David and Bathsheba — E.A. Johnston

David's Faithfulness Before the Fall

This evening, we're going to be in the Old Testament, in 2 Samuel chapter 11. You may turn in your Bibles there now. To review the book of 2 Samuel, it begins with a report of Saul's death, and David anointed king of Judah in chapter 2, and in chapter 5, David becomes king over all Israel.

As we study 2 Samuel, we see several instances where David is found inquiring of the Lord. Chapter 2, verse 1. Chapter 5, verses 19 and 23. He demonstrates his love for God through his actions, obedience, worship, and prayer.

God acknowledges David's faithfulness and makes a covenant with him in chapter 7. We continue to notice the words throughout the beginning chapters. So the Lord preserved David wherever he went. David proves to be a sound administrator, a strong leader, a courageous general, a generous ruler.

Had David's life ended in chapter 10, he would only be remembered for the aforementioned. However, chapter 11 is the saddest chapter in the book of 2 Samuel, and the saddest chapter in King David's life, O Sin's Misery.

Chapter 11 is the account of David's adultery with Bathsheba, and we see a man who previously was a man after God's heart, now break the very heart of God. Listen, friends, a second Samuel should be a warning to each of us here tonight, that if a man like David, who walked so closely with the Almighty, who penned such beautiful Psalms, who was so highly honored by God by being a lad taken from the sheep coat and made king, if that man David can fall into gross sin, how easy it is for each of us here to go and do likewise.

A second Samuel is a warning. I recall Vance Havner saying that there was a certain evangelist whom Havner admired greatly, and this man was a great source of encouragement to him, but this evangelist fell into adultery and drunkenness, and it ruined his public ministry.

Vance Havner said, he who was my biggest inspiration became my biggest warning. A second Samuel is a warning to each of us here. Listen, friend, if you're flirting with someone other than your spouse, that harmless flirt can turn into the devil's opportunity to ruin your marriage and your testimony for God.

I remember Adrian Rogers saying he believed a married person should never take a member of the opposite sex out to lunch because the temptations were just too great. It was a good rule to follow. My message this evening is entitled David and Bathsheba, and we will look at David's tragic fall this evening and learn from it.

David's Sin and Its Consequences

For all scripture is an example to us. Chapter 11 in the business world represents financial bankruptcy, and chapter 11 in second Samuel represents spiritual bankruptcy in the life of David. David eventually repents at the parable which Nathan the prophet relates about the two men, one rich and one poor, where the rich man took the poor man's lamb and slaughtered it for dinner.

David's anger is aroused and he cries out to Nathan, as the Lord lives, the man who's done this shall surely die, and Nathan points his bony finger of conviction at him and says, you are the man. David's heart is broken over his sin, but soon his family begins to break and fall apart as a consequence of David's sin.

Bathsheba bears him a son and it dies. Amnon rapes Tamar. Absalom then murders Amnon because he defiled his sister. Absalom defies David and seeks to dethrone him. Absalom dies when his hair becomes entangled in a tree and he hangs.

David's heart's broken over the death of Absalom, his son. We read in chapter 18 regarding David receiving the news of Absalom's death. Then the king was deeply moved and went up to the chamber over the gate and wept, and as he went he said thus, oh my son, Absalom, my son, my son, Absalom, if only I had died in your place, oh Absalom, my son, my son.

I'm telling you, friends, sin has its heartaches. The devil will place sin on a silver platter and tempt you with its delicacies, and he knows how to push every hot button of yours and prey on your weaknesses to get you to indulge that sin.

The devil will wrap it with a pretty bow and make it glitter in its attractiveness to you, but when sin is conceived, we see how ugly it really was all the time, and sin has its sad and bitter consequences.

I knew a happy Christian family with a wonderful testimony for Christ and active service for advancing the kingdom of God. The husband of this family began a secret affair with his secretary, and soon it became public, and it not only ruined his testimony for Christ, it ruined his family, for divorce soon followed, as well as rebellion in one of his children, whose own life became a train wreck.

Oh, friends, how careful we must be on guard, to guard ourselves and guard our families against dividing it through reckless sin. There are three aspects I want us to see in our study of David and Bathsheba.

Number one, David became self-reliant. Number two, David became self-indulgent. Number three, David became self-deceived. If you will turn in your Bibles to the book of 2 Samuel, we will begin in chapter 11 in verse 1.

David Becomes Self-Reliant

And it came to pass, after the year was expired, at the time when kings go forth to battle, that David sent Joab and his servants with him, and all Israel, and they destroyed the children of Ammon and besieged Rabbah, but David tarried still at Jerusalem.

And it came to pass, in an evening tide, that David arose from off his bed, and walked upon the roof of the king's house, and from the roof he saw a woman washing herself, and the woman was very beautiful to look upon.

I want to pause there, friends. Our text says it was a season when kings go forth to battle. This tells us that David should have been leading the strategic battle, but rather we find him resting on his victories, reclining on his bed, and resisting the Spirit of God.

Here is King David with leisure time on his hands. He's not busily occupied for God right now, for he's decided not to fight the battles of the Lord, but to relax and enjoy himself for a season. So he's in a place he should never have been, up on his roof, for he should have been up on his horse, in the heat of the battle, but instead he's in the heat of his lusts, as he tarries there and stares at the naked beauty of the gorgeous Bathsheba, who is another man's wife.

The tenth commandment is, Do not covet thy neighbor's wife. The seventh commandment is, Do not commit adultery. And the sixth commandment is, Do not commit murder. David is a spiritual leader. He is king.

He is well familiar with the law of God, for he's taught it to his people, and a spiritual leader is a number one target for the devil. He loves to take down spiritual leaders if he can, and hurt the cause of God in the world.

So here is David, out on his roof, and he's on slippery ground, for he would have been safer in the heat of the battlefield, fighting the battles of the Lord, but instead he's stepping into a bog of miry sin, which has a deep descent attached to it, for sin always takes you further than you want to go.

And it isn't long that the man whose heart was after God, soon breaks the heart of God by recklessly, breaking three of the ten commandments. Oh friends, the dangers of presumptuous sin, that tramples the blood of Christ.

David's Self-Indulgence and the Progression of Lust

Well, let us continue with our passage in verse three. And David sent and inquired after the woman, and one said, Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite? And David sent messengers, and took her, and she came in unto him, and he lay with her, for she was purified from her uncleanness, and she returned unto her house.

And the woman conceived, and told David, and said, I am with child. Let us pause here, friends. David's lust for Bathsheba, becomes an act carried out, and it has far-reaching implications. David was told she was a married woman, but that did not stop him in his quest for her.

He decided he wanted to have her, and nothing was going to stand in his way. Was he not king, and cannot a king do as he pleases? The first aspect of David's downfall, is that David had become a self-reliant man.

If we go back to chapter 2 in 2 Samuel, we see how God-centered David was. How dependent upon God David was. He would not make a move without asking God first. Look at chapter 2 and verse 1. And it came to pass after this, that David inquired of the Lord saying, Shall I go up into any of the cities of Judah?

And the Lord said unto him, Go up. And David said, Whither shall I go up? And he said, Unto Hebron. Again, when we examine the character of David, we see a remarkable man, who sought God continually. In 2 Samuel chapter 5 in verse 19 we read,.

So David inquired of the Lord saying, Shall I go up against the Philistines? Will you deliver them into my hand? And the Lord said to David, Go up. For I will doubtless deliver the Philistines into your hand.

David just won't make a move without first consulting God, to be sure that God was with him. God honored David because of his reliance upon God. So David went on and became great, and the Lord God of hosts was with him.

David's reliance was totally upon God. But friends, in chapter 11 of 2 Samuel, we see David no longer inquires of the Lord. David is now running the show. David has become a self-reliant man. Oh friends, what danger there is in being a self-reliant person, whether you be a king or peasant.

Self-reliance is certain spiritual failure. Now notice our second aspect of this passage. David becomes a self-indulgent man. He lies on his bed when he should be out fighting battles. He's now middle-aged, over the age of 50, and enjoying the fruits of his labors and victories.

How dangerous middle-age can be for the Christian. How indulgent we can become at this particular season in life. We cater to our comforts, indulge our passions, and sin against God. So David is now accustomed to a life of self-indulgence.

He's become lax in his walk with God, and this is demonstrated in the fact that he chooses to sin rather than obey. This aspect of David's self-indulgent life goes back much further than this episode with Bathsheba.

For we sing in 2 Samuel chapter 5, where it states,. David took him more concubines and wives out of Jerusalem, after he was come from Hebron. This was a violation of God's command, for God had placed specific laws for one who would be king over his people, and one of these laws is found in Deuteronomy 17 verse 17, which states,.

Neither shall he multiply wives to himself, that his heart turn not away. This tells us, dear friends, that the pathway to sin, the road to backsliding, is paved with consecutive breakdowns in our walk with God.

We may get lazy in a daily quiet time with God, and no longer walk closely with Him in a life of surrender, or perhaps we indulge ourselves in little pleasures, and these become habits that allow us to fall into greater sinful indulgences.

This certainly happened with King David. There was a breach in his walk with God way before the incident with Bathsheba. His heart had become hardened through his self-reliance, and he's out of fellowship with God, so it's easy for him to indulge himself through the stages of sin.

A glance becomes a lingering stare. A lingering stare becomes a burning lust. A burning lust becomes an act of presumptuous sin. David knew better than to lie with Bathsheba. He knew it was a grievous sin against God, but his own self-gratification takes precedence over God's commands.

David Becomes Self-Deceived

Sin is going our way when we know it isn't God's way. Lastly, I want us to see the final aspect of David's failure. David became self-deceived. That's what sin does. It casts a thick blanket over our reason.

We deceive ourselves into thinking the sin we are doing is excused or accepted for reasons of our own concoction. All sin is against God. David, when he comes under conviction from the prophet Nathan, sadly laments, I have sinned against the Lord.

David's self-deception plays out in his desire to cover his sin with Bathsheba by having her husband Uriah killed in the field of battle. David's moral decline is staggering. First covet, then adultery, then murder, then he aggravates the sin by trying to cover it.

In Proverbs 28, 13, we read,. He that covereth his sins shall not prosper, but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy. David covered his sin, and he still carried out the duties of being the spiritual leader of Israel as king.

But during that time period of his backsliding, for at least 12 months, he did not spiritually prosper. A spiritual leader has higher standards than most and a greater degree of accountability before God.

David only deceived himself by covering his sin. And the saddest verse in the saddest chapter of David's life found in 2 Samuel is verse 11, 27, which is the very last verse in that chapter. And it reads,.

But the thing that David had done displeased the Lord. I believe that when David composed Psalm 51, what broke his heart the most in regard to his sins was the fact that he had displeased the Lord. Well, what we have seen is how David became self-reliant, how David became self-indulgent, how David became self-deceived.

Psalm 51 and True Repentance

And this should be a great warning to each of us here. I want to end this message by reading Psalm 51 from verses 113 to you, because it demonstrates how David became self-abased and truly repentant of his great transgression against the Almighty.

Oh, dear friends, how careful we must be, how watchful we must be against the enemy of our souls who desires to trip us up at every turn. Hear now the words of a truly broken and repentant heart. And as I read them to us, it is my prayer, that if there is one here within the sound of my voice, who has strayed from God and needs to turn back to God in true repentance, that these words from Psalm 51 will be arrows to your heart and conviction and a balm of grace to bring you back to the shepherd of your soul.

Have mercy upon me, O God. According to Thy loving kindness, according unto the multitude of Thy tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. Wash me throughly from mine iniquity and cleanse me from my sin, for I acknowledge my transgressions and my sin is ever before me.

Against Thee, Thee only, have I sinned and done this evil in Thy sight that Thou mightest be justified when Thou speakest and be clear when Thou judgest. Behold, I was shaped in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me.

Behold, Thou desirest truth in the inward parts and in the hidden part Thou shalt make me to know wisdom. Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean. Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow. Make me to hear joy and gladness that the bones which Thou hast broken may rejoice.

Hide Thy face from my sins and blot out all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation and uphold me with Thy free spirit.

Then will I teach transgressors Thy ways and sinners shall be converted unto Thee. David and Bathsheba, may it be a lesson to each of our hearts.