I have a message from
the Baby Monster series that really shows clearly
how baby monsters were responsible for taking
down one of the most powerful, prolific, anointed,
gifted, charismatic leaders the world has ever seen. His name is David. And this is his story. It comes to us courtesy
of 2 Samuel 11. We're going to read a
passage of scripture that condenses an entire year
down to just 30 verses or so. And as we go through
it, you're going to feel like, maybe, this
is a lot of scripture. But it's really
important because it allows us to get
up in an airplane and look at this episode
from his life from, sort of, 30,000 feet and gives
us the perspective over this year-period to
watch the baby monsters grow into the full-blown monsters
because he failed to take them out when they were small. So here's 2 Samuel chapter
11, starting in verse 1. The verses are going
up right about there. "It happened in the
spring of the year, at the time when kings go out
to battle, that David sent Joab and his servants with
him, and all Israel; and they destroyed the people
of Ammon and besieged Rabbah." But notice, David
stayed at Jerusalem. "Then it happened one evening
that David arose from his bed and walked on the roof
of the king's house. And from the roof he
saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very
beautiful to behold. So David sent and
inquired about the woman. And someone said, 'is this
not Bathsheba'"-- notice-- "'the daughter of Eliam, the
wife of Uriah the Hittite?' Then David sent messengers, and
took her; and she came to him, and he lay with her, for she
was cleansed from her impurity." That means she had just finished
her period before this day. "And she returned to her house. And the woman conceived; so she
sent and told David, and said, 'I am with child.' In the morning it happened that
David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by
the hand of Uriah. And he wrote in
the letter, saying, 'Set Uriah in the forefront of
the hottest battle'"-- wherever it's the most dangerous-- "'and,'" then,
"'retreat from him, that he may be
struck down and die.' So it was, while Joab
besieged the city, that he assigned
Uriah to a place where he knew there
were valiant men. Then the men of the city came
out and fought with Joab, and some of the
servants of David fell; and Uriah the
Hittite died also. When the wife of Uriah
heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she mourned
for her husband. And when her 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. Then the Lord sent Nathan
to David, and he came to him and said to him; 'there
were two men in one city. One was rich and one was poor. The rich man had exceedingly
many flocks and herds. But the poor man had nothing,
except one little ewe lamb'"-- a baby lamb-- "'which he had
bought and nourished; and it grew up together with
him and with his children. It ate of his own food
and drank from his own cup'"-- that's just adorable,
a little sheep drinking from a cup-- [LAUGHTER] "'And lay in his bosom'"-- stop it. This thing's cuddly, too? [LAUGHTER] "'It was like a daughter to him. And a traveler came
to the rich man, who refused to take from his
own flock and from his own herd to prepare one for the wayfaring
man who had come to him; but he took the poor man's lamb,
and he prepared it for the man who had come to him.'" Hoo-- "David's anger was
aroused greatly against the man, and he said to Nathan,
'as the Lord lives, the man who has done
this shall surely die! And he shall restore
fourfold for the lamb, because he did this thing
and because he had no pity.' Then Nathan said to
David, 'you are the man!'" And Father we pray that as
we just consider for a moment these words, these scary
words, these strong words, these words that are meant
to be for us, a warning. Thank you so much that when
you present the stories of men and women in scripture,
you don't gloss over their failures. You present them for us because
the point of the scriptures is not that we would
think a lot of the heroes, but that we would see
that you are the God who uses weak people and who
sent your son to save us, who are all vulnerable,
who are all able to fall, who are all weak at
the end of the day. So we thank you that
you are a great God who is merciful and
full of compassion and that you died for us
to save us from ourselves. And so we pray that in these
moments you would stir in us, God, fear where there needs
to be fear, hope, God, where there can be hope. And we pray, above all
things, that if anyone has come in today listening to
this message who doesn't know you as Savior that
you would draw them to yourself, to salvation,
so that they wouldn't be without God and without
hope in this world. And we pray this in Jesus' name. amen. One of my favorite things
to do is to read to my kids. And it's a fun tradition. We've worked through a
lot of different books, and they have their favorites. And some of them they know
by heart, and some of them I know by heart. And you can tell the ones
that you know by heart. The other day my
wife caught me-- I had fallen asleep while
reading a book to my kids but was still reading. Like, I was out, my
eyes were closed, but my lips were still, somehow,
saying the words to this book. But one of my favorites
in recent history is this book There's No
Such thing as a Dragon. I don't know if you've read
this book, but it's great. It's about a kid
named Billy Bixbee. The author is Jack Kent. And in the book,
Billy wakes up one day and there's a little dragon
sitting on his bed, just a little, tiny, little thing. It's, like, the size
of a kitten, just an itty bitty little dragon. He's surprised, so
he comes downstairs. The dragon follows him. And he tells his mom
there's a dragon in my room. And his mom, of
course, tells Billy, before she sees
the dragon, there's no such thing as dragons. And Billy's like, well, that's
strange because there's one right there. And the mom-- now she
sees the dragon, too, but she can't go
back on her word. She had said there's no
dragons, so she pretends like she can't see the dragon. And as she does, the
dragon begins to grow. Soon it's eating
Billy's pancakes. Billy is frustrated
because he's hungry, breakfast being the most
important meal of the day, and all. But she makes more pancakes. And she continues
to try and persuade her son there's no
such things as dragons while the dragon continues
to get bigger and bigger and bigger and more of a problem
and making more of a mess. And soon it is so big, it
is filling up the hallway, filling up the living room. Its scaly wings are
sticking out of windows. This thing is enormous. It's grown to
catastrophic proportions. And Billy is frustrated. He's trying to tell his
mom there's a dragon. She doesn't believe there
is one, so he's like, well, maybe there isn't one. Well, now,
eventually, the dragon picks up the entire house. It's wearing the house
like a little backpack, and, eventually,
just kind of starts cruising down the street. He's just knocking
stuff over because he saw an ice cream
truck go by, so he's trying to get the ice
cream and-- you know, it's based on a true story. [LAUGHTER] Billy's dad shows up
from work, and he's surprised to find no home
where his house normally is. His neighbors were
good enough to point to the dragon going
down the street wearing the house like a backpack. And so he starts
chasing it down. He sees Billy and his mom up
in the window, and he's like, what's going on? And then Billy's
like, it's the dragon. His mom's like, there's no
such thing as dragons, son. His dad says, that's true,
there is, technically, no such things as dragons. And Billy gets so
frustrated with his parents that he finally shouts out
at the top of his lungs, there is such a
thing as a dragon. There's one right
there, and it's huge. And at that exact moment, the
dragon, now that it's noticed and they're all
acknowledging it's there, it begins to shrink back
down to its normal size. And of course, the
moral of this story, and the moral of the
story that we just read, is that when you deny
something that's clearly there is actually
there, all it does is get bigger and
create more problems. Here in David's life, we're
reading a chapter of his story that, quite frankly, I
would be fine with not being in the Bible. I don't know about you. This is not how I want
to remember David. Now, anybody ever feel like
David and Goliath is, like, one of those great inspiring
stories we often come to? Anybody ever been
encouraged reading from the book of Psalms? Anybody love that David, when
he had a terrible boss trying to throw spears at
him, David would just duck and keep serving
the cruel king? And just, like, it
encourages us, you know. We've all had that
boss and it's like, I'm going to be like David,
I'm going to be like David, I'm going to be like David. And there's so much from David's
life that's encouraging-- David the shepherd, David the
King, David the poet, David the man after God's own heart. What is this? Here, in one fell swoop, he
breaks half the 10 commandments on one day. It's like, what? He's coveting, committing
adultery, committing murder, covering it up. It's like, this is not
the David that I fell in love with in Sunday school. But what we need
to pay attention to is the fact that these
sins that eventually reached Costco-sized
proportions started out small. They started out benign. They started out
innocent enough. They started out as kitten-sized
dragons, as baby monsters, if there ever were one. What do you mean? I mean, David's seeds that
led to these enormous deeds actually began with
him being lethargic. Would you jot that word down? I see the beginning of
this terrible chapter in David's life when he was
just chilling when he should have been getting after it. In the first verse
that we read, it said this was the time of
the year when kings go out to battle. And then it says, but
David stayed home. The kings go out to battle, but
David sent Joab, his general, and said, you take
care of this one. If the kings are
going out to battle, the scripture's telling
us that not for no reason. It's the time of the year
when kings go out to battle. David's the king. David doesn't go out to battle. What is the Bible
trying to tell us? David is not where
he's supposed to be. The point is he never
would have been home to see Bathsheba
if he would have been out on the battlefield
like he should have been. He was sitting around exposing
himself to more temptation than he needed to. He couldn't have been doing what
he shouldn't have been doing if he simply would
have been doing what he should've been doing. And you're like,
thank you Dr. Seuss, but I'm sure David
had a good reason. No, you're right. You're thinking David's
the king, after all. He probably had things
to take care of. He probably needed to
send Joab to be his proxy on the battlefield because
he had urgent kingly business to take care of. Levi, you don't know him. You can't be judging
him like you know him. You're right. Good point. That's true. David did have urgent
things to take care of. In fact, if we read this
from another translation, it actually shows us
what was so busy that would keep David
from the battlefield like he should have
been as a king. Are you ready for it? Verse 2-- it says, "One
late afternoon, David got up from taking a nap." Oh, yeah, he was very busy. [LAUGHTER] With a late afternoon nap. [LAUGHTER] And so it was, after his nap
was over, he's like, [YAWNING] what's on my calendar today? Oh, I think I'll
stroll on the roof. Strolling! [LAUGHTER] This is not a man
with a full calendar. This is a man who you can almost
hear the rustling of his robe in the breeze as he
strolls about the palace. Do I feel like taking
a shower today? Nah, I really don't feel
like taking a shower. It's too busy for a shower. Right? I've got to stroll on
the roof of my palace. He never would have been
there to see Bathsheba if he'd have been out fighting
like he should have been. Now, don't hear this as
the anti-vacation sermon because that's not what
this is, because it said, clearly in the text, "in
the spring of the year when it was battle time." What does that mean? There have been a whole winter
when it wasn't battle time. He had just finished
a whole season that was, by definition,
a time of recuperation, of recalibration, of where they
couldn't fight because back in those days the
wheels of the chariots couldn't work in the winter
because then it would be muddy. And so that was when, after the
final rainy season was over, they could, eventually,
resume the battles. That was when you could
get back down doing what you're supposed to be doing. But David didn't do it. You ask me why-- here's why. Because David's now 50, and he
had been a king for 20 years. And before that there
were 10 years when he acted like king because
God called him as king, but he wasn't
recognized as king yet. And oftentimes,
that's how it works. Our God seems to like
to give people callings and, then, all but
do everything short of keeping them from doing it
to see if they trust him more or they love his plan. You see what I'm saying? A lot of times, God tucks
dreams in our hearts for what's going to be but, then, puts
us in times of adversity to see if we're out
for blessings or out for the blesser, if we trust
him to see if we're really capable of handling
the kind of blessing that he wants to give us. And so David's anointed
as king, and then life gets more complex
and more difficult. And that happens again and again
and again throughout scripture. And as I look back on our
ministry time here at Fresh Life, and, really,
my whole life, there's never been
a time when there was a great time of
blessing without it being, simultaneously,
a time of challenge, a time of difficulty, a time
of us needing to stay humble. Otherwise, we would
get full of ourselves. Otherwise, we would get
too big for our britches and our heads would grow. God, oftentimes, allows those
thorn-in-the-flesh-type seasons to keep us dependent on him. But we have to always
have the perspective to keep going out to battle and
keep embracing difficult things because comfort zones
don't keep your life safe. They keep your life small. And so David should have
been going out to battle and sleeping on
that cot in a tent and with the other soldiers. But he thought, you guys go. I'm staying here in the palace. I got some napping to do. I got some strolling to do. Let me tell you,
Church, the moment you shift into a
cruise control, you're doing something that's
toxic for your soul. Someone told me once-- I was talking to an
older guy in our church, and I said, what team
are you serving on? You can come before and you
can start serving to me-- serving in the
church in some way. And he said to me, no, I
used to go to a church, and I was there
for a lot of years. I helped out in a big way. I'm not trying to
toot my own horn, but I helped out in a big way
with some building campaigns. And he said, I've paid my dues. I've paid my dues. I said, man, God must
be really grateful that you've paid all your dues. I literally, I was just shocked
and flabbergasted to hear him speak in such a way. But that's David here. David feels like,
I've paid my dues. I've served for 20 years. I was the lead usher. No one ushed like I ushed. [LAUGHTER] I've paid my dues. Thank you, Jesus, for
hanging on the cross to buy me from the
auction block of sin and purchase me from hell. But now, I've paid my dues
because I put in 20 hard-- what are we talking about here? 'I've paid my dues.' David's there where
he shouldn't be, sauntering around the
palace when he should be out on the battlefield. Heaven help us,
Fresh Life Church, to keep going out to
battle like kings. Help us to keep
advancing, to keep beginning the year with a
spirit of fasting and dependence on God. Come on. Let's continue to advance. Let's never be content
with what God's done. Let's never shift
into cruise control. Let's keep fighting for those
who don't know Jesus yet. Let's be willing to
be uncomfortable. Let's keep risking the ocean. Let's keep stepping
out in faith. Let's keep giving big and
offering big and trusting God to do more. Let's keep inviting our friends
and never just come to church and get our little
blessing and then go back to our normal life. Let's keep agitating. Let's keep poking
the devil in the eye. Let's keep stretching our faith. And I pray that
that's our heart. Why? Because if you're not
actively moving forward, you'll automatically
start sliding backwards. The Christian life is an
uphill battle through the mud. And so we must always
be stretching, always be going, always be
doing something stupid-- in a good way. That's something that people
will go, ah, that's crazy. Hudson Taylor once
said, "unless there is an element of risk
in our exploits for God, there is no need for faith." And when you're living a life
where you don't need faith, you're not going
to be trusting God, and then you're ripe for
temptation to attack. So David was-- what was he? Lethargic. Then temptation shows
up and he was lenient. He was lenient on the small
sin that first popped up. This little temptation--
what was it? OK. So he's on the roof now. Shouldn't have been there,
but, OK, he's there. Now, he sees this lady. She's bathing. If you go to Jerusalem,
and maybe someday we'll take a tour of
Israel as a church, and you'll notice
that there's hills. And David's palace would've
been on the top of the hill. And because the
terrace hillside, he would've been able to
see onto the roof of where Bathsheba was taking
her bath on the roof. And he sees her,
and then the text says she was
beautiful to behold. Now, there's a difference in the
two Hebrew words that's used. One is to see, like
I noticed that. The other is to stare and to
gaze and to focus on that. Two different words. He saw her, but then found that
she was beautiful to gaze at. Now, check this out. The first thing he
did was see her. That wasn't a sin. And the devil always wants
you to feel like being tempted is a sin. But it's not. Why does he want
you to think that? Because he knows whenever
the first domino falls, the second domino falls easier,
and the third falls easier, and it gains
momentum as it goes. Why? Because, well, the first
time you break your diet, that's really hard. All of your willpower
is there because you have that good record
you don't want to break. But then, once
you've done it once, it's easier to do it again,
and then you're [GNAWING].. That's just me. Anybody else? The fifth donut goes
down so smoothly. [LAUGHTER] But the first one I thought
about for a long time. All right. So here we are-- sorry. All my temptation from fasting. Go away. Go away. Go away. So the devil wants you to think
that to be tempted is wrong, but feeling like you could do
something wrong is not wrong. It's only wrong when
you take that bait. So you need to know that. So every temptation
is an intersection, and you always have a choice. So David saw her,
could've looked away. Dang, gonna put a hedge there. Got to call the landscaper,
get some big trees here. Man. Right? He didn't do that though. He saw her, now he's tempted. And what does he choose to do? He chooses to gaze, chooses
to take a second look, chooses to now fantasize,
chooses to dwell on this. So to see something
on the inter-- to see something, it
pops up, it happens. You don't have to
choose to stare. At the beach, you don't have to
choose to continue, just throw your sunglasses on,
no one knows, out of your peripheral vision. Oh, yeah. No, no. Listen, listen, listen. To be tempted is not a sin. To give into that temptation is. So David was lenient on
that first temptation. Oh, what does it matter? I would never do anything. I'm a married man. I'm married to 10 women. David had 10 wives, just
so we're all clear on this. So we already see about that. And you're going, that's crazy. Well, on that day that would
have been nothing for a king to have 10 wives. But God specifically
commanded the kings of Israel to not multiply to themselves
wives or money or gold-- that's the same as
money, Levi-- or horses, the same way the other
kings did because he knew it would became a
snare to their heart. So David was already violating
that in having wives-- multiple-- OK? So now, what does that
tell you, by the way? That sin never satisfies. You'd think a guy with 10
wives, why would he even care about this unmarried woman? Because sin is always about what
you can't have in the moment. So sin will never ever
reach a point where it says, that's enough. What do you need to do that for? You've had plenty. Sin will always
want more and more. It's like drinking salt water. The more you drink, the
thirstier you become. So you'll never be satisfied
because there's always going to be forbidden fruit. So if you think
while you're single that if you sleep with
that girl you'll be happy; if, once you marry her, she
won't be the forbidden fruit anymore. There will be new
forbidden fruit, and it's the person
you're not married to. And if you get her, there
will be new forbidden fruit. There's always, always,
always, always, always forbidden fruit because
there will always be what you can't have in the moment. So David's lenient on the
small sin of fascinating and peeping and violating
this girl's privacy. And so what happens? It just grows bigger
and bigger and bigger until, eventually, he's
having sex with her. He calls for her-- and,
man, all along the way, do you not see God giving
him opportunities to stop? He says to his
servants, hey, uh, do you know who lives down
there in that brown house with the chimney? They're like, do
you mean the one with the woman
taking a bath on it? And he's like, oh,
yeah, who's that? And they go, oh, it's Bathsheba,
the daughter of Eliam, one of David's soldiers, Eliam. Oh, yeah. That's a good point. All right. Have a good day. Back to my nap. Oh, she's the wife of Uriah. Who's Uriah? One of David's most
loyal, mighty men who had been risking his life
for David since before he was king. Is that not the opportunity,
when she's somebody's daughter, when she's somebody's wife, when
that man, Uriah, her husband, is out there fighting
in the battle that David should be
fighting at this moment? But what does David say? You know, I would love to meet
her, thank her for her service to her country. Do you want me to have her
brought to your office? No, I'll actually have some
stuff to hang in my bedroom. Have her brought to my-- bedroom. And of course, one
thing leads to another. David's lenient on
it when it's small. And so it just grows and grows
and grows and grows and grows. Eugene Peterson, on his
book, Leap Over a Wall, on the life of David,
puts it this way-- how David was able to go from
one to another to another to another-- he says, David
didn't feel like a sinner when he sent for Bathsheba;
he felt like a lover. David didn't feel like a
sinner when he sent for Uriah; he felt like a king. The subtlety of sin is that
it doesn't feel like sin when we're doing it. And that's truth. You should never
expect while you're sinning to feel like it's sin. It always feels
like you're doing something right in the moment. That's the nature of sin,
is that it's deceitful, is that it lies to you
and always focuses you on the pleasure and downplays
any possible punishment. So now David's done
what he's done. He sends her packing-- no eggs, no coffee. She's just out of there. But the word soon comes back-- I'm pregnant. Well, how do you know it's mine? I had just had my period
before I came there. My husband's off at
battle right now. It's yours. So what does David do? Does he come clean? Does he call the prophet? Does he tell God,
turn to him in prayer, own the consequence, the
shoulder, the embarrassment, look his kids in the eyes
and his wives in the eyes and tell them that he's
committed adultery and done this? No, he doesn't. He shifts into the third
phase of this story. That is the phase I'm
calling "damage control". Damage control. All right. How do we control the narrative? How do we hide this? How do we cover this up? There's got to be way. I'm a king. I'm a chess player. How do I cover this up? I know. If Uriah comes home and
has sex with his wife, he'll think the baby's his. So he sends for Uriah to come
home-- we didn't read it-- but Uriah comes home. David thinks he'll go home
and sleep with his wife, think the baby's his. But Uriah's an honorable man. And so when he calls for him,
he says, what do you want, your honor? What can I do for you? Oh, I just wanted you to
have a couple days off. Go on home. Enjoy. You've been a good soldier. But Uriah is wearing his armor
and refuses to take it off. He says, I've got my
brothers out there dying on the battlefield. How can I live like
it's not war conditions? He sleeps on David's front
porch, will not go home and do this. And so David thinks,
all right, this guy's tougher than I thought. I'll get him drunk. So he slips something
into Uriah's drink, gets him drugged, thinking
once he's out of it, he'll for sure go home. But listen to this-- Uriah is more honorable drunk
than David is sober, here. And even though he's all
confused and disoriented, he once again sleeps
on the front porch. And so David says, this
guy has sealed his fate. So he writes a note
to Joab saying, I want you to put him in the
hottest part of the battle and make sure that
Uriah doesn't come home, seals it with his signet
ring, hands it to Uriah. And Uriah's so trustworthy,
he doesn't open the letter and carries it to Joab, even
though it has his own death sentence on the inside. As you read this story,
Uriah comes out sparkling and is just an incredible man
of integrity and character and honor. And so now Uriah is killed. Why? Because David is
creating so much damage as he's trying
to do damage control. And so it always is. And now Uriah is dead,
David marries Bathsheba, and the baby is
born "premature," and David thinks he has got
away with it completely. But what was this
year like for David, this year before this
confrontation with Nathan? What was this year like for him? It was absolute misery. In fact, he, later on, opened
up about what the year of hiding was like in Psalm
32 when he said that this period of
time his inner life dried up like a spiritual
drought within his soul. Psalm 51-- the deed
he had done, he said, it haunts me day and night. So it always is because
sin, which lies to us, always, when it pays,
it pays in death. Proverbs 20 verse 7 says,
"food gained by cheating tastes sweet to a man. But"-- in the end-- "he will end
up with a mouth full of sand." And tragically,
in David's story, as in so many situations, it's
his kids that suffer the most. He will be forgiven
because God is a God of forgiveness and grace. And at the end of the day,
our standing before him is not about our deeds. It's about the deeds
of Jesus Christ. But the consequences that must
be lived out of and dealt with, oftentimes, it shows up worst
in the successive generations. And so it is in David's life. But that's not the end,
the damage-control era, because then David enters
into the most poisonous, the most dangerous
period of his life, and that's where
he becomes pious. Pious. And what does pious mean? Pious means inflated
self-righteousness. It means smug. It means holier-than-thou. It's where you're really, on
the inside, full of deceit, but the veneer you put up
to project to the world is everything's fine. I'm perfect. David was still doing this
year showing up at the temple, doing all the sacrifices,
all the things everybody would accept. So he was going through
the motions of religion, but he had a wall barricaded
between him and God. There was no sweetness. There was no intimacy. There was no friendship. All of that inner life had
dried up through his choosing. He wasn't drawing near to God. And as a result, during
this time, what happened? What happens to all of us? We become Pharisees. When there's no inward
life but you're still going through the
motions, it's so easy to have this great
sense of piousness. What does that mean? I'm saying this,
that often those who are the most
openly judgmental are actually,
secretly, hypocritical. There is a connection between
being openly judgmental, denouncing sin-- I've read some Facebook pages. It's just, like, everyday, what
sin are you there to denounce? How wicked and
vile is the world? But a lot of times
there's a link between being openly
judgmental and being secretly hypocritical. Jesus put it this way. He said, usually it's the person
who has a plank sticking out of their eye. Right? They were working in the
shop and a little splinter came off the wood. Now they have a two-by-four-- Jesus is the best. You read his stuff
and it's funny. Imagine a two-by-four
sticking out of someone's eye who then, as he
walks around, says, hey, you got
something in your eye. And you're like, what
do I got in my eye? A little bit of sleep. You got a little sleep in here. Let me help you. And like, they turn to
help you and they're knocking stuff off the shelves. [LAUGHTER] Do you want that guy to help you
get the sleep out of your eye? That guy's got a two-by-four
sticking out of his eye, but he's going, hey, hey, hey,
hey, wicked sinner-- repent. Get over here. Let me help you out. Right? It's like, no, thank you. That's David here. And it reaches a
boiling point when he hears the story
about a guy who killed baby Lamb Chop, the pet. Even though he had
all these herds, he had thousands
of sheep, but he chose to take someone's
precious little pet that slept in his own bed. And Nathan knew what he
was doing because David was a shepherd and
he risked his life to save sheep from wolves and
from bears and from lions. So when he hears about this
rich guy that had no pity-- One translation
puts it this way-- does this man think there's
no justice in my kingdom? Does he think I
won't deal with this? I am Batman. I will-- When you're living out of this
judgmental spirit with death on the inside, you
don't see clearly. So what did David say? I'm going to kill this guy,
and then he's going to pay. Well, David, if he's dead,
he can't pay, you know, because dead men can't pay. But he's not thinking clearly. He's just like, this
guy's going to pay because it's the tell-tale
heart of his own sin that he's actually speaking to. What David did was allow him
to see himself in the mirror. And that's when David
lovingly said, David, it was you that I
was talking about. It was you that
did these things. And David fell on his
knees and repented because he realized that
Nathan, his friend, was right. So here's my question-- how can we avoid
this from happening? Because it's great
to pile it on David. But the real question--
if it happened to him, it can happen to us, so how do
we avoid that from happening? Because I guarantee
you if you were able to sit down with David
while he was penning Psalm 23-- Because don't forget, you
read that epic Psalm, the Lord is my shepherd-- David had to write that. So he's out alone in the fields,
and there's probably, like, nine versions of how it starts. You know, originally,
it was going to be, God takes care of me
like a baby sheep. No, that's not-- he
crumples that one up. The Lord is my
shepherd, I'm good. No, no, no. I shall not want. Ah, I got it. Bling, bling, bling. And if you would've said,
hey, hey, David-- you showed up in a DeLorean
or something-- hey, David. Hey, question. [LAUGHTER] Do you think it's possible
that one day you're going to have an affair and then
murder one of your best friends to cover it up? Do you think it's
possible that you'll ignore God for a whole year,
you won't return his calls, but you'll still be showing
up at church for a whole year? David would say there's no
way I would ever do that. God's my shepherd. I have everything I need. And so here's my point-- you and I, how many Psalm
23's have we written? Yeah, exactly. So if it can happen
to David, we're not immune to this temptation. And any of us could do exactly
what he's done or worse. So how do we avoid such a thing? I jotted down three things,
three things that could keep us from such a thing. And the first one is that we
have to be open to conviction, open to conviction. We have to welcome, be receptive
to the conviction of God's Holy Spirit because, no
doubt, at every single moment, God was giving him the
chance to do right. No one has overtaken
any trespass except that which
is common to man. And God always provides
a way of escape. What does that way
of escape look like? It's that little rumble
strip-- brrp, brrp, brrp. No, no, no, no, no, no, no,
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Let's be receptive--
speak, Lord, your servant is
listening to conviction. The second ingredient
is that we have to keep short accounts with God,
keep short accounts with God, meaning don't let
things pile up. Have you ever waited too long to
balance your checking account? Have you ever waited too long
to go through the receipts? And so then you're like, I don't
remember what this was for. What was this one for? I don't remember
what this one's for. And it's so intimidating because
you allowed it to pile up, and so there's so much. If you keep short
accounts, meaning every day you go
through and balance, every day you approach it, you
deal with it when it's fresh, it's much easier to do. Let's keep short
accounts with God. What does that mean? We are all going to
sin-- newsflash-- every one of us. So when you do rush to God, rush
to him, rush to His presence, ask forgiveness. Don't let it pile
up in your soul. Keep short accounts with God. And then third, have
the right friends. I see in David's life, thank God
he had Nathan, not just Joab. David had Joab in
his life who didn't-- Joab knew exactly
what David was doing, and he helped him cover it up. And by the way, he
never let him forget it. From this moment on, Joab will
be uncontrollable by David because he has this
over him, by the way. So here's my question-- do you
have a circle full of Joabs, or do you have some Nathans? Do you have people
in your life who are going to help you
on the path to sin? Or do you have
people in your life who are willing to
lovingly confront you when you're making decisions
that will harm you? I see two sides of the Nathan. I see, hopefully, A, that
we need to fill our lives up with Nathans. And what a great
opportunity for me to say that you should
be in a small group. What a great chance for me to
say you should be on a team here because if you
have a team leader and you have people
around you serving on a team within the Fresh Life
Church family, then guess what. If you're chronically late,
you have a team leader who's going to
lovingly say, hey, I've noticed that you
always hold everybody up. We've asked everyone to
be here at this time. And they're able to deal
with issues in your heart that would come from
pride that would lead to a lack of punctuality. They will call out little
things that-- everyone wears this shirt, you don't like it. Everyone does this--
you see what I'm saying? There's people who lovingly can
address these little issues. Hey, it seems like the way
you talk about your wife when she's not there,
that's not the kindest. It seems like you
interrupt a lot. You see what I'm saying? Do you have a life
full of Nathans, or all you have is Joabs
who are bad examples and not doing anything
about the things that they're seeing
in your life? But the second
ingredient is that we need to learn to be
Nathans, too, that we need to be Nathans, too. And what I mean
by that is that we know how to properly
speak to people about the errors in their
lives and the errors that we see in the world
with grace and with truth, with love and honesty,
but with a broken heart. Nathan didn't rush
in to the room and say, you pervey,
scummy sinner. Yeah I do follow some
Christians on Facebook. You see what I'm saying? Yeah. Yeah. He was winsome. He knew how to speak to David. He knew how to not get
David's shields up. And what an appropriate time
for us to speak about the way that God always
communicates love, always wants to give those
who are in error the greatest chance of doing the right thing
when we're currently sitting in this hallmark legislation-- this law that's been
passed in New York. And the eyes of the world,
and certainly the nation, are on New York. And as it goes in New York, so
often it spreads to the nation. And of course, we're
talking about this law making abortions more
guaranteed in New York to a later point of time. And yes, our hearts
break when we think about babies being killed-- in the womb, babies
being killed. Bathsheba said, I'm with child. There's a child knit
together by God in her womb. And we view life as sacred, and
we view it as a gift from God, and we're made in God's image. But our hearts don't just break
for the babies that are killed. Our hearts break for
those, their experiences, that they would
feel that there's no other choice but to do
that in some situations. Not all are just frivolous-- I want to have sex and
not have consequences. Some are people-- I don't know how I'm
going to have a baby. I don't know what this is
going to do to my life. Our hearts break for
both sides of that. There are two victims
when there's an abortion. There's a woman who
has to live with that, and there's the baby, of course. So our hearts break with
that, but not in a pious way, like we know better,
and how evil are you. Our hearts should break on
both sides of that issue and understand there
are complexities. And the way that
we speak about it should be with the wisdom and
the dexterity and the love and the grace of a Nathan. Yes, it is evil, and it is vile. But it's not unprecedented. The Church was born
into the Roman Empire 2,000 years ago at a point
when it was common practice, if you had a baby and didn't
want it for whatever reason, there was some sort of birth
defect or it was a girl and you wanted a boy or you
just didn't want any more kids, there was something
called infant exposure. You would just toss the
baby out and it would die. Romulus and Remus,
the founders of Rome, supposedly were just
babies that were discarded. That was common practice. And you know what
it was that upended the practice of infant
exposure and eventually got that outlawed? It was Christianity
in the Roman Empire. But it was not them posting on
their Facebook page how evil and how vile it was. Yes, eventually,
a bishop did get in the face of a king
lovingly and encourage him to pass a law to outlaw it. But what it was was Christians
who, during the plagues when people were dying who were
Christians and non-Christians alike, dying because of
the plagues at a rate where 5,000 people per
day in the city of Rome were dying of the
plague, it was Christians who were showing love to people
who were dying of the plague. It was Christians who were
putting themselves out there to help people who were dying. And when they would find a
baby that was exposed and left to the elements, it was
Christians who would pull them into their home. It was Christians
who would give money to help mothers have the
resources to be able to live with this child that she saw
no other way but to get rid of and discard the baby. It was Christians
not just speaking love, but living
love and showing love and demonstrating love. And that is what
changes the world. And yes, there is a time
to speak and to say, hey, this is evil, but to
do so with a broken heart and to do so with the
spirit of humility and to do so in a way that
says I'm no better than you. My heart breaks for you,
and I'm willing to help you. And that's why we, as a
church, are not just committed to speak about that we're
all made in God's image, therefore, life is sacred. But why we, as a church, give
to support pregnancy centers in every city where we have as
a church and have for years, and we'll continue to. Just to say to a
young girl, this is wrong, but to
not make it possible for her to see other
options and to see how she can be taken care
of and to actually be the hands and feet of Jesus-- we can't just speak
like a Nathan, we have to live like
a Nathan, as well. So those three things,
I think, will keep us back from David's
mistake here as he messed with the baby monster
that eventually grew big enough to chew him up. What about Bill Bixbee,
you're wondering. You're wondering how did
Billy's story turned out. So the baby monster
that grew big, eventually when it was
recognized, it got small again. Now it's the size of a kitten,
and the family's decompressing. And Billy's mom says, gosh,
so I guess dragons are real. But why did it
have to get so big? Billy said, I
don't know, I guess it just wanted to be noticed. And if we will notice the
baby monsters in our lives, they won't be able to grow. Why? Because sin grows best
when it's left unaddressed. And when we'll address
it, we won't be lethargic. We will be hungry. We won't be lenient. We will be disciplined. When we do sin, we
won't be thinking damage control, damage control. We'll be thinking forgiveness. And there won't be a bit of
piousness or smugness about us, we will be humble. In Jesus' name we pray--
