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Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for those kindly words, sir. It has been nothing but a pleasure to be with you here. I am sorry that the events of last week mean that we shall not now complete the book, or at least I shall not complete it. There is no reason why you shouldn't complete it. It is always frustrating to have to finish before a book is ended. On the other hand, if I have been able to open a window or two onto this great landscape that is the second book of Samuel, then I shall have felt that I have done something worthwhile. Of this I am assured, that if I have persuaded you to read again and think about Second Samuel, what you get from your own reading of that book will be of far more benefit and of far more importance and of far more enjoyment to you than whatever you might have learned through me.
Now, for this evening, let us read from second Samuel chapter fifteen beginning in verse uh one. And it came to pass after this that Absalom prepared him a chariot and horses, and fifty men to run before him. And Absalom rose up early and stood beside the way of the gate. And it was so that when any man had a suit which should come to the king for judgment, then Absalom called unto him and said, Of what city art thou? And he said, Thy servant is of one of the tribes of Israel.
And Absalom said unto him, See, thy matters are good and right, but there is no man deputed of the king to hear thee. Absalom said, moreover, Oh, that I were made judge in the land, that every man which hath any suit or cause might come unto me, and I would do him justice. And it was so that when any man came nigh to do him obeisance, he put forth his hand and took hold of him and kissed him. And on this manner did Absalom to all Israel that came to the king for judgment. So Absalom stole the hearts of the men of Israel.
And it came to pass at the end of forty years that Absalom said unto the king, I pray thee, let me go and pay my vow which I have vowed unto the Lord in Hebron. For thy servant vowed a vow while I abode at Geshur in Syria, saying, if the Lord shall indeed bring me again to Jerusalem, then I will serve the Lord. And the king said unto him, Go in peace. So he arose and went to Hebron. But Absalom sent spies throughout all the tribes of Judah, saying, As soon as you hear the sound of the trumpet, then you shall say, Absalom is king in Hebron.
And with Absalom went two hundred men out of Jerusalem that were invited, and went in their simplicity, and they knew not anything. And Absalom sent for Ahithophel the Gilonite, David's counselor from the si- from his city, even from Gilo, while he offered the sacrifices, and the compi- conspiracy was strong, for the people increased continually with Absalom. And there came a messenger to David saying, the hearts of the men of Israel are after Absalom. And David said unto all his servants that were with him at Jerusalem, arise and let us flee, for else none of us shall escape from Absalom.
Make speed to depart, lest he overtake us quickly and bring down evil upon us and smite the city with the edge of the sword. And the king's servant said unto the king, Behold, thy servants are ready to do whatsoever my lord the king shall choose. And the king went forth, and all his household after him. And the king left ten women which were concubines to keep the house. And the king went forth, and all the people after him, and they tarried in Beth-Nahar. Then let us read some verses from chapter nineteen.
Chapter nineteen and verse nine. And all the people were at strife throughout all the tribes of Israel, saying, the king delivered us out of the hand of our enemies, and he saved us out of the hand of the Philistines, and now he is fled out of the ha- out of the land from Absalom. And Absalom, whom we anointed over us, is dead in battle. Now, therefore, why speak you not a word of bringing back the king? David sent to Zadok and to Abias of the priests, saying, speak unto the elders of Judah, saying, why are you the last to bring the king back to his house?
Seeing the speech of all Israel is come to the king to bring him to his house. You are my brethren, you are my bone and my flesh. Wherefore then are you the last to bring back the king? And say you to Amater, are thou not my bone and my flesh? God do so to me, and more also, if thou be not captain of the host before me continually in the room of Joab. And he bowed the heart of all the men of Judah, even as the heart of one man, so that they sent unto the king, saying, Return thou and all thy servants.
So the king returned and came to Jordan, and Judah came to Gilgal to go over to meet the king and to bring the king over Jordan. Then we shall read in chapter twenty and verse one. There happened to be there a man of the Nile whose name was Sheba, the son of Bichri, a Benjamite. And he blew the trumpet and said, we have no portion in David, neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse. Every man to his tents, O Israel. So all the men of Israel went up from following David and followed Sheva, the son of Bichri.
But the men of Judah clave unto their king from Jordan even to Jerusalem. The Lord give us good understanding of his holy word. On our last occasion, we saw that when David felt established in his kingdom and that his throne was secure, he looked around to find whom he might show kindness to, and found first of all Mephibosheth, and showed kindness to him for the sake of Jonathan and the covenant he had made with Jonathan.
That, of course, was exceedingly good. Then he looked around and tried to show kindness to the king of Ad- Ammon. We might have questioned the wisdom of David's trying to show kindness to such an indetterate enemy of Israel as the king of Ammon. And in the end, of course, Ammon made it quite impossible and rejected David's kindness. Then alas, David began to show kindness to himself, and instead of going out to the war against Ammon along with his commander and his armies, he stayed at home and indulged himself and fell thereby into grievous sin with Uriah's wife.
Upon his repentance, he was forgiven, so we read on our last occasion. Forgiven, that is to say, the penalty of sin, but not its consequence. And we parried over that scripture to remind ourselves of the very important distinction between the penalty of sin and the consequence of sin. Here in this life, God forgives us through faith in Jesus Christ our Lord of the penalty of sin. Does not always remove the consequences of sin, but sometimes uses them for our discipline, to teach us the seriousness of sin and the cost of sin, and to bring us thereby nearer to his own heart and way of thinking, so that we shall not so easily sin again.
So did God do with David. And though he forgave him the penalty of his sin, he announced that he would allow grievous discipline to enter into David's life, into the palace, into the royal family, into the politics of the nation, that David might learn how grievously David had sinned. And yet for all that, we found that in those disciplines that God allowed in David's life, David was brought nearer to the heart of God to understand the problems that have beset the very throne of God itself.
By reason of the outbreak of rebellion against the throne of God on the parts of the fallen angel, and on the parts of mankind itself. So we saw that, that last, on our last occasion, that through Amnon's, uh, Absalom's murder of Amnon, the king was faced with the difficult problem of the relationship of punishment to love and of love to punishment. Being a king, he realized he ought to punish him. Being a father, he was loath to punish one of his favorite sons.
Listen to the permissive arguments of the woman of Tekoa that was sent in by Joab. And being swept off his feet by the speciousness of those arguments, allowed Absalom to come back, all unrepentant, without even a word of saying sorry, and eventually kissed Absalom and hanged to his cot, what is the inevitable result of forgiving people that have not repented? It is the best days that we take up the stories of evil.
At the rebellions that took place in David's kingdom, as a result of these misjudgments and wrongdoings upon David's part. We are to read of a rebellion when Absalom, the very son whom he had forgiven, turned round almost at once to engineer and finally to achieve a massive rebellion against the king that rose the king off the throne into exile. Secondly, if we have time, we shall have to think about another rebellion. That instead of driving the king off the throne, stripped the nation and took half of them away from David in secession from the royal house of Judah.
Two rebellions that were eventually put down, but came with an average of ruining David's power permanently. Now, as we consider them tonight, so as to help us to see what kind of questions we should be posing to the historical record that God has given us. I'm going to ask you to do, if you will, a very difficult thing. I'm going to ask you to imagine that you were living in those very days when Absalom first started his rebellion.
Difficult, isn't it? But I'm going to ask you to do it. And then I'm going to ask you to do an even more difficult thing. I'm going to ask you to try not only to imagine yourself living in the days when Absalom started his rebellion, but I'm going to ask you to imagine that you didn't know the results of that rebellion and who won. To put yourself in the position where Absalom raised his standard against the king, and multitudes upon multitudes upon multitudes were flocking to Absalom, all of them saying Absalom was right, and it's about time they kicked out the old boy Jaden.
And that his governing of the nation had been shameful. That thing that he'd done with Uriah's wife was awful, and his general slackness was terrible. At that moment, I say, when Absalom was leading the rebellion and exceedingly popular, so popular that some of the leading politicians in the state had gone after Absalom as the way to their political salvation. And as I say, I'm going to ask you to try and forget that you know what the outcome was and who won. Well, the next I want you to ask yourself, who would you have followed?
And why? Could Couldn't you fight by the of fall all days, David put would you? him? Or after what he's done with Bathsheba? And after all his problems but not dealing with Adam. You would have followed David. You sure about that? There were a great many leading men like Ahithophel who followed Absalom. How would you have made up your mind?
Well, we should look to what we are told in the text, of course, in the history. Now we shall find, as we come to choose between these two men, David and Absalom, it certainly will not be a choice between one perfect ruler and one bad ruler. You see, there never have been any perfect rulers. There never will be, except for one. There never have been any perfect kings except for one. There never have been any perfect elders in the church except for one. You know that, don't you?
But sometimes people forget it. You think they are faced with a choice between perfect elders or imperfect elders. They're not so. There never have been any perfect parents. Except one God and Father. And here, whether it be in the church or the world, in the family or wherever, it is never a choice between perfect parents, leaders, kings on the one hand, and bad kings, parents, and elders on the other. But always a choice between imperfect, be they parents, elders, kings, rulers, or elders, or what have you.
But people and leaders that are trying to be what they should be, on the one hand, and ungodly and unspiritual people on the other. How then shall we decide? Well, let's take them one by one. Let's look at Absalom. Oh, what a fine specimen he was, wasn't he? Chapter Fifteen tells us so. Wow. His hair, oh, it was the latest hair. Mm. And when he told me all the girls in the city they turned out to see, he was broad, majestic looking.
And the clothes, of course, they were the right recent sartorial ne- uh, uh, uh, fashion. And, uh, none of this middle-aged, dumpy, corpulent, a bit fade at the edges, old David, you'll see. He was a bit passe, wasn't he? Well, once upon a time, he'd been the top of all the parks, hadn't he, that David? As the ladies came out and they sang his praises and thought there was nobody on there like David, and all he had done. But that was in the past, you know. You can't live on the past, can you? And forever lasting to hear David telling you how he went out and fought the last one, I've heard it thousands of times. And there was now a new athlete with the, the latest gear and a beautiful haircut.
And now he's very attractive and witty. Haven't you got to be witty, I mean, to keep the young folks? Then you look at the cat. Oh, to see him come down that road, readying up the old horses, do you see? Down in a jack. A madman. Come right in the corner of the hole, you know, breaks the marlin. And, uh, you should see him go off. That wasn't a mad, you know, city of Jerusalem, but what she opened mouth. The staff, now this was witty. They didn't all notice that the chariot belonged to David.
Aslam had bought it with the money David gave him. But that surprised them. In any way, these are incidental details, aren't they? It was something more serious when Absalom began the habit of standing himself by the gate, and when anybody came to the king for judgment, Absalom would go over to him, so we are told, and say, my good man, um, where do you come from? And he would say, I'm of such and such a side of Israel. Well, now then, um, uh, what is your trouble? You see, my good man, he would say, uh, thy matters are good.
And why? The trouble is, you see, there's no one around here deputed as the king to look after people and to listen to their troubles and to help them and to decide, you see. That's the trouble around here. Now, if only I were made, uh, a ruler and judge, you see, I could see that you got justice, my good man. But there you are, that's the king, and, uh, doesn't really care, and he's busy up in his old harem. I suppose he's got somebody else now besides that, Eva, and, uh, he's not interested i- i- in the people and seeing that they get their justice. Oh, if only I were making, I would do them justice.
What do you say about that? Unfortunately, it was partly true, wasn't it? Middle-earth David. John Slack. In the question of justice. How when men who should be leaders go slack like that, and they're not really interested in folks, and they don't deal with cases, they're certainly opening a floodgate for ambitious men who, who want to go places.
So that's who's interested in justice. That's an interesting concept. Yes, justice. He's interested in justice. Now, now, if, if, if he were in power, he would do justice. Okay. What about? When anybody came, he would go over to him and say, now where do you come from? Turn back to you. Now your matters are good and right. Well, how could they all be? For everybody to come. It matters for all good and right. Well, how could I mean?
How could they be? Some would have been good and right, others would have been bad and wrong by definition. How could they all be wrong? Obviously, know what a politician has to do, don't you? Look, my good man, your matters are good and right. We doubt you. She's really after justice? And you know, when the poor boy up in the country heard Absent hairdo and all chariot standing, whole brigade of soldiers telling him his affairs were good and right, then the man went to bow down and do obeisance.
Cool none of that, says Absent. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You get up. And he kissed him. How does that impress you? Who say there's democracy for you? Well, perhaps there is, or some kind of democracy. But I don't like the man that stands on a pinnacle. He's coming down to the level of the people. Is that what judges ought to do? Here, wait a minute. Suppose the other chap, you know, in the party to the lawsuit. Here comes number one. Abson hasn't heard the other chap yet. But Abson wanted to be judged.
And the first man he hears, he kisses. Would you like to have appeared before Abson if you'd have been farmer number two? But Abson's already kissed the man you've got a lawsuit against, and Abson's going to be judge. What kind of justice is that? I thought judges were meant to be impartial. And when did you see the last judge of the size in Belfast or anywhere else stopping outside the door of the court and kissing mothers and their babies, let alone the defendants and the prosecution? Of course not.
There is a place for love and affection and kindliness, but it's no good talking nonsense. The judge is not on the people's level. Yes, he isn't a true judge. The judge is meant to be above everybody else, an utterly sovereign in the city while he's there representing the law and Her Majesty the Queen. And for a would-be judge like that to try and curry favor by kissing the first side even before the second side has had time to turn up. Is nothing short of a complete miscarriage of judgment.
And why did he do it? Because he got in the votes, that's why. Justice? Well, yes. He could have made out a case, couldn't he? A very sad and true case, that David hadn't been too concerned with justice. Hm. Sounds a bit odd coming from Absalom, though, doesn't it? Because if David had been concerned with justice, Absalom wouldn't have survived to tell the tale, would he?
Absalom would have been in a murderer's grave long since, if David had dealt out nothing but justice. Oh, I know you can complain about David, you can say he was too weak-kneed and that he ought to have executed Absalom. Yes, you can say that, but my point is this: when a man like Absalom owes the very breath he breathes to David's kindness and that David didn't insist on one hundred percent justice, it hardly becomes Absalom to start prating about how concerned he is for justice as against David.
You know, sometimes you can hear dear Christian men in an assembly, and they're all for justice. They insist on justice. I suppose you all insist on anything there, isn't it? Sometimes, nonetheless, I want to ask them, but my dear good man, if Jesus Christ had been only concerned to do justice on you, where would you have been? Oh, come. The likes of us, if ever we start talking about justice with other folks, we ought to remember that we're only here to tell the story.
Because Christ, for our sakes, bore the penalty of the law, and instead of the penalty that we justly deserve, had mercy upon us. Ah. Nonetheless, with all this slogan of justice, presently Absalom comes to the king and announces that he would like leave to go to Hebron because he vowed a vow to them all while he was in exile, that if ever he came back, then he would go and pay his vow to the Lord.
Oh, how easily some people can, uh, join religion with politics, aren't they? This was fulfilling a vow to the Lord, was it? What he was about to do. And when eventually he consented to the plan for the moment, that they should go and knife David his father. That was fulfilling the vows of the Lord, was it? That was religion, was it?
Ah. However, off he went. And took Ahithophel, David's counselor. David's leading privy council, apparently Ahithophel not knowing what was up, came at the summons and found himself surrounded and couldn't get out, and obliged to advise Absalom upon what he should do. Absalom using David's brains to try and rebel against David.
Final how do you do that, isn't it? Why didn't he use his own brains? Because he hadn't got any. If I might be allowed to wonder just a moment, oh, what a sorry state mankind without God is in, using the very brains God has given them to try and prove there is no God and to rebel against him. Well, let's leave Absalom there. That's where the text leaves him for the moment. And let us now turn to thinking about David. How David heard that the rebellion had taken place and that the multitudes were gone after Absalom, and David, with a strategist insight, saw there was no use in trying to hold Jerusalem.
David must get out. So strong was the rebellion. And perhaps now, if never before, there came up in David's heart this terrible surprise to see how he, without knowing it, had lost the respect and popularity of the people. All these years of middle life resting on his oars. Hadn't had a victory for I don't know when. Resting on the past to keep the loyalty of the people in the present.
Doesn't work, you know. Now, as a severe shock, he finds out that he has in fact lost the hearts of the people, multitudes of them, and they're going after Absalom. And the only hope of survival is for David to run as hard as he can run off into exile. What kind of a man is David? Put in such a difficult position. Well, first of all, verse nineteen of chapter fifteen tells us that, uh, among the others that went with David were the Gittites, six hundred men which came after him from Gath, and they passed on before the king.
Then said the king to Itiai the Gittite, Wherefore goest thou also with us? Return and abide with the king, for thou art a stranger and also an exile. Return to thine own place. Whereas thou camest but yesterday, should I this day make thee go up and down with us, seeing I go whither I may? Return thou and take back thy brethren. Mercy and truth be with thee. I wonder, do you see the implication of it? The Gittites were men, as the verse tells us, from Gath. That is to say, they were Philistines. And in the manner of ancient monarchs and modern popes, they, Israelite kings, didn't, uh, have as a bodyguard men of their own nation, but brought in foreign troops to be the bodyguard of the king.
Hence it was, of course, that Philistine men from Gath had been employed as a mercenary bodyguard to protect the person of the king. So, simply speaking, they were merely there to protect him. The politics of Israel were none of their business. Says the king now, as the Gittites come under their commander, Itiai of Gath, as they come with the king, says the king to Itiai, now look here, my good man, you know, I would like you to go home. You see, you didn't bargain for this when you came to me, did you?
I hired you as a bodyguard for the reigning sovereign, and on those terms you came. I didn't tell you that I wanted you to protect me in exile. There was no thought of that when you came. You came over for a prime position as the bodyguard of the reigning monarch in Judah. Well, now, unfortunately, things have turned against me, and I'm in exile, and I release you forthwith from your loyalty to me. You don't have to stand, uh, with me. I shall think none the worse of you if you go back and go over to Absalom. Oh, what, what a tremendously big man, wasn't he?
Have you ever known any of your friends to get into trouble, into some heated argument, into some difficulty where there are two sides? And as soon as you meet them, they will as good as tell you to the face, now you'll have to take my side, and if you don't take my side, out with you. Don't want to know you again if you don't stand on my side. Truth or no truth. Whosever is in wrong or in the right, doesn't matter. You must stand my side. Not David. Now, Gitea says, Itiye, my boy, it's OK, I can't think of any worse of you.
You didn't bargain to come out into exile like this with me. So he said, you're free. Here's one thing about our Lord Jesus Christ, he will ask you to stand with him, of course, won't he? Even in the days of his exile, that he tells you that before you join up. If you come after him, you'll have to bear your cost. Yes. But with lesser foes, it gets David ten marks out of ten in my book, that he doesn't force Itiai to be on his side.
David could be wrong. He's prepared to admit he could be. Oh, then we're told that he went a little way up the hill. There came Zadok, verse twenty four of chapter fifteen, and all the Levites with him, bearing the ark of the covenant of God, and they set down the ark, and Abiathar went up until all the people had done passing out of the city. Scene number two. I wonder, can you picture it again? Here is David and his forlorn band of followers, a few hundred or an odd thousand maybe, but no more.
And they're fleeing for their lives. And Absalom has already taken Hebron and is announced king in Hebron, and the multitudes are flocking to Hebron when certain priests come, and they're bearing the ark of the Lord. Oh, what tremendous good fortune, wasn't it? You see, for Israel were a religious people, and they believed in God, and they believed in his priesthood, and they believed, of course, in the ark. Oh, what tremendous good fortune if he could get his hands on the ark. Because whoever held the ark could tell the people, look, God is on my side, I've got the ark. What would you have done if Zadok and Abiathar had come bringing you the ark?
You would have said, praise the Lord, now I can see the Lord is in this. Oh, how marvelous, the Lord is on my side. I can see this is the guidance of the Lord. Because the Lord is on my side, isn't he? Not David. I know, he said, please take the out back. Take it back? Just take it back. Why take it back? I might be wrong, says David. You mustn't think that everything I do God agrees with.
And you mustn't get it into your head that in order to, um, agree with God, you've got to agree with me. You mustn't confuse those two things, says David. Loyal to God, yes, you must remain loyal to God. You must do whatever God tells you. But I do not suppose that everything I've done is agreeable to God, and you mustn't confuse me with God to think that to agree with God, you've got to be on my side. Tell me, have you got anybody, believer or other, that disagrees with you?
What kind of people are they? Unspiritual by definition? If they disagree with you. Ah, now David was in exile. He will not presume that he's absolutely right. Don't you identify God and his ark with me, poor sinner that I am. Take it back. Cool. I know what Aslan would have done if he could have got his hands on Yarden. How many a nation, to come to a different level of exposition, how many a nation has gathered its forces to go out into an aggressive war and has made the people think that God is on their side by definition?
A blasphemy. To suppose that our side of an argument is necessarily God's side. We're going to take you out there. Hmm. And told them, of course, he wasn't being stupid. And nevertheless, if they like to use their wits in the city and act as intelligence officers in the city and use their sons to bring the information, now that could be helpful.
David wasn't, uh, taking leave of his senses or being anything less than practical. He had an enemy to defeat. Or if he didn't, the enemy would take his own very life. Then Hushai came. Hushai was one, again, of the privy council. An honorable counselor used to advising the king. Said David, now Hushai, my man, I got no use for you here. If you would like to go back into the city and, uh, help me in dealing with Absalom, well, go and God be with you.
So back, Hushai went to the city. More of him along. Meanwhile, as David was going ever further out into exile, chapter sixteen tells us that there came Ziba, the servant of Mephibosheth, with, uh, asses loads of all sorts of goods. And when David said, uh, tell me, Ziba, where is Mephibosheth, your master? Ziba proceeded to concoct a devilish lie and said that Mephibosheth was staying at home because Mephibosheth was now thinking that the political tide was turning, and with David in exile, perhaps the nation would restore the throne of Saul and give it to Mephibosheth.
It was a most brilliant lie. And alas, in the circumstances, it had a certain, uh, spiniousness about it. And David fell for the lie. And forthwith stripped Mephibosheth of all his possessions and gave them to Zilbar. I warned you, didn't I? That you're not choosing between a one hundred percent good man, a one hundred percent wise man, and a baddie. Your choice will have to be, by definition, between two men that are both failures. And here's David, taken in by a lie.
And what Mephibosheth did about all that, we shall have to see in a moment. So let's pass on to the next man. There came out Shimei. He was of the family of Saul, and seeing his opportunity to do what he'd been wanting to do for a long while, he stood on a hillock away from David, and he cursed him till the air went blue with the curses. Said Abishai, one of David's commanders, to him, my lord David, he said, give me permission to go over, I'll deal with him, I chant out to strike him twice.
You think that a chap like him could rail and rant and curse the king? I won't stand by and see it done, says Abishai. Let me go and take his head off. And David said, no, you don't, Abishai. Maybe God has told him to curse. You see, Abishai, you don't suppose I got to this model, do you, without myself being in the wrong somewhere?
What's the good of me getting on my high horse and pretending I'm perfect? Maybe this is God's discipline. Oh, how the words that Nathan spoke and God spoke through Nathan would be now coursing through David's mind, wouldn't they? Maybe bad, evil, hurtful, malicious, and wicked as the cursing was. Maybe God was in it, says David. Oh, but David, it isn't true what he's saying. You've not been a man of blood to riot in the blood of your fellow citizens.
No, he hadn't. It was a ghastly travesty of the truth that Shimei was voicing. Never mind, says David. Let him curse. Maybe the Lord will look upon it, and if the cursing is excessive, maybe God will look upon it in his compassion, bring me back again. But for the moment, if God delight in me and bring me back, very good. If God decide not and that I'm to be in exile forever, the Lord's will be done.
Here I say, you've begun to make up your mind which side you're going to choose. Anyway, we may leave them. For now the history changes the scene, doesn't it? And we leave David hiding in his hideouts in the plain while we go back to the city to have another look at Absalom. Absalom now has thousands of people around him in Hebron. David is fleeing in the wilderness.
The rebellion has begun. But now the question arises, how clinch and consolidate the rebellion and actually seize the throne? How would you do it? Now you remember, Absalom is the man that is concerned with justice. You will remember that, won't you? He's concerned with justice. So he calls his privy counselors to inquire of them what would be the best tactics now to adopt, to deal with the situation and to secure the throne.
And first in rank comes Ahithophel, David's leading privy counselor. What shall I do, Ahithophel? Ahithophel had two pieces of advice. Mark them both well, for they were clever. They bought at being undivernishly clever. First, says Ahithophel, if I were you, Absalom, you'll say, what I would do is to take your father's concubines, spread a tent on the roof of the palace, and go into your father's concubines on the roof of the palace in the sight of all.
That's what I would do. You would say that, sir? You would? I don't know that his brains worked as fast as Ahithophel's to see the point of it. But you say it's a shocking thing to do. Well, that is the point. My dear good man, if you want to start a rebellion, if you want to get the throne, if you want to divide a nation, you'll have to learn a few tricks from the Hittite. And shocking things are the things you have to do. Why do it? Well, in the first place, you see, it's only the king that had a harem like this.
And of course, if a foreign king had come invading and had slain the king of the land, then the foreign monarch had the right to take over the king's harim. And if Absalom had been a foreigner, it would have been the expected thing to do for Absalom to come in and take over the defeated king's harim. They- Absalom wasn't a foreigner. He was the king's son. For him to take over the Harem was the grossest of shocking things to do.
Don't do that, says the Thistle. Why? Why, and all the people do see, verse twenty one of chapter sixteen. and all Israel shall hear, thou art abhorred of thy fathers, then shall the hands of all that are with thee be strong. You say I don't follow the logic, don't you? You'll have to take a few courses with the Hithable. Oh, she'll never get to the White House. Do you see, if you're going to do this shocking thing, then all Israel shall hear that you are utterly abhorred by your father, and they'll see the point there will be no possibility of any reconciliation.
And so they'll have to take sides, won't they? And seeing they're already with the Hithop- uh, with Absalom anyway, then they'll have to say, well, that's finished it then. You see, some of them might have been hoping that, uh, after a few days, after a month or two, Absalom would see sense and the other side would see sense, and they both of them simmer down, and then they'd have a parley or two, and they'd face- find some face-saving formula, and, uh, presently they come together, and the king would kiss Absalom. He might even make him his viceroy, and it would all be settled.
Not now. Do something so shocking that all Israel will see there is no possibility of any reconciliation. And so, well, there's nothing for it, they'll have to follow Absalom then. That was clever, wasn't it? I didn't say it was good, I said it was clever. What next will he do? Say to Hithol, there's one other thing, Absalom, chapter seventeen. Look, let me now choose out twelve thousand men.
I will arise and pursue after David this very night, and I will come upon him while he is weary and weak-handed, and will make him afraid, and all the people that are with him shall flee, and I will smite the king only, and I will bring back all the people unto me. The man whom thou seekest is as if all returned, so all the people shall be in peace. Oh, that was dastardly clever, wasn't it? For Ahithophel could see that at the heart of the whole business wasn't justice at all. It wasn't even the interests of the people. It was a plain struggle of ambition.
Absalom wanted the throne. That was the end all and be all of it. If you want the throne, Zaziel, I tell you how you get it. You just go after David and you kill David. The throne's yours, Absalom. You see, if some of the older folks weep and remember David as he used to be and say, ah, what a pity, and you oughtn't have killed him, Absalom, but don't get over that in a week or two. And there being no other body about to be king, well, of course Absalom will be king. It's as simple as that, Absalom, he says. The man whom you see is as if all the others came back, let me go and I know him.
that is as good as any a description of rebellion you can find. You may grumble about the weather, and you may grumble about circumstances, and you may grumble about your elders, and you may grumble about everything under the sun, and you may grumble about your illness, and you may grumble about your circumstances, but in the end, at the highest level of all, the matter is a matter between you and God Almighty, who's going to be king. And is it your will or his will? If you want to succeed and be the perfect rebel, you kill God, my dear good man, that's what you do.
Don't bother about anything else. Kill the king. The very king that legally ought to have Absalom executed and in his kindness dead. And Absalom is concerned with justice. Kill the king to get the throne, and the saying pleased Absalom. Well, if that's Absalom's concept of justice for the people, I'd probably never come under Absalom, neither here nor there.
Ah, but said Absalom, that's a very good plan. But just, uh, just so that we can think the thing through. Now, Hithil, stand aside a minute, and we'll call Hushai. So out comes Hushai. Now, says Absalom, now you've heard what Hithil said, the Hushai. Now what say you? And you remember Hushai was the counselor loyal to David that David had sent back to the city. Well, now, said Hushai, as I come to ponder it, Absalom, my lord, he said, you know, I, I, I must say, actually, that the Hithophel's counsel doesn't appeal to me at this time. In fact, the man's got it altogether wrong, Absalom.
Oh? Yes. Well, you know, and the nation knows that your father is a redoubtable warrior. Even now he's hid in some lair like a bear robbed of her cubs. Savage, wild. And if you send a small detachment of troops down to attack him, he'll come forth and he'll begin to slaughter, and one or two of your chaps will fall in the battle, and the news will be flashed on every TV. Some of Absalom's men have fallen, and David has begun a counterattack, and the people will panic. No, no, you don't want to do that, Absalom. Oh? What shall I do then?
And he said, now, Absalom, I do nothing hasty. Do nothing hasty. What I would do if I were you, you want to make a good job of Absalom. I should send messengers from Dan to Beersheba all around Israel, commanding that the whole nation's forces turn out from Dan to Beersheba in all their fronts. Oh, that's interesting, said Absalom. That's what I should do. I should get them all marshaled, army, bands, the whole shoot. Yeah. And then if I were you, Absom, I wouldn't just send a hill with it.
You know, you're the man to do it, Absom. Now, now, now, there isn't a man like you in the whole kingdom. Now, wouldn't let anybody else have a go. You do it. You go at the head of this army. And old Abson's face began to smile. Yes, he could see the wisdom of that. Now he, and there would be him and all his mighty great army, and he in front of it. Oh, that sounded a very good plan. Yes. We'll go after the king with you at the head of the united forces, and if he be gotten into some city or other and they bar the gates, well, we'll get on the latest engineers.
Have you heard of the latest machines? Well, I'll tell you, Abson, we'll get ropes and we'll put them around the city. Well, this sounds fantastic, said Abson. I never heard of this kind of military engineering before. It can be done, Abson. You get the right contractors and the right sappers. We'll put on such a show, Abson, that I'll go down in the history books as tremendous. We'll have ropes all around the whole city, and we shall have so many thousands of troops. I'll pull the whole city right down into the river, we shall. Abson said, I can see that's the way to do it. And he decided for Hushai's plan.
Poor fool. For as soon as Ahithophel had seen that David had decided to follow Hushai's plan, he went home, made his will, and hanged himself. He could see that was fatal. Can you see it's fatal? Yes, you say, of course you can. Because you see, while Absalom was waiting to connect the whole army from Dan to Beersheba, and that would take a week or two, if not a month, David was getting away, and the people were beginning to come back to him. And the advantage of surprise coming upon David when he was weak would all be gone, and by the time the end of the month, David would have gathered a tremendous army behind him.
To lose those valuable days was suicide. You say, but whatever did Absalom go and do that for? Why did he choose that stupid plan instead of Ahithol's brilliant plan? Why did he do it? Well, because he wasn't interested in justice, nor mercy either. I tell you what Absalom was interested in. Absalom. Absalom being the big man. Absalom being the one in charge. Absalom being the one that would be in front of all the armies giving out the orders, blowing the bugles, Absalom.
And what Hushai did to defeat Absalom was to play on Absalom's pride. And his pride became his undoing. For ever since Satan rebelled against God for that very same reason. How skillfully Satan has destroyed many a man or woman for that very reason. You in the end might be glad, perhaps, that sin, you know, is a self-limiting disease, mercifully.
For sin, in the end, destroys itself. It must in God's universe, mustn't it? If pride could succeed to the throne of the universe, then the very universe will be hell. In God's great mercy, sin in the end, by its own folly, destroys itself. I've already long since made up my mind whose side I'm going to be on in this contest.
I know you can find fault with David uphill and down dale, but if I got to follow one imperfect man as against another, I'm going to follow the imperfect David. For all Absalom's talk of justice is now exposed for what it really was. It was nothing other than Absalom's pride, self-seeking for position. You know the story, and I needn't detain you.
Because Absalom waited and delayed and follows Hushai's tactics, David had time to amass the armies. There came the battle, and Absalom was killed. When Absalom was killed, the messenger brought the message home to David. On hearing it, David went up over the gateway, the gateway is like a big lodge, of course, and went over to the room above the gateway and sobbed, fit to break his heart.
Always was God, I have died for you. And in those sobs, we may see a distant echo of the very heart of God. David's treatment of Absalom may have been tinged with David's own self-indulgence. We can pass that by for a moment. But if God ever has to execute a sinner, and he must and will, it will be a God who at Calvary said, oh, that I gave my son for you, rather The than new you path.
pay. But we must descend from that to face final stern realities. As David was sobbing his heart out in the room above the gate, Joab the commander came home and saw what was happening. The crowds that had followed David were beginning to dwindle away, for this was embarrassing. They'd gone out and they'd risked their very lives for David's sake to defeat Absalom, and now the king was upstairs making more fuss over Absalom than he was of them.
And you might have thought that they were the evildoers instead of Absalom. For he was grieving more about the criminal than he was, uh, about the people that had defeated his enemy. And when Joab saw what was happening, he ran up the stairs too at the time, you know, and virtually kicked David downstairs. He said, you fool David. Now the whole thing will be worse than it was at the start. Here, these people, they risked their very lives for you at the hands of this criminal, and you're more interested in the criminal than you are in them. If you don't get downstairs soon and talk to those people and tell them how you, uh, are grateful to them, you'll lose the whole lot.
And Daly came down and swallowed his grief and thanked the people that had executed his son. Oh, what a thing to have to do to retain power. And even as I say it, oh, my dear friend, ponder if you will, and ponder it again, what God Almighty has done to retain his throne.
And get your obedience. He spares not his son, his innocent son, his sinless son, and delivered him up for us all. That's true kindness, for it's true justice. Ah, but it's more than justice. It is love. And there we must finish.
I have just one more remark to make. Had we another week, we should have had time to think about how David, uh, staged his coming back again, shouldn't we? And what he had to do when he came back again. And we should have to consider it at the lowly level of the practical politics of Israel and Judah, with all sorts of pulling of wires and maneuvering to get David back up on the throne. Inevitably, of course, it would have echoes in our mind of another event, when our Lord, who is now rejected and by this world disowned, will come again in glory. The hour is drawing nigh, and the crowning day is coming.
Bye-bye. And our greater than David is coming back for the day of reward. That's a very big story, and we must leave it. One, just one incident I want to take out. And from that incident, whatever you think of it, I want to take not all its different levels, but simply one level. Hm. And it's the story of what David did to Amasa, who had led the forces of Al- A- Absalom's rebel armies. There was the River Jordan, there was David over the east side of it, there was Jerusalem City over there.
There were the armies that had belonged to Absalom. There was Anasa, who had been commander in chief of the rebel forces and had led the fight against David. What did David do to him. How would you have done it had you been David? You say, well, I would have gone over there in force. There was one man I would hunt for uphill and down dale until I set my hands on him, and five minutes after I set my hands on him, his throat would be slit. And that would be the end of him. That isn't what David did.
He sent a message. Amater, I'm coming back. I have a proposition to make to you, Amater. If you will, you can be now commander in chief of my army in the place of July. What? Me commander in chief? When I'm the leader of the opposition forces, me, me come over and be your commander in chief. Yes, you can do that, said David. Are you thinking that was a rather cheap way of doing things, winning over Absa- uh, Amater?
You see, Amater had rather a lot of forces behind him, and if he'd chosen to stick in his heels and fight, he could have put up a very good battle, couldn't he, for a while? And if he thought David was coming over to slit his throat, Amater would have fought to the very last bits to stop being destroyed, wouldn't he? David knew a thing or two. You're right, oh, we'll stop that kind of resistance. I'll make him commander in chief. He won't have any reason to oppose my coming back. You don't approve of tactics like that? Well, think again before you finally decide. In Christian times, there was another army commander, commander of spiritual forces.
His name was Saul of Tarsus. He led such a rebellion against the name of Jesus as he afterwards described was the worst thing that ever happened to the church. He determined to blot out the name of Jesus. He tortured the followers of Jesus to make them blaspheme against the name of Jesus. And when the risen Lord brought the man to his knees, he did what? He put him in the back seat. He said, now here, Saul of Tarsus. Now, Saul of Tarsus, ha, you go careful, my boy.
You thank the Lord. You've, um, survived. I will watch your behavior very carefully for the next ten years, and should you show yourself a good man and true, uh, we might make you a corporal. Not Christ. He sent Ananias to tell Saul, as Saul was on his knees in fear. Saul, I've chosen you to be one of my commanders, to take my gospel to the Gentiles. You say, so soon? Yes, so soon, sir. And Paul never forgot it. And when he writes his conversion as a pattern conversion for us all in one Timothy chapter one, he says, you know, the grace of our Lord was exceedingly wonderful through faith that is in Christ Jesus.
For I was the very chief of sinners and a blasphemer, but you know Christ dared trust me as putting me into his service. Oh, what a courageous crime to take the arch enemy Saul, bring him to his knees, and then instead of destroying him, making him one of the chiefest of the apostles. That's Christ, as it was David before. I say to you, have thought again. And isn't that what Christ has done with you?
Ah, if he came again and found you still a rebel, what disaster, what eternal disaster for you that must be. But you've heard he's coming back. You've heard that he not only has forgiveness, but my dear friend, the very moment you trusted him, he was prepared to trust you and put you into his family. Lovely, isn't it? And one day we're going to see him. And when we see him, like he did for his loyal men, we shall reward his servants for their faithful service.
And there we must, therefore, thank you for your tremendous patience and your tolerance this evening. Go with that. Our Father, we thank thee now for thy holy word. These are solemn parts of thy word, and they send us home quiet and subdued. They remind us once more that life is not simple. Its issues often far from straightforward. And the human heart, even in the best of us, is desperately sick and deceitful above all things.
So that even when we think we serve thee well, we subsequently discover often that our motives have been a dark tangle of unworthy things. Therefore, now we thank thee for thy mercy, that has forgiven us our rebellion, and not only washed us from our sins in the blood of Jesus Christ, thy son, but has dared to count us faithful and put us into thy service. We pray, Lord, that we might be loyal until thou shall come again. Not only loyal, but wise. And therefore use thy word, we pray thee, and our meditations upon it, and by the guidance of thy spirit, so exercise our hearts, and in all our decisions at all the different levels at which we must live life, we may learn to take those attitudes that more nearly reflect the attitude of our blessed Lord.
And so we part and seek thine evening blessing through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
