OK, so we are finishing up our series on the life of David we
have today and we have two more left and next two sermons will
be dealing with actually end of his life.
Today is probably the last kind of event that that is well
known. Today's sermon is on David and
Bathsheba. It's about how he commits
adultery and murder. Let that sink in for a moment.
Adultery and murder. We've been just talking about
for weeks how wonderful David is.
Last week's sermon was how David showed the kindness of God that
has said of God to somebody who did not deserve it, how his
kindness directly points to the gospel.
And two chapters later we're talking about adultery and
murder. This is, after all, the man
after God's own heart. This is the king that God chose.
This is the man who trusted in God fighting a giant named
Goliath. And now adultery and murder.
And we see this kind of things all the time.
One of my heroes of the faith, Philip Yancey, who wrote What's
So Amazing about Grace? He just had a falling recently,
Ravi, Ravi Zacharias, who faithfully defended our faith
for decades. And several of really people who
I consider to be role models in the faith, they went from
faithful men to destroying their life with sin.
And that's the question we want to answer today.
How can a faithful person like David fall into destructive sin?
Well, number one is because we think we can control sin and we
can manage it as we're not that bad.
Let's read Second Samuel Chapter 11 one through 4 for now.
Oh now it's OK, I'll just turn around Arena.
In the spring, when kings March out to war, David sent joy with
his officers and all Israel. They destroy the Ammonites and
besieged Rabbah, but David remained in Jerusalem.
One evening David got up from his bed and strolled around on
the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman
bathing, a very beautiful woman. So David sent someone to inquire
about her, and he said, isn't this Bathsheba, daughter of
Eliam and wife of Uriah, that he's like.
David sent messengers to get her, and when she came home to
him, he slept with her. Now, she had just been purifying
herself from her uncleanliness. Afterward, she returned home.
Oh, yeah, It works. OK, It works.
I see it. Yeah.
Thank you. Thank you.
Although the king is not expected to be necessarily every
part of battle. But it seems like, according to
verse one, it says when kings March out to war.
This is a time when I guess kings did March out to war.
And we know that this is what he should have been doing because
it says here, but but David remained in Jerusalem.
He did not go to war instead, but David remained in Jerusalem.
So why did David stay behind? Was he scared?
Of course not. He won many battles.
He defeated giants. There's no way he's scared.
He didn't go because he was actually winning every battle.
David is at the height of his power and everything is going
his way. Kind of like you start your own
business and it goes so well. After a while, you just hire
some managers, just kind of check in here and there.
And it seems like that's what he's doing.
He's checking in here and there and he's not actively involved.
And this where David is at, at the height of his power,
comfortable, settled in. This is actually a very
dangerous place to be being settled in, comfortable, kind of
doing the cruise control of life.
That is a very dangerous place to be.
And we know this because immediately he's comfortable.
He's walking around his palace. In verse 21 evening, David got
up from his bed and stroll around the roof of the palace
and he saw a woman bathing, a very beautiful woman.
Now, let me just note that Bathsheba was she was doing a
purification ritual. It was actually she was doing
something religious. It wasn't a woman just kind of
flaunting herself in public. They I read that the bath, it
was often on the roof, but it was well covered.
Really the only person who could see her was somebody who was in
a really high place, which is the palace where David lived.
So she was certainly not trying to seduce anyone, but David
certainly is not the victim here.
David was walking around kind of bored, and then a naked woman
caught his eye. See David's danger?
But it wasn't just that he he was lustful.
It was more so combination of success and an absence of trial.
See, trials often awaken our dependence on God and comfort
can lowest low person to spiritual sleep.
He wasn't afraid of sin. He wasn't guarding his heart.
And oftentimes that is where spiritual danger is most
present. You know, you don't fall asleep
through middle of storm. You fall asleep in Hawaii in a
nice beach when your guard is down against sin.
Step by step you may be walking into destruction and you don't
even know it because you don't think you could fall.
Things are going too well, so you just go along with it.
There is a progression of sin and David doesn't even notice
it. Look at verse 2.
He first saw when you're walking around and then you accidentally
see a naked woman. That is actually not sin.
That is actually not his fault, unless he was looking for a
naked woman, but it doesn't say that he saw a woman bathing.
It's only bad when you keep looking.
So he saw and then verse three, he sent, OK, there's a
progression that's worse. And then and then he he sent
someone to inquire, right. And then he sent somebody to get
her in The Hebrew is directly translated.
He took her and then of course, the worst part, he slept with
her. He saw, he sent, he took, and he
slept with her. In the middle of this, he even
got a reminder who the husband was because remember he said
someone to inquire about her. And then he said, isn't this
Bathsheba? Isn't that the wife of Uriah?
So Uriah is mentioned in other parts of the Bible.
So you actually Uriah is somebody David would have known
very well there. There was a time when he was
running away from Saul and some of his warriors kind of rescued
David from from danger. And Uriah was one of the men
that was part of the rescue team.
So Uriah has been faithful servant from day one, before
David even became king. The servant goes, wait a minute,
isn't that woman Uriah's wife? And he just says, come, bring
her to me. There is a progression of sin
and he just keeps going along. The vast majority of us are
sitting here thinking, well, you know what, I won't do that.
This will never happen to me. I can never get there.
If you are thinking to that to yourself, I'm sorry to say, but
you just put yourself in the front of the line of spiritual
danger. The person who says that will
never be me is the person in danger of doing the exact same
and sin. See, because sin rarely happens
with just just sudden fall. Nobody goes from faithful
servant and boom, destructive Sinner.
There's steps to it, and when things are comfortable, when
your guard is down, you take those steps and you don't even
know you're going in that direction.
Because comfort, success, it makes us prideful and we ignore
the signs. There's a progression.
Look, scent, take slept. Why not fight it at look?
Why not? Why didn't he just fight the
scent at look, what we have to do is check even the little
smallest movements of our hearts and we cannot leave our hearts
unchecked. The famous quote by John Owen,
be killing sin or it will be killing you.
He's saying we cannot just control sin, manages sin.
He says we have to fight it. We have to be alert.
We have to be intentional about it, but when things are, you
have a crazy season of life and things are settling down, a
little uncomfortable, we start fighting sin and things just
creep up. We forget that we have to be
constantly suspicious of our own hearts.
When you're angry, when things are unsettled, we have to be
first be suspicious of our own hearts.
Is this something me? Before you start blaming others,
you got to be suspicious of your own heart first.
But we don't do that when we're comfortable and then we let them
grow and our hearts unchecked. Our only hope is sneaking out
our sin and going to God in repentance.
Our only hope is that to ask the Holy Spirit that we'll be
sensitive to the warning signs. Our only hip hope is to be alert
against sin at all times. OK, so how can we go from
faithful to destructive sin? We think we can control sin, and
we put our guards down #2 we think we can keep sin private.
We think we can keep sin private.
Let's go to the next passage, chapter verse 5 to 11.
So. All right, it's stuck, I'll just
turn around. Oh Nope, the woman conceived and
sent to word to inform David I am pregnant.
Let's stop there for real quick. So after 4 verses, right, David
might have seemed like OK, it was a one and done, it was a one
night stand and OK, nobody knows about it.
I'm good all right. In fact, he might have even felt
like he felt maybe good about himself because most kings right
when they take a woman, it doesn't matter if she's married
or not, it's his woman. Now other kings would not let
that woman go back to her husband.
So maybe David's like, OK, well, you know, maybe I'm I'm I'm
better than others. And and he thought it was going
to stop right there. But that cover up is no longer
possible. It's no longer A1 night stand.
It's no longer a closed chapter because verse 5 she sends word
to David, I am pregnant. Oh, oh, Plan B OK, so now he has
to do more things to cover this up.
So David sent orders to Joab. He's the commander in in the in
the war. Send me Uriah the hicite, the
husband. So Joab sent Uriah to David.
When Uriah came to him, David asked how Joab and the troops
are doing and how the war was going.
Then he said to Uriah, go down to your house and wash your
feet. So Uriah left the palace and a
gift from the king followed him. OK next.
But Uriah slept at the door of the palace with all his master
servants. He did not go down to his house.
When it was reported to David, Uriah didn't go home.
David questioned Uriah, haven't you just come from a journey?
Why didn't you go home? Uri answered David, the Ark, the
Israel. Israel and Judah are dwelling in
tents and my master Joab and the soldiers are camping in the open
field. How can I enter my house to eat
and drink and sleep with my wife?
As surely as you live and by your life, I will not do this.
So David has a clever plan. OK, let's bring home Uriah.
Have him sleep with his wife and then it will be his.
People will think it's his baby. OK, all the cover up will be
complete. A little problem.
This guy is too faithful. He's like my soldiers, my my
commander. Everyone is on the in in the in
the field, in a tent. How can I go home to my wife?
How can I be in comfort? And then we didn't read it but
the next few verses David tries again but this time he gets him
drunk. But same thing Uriah just
drinking he does do, but he sleeps still on the floor.
It still doesn't work. He just thinks if I keep this
thin hidden I will be OK. If nobody finds out I should be
good. So now he has to go to Plan C,
and now it won't be pretty. We're not going to read it, but
perhaps it's a story that many of us know.
He sends Uriah back to the battlefield with the letter, a
letter to the commander Joab in. In it.
It instructs Joab to send Uriah to to the front of the word.
There is most fierce battle. Essentially, David is arranging
Uriah to die. Adultery now became murder, and
it's not possible to send one man in battle.
It's too obvious. It's too fishy for for a king to
say send Uriah to conquer the city of I like.
You can't send one man, you have to send a group of men.
All of them went to battle just so they could die, and so the
King's sins could be covered up. If you find yourself hiding sin,
if there's something going in your life and you're ashamed and
you don't want anyone to know and nobody knows about it, that
is the most dangerous place to be.
Because we know from Scriptures that sin grows in darkness.
And when I mean darkness, I mean letting nobody in, not not
asking anyone for prayer, not asking anyone for support, not
confessing it to anyone. James, 15, says after desire has
conceived, it gives birth to sin.
And when sin is fully grown, it gives birth to death.
Sin doesn't just stay there. It grows in darkness, and
darkness is not letting anyone in, including God.
Your sin grows in darkness. It's hidden.
Give it enough time. Keep it a secret long enough.
It will grow out of control so much that it will eventually be
revealed. Somebody will find out.
There's a long list of celebrity Christians who have fallen
because the sins have gotten out of control, and by the time we
read about it or hear about it, it's just crazy.
If you find yourself hiding even the smallest of sins, like
secretly at home, you, you're angry or you yell at your wife
or a husband and nobody knows about it, or you have a lust
issue and you let nobody in, They will only grow in darkness.
Let other people in. We are called the children of
the light, right? Let other believers in.
Let them pray for you. Let them support you.
However, in this story, you might think, OK, but you know
that's exactly what happened. Like, he like, OK, but what
happened to David? He planned to have Yorak killed.
And he does die. And it seems like it's covered
up. Well, from this point on, David
will no longer live in peace. David will spend the rest of his
reign as a king dealing dealing with violence, rebellion and
really deep personal sorrow. I mean, he has family members,
you know, rape and murder, and then his son tries to kill him
and he's running away. Rest baby dies and rest of his
life is no longer peaceful. Even if you didn't get caught,
it doesn't mean you succeeded. Ah, it's all covered up.
I'm good now. There is always consequence of
sin. Always consequence of sin.
The restless nights, the anxiety, no peace.
You're irritable, impatient. Sin changes you.
But even if nobody finds out, guess what?
Let's go to the last two, verse 26 and 27.
When Uriah's wife heard that her husband Uriah had died, she
mourned for him. When the time of mourning ended,
David had her brought to his house.
She became his wife and born him a son.
However, this is the key. The Lord considered what David
had done to be evil. The Lord knows.
God knows about it. Nothing could be hidden from God
when you're in sin. Yeah, and you have hidden sin
and it's growing. You have the separation from
God. There's always consequences.
As I was reading the story and and thinking about David, it's
really like a one of those depressing Hollywood rich and
famous stories. Oh, this person got rich and
famous and successful. Oh, but he did drugs and died.
The end. That's not all these stories
end. I saw that movie about Queen.
Oh, successful, so talented. Oh, he got as and died.
I didn't see Michael Jackson's story that's out in theaters.
I'm assuming that's the same. Oh, it's rich and famous.
And then he started buying up animals and speaking to monkeys
and then he died. Those those stories all end the
same. It's tragic.
David kills Goliath and becomes king.
He's a hero. Oh, but he commits all adultery,
murder, and his life spirals down from then.
His child dies, murder in the family.
Absalom tries to kill him. The end.
And really the next sermon, we're going to skip Absalon
because we've talked about it quite a bit.
Next week's sermon is toward his like, end, End.
It's like Bathsheba and then story almost ends.
The sad thing is our life is no different than David because we
deserve the same ending. Yeah, we're not adulterers and
murderers perhaps, But you know, Jesus raises the bar for
adultery and murder in the New Testament.
He said if you have hatred in your heart, that is murder.
If you have lust in your heart, that is adultery.
So yes, we are in fact adulterers and murderers, and we
do deserve the same tragic ending.
We do deserve the consequence of sin, the punishment for sin.
But for God's people, it is actually not one of those
Hollywood movies that end tragically for us.
The Gospel offers a rescue, a rescue from sad endings.
And Davis finds that rescue as well.
Yes, his life was in turmoil. Consequence of sin cannot be
avoided, but we know somewhere along the line, his heart was
renewed, he was restored. Let's look at Psalm 51.
This is, I know that most people know the NIV version of this
passage. And you know there are songs
written about this. But God created me a clean heart
for me and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Do not banish me from your presence or take your Holy
Spirit from me. Restore the joy of salvation to
me and sustain me by giving me a willing spirit.
This is written after Bathsheba incident and after he becomes
repentant of his sins. David is his sin and he clings
on to God and begs God, Lord, I'm a Sinner.
I want a new heart. I want a clean heart.
And he says the last thing I want is for your presence to
depart from me because God's presence departed from Saul.
He's like, I don't want that. I want your presence.
And Lord, because of sin, I am devastated.
I am sad. There's tragedy in my family.
But he says I want you to restore the joy of salvation.
It doesn't matter what you've done.
It doesn't matter what sins you've been hiding.
Right now, God offers a rescue plan.
God offers a rescue from sad endings.
What He offers you is a clean heart.
What He offers you is that He will be.
He will have your His presence in you through the Holy Spirit.
And when you come to Him in repentance, the joy of salvation
will be restored in your life. It's true that there is no
hiding from sin, but there is a safe place for our guilt.
It's the cross of Christ. David eventually found mercy in
God's forgiveness. Our hope, our only hope, is that
Jesus died for all our all our sins.
And his mercy is available for all of us, for all of our sins.
Main point Destructive sin grows when we try to control or hide
it, but mercy is found when we bring it into the light before
God. Let's take time to pray.