1.
Please pray with me.
May the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be pleasing
in Your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen. The
message from God’s Word as we continue our Lenten sermon series on the 10
Commandments is taken from the 6th Commandment and it focuses on 2
Samuel 11:1-5. Dear brothers and sisters
in Christ.
2.
Keeping the 6th
Commandment and upholding God’s gift of marriage is hard. Here are a few illustrations to prove my
point. When the late Mr. and Mrs. Henry
Ford celebrated their golden wedding anniversary, a reporter asked them, “To what do you attribute your 50 years of
successful married life?” “The formula,” said Ford, “is the same formula I’ve always used in making cars—just stick to one
model.” Here’s another one. Lillian Woods’ mother was the old-fashioned
kind who was firmly committed to the sanctity of marriage. Just before she got
married, Lillian’s mom took her aside and said, “I’m not going to give you a long sermon. Just remember one thing: in
every marriage, there are grounds for divorce. What you have to do is to keep
finding grounds for marriage.” Finally,
the last one. After five years of
marriage, Amber and Jack began having problems. They argued so bitterly that
Jack decided he wanted a divorce. Jack went to see a lawyer. At their first
session, the lawyer asked Jack, “What
first attracted you to this woman?” Jack replied, “Her forthrightness, straightforwardness and frankness.” The
counselor then asked, “Why then are you
now telling me you want to end the relationship?” Jack answered, “Her forthrightness, straightforwardness and
frankness.”
3.
Through the Sixth Commandment,
the Lord explicitly declares: “You shall
not commit adultery.” Did you hear that? God’s not talking to the pews, the
carpet, or the walls. He’s talking to you! “You shall not commit adultery.” That means
that you should fear and love God (fear and love takes you back to the First
Commandment)—fear and love God so that you lead a sexually pure and decent life
in what you say and do. Anything that
adulterates marriage God forbids. Everything that enhances faithfulness and
love between a husband and a wife in holy marriage is what God wants practiced.
That’s for you and your neighbor’s good. Really!
4.
Here’s another news flash, everyone. Hang on tight.
I know it’s going to blow your mind and rock your world. Here it is: Sex is
not for single people as it’s often depicted in many popular television
shows. Instead, sex is a gift from God for a man and woman to use properly in
the estate of holy marriage. Let me say it this way: Sex is for a married
couple—a man and a woman. A one-flesh union! As Scripture teaches based upon
God’s “very-good”-from-the-beginning institution of holy marriage in Genesis
with Adam and Eve: “Therefore a man shall
leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall
become one flesh” (Gen 2:24).
5.
And what does King David, of all people, do? The man
after God’s own heart (1 Sam 13:14)? He sins! Blatantly. Unrepentantly. He flat
out adulterates marriage. Sixth Commandment? He’s going to blow that off. Why?
Well, he spies Bathsheba bathing. She’s very beautiful. Stunning. Quite the
hottie! Sports Illustrated swimsuit-issue model or Scarlet Johansson or
Jennifer Lawrence lovely. And King David wants her. Lusts for her. Instead of lusting after Bathsheba, David
should have run three miles, thought about baseball, or taken a cold shower,
but instead, he goes after Bathsheba.
6.
Bathsheba is married to Uriah, one of David’s royal
guards. David doesn’t care. The Tenth Commandment? He couldn’t care less.
Bathsheba is the daughter of Eliam, one of the king’s personal bodyguards.
David doesn’t care. He will have her. She’s all he can think about. Can’t get
her out of his mind. He’s the king! And kings get what they want! No matter
whom he hurts. No matter whom he sins against. He has a desire. He will fulfill
his desire!
7.
So he sends his royal messengers to get her. “Sneak her in the back door of the mansion,
boys. Bring her to my royal bedchamber. Light the candles. Turn on the
easy-listening music. A little aromatherapy. Pull down the sheets. Tell her to
put on something very comfortable, if you know what I mean! Put the Do Not
Disturb sign on the doorknob when you leave.” And then, matter-of-factly the
Scripture says she, “came to him, and he lay with her” (v 4).
8.
There’s no spinning this. No excusing the adultery
by saying that David and Bathsheba “love” each other. There’s no justifying the
adultery by saying that what people do in the privacy of their own bedroom is
nobody’s business. The one-night stand that David and Bathsheba have is adultery.
It’s not God pleasing! Adultery is a sin against God and against your own body!
Adultery adulterates holy marriage. Corrupts it. Wrecks lives. Destroys
families. Ruins reputations. Proverbs 6:32 wisely warns, “He who commits adultery lacks sense; he who does it destroys himself,”
that is to say, “destroys his own
soul.”
9.
And yet David does it! Lacks total judgment. Puts
his life before God in serious spiritual jeopardy. Lives only for himself.
Exists only by his own words: “I want her! Go get her and bring her to me!”
As if his words are better than the words of the Lord: “You shall not commit adultery.”
10.
How about you? Have you pulled a King David?
Adulterated your marriage? Abused the gift of sex outside of holy marriage?
Broken the Sixth Commandment and therefore the First? Before you answer those questions, you’d
better hear the Lord’s words from Mt 5:27–28. Jesus declares: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall
not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with
lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”
11.
So you’ve pulled a King David! No one is excluded.
All have broken the Sixth Commandment. You break it not only with your deeds,
but also with the thoughts of your mind, the lust of your eyes, and the desires
of your heart. And for such Sixth
Commandment sinners, Jesus comes and lords his forgiveness over you. His divine
forgiveness that comes from his Good Friday suffering and dying. Suffering and
dying with all the sin of every sinner in his body as it hangs on the tree.
Numbered with the transgressors he is! Totally. So that “for our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin” (2 Cor 5:21). Bearing
every unfaithfulness and all adulteries. David’s. Yours. The world’s. Even the
adulteries and all the unfaithfulness that was committed against you! Becoming
the maximum sinner! The biggest adulterer. All sin is his on the cross. To
answer for. To atone for.
12.
So, I’m here to tell you today what God’s will is
for you. It’s this: that he wills your forgiveness in Christ—that your sin, all
sin, especially the Sixth Commandment sin, doesn’t belong to you anymore. Why? Because
Jesus took it. He was cursed and damned with it when darkness came over all the
land, and he cried out from the cross, “My
God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46). Listen! The Lord has
taken away your sin! He doesn’t count it against you at all. You are forgiven. And with
Jesus’ Good Friday forgiveness, you are content to enjoy the gift of a sexual relationship
only in holy marriage, not adulterating it.
13.
To be a true human being who is content to live as a
creature in the estate of holy marriage the way God created it. In other words,
the Creator, who died on the cross for you, has good use for you, his redeemed.
You are given to fear and love God so that you lead a sexually pure and decent
life in what you say and do. And husband and wife love and honor each other in
the estate of holy marriage as you live by faith in Jesus and fervent love
toward one another. That’s precisely what you want to do, right? Of course! In the name of Jesus. Amen.
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