1.
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from
God our Heavenly Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The
message from God’s Word today is taken from 2 Samuel 12:1-13 (READ TEXT). It’s entitled, “You Are the Man,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2.
It was the time of year when kings went off
to war, but not this king. He stayed at home. In the neighborhood his eyes fell
upon a beautiful woman, and he desired her very much. He called for her, the
deed was done, and soon she found that she was going to have a baby. This plotline doesn’t come from some soap
opera on TV. This is straight out of the Bible. It’s only part of the story of
King David, David’s loyal soldier Uriah the Hittite, and Uriah’s wife,
Bathsheba. In desperation David eventually killed Uriah so he could both take
Uriah’s wife and try to hide his own sin at the same time. Yes, the great king
committed adultery and murder, to say nothing of all his covering up. Maybe we
weren’t expecting such things from David. But, he was, after all, a sinner.
3.
The Lord gave the prophet Nathan the
assignment to confront the king with his sin. Nathan had a difficult job. It
wouldn’t do to send a memo with the heading, “TO: King David FROM: Nathan the prophet RE: Bathsheba.” The king
would quite possibly quit reading such a note, crumple it up, and burn it.
Still worse, he might send soldiers after Nathan, and then who would tell David
what he needed to hear? Instead, Nathan
told the king about a rich man and a poor man. The rich man had many flocks,
but the poor man had just one little lamb that was like a member of his family.
When the rich man received an out-of-town guest, he took the poor man’s lamb
and had it prepared for dinner. When he heard this, King David became enraged.
He was filled with anger at this despicable act. He declared that the rich man
deserved to die. Then Nathan the prophet sprang his trap. He told the king: “You are the man!” Nathan’s story was
about David. There was no denying it: David
was the man.
4.
A little boy had attended Vacation
Bible School years ago. As he and his classmates were sitting in the church
pews that day, his pastor brought them pencils and paper. He told the little
boy and his classmates to think of some really bad sin they had committed. All
sins look equally bad to God, but we all tend to regard some as worse than
others. Each of them was to recall a sin they thought was horrible. Then the
little boy and his classmates were supposed to write that sin down! As the
little boy wrote, he tried to make certain that the kids sitting on either side
of him couldn’t see what he was writing. He could have saved myself the
trouble, though. They were too busy trying to keep their own papers covered to
look at his. Then the pastor talked
about sin. He told them that it’s rebellion against God. In fact, sin amounts
to our ridiculous and wicked desire to kill God and sit on his throne
ourselves. He added that sin has consequences, both in this life and for all
eternity. The little boy and his
classmates listened as their pastor spoke, but at least some of their thoughts
were turning to what the pastor might be planning to do with the sheets of
paper they were keeping so carefully covered.
They didn’t have long to wonder. The pastor asked them to hand him their
papers. Then he took them from them. He was collecting those papers on which they
had written their most terrible sins! Was he going to read them? Still worse,
was he going to read them out loud? Worst of all, was he going to show those
papers to their parents? You see, sin always wants to remain unknown. The
little boy and his classmates thought they were about to be exposed, like David. Then their pastor produced a big metal pot.
He placed all their papers in there, lit a match to them, and burned them. He
did this to show them how complete God’s forgiveness is. For a while, though,
how the little boy and his classmates squirmed!
5.
Think about that story for a moment… If the little boy’s pastor had begun the
devotion that day by saying that he was going to lead his class in the public
confession of sin from the hymnal, they would have gone along without a second
thought. Even if he told them before the confession itself that he wanted them
to think of some really bad sin and especially recall it as they confessed, they
wouldn’t have been greatly upset. Although they would have readily confessed their
sins to God, nonetheless it terrified them to think that some mere human being
might find out what they had written on those sheets. Shouldn’t the little boy
and his classmates have feared God more than people? Shouldn’t this be the case for you and me
today too?
6.
When the subject of private confession
and absolution comes up, sometimes people say: “Oh, I could never confess my sins to my pastor or to anyone else.” It
seems they don’t mind that God knows all their sins, but telling those sins to
someone else scares them to death. Isn’t that strange? We might think we would
get some sympathy from fellow sinners, even though we don’t deserve any from
the Lord.
7.
After about a month of hearing a new
pastor preach, one man stormed out to his car in the parking lot. “I’m never going back to that church again,”
he was muttering. When someone asked him why, he responded, “Because of that new pastor. He knows me too
well.” Of course, the brand-new pastor didn’t know this man very well at
all. Still, God’s law as proclaimed by the pastor had apparently touched a
nerve. The real issue wasn’t how well the pastor knew the man, but rather how
well the Lord knew him. The Lord knew
David. In the text, God’s Word found him out. He was the man. David was caught,
caught before the Lord. There was no more avoiding sin for David, covering it
up or hiding it. He was the man. David confessed.
8.
God’s Word has something to tell us,
as we sit here listening to the account of David’s sins. It springs the trap on
each of us and declares, “You are the man.”
The Bible says, “Therefore you have no
excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another
you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things”
(Romans 2:1). Just like David, we can be selfish. In our selfishness we hurt
other people, and like David we want to cover everything up. The words of God
through Nathan apply most fittingly to us: You are the man. Like David we need
to confess, “I have sinned against the
Lord.”
9.
After we confess our sins before God
and one another, the absolution, the word of forgiveness, is really quite
simple. It’s short and sweet. In the text, it was shorter still. Nathan told
David, “The Lord also has put away your
sin.” Again David was the man, but now the man whose sin the Lord had put
away. So also, the absolution says to you the most important thing of all. Don’t
concentrate on anyone else right now. This is about you. It’s a simple and
direct word, directed right to you: you are the man, the one whose sin the Lord
has put away. See what I mean? From our perspective it’s short, even simple.
Our sin is forgiven. When God says it, that’s how it is. There are no “ifs” “ands” or “buts.” The Lord has put
away your sin. Period.
10.It’s
possible for us silently to agonize over our sins for days stretching into
weeks and months. David did. In a psalm, he said: For
when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon
me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not
cover up my iniquity; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,” and
you forgave the iniquity of my sin (Psalm 32:3–5). After David confessed, forgiveness was
simple. It was simple for David, and it is for you and me.
11.During
a war in which the British army was engaged years ago, a chaplain was watching
British soldiers marching toward the front, wearing their famous red coats. A
friend handed him a piece of red-colored glass and told him to look at the
soldiers through it. Through the glass all their red coats looked white—pure
white. The chaplain thought of the words of God through Isaiah, “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall
be as white as snow” (Isaiah 1:18). How simple it was for him to look at
the passing troops through a piece of red-colored glass! Then he remembered
that when God looks at us and sees us white, it is because he, too, is looking
through something red. He’s looking through the blood of Christ.
12.Although
I said a moment ago that from our standpoint God’s forgiveness is simple, it
remains true that from the Lord’s standpoint there was nothing simple about it.
Look at the lengths to which he was willing to go. It was for us men and for
our salvation that God sent his only Son into this world. It has well been said
that G.R.A.C.E. is “God’s riches at
Christ’s expense.” Christ is the only reason why God has ever forgiven
anyone, in the New Testament or the Old Testament. He extended himself to
fulfill God’s law perfectly, in every respect, as our Substitute. He went all
the way to death on the cross. Christ
even went to the length of enduring hell in place of us all when he cried out,
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
(Matthew 27:46). Jesus was “delivered up for our trespasses and raised
for our justification” (Romans 4:25).
13.Therefore,
you are the man whose sin is put away. All your sins are forgiven—not merely
some of them, or many of them, or most of them, or even almost all of them. In Christ, all of your sin is forgiven,
including original sin. Your sin is totally forgiven, even that thing you
seldom think about until someone brings it up, and that other thing you can’t
seem to get out of your mind. God has hidden his face from our sins and blotted
out all our iniquities (Psalm 51:9). Once red as scarlet, on account of Christ
we gleam as white as snow.
14.All
of us have felt guilt and shame before other people when we’ve wronged them. We
know how powerful this feeling can be, but guilt is no mere feeling. Our real
guilt before God runs greater and more terrible than any guilt feeling, but it
has really been put away by our crucified and risen Lord. You really are the
man—the sinner completely forgiven in Christ.
Now the peace of God that passes
all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus until life
everlasting. Amen.
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