Sin and Disgrace

2 Samuel 11

Immanuel – 8/27/23

As I said last week, as Steve Covell said the week before, 2 Samuel 7 and the Davidic Covenant was the pinnacle of David’s story. There God made very great promises to David: Most prominent of these promises was that a descendant of David would reign over an everlasting kingdom. The Anointed One, the One to crush the head of the serpent, would come from David!

But from the heights of the Davidic Covenant the trajectory of David’s life begins to taper. Then in 2 Samuel 11, it dramatically careens off a cliff and crashes in violent lawlessness.

The story of David and Bathsheba is likely the most famous story of David’s life, after the David and Goliath account. Israel’s greatest king, the man after God’s own heart, is forever marked by his breathtaking fall into sin and disgrace.

Purpose

1. Unpack the events in chapter 11.

2. Though David prefigures Jesus, he is a mirror into our own hearts too.

Disclaimer: Today we are covering some mature content. If you want to protect innocent ears, here’s your warning.

As I said last week, chapters 9-20 focus on David’s royal court, what happens in his inner circle, and the chaotic family dynamics that will so trouble David – dynamics that grow chaotic following this chapter.

But it all starts peacefully enough after the chill and the mud of the rainy season gives way to the hot and dryer spring. With spring dawned new hopes of growing crops and a growing kingdom.

Read vs 1

Kings went to war in late spring because everything was drying out. Their armies wouldn’t get bogged down on muddy roads. It was also before the season of harvest, when most of their men had to tend to their crops. (There were no such thing as professional soldiers at this point in history: The Romans were the first to truly institutionalize that.)

David had been fighting against the Ammonites since he was a young man. He defeated and subdued them in the south. In 2 Samuel 10, David scored a major victory against the Ammonites across the Jordan River – to the north and east. Though he was victorious in battle, he had yet to fully subdue the Transjordan Ammonites.

Chapter 11 begins with David sending Israel’s army, under the command of Joab, to strike the Ammonite heart, to attack its capital of Rabbah.

But, verse 1 ends, David remained at Jerusalem. David has lost sight of his royal duty; what the people wanted from their king.

There shall be a king over us, that we also may be like all the nations, and that our king may…go out before us and fight our battles. -1 Samuel 8:19-20

David is not the warrior he once was. He’s growing soft. He’s getting comfortable with his new power and the ease it brings. You see, this is not the first time he has stayed home from battle. When the Ammonites were defeated in chapter 10, it was Joab who was on the battlefield. David only showed up at the very end when victory and glory were inevitable.

It’s embedded within human history. The corrupt and powerful transfer their risk to those already vulnerable. The wealthy live in security unconcerned with the calamities of the poor. The lowly endure hell’s torments so the lofty can enjoy heaven’s pleasures.

Though it looked like David might be a king of a different sort, sadly he was not. For while the soldiers endured the hell of war, David feasted on palace pleasures.

Read vs 2

A Crumbling City

An afternoon nap, though not uncommon in Israel’s late spring heat, contrasts David’s leisure with that of his soldiers. It also gives us something we can connect with, because we all know that groggy feeling after a nap. David’s probably up on the roof trying to shake it off. And we all know from experience, it’s when you’re tired and your mind is sluggish that you are most vulnerable to temptation, that self-control is at its weakest.

A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls.

-Proverbs 25:28

A city is about to crumble. For from his palace roof, there David sees a woman bathing. The only thing we learn about this woman’s characteristics in the entire narrative is that she was very beautiful.

Though it says she was bathing, this does not necessarily mean that she was naked. She may have been using a basin and washing somewhat discreetly. This wasn’t a normal bath like we might conceive it to be.

As we see in verse 4, she had been purifying herself from her uncleanness. According to Mosaic Law, a woman was unclean during menstruation. As Leviticus 15 instructs, a woman would count seven days from the beginning of her cycle and on the eighth day she would undergo a ceremonial cleansing: First she would wash herself and then she would go to the priest and make sacrifices. It’s this first part, the washing, that David likely watched.

She may not have been naked, but her beauty was obvious to David. David got suddenly hungry. He didn’t look to his three wives somewhere in the palace below. He didn’t look to Yahweh whom he so ardently proclaimed was his satisfaction. No. On this lazy afternoon, he continued to look across rooftops.

Read vs 3

David calls a servant and essentially asks, “What is her name?” It’s a dangerous thing when lust grips your heart and you ask, “What is her name?”

A sequence of events are underway not unique to David. Every man in this room knows what’s happening right here. It might not lead to another woman in your bed, as it does for David, but it might lead to a woman on your screen.

I’ve said this before from the pulpit; I’ll say it again: If a man tells me that he has never struggled with porn, I don’t believe him. I know there are exceptions, but the nature of an exception is that they are exceedingly rare. I also know that a staggering number of women are likewise afflicted with this temptation.

I’m sure there are many in this room who feel very uncomfortable right now. You know. You know that even though we are in the church, we are not safe from this temptation. David was not safe even in Israel’s palace.

When David was told who the woman was, Bathsheba, he was also told to whom she belonged. She was Eliam’s daughter, Uriah’s wife. Far from an object, she was a daughter, she was a wife.

And even more, we see in 2 Samuel 23 that both Eliam and Uriah are listed among David’s mighty men. Out of all Israel, these two mighty men were counted among 37 of Israel’s greatest warriors. They had been fighting alongside David long before he was king; back when David was in exile among the Philistines, if not even further back. These were some of David’s most loyal, most trusted men – which explains why they lived so close to their king.

Right here, in verse 3, is the only time in the chapter Bathsheba’s name is used. Everywhere else she is referred to as “the woman” or “the wife of Uriah.” For once given a foothold, temptation blinds. David is blind to the personhood of Bathsheba. He is blind to the deep loyalty of his friends. He is blind to the God who watches. All he can see is “the woman.”

Perhaps you too know what it is to be blind.

Read vs 4

David is, has always been, a man of action; glorious when following God, terrible when following a lustful heart. Look at the action words describing David: looked, inquired, sent for her (could also be translated reached), took, lay. There is no hint of caring in David’s actions, there is no conversation, there is only taking.

David has become the king Samuel had warned about (1 Samuel 8:10-18), the kind of king that uses his power to take for himself. David took the woman and slept with her. And then, without a any indication of how Bathsheba feels about all this, she returns to her home.

David probably thought that everything would return to normal. But the darkness David thought was hidden, God would bring into the light. For God always brings his children into the light.

Read vs 5

There’s an irony in these first few words. The woman can’t be an object; she conceived. “The woman” is not just a daughter and a wife, now she is a mother.

The words probably fell on David like a great millstone. His hopes of hidden sin were shattered. A few moments of pleasure have now mutated into the terror of being exposed, of being found out, of losing everything.

Perhaps you know the feeling.

But always the man of action, David began to conspire, and he shamelessly plunged himself deeper into the darkness.

Read vs 6-8

Deceptions

Ever the loyal servant and friend, Uriah leaves his battle obligations to answer David’s summons.

There’s something in the Hebrew that the English does not reveal. When David asks Uriah how everything in Rabbah was going, he uses the word shalom – the word for peace and/or success. “Is there shalom with Joab? Is there shalom with the people? Is there shalom with the war?”

The sad irony is that there is no shalom in David’s own heart – the opposite: malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, fear. Has your darkness ever plunged you further into the dark?

During this period of history, it appears that the word feet was a common euphemism for male genitalia. When David says, “Go down to your house and wash your feet,” it sounds like typical crass banter between war buddies. David is looking Uriah in the eye, having slept with his wife, and feigns friendship.

Have you ever lied to cover your tracks? Have you ever pretended that everything was fine while cancer was eating your heart? Have you concealed a dread that everything will be exposed?

Scholars debate over two possible motivations David may have for sending Uriah to Bathsheba. The first reason is straight forward: If Uriah spends the night with Bathsheba, then her pregnancy can be attributed to her husband. The adultery could be concealed.

The second possible motivation is far more nefarious.

The Mosaic Law indicates that a man who sleeps with a woman is unclean (Deuteronomy 23:10, Exodus 19:15). This is why, all the way back in 1 Samuel 21, when David asked for provisions from the tabernacle in Nob, one of the conditions was he and his soldiers had kept themselves from women. The implication is that, because they had practiced sexual abstinence, they were ceremonially clean.

In a time of war, if a man became unclean, he had to leave the military camp and spend the designated time by himself until he became clean again. You can imagine, in a time when every soldier was needed, this created a serious problem. Therefore, a tradition arose in Israel’s military: If you willfully made yourself unclean – like by being with a woman – it could be a capital offense.

By encouraging Uriah to be with his wife, some see in David’s motivation a dark intent. For if Uriah made himself unclean with Bathsheba, David would have legal reason to execute Uriah. He could then take Bathsheba, and his unborn child, all for himself.

If this is true, then not only is David abusing his power, he is attempting to manipulate the law of God.

We too can attempt to manipulate God’s law in countless ways. One example: you perform your rituals and receive forgiveness and cheapen grace when true die-to-your-self repentance is never sought. True cleanliness, true forgiveness, can only come through faith in Jesus Christ, faith that produces repentance. More on this later.

Returning to Uriah: Once we understand the high stakes of ceremonial cleanliness, according to Mosaic Law and Israelite law, we can understand Uriah’s determination not to go home.

Read vs 9-11

When David asks Uriah why he didn’t go down to his house, you can hear his concealed frustration. But Uriah’s response is nothing short of noble. The ark and Joab and all the soldiers are in tents on the battlefield. How can he enjoy pleasures while the army is enduring hardship?

Also note that David had only recently gotten the ark. The ark hadn’t been brought into battle for decades, and it hadn’t been brought into battle in any meaningful way since the time of Joshua. Additionally, the presence of the ark with the military only further emphasizes the solemn need for soldiers to be ceremonially clean.

With all this, how could Uriah compromise himself? Notice his loyalty and his virtue as he twice makes an oath on David’s life: As you live, as your soul lives, I will not do this thing.” Uriah’s commitment to David is complete and unwavering. He has no idea what David has done; what David intends to do.

Read vs 12-13

David tries once more to manipulate Uriah into going home. Uriah does make some compromises now, eating a drinking. They party and the wine is flowing. Seemingly, David makes it look like he’s drinking. He’s not. He makes sure Uriah is drinking. David’s hope is that in his stupor, Uriah will stagger back to his wife. Once again, as David pretends to be a friend, he is cold and calculating and ruthlessly controlled.

But drunk Uriah is more virtuous than the sober king. For the fourth time in this passage we are told, like hammer blows to David’s scheme, Uriah did not go down to his house. Again, from behind the scenes, the hand of God quietly guides the events of chapter 11.

Foiled, David’s darkness only gets darker. Now he pulls in his bulldog.

Read vs 14-21

Conspiracy

This is a conspiracy at the highest level; corruption and injustice spreads from the throne. Conversely Uriah is loyal to David and Joab. He has no reason to suspect betrayal. He has no reason to think he is delivering his death sentence.

David wants Joab to put Uriah in the worst fighting, pull everyone else back, and let Uriah be slain. But Joab knows that’s a stupid move. He’ll lose the trust of his troops if he does that. Joab may question the king’s tactics, but he does not question his intentions. Joab is truly David’s bulldog, his loyal hatchet-man.

Instead of David’s plan, Joab instigates a skirmish with the Ammonites. He somehow draws them out of the city, then sends Uriah and others to push the Ammonites back into the city, knowing they will get too close to the walls. Sure enough, Uriah and his company fight their way to Rabbah’s walls and find themselves exposed to the archers; so exposed they could be killed by women dropping millstones.

Uriah and an unnamed, unnumbered company of soldiers perish.

Joab knows that David might not be happy with his tactics, nor that a company of soldiers were killed, but he knows David will be calmed when he hears of who else has died. See how the darkness grows darker? David and Joab have not just killed Uriah, but a collection of Israel’s sons too: Acceptable collateral damage to cover-up the sins of the king. Sin devours, sin always devours.

Read vs 22-25

David listens to the news from the battlefield, but you know he only wants to hear a single detail: of a life destroyed in an incident report.

He hears it. His mighty man has fallen. Uriah is dead. So is the fear. The adultery can remain concealed. His position need not be compromised. He can comfortably go on taking.

Look again at what he says to Joab in verse 25, “Do not let this matter displease you.” The Hebrew literally reads, “Do not let this thing be evil in your eyes.” David was effectively saying, “Don’t feel guilty Joab, we did no evil. People die all the time in war. Uriah lived by the sword and he died by the sword.”

But David knew better. Though Uriah died in battle, he was slain by the dark conspiracy of Israel’s king.

And Yahweh knew better. And you know better.

Read vs 26-27

Once again, she is not Bathsheba, she is the wife of Uriah. Even after David marries her, she will always be known as the wife of Uriah. Even in Christ’s lineage she is the wife of Uriah.

And David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah… -Matthew 1:6

David took what was not his to take, another man’s wife. And in so doing he deceived, conspired, murdered. Though he tried to cover his sin with more darkness, though he claimed what he had done was not evil, all was exposed and naked before the eyes of Yahweh.

The thing that David had done displeased the Lord.

All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the LORD weighs the spirit.

-Proverbs 16:2

David’s fall into sin and disgrace is foreign to none of us, whether it be by lust or some other persistent sin. And we are only held from the deepest darkness of David’s fall by the pure grace of God.

For our king is not David, and there is no darkness that flows to us from the throne of Jesus: only light, only hope, only forgiveness.

Our king is not like David, who uses his power for personal gain. Rather Jesus emptied Himself and took the form of a servant, stepping down from glory and power to enter into the disgrace and weakness of humanity. He resisted entirely all the temptations common to man and lived in perfect righteousness. Our uncleanliness never stained Him.

Then, like a pure, spotless lamb, He died in our place; righteous for the unrighteous, clean for the unclean. Now He summons us all – lustful, deceitful, hypocritical, hateful though we are – and He offers us His cleanliness, His righteousness.

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

-Romans 8:1

You need not fear the exposing light of Jesus Christ! Though it may feel like we are dying, let us bring all of our hidden sins into His glorious light. He will not condemn! He will wash you as white as snow. He will separate you from your sins as far as the east is from the west. And all that will be left, the only thing remaining for you, is the undeserved, overflowing, life-giving love of God lavished upon you.

Brothers and sisters, if you are in Christ, then He loves you!

So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. -John 8:36

It is love that breaks the chains of sin. You are no longer ensnared. So when temptation rises, look not to its temporary gratification, but look to Christ who has released you from such sins by spilling His own blood. Look to see your crucified Lord, risen and reigning, ready to rescue you from temptation’s grip. He is not surprised or ashamed of your sins, He is eager to be your help in time of need.

And if you know someone who has yet to shake the chains of lust or has not yet fully emerged from the darkness, who are you to cast stones? Christ has given you grace and so He calls you to give grace.

Indeed, we should never become comfortable with sin nor allow others to become comfortable with theirs, but is by grace they will be saved; not by doing better, not by pulling themselves up by their bootstraps, and not through a rigid pattern of behavior modification. What they need, what you need, is for the righteous King to touch your heart and fill you with His life transforming grace and peace and love.

Jesus is so much greater than David. He does not conspire against you. He does not want to take from you. He does not feign His friendship. Jesus is not like sinful David, you are.

Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you. -James 4:8-10

Draw near to Him and He will draw near to you. Though in your sin you are a wretch, He delights to save wretches and exalt us as heirs of eternal life.

For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. -Titus 3:3-7