DAVID AND BATHSHEBA

2 Samuel 11:1-13 / Keywords 11:4

Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he slept with her. (She had purified herself from her uncleanness.) Then she went back home.

 

David and Bathsheba

11:1 In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king’s men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem.

2 One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful, 3 and David sent someone to find out about her. The man said, “She is Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite.” 4 Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he slept with her. (Now she was purifying herself from her monthly uncleanness.) Then she went back home. 5 The woman conceived and sent word to David, saying, “I am pregnant.”

6 So David sent this word to Joab: “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” And Joab sent him to David. 7 When Uriah came to him, David asked him how Joab was, how the soldiers were and how the war was going. 8 Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” So Uriah left the palace, and a gift from the king was sent after him. 9 But Uriah slept at the entrance to the palace with all his master’s servants and did not go down to his house.

10 David was told, “Uriah did not go home.” So he asked Uriah, “Haven’t you just come from a military campaign? Why didn’t you go home?”

11 Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah are staying in tents,[a] and my commander Joab and my lord’s men are camped in the open country. How could I go to my house to eat and drink and make love to my wife? As surely as you live, I will not do such a thing!”

12 Then David said to him, “Stay here one more day, and tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. 13 At David’s invitation, he ate and drank with him, and David made him drunk. But in the evening Uriah went out to sleep on his mat among his master’s servants; he did not go home.

Footnotes

a. 2 Samuel 11:11 Or staying at Sukkoth

1. Even David, a man after God’s own heart, was not fully obedient to God (1Ki 15:5). As his encounter with Goliath propelled him upward, his encounter with Bathsheba led to his downfall: But God was faithful to David. In his story we see ourselves.

 

2. What led David to such action? There is the obvious temptation of her beauty (2b). But look at the repeated use of David’s authority in the verbs, particularly “David sent…” Instead of fighting the war, David sent Joab, while he remained. He sent for Bathsheba (4), sent for Uriah (6). When David began to think he was in control of his life, knowing what was best, sin had him.

 

3. But not all things were in his control. Bathsheba sent word she was pregnant (5). Her husband Uriah, one of David’s mighty men (23:39), was too loyal to God and to David to abide by David’s plot to cover the adultery. David was fully trapped in sin. The story is as old as the garden of Eden. As we begin to think we can be like God – sovereign over life – Satan has us. Objectively we might feign disgust: how could David do that? But as we honestly allow God’s word to speak to us, we realize none of us is without sin (Jn 8:7).

 

Prayer Father, I cringe at this story, as it exposes too closely my own sin. Help me not to look away but allow your word to convict me of the truth.

One Word Pride is the root of sin