2 Samuel 12

2 Samuel 12:4

AT A POOR BROTHER’S EXPENSE2 Samuel 12:4THE Old Testament does not deal so largely in parables as its complementary volume—the New. Even those that are found in the Old Testament seem inferior to the wonderful word-paintings that Christ has hung in the gallery of every Scripture-filled mind. But the Scripture from which we bring this text is the exception to this Old Testament rule. Dr. Joseph Parker voices a feeling that many have experienced when reading this chapter, by saying, “This parable of Nathan’s stands up before us, a thing unrivalled in beauty, complete as a dew-drop, fragrant as a flower, yet—for the figure may be changed even without violence—a picture painted in the sky. If there is anything superior to it, our only desire is to know where it is and to look upon it.” In many of its features it reminds one of the parables of Christ.

Like some of them it presents contrasted conditions of domestic life. Like many of them it appeals to one’s sympathy for the poor and the oppressed.

Like all of them, its moral teaching—the main point of its creation—is not in dispute. David did not see himself in the parable, but he saw every purpose it had, and was ready to pronounce judgment against the man who had so behaved.MODERN DAVIDSThe parable has a very present application. The modern city is literally full of men who are doing over this misdeed of David. They are rich, and assume to be hospitable, and benevolent, but—if we would not drag skeletons from perfumed closets— we had better not ask, “At whose expense is their liberality practiced?”There are among us many who senselessly defame the rich. The fact that a man has been hardworking and frugal enough to lay up something is a poor occasion to count him a sinner above his fellows. But there are also among us some who deem the rich the undisputed lords of earth—men whose money-genius makes the criticism of their conduct a scandal to him who utters it.

The first are predisposed to anarchy, the last to plutocracy, and between them there is but little choice. The sane thing, and the thing warranted by Scripture, is that of setting up a common standard of honesty, integrity, character, and asking the rich and the poor to stand side by side under that!

That was Nathan’s idea, and that is His idea who is “no respecter of persons”.But to turn from the consideration of the parable as a whole to the study of specific suggestions, we are impressed that this is a lesson we should learn, and one upon which we should insist with emphasis; namely,His method of money-getting is one measure of the man. You have no right to condemn David because he is rich. But you have a perfect right, yea, a solemn obligation to ask how he got his riches. You can’t know a man to trust or love him until you have that question answered.By it you can determine his thought—his mind. It is quite impossible for a man to amass great fortunes without great mental excitement and strain. But some men keep so close to God that the mind is not money warped; while others keep so close to mammon that the mind becomes a metallifacture, and nothing enters it but that which can be worked to the advantage of a bank account.Mr.

Darwin tells us that in his early life he was passionately fond of poetry, music and art. But he gave himself so assiduously to scientific research that he dried up the fountains of the old affection, and so art affected him with ennui, music with displeasure and poetry with disgust.

So, if a man applies himself so assiduously to getting gold that all ethical and moral faculties are neglected in him, they will die out of the mind, and the reports of the pork-market will be poetry to him; the figures on silver bills the only masterpieces of art, while no other music starts a throb in his soul, save the clinking of gold and silver as it falls into his chest.A man’s method of money-getting also interprets his heart. The emotions of human life are born of unseen motives, and become the visible indicators of the invisible springs of the soul. You can’t tell what a man thinks in his heart except as you study his outward acts, and “as he thinketh in his heart, so is he”. The man whose mind is constantly engaged with the problems of amassing fortunes, is sure to get money on the heart as well as on the brain. “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also”. I heard Dr. Phillip Moxom, before he went adrift, stand before a great anniversary gathering in Boston and plead the cause of Spanish missions; and, when about to finish his impassioned address, he said, “Brethren, if, when I am dead, you open my heart, you will find in it the likeness of Spain.

I have carried that country in my heart so long, that I know the impression is permanent.” It was a better speech, and nobler, than any man of money greed can make. Common honesty would compel him to say, “If, when I am dead, you open my heart, look to its center, and on the inside fore lobe see the American Eagle, on the other the Goddess of Liberty and about them both the circle of current coin; I have given them so constant a place in my affections that I know the impression is permanent.”A man’s method of money-getting may seal the doom of the immortal spirit.

To get money honestly is a virtue. To get it dishonestly is a vice, and as sure as the honest man has some hope of Heaven, so the man who makes gold his god, and sacrifices his own flesh to it, has a good prospect of hell. To get rich by robbing the poor is to sell the soul. You remember what James said of such millionaires, or bond-holders,“Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.“Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth eaten.“Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire” (James 5:1-3).We know of no worse calamity that could ever come to some men than to have the record of their financial transactions meet them at the judgment.I saw, by the papers one day years ago, that many of the employees in the Philadelphia Mint came near losing their lives. Two millions of dollars, stored in Vault C. fell and it was with desperate struggles that men and women escaped being buried beneath the tons of gold and crushed to death. If Judas shall never get from beneath his thirty pieces of silver, what shall the soul do beneath millions that are the price of blood?THE THING COVERED IS SURE TO COME ABROADOne’s secret is not safe because the subject of his evil perishes without suspecting it.

Uriah little knew that David was both robbing and murdering him, taking his life to get his most precious possession. He thought it all came in the natural course of warfare.

So it often is in the marts of trade. A few years ago there were many small shops in our great city centers that brought their owners good returns. The small grocery, dry good’s store, meat shop, sufficed to support families, and the houses were happy. By and by the battle of trade waxed hot, and one after another of these fell before the competing hosts. They never laid it to the charge of anyone. They died, little dreaming that they had been the victims of deeply laid schemes.

Their houses were broken up, and the destitute daughters were kindly taken into the house of David, the very King who had ordered the battle, and planned the bankruptcy and commercial death of this unsuspecting man. Those shop girls do not now know that he who so kindly (?) employs them to his own advantage deliberately despoiled their house.

But it is an open secret, notwithstanding.It didn’t get out through David’s trusted man. The tribe of Joab has increased. It is one of the most alarming symptoms of our modern trade systems that servants of money kings are willing to be silent about their master’s sin. Here is a man who wishes to steal a million from Chicago in the shape of a franchise. His lawyers, professedly respectable men, are ready to serve him and be silent. His banker, a very Zimri Dwiggins for religion, takes a deposit and pays it out, on order, to aldermen and never opens his head about corruption.

They smile and say, “Oh, well, it isn’t business to tell all you know!” They forget that it is criminal business to be in the secret of crime and be silent about it. Here is a street car corporation that runs over a man and kills him.

The brakeman and conductor are called. The Company asks how it happened. They say, “The brakes were out of order when we brought the train out of the barn”. Some member of the firm turns the key in the door and says, “My God, man, don’t say that! If that comes abroad they will sue us and receive a judgment against us.” The motorman and conductor go before the coroner’s jury and are dummies. They don’t know anything, except the fellow got on the track and was killed. Meanwhile a young mother cries for comfort that comes not, and young children go naked and hungry, while the Davids of Corporations wear purple, and the Joabs remain silent and keep their job. But just the same the thing is not covered!

The secret is not buried when you cart the human carcass to the potter’s field and put a padlock on the lips of eye-witnesses.God saw it and ordered it on record. David must meet it again. Some prophet thunders it at him. Some judgment strikes him, and as he sits in sackcloth waiting for its severity to pass, he remembers his sin and acknowledges it, or he remembers it and hides it more deeply still and dies with the deeper stain accusing him. It is all folly to suppose that because the wicked flourish as a green bay-tree God is not cognizant, or has lost His notes, of their misdeeds. God’s delays in executing judgment are not to be interpreted as His compromise with sin. “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness; but is long suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance”.You will remember that Beckford in Vathek, makes Soliman—the lost Prophet Spirit, to tell the Caliph how he came to be in the pit.

He had been on a throne of earth, knew all honor and luxury, and engaged in much lust, and worshipped at altars of idols. After telling the glories of his station and the extravagance of his living, he said, “For a while I enjoyed myself in the zenith of glory and pleasure; not only men, but supernatural existences were subject also to my will.

I began to think, as these unhappy monarchs around had already thought, that the vengeance of Heaven was asleep, when at once the thunder burst my structures asunder and precipitated me hither. Till this cataract shall cease to flow I am in torments. An unrelenting fire preys on my heart!” Having uttered this exclamation, Soliman raised his hands toward Heaven, in token of supplication, and the Caliph discerned through his bosom which was transparent as crystal, his heart enveloped in flames. Let us not complain against the apparent prosperity of wicked men. Let us pity them rather. Their secrets will be out soon enough.

Soon enough will their judgment come, and when it is seen, it will seem sufficiently terrible. There are men in every great city today, whose financial success is the envy of many, who would seem subjects of the profoundest pity, if only one could see the flame that eats at their heart, and is replenished daily by all the demons at Mammon’s command.But our text is an emphatic suggestion of another truth.Benevolence practiced at a poor brother’s cost goes unblessed.

The world has many who are hospitable but unholy, benevolent, yet bloodstained.Christian benevolence requires personal cleanliness. David’s charity, at the hour of our text, was worm-eaten and in decay. It is the sort that Satan deals in. I knew a man to so live that his name was a stench in all the church to which he belonged, and yet he gave to its finances with a liberal hand. I knew a company of young men to exploit their noble purposes by making up a purse to send to a health asylum a poor girl, whom they had so wrecked in body that she no longer satisfied their lecherous desires. Such charity invites God’s bitterest curse!A dishonest man cannot be a benevolent man.

You must be just before you can be generous! Some of our public benefactors will hunt Heaven in vain to find there any note of their munificence, but their record as “good-givers” will be read aloud in the light of the eternal fires.I believe with the unfortunate George D.

Herron that “The philanthropy of selfishness and covetousness is the social anti-Christ. The adulation which the religious press lavishes upon the benevolences of Mammon, the adoration which it receives from the pulpit, converts the Church into an apostle of Atheism to the people. The priests who accompanied the pirate-ships of the 16th century, to say mass and pray for the dead pirates for a share of the spoils, were not a whit more superstitious or guilty of human blood, according to the light of their teaching, than Protestant leaders who flatter the ghastly philanthropy of men who have heaped their colossal fortunes upon the bodies of their brothers.”It may be natural enough for a minister to court men of wealth, thinking their favor means increased salary for himself, increased facilities for his work, increased offerings to every good cause. It is my hope that such prosperity may come to the frugal young men of my fold that one day they will be able to meet the larger demands of a many-sided Church of Christ. But, it is my prayer that we should remain poor together, and our progress be measured and slow, rather than prosper by the help of immoral and scheming hands. The “Ram’s Horn” once said as truthfully as tersely, “No church is ever made a bit stronger by having an unrepentant sinner with a pocket full of money, walk up and join it.”SELF-OFFEREDThe most Christian benevolence is that which offers Self in Sacrifice.

Christ’s own example is warrant for that word. Dr.

Northrup once said, “When Christ wanted to redeem the world from sin, He didn’t send a check on His Father’s bank. He came Himself.” When Christ wanted to redeem us by an offering of blood, He didn’t lay some weak angel on the altar of human need, and offer him against his will. He lay His own body and spirit there. That is the benevolence that is blessed. Our first duty to the wayfaring man who comes in unto us is not a stolen lamb, nor yet an honest offering from our own flocks. He needs more than that, and something better than that. Our kitchen charity never saves the tramp; our liberal offering of money does not assure the heathen’s salvation. You and I, as consecrated men and women, are what they want.

Let us prove our kinship to Christ by offering ourselves in love. Lowell said, “The only conclusive evidence of a man’s sincerity is that he gives himself for a principle. Words, money, all things else, are comparatively easy to give away; but when a man makes a gift of his daily life and practice, it is plain that the truth whatever it may be, has taken possession of him.”If we but gave ourselves to Christ what we have would be His indeed, subject to His call, and money offerings would be easy. If only we would give ourselves to our fellows first, then what we win or own, they would share in love.

2 Samuel 12:7-23

THE FALL AND OF KING DAVID2 Samuel 12:7-23.THE thousands of years that preceded the birth of Jesus of Nazareth knew but one more capable man than David, namely Moses. The two names that are linked with the name of Jesus, not alone for time but for eternity, are Moses and David. Moses—the real founder of the Israelitish nation, of whom Abraham was Father, and David, the first king of Divine appointment, whose greater Son Jesus shall be Israel’s final King.The history of David begins in First Samuel, but it does not end with the record of his death. Till Revelation is complete, that name is still being entwined with the great truths of the Word. The name of David is immortal; the spirit of David is eternal.In the Scriptures now before us for consideration, David’s sin looms as the large thing, but let it be understood that no man is to be judged by a single thought or act. There are spots on the sun that are blacker than the most starless midnight the world ever saw.

Their darkness is deeper than anything of which the world ever dreamed, but in spite of them, the sun shines and floods a great portion of the universe with its effulgence. There are men who would make the single sin that stained David’s life the occasion of defamation for all time and damnation for all eternity.

Such thinkers would be poor astronomers. The sun for them is a spotted substance, and every star is speckled mud.I invite you to a broader and deeper study of David’s life, to one that compasses’ it at least superficially from youth to old age, from the day of his Divine anointment to the hour of his conquering decease.And yet to keep it somewhat within the limits of the text, let me relate this discussion to four suggestions: David’s Generosity; David’s Degradation; David’s Repentance; and David’s Redemption.DAVID’S It was evinced toward his own brothers. The record of conduct that becomes a revelation of character is in the seventeenth chapter of First Samuel. The armies of Israel had been defied by the Philistines; and the big brothers of David, together with their associated captains, utterly cowed at the sight of Goliath—the Titan leader of the opponents. In fact, the record is that “All the men of Israel, when they saw the man, fled from him, and were sore afraid.” Billy Sunday’s rendition of David’s intervention there, is as he claims, the vernacular of the street, and quite easily understood by the crowds who know more of slang than of Scripture. He puts it somewhat after the following manner: “When the big guy Goliath walked out from the army of the Philistines and shook his big stick in the face of Israel, they all got cold feet and struck for the tall timber.

Whereupon the lad David said, “What is the matter with you cowards?” “Why don’t some man go up and biff him one, and take the breath out of the big brute?” To this Eliab, his older brother, replied, “We have had upstarts down here before; but I guess nothing fresher than you are. Try it on if you’d like, and you will come out of his fingers mincemeat.” And Saul said, “You bet!

That spot there on that hill is no place for boys.” To which David answered: “I do not know about that. I knocked the breath out of a lion once. I gave a bear a jolt from which he has never recovered; and I did that with my own hands. If you will let me take a crack at this uncircumcised geezer I will teach him something he will never forget.” And Saul said, “Well, there is a good chance for you, Freshy, wade in!” Whereupon David started and as he crossed the brook he picked up a few little stones and putting one in his sling he fetched a flip and hit the big bully on the block between the lights, and he went to the mat and took the count.” It is a rendition one will not shortly forget, and is substantially true to the facts.But the thing that ought to impress the reader quite as much as David’s victory here, is David’s spirit. His brothers twitted him, treated his claims with scorn, scoffed at his assumed ability, sneered at his suggested strength, and every answer from the lad’s lips is unassuming and sweet. The finest test of true character is made by the necessary relationships to one’s own.

The man who does not treat his own brothers with consideration; the individual who is not true to the members of his own house, is never to be trusted by society at large. I recently had a letter from a man who is posing as a saint in the community in which he lives.

He assembles the children on Sundays and assays to conduct a Sunday school, but unless his own daughter is one of the biggest liars out of the pit, his secret life would put the devil to shame. And the truth is that one’s life is known better by the people that dwell under the roof with us than by all the world beside. The deportment of David, the lad, toward his father and mother and brothers, makes it easy to understand why God selected him for the throne Saul was but shamefully filling.That generosity was also expressed toward Jonathan. No sooner had David conquered the Philistines than “Abner took him, and brought him before Saul. * * And Saul said to him, Whose son art thou, thou young man? And David answered, I am the son of thy servant Jesse the Bethlehemite. And it came to pass, when he had made an end of speaking unto Saul, that the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul.

And Saul took him that day, and would let him go no more home to his father’s house. Then Jonathan and David made a covenant” (1 Samuel 17:57-58; 1 Samuel 18:1-3).No more kindred spirits ever met; the love between these two, born at first sight, never ended, nor even waned.We have an adage, “Familiarity breeds contempt.” That depends entirely upon the character with whom you become familiar.

There are men more kingly in spirit than in appearance; women whose sweetness increases with a deeper knowledge of their lives. Certainly they are the exceptions to the rule, but that such souls exist, only the cynical and insincere can ever question. The moment one tells me he “believes in nobody” I can take his own character measure. The Davids and Jonathans of the world are not all dead. The great, generous souls whose increased acquaintance begets enlarged affections, are yet in the world. If I did not believe there were still some St.

Jerome’s in the world, some Paula’s yet alive, I should count human life a tragedy and Christianity an utter failure, and dispute the redemptive power of Christ Himself.David’s generosity was shown toward even Saul. I speak now not of the Saul who took him into his home and gave to him in marriage his daughter Michal, but of Saul—the insane king, the Saul who “thought to make David fall by the hand of the Philistines”, the Saul who “became David’s enemy continually”, the Saul whose third attempt to kill David compelled his flight, the Saul from whose fury his own son Jonathan had to protect this lad, the Saul from whose fury the lad could only escape by dwelling in the forest.

When he was in David’s power, and his life could have easily been taken, the lad not only spared him, but afterwards felt condemned in heart because he had cut a piece off of Saul’s skirt—a deed that was done to demonstrate to Saul that when he had him in his power, he had no disposition to take away his life—and when David’s servant would have willingly slain him, the young man suffered him not.If there is any test of character truer than the relationship we sustain to the home, and those we sustain to most intimate friends, it is found in one’s conduct toward his enemies. Here the devil commonly does his worst with us, and has his victory over us. It is related that Peter the Great was thought to be dying. His physician had told him that if he had an enemy he had better send for him and adjust things lest he die with hatred in his heart. So Peter sent! The former friend, now estranged, came.

They made up and shook hands and the man turned to depart, whereupon old Peter raised himself from his pillow, and said, “Remember, if I live, the old grudge holds.” I am afraid too many death-bed repentances are after the same manner. We are told that Bismark once borrowed an autograph album, where, on one page, he found written, “My long life has taught me that one must pardon many things and forget nothing”, signed— Guizot.

Just below it another sentence—“A little forgetfulness will not hurt the sincerity of the pardon”, signed—Thiers. Below both of these Bismarck himself wrote: “My life has taught me that I have much to forget and much to be forgiven for.” The generosity of Bismarck’s soul was expressed in that sentence. The man who cannot forget and forgive is not himself forgiven.When the generosity of David’s nature is seen, one can understand why David’s sins were passed over by God.But we must not omit to give candid study toDAVID’S One of the remarkable things about the Bible is its utter candor. Its great heroes are never presented as faultless men, and when the record of their sins is made, it does not come before us roseate and perfumed, but reeking and offensive. If any man of all Old Testament Scriptures might have expected his conduct to have been covered, David was that man. Israel never knew a king who was his equal, and his popularity with his own people was never exceeded.

Samuel himself, from whose Book we bring the report, anointed David with his own hands. And yet he presents David’s sin in unvarnished speech.The record, therefore, makes clear two or three things.Regeneration had been David’s experience.

Perhaps no one would say of David, “He is an unsaved soul!” Campbell Morgan declares an important truth in his phrase, “Apart from the miracle of regeneration no man has a true vision of God.” Then David must have experienced that miracle, for his vision of God is clear. He knew that God was with him when he slew the lion and the bear; he depended upon God and no other when he went against Goliath; he looked to God for salvation from the hands of Saul; God was his one and sufficient source of strength. The spiritual vision of David is not only recorded in his history but finds perfect expression in the Psalms he penned. And some of them antedated the fifty-first—the great Psalm of repentance. It must be accepted that David was a saved soul.The eradication of sin from his nature had not occurred. The fifty-first Psalm is an abundant testimony to this truth.

With humility he confesses his sin, and in strong speech he describes it. It is “blood-guiltiness” than which there is no greater!

Unquestionably the reference is to the experience of this text, where the indictment of adultery and murder are combined; to which indictment the great man confesses with shame. Who, then, is holy? Where is the man who can say, “I am every whit clean?” Charles Spurgeon, speaking to his students one day, reminded them of the legend concerning Mahomet, who believed with his people that in every human being there are two black drops of sin, and the Prophet claimed that “an angel had been sent from Heaven to take his heart and squeeze out of it those two black drops”. But it must be confessed that the angel was not entirely successful in Mahomet’s case; nor has he ever been successful in any case. Isaiah was one of God’s great men and good men, but he confessed, “I am a man of unclean lips, and dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips”. Moses was one of the noblest souls a man ever saw, and yet, the record of his sin exists and it kept him out of Canaan.

Peter was the first Apostle, and yet in the presence of the holy Jesus, he had to fall on his face and cry, “Depart from me; for I am a sinful man”. John was probably the most saintly of the Apostles, but he writes; “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us”.

Why, then, do we say it, and make God a liar and prove that His Word is not in us? Yes, David’s soul was regenerate, but all sin was not eradicated.We are told that the Jews in New York and in Chicago once a year resort to the rivers and go through the form of casting away their sins. You will see them on East river bridge in New York and the twelfth street bridge in Chicago, October 2nd, keeping up the old custom, and reading portions of Micah, Isaiah and the Psalms, and acting as if they were throwing their sins into the water. Alas, for the impotence of the endeavor! Sin does not so easily go, as the experience of David—the Divine favorite—abundantly illustrates.In spite of God’s grace he fell. That is in keeping with his own confession. “The loving kindness” of God had been his and “the multitude of God’s tender mercies”; and yet he admits “transgression” “iniquity” and “sin” (Psalms 51:1-2), It is the only way a son of God can ever fall—in spite of God’s grace.

To Peter Jesus said, “Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee”. And yet, Satan did get a temporary victory against the will of the Father and the prayers of the Son.

The Irishman was not far wrong when he said: “I kin resist inything but timptation.”The trouble with men is they do not see that just beyond temptation is the consequence of the sin— death. An old pilot voiced a considerable amount of wisdom when he said: “As I look at some of these young fellows in their doings on this boat, and on shore, when they get to the end of the trip, I am reminded of the day I was down on the bay, running out toward the gulf and saw a big sea gull circle around, looking into the water, where, down at the bottom, was a big clam lying open. The gull thought to himself, “What a nice dinner that would be,” and down he went after him, and drove his sharp bill right into the tender flesh of the clam. The gull stayed down so long I thought he would never come up. When he did come that clam was right with him. He shook his head, he writhed in agony, but he could not get rid of the clam.

That clam was saying, “There are going to be two deaths in this tragedy before we get through, yours and mine”. And although the clam was a little fellow the gull never got rid of it and after a while her head went down and what little life was in her was choked out for the clam had killed her and dragged her to the bottom.” “Now, I am not a preacher,”said the old pilot, “but some preachin’ does seem to come to me now and then, and when I see these young ‘fellers’ diving down for the choice morsel, I am thinking of that sea gull and that clam, and wonderin’ if they will not come out the same way, and the first thing you know, lie at the bottom of society dead.”But David’s fall was not the end of David’s history, for which we ought to be grateful.The text recordsDAVID’S The record of that repentance is replete.It came through a quickened conscience.

There are some men who think conscience is a correct moral guide. Not until it has been quickened by the truth of God. Nathan was God’s prophet. He was a pungent preacher also, and when he got through with his illustration David understood the meaning of judgment against sin, and hung his head in shame, saying, “I have sinned against the Lord”. That is the first step in a genuine repentance. No man ever repented until he became conscious of sin. No man was ever saved without the conviction for sin. The Spirit’s work through the Word is to “convict of sin”, and to that conviction He is splendidly faithful.

Once in a while I meet a man who says, “I never had any conviction of sin.” If I acted in candor I would be compelled to say that one of two things are true: either he never had any sense of any sort, or else he is falsifying the fact. The intelligent man who gives attention to the truth of God will be convinced of sin. That is the thing that proves the Bible Divine. You cannot convict men by the use of Shakespeare; you cannot convict them by quotations from Tennyson; you do not convict them by reciting poetry, but the man has never been born who could give intelligent attention to the Word of God and escape conviction for sin. The way men manage it is to stay away from where the Word of God is preached, leave the Bible in their own homes unopened and as far as possible forget the Scriptures their mothers taught them in infancy. They go upon the principle, “Where ignorance is bliss ‘tis folly to be wise”, forgetting the opposing principle that ignorance is injury and indifference is death.David’s penitence preceded the judgment upon his sin.

He did not even know the sentence that was to follow, “Because by this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also that is born unto thee shall surely die”. I am glad he did not know it.

I am glad he confessed his sin before he found it out. I have never felt like putting any special emphasis upon death-bed repentance and believe one tear in health worth any dozen ever shed when in the grip of sickness or the throttling embrace of death. Truly, as one has said, there was one death-bed repentance in the Scriptures that none might despair, and only one that none might presume, and that was the thief on the cross.This repentance did not exempt him from suffering. Genuine as it was, God could not pass over his act with Bathsheba and his treatment of Uriah. Every sin committed, for the saint, must be judged in this world because in the world to come there is no judgment for him. That accounts for the fact.that sinners sometimes seem to get on better than saints, and to be far less afflicted; they have an eternity in which to answer, but God’s men are only judged in Time.

The child of this beautiful woman, made doubly dear to him perhaps by the very conditions under which he had come to his birth, must sicken in his presence and languish for days and finally die. As someone has written, “There is a difference between the penal and natural results of sin.

The penal results of sin were borne by Christ for us all, and they are remitted forevermore to the regenerate; but the natural results remain, and in this instance, God simply removes the natural result of sin. We can see the reason for that. As long as David lived, being a man of God, and looking into the face of this beautiful lad, he could never forget how he came to be his father, and what crimes he committed in its conception, and possibly never could be brought to believe that God pardoned him. But when the child is taken then he will say in his secret soul, “My sin is adjudged; I have paid the penalty in my own person, and for the treatment of Uriah I have had to suffer more than he suffered, and for the sin with Bathsheba I have had to share with her in a sorrow unspeakable.” I tell you God’s judgments are marvelous. And the fact is illustrated daily that “Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death” (James 1:15).But this text also recordsDAVID’S “Then David arose from the earth, and washed, and anointed himself, and changed his apparel”.Outward cleansing expresses inward character. “Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth”. Repentant David is restored David.

In his deep penitence he had prayed, “Wash me throughly from mine iniquity and cleanse me from my sin”. Now he believes that it has been done, so he washes his body as a symbol of it, and changes his apparel, indicating the cleansing accomplished upon the inner life.

He had also prayed: “Renew a right spirit within me”, and “take not Thy Holy Spirit from me?’. He believes God has answered, and so he anoints himself with the oil, which was the symbol of the returning Holy Spirit. There is no greater tragedy that ever comes to a man’s life than when the Holy Ghost is taken from him; and there is no blessing that can come to him greater than the return of the Holy Spirit. A. J. Gordon illustrates for us the fact of our powerlessness apart from that Spirit. That is what he means when he writes: “Imagine one without genius and devoid of artistic training, sitting down before Raphael’s famous picture of the transfiguration and attempting to reproduce it. How crude and mechanical and lifeless his work would be. But if such a thing were possible that the spirit of Raphael should enter into the man and obtain the mastery, it would be easy for him to paint this masterpiece, for it would simply be Raphael reproducing Raphael.

And this in a mystery is what is true of every disciple filled with the Holy Ghost.” The power of God in him makes possible every needed renovation and revolution, and supplies the strength for every needed action.David also returned to the worship of God. He came into the house of the Lord and worshipped.

There may be people here to-night who long since quit the House of God. I wonder why? You say, “I lost interest.” Did you lose character first? You say, “The songs no longer appealed to me and the sermon no longer interested me.” Why? Did sin take the music out of the song and the interest out of the sermon? If so, you know it. You understand that you cannot come back to God’s house until you come back to God Himself. David was first repentant and worshipped afterward, and the service of the sanctuary can never interest you and help you and inspire you until you have repented and the Holy Ghost has returned.David also voiced his faith in future good. “While the child was yet alive, I fasted and wept; for I said, who can tell whether God will be gracious to me, that the child may live?

But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me”. When the Christian finds his prayers unanswered, that is not an end of his expectations, nor the downfall of all his hopes. The Christian is not shut up to a few brief days; time does not limit his opportunities and privileges; with his new birth the day of eternity breaks upon him and what is not made right on earth can yet be righted in Heaven.David believed in God to such an extent that he could trust him for future good, believed in Him to such an extent that he could abide the day when the home, broken now, should be rebuilt and perfected. A man who has called God Father, and spoken of Heaven as Home, cannot be utterly discouraged. Newell Dwight Hillis says: “As we will never have a better name for the infinite God than ‘Father’, so we will never have a better name for heaven than home.

From that palette Paul has derived the colors bright enough to paint the picture of a realm of perfect happiness. Overtaken by misfortune, poverty, and sickness, John Howard Payne went staggering down the streets of Paris toward the garret where he slept.

Darkness had fallen! The sleet drove against his face, and the cold pierced his thin cloak. Suddenly a door opened, and the light streamed forth upon the street, the glow and warmth perfuming all the air. Into the arms of the man who stood upon the threshold happy children leaped, while the beaming mother held forth her babe. In a moment the door closed, the light faded into darkness, and the youth stood again in the sleet and cold, little dreaming that what he was learning in suffering he was to teach in song. That night, shivering beside his table, the youth lighted his candle, and though the tears fell on the paper within like the rain upon the street without, his heart went bounding across the seas, for he knew that there was no place like home.

He saw the old homestead again, crossed its sacred threshold, saw again the warm smile of the mother long since dead, heard his revered father’s voice, heard the voices of his old companions ringing across the green, and felt the home that once was behind him was now before him in that heaven where he should meet again those whom he had loved and lost. And so, with streaming eyes and leaping heart and shining face, he saw the ‘vision splendid’ and exclaimed, ‘There’s no place like home,’ and sang of hope and Heaven.

For all the memories of the home that was, and all the dreams of the immortal home that is to be, are but fore-tokens of that fair life we soon shall lead. The vague longings for ideal truth, the striving after the music that eludes us, the gropings for beauty we cannot find, the yearnings for love and sympathy and satisfaction, oft denied us here, are God’s ways of alluring men unto the home that awaits us all.”