2 Samuel 14
Riley2 Samuel 14:25
ABSALOM—THE SELF-WILLED MAN2 Samuel 14:25I AM to speak to you this evening on “Absalom, The Self-Willed Man.” His history, like that of Saul, is too extensive for a single Scripture lesson. But we can compass it in a Bible reading which shall group together and interpret references to his life.Two weeks ago I reminded you that Samson was not so fully reported in Scripture because his life was worthy, as by way of warning; and to-night I must remind you again that Absalom does not hold his place in the Divine record by virtue of character, but rather on account of his kinship to David— the king, the great man, and the man of God as well. Absalom illustrates the twofold fact that a man of might and power may bring up a degenerate son, and yet that son will enjoy a certain amount of social standing and popular respect on account of the very blood within his veins. It is altogether possible that Absalom is more fully reported in the Divine record than Amnon, Chileab and Adonijah— David’s other sons—because he attempted to take the reins of government into his own hands, and came so near to success that a full report of Israel’s doings involves the record of his attempted leadership.I want, to-night, to set the life of Absalom before you under these suggestions: His Birth and Breeding; His Beauty and Badness; His Rebellion and Death; and then see, with you, what are some of the suggested lessons.First of allHIS BIRTH AND He was a child of sin. He was not the son of Bathsheba—the wife of Uriah, the Hittite, but of David, who sinned against and set Uriah in the forefront of battle that he might perish, that David might receive Bathsheba unto himself as his own. Perhaps no king of earth ever received so scathing a rebuke as Nathan, the prophet, gave to David, in consequence of this unrighteous procedure.
He did it by a parable, after this manner,“There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor.“The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds:“But the poor man had nothing, save one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and nourished up: and it grew up together with him, and with his children; it did eat of his own meat, and drank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a daughter.“And there came a traveller unto the rich man, and he spared to take of his own flock and of his own herd, to dress for the wayfaring man that was come unto him; but took the poor man’s lamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him.“And David’s anger was greatly kindled against the man; and he said to Nathan, As the Lord liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely die;“And he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity.“And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man. Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, I anointed thee king over Israel, and I delivered thee out of the hand of Saul;“And I gave thee thy master’s house, and thy master’s wives into thy bosom, and gave thee the House of Israel and of Judah; and if that had been too little, I would moreover have given unto thee such and such things.“Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the Lord, to do evil in His sight? thou hast killed Uriah, the Hittite, with the sword, and hast taken his wife to be thy wife, and hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon.“Now therefore the sword shall never depart from thine house; because thou hast despised me, and hast taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be thy wife.“Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will raise up evil against thee out of thine own house, and I will take thy wives before thine eyes, and give them unto thy neighbour, and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight of this sun.“For thou didst it secretly: but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the sun.“And David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord.
And Nathan said unto David, The Lord also hath put away thy sin! thou shalt not die.“Howbeit, 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” (2 Samuel 12:1-14)And yet, Absalom was not the child here spoken of, but the son of Maacah instead. Processes of law, however, never put right a violation of morals, and Absalom was as surely the child of sin as was the poor, unfortunate, little one that had long lain dead. It is little wonder, therefore, that Absalom proved a disappointment to his father, was the murderer of his brother, a rebel against government, and an opposer of God. “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. He that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption”. It is not an unusual thing that in the bad behavior of one’s children, one but sees his own sin reproduced again.Alas, the law of inheritance will reproduce the unsatisfactory features of life, and if one does not want to see again the fruit of sin he must not sow to the flesh. Did it ever occur to you that possibly one reason why Jacob, the bad boy in Isaac’s house, eventually became converted, and though late in life, turned about to be a prince with God and man, was due to the fact that he had a father and grand-father of such superior characters?
When Abraham was chosen, God said: “I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment; that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which He hath spoken of him”. We have more hope of the final conversion of a wayward son or daughter when it is known that no gross sins characterized the youth of father or mother.
The question as to when a boy’s culture should begin was rightly answered by that philosopher who said, “Two hundred years before his birth.”It would seem, however, that Absalom’s breeding was little better than his birth. So far as the sacred record goes, David seems to have shielded and petted this son. It is likely to be so with the child whose father has sinned. Every time the father looks into the face of such a child he is convicted of his own iniquity, and has no heart to correct him; every time a father looks into the face of such a child, it is with pity that there is imposed upon a helpless one a permanent disgrace. Once or twice in life I have known instances where children born under circumstances similar to that which ushered Absalom into existence have been permitted to grow up without correction, their parents catering to their every desire.The one thing that is too often forgotten in such a connection is that the spoiled child is destined to see much of sorrow. And, in that sorrow their spoilers must share.
Take Eli’s experience as an illustration of this truth. You recall, how, in the Divine Record, the charge is laid against the boys of that ancient prophet that they made themselves unclean at the door of the Tabernacle of the congregation, and the old father queried,“Why do ye such things? for I hear of your evil dealings by all this people.“Nay, my sons; for it is no good report that I hear: ye make the Lord’s people to transgress”.Yet when little Samuel was given his message to Eli it read like this,“In that day I will perform against Eli all things which I have spoken concerning his house; when I begin, I will also make an end.“For I have told him that I will judge his house for ever for the iniquity which he knoweth; because his sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not”.Beloved, it is not one of the easy tasks to correct children.
Yet, if I read the Bible aright, it is one of the essentials to the success of their better breeding. The warden at Sing Sing prison once said that it made him tremble to see a boy growing up to the point of rebellion against father and mother, to hear him say to father or mother “I won’t”, for he never listened to that word without fearing that the boy had already started on the road to the penitentiary, since the spirit of rebellion to rightful government was coming to be master of his mind and heart.In the book of Proverbs you will find written,“He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes” (Proverbs 13:24);again—“Chasten thy son while there is hope, and let not thy soul spare for his crying” (Proverbs 19:18);and“Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child; but the rod of correction shall drive it far from him” (Proverbs 22:15);and yet again,“Withhold not correction from the child: for if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die. Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from hell” (Proverbs 23:13-14).Later Solomon writes again:“The rod and reproof give wisdom: but a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame” (Proverbs 29:13).And yet, while these things are written into the Old Testament, let no high-tempered, angry father suppose that he is thereby authorized to maltreat his own children, to beat or abuse them, for is it not written into the New Testament,“Fathers, provoke not your children to wrath; but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4);and again,“Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged” (Colossians 3:21)?The thing that is required in this, as at all other times, is the exercise of a clear judgment, and the expression of a kindly heart and the strength of a firm hand. Spoiled Absaloms can never become satisfactory sons. I think if it be a proverb on the one side that “the child is father to the man”; it ought to be a truth on the other that “the man is true father to the child.”BEAUTY AND BADNESS“In all Israel there was none to be so much praised as Absalom for his beauty; from the sole of his foot even to the crown of his head there was no blemish in him”. Robert Tuck, discussing this character, justly says, “It is by no means an unqualified advantage to be born, as Absalom was, with a beautiful countenance, lovely hair, and what would surely grow into a handsome body and commanding personal appearance.
Such children are always in danger of being flattered and petted. A thoughtful writer recently pointed out that mental strength is very seldom associated with what is commonly understood by beauty of countenance.
He ventured to say that bodily plainness was almost universally the attendant on noble character and intellectual vigor. There is some measure of truth in the representation. Character comes out of warfare, and moral warfare leaves its traces on the countenance.” History is full of illustrations of the truth that beauty of body is often only a medium of temptation. Take Goethe, the German philosopher, and Cleopatra, the Egyptian queen, as illustrations: the first, a king in appearance; the second, the queenliest of queens in feature and form; but both victims of the Adversary, playing the part of tempter and temptress, touching other characters to tear them down and bring against themselves that awful sentence that Jesus once uttered, “It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones” (Luke 17:2).Years ago when they were working in Pompeii they exhumed a slab which had on it the features of a man. As they carefully picked away the dirt they were convinced that it was the face of one of the ancient kings; and yet, as they wrought on they discovered that while the slab was yet in a plastic state, a dog had walked across it and his tracks had obliterated some essential parts of the noble countenance. We never think of that obliteration but we reflect also on what Solomon says of the wicked: “They sleep not except they have done mischief”.While it is true that Moses’ beauty was at once his salvation and the redemption of Israel, and that the beauty of Esther was made to honor God and preserve her own people alive, it ought not to be forgotten on the other hand, that the awful fall written into the sixth chapter of Genesis is recorded in these words: “The sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose”, and then it was that God said, “My Spirit shall not always strive with man”.
Better be as insignificant in personal appearance as Paul confesses himself to be, and yet victor daily against the enemy, than to be as handsome as was Absalom, and yet daily be beaten of the Adversary, for after all, beauty is a question of character. As Dr.
Buckingham once wrote, “To my mind Wendell Phillips was the most beautiful person I ever saw— handsome indeed in form and features; but what I mean by his beauty was his grace of character, his kindly, generous manners, his brightness of mind, his perfect purity and whiteness of soul.” Absalom’s character was no such combination.His constitutional badness was cultivated. True, he inherited from David, but instead of correcting himself, instead of calling upon God to help him conquer temptations from within, by which he was led away and enticed, he yielded and his vices grew upon him. Some one tells the story of a girl given to fits of temper, and when a friend admonished her, she replied, “Well, I am just as God made me.” To which her friend replied, “That is what I object to; you never improve yourself any.” Even a worse charge must be laid against Absalom. He had cultivated himself in the wrong direction. It is difficult to believe that Judas Iscariot was different in appearance from other babies, that the devil in him was so much larger than in other men. But he cultivated it, and it dominated him utterly, and even the association of the Son of God did not suffice to save him from that terrible supremacy.Theodore Parker once said, speaking of human wreckage, “Think of a young man growing up, conquered by his appetites—the soul overlaid by the body, the smutch of shame on all the white raiment of God’s youthful son.
Who can stoop the pride of his youth so low, and be a trifler, a drunkard, a debauchee? The mind of man despises it, and woman’s holy soul casts it aside with scorn.
I can only weep at such decay as this—flowers trodden down by swine, the rainbow broken by the storm, the soul prostrate and trampled by the body’s cruel hoof.”And yet, beloved, all over Minneapolis to-night there are young men who only a few years since were beautiful boys in comfortable or luxurious homes, into whose faces mothers and fathers looked to indulge the most ardent hopes of coming greatness of endeavor and holiness of character. But to-night they are crying as did David over Absalom, “Oh, my son Absalom, my son Absalom, would God I had died for thee!” “How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child”. AND DEATHDid you ever trace the formation of character as found in Absalom? Did you ever note how the evil born within him was bred by the very course he himself pursued? Some have admired him for slaying Amnon—his sister’s despoiler—but, after all, he is not worthy even at this point. Had he been moved by brotherly love toward her, and in the moment of awful excitement, consequent upon her shame, smitten Amnon, perhaps he might be commended.
But, on the contrary it is distinctly stated that Tamar was “desolate in her brother Absalom’s house”. So far as the record goes he did nothing to lighten the awful load this innocent, beautiful, but outraged girl was bearing.
He hated his brother for the disgrace brought into the king’s house, and for many months he nourished the thought of murder, never surrendering it until the day when he spilled Amnon’s blood.Beloved, it does not make any difference how justifiable the anger, how righteous the wrath, a man cannot entertain it without becoming like his purpose, without suffering a degradation of soul, an unspeakable loss of character. It is reported, you know, that the beautiful young man who sat for the portrait of the Christ in daVinci’s “Last Supper” was the very same, who years afterward, furnished the subject for Judas’ face. If so, many a mean thought must have passed through his mind, and left its mark on every feature of the face, destroying all beauty, taking out all that was angelical and working in all that was demoniacal.A great many of you have read in George Eliot how the good Baldassarre suffered at Tito Melema’s hands, and you remember how Baldassarre determines to be revenged, and for years hunted this ungrateful son with all the cunning of a serpent in search of its prey. And when at last Tito falls into his hands and he grips him about the throat until he is dead, the very picture of Baldasar’s face that George Elliot presents is the face of a fiend.May not Christ have had this very fact in mind when He taught us to forgive our enemies and pray for those who despitefully use us. A man who goes through life hating another will find at last that this hate has written itself into his forehead, is made to gleam in his eyes, and has come to set his jaw, to change the whole countenance, and make it conform with the conception of his mind. Yes, Absalom is sweeping toward his destruction, because Absalom is planning the murder of Amnon.Another thing occurs here which is very natural, and that is that this rebellious man proves himself a politician.
Listen while he discredits his father David, and tries to bring to naught his supremacy. It takes a bad man to make a good politician.
How much of selfish motive, of sinful scheming is covered by a smile, and expressed in a hand shake, who can tell? And the significant thing about Absalom’s’ conduct is that it is symbolical of the methods of men in both Church and State. The Israel he was trying to win was in one sense a nation, and he sought office with emoluments, as some modern politicians do; he sought them for the display of power, of prestige. In another sense Israel was the Church of God, and to this hour her membership is not free from men—self-seekers—who turn to account their position, who seek favor for themselves by defaming others! It is Haman’s trick! and the end of that man ought to be an eloquent warning to all those who walk in his way, for in the next step,The politician perishes. Did you ever look into the record to see at whose hand he died?
It was Joab, who thrust him through with three darts; Joab, whom he had hoped at one time to make leader of his own hosts. Thus it turns out that the self-willed man who hopes to subdue others to secure his own success, suffers at last by them, and perishes possibly at their hands.
A chief of police consorts with sinners and sets them to gathering gold in the most dishonest ways. They seem to be as minions, and the very source of his success. But one day they will be witnesses against him, and at their hands he will perish. How perfectly Haman illustrates this thought. He devises a gallows on which a man is to be hung. He selects the man— Mordecai—and sets in operation all his machinery to make the execution certain.
But lo, another is the victim, and ere he is aware of it, Haman himself is taken and hung on the gallows of his own making.A while ago I fell in with a gentleman who lives near Brookings, S. D., and he told me how a land-shark company, in his old home in Tennessee, had palmed off by a picture a useless place to a poor old farmer who put into it all that he possessed.
After he had moved in, he found that the picture was a snare; the stately looking house proved to be a hut, the big barn a most outlandish building, the broad acres a sand heap. The old man lapsed into silence and his wife into tears. For one year he worked on as if discouraged and downcast, but in the silence he was thinking. At last this scheme came to him. He dug a hole in the back yard fifteen feet deep. He then carried down a ton of coal, and climbing out, set the sand as though it had not been disturbed. Six months later he sent for a well-digger employed by the real-estate firm to come and build him a well in his back yard. The digger came, and before the day was over he had discovered a portion of the buried coal.
He hied himself to the land-shark’s office, and next day the real estate dealers put in an appearance and offered to buy the land back at the original price. But the old man refused. Then they named a larger sum, but still the old man rejected it. At last it reached $45,000.00. “All right,” said the old man, “my wife and I can live off the interest of that. That is as good as the farm.” They paid him the cash and he got ready to move. The next day they were mining coal. But when they had brought up the ton they were in chagrin and demanded their money back. But the old man only laughed and went his way.
I am not telling you this story to justify the farmer, but to illustrate the fact that schemers are often setting up a gallows to hang themselves; to show that Absalom, the politician, is destined to perish by the very process which he took to bring others into subjection to himself. “Better is little with righteousness than great revenues without right”.Now a few moments forS LESSONSSin necessitates judgment. People may complain as much as they please about having inherited this disposition to iniquity and that, but the fact remains that we must not indulge the tendency to sin. It makes no difference what your father was or what your mother did, or how difficult the sin to overcome, if you yield to it you will have to pay the penalty, for sin necessitates judgment. And that judgment, beloved, is always what it was in Absalom’s case—it is death. That is what the Word says, “The soul that sinneth it shall die”. And there is a law written into that sentence just as definite and effective as the law of fire, for the man that casts himself into it, burneth.
People sometimes imagine that because the judgment does not appear immediately upon the deed that God does not mean to execute it. And yet, Peter in his Epistle warns us against such a conclusion, saying, “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”.And that suggests the last lesson from the experience of Absalom—the self-willed man; namely,Salvation is God’s desire and offer.
Did it ever occur to you that David here is a good illustration of the Father God? How he loves Absalom! How he pities Absalom! even in the time that this ingrate is planning against him! The conduct of David reminds one of the text “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins”. In all literature I know scarcely a better illustration of the Divine love for sinners’ souls than that written into this report of David’s speech. Too many speak of God’s willingness to save rebellious men, in words which seem to say, “The purpose of God was speedy and terrible judgment, had not His Son counseled better things.” Nothing could be farther from the testimony of the Inspired Word!
It was God the Father who walked in the garden in the cool of the day and lifted up a plaintive voice, deepening into agony, as He listened in vain for an answer to His cry, “Adam, where art thou”? (Genesis 3:9). I have witnessed the terrible torture of a mother’s mind when the news was brought to her that her darling babe was lost.
But I have never believed it to be possible for human imagination to compass the Divine distress when God first learned of Adam’s sin! I have seen an excited mother when she discovered the hiding place of her babe, supposed to be lost, and heard her chide him severely while showering his face with kisses. But never did a mother’s love more completely triumph over maternal judgment than did God’s mercy over His justice when Adam was found hiding among the leaves. In the very midst of announcing man’s curse, the promise of salvation escaped Him (Genesis 3:15). We have read how the great-hearted Washington wept when he was compelled by duty to sign the death sentence of the gallant Major Andre, but our Father in Heaven, discovering Adam’s greater crime, decided to die Himself rather than set His seal to Adam’s irrevocable doom. If you would discover a better illustration of God’s love for man, despite apostasy and rebellion, read the account and imagine the sorrow of David’s heart as he turned from the announcement of his rebel son’s death and went up to his chamber over the gate, sobbing with every step, “O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son”!
And yet in David’s words how faint a suggestion of that Divine affection with which “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life”.Did it ever occur to you how perfectly God meets the soul’s cry? If you say as David did, in the consciousness of his sin, “Lord, be Thou my helper”, the instant answer is, “Fear not, I will help thee”.
If you cry as he did, “O Lord * * I am in trouble”, God responds, “Call upon Me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee”. And if you say as David did, “Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin”, He answers, “I will; be thou clean”. And if you add, “Create in me a clean heart, O God,” He graciously promises, “A new heart also will I give you”!