As you're being seated, I would invite you please to turn with me in your Bibles to 2 Samuel chapter 11. And I'll ask for your forgiveness for the fact that I'll be reading out of the English Standard Version. This is a rather long portion, this little drama here in David's and Israel's life. And I've broken, there's some portions in both chapter 11 and 12 that we'll be reading. And I've broken up the main parts to be able to get just the main import of this little mini-drama here in David and Israel's life here. 2 Samuel chapter 11 and 12. In the spring of the year, the time when kings go out to battle, David sent Joab and his servants with him, and all Israel. And they ravaged the Ammonites and besieged Ramah. But David remained at Jerusalem. It happened late one afternoon, when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king's house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful. And David sent and inquired about the woman, and one said, Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite? So David sent messengers and took her, and she came to him, and he lay with her. Now she had been purifying herself from her uncleanness. Then she returned to her house, and the woman conceived, and she sent and told David, I am pregnant. Now jump down to me, please, to verse 14, 11, 14. In the morning, David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. In the letter, he wrote, Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting, and then draw back from him that he may be struck down and die. And now jump down, please, to verse 26. When the wife of Uriah had heard that Uriah, her husband, was dead, she lamented over her husband. And when the morning was over, David sent and brought her to his house. And she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing that David had done displeased the Lord. And now chapter 12. And the Lord sent Nathan to David, and he came to him and said to him, There were two men in a certain city, the one rich and the other poor. The rich man had very many flocks and herds, but the poor man had nothing but one little ewe lamb, which he had bought. And he brought it up, and it grew up with him and with his children. It used to eat of his morsel and drink from his cup and lie in his arms, and it was like a daughter to him. Now there came a traveler to the rich man, and he was unwilling to take one of his own flock or herd to prepare for the guest who had come to him, but he took the poor man's lamb and prepared it for the man who had come to him. Then David's anger was greatly kindled against the man, and he said to Nathan, As the Lord lives, the man who has done this deserves to die, and he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing and because he had no pity. Nathan said to David, You are the man. Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you out of the hand of Saul, and I gave you your master's house and your master's wives into your arms, and gave you the house of Israel and of Judah. And if this were too little, I would have added to you as much more. Why have you despised the word of the Lord to do what is evil in his sight? You have struck down Uriah the Hittite with a sword and have taken his wife to be your wife and have killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. Now, therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house because you despised the Lord and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife. Thus says the Lord, Behold, I will rise up evil against you out of your own house, and I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor. And he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this son. For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the Son. David said to Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord. And Nathan said to David, the Lord has also put away your sin, you shall not die. Nevertheless, because this deed, you have utterly scorned the Lord. The child who is to be born to you shall surely die. Then Nathan went to his house. Thus far, the reading of God's word. And may God add his blessing to the reading, preaching, and hearing of his word. I'm titling this sermon, A View of Christ Through David's Failure and Confession. And this is because this text, with all of Scripture, whatever else it is doing in its immediate context, is ultimately about the person and work of Jesus of Nazareth. And so, even though this text has to do with David's sin and, as I hope to show, Israel's sin, Because all Scripture, and thus all reality, is about what God is doing in Christ, therefore, again, I'm titling this sermon, A View of Christ Through David's Failure and Confession, even as the Apostle John says in the book of Revelation, that the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. Well, first of all, scene one in this little mini-drama opens with a feeling of calm, both individual for David and national for Israel. David recently had ascended the throne and had a great deal of success. And yet, right after this opening narrative in this little mini-drama in David's and Israel's life, we see that, you know, though springtime is a year of a time of genesis and new life, and you can almost hear the birds chirping in that opening narrative, Nonetheless, it quickly turns to this very unexpected event in the life of Israel's king, David, at that time. And the narrative tension continues to build and build as David continues to cover his sin until finally the centerpiece of this little mini-drama. When David finally confesses, I have sinned against the Lord. Well, this morning we want to focus on two simple points. First of all, we want to identify the sin of David, and as I hope to show also the sin of Israel in this drama, we want to ask and answer the question, what specifically is the essence of the sin being committed here? And then secondly, as I mentioned, we want to have a view of Christ through David's failure and confession. Well, first of all then, the sin of David, and as I will hope to show later, the sin of Israel, The sin here committed is the sin of presumption. The sin of taking God's goodness for granted. Presuming upon God. The sin of presumption is an attitude that, well, God is with me or God is with us because of something I have, something I possess, something I've done. It allows one to be rather smug and self-confident in his or herself. This sin of presumption causes one to be unwatchful. You've heard of the adage, resting in your laurels. That's what David is doing here. The sin of presumption is not the sin of a rookie. It's the sin of a veteran. The sin of presumption is not normally the sin of a beginner, but rather the sin of a professional and expert. I've been doing this for a while, is the thought here. Ultimately, the sin of presumption is a failure in heart devotion. And all throughout Scripture, we see that God is always concerned about the disposition of men and women's and boys' and girls' hearts. In fact, on one occasion, Jesus, quoting Isaiah, turns to the people of Israel. And he said, rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, saying, This people honors me by their lips, but their heart is far from me. And as we look around through lots of Scripture, especially the Psalms, they speak of this very sin, the essence of this sin of presumption. In fact, ironically, one of the greatest creation, Psalms written by David, bears this out. That beautiful creation, Psalm 19, where David begins, The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows His handiwork. Day unto day utter speech and night unto night reveals knowledge. And he goes on poetically describing the beauties of creation. And then interestingly, he goes from this poetic description of the beauty of creation and then he goes to the perfections of the law. He says the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul and so forth. And then he finishes this creation psalm with these words. Listen, who can discern his errors? Declare me innocent, he says, from hidden faults. Keep back your servant also, here it is, from presumptuous sins. Let them not have dominion over me. Then I will be blameless and innocent of great salvation. So this presumption, this taking God's goodness for granted, this self-confidence because of something we have or something we've done, particularly for David, it leads him to a self-confidence as his passion for God begins to wane. After David ascends the throne, after so long a time, and after conquering the Canaanites, The first thing recorded here in Scripture after he conquers the Canaanites is he goes and acts exactly like the Canaanite lords as he commits sexual immorality and murder. In fact, you remember earlier in David's life when he stood before the Philistines and said, Who is this uncircumcised Philistine to defy the armies of the living God? And here, David is not only acting as bad as the Canaanites and the Philistines, he's acting worse. Why? Because he's doing the same actions that they're doing, but to whom much is given, much is required. And David had the law and the prophets and the promises of the Gospel in shadowy form, and yet he's behaving exactly like the pagan lords. David in this little mini-drama is thinking, oh, God's with me. Look how well everything's going. You can almost hear the birds chirping. I'm conquering my enemies. Look at all this success. Surely a little folly won't hurt. Gone are the days when David used to cry out for his life. You remember those years when Saul would hunt David like some sort of abandoned dog and hunt for his life? And David wrote a host of psalms that occupy the greatest place in all the psalms. The number one genre of psalms are called psalms of lament. And ironically, David is the number one author of these psalms. These psalms are crying out to God. For instance, Psalm 13. How long, O Lord, David says, will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily? He's asking God to draw near to him, but no, no. In this little episode here in 2 Samuel, David's not thinking like that at all. No, no. No, David's smug now. He's got this God thing down. He is presuming on the grace of God and he's thinking, ah, you know, a little folly won't hurt. Look, everything's going so well. But David forgot who he was and where he came from. He forgot that all of his success had nothing to do with him ultimately. He forgot that the very breath that he breathed came from God. That his life, that in God, he lived and moved and had his being. He forgot about this because now he's in these years of success and he's feeling smug. We know this because in the cursing episode spoken by Nathan, God says as much when he says this. Thus says the Lord God of Israel, I anointed you king over Israel, I delivered you from the hand of Saul. I gave you your master's house and your master's wives in your keeping and gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And I would have given you much more, implying if you had not committed this heinous sin. And Uriah, Bathsheba's husband, he is brought into this little narrative as a foil to David. That is to say, he's brought into this story to highlight the absolute heinous and self-interested nature of David's sin. Uriah's faithfulness serves to illustrate and magnify the utterly self-interested nature of David's sin. But it's interesting, brothers and sisters, as we turn to the New Testament, we never find the apostles giving us moral lessons from the life of Old Testament saints. Not that there isn't a pastoral place for this. But if we look in the broader canon and look at this story and what's actually going on in redemptive history, we notice, along with the apostles that hear, there's something else going on in the broader canon that is not simply focusing on David's sin alone. That is to say, in the broader canon, God is dealing with Israel's presumption as a nation. That is to say, God is dealing with Israel's corporate pride. Israel loved David and they couldn't wait for him to become king. Remember how many years they labored under Saul and they couldn't wait for David to become king? And after Samuel anoints David and he's finally, after all these years of hardship, when he finally ascends the kingship, We read back in 1 Chronicles 11, Then all Israel came together to David at Hebron, saying, Indeed, we are your flesh and your bone. King David, now that you've taken the throne, we'll do anything for you. We're like your body. They love King David. And now everything in David's life and in his real corporate life is going so well, they're conquering their enemies. It's this shining time in their life. But do you remember how Israel got a king in the first place? Kids, I bet you remember this from Sunday school in your Bible reading. They didn't even have a king for anything that they did that was good. In other words, the very fact that they had a king was not because of their good, but because of their evil. If we turn back to 1 Samuel, we'll see this in 1 Samuel 8. Listen. Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah and said to him, Look, you are old and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now make us a king to judge us like all the nations. But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, Give us a king to judge us. So Samuel prayed to the Lord and the Lord said to Samuel, Heed the voice of the people and all that they say to you, listen, For they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me, that I should be king over them. The very simple fact that they even have a king was because of the rejection of God. And in spite of the fact that David had been successful, in spite of the fact that this is a shining time in Israel's history, Nonetheless, David's sin is a reminder of Israel's corporate pride and presuming on God. And we notice this, that Israel themselves has had this tendency throughout all the prophets, you see the prophets bearing witness to this fact as they speak against Israel as a corporate body and failing to keep the Mosaic Law as they were supposed to. But Israel is not the only culprit. As we look throughout church history, sadly, I think we see the church has always had sort of a default to fall into this sin of presumption. Taking God's goodness for granted. Thinking that God is with us as a Christian body because of something we have, something we have done, or something we possess. Right after the current Pope Ratzinger in the Roman Catholic Church became the Pope, one of the very first things he says is he reminded all Catholics that Protestant churches are not true churches. And you know why. Because they say, the Roman Catholic Church says, that we are the only ones that have apostolic succession back to Peter. And they raise their tradition to the same level of Scripture, exactly like the Pharisees. And saying that God is with us ipso facto, just because of the mere fact that we have apostolic succession. Even though they teach things, not only that Scripture doesn't teach, but teaching things and binding the consciences of Christians that Scripture teaches against. But Israel and the Roman Catholic Church... Now, I'm speaking about the Roman Catholic Church as an institution, not every individual Roman Catholic. And I'll remind us, for instance, that John Calvin, and I think he was right here, that he believed that there were even true parishes within the Roman Catholic hierarchy, and that both Luther and Calvin and all of the Reformers believed that there were Christians within that body, as we make that distinction between the visible and invisible church. Be that as it may, the idea that the church can have something or do something that presumes upon God, I think is analogous or very much like what's happening here in the overall narrative in Samuel. And I don't think Israel and the Roman Catholic Church is the only culprit. I can remember myself in my early days when I first heard about the gospel of Christ. I lived in Hawaii, and I can remember going with many of my friends on the beaches of Waikiki and knocking on people's doors and saying, have you accepted Jesus into your heart as your Lord and Savior? And I realized that deep in my heart, after many years, that I thought that God was with me because I did this little thing. I said this prayer, and therefore that's why God's with me. And many of my Pentecostal brothers and sisters say to me, you know, Alex, that's great that you've got all that theology, but do you speak in tongues? Do you have the gifts of the Spirit? Many times, sadly, looking to some religious experience to give me assurance that God is with me. So we look for things like Israel did with kings or certain things to know that God is with us outside of the Gospel. And many times, sadly, in our Reformed tradition, We need to be very much aware of this presumption as we sometimes sadly think that, oh, God is with us because we have this perfect system of doctrine. We've got this infallible church order. That's why God's with us. He's not with the church down the street. They don't believe in election. Presuming that God is with us because of something that we have or something that we do. But yet, in the final analysis, this presuming on God, thinking that God is with us in some way outside of the Gospel itself, His promise in Christ, ultimately this presumption on God ultimately is idolatry. And I think the Heidelberg Catechism question in answer 95 gets it perfectly when it asks the question, what is idolatry? And the answer is, idolatry is having or inventing something in which one trusts in place of or alongside of the only true God who has revealed Himself in His Word. And all of us, in some way or fashion, have done this. But as I mentioned, David's sin and Israel's corporate pride and even the church's idolatry, as we confess there is no perfectly pure church, this is not the final word here. Ultimately, for those who have been given the eyes of faith, what we have here in this text is not simply moral lessons about David's life or Israel's corporate pride or the church's idolatry. Ultimately, what we have here is the most beautiful of all vistas. We have a view of Christ through David's failure and confession. First of all, we see Christ through David's failure as a negative example and a positive type. and then in David's confession. First of all, we see Christ through David's negative example. That is to say, quite simply, that David as an imperfect king points forward to the perfect king. It's this simple. David sinned and that shows that he was not the Messiah. And Israel should have recognized that and waited for his greater son. But more interestingly, we see a view of Christ through David as a positive type. That is a positive prophetic type. That is to say that David, in his office of king, aside from his personal failure, God establishes the kingly office through David's sin. Amazingly, God permits Israel's sin and idolatry and then in spite of this sin and idolatry, He uses their request to bring about His ultimate redemptive purposes in Christ. Where sin abounded, grace abounded much more. So we see even here the amazing providence of God and bringing out his redemptive purposes in Christ in spite of the failures of Israel, the church, and King David. And to bring this point home, I would ask you to turn with me, please, to Psalm 51. And again, I'll be reading from the English Standard Version, but a couple points before we look at a couple verses here in Psalm 51. as we see Christ revealed through David's confession, first of all, the genre of scripture there in 2 Samuel is simply historical narrative. That is, the literary form of historical narrative is simply recounting historical events. But now we are turning over to what traditionally has been considered the very confession that David wrote right after his sin with Bathsheba, and he writes this in a poetic way. So now we're turning to poetry. And poetry works quite differently than does historical narrative, whereas historical narrative just gives us one fact after another. Poetry works differently, and that is to say that poetry tends to go beyond mere historical facts to speak to us in a different way. That's why, you know, when you're driving in your car and you just went through a heartbreak or something like that and you hear some song, it speaks to you in a different way. She moves in a mysterious way. Who's she? You don't know. But it starts to speak to you in a different way, in a deeper way, because the poetry just works like that. Well, now we're turning to poetry and David's confession, And we see in this poetry that David is remembering. He's remembering his sin, but he is remembering much more than just his sin as he makes his confession through this poetic hyperbole, as it were. Look with me here, please, at Psalm 51, verse 2, for instance. David says, He says, wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgression and my sin is ever before me. Ever before me? I thought you just committed this one sin with Bathsheba and this murder against Uriah. Now you're saying my sin is ever before me. See, he's talking about something much deeper here. Look with me, please, at verse 4. He says, against you and you only have I sinned. Now that's a bold thing to say. He didn't also sin against Israel and Bathsheba and Uriah. Well, he did, but because of this poetic hyperbole, as it were, David is speaking about sin much deeper and much greater in his heart. Look at verse 5, please. Behold, David says, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me. Verse 6, Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being, and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart. Now David begins to talk about his very creation. In fact, it's very interesting that the artistic structure of this episode there in 2 Samuel is framed literally exactly like Genesis 1-3 and the account of the fall. It's almost as if you meditate on this psalm that God is saying to David and David is hearing echoed in his own ears the same words Adam heard in the garden. It's as though God says to David, David, what have you done? Have you eaten of the tree that I told you not to eat of? So even as Eve saw the fruit and took it, the exact same verbs are used. David saw the woman and took her. So what the Holy Spirit is indicating is that King David is walking in the steps of his father Adam. He's not the Messiah. And because David as a youngster was catechized and brought up on Israel's canon in the Torah, Therefore, he goes to God, the God who spoke out of light everything into existence. He goes to that God, and look at verse 10. He says, Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. He goes to the very first words of the Torah. And he reiterates those words that in Hebrew are, Bereshit, Berah, Elohim, Vayet, Hashemayim, Haeres. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. See, David's been covering his sin. And now he's been found out and he knows he's undone. And all he can do is go to the very first words of the Torah and say, create in me the same way that you created all things by your powerful word. Create in me a clean heart, O God. And he uses that same verb here in verse 10 when he says create. The verb is bara. Create in me a clean heart. And more interesting than this, brothers and sisters, Look down with me, please, at verse 16. David says, For you will not delight in sacrifices or I would give it. You will not be pleased with burnt offerings. Brothers and sisters, this is an amazing statement. I don't know about you, but when my pagan friends say, Alex, okay, I'm going to read the Bible, you know that if they make it through Genesis and Exodus, there's no way they're going to make it through Leviticus. Why? Leviticus is the church order of the Old Testament. When you sin, it tells you exactly what to do and what kind of sacrifice to make. And it gets rather boring, doesn't it? It just goes on and on and on about exactly what sacrifices you're supposed to do. And David says here, you don't delight in sacrifice? Where does David get this boldness to tell God that he doesn't delight in his church order that he instituted? He's trashing the church order. Elders, we better call David in for a consultation and get him straightened out here. Is he trashing the church order? No, he's not. He's rather doing two things. If you look carefully and read the Mosaic Law and the sacrifices in Leviticus, you'll notice that there is no sacrifice for murder and adultery. What is the penalty? It's death. David knows he's a dead man. He didn't just do something wrong in history. He knows deep inside of his being that he's undone before God. And there's no hope for him. Unless the God who caused light to shine out of darkness shines in his heart and makes him a new being and creates in him a new spirit, he knows that there's no hope. So he, first of all, recognizes that his sin means that he needs to be made new and he's utterly undone. But more importantly, brothers and sisters, by confessing that God does not delight in sacrifices, though he doesn't realize it at that time, yet we do, that what he is doing ultimately is he is prophesying of his greater Son, Jesus of Nazareth, who in time in history will reiterate these very words and say, sacrifice and offering you did not desire but a body you have prepared for me. Behold in the fullness of the book it is written of me to do your will. And therefore Nathan could say to David, David though you have sinned, God has put away your sin. And the only way we know that he can do that is because the second person of the triune God took David's and all our flesh upon him and lived the life that David never lived and took all David's sins and your sins upon him and nailed him to the cross. Blessed be the name of God. So as we conclude, brothers and sisters, let us make a few points. Are we then supposed to see this text as simply moral lessons for us to have, live the best life now and live a good moral life now and not be like David? No. Again, not that there isn't some pastoral aspect to that, But if you look through it and be honest, the patriarchs are pretty shady characters. So we see here, first of all, in conclusion, that David was not saved because he was good. He was saved because God is good. There's no cursing episode with Christ. There's never a time when some prophet came to Christ and said, because you've done this deed, therefore God's going to do this to you in a negative way. All we hear of is all, because you have done this, Therefore, Christ, our true king and priest and prophet, is given the inheritance of all things because he never failed. And also we see in this little drama in Israel and David's history that God used Israel's unbelief in asking for a king, ultimately for the purposes of the gospel. As Paul says in Romans 11, through their fall, salvation has come to the Gentiles, And then he breaks out with, oh, the depth of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his ways and his judgments past finding out. We serve a sovereign God who works all things after the counsel of his own will. Even the sins, overriding the sins of his people, of Israel and of the church and our individual sins and ultimately bringing about his covenant promises which can never fail. But there is some wisdom to be gained in this little drama. There is some wisdom to be learned. For instance, if we look over at Ecclesiastes, the wise man tells us in Ecclesiastes 11, That is to say, there is no utopia in this present age. There is nothing outside of the gospel of Jesus Christ given to us through the means of preaching and sacraments. These ordinary means that we can hold on to. There is no perfect family. There's no perfect church. There's no perfect job. There's no perfect relationship. Because as Paul says, the whole creation has been subjected to futility. And that futility will not end until Christ comes again. So we should not rest in anything but the gospel of Christ as we look forward to the call of God in Christ. For we are saved in hope, Paul says, but a hope that is seen is not hope. There is no utopia now, no perfect church. Preaching the Lord's table are means of grace, not machines. And we can never presume that because of anything we have or anything we possess that God is therefore automatically with us. God does not love the foolishness of preaching and the sacraments in and of themselves. They are temporary and imperfect, yet sufficient for the time. But there's coming a time when there will be no more of this foolishness of preaching and the Lord's table, when the kingdom of God comes and is perfected in Christ, all these temporary things will be done away. So ultimately, we want to look outside of ourselves once again to that unfailing promise of God in Christ, who will come again in the very flesh in which he was crucified. Let us therefore let Paul close us with an attitude, I think, in Philippians that reflects the attitude that we are to have in light of the words that we heard of the gospel this morning. Paul says, Not that I have already obtained, nor have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet, but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal of the prize of the upward call in Christ Jesus. In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen. Let us pray. Our Father and our God, we thank you once again that you, though you bring fallible men to bring the gospel to us, that nonetheless through these simple means of preaching and the Lord's table that you bring to us ultimately the gospel of Christ. We thank you, our Lord, that though we have sinned in as bad a way as David, Yet you have done away with our sins in Christ. And so we ask now, Father, that as you dismiss us, you would dismiss us in your Holy Spirit, that we would go full of faith in Christ and continuing to walk in our sanctification that you have outlined for us. In Jesus' name, amen.