Someone asked me the other day, "Why do we have to have all these stories from the Old Testament. They’re so gruesome!" Well, the reason we have to hear these stories is because they’ve been put here to tell us about God. You see, these aren’t just stories about David, or Saul, or Samuel. They’re always and primarily stories about God. And here today we discover, once again, the two central elements in the way God deals with his people. Here we find God’s justice and mercy going hand in hand as he deals with a failed leader.
But we also find here lessons about ourselves. For example we discover that even someone as close to God’s heart as David can fail. Even the most godly have their weaknesses and can fail at critical moments. This is a warning to us to keep watch because we too could fail if we’re not careful. You may remember when we were going through 1 Corinthians we came across these words in 1 Cor 10:11-12: "These things happened to them to serve as an example, and they were written down to instruct us, on whom the ends of the ages have come. 12So if you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall."
So let’s see what lessons we can learn as we go through this passage, first about God and his justice and mercy, and second about how we might avoid the pitfalls that David stumbled into.
The story begins with the statement that it was spring, the time when kings go out to battle. But what’s David doing? Not going out to battle. He’s done his fighting it would seem. He sends Joab off to do battle, while he stays at home in his palace, in Jerusalem. And what happens? Well, as the saying goes, the Devil finds work for idle hands to do. David has nothing better to do, so he goes for a walk up on the roof top late one day. And as he looks down into the courtyards of the surrounding houses he sees a woman bathing; not just any woman, mind you, a very beautiful woman. And what does he do? Does he immediately turn around and walk away from temptation? No, he stops and takes in the view. He admires her beauty. He checks out which house it is so he can inquire as to her identity.
In Genesis 3 we get a similar picture of the way temptation so often comes upon us. There we read that the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, and so she ate. You see, the temptation itself is not the problem. It’s the way it’s dealt with. Eve checks out the fruit. She dwells on it’s desirability. So too, here, David stops to admire this woman’s beauty. He thinks how desirable she is. He sends to find out who she is. But even then his situation remains reversible. Until he sends for her. Had he accepted that she was a married woman nothing more would have been heard about it. But no, he flexes his royal muscles and she comes and he takes her to his bed, despite the fact that we’re told she’s still in the process of being purified after her period. His desire for her by now is so strong that even her ritual impurity isn’t a deterrent. Then he sends her home. And there again, the matter might have ended except for one thing. Bathsheba discovers a month later that she’s pregnant. God isn’t going to let David get away with this clear act of rebellion on his part. David thinks his sin has been done in secret, but the secret is shaping up to become public.
So what is he to do? He could own up to it and seek to make reparation. That would be the godly way to behave. Or he could seek to cover it up. That’s the politic way to behave and sadly, with kingship, it seems, comes the need to be politically astute in the way you behave. Certainly that’s something that David has learnt well. He’s a past master at turning difficult situations to his own advantage. So he sends for Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband. He’s been at the battle front so David thinks this will solve his problem. Uriah will be given a few days furlough, he’ll go home to his wife, make love to her and the pregnancy will appear perfectly normal.
Except that Uriah shows himself to be a man of more integrity at this moment than David is. As much as he’d love to go home to his beautiful wife, he’s part of an army at war. It may even have been one of David’s own rules that an army at war refrained from sexual encounters while the battle raged. Or this rule may have come out of the same purity laws that David had ignored in his encounter with Bathsheba. In any case he stays with the priests who are tending the ark. Now remember that Uriah is a foreigner, a Hittite, yet he shows far greater concern for the Lord’s name than David has, even when David gets him drunk in an effort to break down his self control.
And so David moves to the next stage in his efforts to cover up. He arranges with Joab for a battle casualty to solve his dilemma. Joab understands exactly what David wants, even if he doesn’t understand the reason and Uriah dies in the next day’s battle. David is safe. After a suitable time of mourning, not too long, mind you, David sends for Bathsheba and she becomes his wife.
It’s an horrific story isn’t it? This is David, the king after God’s own heart and here he is, engulfed in this spiralling story of sex, intrigue and murder. Surely this isn’t the same David we’ve been reading about for the last few weeks and months!
Well, yes it is! And it’s all happened in the blink of an eye! So how does something like this happen? Well, like most sin, it happens little by little. It begins with a look that lingers, it involves the exercise of a little power, and it continues with a cover up, with a lie that grows and grows until murder is required to keep it quiet.
By the way, notice how the word ’send’ is repeated through this account. It seems an inoffensive word at first until you realise that it in fact signifies the wielding of power and David’s gradual slide from obedient servant of God to out and out sinner. It begins with David sending Joab off to fight the battle. That’s fine. That’s his job. But then he sends to inquire about Bathsheba. His authority at this point is beginning to be directed in a less appropriate way. Then he sends for her to come to bed with him and he’s finally stepped over the line. His power, given to him by God, remember, is now being used to indulge his own personal lust. And so it goes on. He sends for Uriah, he sends him back with a message for Joab, and finally he sends for Bathsheba to come and be his wife. They say that power corrupts, and sadly, David is no exception.
But despite his power, David isn’t as in control as he thinks. We see it, interestingly in the use of the word "sent" in v6. There’s one thing that David has no control over and that’s the fact that Bathsheba is pregnant. This can’t be kept secret. And as much as David might try to cover up, even by marrying her, he can’t hide it from God. God sees everything that happens and he isn’t pleased. So he sends Nathan the Prophet to speak to David.
Now before we go on, I think it would be good for us to stop and reflect on the situation here. What David has done is pretty bad, but if you think about it, he isn’t so far removed from each of us is he? Who is there in this room today who hasn’t ever done something wrong, something they were ashamed of, and tried to cover it up? And how many times has the cover-up led to a greater need for cover-up? How often has one lie led to another? Until the situation escalates out of hand? How often have we looked back and thought, "If only I’d owned up from the start, it wouldn’t have ended up nearly as badly as it has?" And what’s worse, how often have we tried to convince ourselves that God isn’t there watching us ignore him?
Well, God is watching David and he’s not pleased. So he sends Nathan to David with a story. A story of a rich man who owns many flocks of sheep who lives next to a poor man who has only one small lamb who’s like a family pet. A traveller calls on the rich man, but instead of taking one of his own sheep to prepare a meal for this guest, the rich man decides to appropriate his poor neighbour’s lamb instead. The poor neighbour is powerless to stop him, so the rich man can do what he likes.
Well, David has been king long enough to know that this isn’t the sort of thing he wants happening in his kingdom. He’s righteously indignant. He tells Nathan such a man deserves to die. And David is right. Such behaviour will never do in God’s kingdom.
You can imagine Nathan turning to David and saying in a clear but quiet voice: "You are that man!" And he proceeds to give him God’s message. God has given him everything and now he’s totally ignored God, doing something that’s abhorrent to him. Do you remember what David said to Saul’s assassins about killing an innocent man in his own bed? Well, here’s David guilty of the same crime. Killing an innocent man with the sword. And as a result the sword will never leave David’s house. David’s own sons will rise against him. His house will be torn apart by rebellion. His own wives will be taken by another. And here’s the ironic part: where David had tried to keep his shame hidden, now it’ll be known to everyone.
Well, what is David to do? His guilt is clear. His judgement has come from his own lips. He deserves to die. So what does he do? He admits it to Nathan. "I have sinned against the LORD" he says. His repentance is clear. It’s shown in greater clarity in Psalm 51 that we just read. "3I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. 4Against you, you alone, have I sinned, and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are justified in your sentence and blameless when you pass judgment." He knows he deserves God’s judgement.
But God is a gracious God, who doesn’t desire the death of the wicked, but rather that they should turn from their ways and live? David has repented and in response God withholds his hand of judgement. David won’t die. But in case he thinks he’s got away with it he needs to realise there are always ramifications to our sin. His child will die.
And here we come to another lesson that God wants us to learn from this passage. As so often happens, one man’s sin leads to much suffering for others. In fact have you noticed how it’s often those other than the perpetrators who suffer the most. First it was Uriah who was killed, now it’s this new born child who’ll die, simply because of David’s uncontrolled lust for a beautiful woman and his inability to control his desires and resist temptation.
If ever we start to think our sin won’t matter, or that it’s only us who’ll be affected we need to stop and think. Every action we take has an effect on those around us, whether we realise it or not and even more so when what we’re doing is rebelling against the Lord.
And so it turns out. David begins a long period of prayer and fasting, of showing his repentance towards God. For a week he refuses to eat. He spends his nights in prayer before the Lord. But in the end the child dies. God has answered his prayer, though not with the answer he’d hoped for. David rises, bathes, returns to his home and resumes his life. When questioned he explains that while the child was alive he pleaded with God for mercy but now that the child is dead there’s no point in continuing to plead. God has answered in a final way. The child is in God’s hand now. David will go to him, but he can’t come back to David.
I guess there’s a lesson here for us in the way David accepts God’s negative answer to his prayer. Sometimes people think God hasn’t answered their prayers because they didn’t get the outcome they were looking for. But in fact God has answered them, but with a "No". And it’s as important that we accept those answers as it is that we thank him when he says "Yes". But at the same time remember that David kept on praying for mercy until the day the child died.
Well, that could have been the end of the story couldn’t it? David has sinned in the most terrible of ways. God has seen it, has sent Nathan to David to accuse him and to pronounce the judgement of God. And that judgement has been carried out in the death of David’s son. But then comes another one of those surprises that pop up in God’s dealings with his people all the time.
David again makes love with Bathsheba and again she becomes pregnant and bears a son, who is named Solomon.
David’s sin is great, but God’s mercy is greater. It isn’t that God has simply ignored David’s sin. Rather David has repented, has turned away from his evil behaviour and God responds to such repentance with forgiveness and mercy. He sends Nathan to David this time with a word, not of accusation, but of encouragement. The child is to be called Jedidiah, which means "loved of the Lord". You can imagine David at this moment feeling like he’s a total failure; feeling like God has abandoned him because of his gross sinfulness. But God hasn’t abandoned him. God continues to love him.
There may be times when you feel like you’ve let God down to such an extent that he won’t be interested in you, that he’s turned his back on you. At that moment you need to remember this important lesson from David’s experience. God never forgets us. When we turn back to him in repentance, when we ask for forgiveness, intending to live a godly life again, God’s mercy reaches out to us with a message of love. David is loved by the Lord. His new born son Solomon is loved by the Lord. David needs to know this, just as we need to know it. God’s judgement and mercy are never far apart, provided we truly repent as David did.
Lets finish with these words of Geoff Bullock that express this so well:
Oh, the mercy of God, the glory of Grace,
that you chose to redeem us, to forgive and restore,
and you call us your children chosen in him
to be holy and blameless to the glory of God.
Oh, the richness of grace, the depths of his love,
in him is redemption, the forgiveness of sin.
You called us as righteous, predestined in him
for the praise of his glory, included in Christ.
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