From late July into late August of 1883, a series of tornado families swept through the southeastern potions of Minnesota. In this month of destruction, the first two tornado’s, one being an F4 killed four people. One month to the day later, another series of tornado’s landed in the Rochester area. The first landed and did some destruction. It swept through the area, hitting 40 farms, completely destroying 10 of them. An hour later, two tornados, with one being a massive category F5, swept through the northern part of Rochester, and in about five minutes, destroyed 135 homes, and damaged another 200. In the end 37 people died and over 200 were injured. An hour and half later, another tornado touched down, killing one more person, and injuring another 19.
The series of tornados carved a 10 mile wide path of destruction, and is considered one of the most devastating tornados to ever hit Minnesota at the time. But that’s what tornados do. They don’t attack certain people, they move, indiscriminately through an area, destroying whatever’s in their path.
And its this idea of indiscriminate destruction that brings us back to our series in Second Samuel, where we’ll be picking it back up in Chapter 12, verse 15. And as we open up to Second Samuel 12:15, let’s look back on the last few weeks.
As we entered into the second section of Second Samuel, we started seeing the dark days of David rise up. From his point of being on top of the world, his eyes lingered and led him to adultery with Bathsheba and the murder of Uriah. Through David’s sin, we talked about how, God uses extreme language to call us away from sin, so that we understand that sin is not something to play with. If David would have listened to God’s word, then things might have turned out differently.
David’s coverup of his sin led God to send Nathan to confront the king. Through an allegorical parable, David condemned his own sin by rightly judging the sin of another. When the sin was revealed, Nathan told David of God’s judgment upon his house. From this interaction, we walked away with the understanding that, God will not allow sin in our lives to go unpunished, and will expose sin publicly if necessary. Instead, God is calling us to a life of confession, repentance and cleansing.
Finally, we looked at David’s repentant Psalm 51. Through this psalm, David shows us that confession does not try to sugar coat the sin. It also shows us that repentance is seeking God’s cleansing, not just saying we’re sorry. We walked away from last week with the understanding that, God is calling us to a Psalm 51 attitude of confession, repentance and cleansing so that we would bring right sacrifices to him. Because only when we are right with God, can we bring a right sacrifice of our lives to him.
With these things back in our minds, we can look to the next part of the story as David’s sin begins to affect the people around him. Let’s read Second Samuel 12:15-23.
15 Then Nathan went to his house. And the Lord afflicted the child that Uriah's wife bore to David, and he became sick. 16 David therefore sought God on behalf of the child. And David fasted and went in and lay all night on the ground. 17 And the elders of his house stood beside him, to raise him from the ground, but he would not, nor did he eat food with them. 18 On the seventh day the child died. And the servants of David were afraid to tell him that the child was dead, for they said, “Behold, while the child was yet alive, we spoke to him, and he did not listen to us. How then can we say to him the child is dead? He may do himself some harm.” 19 But when David saw that his servants were whispering together, David understood that the child was dead. And David said to his servants, “Is the child dead?” They said, “He is dead.” 20 Then David arose from the earth and washed and anointed himself and changed his clothes. And he went into the house of the Lord and worshiped. He then went to his own house. And when he asked, they set food before him, and he ate. 21 Then his servants said to him, “What is this thing that you have done? You fasted and wept for the child while he was alive; but when the child died, you arose and ate food.” 22 He said, “While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept, for I said, ‘Who knows whether the Lord will be gracious to me, that the child may live?’ 23 But now he is dead. Why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me.”
From Nathan’s confrontation of David, the story moves straight into divine judgment. The word, “afflicted,” is used numerous times in the Old Testament in connection to God’s act of judgment upon a person. The most notable of these divine judgments is against Egypt, where God instructs Moses to tell Pharaoh that he will “plague” Egypt (Ex. 8:2). So there is no mistake that the consequence of the child’s affliction comes from divine punishment of David’s sin.
Because of this divine punishment, we must stop and ask the question, why would God afflict a child for the sins of the parent? We might even go to Ezekiel 18:20, where God states, “The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself.” In fact the whole chapter os Ezekiel 18 is about how a person’s sins will only be judged to them and no one else. So why is God holding David’s sin upon a child?
We need to remember a few things here: First, Israel is under covenant with God. National covenants are a trickle down agreement. As the king goes, so does the nation. The child’s affliction comes through the actions of the father. Within the covenant, God states in places likes Deuteronomy 5:9, “… for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me.” Judgment within the covenantal frame work can affect those who did not sin. However, if a person repents, God restores. Yet, in this case, David’s sin has already infected multiple people, and so God has to deal with it on a larger scale. This shows us how devastating our sins can be for others. Children are affected by their parents’ sins all the time. They will feel the affects and be under the same judgments as those in authority over them. It’s a hard reality, but sin isn’t a game, and we need to realize how much our personal sins can destroy others.
Secondly, a concept arise from this passage called, the age of accountability. Within theology, there is this idea that a child, or even an adult who does not have the ability, or who has yet to come to an understanding of good and evil, is not judge by God to eternal separation. In other words, every child who dies before they are able to understand good and evil, and every person who is mentally unable to understand the concept, are seen as righteous in God’s eyes. This concept comes from David’s words at the end of the passage, that, “… I shall go to him, but he will not return to me. (v.23)” David has an understanding that the child is with God, and when David dies, he will be reunited with his child in eternity.
Another verse that supports this idea is Deuteronomy 1:39, which reads, “And as for your little ones, who you said would become a prey, and your children, who today have no knowledge of good or evil, they shall go in there. And to them I will give it, and they shall possess it.” In this passage, God did not hold the sin of the parents which kept them from the promise land against their children, because the children did not understand the difference between good and evil.
So even though David’s child was afflicted through divine judgment because of David’s sin, it did not receive an eternal punishment, but rather entered into God’s presence when it died. John Lenox, a Christian mathematician and apologist was asked about the suffering of children and his response was that, “God will compensate” that child for the suffering it has endured. That answer reminds me of Paul’s words in First Corinthians 2:9, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him.” Any person who dies before they understand good and evil, will not face the wrath of God. This is because Jesus’ payment on the cross, covers them in their position of not being able to understand good and evil, and they are ushered into the great presence of God, which is greater than any amount of suffering in this life. So even though David’s child suffered because of David’s sin, that child experienced a greater prize than any of us could imagine.
Yet, though God is gracious towards those who do not understand good and evil, it is the affects of sin that is the focal point of the passage. David’s sin is what caused the child to be afflicted and die. The weight of the pain falls upon David as the cause of death. His lustful eyes led to the death of Uriah and several unknown soldiers, and now his own flesh and blood. And this is a core teaching throughout the Bible that God wants us to understand: There is no personal sin, all sin affects the world around us. This is clearly seen in what God says to Adam in Genesis 3:17, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you …”
God created us as interconnected beings, whose actions affect the world around us. When we understand that our sin can affect those around us, it puts the burden of consequences back on to us, where it should be.
Through the death of David’s child, he realized these deeper truths that God shows us. Psalm 32 is considered to be the Psalm David wrote after Psalm 51. In it he writes,
“1 Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven,
whose sin is covered.
2 Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity,
and in whose spirit there is no deceit.
3 For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away
through my groaning all day long.
4 For day and night your hand was heavy upon me;
my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. Selah
5 I acknowledged my sin to you,
and I did not cover my iniquity;
I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,”
and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah
6 Therefore let everyone who is godly
offer prayer to you at a time when you may be found;
surely in the rush of great waters,
they shall not reach him.
7 You are a hiding place for me;
you preserve me from trouble;
you surround me with shouts of deliverance. Selah
8 I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go;
I will counsel you with my eye upon you.
9 Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding,
which must be curbed with bit and bridle,
or it will not stay near you.
10 Many are the sorrows of the wicked,
but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord.
11 Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, O righteous,
and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!
Psalm 32 is a recognition of God’s love even for the sinner, and how God’s people need to call out with rejoicing because of God’s love for us. David accepts the blame of his sin, and see that God is good even in the judgments of that sin.
My challenge for you this week, as we did in the previous one, is to recite Psalm 32 everyday. Take time in the morning and read it out loud and thank him that, though we have sinned, he has forgiven that sin through Christ Jesus. We are only forgiven, because he placed our sin on Jesus. And because of that saving work, his steadfast love surrounds us even though our sin has effected so much. God brings good even out of our most heinous sin, which is what we will talk about next.
But for now, let us be a people who recognize that without the Lord, we would be tornados destroying the lives of others. But through Jesus, the twisters of our lives can see good things happen through them. Amen
