2 Samuel 12:7

2 Samuel 12:7

I. It is just in this circumstance, that David's righteous and evil acts are not to be harmonised, that the wholesomeness of his written story lies. We do not feel the inconsistency which unbelievers point to in David, with the sneering question, "Is this the man after God's own heart?" We feel rather that were it not for these inconsistencies David would be unlike us, and his story no pattern of ours.

II. David's method of attaining his treacherous object here seems to us clumsy when compared with some modern refinements of treachery; but the moving cause gratification of self and disregard of all that stood in the way of it this is the sin: the rest is merely an accident of time and locality.

III. How are we to account for David's strange conversion? People who pride themselves on being worldly-wise will tell you that a man's conscience does not trouble him until he is found out. They will tell you that repentance is easy when there is no escape. But this will never account for the real repentance of any man who has been brought from darkness into light. When a man's arguments for sin are swept away, and he sees it as it is, he may well be filled with horror and disgust. The horror is no subject for a careless sneer, but for awe and reverence.

A. Ainger, Sermons Preached in the Temple Church,p. 26.

I. Notice first the general character of David. It is full of variety, full of impulse, full of genius; it covers a great range of characters amongst ourselves; it is not like one class or character only, but like many. He is exactly that mixture of good and evil which is in ourselves, not all good or all evil, but a mixture of both, of a higher good and of a deeper evil, yet still both together.

II. Let us now see how from this union of glory and shame, of holiness and sin, we can draw the fitting lessons of David's repentance and our own. (1) Observe that the Scripture narrative does not exaggerate and does not extenuate. The wise and impartial history sets before us without fear or favour, in all its brightness and in all its darkness, the life of David. His goodness is not denied because of his sin, nor is his sin because of his goodness. (2) The sin of David and his unconsciousness of his own sin, and so also his repentance through the disclosure to him of his own sin, are exactly what are most likely to take place in characters like his, like ours, made up of mixed forms of good and of evil. His good deeds conceal his bad deeds, often even from others, more often still from himself. (3) Notice that Nathan in his parable called attention, not to the sensuality and cruelty of David's crime but simply to its intense and brutal selfishness. Notice also that even deeper than David's sense, when once aroused, of his injustice to man, was his sense of his guilt and shame before God. (4) The story teaches: (a) that no case is too late or too bad to return if only the heart can be truly roused to a sense of its own guilt and God's holiness; (b) that David's former goodness had this advantage: that, great as was his fall, there was for him a hope of restoration which in another there would not have been. A foundation of good in a character is never thrown away. If it is not able to resist the trial altogether, it will at least be best able to recover from it.

A. P. Stanley, Oxford Lent Sermons,1858, No. 2.

I. When Alexander, king of Macedon, had his portrait taken, he sat with his face resting on his fingers, as though he were in a profound reverie, but really that he might hide from the observer's view an unsightly scar. Our Bible always keeps the sitter's fingers off the scars. It paints the full face with flawless detail beauty and blotches, saintliness and scars.

II. After all, is it not a true human instinct and a healthy canon of art that puts the finger on the scars of the face? Is it fair and just to David himself to reduce the account of his numerous victories over adjacent foes to a few verses, and be so prodigal in sketching the one glaring wickedness of a career of splendid purpose, fine daring, and magnificent achievement? All that depends upon the spirit in which the biographer conceives and carries out his design, and mainly upon the purpose which dominates every part of his painting. (1) This story has set in the irrefutable logic of facts the truth that increasing and incredible mischiefs follow the violation of the laws of social purity in monarch as well as subject, in the children of genius and of goodness as well as in the offspring of sensualism and vice. (2) It has proclaimed that woman is not a satanic bait for man's soul, but a minister to his purity and happiness. (3) It has revealed the essential falseness of the polygamous basis of family life. (4) It is a pathetic and powerful enforcement of the law, discovered in the dawn of the world's life, that it is impossible to hush up a solitary lapse. (5) But the principal message of this chapter in the life of Israel's greatest hero is that David's great sin is met and mastered by God's greater grace.

III. It is not well for any of us to escape difficulty, combat, or criticism. We must not forget the perils of advancing years. Age has its dangers not less than youth. The true soldier aims to be faithful unto death. If David falls after half a century's experience of God's mercy, who is safe?

IV. God enlarges a thorough repentance with His free and instant forgiveness, and crowns it with swift peace, soul-enlargement, and hallowed progress. "The Lord hath also put away thy sin."

V. But forgiveness is not all David seeks, nor is it all he obtains. The greater grace of God triumphs over the great sin of David in making it contributive to his spiritual enlargement, the clearing and expansion of his conceptions of sin, of responsibility, of the personality of God, and of holiness.

J. Clifford, Daily Strength for Daily Living,p. 203.

References: 2 Samuel 12:7. T. Coster, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxii., p. 332; Bishop Armstrong, Parochial Sermons,p. 144; J. G. Packer, Twelve Sermons,p. 112; Clergyman's Magazine,vol. i., p. 15; J. Edmunds, Sixty Sermons,p. 293; C. Girdlestone, A Course of Sermons for the Year,p. 165; H. M. Butler, Harrow Sermons,1st series, p. 85. 2 Samuel 12:7. Clergyman's Magazine,vol. viii., p. 348.