Downfall and Uprising: David
For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me … Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Psalm 51:3,7
David’s sin of adultery with Bathsheba, and the consequent murder of her husband Uriah, was the low point of his spiritual life. David, the young courageous slayer of Goliath, won our hearts early in his life when he faced the giant alone. For years he lived off the land with his loyal soldiers as he hid from King Saul. Then finally he became king and was elevated to a position of authority and a life of comfort that he had previously known little about.
Then it was that temptation came and he let down his guard and sinned. We should always be mindful that when the Lord sees fit to leave us in humble circumstances that perhaps He is simply protecting us, knowing that we are not ready to face the temptations of promotion and comfort.
How do we track David’s sin and his spiritual recovery? We can find knowledge and encouragement that help us as well as we face temptations and fall into certain sins. This part of Scripture helps us know that we can repent and be restored to God. We find four simple parts of this story: the descent into sin, the effort to cover it up, the confrontation of Nathan, his repentance and spiritual recovery.
He was not where he should have been. The stage is set early in this story in 2 Samuel 11:1, “It happened in the spring of the year, at the time when kings go out to battle that … David remained at Jerusalem.” His first mistake was not to be busy doing what he should have been doing — going to war and defending the borders of Israel. Instead he sent his men, under the command of Joab, but he stayed back in Jerusalem. We all do get tired of service and tired in service, but we should consider the other alternatives. We are most vulnerable to temptation when we are not where we should be, doing what we should be doing.
His eyes were not seeing what they should have been looking at. It was then that he saw Bathsheba, and he let his eyes linger on her body, lusted after her in his heart, and committed adultery. As she is described in the Bible, she is said to be the daughter of Eliam, and the wife of Uriah. David’s lust reduced her to merely an object of desire, but the biblical record reminds us that she was a human being, a person — she had come from a family and was married to a brave soldier of David. Sexual temptation and sin demean people made in the image of God, and sees them as mere objects.
Several ingredients of temptation are seen here: self-pity on David’s part, self-indulgence, neglect of duty, demeaning other people to mere objects, thinking about the act, obsessing on the disobedience, and an entrance into sinful acts. We know too well from our own hearts what David could have likely thought. He looked first, then he invited her to the palace — he was deceived that this invitation could be an innocent gesture on his part — but once they were alone he fell into sin.
He sought to cover up his deed: The matter fell apart quickly. Bathsheba was pregnant. His first act was to bring Uriah home from the battle and have him sleep with her, so he would suppose that the child was his. When Uriah came, however, he refused to go home to his wife, since his fellow soldiers were separated from theirs. David then gave a secret order to Joab, and had Uriah and several other soldiers killed by a foolish maneuver in battle. Uriah himself even carried the letter to Joab that gave his own death sentence.
With Uriah dead, he brought Bathsheba to the palace and married her — an act that could be interpreted as generous compassion for the wife of a slain soldier — but was actually a cover up for adultery and murder. Chapter eleven ends with the ominous statement: “But the thing that David had done displeased the LORD.” God saw through it all, and it is highly likely that others in the palace also knew of what David had done. They were sworn to secrecy, but matters like this always have a way of leaking out.
It was almost a full year of David’s life that was lost to God’s service from this sin. The psalmist of Israel was silent during that time — his poetic pen did not write any poems of praise. We can wonder if he did not pick up a writing utensil during that time and try to come up with some psalm, but found he could not. His heart was not right with God, so his head was not right with anything else.
Nathan the Prophet confronted him: Nathan’s confrontation of David was a turning point. He told the story of a man in the kingdom who was wealthy and had plenty of sheep, but when a guest came to visit him he stole his neighbor’s little ewe lamb, that was a family pet. David’s anger was aroused with the story, but Nathan said, “You are the man!” God had been generous to David and was willing to do even more if he had wanted it, but instead he lusted after another man’s wife and used a human being — a wife, a daughter, someone who was cherished — as though she was nothing more than an object to satisfy his lust. And, of course, lust is never satisfied.
Repentance and Spiritual Recovery: In the confrontation David’s heart was broken and he repented. Psalm 51 was written by David to describe his repentant heart, and it has been an encouragement to people ever since. Rather than hiding his sin, he confessed it and repented. He was open before the Lord and before the Lord’s people. The Bible does not demand that we write hymns about our sinful indiscretions, it simply says, “Confess your faults to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed” (James 5:16). The general principle is that the circle of confession should be as large as the circle of knowledge about the sin. David, perhaps, realized that more people knew about his sin than he had been willing to admit to himself during his time of deception.
David was convinced that God had a means by which he could be forgiven. “Hyssop” was a plant that was used in the temple sacrificial rituals, and his naming this plant meant that he trusted in the way of forgiveness and grace that God had provided. For us today, it means that we trust that Jesus Christ is the answer for our sin and that when we sin we turn to Him in repentance and faith. As David said, so we can say as we confess our sins and trust in Christ, “Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.”
The Outcome: The judgment of God against David was that “the sword shall never depart from your house” (2 Sam. 12:10). What David had done could not be entirely undone. The child that Bathsheba bore to David died. We have a jewel in scripture from this event: David said, “I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me” (2 Sam 12:23). Here is a verse that has encouraged parents through the centuries who have lost young children, that their souls are kept by God and we shall go one day to join them in heaven.
But we also see the grace of God in this relationship. Grace means redemption and from David and Bathsheba came also their son Solomon who ruled after David. That which was begun in lust and consummated in murder, when placed in the hands of God could be redeemed and made holy. This is the power of God’s grace, so we should never fear turning to Him in repentance and faith. We always find Him to be a gracious and forgiving God. Even though in our lives, like David’s, there can be some consequences of our sin that we cannot stop, that we must live through, but the grace of God is always greater than our sin.”But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more” (Rom. 5:20b).
