Pastor Jonah preached 2 Samuel 12:1-10. He taught us that the only way you will live with a willing Spirit, the only way you will ever receive the difficult words of friends, the only way your eyes will ever be opened, is if you see that Christ has set you free. Lector: Melissa Gordon
Pastor Jonah preached 2 Samuel 12:1-10. He taught us that the only way you will live with a willing Spirit, the only way you will ever receive the difficult words of friends, the only way your eyes will ever be opened, is if you see that Christ has set you free.
Lector: Melissa Gordon
In the spring of the year, when kings normally go out to war, David sent Joab and the Israelite army to fight…however, David stayed behind in Jerusalem.
-2 Samuel 11:1
2 Samuel 11 begins with alarm bells. How often does something good happen when you’re not doing what you’re supposed to?
Rarely. This is what kings normally do, but here’s what David did. Not good.
David is apparently not troubled, though. Rather, he’s napping:
Late one afternoon, after his midday rest, David got out of bed and was walking on the roof of the palace. As he looked out over the city, he noticed a woman of unusual beauty taking a bath.
-2 Samuel 11:2
David naps, then goes for a walk, while his army is fighting/dying for him.
Then he notices a woman bathing. This is very uncomfortable…
He sends someone to find who this beauty is…she is Bathsheba, her husband is a soldier
While this man is fighting for David, David is napping and watching his wife bathe…
Then David sent messengers to get her
-2 Samuel 11:4
Fascinating grammar here…we could translate “get” as “take”…
The same take as we saw with Eve in the garden, the same take we saw from rebel Elohim in Genesis 6…the way the grammar works here makes it clear David is doing the taking. David is accountable here.
These messengers take her and bring her to David:
When she came to the palace, he slept with her. She had just completed the purification rites after having her menstrual period. Then she returned home.
-2 Samuel 11:4
Bathsheba is not bathing on a roof. She’s not being seductive.
She’s obeying Leviticus 14. This was a religious, ritual bath.
She wasn’t cleaning up, she was obeying God.
This was a personal act of devotion.
In no way can we twist this text to make Bathsheba a seductress or anything less than a faithful woman obeying God.
The text leaves no room for any other interpretation.
David, who should be at war, sees her, wants her, and so he takes her. It gets worse.
She finds out she’s pregnant, tells David, and David immediately sends for Uriah
David knows the child is his, and fear creeps in.
We rarely make good decisions when we’re avoiding responsibilities, and we make even worse decisions once we get afraid.
Bathsheba is pregnant because David raped her, and now David is afraid.
He calls for her husband to try and cover his tracks.
Uriah comes home, but he won’t sleep with his wife.
He sleeps at the entrance to the palace instead. Why? listen to this man:
The Ark and the armies of Israel and Judah are living in tents, and Joab and my master’s men are camping in the open fields. How could I go home to wine and dine and sleep with my wife? I swear that I would never do such a thing.
2 Samuel 11:11
David tells his general to put Uriah where the fighting is fiercest, and then:
Pull back so that he will be killed.
-2 Samuel 11:15
David rapes this woman and then executes her husband.
David forces her to marry him. But…
The Lord was displeased with what David had done.
-2 Samuel 11:27
This is the kind of story that makes your skin crawl.
It’s an abuse of power, an abuse of a woman, a murder and a cover up.
And do you know what troubles me the most of all?
David doesn’t see it. He goes on with business as usual. He’s blind to his own sin.
Few of us will ever do what David did, but we can all relate to the last part
The hardest lies to see are the ones that come out of our own mouths.
Have you noticed? Do you think this was David’s plan when he stayed home?
Doubtful. We know David loved God…but even such a man was blind
Listen: your faith is likely less than David’s was.
You are probably not the hero David was, or have a plan for your life as significant as David’s was…which means you must be willing to believe you could be blind, too.
If David can get into a place like this, so can you.
And I want you to watch how God goes about showing David…it’s a sneak attack.
If we knew where/how we were blind, we wouldn’t be blind!
If David was willing to murder to cover up his sin, do you think saying, “hey David you sinned” would work? No…God has to sneak around David’s self-protective defenses
So he sends a prophet to tell him the story we began our service with this morning.
There were two men in a certain town. One was rich, and one was poor. The rich man owned a great many sheep and cattle. 3 The poor man owned nothing but one little lamb he had bought.
-2 Samuel 12:1-3
David is the rich man, Uriah the poor man, and Bathsheba is a lamb
Just a quick note here…can you think of a time in the Bible where a lamb was used to describe someone guilty of sin? NO.
Lambs are innocent and blameless…lots of imagery could have been used here if Bathsheba was a seductress or had done anything wrong. Could have been a cow or a vineyard or donkey. Further evidence that she is a victim of David’s sin.
As this story is being told, though, David doesn’t think it’s about him!
It’s obvious to us, but that’s the point: it’s not obvious when it’s your sin.
There are no lies harder to see than the ones coming out of your mouth!
David cries out after hearing the story:
David was furious. “As surely as the Lord lives,” he vowed, “any man who would do such a thing deserves to die!”
-2 Samuel 12:5
David can see the sin in the story…and now he is inescapably caught.
Then Nathan said to David, “You are that man! The Lord, the God of Israel says: I anointed you King of Israel and saved you from the power of Saul. I gave you your master’s house and his wives and the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. And if that had not been enough, I would given you much, much more.”
-2 Samuel 12:7
I want us all to see something hopeful at this point…God keeps pursuing David.
To put it another way, God is more committed to your good than you are.
Look at how he talks to David: he reminds him of all he did for him and all he would have done for him.
He reminds him of his love, how he saved him, how he provided for him.
God sends David a messenger to open his eyes to God’s love/provision.
Some of you are here this morning and you’re afraid you’ve gone too far or done too much…but I want you to know that’s simply not true.
God keeps pursuing, and perhaps you’re here this morning as a result of that pursuit
Maybe this morning is God’s wake up call to you…open your eyes.
Hear what he’s telling you.
Be encouraged, be reminded, God never stops running after you. He is relentless.
But you also need to be warned. The consequences of blindness are severe:
From this time on, your family will live by the sword…Because of what you have done, I will cause your own household to rebel against you…you have shown utter contempt for the word of the Lord by doing this, your child will die.
-2 Samuel 11:10,11,14
Can you see how many innocent victims are involved because of David’s blindness?
Bathsheba was just trying to obey the Lord
Uriah was trying to obey his King and honor his men
This child…this poor child did absolutely nothing
And yet all three felt the consequences of David’s sin.
Sin will deceive us, distort us, and blind us, and so often many innocents around us pay the price
David actually wrote a song about this and it shows us his own heartache.
2 Samuel goes on to describe David weeping/fasting/praying in sackcloth for his child.
Not sleeping, crying out to the Lord…so as you hear these words don’t think of a king on his throne, think of a desperate man with his face on the ground:
Have mercy on me, O God, because of your unfailing love. Because of your great compassion, blot out the stain of my sins. Wash me clean from my guilt. Purify me from my sin. For I recognize my rebellion; it haunts me day and night…Oh, give me back my joy again; you have broken me—now let me rejoice. Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a loyal spirit within me…Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and make me willing to obey you.
-Psalm 51:1-3
Heart wrenching and desperate…but on this side of the resurrection of Jesus, it actually shows us the way to have restored sight, to have our blindness cured.
Look at how he ends…make me willing to obey you…
Such an honest prayer. What would David have done if he was willing to obey?
He would have done what Kings were supposed to do, not stayed home to nap.
He would not have peered into a woman’s window while she was bathing.
He would not have taken her, would not have slept with her, would not have killed her husband, would not have tried to cover it up…
How can we be willing, though? Where does that come from?
Is this something we just drum up inside of ourselves?
That’s not what David thought…back up one verse
Give me a clean heart. He doesn’t need will power, he needs renewal.
He needs a new heart, with a new Spirit.
Do you know you need that?
When David prays I recognize my rebellion…do you?
David needed someone to open his eyes. He needed a friend to confront him.
So, who in your life can do that? Who in your life tells you difficult things?
Who in your life can help you process whether or not a hard thing someone said is in fact true?
Willing…make me willing…make me see…help me…
Keep moving back in this psalm.
Wash me clean from my guilt…is anything in this song sounding familiar yet?
Because of your great compassion…blot out the stain of my sin.
Have mercy on me, O God, because of your unfailing love…
Not because of what I’ve done, but because of who you are…save me.
Psalm 51 is David crying out for Jesus. Crying out for the hope of the Gospel
One who would come and show compassion, open the eyes of the blind, live for us, die for us, and be raised for us, so that in him we could be given a new heart, a new spirit, and be made willing to obey him.
The only way you will live with a willing Spirit, the only way you will ever receive the difficult words of friends, the only way your eyes will ever be opened, is if you see that Christ has set you free
The payment of your guilt has been made with the blood of Christ
The pain of your shame has been healed with the love of Christ
And the fear that drives you to hiding is quieted with the presence of Christ.