2 Samuel 12:15-31 (CLICK HERE FOR BIBLE VERSES)
Hi GAMErs,
Today’s passage is 2 Samuel 12:15-31. As usual, I encourage you to open your Bible and read the passage yourself first. See what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help. Then read the GAME sharing below. Let’s go!
2 Samuel 12:15 (NIV)
15 After Nathan had gone home, the LORD struck the child that Uriah’s wife had borne to David, and he became ill.
On verse 15: Whenever a person has a miscarriage, or a child gets sick and dies prematurely, does that mean that God is actively giving the baby a sickness and punishing a child for their parent’s sins? No. Remember that in the Old Testament, the mindset of people was that everything — both good and bad — comes from God. In a way they’re correct insofar as without God there wouldn’t be anything. But when you read the New Testament, rather than emphasizing that everything good and bad comes directly from God, Jesus and the New Testament writers make a couple distinctions. First, everything good is from God (James 1:17). Second, when it comes to things that we consider bad, like sickness, sin, the death of a baby, an evil spirit or someone going to hell, these are not things that God wants. Rather they are things that God allows in a world broken by sin, where people are free to make their own choices (and often make the wrong choices). Does that mean the Old Testament and New Testament contradict each other? Rather, through Jesus and the New Testament we get a clearer, more defined, more fleshed out, picture of who God is. It’s like meeting someone in person versus seeing them on a screen.
As difficult as it is to learn of this baby boy’s sickness and death, we must remind ourselves that after suffering this temporary illness, this boy went to heaven, as David alludes to in verse 23. This boy’s sickness and death was a reminder to David, to David’s household and to all of us today not to put our entire hope in our life on earth, but to remember that heaven is waiting for us. I believe this also suggests that when a child passes away before the child can understand or be held accountable for his or her sin, we can have great assurance that the child has gone to heaven.
2 Samuel 12:16-17 (NIV)
16 David pleaded with God for the child. He fasted and went into his house and spent the nights lying on the ground.
17 The elders of his household stood beside him to get him up from the ground, but he refused, and he would not eat any food with them.
On verse 16-17: Pressure and crisis have this way of revealing what is truly in our hearts. Having earlier confessed his sin to Nathan (v13 – “I have sinned against the Lord”), David responds to his son’s sickness and to the prophecy that this son will die not by blaming God or complaining to God, but by drawing close to God and pleading with Him for mercy. So David fasts day and night, weeping and lying prostrate before God on the ground, hoping that somehow God would spare his son somehow.
What can we learn from this? When you are facing a crisis, don’t just blame God or complain to God. Rather, take time to repent of sin, to draw near to God like never before and to look to Him for mercy. In some cases, God will give you the breakthrough you requested; in other cases, as in David’s case here, the breakthrough would come in other ways, namely in his own relationship with God and in the way He would from then on use the power God had given him.
2 Samuel 12:18-23 (NIV)
18 On the seventh day the child died. David’s servants were afraid to tell him that the child was dead, for they thought, “While the child was still living, we spoke to David but he would not listen to us. How can we tell him the child is dead? He may do something desperate.”
19 David noticed that his servants were whispering among themselves and he realized the child was dead. “Is the child dead?” he asked. “Yes,” they replied, “he is dead.”
20 Then David got up from the ground. After he had washed, put on lotions and changed his clothes, he went into the house of the LORD and worshiped. Then he went to his own house, and at his request they served him food, and he ate.
21 His servants asked him, “Why are you acting this way? While the child was alive, you fasted and wept, but now that the child is dead, you get up and eat!”
22 He answered, “While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept. I thought, ‘Who knows? The LORD may be gracious to me and let the child live.’
23 But now that he is dead, why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me.”
On verses 18-23: When David gets confirmation that his 7 day old son has died (v18), David responds to the news in a way that surprises those around him. Rather than weeping and prostrating himself even more, David responds in ways that make people think he has finished mourning: he gets up, washes himself, changes his clothes, goes to the house of God to worship, returns home, asks that a meal be prepared for him and eats it (v20). When his servants ask David why he is acting this way, David answers that while the boy was alive, he thought that maybe there was a chance God would let the boy live (v22). But now that the boy is dead, David says, “why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me.” (v23) Was David responding in anger as if he had given up on God? Or was David’s response one of surrender and humbly choosing to move on? I believe it’s the latter. David had reached the point of surrendering the situation to God. He had done all he could to plead with God for his son’s life, but when the news came that his son had died, David could go to the house of God to worship and say, “God, Your will be done.”
What can we learn from this? When we try to play God (as David did when he slept with Bathsheba and murdered Uriah), it only results in death and destruction. But when we surrender our lives to God and accept that God’s way is best (as David did in this passage), God sets us free and He gives us the strength to rise again.
Also, praise God that though this unnamed baby son of David died for David’s sin and never returned back to life, there would be another son of David who would die for David’s sin and return back to life. His name is Jesus Christ.
2 Samuel 12:24-25 (NIV)
24 Then David comforted his wife Bathsheba, and he went to her and lay with her. She gave birth to a son, and they named him Solomon. The LORD loved him;
25 and because the LORD loved him, he sent word through Nathan the prophet to name him Jedidiah.
On verses 24-25: David’s surrender to God had set him free and helped him rise again. So much so to the point that David could also comfort his wife Bathsheba and God would bless them with another son. David and Bathsheba would name this second son Solomon and through the prophet Nathan God would give this son a nickname: Jedidiah, meaning “loved by God”. Solomon would go on to succeed David as king eventually. God could celebrate and bless the birth of David and Bathsheba’s second son because His anger toward David’s sin had been exhausted and forgiven. All of this goes to show that once God’s anger toward a certain situation is exhausted, God does not let His anger leak into other situations. Praise God that His anger lasts only a moment, but His favour lasts a lifetime. May we deal with our anger in similar ways, not allowing our anger at past situations poison the way we see new situations.
2 Samuel 12:26-31 (NIV)
26 Meanwhile Joab fought against Rabbah of the Ammonites and captured the royal citadel.
27 Joab then sent messengers to David, saying, “I have fought against Rabbah and taken its water supply.
28 Now muster the rest of the troops and besiege the city and capture it. Otherwise I will take the city, and it will be named after me.”
29 So David mustered the entire army and went to Rabbah, and attacked and captured it.
30 He took the crown from the head of their king–its weight was a talent of gold, and it was set with precious stones–and it was placed on David’s head. He took a great quantity of plunder from the city
31 and brought out the people who were there, consigning them to labor with saws and with iron picks and axes, and he made them work at brickmaking. He did this to all the Ammonite towns. Then David and his entire army returned to Jerusalem.
On verses 26-31: Here we see David returning to his role as the active commander in chief of Israel’s military, a role he neglected when he was having his affair with Bathsheba. Verses 26-28 suggest to me that David’s absence from leading the way he should affected the morale of his troops, especially Joab his general. It goes to show that when we neglect our responsibilities and act selfishly, we cause the team that we serve with to suffer.
These verses also point us to hope. For if the events here in verses 26-31 chronologically follow what happened in verse 25, then it shows that David was able to rise again and move forward with life after the death of his baby boy.
Father, thank You that as great as the pain and loss we may suffer in our lives, Your grace is greater. May I surrender to Your will and Your ways. Thank You for being fully ready, willing and able to restore us so that we can rise again and conquer new territory in Your name. In Jesus’ name, AMEN!
opyright © 2022 Justin Lim. All rights reserved.
