When I was in sixth year, I got
to go on a rugby trip to Scotland. On
the bus someone explained that there was an award for the person who made the
biggest fool of themselves on tour. I
remember thinking, ‘I will be the last person on this team to get that award.’ After all I wasn’t as wild as a lot of the
others. I was wrong. I was to learn that I could not handle drink
and spent a lot of weekend totally drunk.
I did things and said things that drunk teenagers do and made myself
look like the idiot I was. On the away
home it felt so shameful to be told that I was the person on tour who had made
the biggest fool of themselves.
I have done worse things in
life. But I tell you of that one because
it a real lesson in the arrogance of thinking that it could never happen to
me. The Bible teaches us that we are to
be careful when we think that we are strong lest we fall (1 Corinthians 10:12).
The
steps into darkness
Up until this point in the story
of King David, David has come across as a remarkable man. We are told that he was a man after God’s own
heart. In our last look at his life we
saw that he was capable of extreme kindness.
But now, all of a sudden, his world comes crashing apart because of his
sin. I can’t imagine he ever thought it
could happen to him. If a great man like
David can fall then we need to be on our guard.
In
the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the
king’s men and the whole Israelite army (1a). The Ammonites had refused to make peace and
so there was battle. But David was not
leading his men. David’s descent into
darkness started with him doing nothing.
He was neglecting his duty. Lounge
around long enough and you will get yourself into trouble. It is when you are at home doing nothing that
you are most likely to look up porn or other compromising images. It’s when you have nothing better to talk
about that you are going to start assassinating someone’s character. Bored minds are ripe for temptation.
I don’t know if David was using
the raised height of his house to look voyeuristically over the city. I certainly don’t think that Bathsheba was
out to grab his attention as she had her bath on the roof. David seems to have stumbled across
temptation. But rather than turning his
eyes away he stared. He stared and he
wanted. His sin was not that he saw
Bathsheba but that he continued looking.
Sometimes people say to me that there is nothing wrong with looking at
the menu as long as you do not order.
Jesus says that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already
committed adultery with her in his heart (Matt. 5:28).
Then he betrayed his spouse. He invites Bathsheba over (although given
that he is the king she has little choice) and he sleeps with her. But this wasn’t just an act of physical
adultery, this was spiritual adultery.
Later David would write, ‘against you [Lord], you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight’ (Psalm 51:4a). Whenever we live for things that compete
against our love for God, whenever we approve of what he condemns, whenever we
do what he has forbidden, and whenever we seek our ultimate happiness in
anything but him then it is ultimately God that we are betraying.
What would have happened if David
had repented after his adultery? The
consequences could have been awful. There was a death sentence for adultery,
although it was not always enforced. He
might have been in all sorts of trouble.
But one thing that is certain is that God would have forgiven him. David knew that a contrite heart you, God, will not despise (Psalm 51:17b). But rather than acknowledge his sin, he
engaged in a cover-up. It was a cover-up
that would lead to the death of Bathsheba’s husband Uriah.
The
journey into the light
For a year David thought that he
had got away with it. As he denied his
guilt, his spiritual life must have been a mess. In fact, in Psalm 32 David say that at this
time he was miserable. In his mercy God
made David miserable, because God loves his people too much to allow us to live
spiritually dead lives. God always wants
to restore to us the joy of our salvation.
God then sends the prophet Nathan
to the miserable David. With a clever
tale Nathan exposes David’s guilt. In
one of the most dramatic moments in the Bible Nathan points a finger at David
and says, ‘You’re the man.’
Nathan speaks God’s word and it
exposes David’s sin. It was an act of
mercy of the God who is calling David to come home. What are you going to do if someone points to
God’s word and shows you that you are wrong?
Are you going to act like most of our society and shout, ‘who are you to
judge me?’ Do we have the courage to
challenge those who are ignoring God’s word?
If we have to challenge someone with God’s word, then may God enable us
to do so with love and tact and after a lot of prayer. Are we looking to God’s word to see where we
need to repent?
The most encouraging words in
this whole sorry affair come with the reassurance of Nathan: ‘The Lord has
taken away your sin. You are not going
to die’ (12:13). Our God is a forgiving
God. The Lord ‘will not always accuse,
nor will his anger burn forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or
repay us according to our iniquities.
For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for
those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed
our transgressions from us’ (Psalm 103:9-12).
In order to live freely as Christians, we must hear these words of
assurance. Therefore, there is now no
condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus’ (Romans 8:1).
Life may not be exactly like it
was before we fell, but God will not give up on us. Moses murdered but God still used him to lead
his people out of slavery. Peter denied
even knowing Jesus, but Jesus used him to build his church. This story shows that after David was
restored, he leads the army in victory in battle (12:29-30). The most amazing thing is that God had
promised to make a name for David and do a great thing through his family line,
and at no point did God consider going back on that promise. Please don’t think that God has given up on
you. He has works prepared for each of
his children to do. Whatever may lie in
your past, your best days as a Christian can be before you.
Conclusion
The thing I find hardest about
this story is the death of David’s son.
If God does not repay us according to our iniquities, then why does the
child have to die? I actually think the
answer to this question points us to Jesus, who is called the Son of David. You see, God’s forgiveness doesn’t mean that
justice is ignored. David knew that the
person who sinned deserved to die. But the
child dies instead of David. It is a
principle that we see right through the Old Testament—the death of a substitute
in the place of the sinner. But is that
fair on the child? Remember that in
God’s grace the child is raised to life.
David says, ‘I will go to him, but he will not return to me’ (12:23b). David knows that he will meet that child
again.
Forgiveness comes freely to us,
but it comes at a great cost. We have
the assurance that God will not turn away a broken and contrite heart. Indeed, it is the promise of his restoration
that brings about genuine repentance (Romans 2:4). But another son of David died for our guilt. A substitute died that we could be restored. Indeed, as you watch David’s grief over his
perishing son, think of the heavenly Father grieving as the Son of David
suffers as our substitute on the cross. Then
remember that this Son of David was raised from the dead and now we are to
rejoice. We are to delight in the God
who has brought us out of the darkness of our wickedness into his wonderful
light.
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