INTRODUCTION
• SLIDE #1
• One of the most frustrating parts of life can be dealing with failure, succumbing to sin.
• Failure can be especially hard to deal with if you have not dealt with a lot of failure in your life.
• The biggest failure in life usually has to do with walking down a path of sin that gets us into some kind of trouble. It can happen to anyone who is not aware of the dangers that lurk.
• We can be walking with the Lord successfully and then if we are not careful, we can set ourselves up for failure.
• As we have been studying the life of David, it is apparent that David was a very successful person who had a great relationship with God.
• God had done many wonderful things through David and His Spirit was strong within David.
• As the successes in David’s life mounted something started to change in him. David is getting ready to put himself in a position that will forever change his life.
• David is essentially setting himself up for failure.
• Today we are going to look at the story of David and Bathsheba. This is the point of David’s life were things really changes.
• David’s failure had to do with a sin that he committed and the things that happened as a result/
• As we look at how David dealt with this massive failure in his life, we hope we will be able to glean some lessons from his situation that will benefit our lives today.
• Let us begin be first seeing…
• SLIDE #2
SERMON
I. A formula for failure.
• Failure has a formula and if we follow the formula we are sure to fail. As we look at dealing with failure, we need to know the formula for failure so that we can make sure we do not allow that mixture to happen in our lives.
• Let’s begin by looking at four steps in the formula to failure.
• SLIDE #3
1. Letting your guard down.
• We will set ourselves up for problems when we let our guard down. David had had many successes and he had a busy life. Look at verse 1 with me
• SLIDE #4
• 2 Samuel 11:1(ESV) 1In the spring of the year, the time when kings go out to battle, David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel. And they ravaged the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained at Jerusalem.
• David instead of doing what a King should have been doing sent Joab to fight the battles for him.
• David allowed himself to sit idly by as the army went to battle, David should have been leading the battle but he stayed at home, lounging around in his robe.
• As David was laying around eating Doritos and drinking coke, listen to what happened.
• SLIDE #5
• 2 Samuel 11:2(ESV) 2It happened, late one afternoon, when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king’s house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful.
• David is getting off the couch, after watching some baseball and he is lazily walking around the roof of his house when he saw a woman bathing.
• Ok, maybe he could not help seeing that the woman was bathing. But the passage tells us that not only was a woman bathing and that David saw her, but we are told she was VERY BEAUTIFUL!
• David let his guard down, seeing the woman was not to problem, but what he did next takes him further down the path.
• SLIDE #6
2. Giving traction to your lust.
• It is one thing to look, but David kept it going. Not only that but he did more.
• Look at verse 3-5
• SLIDE #7
• 2 Samuel 11:3-5(ESV) 3And David sent and inquired about the woman. And one said, “Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” 4So David sent messengers and took her, and she came to him, and he lay with her. (Now she had been purifying herself from her uncleanness.) Then she returned to her house. 5And the woman conceived, and she sent and told David, “I am pregnant.”
• David should have stopped at the look, but then he inquired, then he sent for her, then he slept with her and sent her away.
• David gave traction to his overmastering desire (lust) for Bathsheba.
• SLIDE #8
• James 1:15 (NASB)15Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.
• What now? Verse 5 tells us that David and Bathsheba’s liaison resulted in a surprise for David, what now? Well let’s see the next part of the formula for failure.
• SLIDE #9
3. Looking for ways to cover up your failure.
• In verses 6-13 David is calls Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband from the lines of battle. He tries to get Uriah to spend the night with his wife so that it would look like the child was his.
• Uriah was a noble man and would not do it because his troops did not get to sleep with their wives either.
• David then tries to get Uriah drunk the next night hoping to get him to sleep with Bathsheba. Uriah did not go home.
• David is getting in deeper and deeper as he tries to cover up his failure.
• Now verse 14, this verse is really sickening to read.
• SLIDE #10
• 2 Samuel 11:14(ESV) 14In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah.
• Now what is the big deal? It is a letter. Well when you read the passage we are told the letter is basically Uriah’s death warrant. Joab is told to put Uriah in the front lines and he is to move him in too close to the city walls so Uriah will die.
• The chapter finishes up with Joab sending a report to David that the deed had been done.
• Now David has drug another person into his sin in the quest to cover it up.
• The last ingredient for the formula for failure is…
• SLIDE #11
4. Thinking you got away with it.
• We do things we think we have gotten away with it. David takes Bathsheba as his wife after the period of mourning is over.
• Only a couple of people know something is going on, David is safe!
• But look at verse 27.
• SLIDE #12
• 2 Samuel 11:27(ESV) 27And when the mourning was over, David sent and brought her to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing that David had done displeased the Lord.
• God knew what happened and He was none too happy about it.
• God ALWAYS knows what we do, we NEVER get away with it.
• GOD SENDS NATHAN. Chapter 12:1-9
• STORY OF LAMB. Rich man and poor with and a visitor.
• As the story is told, David gets angry and says the rich guy needs to die and he needs to pay fourfold in damages.
• Now look at verse 7
• SLIDE #13
• 2 Samuel 12:7(ESV) 7Nathan said to David, “You are the man! Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you out of the hand of Saul.
• BUSTED!
• Well now what? In order to be able to deal with failure we need to understand…
• SLIDE #14
II. Failure has consequences.
• We need to understand that when we suffer a failure that there will be consequences to deal with.
• We cannot be surprised by anything that happens. It is like, you rob a bank, you get caught, do not be surprised that you go to jail.
• In verse 10-14 Nathan tells David that God is VERY unhappy. He tells David that the sword would never leave his house. Meaning that David’s house would always suffer trouble.
• God would raise up evil in the house against David.
• He was going to see that David suffered consequences for what he did.
• They were also going to lose the child.
• Adultery does not hurt anyone does it? It DOES and it hurts God.
• Look at verse 10
• SLIDE #15
• 2 Samuel 12:10(ESV) 10Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.’
• God takes these things personally especially for those who belong to Him.
• Wow, now what? Is life over? Is David going to die? Let’s finish by understanding how we can endure…
• SLIDE #16
III. Failing without becoming a failure.
• What happens when we fail is it all over? It looks bad for David and it can look bad for us also at times. Fortunately we serve a loving God, a God of forgiveness and mercy. How can we fail without becoming a failure?
• SLIDE #17
1. Admit your failure.
• In verse 13, David ADMITS his failure.
• SLIDE #18
• 2 Samuel 12:13(ESV) 13David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” And Nathan said to David, “The Lord also has put away your sin; you shall not die. 1 JOHN 1:9
• Secondly…
• SLIDE #19
2. Understand who you are really failing.
• Notice that David says he is sinning against God. When we sin, that is who we are really offending. Others are hurt also, but sin is rebellion against God.
• Sin is ugly and it was so ugly that God sent His Son to die for our sins.
• Notice in verse 13 that we are told that God put away David’s sin. However; we ned to understand that…
• SLIDE #20
3. Accept the consequences of the failure.
• The child is born, it gets ill and David prays and fasts for healing for the child. God did not relent on his punishment for David. It is like how sin cost God His Son, the sin cost David his son also.
• After the child dies, David picks himself up and look at verse 20
• SLIDE #21
• 2 Samuel 12:20(ESV) 20Then David arose from the earth and washed and anointed himself and changed his clothes. And he went into the house of the Lord and worshiped. He then went to his own house. And when he asked, they set food before him, and he ate.
• David accepted the consequences that is part of repentance! If we are truly repentant, we will accept the consequences and not blame God.
• Now it looks like God is through with David, but even though David is damaged, he is not broken.
• SLIDE #22
4. Know that God will bless repentance.
• David has another son by Bathsheba; you may have heard of him, his name was Solomon.
• Look at verses 24-25
• SLIDE #23
• 2 Samuel 12:24-25(ESV) Then David comforted his wife, Bathsheba, and went in to her and lay with her, and she bore a son, and he called his name Solomon. And the Lord loved him and sent a message by Nathan the prophet. So he called his name Jedidiah, because of the Lord.
• God loved the son even though the marriage was not done the right way. God will use us even when we have failed if we will repent and be open to Him.
• David goes on to more victories also.
CONCLUSION
• We can survive failure if we will realize what is going on and whom we are sinning against. God can and will use us IF our heart is right with Him.
• God loves you and wants you to walk with Him in victory!
