Episode Details

Transcript generated by AI. The sermon was not. Please comment if you notice any errors.

If you want to take your Bibles and turn to 2 Samuel chapter 12, the book of Romans chapter 6 verse 23, it tells us that the wages of sin are The wages of sin is death. And as we looked at last week in 2 Samuel 11, David had sinned grievously. So much so that this narrator, who's usually happy to just tell us the story, just tell us what happened without casting judgment on it, just lets us interpret what's going on, and by the way that he shades things or the words that he uses, figure out, okay, are we supposed to see this positively, negatively, or is he just telling us what happened? But here in 2 Samuel chapter 11, David has sinned in such a severe way that the author inserts himself and says, God is upset about this. The thing that David had done displeased the Lord.

He's committed at least—he's broken at least four of the Ten Commandments. I mean, if we start getting nitty-gritty about how we parse it, probably more than that, but at least—Clearly four. He's coveted Uriah's wife. He's committed adultery then with Uriah's wife. He's lied to try and cover it up, and then he murders Uriah. At least four of the Ten Commandments David breaks just in chapter 11. Have you ever been in a spin cycle of sin? It seems like you do one thing and that leads to committing another sin and another sin. This is especially true once you start getting into lying to cover it up. It just compounds and builds on itself and spins over and over. And you feel like sometimes you can't even get off of that roller coaster.

One of the most precious and terrifying truths in the Bible is that if you are a child of God, When you are in that cycle of sin, he will chase you down. He will chase you down. That's the first thing that we see here in 2 Samuel chapter 12, the first six and a half verses, is that God's grace will pursue you in your sin. God's grace will pursue you in your sin. And the Lord sent Nathan to David. He came to him and said to him, There were two men in a certain city, the one rich and the other poor. The rich man had very many flocks and herds, but the poor man had nothing but one little ewe lamb, which he had bought. And he brought it up, and it grew up with him and with his children. It used to eat of his morsel and drink from his cup and lie in his arms. It was like a daughter to him.

Now there came a traveler to the rich man. He was unwilling to take one of his own flock or herds to prepare for the guest who had come to him. But he took the poor man's lamb and prepared it for the man who had come to him. Then David's anger was greatly kindled against the man. And he said to Nathan, As the Lord lives and the man who has done this deserves to die, and he shall restore the lamb fourfold because he did this thing and because he had no pity. And Nathan said to David, You are the man. You are the man.

Verse 1, that word sent is a word we saw several times. I think it's 11 times total in chapter 11 that the word sent is used. It's usually David sending messengers to do this or to do that. David never leaves his home in chapter 11 of 2 Samuel. He's sending messengers back and forth with Bathsheba and with Joab. The action in chapter 11 is driven by sending. The actions all take place, and there's very little notice of God given at all in that chapter until the very end where the narrator tells us that God's not happy about what's been going on. But as we come into chapter 12, God himself decides to do some sending. He sends Nathan. He sends a messenger, a prophet, to David.

I think we should observe the wisdom of how he does this, though. God sends Nathan to pursue David, but Nathan doesn't come with a full frontal assault. He comes with a story, and the story isn't, now once there was a king who had a loyal servant who had a wife who was bathing on a rooftop. That's not the