Stephen Waller
Sermon for the Ninth Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 11, Year B – 7/25/21
2 Samuel 11: 1-15
Psalm 14
Ephesians 3:14-21
John 6:1-21
David! All of us know many stories of David…
We encounter him for the first time when he is busy with the sheep while Samuel is checking out his several brothers to figure out which one God wants him to anoint. When everyone else failed to meet God’s standard, Jesse, their father said, “the youngest is out taking care of the sheep.” So, young David was summoned…and there in the presence of his siblings (think of the trouble this would cause among siblings), Samuel pours holy oil on the lad, anointing him. We are told that he was ruddy and beautiful…young, ruddy and beautiful…is that what God looks for when selecting a leader?
Not long afterwards, David learns that the armies of Israel are being challenged by some Philistines…one of them, Goliath, has challenged any one of Saul’s soldiers to a one on one. Apparently no one rose to the occasion….until young David shows up and tells the King that he would fight Goliath. After some back and forth, he is allowed to suit up in the King’s armor to go after the enemy. Alas, the armor was too heavy and cumbersome so he shed it and armed only with his trusty sling shot David slays Goliath and cuts off his head with the big guys own sword. Needless to say, Saul, is impressed and sends word to Jesse, David’s Dad, that he would be keeping David with him.
King Saul had depressive moods, deeply depressive moods and David was able to soothe the kings bad temper by playing his lyre. Not a bad fellow to have around if you are the moody sort. Those of us who have such moods ourselves could all be so lucky….less expensive than antidepressant meds or shrinks.
Sometime during all of this living with the King and his family, David apparently found the time compose our Psalms….The Psalms of David, we call them. This guy is a keeper! And that is exactly what Jonathan, Saul’s son, apparently thought: They became very…very good friends. Just read their stories in The Bible to see how close they were. Their love passed that of women…and they pledged loyalty to each other forever. I own an icon of David and Jonathan given me by a former member of this parish, Vincent Feehan. Who knows the full story of their affection, just know that it was powerful enough for Jonathan to bind himself to David in life and death.
Speaking of death: as things got unpleasant with King Saul and David…unpleasant enough for spears to be thrown at David…he took off for safer dining tables. And then it happened…what every soldier wants to happen, the King, while seeking David to Off him enters a cave one day to do his business. Inside the cave, hiding for his life from this depressive King, David did not take the opportunity and kill the King…Saul was, after all the Lord’s anointed and David passed up this golden chance to kill him.
Later, David shows the King a portion of his cloak which he had cut off his cloak while he was doing his business as proof for the King to know that he passed up on the chance to slay because David did not think Regicide a good idea.
Eventually, King Saul and his son, Jonathan, die in battle. David is devastated and has the women sing a lamentation about the two men, the father and son. What a guy.
He steps up to assume the office for which that holy oil had been poured upon his head. He becomes King.
One of the ideas the new King had was to recover the Ark of God and bring it to Jerusalem. It had been in several places of safe keeping, but the new King wanted it in his City of David. He and a crowd of people get the Ark of God and begin a procession with it…singing and dancing as they processed. Perhaps David was ecstatic because his dancing before the Ark was so enthusiastic that his wife, Saul’s daughter Michel, took offense….she probably thought kings ought not show such raucous joy. Scripture tells us that she hated him because of that wild dancing before the Ark of God.
David intended to build a House worthy of The Ark, but God let him know that he had been fine living in tents all those years and would gladly wait until David’s successor would come along and build that House of God.
Still David had been living a charmed life if anyone has ever lived such a life.
And then we come to today’s Old Testament Lesson. There is a war with the Ammonites. David has stayed home and not gone out with the army…a big mistake.
Following his nap one day on the roof of his house, he spies a beautiful woman bathing. Having nothing better to do and little sense, he sends for her. Bathsheba stopped over and they spent some time getting to know each other very well indeed. She goes home and promptly sends a message back to the King that she was pregnant! Not a problem he thought. He would summon Uriah, her husband from the battle to come and spend some quality time with his wife…Turns out that Uriah the Hittite had a higher moral standard than his King. He would not “go into his home” and sleep with his wife…even though David had plied him with wine and suggested he might want to check out Bathsheba.
So far, the only contemporary folk David has offended will the Me -Too folk. However, things get worse, much worse, and fast.
Realizing that Uriah the Hittite was either too stubborn or dumb to see his wife, no matter what the King suggested or tried to make happen, The King decided that the way to handle this “problem” was to send Uriah back to the battle bearing a letter to his commander that said: “put this man in the front of the battle and then draw back.” Bingo, problem solved. Uriah the Hittite falls in battle.
What contemporary group does this Kingly behavior offend? Essentially, he murdered Uriah…
So, my good friends at St. Thomas the Apostle, what of this David? But, more my good friends, what of our God?
What does David’s life and story tell us about the God who made him King? What does this story tell us about the nature of God and what God thinks of those created?
The only conclusion this priest can come up with is this: God uses us to do his will, even though we are often mighty flawed people. God does not use perfect people. God uses people….people like you and me to do the work God wants done…people like David…people like absolutely every one of us.
Thank God that God does not wait for us to be perfect. Remember that the next time you notice the imperfection of another member of the Body of Christ. If God can use them for His purpose, who are we to call anyone unworthy.
All of us serve only by God’s Grace, not by our merits or our talents, or our skill or our beauty or gender.
AMEN!
