“After they did everything that the king had commanded …

… God listened to their entreaties for the land.” (2 Samuel 1:14)

What had happened in Israel? “There was a famine in the days of David for three consecutive years.” Only after three years, “David consulted Jehovah, and Jehovah said: ‘There is bloodguilt on Saul and on his house, because he put the Gibeonites to death.’” (2 Samuel 21:1) So the famine had been sent by Jehovah to punish the people for Saul’s transgression. How was the problem finally sorted out?

David approached the Gibeonites, and they proposed: “Let seven of … [Saul’s] male descendants be given to us to be killed and their bodies exposed before the Lord at Gibeah.” David “said, ‘I will give them to you.’ … He handed them over to the Gibeonites, who killed them and exposed their bodies on a hill before the Lord.” (2 Samuel 21:6, 9, NIV) Was this human sacrifice pleasing to God? Obviously, since “after they did … [this,] God listened to their entreaties for the land” and ended the famine. – 2 Samuel 1:14.

When we have the feeling that Jehovah doesn’t bless us, maybe we have a similar issue like the Israelites. Unfortunately, “the law of the land … forbid[s] us to kill apostates, even though they be members of our own flesh-and-blood family relationship,” so that we cannot kill them and their children and ‘expose them before the Lord.’ (The Watchtower, November 15, 1952, page 703) But perhaps we have let ourselves get carried away and got in touch with apostates, maybe because they are members of our family. We must never forget that we need to completely shun such persons until Jehovah will slaughter them in Armageddon!