SERIES: The Life of David
TEXT: 2 Samuel 11
MESSAGE: “David and Bathsheba”

“It was pride that changed angels into devils…” — Augustine

“Two names are unforgettably linked with David: Goliath and Bathsheeba…Both bring him into places of testing. The giant and the woman enter David’s life at contrasting times. In the meeting with Goliath, David is young, unknown, and untested. In the meeting with Bathsheeba, David is mature, well-known, and thoroughly tested and tried. In the first meeting, David emerges triumphant; in the second meeting, he goes down in defeat. The common element in the two meetings is God. For this story too, for all its moral and human pathos, is primarily a story of God’s purposes worked out in David’s life.” — Eugene Peterson

TEXT: 2 Samuel 11

Q: What is the progression of sin that we see in this narrative from David’s life? It’s the…(1. Corruption 2. Coverup 3. Confrontation)

1. The Corruption (v. 1-6)

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. 2 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. 3 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?” 4 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. 5 And the woman conceived, and she sent and told David, “I am pregnant.”

“The verb ‘to send’…occurs eleven times in this chapter, framing the beginning to the end…David, now a sedentary king removed from the field of action and endowed with a dangerous amount of leisure, is seen constantly operating through the agency of others…creat(ing) a whole new order of complications and unanticipated consequences.” — Robert Alter

“Life in many Western nations has become more socially isolating for everyone in the past century. Men, however, are at the most risk of social isolation, especially in countries where people value individualism highly. Although this risk is greatest for older men, nearly two thirds of young American men report that “no one really knows me well.” Nearly half of men in the U.K. say they cannot confide in their friends about problems. Large U.S. Census–representative surveys indicate that the number of people who say they have no close friends at all has grown over the past 30 years, and that increase is higher for men than for women.” — ANGELICA PUZIO FERRARA & DYLAN VERGARA

“…David’s dark road continues. His descent into sin wasn’t immediate, and even here we see how he was given a chance to escape. “This is Eliam’s daughter,” someone tells him. “This is Uriah’s wife.” Why these details? This is the author pointing out to us—even if David didn’t catch it—that Bathsheba wasn’t just an object. She was someone’s wife, someone’s daughter. The anonymous person who answered David was trying to say, ever so subtly, “David, I know what you’re thinking. And someone is going to get hurt.” — J. D. Greear and Heath Thomas

“Our sexuality is a revelation of God’s very nature. But the revelation is destroyed when sex is “solo”—when it isn’t characterized by a responsible and caring relationship between a husband and wife. Sexual bondage is always a solo experience. Another person may be involved, but sexual addiction and bondage are self-focused; they are not about a healthy relationship.”  ― Ted Roberts (Pure Desire)

2. The Coverup (v. 6-15)

6 So David sent word to Joab, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” And Joab sent Uriah to David. 7 When Uriah came to him, David asked how Joab was doing and how the people were doing and how the war was going. 8 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. 9 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. 10 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?” 11 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.” 12 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. 13 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. 14 In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. 15 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.”

“As far as we can tell, once Bathsheba left, David put the incident out of his mind and would have forgotten all about her—if it had not been for one thing, she was going to have his baby.” — Mary Evans

“Uriah’s refusal to have sexual contact with his wife at this time was clearly an expression of his devotion to the Lord: all sanctioned military activity was a form of service to the Lord, and it required the Lord’s blessing for success.” — Robert Bergen

“There is a dark comedy in the way that the story is told. Even being made drunk did not make Uriah set aside his principles. David could take away Uriah’s wife and even take away his life, but he did not have the power to take away his integrity. The contrast with David could not be more marked. Uriah the Hittite was a more faithful Israelite than David, Israel’s king.” — Mary Evans

3. The Confrontation (v. 11:26-27; 12:1a)

When the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she lamented over her husband. 27 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. 1 And the Lord sent Nathan to David.

TAKEAWAYS: How can we apply these lessons today?

• Sin starts with distance
  “Do you mortify; do you make it your daily work; be always at it whilst you live; cease not a day from this work; be killing sin, or it will be killing you.” — John Owen
• God sends warnings
  “And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.” — 1 Corinthians 10:13
• Sin’s consequences are more than personal
  “Joab receives his letter, sends Uriah on what is effectively a suicide mission and dispatches a messenger to inform David of what he has done. David hears the news, sends an encouraging reply, eventually marries Bathsheba and, from his point of view, the book is successfully closed on the incident…Other women lost their husbands, other parents lost their sons. Normally these unnecessary deaths, that had no effect on the course of the campaign other than hastening its end, would have provoked strong anger from David. In this instance there was not even a mild rebuke, only calm compliance and encouragement. David appears to have sold out his principles.” — Mary Evans
• God’s grace overcomes our sin

GOSPEL: “…and Jesse the father of David the king. And David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah.” — Matthew 1:6