This too shall pass – Advent Psalm of Thanksgiving, Part 4

As we study Psalm 30 this week, we’re discovering it’s parallel structure. We found its first matching pair of lines here, and we found its second pair here. To search for its third coupling, we first look at verses 4-5.  These two verses are loaded with praise to God because, David says, God’s favor that lasts a lifetime.  Yet David is honest about the reality of pain in life.  David says he has felt what appears to him to be God’s anger.  David has wept. 

But notice the difference in longevity between the negative side (God’s anger and David’s weeping) and the positive side (God’s favor and David’s rejoicing).  God’s anger and David’s weeping are temporary, while God’s favor lasts a lifetime, and rejoicing comes in the morning. 

What David is saying is very similar to the phrase, “This too shall pass.”  We all go through difficult moments in our lives.  But for most people, in the vast majority of difficult situations, those hardships are moments, short-lived; they will pass.  Or at least the depths of despair and emotion, will pass.  Even if the circumstance doesn’t become all you want, there will be a new normal. 

I will admit that it can be very difficult to believe “this too shall pass” when I am in the middle of a difficult moment.  It can seem as though there will be no end to the pain, the frustration, the ordeal.  In the middle of the pain, we can rarely see the light at the end of the tunnel.  We rarely see light at all.  We only see how we are struggling, hurting, in pain. 

“You have cancer.” And we think, “My life is over.”

“I’m breaking up with you.”  And we can think, “I’ll never be in a relationship again.”

“You’re being let go.” And we can think, “I’m never going to be able to make ends meet.”

We start to believe we’ll never be able to pay off that ridiculous school debt, mortgage, car loan, or medical bill. 

We wonder if we’ve screwed up as parents, and our kids are too far gone. 

When he says “weeping may stay for the night,” in verse 5, David is using the image of a traveler who stays the night at an inn.  Weeping, depression, sadness, mourning, or anxiety can seem like they are taking up residence in our lives.  It can seem like they are moving in permanently.

But David is right.  The weeping is only an overnight traveler who is on their way in the morning.  This too shall pass. David is not being insensitive here.  He is not dismissing the real hurt of the pain, and neither am I.  Our pain is real.  But it is not permanent.

My guess is that his phrase in verse 5, “God’s anger” is not meant to be literal, as if David’s illness or whatever situation brought him to his deathbed is because God is angry at him and God decided to smite David with a mortal illness. 

From last week we know that David’s terrible sin with Bathsheba, and the resulting murder of her husband, made God angry, as it should.  But the situation David is talking about in this psalm seems different.  It feels to him as though God is angry at him, because David is deathly sick. 

If you’ve ever thought the words or felt the feelings, “God, why are you allowing this happen?” and wondered if God is angry, you know something of what David expresses here.  This doesn’t mean that you have done something wrong and God is angry at you.  But it feels that way.  It feels that way when we are alone.  When we are hurting.  When we are sick.  

Rather, David is facing death’s door not because David sinned, but because in life we will all face death.  Death is our inevitable human reality. 

Facing death has been one of the most difficult realities of being a pastor.  I don’t like to think about death.  But pastoral ministry has forced the reality of death upon me.  Years ago I did 8 funerals in seven months.  I couldn’t get away from death.  It just kept happening, and as the deaths piled up, I really started struggling.  I remember driving thinking, “I could die today in an accident.”  I would watch the NFL on TV and think, “Look at those vibrant athletes. They will all die.”  It was eerie, and I couldn’t shake the dread of it for the longest time.  But this too shall pass. 

You know what helped me?  Reading Ecclesiastes.  Some people believe that Ecclesiastes is the most depressing book of the Bible, and I get why.  It’s most famous phrase is “meaningless, meaningless, it’s all meaningless.”  The writer of Ecclesiastes some believe is David’s son, Solomon, the great Israelite King who had everything you could ever want in the world.  Power, money, position, wisdom, peace, success. 

The writer of Ecclesiastes, called the Teacher, writes as if he was able to indulge in all of that, and after having his fill, he says “it’s all meaningless.”  I’ve since learned that a far better reading of the text is that “it’s all fleeting.”  It’s not meaningless.  It has great meaning.  The experiences of our lives, even the indulgent, selfish experiences, still have meaning.  But they are fleeting.  Meaning, they come, they go, they come, they go.  Like the wind.  So the teacher’s conclusion is actually very positive and joyful, “eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow you die.” 

I was shocked when my Old Testament professor in seminary remarked that Ecclesiastes is the most joyful book of the Bible, with more references to joy than the famous joy book of the Bible, Philippians.  The point the Teacher in Ecclesiastes is trying to make is that, yes, death is inevitable.  We need to stare death in the face and admit that, but that doesn’t mean that we need to stare at death all the time.  Even when surrounded by death, we can also choose to rejoice.  It is right and good to celebrate, to eat, drink and be merry.  We remember God, the Teacher says.  We focus on revering God and following his ways. 

Likewise, back in Psalm 30, David writes in verse 4, “Sing his praises, you faithful people.”  “Faithful” is a description of how people live their lives.  Their practice, their habits, their pattern of life is one of faithfulness to God.  Part of that habit, is regular praise to God.  This is why we sing in church worship services, but there is so much more to praising God.  There is the pattern of a faithful life.  Our lives praise God by how we live.  So when times are very difficult, remember this too shall pass, this is not your permanent state, and choose to practice living God’s way. 

Do verses 4-5 have a match? If they have a match, it should talk about God’s anger and God’s favor.  The struggle and the praise.  Look at verse 7.  What do you see.  God’s favor and God hiding his face.  It’s a match.  God’s favor makes Mount Zion, the mountain of God where Jerusalem is situation on, where the king’s palace is located.  It’s a royal mountain.  When God favors the king, the royal mountain stands firm.  But when God hides his face, the king is dismayed. 

It can seem as though God is hiding his face.  Especially when we are struggling.  This is why we started our Advent series with psalms of lament.  In lament we declare to God that it seems like he is hiding his face right at the moment when we need him.  David is recalling those times.  Those too shall pass.  Because there will follow the times when God favors us, when we feel and know his presence. 

That leaves us with one verse, and we’ll talk about that in the next post.

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Prayer matters – Advent Psalm of Thanksgiving, Part 3

As we learned in the previous post, when King David was in The Depths, his life, emotions and faith felt very dark.  The reality of life in The Depths brings us to the next matching pair in Psalm 30. 

Look at verses 2-3.  David remembers when he called to God for help.  He remembers how God brought him up from the grave and spared him from going to the pit.   That word “grave” is the Hebrew word “sheol”, which is one of the ways the Hebrew people talk about the place people go when they die. 

Next, the word “pit” is the word for “cistern.”  A cistern would be dug into the ground, maybe into rock, and the walls would be plastered.  It was a place where people would store water or grain.  David is using the word figuratively to talk about the place of the dead. 

What is David remembering?  God healed him, perhaps from a time he was deathly ill.  God saved his life.  He was on death’s door, and God brought him back to life.

Like we did for the first matching pair, let’s look for a second matching pair.  If there is a match, it should be a memory about how David called to God and God saved David from death’s door.  And it should appear in the psalm right before the conclusion.

Look at verses 8-10.  What does David mention there?  He remembers how he called to God for mercy. In his calling to God he mentions about going down to the pit.  Both sections, verses 2-3 and verses 8-10, are about crying out to God and mention the pit.  It’s another match!

In this section, verses 8-10, David is not only remembering when he previously called out to God, he is now calling out to God again.  As he calls out to God for mercy, he also, in verse 9 provides what he hopes is compelling logic to convince God to be merciful.  Notice his three questions in verse 9.  They are rhetorical questions, meaning that though David does not need to answer the questions, because all three have obvious answers.  All three questions imagine what would happen if David, who is on his death bed, would actually die.

“What is gained if I am silenced, if I go down to the pit?”  Obvious answer: Nothing.  If he dies, his body function ceases, meaning there will be no ability for David to proclaim God’s glory.

“Will the dust praise you?”  Obvious answer: No.  If his dead flesh and bones turns to dust, there will be no praise to God.

“Will it (the dust) proclaim your faithfulness?”  This is basically a repeat of the previous question.  Obvious answer: No.  Dust cannot talk. 

This is precisely the same method that another Israelite king will use many decades later.  King Hezekiah.  Let me summarize a situation in Hezekiah’s life that is very similar to what David is writing about here in Psalm 30.  In 2 Kings 20 (also repeated in Isaiah 38), Hezekiah is deathly sick.  The prophet Isaiah visits the king with a message from the Lord.  The message is this: “King Hezekiah, get your house in order because you are about to die, you will not recover.”  As Isaiah leaves, Hezekiah prays, reviewing his faithfulness to God.  In response, God gives Isaiah a new message for Hezekiah, “I have heard your prayers and seen your tears, and I will give you 15 more years of life.” 

Then using words that sound very much like David’s words in Psalm 30, Hezekiah writes a psalm of his own, and he says, “For the grave cannot praise you, death cannot sing your praise; those who go down to the pit cannot hope for your faithfulness.”  Hezekiah is not using rhetorical questions, but he is making the same point, “It is living people who praise God, not dead people, so thank you God for saving me, as now I will praise you.”

In this section, and illustrated by Hezekiah’s situation, we see the relationality, the personalness of God, and thus the reality that prayer is a genuine conversation with God.  God told Hezekiah that his life was over, that Hezekiah would not recover.  God was not lying.  God was not testing Hezekiah.  He was telling Hezekiah the truth.  But God also views the future as open to change based on our relationship with him.  Our desires, our hearts, our perspectives matter to him.

This is not a guarantee that if you pray, you will always get what you want.  There are plenty of times when God does not give us whatever we ask.  He’s not a spiritual vending machine.  Most famously of all, perhaps, is when Jesus prayed in the Garden the night before he was crucified, “Father, please let there be another way.”  But there was no other way, and God essentially replied, “No.” Jesus was quite prepared for God to answer “No”, so he concluded his prayer, “But not my will, but yours be done.” 

In the same way, in Psalm 30, David desperately wants God to save his life so that he can serve God and praise God, which is precisely what happens, as we already learned in verses 11-12.

What we have seen in the parallel structure so far are two points about David promising to praise God if God will save him from death.  That brings us to the third coupling, which we’ll study in the next post.

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How to pray when you’re down – Advent Psalm of Thanksgiving, Part 2

The ancient Hebrews often uses parallel structures in their writing, and we see it throughout the Hebrew Bible, which we call the Old Testament.  It seems that Psalm 30 was written with one of those structures.  Here’s the way they work.  The opening matches the closing.  The second main point matches the second to last main point.  The third point matches the third to last main point, and there is an unmatched center point.  In today’s post, and in the next few posts, let’s try to discover the structure in Psalm 30.  It will help to have a Bible open to Psalm 30. 

Look at verse 1. David writes what is essentially a promise to praise God, “I will exalt you”.  Why? Because God has lifted him out of the depths, and God has not let his enemies rejoice over him.

If this psalm was written with an intentional structure, this is the beginning point that should have a match in the closing.  That closing should include a promise to praise and a mention of rejoicing or joy.  Does the closing have that?

Look at verse 11 and 12, the closing verses.  David writes in verse 12 “Lord my God, I will praise you forever.”  That is clearly a promise to praise God.  And in verse 11 he mentions joy. 

It’s a match!  Verse 1 matched with Verses 11-12 are the first main point of Psalm 30.  David promises to praise God, because David was in the depths of despair and had enemies, and God intervened.  It was not the enemies who rejoiced, it was David himself, because God rescued him.  Our God loves to rescue us. 

In the past few weeks of Advent, we have learned psalms of lament and confession.  The reality is that we are people who experienced what David calls The Depths.  This is basically a synonym for what we call The Dumps. Or The Grumps.  Or The Blues.

When we are in The Depths, we are wailing, we are putting on sackcloth.  Think of a burlap bag.  Very rough cloth that is used as a sack for carrying things.  Burlap is itchy, scratchy, and uncomfortable.  It is not stylish, it is unattractive.  In David’s culture people would wear sackcloth, burlap, when they were in The Depths. Their outward clothing told everyone around them that the person was in The Depths, what they were feeling inwardly.  Darkness, depression, despair, mourning.  They were down. 

But David makes a promise to God that a new day has dawned.  A day for thanking God, praising God, because God brought him up out of The Depths.  The image this word evokes is that of drawing water out of a well.  David is way down in the depths, but God has drawn him up.  He mentions a specific situation that had him in the depths.  His enemies gloating over him. 

When your enemies gloat, it makes you feel so small.  Even if it is something unimportant.  Like their NFL team beat your team.  Or when someone says, “I told you so.”  Their gloating hits you deep inside, and you wonder about your worth, your value.  You can take it hard.  But David says he is praising God because God has lifted him up from the Depths.

When we connect that with the matching point in verses 11-12, now David is dancing!  I recently heard a story about someone’s aging parents. Their mother is her late 80s, and her dad just turned 90, and they go dancing.  She said that it is 1950s kind of dancing, and the love it, it keeps them in shape.  There is something special about dancing.  We let ourselves be free, experiencing joy, and hope.  David said that when God pulled him out of the depths, it made him feel like dancing. 

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Can you feel others’ pain? – Advent Psalm of Thanksgiving

The Netflix show Black Mirror is about the future.  Each episode is a standalone, with no connection to the rest of the episodes, so they’re like mini-movies.  The theme of Black Mirror is to imagine what the future will be like if medicine, artificial intelligence, social media and electronics continue to advance.  In particular, Black Mirror tries to answer the question, “What could go wrong?”  In that sense, Black Mirror is prophetic. 

For example, one episode imagines a device that allows doctors to feel what their patients are feeling.  If you’ve ever been to the doctor, and you complain about pain you’re feeling in your body, they will ask you to describe it.  Usually they will ask you to rank it on a scale of 1 to 10.  If you’ve had kidney stones or shingles, you might say, “12!!!” 

But a doctor doesn’t really know what that means.  One person’s “12” might be another person’s “6.”  We experience pain differently.  Some people have a high tolerance for pain, others have a low tolerance.  It would be a great help if doctor’s could actually feel their patients’ pain level.

While there is no such device like that (yet), I encourage you to try to think about others’ pain.  More than likely, not only have you experienced pain, but you have walked with others as they experienced pain.  I’ve mentioned the shingles and the kidney stones.  My guess is that you know people who have battled cancer, undergone surgery, or struggled with sickness.  Think about what we all went through in 2020 and 2021 during Covid.  For some of you, Covid was particularly difficult. 

There are many other ways we experience pain. Some of you have lost loved ones.  Some of you have lost jobs.  Some of you have lost close relationships.  Some of you have struggled with loved ones.  Some of you have struggled in your jobs.  Some of you are in the middle of the pain right now.  My family is waiting for the birth of our granddaughter, who has an underdeveloped heart.  Plans are set for her to be born, and then rush into surgery.  Right now we’re waiting.  Things are okay, but in a month from now, we could be a family in pain.  Waiting is its own kind of pain.

What do we do in the middle of our pain?  This Advent season, we’ve turned to the psalms, looking at a variety of genres of psalms, seeking to prepare ourselves to celebrate the birth of King Jesus, remembering his first coming, while at the same time readying ourselves for his second coming.  To do that, we’ve looked at psalms of lament and confession, and this week, Psalm 30,

1 I will exalt you, Lord, for you lifted me out of the depths and did not let my enemies gloat over me.

2 Lord my God, I called to you for help, and you healed me.

3 You, Lord, brought me up from the realm of the dead; you spared me from going down to the pit.

4 Sing the praises of the Lord, you his faithful people; praise his holy name.

5 For his anger lasts only a moment, but his favor lasts a lifetime; weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.

6 When I felt secure, I said, “I will never be shaken.”

7 Lord, when you favored me, you made my royal mountain stand firm; but when you hid your face, I was dismayed.

8 To you, Lord, I called; to the Lord I cried for mercy:

9 “What is gained if I am silenced, if I go down to the pit? Will the dust praise you? Will it proclaim your faithfulness?

10 Hear, Lord, and be merciful to me; Lord, be my help.”

11 You turned my wailing into dancing;you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy,

12 that my heart may sing your praises and not be silent.Lord my God, I will praise you forever.

Did you notice that there appears to be an intentional structure to the way David wrote this psalm? No? Some scholars see the structure. In the next post, we’ll start to see it. 

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When pain is like a house guest that wears out their welcome – Advent Psalm of Thanksgiving, Preview

The holiday season is in full swing, having started a few weeks ago with Thanksgiving and lasting until after New Year’s Day.  During the holidays, many people will spend time with family.  On Thanksgiving my family had lunch at my parents and dinner at my in-laws.  Thankfully, they live only 5 minutes apart.  Over the next few weeks, we will have two more extended family gatherings, and probably others as well.  My family all live close by, so no one comes to stay overnight.  Some of you, however, either stay over with family or you have family stay with you.

Family visits for the holidays can be interesting, to say the least, especially when they involved overnight stays.  Have you ever had guests wear out their welcome?  Have you ever tried to give them hints that you were ready for them to pack up and go home?  It can be very awkward, right?  You don’t want to offend, but they are clearly not picking up on the subtle clues you’re trying to give them.

In week three of our Advent blog series looking at a variety of genres of psalms, we’re studying Psalm 30, and in that psalm David talks about pain, suffering, emotion and struggle like a visitor that has made its lodging in our lives, and it seems like it will never leave. 

You might think, “Joel, I would never invite pain into my life, so this analogy doesn’t work.” I get that. But the reality is that pain is like some family over the holidays, we might not invite them, but they still show up. Or we feel obligated to invite them, almost as if we have no choice in the matter. Pain is often like that, a regular part of our lives.

But there is hope.  With this psalm we move from lament to confession to thanksgiving for that unwanted visitor of pain that actually does leave.  How?  Why?  Join us on the blog next week as we study this joyful psalm.

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Why humility, teachability and the Korean concept of Han are vital to confession – Advent Psalm of Confession, Part 5

As we learned in the previous post, when we confess our sins, we are trusting in God.  But there’s more. When we confess our sins, here is what we are to do next, as David writes in Psalm 32, verses 8-9,

“I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you. Do not be like the horse or the mule, which have no understanding but must be controlled by bit and bridle or they will not come to you.”

David is saying that we are to be humble and teachable. We are not to be stubborn, cold-hearted, thinking that we are okay, that our sins aren’t that big of a deal. There is more here than just telling God you did something wrong.  There is a teachable humble spirit that leads to repentance. Repentance means that you will change your behavior in order to restore what you have broken.  Notice how Paul describes godly sorrow in 2 Corinthians 7:10-11,

“Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. See what this godly sorrow has produced in you: what earnestness, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, what longing, what concern, what readiness to see justice done.”

That reminds me of a Korean concept called Han, that is very difficult to translate into English (thanks to Andrew S. Park and his work on Han in his book The Wounded Heart of God).  Han is an emotional relational feeling that results when one person sins against another.  So often we think about sin as just affecting us, but Han reminds us that when we sin, we hurt others too.  Naturally our sin erects a wall between us and others.  Our relationship with them will not be as genuine when there are secrets and sin.  There will be distance and shame, and those deep feelings and hurts breed habits of reacting, relating and communicating that harm relationships with others.  I think Han helps us remember that our sins are a big deal to ourselves, to God and others. 

The Puritans called it the “exceeding sinfulness of sin.”  That’s why it is so important that we listen to God and others about ourselves.  That’s why we should tear down our inner walls we have built to keep us from being confronted.  Remember the story of David and Bathsheba? We talked about that in the previous three post. Imagine if David would have kicked the prophet Nathan out, or tried to ignore or even do worse, eliminate him?  We need to nurture teachable hearts if we are to properly confess our sin.

The result of a teachable heart?  Hear verses 10-11, “Many are the woes of the wicked, but the LORD’s unfailing love surrounds the one who trusts in him.  Rejoice in the LORD and be glad, you righteous; sing, all you who are upright in heart!”

Now that we have worked our way through the whole psalm, with the understanding of what might have been going on in David’s heart and mind, read Psalm 32 again: 

1 Blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. 2 Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord does not count against them and in whose spirit is no deceit.

3 When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. 4 For day and night your hand was heavy on me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer.

5 Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.” And you forgave the guilt of my sin.

6 Therefore let all the faithful pray to you while you may be found; surely the rising of the mighty waters will not reach them. 7 You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance. 8 I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you.

9 Do not be like the horse or the mule, which have no understanding but must be controlled by bit and bridle or they will not come to you. 10 Many are the woes of the wicked, but the Lord’s unfailing love surrounds the one who trusts in him.

11 Rejoice in the Lord and be glad, you righteous; sing, all you who are upright in heart!

So let’s be people who confess our sins.  What sins do you need to confess?  Who do you need to confess to?  Confess and embrace the love and forgiveness God offers us.  May God be your hiding place, your comfort.  May you listen to his instruction and counsel which comes to us from his heart of love.  Then rejoice and be glad.

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Your mistakes do not define you – Advent Psalm of Confession, Part 4

Confession is not easy. We can rebel at the thought of admitting even the smallest mistakes. So to help us learn how to confess, David concludes with some instruction in Psalm 32.  Here is what we should do.  First, in verse 6.

“Therefore let all the faithful pray to you while you may be found; surely the rising of the mighty waters will not reach them.

We are called to be faithful in prayer.  In the context of this psalm, David is saying we are to confess our sins to God in prayer.  Yes, God already knows what sins we have committed.  But there is something important about admitting our sin to the point where we speak it to God.  There is something powerful about being totally honest about ourselves, including our failings.  It’s the beginning to possible healing. 

When we confess to God in prayer, notice the result in verse 7,

“You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.”

Confession is act of trusting in God, who is our hiding place.  When we confess, we are being honest about our choices, and we are trusting in God’s love, grace and mercy.  That can feel risky.  But it is an act of honest love.  Of surrender and trust in God.

When we tell people the truth about our sins, when we confess to people, those people might not treat us with love, grace and mercy.  In fact, we can be so used to human reactions of recrimination that we cannot imagine that God will forgive us.  We might feel we are not worthy of forgiveness.  We might think that what we did was so bad that we only deserve pain and brokenness.  Or maybe we just aren’t used to speaking vulnerably and honestly with God, and so we struggle to confess our sins to God. 

God reminds us this Advent season that he loves us so much that he sent Jesus to become one of us, because God wants us to be people who are living restored, forgiving, without hidden sinful parts of our lives. God wants us to live freely in truth, set free to live as he wants us to live. 

God wants us to be able to sing songs of deliverance.  So we confess our sins, trusting in him. 

But there’s more. And we’ll learn about that in the next post.

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What to do when our hearts feel stone cold – Advent Psalm of Confession, Part 3

Israel’s great king, David, has sinned greatly, as we’ve seen in the previous two posts in this series here and here. But with some creatively devious evil thinking, he has covered his sin, and has just one more detail to care for. This is how the story continues in 2 Samuel 11, verses 26-27,

“When Uriah’s wife heard that her husband was dead, she mourned for him. After the time of mourning was over, David had her brought to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son.”

Done. David can breathe a sigh of relief.  His lust, adultery, lies, deceit, drunkenness, and murder is all covered up tidily.  Or is it?  Here’s what the narrator writes in the last phrase of verse 27:

“But the thing David had done displeased the Lord.”

David may have covered it up, but God knew.  God cared.  God cared for David, Bathsheba, and Uriah.  While it seems David’s heart has gone stone cold, that’s not acceptable to God. God is a God who cares deeply about our hearts.  Our actions show what is in our hearts, and God has seen quite a lot of troubling sin from David.  So God will not allow this horrible evil to stayed covered up. 

As we continue into chapter 12, verse 1, we read that God sends Nathan to David.  Nathan is a prophet.  He doesn’t show up very much in the Bible, but he plays a major role in this episode.  Nathan has a story for David, a parable.  Look at verses 1-4,

“There were two men in a certain town, one rich and the other poor. The rich man had a very large number of sheep and cattle, but the poor man had nothing except one little ewe lamb he had bought. He raised it, and it grew up with him and his children. It shared his food, drank from his cup and even slept in his arms. It was like a daughter to him. Now a traveler came to the rich man, but the rich man refrained from taking one of his own sheep or cattle to prepare a meal for the traveler who had come to him. Instead, he took the ewe lamb that belonged to the poor man and prepared it for the one who had come to him.”

What a great story.  So much emotion in its telling of greedy, cold-hearted injustice.  But David thinks Nathan is reporting a true story, and as king, David goes into righteous action mode.  Look at verses 5-6,

“David burned with anger against the man and said to Nathan, “As surely as the LORD lives, the man who did this must die! He must pay for that lamb four times over, because he did such a thing and had no pity.”

David is incensed because the rich man in the story demonstrated a callous heart.  Nathan looks David in the eye and says in verse 7, “You are the man!” 

How long did it take David to realized, “Oh, Nathan’s parable is about me”? We don’t know because Nathan keeps talking, sharing with David a very cutting word from the Lord.  Look at verse 7 again,

“Then Nathan said to David, “You are the man! This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. I gave your master’s house to you, and your master’s wives into your arms. I gave you all Israel and Judah. And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more. Why did you despise the word of the Lord by doing what is evil in his eyes? You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own. You killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. Now, therefore, the sword will never depart from your house, because you despised me and took the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your own.’ “This is what the Lord says: ‘Out of your own household I am going to bring calamity on you. Before your very eyes I will take your wives and give them to one who is close to you, and he will sleep with your wives in broad daylight. You did it in secret, but I will do this thing in broad daylight before all Israel.’”

Whew.  It’s all out there now.  God knows the truth, as he always does, and God has directly told Nathan the truth about David.  The cover-up is revealed. David is the man with numerous wives, power, position, wealth, and success. David is the man who wanted yet another woman, another man’s woman. David took what wasn’t his, committed evil, and thought he got away with it. Now the secret is out in the open. 

In these moments, when there is no more hiding, no more running, no more lying, it is really anyone’s guess what will happen next. The guilt and shame feel massive at this point, and some people choose to end their lives.  Some lash out against the bearer of truth.  Some try to gaslight and blame everyone else for their bad behavior, as if it really wasn’t their fault.

David, though, takes a different approach.  This is where I think the story of David’s sin relates to Psalm 32, which we began studying in this first post this week.  I know that I have been saying that David, the man after God’s own heart, was demonstrating a stone cold heart, and he was.  But I suspect there was another side to this story that we only hear about in what we already read in Psalm 32, the agony of carrying sin.  The fear of getting caught.  The heaviness of sin.  The reality that we have hurt not only ourselves and our reputation, but our sin always, always, always hurts others.

What David says next shows us that his heart had not gone completely dead. It was still tender in there.  Look at verse 32:

“Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” Nathan replied, “The Lord has taken away your sin. You are not going to die. But because by doing this you have shown utter contempt for the Lord, the son born to you will die.”

And that’s what happened.  David mourned and fasted and pleaded with God, but God did not intervene.  The child died. 

Now turn back to Psalm 32.  David has been agonizing about his sin. Finally, he speaks up.  See verse 5:

“Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.” And you forgave the guilt of my sin.”

Our God is a forgiving God.  We can confidently confess our sin to God because he is gracious, merciful and forgiving.  We can confess to him because Jesus has won the victory over sin, death and the devil through his birth, life, death and resurrection.  Our sin is already forgiven!  So when we confess to him, we are receiving anew forgiveness that he has already bestowed on us in Christ.

Photo by Kylo on Unsplash

The perfect cover-up for sin? – Advent Psalm of Confession, Part 2

David is in a terrible spot of his own making. He has slept with one of his soldier’s wives, and now she is pregnant. How will this king who is known as “the man after God’s own heart” react?  In 2 Samuel 11, verses 6-9, David concocts a plan:

“So David sent this word to Joab: “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” And Joab sent him to David. When Uriah came to him, David asked him how Joab was, how the soldiers were and how the war was going. Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” So Uriah left the palace, and a gift from the king was sent after him. But Uriah slept at the entrance to the palace with all his master’s servants and did not go down to his house.”

David thinks he has come up with the perfect cover up.  Bring the woman’s soldier husband home on leave, and of course the soldier will sleep with his wife.  No one will know that the child isn’t the soldier’s.  David will be off scot-free.  Except for one thing.  Look at verse 10:

“David was told, “Uriah did not go home.” So he asked Uriah, “Haven’t you just come from a military campaign? Why didn’t you go home?” Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah are staying in tents, and my commander Joab and my lord’s men are camped in the open country. How could I go to my house to eat and drink and make love to my wife? As surely as you live, I will not do such a thing!” Then David said to him, “Stay here one more day, and tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. At David’s invitation, he ate and drank with him, and David made him drunk. But in the evening Uriah went out to sleep on his mat among his master’s servants; he did not go home.”

David thinks, “Maybe I haven’t made it clear enough for this guy.” So he essentially tells Uriah “It’s okay, go home and be with your wife!”  David even gets Uriah drunk, so that Uriah would be uninhibited by his sense of honor, go home and sleep with his wife.  But nope.  This Uriah is a dedicated soldier. 

In fact, what he says to David in verse 11 must have made David seethe more guilt, shame, anger, embarrassment.  What Uriah says is what David himself should have been thinking, saying, and doing all along. Remaining faithful.  The scene is dripping with irony.  Unfaithful David is unwittingly confronted by faithful Uriah, whose wife David has been unfaithful with.

Nothing is working. David must come up with another plan.  And just then, he has a moment of inspiration.  See verses 14-17,

“In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it with Uriah. In it he wrote, “Put Uriah out in front where the fighting is fiercest. Then withdraw from him so he will be struck down and die.” So while Joab had the city under siege, he put Uriah at a place where he knew the strongest defenders were. When the men of the city came out and fought against Joab, some of the men in David’s army fell; moreover, Uriah the Hittite died.”

This story just keeps getting darker and darker, as David is desperate to cover his sin.  Now he has not only committed adultery which the law says is punishable by death, David uses his power to effectively kill Uriah, which the law also says is punishable by death (Lev 24:17).  But after being told the news that his plan worked and Uriah is dead, take a look at verse 25 to hear David’s response, cold as ice: “Don’t let this upset you; the sword devours one as well as another.” David who is a man after God’s own heart, seems now to have a heart of dead cold stone. 

With the husband out of the picture, David has just one final detail to cover up. In the next post we’ll learn what David does next.

Photo by @felipepelaquim on Unsplash

Hidden sins and indiscretions – Advent Psalm of Confession, Part 1

As I write this in December 2023, we’re just three weeks away from Christmas Day. Do you hide Christmas presents and wait until Christmas Eve night to place the gifts under the tree? When you were a child, did you tried to find the hidden gifts and take a peek?

Thinking about hiding things, take a moment, and I want you to think about the last time, or any time you can remember, that you hid something from someone.  I’m not talking about Christmas gift, though. I’m talking about a time you did something bad, and you didn’t want them to find out, you didn’t want to be caught.  You were trying to avoid consequences. 

The desire to hide our sins is a common human experience. We do something bad, something we regret, something we are ashamed of, and we tried to hide it so we don’t get caught, and especially so we don’t have to face the consequences.  In our Advent blog series, we’re looking at a selection of psalms that help us prepare for the celebration of Christmas. Last week Jeff Byerly blogged about psalms of lament. This week we turn to Psalm 32, a psalm about uncovering the sin we have hidden.

The writer of the psalm, King David, reflects on a time when he was not doing well at all. He starts with a reminder of grace in verses 1-2:

“Blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the one whose sin the LORD does not count against them and in whose spirit is no deceit.”

The problem is that sometimes we do have a spirit of deceit in our lives.  We sin, and we hide it.  When we lie.  When we steal.  When we act like one person at home, another person at church, and yet another person at work or school or with our friends.  When we have an secret sin in our lives.  A bad habit no one knows about.  Maybe we call it a guilty pleasure, trying to appease the feeling of shame.  Maybe in our minds we rationalize and try to legitimize the reason for hiding things. 

As he continues his poem in verses 3-4, David talks about the pain he was suffering from hiding his sin:

“When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy on me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer.”

Do you wish you knew the details that led David to write these deeply emotional words? There is a story from David’s life that he might be talking about.

In 2 Samuel chapter 11, David is at a very, very good spot in life.  It hasn’t been easy for him for a long time.  From the time he left his father’s house to fight the giant Philistine Goliath, David has had all sorts of drama.  Though the prophet Samuel had anointed David as king, David’s father-in-law Saul wanted to kill him, so David was a refugee for something like ten years.  Even after Saul died, it took many years for David to fight more battles and unite the nation.  So much war. But through it all, David sought the Lord, striving to live and lead God’s way. Finally he is king of a unified nation and he brings the Ark of God into the city.  That brings us to 2 Samuel 11, verse 1,

“In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king’s men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem.”

There are still wars to fight, but they are now far from home.  David can finally relax.  You know that feeling of calm and ease and peace when you’ve worked so hard for so long?  Here’s the problem.  If you’re so used to working, you might not know how to do anything else.  There is a vacuum, an emptiness in your life.  Work is gone.  What will you fill that time with?

Look at 2 Samuel 11, verse 2-5,

“One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful, and David sent someone to find out about her. The man said, “She is Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite.” Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he slept with her. (Now she was purifying herself from her monthly uncleanness.) Then she went back home. The woman conceived and sent word to David, saying, “I am pregnant.”

Do you ever do people-watching?  It is really fascinating.  Go to the mall, especially in this busy holiday season, sit in the middle, and just watch.  People are endlessly interesting. 

David is people-watching.  He’s up high, and he gets an eyeful.  He should have turned away.  But no. 

What he does is bad.  Very bad.  Lust leads to using his power to sleep with the wife of his soldier, while his soldier is away fighting for him.  It is deeply, deeply troubling and sinful.  David was called a man after God’s heart, and that is true, but this situation is really shameful.  David has served the Lord, an incredible example for decades.  Now this indiscretion. 

What should David do?  Tell everyone the awful thing he did?  That would be unthinkable because the Mosaic Law in Lev 20:10 and Deut. 22:22 says that the punishment for adultery is death.  So even though it would be the right thing to do, it’s very unlikely that David is going to make a public confession.

What does he do?

We’ll find out in the next post.

Photo by Road Trip with Raj on Unsplash