The Gospel According to David: David's Fall

In 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. It 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. And David sent and inquired about the woman. And one said, "Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?" So 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. And the woman conceived, and she sent and told David, "I am pregnant." So David sent word to Joab, "Send me Uriah the Hittite." And Joab sent Uriah to David. When Uriah came to him, David asked how Joab was doing and how the people were doing and how the war was going. Then David said to Uriah, "Go down to your house and wash your feet." And Uriah went out of the king's house, and there followed him a present from the king. But Uriah slept at the door of the king's house with all the servants of his Lord, and did not go down to his house. When they told David, "Uriah did not go down to his house," David said to Uriah, "Have you not come from a journey? Why did you not go down to your house?" Uriah said to David, "The ark and Israel and Judah dwell in booths, and my Lord Joab and the servants of my Lord are camping in the open field. Shall I then go to my house, to eat and to drink and to lie with my wife? As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not do this thing." Then David said to Uriah, "Remain here today also, and tomorrow I will send you back." So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. And David invited him, and he ate in his presence and drank, so that he made him drunk. And in the evening he went out to lie on his couch with the servants of his Lord, but he did not go down to his house. In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. In the letter he wrote, "Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting, and then draw back from him, that he may be struck down, and die." And as Joab was besieging the city, he assigned Uriah to the place where he knew there were valiant men. And the men of the city came out and fought with Joab, and some of the servants of David among the people fell. Uriah the Hittite also died. Then Joab sent and told David all the news about the fighting. And he instructed the messenger, "When you have finished telling all the news about the fighting to the king, then, if the king's anger rises, and if he says to you, 'Why did you go so near the city to fight? Did you not know that they would shoot from the wall? Who killed Abimelech the son of Jerubbesheth? Did not a woman cast an upper millstone on him from the wall, so that he died at Thebez? Why did you go so near the wall?' then you shall say, 'Your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.'" So the messenger went and came and told David all that Joab had sent him to tell. The messenger said to David, "The men gained an advantage over us and came out against us in the field, but we drove them back to the entrance of the gate. Then the archers shot at your servants from the wall. Some of the king's servants are dead, and your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also." David said to the messenger, "Thus shall you say to Joab, 'Do not let this matter displease you, for the sword devours now one and now another. Strengthen your attack against the city and overthrow it.' And encourage him." When the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she lamented over her husband. And 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. - 2 Samuel 11:1‭-‬27 ESV

Rev. Dan Whang

We think that our politicians are bad. David is no better. He has a huge moral failure. There is no human hero worship.

David is not where he should be. It is the time of war. Kings customarily go out to war during this time. But David stayed at home. He sent Joab in his place.

  David is laying on his couch and decides to go for a walk. He goes out on his roof. He isn't looking for sin and temptation. But we need to remember, sin and temptation does not take a vacation. David does not remember his integrity and forgets God. When sin comes to tempt, Satan does not make God evil, he makes us forget God. He makes us feel that we are justified in sinning.

  David sees this beautiful woman. And he sends messengers. They tell him, this is the wife of one of his men. He sends his men to go get her. And he sleeps with her. He goes from lazing about to actively seeking out the desire of his flesh. He actively seeks it out.

  David has been in control this whole time. Not any more. Things are out of David's control. Bathsheba becomes pregnant. David sends for her husband. Uriah comes and the king talks nicely to him. David tries to send him home to sleep with his wife. But Uriah won't cooperate. So he gets him drunk. But Uriah has more integrity drunk than king David. David doesn't repent. He plots murder. David sends Uriah with a note to the commander that was his death warrant.

  Uriah was one of his mighty men. A close comrade who fought for the David.  The king who invited the descendent of Saul to his table also murdered and stole the wife of a close friend and brother in arms. David is a monster. The man after God's own heart has become a murdering adulterer.

Application

Close your eyes (to sin)

Sin attacks with a visual attack. Not the first look, but the lingering second look. The first is a temptation. What happens after is where we can fall to sin.

Divine silence

After all these things, we see no reference to God. Until the very end. Then we hear that God was displeased. Not that God rejected or withdrew from David, but that God saw David's sin. David did all these things out of fear of man. He wanted to hide and cover over his sin in the eyes of men, but God sees.

"Be killing sin or sin will be killing you."