Sound Doctrine

Guest (Male): Does God ever treat sin lightly, like we do? Never. Here’s Pastor Jeff.

Jeff Johnson: Listen, God never winks at sin. Never. I know sin for a season is fun, but even for a few moments of pleasure—and that’s usually what it is when you’re talking about sexual sin—a few moments of pleasure. If you sow, the Bible says, to the flesh, you’re going to reap corruption. Guaranteed.

You can’t escape this, whether you’re saved or not saved this morning. It’s God’s law of sowing and reaping. It’s constant. It will always be. You can’t run away from it.

Guest (Male): Great to have you with us for Sound Doctrine with Pastor Jeff Johnson. As we return to our study of 2 Samuel, we encounter one of the lowest points of David’s journey on earth. David’s adultery and the murder cover-up didn’t just happen. There were identifiable steps that led to this particular failure.

How did this sort of thing happen? It’s a question we’ll pose and seek to answer now with Pastor Jeff Johnson on today’s Sound Doctrine. Don’t be fooled by the world’s view of sin. There are consequences. Again, we’re in 2 Samuel, chapter 11.

Jeff Johnson: Out of this, it says, a child is conceived. In other words, the sin is being revealed here. Oh gosh, look what has happened now. Well, you know what we can do? We can have an abortion and that will just hide it. What do you mean? You’re going to compound now one sin upon another to hide it? What good is that going to do?

Moses said this in the Old Testament. Listen to what Moses said: If you don’t obey the Lord, you’ve sinned. And be sure of this, that your sin will find you out. In other words, there is no such thing as secret sin. Because to whom we have to deal, all things are naked. There is no secret sin. Everything is wide open.

David blew it. He violated God’s word. In God’s word, Leviticus 20, verse 10, it says that you’re not to lay with another man’s wife. You see, God’s not trying to rip us off from the joys of life. I was one day flipping the tube and there’s this talk show. You know how raunchy these talk shows have gotten?

Well, there are these people on there saying that if you just have an affair, your marriage is going to be better. Oh, this is great. That’s the junk that you’re getting on talk shows today. Totally absurd, totally against God’s word, totally getting people to get into the things of sexual sin. That’s the society that we’re living in today.

That it’s okay, that it’ll be good for your marriage and you’ll benefit from it. God’s trying to save us and deliver us from a sin that could bring death to our very being, not only physically, but emotionally and definitely spiritually. It’s destroying our nation today, it’s destroying the home today, it’s destroying lives today.

And I’ll tell you something about sexual sin: It is not a personal thing. No man is an island. You say, "Well, it’s me. I’ve made this decision. This is what I want to do." Yeah, but you affect everyone else because we all affect the other. That’s just the way the human race has been put together. We affect one another by our decisions. You’ve got to be careful.

A child is now born, so lives are affected. So David, instead of facing his sin and confessing it like he should have, fearing that his sin would be exposed, he sought to hide it. Remember Adam and Eve? They tried to cover up their sin with little fig leaf swimming suits. Remember Moses?

He tried to hide his sin of his anger and, "Oh, I killed a guy. Oh well, I’ll bury him in the sand and nobody will know." And Achan, as he took of the blessed thing of the Lord where he wasn’t supposed to, he ran and he hid it in his tent. He knew nobody saw, and he tried to bury it.

The common reaction of man is always trying to hide the guilt, trying to do away with it. So the idea is, well, we’ll just go have an abortion. It’ll be quick, it’ll be easy, and it’s over and we don’t have to deal with it anymore. But that simply isn’t the truth. That’s a lie. You’ve got to deal with that.

Verse 6: David sent to Joab saying, "Send me Uriah the Hittite." And Joab sent Uriah to David. And when Uriah was come unto him, David demanded of him how Joab did. He started small talk. He just said, "Hey Uriah, it’s good to see you. How are the people doing? How’s everybody doing?

How’s the war going? Tell me about it. What’s your concept? Are we winning? Is everything going great?" Little small talk. And then David said to Uriah, "Go down to your house and wash your feet." It’s not that his feet were stinky and smelled that he’s saying go wash your feet, Uriah.

He wanted him to go and spend some time with his family. He said, "You fought hard. You’re one of my good, mighty guys. I want you to just go home, be with your wife." Very important because this would cover it all up. He’d have relations with his wife and, "Oh, you’re pregnant. Oh, praise the Lord."

And Uriah departed out of the king’s house, and there followed him a mess of meat, or a portion of meat, from the king. And Uriah slept at the door. He actually went into the guard house of the king’s house with all the servants of his Lord, and he went not down to his house. He didn’t do it. David’s plan failed miserably. He wouldn’t go home.

Verse 10: And when they had told David saying, "Uriah went not down to his house," David said unto Uriah, "Comest thou not from thy journey? I mean, you’ve had a hard journey. Why then didst thou not go down to your house?" And Uriah said to David, "Hey listen David, the ark, Israel, Judah abide in tents and my Lord Joab and servants of my Lord are encamped in the open fields.

Shall I then go to my house and eat and drink and lie with my wife? As thou livest and as thy soul livest, I will not do this thing." What a loyal, honorable guy, right? David’s going, "Oh, bummer." He won’t do it. And when David called him, he did eat and drink.

No, verse 12: And David said to Uriah, "Tarry here today also, and tomorrow I will let thee depart." Uriah abode in Jerusalem that day and the morrow. And when David had called him, he did eat and drink before him and he made him drunk. Look what David’s going to now. "You know what? I’m going to get him drunk."

One sin upon another. And that drink, drink always gets the juices going and the lust of the flesh. You know how many children have been abused and people have been raped? Why? Because the drink. Many times they’re drunk when they’re doing this. They're just out of control.

David thought, "Ah, it’s the drink. That’s the key. I’ll get him home now." And at evening, he went out to lie on his bed with the servants of the Lord. He went again, and he went not down to his house. And it came to pass in the morning that David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah.

And he wrote in the letter saying, "Set ye Uriah in the forefront of the hottest battle and retire ye from him, that he may be smitten and die." You see, plan A didn’t work. Plan B didn’t work. So what do you do? Now, some here believe Uriah knew what David was trying to do because of the gossip in the palace.

You know how gossip gets around. Juicy stuff like this—Bathsheba going into the king’s palace—gets around. Loose lips sink ships, but servants talk. And some feel that maybe Uriah knew about it and he’s just wasn’t going to go for it. He wasn’t going to deal with it. If David’s messing around, it's on David.

"I’m not going to get involved in this and I’m not going to help it out." I don’t know. That’s speculation. But David is desperate. He seeks now to have him killed. And Uriah, note, is carrying his own death pronouncement. Doesn’t even know it, carrying it to the front lines.

And so he was to be put into the front lines and the plan was that he was to be killed. So David’s sin goes from now adultery to murder. And yet David was called a man after God’s own heart. Wow. God is definitely an awesome God. Amazing grace that saved a wretch.

There’s a little saying: Oh what an evil web we weave when at first we seek to deceive. And so David, trying to cover up one sin with another sin with another sin, and it goes on and on. You say, "Well man, I’m glad I’m not like David. I’d never do that."

But when you’re in the midst of it, when you’re in the midst of something that David is in the middle of here, you don’t know. When the lies are going about, the deception is happening, all of a sudden you’re seeing something that you can’t stop and you begin to fall into it yourself.

You’re totally deceived and you’re wrapped up in it, and you’ll do anything to cover it up. Leaven is a type of sin in the Bible. Behold what a little leaven, it leaveneth the whole lump. It blows it all out of proportion. It ruins it all, just one little bit.

And then also leprosy in the Bible is a type of sin. And it starts very interestingly with just the extremities—the fingers and the toes—and begins to eat away at those extremities. And then after it spreads, it continues to spread to the whole body. It kills the nervous system.

I thought that was interesting. The nervous system—no feeling now. No pain, no feeling. No conscience. You lose your conscience. You get hard-hearted and you just begin to do things that actually you’re destroying yourself as you begin to pound and you don’t even feel yourself cutting off your own fingers, wasting your own feet, until finally the leprosy gets into a vital organ and ends in death.

It was interesting, I found how the Eskimos—and this is a beautiful picture, not a beautiful picture, it’s an ugly picture—but it’s a very true picture of what sin will do. Eskimos kill wolves by taking a knife that is sharp as a razor on both sides, and they take it and they dip it in seal’s blood and then they freeze it.

And they dip it again in seal’s blood and freeze it. Then they put it straight up in the snow and then they depart. And the wolves come because their smell for that blood, they’re carnivorous and they go after it. And they get that knife and they begin to lick that knife to try to get the blood off the knife.

And as they’re licking it, they’re slicing their own tongue. And as they’re slicing their own tongue, they’re getting more of the blood and they think it’s the seal’s blood, but it’s their own blood. And they continue to drink their own blood until finally they’re just exhausted and they move over a few feet and die. And that’s how they kill wolves.

A picture of sin. It gets more and more and more until it’s overwhelming you and it’s destroying you in your life. We’re warned not to flirt with it but to flee sexual sins. Don’t mess around with it. If you play with fire, you’re going to get burned.

So David is getting deeper and deeper with all the plotting now and all the planning to the point of now murder. Look at verse 16: And it came to pass when Joab observed the city, that he assigned Uriah into the place where he knew that valiant men were, right up in the front.

And the men of the city went out and they fought with Joab and there fell some of the people of the servants of David, and Uriah the Hittite died also. Then Joab sent and told David all the things concerning the war. And he charged the messenger saying, "When you have made an end of telling the matters of the war to the king, and if so be"—he figured that David would begin to get angry—"and if he says unto you, 'Wherefore approach ye so near to the city when ye did the fight?'"

I mean, it’s very stupid to go right into the city gates with your men. That’s the most armed area. I mean, that’s where you’re going to get it right at the city gates. You don’t attack a city at the gates. And so David, he knew would get upset. "What are you doing going right to the gates?"

And then he gives this illustration. He says, "Knew ye not that they would shoot from the wall? Who smote Abimelech, and the son of Gideon? Did not a woman cast a piece of millstone upon him from the wall and he died at Thebes? Why went ye near to the wall?"

Then you will say, "David, though, thy servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also." Hey, cheer up, your plan worked. It’s okay. I mean, we lost a few men but it’s all right. Uriah is dead. So the messenger went, came, and showed David all that Joab had sent him for.

And the messenger said unto David, "Surely the men prevailed against us and came out into us into the field, and we were upon them even unto the entering of the gate. And the shooters shot from off the wall upon thy servants, and some of the king’s servants be dead, and thy servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also."

This time, David’s plan works. But you know what? I couldn’t but think about how Joab felt when he got that letter from his great and awesome king. Joab, this is a special—don’t let anybody see this letter. I want Uriah put up on the front lines, I want him put down good, kill him.

Joab’s going, "Well, I remember when David got all over me when I killed Abner. And he said, 'What are you doing killing this guy?' and he got all over me. And I remember my king has been so merciful to Saul and he did this. And I’m confused. Now he’s wanting me to commit murder."

Or actually, he’s doing it and he wants me to do it. And I think the message here is that all of a sudden David now is becoming a bad representative. And all of a sudden he’s becoming a stumbling block to Joab. And that’s what happens. Now David’s sin is linking his general into a conspiracy to commit murder.

Plus, sin affects many, doesn’t it? Not only did Uriah get killed, but there’s a lot of other guys that went to that wall too. Your sin doesn’t just touch you, it touches a lot of people and hurts them. And this is the illustration here. There’s a lot of people getting killed here, not just Uriah.

It was a stupid move, a ridiculous move, but Joab carried it through, faithful to the king. Verse 25: Then David said unto the messenger, "Thus shalt thou say unto Joab, 'Let not this thing displease thee. Cheer up. For the sword devoureth one as well as another.

Make thy battle more strong against the city and overthrow it, and encourage thou him.'" So David, now you can see how hard his heart is getting. His reaction to the whole thing was, "Hey, it’s all right. I know many have died but let’s cheer up.

Let’s keep going. In fact, let it be a motivation for you to really take the city now for me. I mean, go for it, be encouraged." And using it as an encouragement to the troops after he sent them in to get wiped out.

Verse 26: And when the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she mourned for her husband. And when the mourning was past, David sent and fetched her to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. 30 days is what many believe could be the biblical mourning stage as far as how long you mourn.

Some say seven, but even today we have the flags at half-mast why because it’s 30 days since President Nixon has died. So she observed the form of the 30 days and probably brought in professional mourners as they would all do back then to mourn for the dead.

But right after the 30 days, I see here like, "Okay, it’s over, time to go on with our lives. Steady on and hey, listen, maybe I had a captain at one time but now I got a king." I don’t know, but I’m just throwing that out. I’m sure as David took her and the child in—I mean she was pregnant and under his wing like, "Oh you poor thing you."

And everybody’s looking at David saying, "Oh isn’t he such a dear man? He just loves everybody and if somebody dies in his force, I mean he’ll just take them into his table and into his palace and he’s such a good man. Look at how he’s just taking her in and just taking care of them to raise the child. Gosh."

So David and Bathsheba, you can see them riding off into the sunset and they lived happily ever after. Not. No way. I’m sure that David thought, "Oh man, I’m glad all this is over. Let’s just go on now and let’s enjoy the rest of our lives and I can’t believe I got away with it. This is great."

But what David didn’t count on and realize is that whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap. Notice the last part of verse 27: But the thing that David had done displeased the Lord. He thought he’d covered his tracks. Uriah’s dead. I pulled it off. No one knows. But remember what Moses said: Be sure that your sins will find you out.

This is a true story. In the city called Pelham, New Hampshire, couple guys got together and decided to go up into the rich section of their city and to rip off some houses. They broke into this one house and they began to steal the TV and the stereo and the money and the jewelry.

And all of a sudden they got spooked. And they ran to their car, they got in their car, and the guy threw it into reverse and they backed up, it slammed against a snowbank. And then he finally got it into drive and he took off and they figured, "Wow, we got away with it."

The next day, as the day came and the investigators were out there looking around the house, there in that snowbank had a perfect imprint of their license and number. And of course they got busted. One way or another, what goes around, comes around. You’re going to get it.

Listen, God never winks at sin. Never. I know sin for a season is fun, but even for a few moments of pleasure—and that’s usually what it is when you’re talking about sexual sin—a few moments of pleasure. If you sow, the Bible says, to the flesh, you’re going to reap corruption. Guaranteed.

You can’t escape this, whether you’re saved or not saved this morning. It’s God’s law of sowing and reaping. It’s constant. It will always be. You can’t run away from it. Next week we will see the horrible price of sin in chapter 12 and going on into the next chapters.

David will pay throughout his life what he has done here. There are consequences to sin. And you might say this morning, "Pastor Jeff, I’m so glad I’m not like David. I have never, ever committed murder. I have never, ever committed adultery."

And yet Jesus says to you this morning because, you see, things in the New Testament change a little bit when Jesus came. He came, remember, to fulfill the law. Jesus says, "But I say unto you, that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart."

Uh-oh. If you have even hated your brother, you’ve committed murder. That’s pretty serious. We need to be convicted, don’t we? We need to walk humbly before our God. We need to be continually confessing our sin, convicted. We need to be repenting.

God, thank you for saving me, a sinner. That doesn’t mean we’re perfect. We make mistakes. But you know, God’s saying, "Listen, I want to totally restore the years that the cankerworm has tried to destroy in your life."

Now listen to what he’s saying because I truly believe if we sow to the spirit, we’re going to reap everlasting life. In other words, God will cover us many times. In fact, what I have sown in my past life, I should be reaping a whirlwind right now.

And I believe that God holds a lot of that off from us because he loves us and he says, "I want to bless your life. Your latter years are going to be even greater. I love you. And when I forgive you, I forget. And I want to wipe the slate clean and I want you to love me and serve me all the days of your life. That’s all."

Guest (Male): This is Sound Doctrine and we just heard a message from Pastor Jeff Johnson in 2 Samuel, chapter 11. Pastor Jeff will be back with a closing thought on the forgiveness of sin in just a few moments. We house all of our 2 Samuel studies at sounddoctrineradio.org.

This comes in handy should you miss a study or two on the radio, or just want to hear something again, or even share it with someone you know. This study and more are available now at sounddoctrineradio.org under messages.

You can also listen at oneplace.com and through the Sound Doctrine Radio podcast app. And of course, speaking of podcasts, Sound Doctrine can be heard wherever you enjoy podcasts, and that includes Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

This program is made possible through the support of our listeners. To make a contribution to the ministry, just visit sounddoctrineradio.org and click on giving. All of us sin, every single one. Big or small, the blood of Christ covers them all. Well, to those who have placed their trust in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, here’s Pastor Jeff once again.

Jeff Johnson: I love that scripture in Joel where the Lord says, "I will restore the years that the cankerworm has tried to destroy." And then Paul, talking to young Timothy says, "Flee these things. Follow after righteousness, the things of God.

Flee the things of the flesh. Follow after the things of God and fight the good fight. And you’re going to be all right. Steady on, understand these things and receive, definitely receive God’s love and forgiveness for your life."

If the Lord has spoken to you this morning through this chapter, God brought you here today to let you know that he loves you and that he wants to wash you totally clean. He wants you to walk out of here renewed, refreshed, forgiven. For the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses a man from just a few sins? No, from all sin.

Guest (Male): We’ll continue our study of 2 Samuel next time on Sound Doctrine with Pastor Jeff. This program is listener-supported and brought to you by Calvary Chapel Downey.