«　WEEK 6　DAY 5　»

　　2 Sam. 12:10 Now therefore the sword will not depart from your house forever because you have despised Me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.

　　1 Cor. 10:11 Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our admonition, unto whom the ends of the ages have come.

　　God is not only loving and merciful, but He is also just and fearsome…. God forgave David (2 Sam. 12:13), but on the other hand, He disciplined and chastised David according to His governmental righteousness. (2 Sam. 12:10, footnote 1)

　　In God’s punishment, the first child born of the wife of Uriah died (2 Sam. 12:18). In God’s sovereign mercy, another child was born of her. The name given to him by God was Jedidiah, which means “beloved of Jehovah” (v. 25). David gave him the name Solomon, which means “peaceful” (v. 24)…. But from that time there was no peace in David’s family or in the entire kingdom of Israel. Solomon’s kingship had a wonderful beginning, but the same thing happened with him as with his father, and his end was pitiful…. Our God is merciful, but He is also just. (Life-study of 1 & 2 Samuel, pp. 218-219)

　　After all the enemies of Israel were subdued and David was exalted as the king of Israel, David committed a great sin while he was in a peaceful situation. This indicates that whenever we are in a peaceful situation, it is easy for us to be seduced to indulge our flesh.

　　David’s sin was the issue of his indulging of the lust of the eyes and the lust of the flesh (2 Sam. 11:2b-3)…. David committed a willful adultery by robbery, abusing the power of his kingship (vv. 4-5). This was a real insult to God. David’s great sin nearly annulled all his attainments from the past…. David murdered Uriah, his faithful servant, by a conspiracy with Joab (vv. 14-25).

　　Uriah was not merely devoured by the sword—he was actually murdered by David so that he could take Uriah’s wife…. David [also]…willingly committed adultery. By [this] one sin David broke the last five of the Ten Commandments (Exo. 20:13-17).

　　David was perfect in every way, but he was weak in the matter of the indulgence of the lust of the flesh. The lust of the flesh is like a wild horse. To subdue this lust, we must hold the bridle very tightly. In this matter David was loose, and he sacrificed his high attainment in the pursuit of God. David was a great “diamond,” but his indulgence in lust was a black, foreign particle in this diamond. Even though he was a person of high attainment in his spiritual pursuit, he was still able to commit such a great sin.

　　The books of Samuel also unveil man’s failure. David, a man according to God’s heart, failed in the matter of the lust of the flesh. David’s defect was that he did not restrict his flesh. David, being a man according to God’s heart, afforded God the way to begin the age of kingship for the establishment of His kingdom on the earth for His coming Christ. But how regrettable it was that David, at a crucial time of the evil one’s temptation, did not exercise strong control over his lust but indulged in it and committed a gross sin, which offended God to the uttermost. (Life-study of 1 & 2 Samuel, pp. 211-213, 217, 248)

　　God loved David, but because of his sin David lost his standing and position as well as eleven of the twelve tribes (2 Sam. 20:1-2). David’s sin sowed the seed of Solomon’s corruption (see footnote 1 on 12:24), which issued in the dividing of the God-given kingdom (1 Kings 11:9-13; 12:1-17), and the seed of the corruption of Solomon’s descendants in the kingship, which issued ultimately in the loss of the nation and of the holy land of their fathers, in the captivity of the holy people, and in their being scattered around the globe and having no peace up to the present time. (2 Sam. 12:10, footnote 1)

　　Further Reading: Life-study of 1 & 2 Samuel, msgs. 33-34, 38