struck down a lion in a pit on a day when snow had fallen. 2 Samuel 23:20
Benaiah didn’t attain to the three mighty men of David, but he did attain to a unique renown of his own. His great deeds were of a strange sort. First he killed two ariels. “What are those?” says the Millenial (and the rest of us). Some modern translations render it the sons of Ariel, a supposed man of Moab. Others believe ariel means hero. According to Jewish tradition, they are a kind of angelic being. Whatever the case, old Ben began his career with a great victory against mysterious opponents.
His next is also strange. David’s other mighties struck down so many hundreds of men (a strange creature in his own right). But Benaiah continues his peculiar martial campaign with his next opponent, a lion. Lions have been beaten by God’s servants before, but his battle is different. Samson slew the beast in the vineyards and David among the pastures of his flocks. Benaiah went into the cage with it. The venue of the battle adds great glory to the victory.
To face the wild animal, he had to go down into the pit. The Good Shepherd makes his lambs lie down in green pastures, and sometimes he makes them go down into pits of despair to slay lions. The heavens seem frozen against us, God seems cut off. There we are pressed, tight-quartered with a snarly roomie. And there God is with us incognito to strike down the dread foe.
The Puritan Samuel Rutherford wrote, “When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord’s choicest wines.” A lovely and strengthening thought! Well, allow me to wield it like this. If God is sending you down, down, down into the pit of despair, look for the lion and smite his ruin. That’s probably why you’re there.
All the mysterious, intangible, non-human, strange enemies of God must find their end at the strange warfare of God’s suffering servants. We’re not scared of the dark. They are. It was dark and heaven was frozen when the Valiant Man laid their lord waste in the pit.