2 Samuel 11:1-15 In the spring of the
year, the time when kings go out to battle, David sent Joab with his officers
and all Israel with him; they ravaged the Ammonites, and besieged Rabbah. But
David remained at Jerusalem. It happened, late one afternoon, when David rose
from his couch and was walking about on the roof of the king’s house, that he
saw from the roof a woman bathing; the woman was very beautiful. David sent
someone to inquire about the woman. It was reported, “This is Bathsheba daughter
of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite.” So David sent messengers to get her,
and she came to him, and he lay with her. (Now she was purifying herself after
her period.) Then she returned to her house. The woman conceived; and she sent
and told David, “I am pregnant.”
So David sent word to
Joab, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” And Joab sent Uriah to David. When Uriah
came to him, David asked how Joab and the people fared, and how the war was
going. Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house, and wash your feet.”
Uriah went out of the king’s house, and there followed him a present from the
king. But Uriah slept at the entrance of the king’s house with all the servants
of his lord, and did not go down to his house. When they told David, “Uriah did
not go down to his house,” David said to Uriah, “You have just come from a
journey. Why did you not go down to your house?” Uriah said to David, “The ark
and Israel and Judah remain in booths; and my lord Joab and the servants of my
lord are camping in the open field; shall I then go to my house, to eat and to
drink, and to lie with my wife? As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not
do such a thing.” Then David said to Uriah, “Remain here today also, and
tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day. On the
next day, David invited him to eat and drink in his presence and made him
drunk; and in the evening he went out to lie on his couch with the servants of
his lord, but he did not go down to his house.
In the morning David wrote
a letter to Joab, and sent it by the hand of Uriah. In the letter he wrote,
“Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting, and then draw back from
him, so that he may be struck down and die.”
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To quote the psalm,
"Fools say in their hearts, ‘There is no God.’” Although, many of the atheists I have known
thought they were smarter than everyone else.
Who is the fool in this story we hear today from the book of Samuel?
It was the spring of the year, the
story begins, the time when kings go out to battle. Kings didn’t stay at home in time of
war. They didn’t sit on the throne while
their armies went out and fought their battles.
Kings led their troops on the battlefield. And David was a seasoned warrior who had
known many battlefields.
David had proved himself an able fighter
even as a boy, when Saul was king. From
the time he slay the giant Goliath, he was winning battles for Israel. His skill in war increased Israel’s
territory, increased their security, increased their wealth. King David was a great warrior, a gift to
Israel.
And yet, this spring, the great
warrior king stayed home. He sent the troops
out to ravage and besiege and conquer in his name. Why do you suppose he did that?
There are many possible reasons. Maybe he was feeling weary. He had seen enough of war – more than enough – enough for ten
lifetimes.
Maybe he was feeling insecure. Perhaps David was feeling his age and no
longer confident he was at the peak of his powers.
Maybe he was feeling entitled; he
deserved a break, a time to rest on his laurels.
Maybe David enjoyed living too
much. Maybe he was thinking about his
luck. He had been out there on the
battlefield more times than he could count and had been lucky. But how much more luck did he have; wouldn’t
anyone wonder? David was no fool. He could get away with staying home now and
he would.
And so a king at home in his palace
during a time of war has little to do, evidently. He spends his days lounging on his couch,
pacing around on his roof, looking at stuff. He seems bored. He seems like a man without a purpose.
And while he’s looking at stuff he
spies Bathsheba, bathing. And he likes
what he sees. The king sees something he
wants. He sends for Bathsheba and she comes
to him.
Some have questioned her motives in
coming to him. She was a married woman
and surely she knew the danger of what she was doing. Why do you suppose she did it?
Maybe she was ambitious. She could have had some designs of her
own. Maybe she dreamed of having a son
who would be king someday. Maybe
Bathsheba was no fool herself and some strategic bathing put her right where
she wanted to be. Or maybe not.
Maybe she was afraid. When your king summons you, you don’t ask
questions. And when your king says, “Lie
with me,” you obey. Again, Bathsheba is
no fool; she knows how to take care of herself.
Whether it was something she hoped for
or something she feared, Bathsheba soon found she was pregnant. This was a sticky situation because her
husband was at war. There would no doubt
be questions. So David handled the
situation by calling Uriah home from the front.
Best case scenario: Uriah and everyone else in Jerusalem will believe
that he is the father of Bathsheba’s child.
David’s no fool, and neither is Bathsheba.
Uriah, however, might be a fool. This poor guy believes doing the right thing is
always the right thing. When his king
calls him in for a chat, to ask him how the war is going, how his friends on
the front lines are doing, he answers the call.
And when David says to him, “Uriah, you’ve had a hard day. Take a break.
Go to your home and wash your feet – which is code for go home and get
reacquainted with your wife – Uriah chooses to sleep out on the palace
doorstep. Because a loyal soldier would
not sleep in a bed with his wife while his comrades are sleeping out in an open
field.
At this point David was forced to
resort to Plan B, which involved getting Uriah drunk and hoping he would loosen
up, but that didn’t work either. So it
was on to Plan C. Arrange to get him
killed in battle – which turns out to be not so hard. It’s not as clean as plan A or B, but it was
something David had to do.
He had to do it and it’s basically
Uriah’s fault. He was such a straight
arrow he forced David to get dirty. So
send the order, and send it by Uriah’s own hand. He’s a loyal soldier; he would never break
the seal and read the message. This plan
will work.
“Fools say in their hearts, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt,
they do abominable deeds; there is no one who does good.” So says the psalmist. This is a different definition of fool.
In our world the fool is
the one who loses at the game, and Uriah clearly lost in this game. Yet, according to the Psalm, Uriah is not the
fool. The godly man is not the fool.
I have known some
atheists who think it is foolish to believe in a supernatural being that you
can never see, never prove, never understand.
They claim that science has explained so many things that used to be
attributed to supernatural power, so the case for God has been debunked. What Francis Collins calls “the god of the
gaps” becomes unnecessary. This is the
understanding of God in which everything we don’t comprehend is attributed to
the power of God; but once you understand it, it seems to take the power away
from God.
I have also known some
atheists who speak wistfully about God, wishing they had this thing called
faith but somehow unable to embrace it.
They don’t understand belief in God, but sometimes long for the comfort
and strength it seems to give to others.
And I have known of
atheists who see and understand the full implications of a world without a god
and they are struck by the gravity of it.
A world without God is a world in which chaos reigns because everyone is
his own god.
There are more ways than one to believe
in God, and there are more ways than one to deny God. The Psalmist
says, “Fools say in their hearts, there is no god” … because the fool thinks he
is a god. Which is the point David had
come to when he was pacing restlessly on his roof that spring day. He was the god who says, “I see, I want, I
take … because I may.” The fool – so
says the Psalmist.
David was the fool
because he had lost his way. He was once
a man of God, richly blessed and a rich blessing to Israel. He was the one the scriptures called a man
after God’s own heart, but this man had lost his way, because he had claimed
all the power.
When David became king of Israel he
stepped into the gap between the people and the Lord. His duty was to be obedient to his sovereign
God in his role as shepherd and protector of God’s people. He was the most powerful man in the
kingdom. But it all began to fall apart
for him when he forgot he was a humble servant in God’s eyes. When David
decided he could go it alone, he had become one of the fools who say in their
hearts there is no God.
So, you see, here we are not
necessarily talking about those who call themselves atheists. This kind of fool may even be religious, but
somehow forgets that there is a God who is in control.
My friends, we are all this kind of
fool sometimes; the one who thinks she is out there on her own, in need of no
one and obligated to no one. Such fools
are we. But –
May you love yourself for the fool you
are, and always seek to be less a fool than you were. May we all embrace the shelter of one
another, together under God’s powerful love.
