SERIES: David: A Person After God’s Heart
David’s Greatest Sin
SPEAKER: Michael P. Andrus
Introduction: I regret that my sermon this morning is not a Mother’s Day sermon, but I also remind you that this is not a biblical holiday (though respect for mothers is certainly biblical–and not just the 2nd Sunday in May but every day). Mother’s Day originated in 1908 when a spinster named Anna Jarvis started a letter-writing campaign to set aside a special day to honor mothers, her own mother having died two years before. She hoped Mother’s Day would increase respect for parents and strengthen family bonds. On May 9, 1914, a Presidential proclamation declared the 2nd Sunday of May to be observed as Mother’s Day, and nearly a century later we still gladly join in the celebration of mothers. Nevertheless, I want to finish 2 Samuel next Sunday, and to accomplish that I have to move along. Unfortunately, there’s nothing in chapter 24 about mothers.
The title of my sermon this morning may surprise you, for it was several months ago that we considered the tragic incident in David’s life when he committed adultery with Bathsheba, murdered her husband, took her as his wife, and brought dire consequences upon himself, his family, and his nation. There are indications, however, that late in his life David may have sinned even more gravely in the eyes of the Lord.
Let’s turn in God’s Word to 2 Samuel 24.
Again the anger of the LORD burned against Israel, and he incited David against them, saying, “Go and take a census of Israel and Judah.”
So the king said to Joab and the army commanders with him, “Go throughout the tribes of Israel from Dan to Beersheba and enroll the fighting men, so that I may know how many there are.”
But Joab replied to the king, “May the LORD your God multiply the troops a hundred times over, and may the eyes of my lord the king see it. But why does my lord the king want to do such a thing?”
The king’s word, however, overruled Joab and the army commanders; so they left the presence of the king to enroll the fighting men of Israel. (Skip down to verse 8).
After they had gone through the entire land, they came back to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days.
Joab reported the number of the fighting men to the king: In Israel there were eight hundred thousand able-bodied men who could handle a sword, and in Judah five hundred thousand.
David was conscience-stricken after he had counted the fighting men, and he said to the LORD, “I have sinned greatly in what I have done. Now, O LORD, I beg you, take away the guilt of your servant. I have done a very foolish thing.”
Before David got up the next morning, the word of the LORD had come to Gad the prophet, David’s seer: “Go and tell David, ‘This is what the LORD says: I am giving you three options. Choose one of them for me to carry out against you.’ “
So Gad went to David and said to him, “Shall there come upon you three years of famine in your land? Or three months of fleeing from your enemies while they pursue you? Or three days of plague in your land? Now then, think it over and decide how I should answer the one who sent me.”
David said to Gad, “I am in deep distress. Let us fall into the hands of the LORD, for his mercy is great; but do not let me fall into the hands of men.”
So the LORD sent a plague on Israel from that morning until the end of the time designated, and seventy thousand of the people from Dan to Beersheba died. When the angel stretched out his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the LORD was grieved because of the calamity and said to the angel who was afflicting the people, “Enough! Withdraw your hand.” The angel of the LORD was then at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
When David saw the angel who was striking down the people, he said to the LORD, “I am the one who has sinned and done wrong. These are but sheep. What have they done? Let your hand fall upon me and my family.”
In 2 Samuel 12, when the prophet Nathan rebuked David for his sin toward Bathsheba and Uriah the Hittite, David responded to that rebuke by saying, “I have sinned against the Lord.” Now compare that to what we read a moment ago in 2 Samuel 24:10, where it says, “David was conscience‑stricken after he had counted the fighting men, and he said to the Lord, ‘I have sinned greatly in what I have done. Now, O Lord, I beg you, take away the guilt of your servant. I have done a very foolish thing.” Do you see the difference? In chapter 12 he says simply, “I have sinned.” In chapter 24 he says, “I have sinned greatly.”
Now I don’t want to push too hard on the presence or absence of that one word, “greatly,” but frankly I think there are other indications in the text that not only David but also God considered the sin of chapter 24 to be more blameworthy. Why else would the chastisement be so much more severe?
You may be inclined to shake your head in amazement when you read that 70,000 people succumbed to divine judgment because David ordered a census. Is this the same God that we have found to be a God of reason and order and fairness? Obviously, there is something under the surface here that we need to understand. And when we do, I believe we are going to find that this sin of David is not only more sinful but also more common in the church today than is the sin David committed earlier. That should give us great pause and force some serious self‑evaluation.
A foolish decision (1‑9)
In the early verses of our text, I want us to look for two things: the external cause and the internal stimulus of David’s action. The external cause is clearly stated in the first verse, but while we can read it, we struggle to understand it.
The external cause (1) Verse 1 reads, “Again the anger of the Lord burned against Israel and He incited David against them, saying, “Go and take a census of Israel and Judah.” From this it appears that God is angry at the nation for some reason and desires an excuse to punish them. So, He tells David to do something and then turns around and disciplines him and the nation for doing it. If this is all the information we had, I think we would be excused in assuming that David was used, but from verse 10 we learn that David himself didn’t feel that way (and he was certainly closer to the situation than we are!). Fortunately, there are other Scriptures to help us with this dilemma.
Turn with me to 1 Chron. 21, which is a parallel passage to 2 Samuel 24. In other words, it tells the same story from start to finish, only from a slightly different perspective. The introductory verse is certainly quite different. It reads, “Satan rose up against Israel and incited David to take a census of Israel.” Well, who was it who incited David? Was it God or Satan? I would say that from the perspective of the Biblical author both are true at the same time.
The immediate cause was undoubtedly Satan. One of his most common tactics is to incite God’s people to sin. And if he can trip up their leaders, he can usually bring about the greatest harm in the shortest time. But another cause always lies behind the scenes.
The ultimate cause is the permissive will of God. Satan cannot do anything to God’s people unless God allows it. That is clearly seen in the story of Job. Satan had to ask specific permission from God to bring any calamity upon Job. As I mentioned last week, the permissive will of God is at times a troubling theological problem to us, because we have a hard time seeing how a sovereign God can permit something to happen and still hold the person who does it responsible. But this doesn’t seem to bother the prophets and apostles when they are writing Scripture. They frequently refer to one and the same event as being the responsibility of God and the responsibility of someone else at the same time.
One of the starkest examples of this is found in the NT in Acts 2:22, which is part of Peter’s great sermon on the Day of Pentecost. He spoke,
“Men of Israel, listen to these words: “Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst, just as you yourselves know–this Man, delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.”
The crucifixion of Christ was the most heinous sin ever committed by human beings, and they were morally accountable for that awful deed, but Peter has no qualms about saying that God Himself delivered Jesus up for crucifixion.
Listen to Walter Kaiser’s perceptive analysis of this theological problem:
“… according to Hebrew thinking, whatever God permits he commits. By allowing this census-taking, God is viewed as having brought about the act. The Hebrews were not very concerned with determining secondary causes and properly attributing them to the exact cause. Under the divine providence everything ultimately was attributed to him; why not say he did it in the first place?” [i]
But it’s important to realize you can never exhaust your analysis of sinful behavior by looking only at external causes–whether God or Satan or something else, like an addiction. Every evil action involves some wrong human choices; so, the victim can never shirk responsibility for his condition. And that causes us to ask, “What was it that made David a willing participant? What was the internal stimulus?”
The internal stimulus (2‑4) There are probably many factors we could mention, but I have chosen four:
Pride and self‑reliance. Every indication is that David was vulnerable to Satan’s suggestion to conduct a census because of personal pride and a spirit of self‑reliance. Notice that the census was not designed for tax purposes or public planning, for only the troops were to be counted. Evidently David had some more battles in mind and wanted to know exactly what his military strength was before engaging any more enemies. Now that sounds reasonable to us. We would be hard‑pressed to criticize a commander‑in‑chief for taking inventory of his strength under normal circumstances. But these were not normal circumstances.
God still considered Israel a theocracy. Yes, they had a king, but that king was to seek wisdom and strength from Him. God had taken them through countless battles against enormous odds, and when they put their trust in Him rather than in horses or chariots or weapons, they were always victorious.
Remember the story of Gideon from Judges 7? God caused that commander of Israel to recognize that numbers are irrelevant to Him by sending him into battle against the Midianites with a hopelessly outmanned army. Gideon started with 32,000 men, but the Lord said, “You have too many men for me to deliver Midian into their hands. In order that Israel may not boast against me that her own strength has saved her, send home all those who are afraid.” That left 22,000. But the Lord said, “There are still too many men,” and eventually he cut it down to 300. Then God said, “With the 300 men I will save you and give the Midianites into your hands.” And He did.
But a century or two had passed and David had forgotten the lesson God taught Israel through Gideon. He began putting confidence in the size of his army, determining his strength and his chance of success based on military strength. Human planning replaced divine promise. And that was not simply misjudgment, not just a lack of faith; it was gross sin in the eyes of God.
And friends, it is right here that the church today has so often followed in David’s tragic footsteps. We have such a tendency to put pride in numbers, and as the numbers grow, we become self‑reliant and self‑confident, which in turn draws our hearts away from trusting in God. There is a whole movement in the Church today known as the Church Growth Movement. It’s instructive to me that its name is not the Church Health Movement or the Church Faith Movement or the Church Commitment Movement–it’s the Church Growth Movement. And that wouldn’t be so bad if the emphasis of that movement were consistently on winning the lost to Christ, discipling those believers, and therefore increasing the total number of committed Christians. But sadly, too often the emphasis is on growing for growth’s sake–on growing my church at the expense of neighboring churches.
The sad fact is that while the number of mega-churches has exploded in the past two decades, there is not a single county in the United States where there are more believers today than there were ten years ago, including the counties that contain the ten largest churches in America. Christians are, for the most part, just playing a grand game of musical chairs.
There is tremendous competition to attract church consumers with exciting entertainment disguised as worship, sermons that tickle people’s ears, and beautiful facilities. I’ve watched Joel Osteen half a dozen times on television; he’s the Pastor/CEO of Lakewood Church in Houston, currently the largest church in America. Lakewood has 30,000 worshipers in their facility that seats only 8,000 per service. So, they’re raising $70 million for a long-term lease and renovation of the Compaq Center, where the Houston Rockets used to play.
The auditorium will seat 16,000 per service. The Grand Entrance and Lobby will be a spectacular multi-story foyer accessed through towering glass doors. Cascading water will surround the main stairway and three new escalators will lead up to the Worship Center Lobby. The Children’s Ministry Center is being designed by Disney artists; the Lobby and Food Court will be state-of-the-art, etc.
All that is, of course, secondary to what is being preached at Lakewood. I may have watched Joel Osteen on off Sundays, but in the half-dozen times I have heard him, I have yet to hear anythingdirectly from the Word of God. His messages are very encouraging, very uplifting, very focused on practical psychological principles of good mental and relational health. But I have heard virtually nothing about sin, or salvation by grace through faith, or anything that would challenge the world view of sinful, greedy, proud, lustful, narcissistic people, which I assume characterizes most of his congregation (because that’s what characterizes most people).
I just wonder what the value is in growing a church to 30,000 or 60,000 or 100,000 if the vast majority of them are refugees from other churches just looking for a more positive message, a more comfortable facility, a more professional music program, or better food choices in the food court? And while I’m talking about Lakewood Church, I must admit that we can easily get caught up in the same kind of thinking, just on a much smaller scale. We can readily measure our effectiveness by the numbers of people who come to events, getting excited when the crowds grow and discouraged when they are small. But we as church leaders must be so careful what we’re trying to grow for. If we’re trying to bolster our pride as the largest church in the country, or even the largest in our section of town, or if we’re becoming self‑reliant because of the strength we see in numbers, then we are in danger of a serious spiritual fall.
By the way, counting people is not the only way we can fall into the sin of David here. As individuals we can do the same in counting money. We can get so involved evaluating our portfolios and making all kinds of projections about what will happen in the next ten years, given certain economic trends, that we end up putting our faith and trust for the future in stocks and bonds and interest rates rather than in the Lord.
Or we can become proud and self‑reliant simply by counting our gifts and abilities. We may think we’re so good at sports or academics or business or medicine that we no longer need God that much. We keep Him at a distance, close enough so He’s handy in case our plans go awry, but not so close that He interferes with our daily decisions. We forget how to lean on Him.
Success is a second possible factor in David’s fall. The 23rd chapter is a very intriguing passage which I’m not going to read but I would encourage you to do so. The entire chapter from verse 8 to the end is a rehearsing of the great military exploits of David’s mighty men. The implication is that he had assembled a military machine studded with incredible heroes, like Josheb‑Basshebeth, who killed 800 men with a spear in one battle, and the three guys who risked their lives to go behind well‑fortified Philistine lines to get a drink for David from a well near the gate of Bethlehem, just because they overheard him say he wished he could have one. Military success has a way of turning a commander’s heart away from God, just as success in any area of life can cause us to become self-sufficient.
Spiritual apathy may have been an issue at this point in David’s life. This is an argument from silence, but nothing is mentioned in these chapters about him seeking the Lord’s face or going to the temple. My suspicion is that David has become spiritually lazy.
Lack of accountability is another factor. There aren’t very many people who will force accountability on a great leader; he usually must seek it out. I still recall Chuck Swindoll’s message to our Free Church pastors in 1988 in California. One of his points was that to maintain integrity it is essential to have accountability. And he illustrated it by what he claimed was a true story. One day a rather crusty old member of his church pushed past three levels of receptionists and secretaries in the church office and burst right into his study. He leaned over his desk and said, “Swindoll, do you have anyone who’s willing to come in here and say, ‘Bull!,’”—only the man was a little more explicit. Swindoll said it just shocked him, but it also made him think, “Is there really anyone I’m open enough so that he will be perfectly honest and call me up short when I’m about to blow it?”
Believe me, every one of us needs someone like that, but David wouldn’t allow it. Joab tried to be that person. I paraphrase what he said to David: “Look, if you need more troops the Lord will multiply them a hundred times, but why take this census, which is so opposed to God’s expressed will?” But, according to verse 4, “The king’s word, however, overruled Joab and the army commanders; so they left the presence of the king to enroll the fighting men of Israel.” When you’re important and have authority and can tell people what to do, you don’t have to listen to anyone, but you’d better! David doesn’t.
It takes almost ten months to do the census, but it is finally completed, showing 1,300,000 able‑bodied men who can handle a sword.
Now the second major movement in our chapter shows that David’s foolish decision leads to …
A tragic consequence (10‑17)
David finally comes to his senses and realizes what he has done. He readily confesses to the Lord and begs God for forgiveness. And, as always, God forgives, but also, as always, there are consequences for sin, even when forgiven. This time the consequences come in an unusual form.
God sends a prophet named Gad to give David a choice of three options for discipline. He apparently chooses the third and the result is that 70,000 of his countrymen are slain by an angel sent by God (that put quite a dent in his census!). Had not God intervened before the three days of judgment were over, the entire city of Jerusalem would have been wiped out.
There are several principles in this section that stand out to me.
Confession is good and necessary, but it does not negate the consequences of our sin. (10‑13) I rather suspect that some of you are getting tired of hearing this, because this is at least the fourth or fifth time in our study of the life of David that this point has been stressed. But there must be a reason why God brings it to our attention again and again, and I think it is that we tend to forget it so quickly. Sin wrecks everything, and all the tears and begging in the world will not remove the consequences.
It’s better to fall into the hands of an angry God than into the hands of men, providingyou are part of His family. (14) Look at David’s words in verse 14, “I am in deep distress. Let us fall into the hands of the Lord, for his mercy is great; but do not let me fall into the hands of men.” Even though he knew God was angry at Israel’s sin and was going to bring great judgment upon them, David thoroughly believed in God’s mercy, and he figured it was better to be near the source of the judgment than on the fringe.
I learned as a boy that it was better to stay close to my dad when he was spanking me than to try to get away from him. The closer I was, the less leverage he could achieve. The wise believer will draw close to God in time of discipline rather than distancing himself. Unfortunately, many people view God’s mercy as an exception rather than an aspect of His essential character, and they try to run from Him when there is sin in their lives. Or they get bitter. They only succeed in adding isolation and loneliness and resentment to the discipline.
The greatest pain involved in discipline is seeing the damage our sin does to others (15‑17). We often excuse our sin by saying that it’s personal and doesn’t affect anyone else. But it always does. Look at David’s words in verse 17: “When David saw the angel who was striking down the people, he said to the Lord, “I am the one who has sinned and done wrong. These are but sheep. What have they done? Let your hand fall upon me and my family.” Can you feel the intense regret and pain in his heart?
I had a good friend in St. Louis who once was a pastor but he messed up morally. He didn’t commit adultery, but he committed serious verbal indiscretions with a woman who turned out to be an undercover policewoman and the conversations were taped. As a result, he was forced to resign from the ministry. He told me with tears in his eyes,
“I knew it was wrong to talk that way, but I figured it wasn’t hurting anyone but me. But now I’ve lost the only job I’ve ever loved. My wife is devastated. My kids are having to be uprooted from school at the most critical time of their lives. And who knows how many marginal Christians in my church will chuck it all or, worse yet, excuse similar behavior in their own lives because of my example?”
Now quickly I want us to look at the third movement in our text:
A gracious intervention (16)
David was right with what he said of God’s mercy. In verse 16 we are told that when the angel stretched out his hand to destroy Jerusalem itself, the Lord was grieved because of the calamity and said to the angel who was afflicting the people, “Enough! Withdraw your hand.” God’s chastisement can be terrible, but it is always limited by His supernatural love. Time and again in the OT, God’s people deserved to be annihilated, but He never carried out such drastic measures. He would discipline them just as much as necessary to wake them up and bring them back to Himself. One writer calls it “wrath wrapped in mercy.”[ii]
A costly offering (18‑25)
It was at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite that God told the angel of the Lord to halt the killing. And it was there that God told David to build an altar. God’s wrath has been stayed but not yet satisfied. It would take an act of atonement. Let’s read the remainder of our chapter, beginning in verse 18:
On that day Gad went to David and said to him, “Go up and build an altar to the LORD on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.” So David went up, as the LORD had commanded through Gad. When Araunah looked and saw the king and his men coming toward him, he went out and bowed down before the king with his face to the ground.
Araunah said, “Why has my lord the king come to his servant?”
“To buy your threshing floor,” David answered, “so I can build an altar to the LORD, that the plague on the people may be stopped.”
Araunah said to David, “Let my lord the king take whatever pleases him and offer it up. Here are oxen for the burnt offering, and here are threshing sledges and ox yokes for the wood. O king, Araunah gives all this to the king.” Araunah also said to him, “May the LORD your God accept you.”
But the king replied to Araunah, “No, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the LORD my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.”
So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen and paid fifty shekels of silver for them. David built an altar to the LORD there and sacrificed burnt offerings and fellowship offerings. Then the LORD answered prayer on behalf of the land, and the plague on Israel was stopped.
The threshing floor was private property, so David proceeded to make an offer for it to the owner. Araunah, however, refused the offer and said, “You may have it and besides I’ll give you the oxen to sacrifice and the wood to build the fire.”
But David replied, “No, I insist on paying you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.” What a valuable principle that is. Worship which costs nothing is worth nothing. But isn’t that what so much of our modern worship is–worship that costs nothing? It’s so convenient. The pews are padded. The temperature and humidity are carefully controlled. The offerings are tax deductible. The times of worship are convenient. The lighting is soft and the sound system tuned.
Where in all this is the costliness of worship–gathering with the family of God when it’s not convenient, when we don’t feel perfect, when the weather isn’t good, when we’re tired, when the music isn’t our favorite, when there is persecution and it may cost our lives? Or having a time of personal Bible reading and prayer even when we’re too busy or too tired? Or being obedient in the face of the strongest of temptations, saying “no” when body and soul are saying “yes.”
Well, David bought the threshing floor and paid fifty shekels for it.[iii] He then built an altar to the Lord and sacrificed burnt offerings for his sin and fellowship offerings for the restoration of communion with God. The Lord answered prayer on behalf of the land and the plague on Israel was stopped.
As an aside, the site which he purchased was Mount Moriah, the very spot on which Abraham offered Isaac centuries before, and the spot on which Solomon would shortly build his magnificent temple. It remains the most sacred spot in the world for the Jewish people.
Conclusion: David was a man who sinned greatly, but he also repented greatly. He had many faults, but a hard, rebellious heart was not one of them. He committed the dastardliest of deeds, but his conscience would never let him rest. He never got used to sin. We need hearts like his without making the same mistakes and suffering the same consequences.
There are many here who have never murdered and never committed adultery as David did, but there are probably few of us who have not repeated his greatest sin–the sin of self-reliance and independence from God. The question is, “Have we been conscience‑stricken? Have we ever said to God, ‘I have sinned greatly in being proud and self-reliant, in putting confidence in my own success, in being spiritually apathetic, and in failing to be accountable to anyone? Now, O Lord, I beg you, take away the guilt of your servant. I have done a very foolish thing.’”
Even this sin is forgivable because Jesus paid for it all. He not only offers atonement; He offers complete forgiveness. I challenge you this morning to confess and repent. And if you have never done so, I urge you to trust Christ as your personal Savior.
DATE: May 8, 2005
Tags:
Mother’s Day
Sovereignty of God
Pride
Accountability
Consequences
[i]. Walter C. Kaiser, Jr. Hard Saying of the Old Testament, 131.
[ii]. Dale Ralph Davis, 2 Samuel: Out of Every Adversity, 264.
[iii]. 1 Chronicles 21:25 tells us that David paid 600 shekels of gold, but the difference is possibly due to the fact that 600 shekels was the cost of the entire site, while 50 shekels was the site of the threshing floor alone.