Sermon - Advent Midweek 2 - King David

 2 Samuel 11:1-5, 22-27; 12:1-7a, 13-14

John 8:1-11

There she was in all her beauty, for David’s lustful eyes to see.  But that beauty brought on the ugliness of David’s sin, and he took Bathsheba, another man’s wife, for himself.  Sin is always ugly.  Sin is always selfish.  It lurks just beneath the surface, but here it was in all its naked glory.

There are so many stories from the life of King David through which we can learn about the Son of David, Christ our king.  But this one… this one about his great sin with Bathsheba, perhaps stands most starkly as a contrast to the promised king who is to come.  It perhaps shows most clearly the real blessing of Christ’s kingly mercy, forgiveness, and faithfulness.  It reminds us that even a great man like King David is a terrible sinner, and as are we, we need an even better king to deal with our sin.  And that’s Jesus.

This story shows us how sin tends to lead to more sin.  There was first the lust, then the adultery, then the attempt at a coverup that failed (we skipped over that part).  Then, there was the conspiracy to commit murder, and make it look like an accident.  Uriah was put at the front lines of battle and, like David planned, he was killed.  And now David even gets to look like the good guy – taking in the poor grieving widow as his own, what a guy!  Long live the king!  But God cannot be mocked.  The truth must come out eventually.

So God sent Nathan the prophet to tell David about a certain case that needed to be judged.  The king, you see, was the final judge of difficult cases.  The final arbiter or right and wrong in the land, and the one to mete out just punishments for the wrongdoers.

Only it wasn’t a real case, it was a parable for David’s own sin.  And when David issued the right and just verdict, “This man must die!” he rightly condemned himself with his own words.  He only needed Nathan to connect the dots.  “You are the man”.

Friends, you are the man.  You are the men and the women who also stand rightly under the king’s just decree of death.  You have sinned before God and one another.  You and I, too, are no better or worse than King David on that account.  We have hit ourselves with the ugly stick of sin, again and again.  We sin, then try to cover it up, then excuse it, then make it look like a good deed after all.  We lust and lie and cheat and steal and murder, all in turn.  From the greatest of us to the least of us, there is no escaping this fact.  As the Lord lives, the man who has done this deserves to die.

We issue the right and true verdict upon ourselves when we confess our sins.  We deserve God’s temporal and eternal punishment.  That means we deserve death, right now… and forever.  Let’s not let those words pass our lips without thought, week in and week out. 

The Son of David is not like his father David.  He is, rather, like his Father in heaven.  He sees the bride, the woman whom he would love, and though she is ugly as sin, he loves her.  He goes to her and seeks her to be his holy bride.  With his own blood he bought her, and for her life he died. 

Jesus does well where David fails.  Jesus had no ugly sin of his own, but he took ours from us.  And he took the ugly sticks of the cross and used death itself to bring life, used condemnation to bring forgiveness, used the unjust verdict of guilty to justify us as righteous and holy forever.  He turns it all around.

Nathan confronted David with his sin.  And here we see perhaps the best example of David, and why he’s a man after God’s own heart.  We see how he is different than Saul and all the wicked kings.  David confesses his sin.  David repents.  Nathan accuses, “You are the man!”  and David confesses, “I have sinned.”

What a dramatic moment!  David could have balked.  He could have blamed.  He could have denied it all and thrown impudent Nathan into prison or worse.  He could have explained away his sin or given some lame excuse, but he did none of that.  He simply confessed it.  Humbly.  Honestly. Directly.  I have sinned.  There is much to learn from this, dear Christians.

And Nathan, for his part, played the faithful pastor.  He neither condemned David, but absolved him.  You will not die.  A word of forgiveness and comfort.  The first words out of his own mouth.  However there was still a consequence.  The child of this adulterous union, the son of David, would die.  And seven days after being born, that’s just what happened.  Surely Nathan was pointing to this – but also to much more.  Surely this also points us to Jesus.

Jesus, the Son of David, dies so that we do not face death.  He, innocent as he was, even more innocent than the child of Bathsheba (who was conceived in sin).  The innocent dies for the guilty. 

And out of his great mercy, he provides that you will not die.

In our other reading tonight, we see Jesus confronted with a woman caught in adultery.  She, too, was dead-to-rights and almost dead herself as the crowd began arming itself for an execution by stoning. 

The crowd was ugly with self-righteous indignation.  What blood lust clamors for the condemnation of others?  The kind that is blind to, or wants to obscure its own sin.  Put that spotlight on that adulterer over there, and not on the one right here, winding up to toss the rocks. 

Jesus knows better.  He doesn’t deny the ugliness of the woman’s sin.  He doesn’t condone it.  Rather, he has mercy on her.  He calls off the dogs that are slobbering for her punishment by turning the spotlight of law back on them.  He goes all Nathan on them.  You are the man!  Look at yourselves! Whoever is without sin among you cast the first stone.  And all the stones drop from all the sinful hands, at the word of the only one without sin.

Who condemns you now?  No one, sir.  Then neither do I condemn you.  King Jesus comes not to be the judging king that dolls out punishment.  He comes, rather, to be the one to bear that punishment himself.  He comes to doll out the mercy, freely, far and wide, the water of life without cost, and bread from heaven without payment.  He gives a burden that is light and a yoke that is easy.  He gives, he gives, he gives his own self.  He gives his back to the scourge, his face to those who pull out his beard.  He bows his head to receive a crown of thorns.

Not that you are free to go on sinning, oh, no.  For as he said to the woman, “now go and sin no more!”  So he calls us to live for him and our neighbor, not for self.  He doesn’t ignore or wink at sin, and sweep it under the rug.  He takes it so seriously he dies for it.  And he forgives it.  His kingly decree declares it is finished.

This advent, as always, we eagerly await the coming of Christ our king.  We transport ourselves back to walk with the saints of old as they anticipated his first coming.  And we turn our eyes to the blue skies in eager anticipation of his second coming.  We know that David’s son and David’s Lord is not a man after God’s own heart, but the God-man that shows us God the Father’s great love.  He calls us from the ugliness of our sins to the beauty of his grace, and a blessed union, a fellowship divine.