Sermon - June 13, 2010

Pentecost 3 - Year C
2 Samuel 11:26-12:10, 13-15

Being a “Have,” and wanting more

Few stories in the Bible have a greater potential to upset our lives than today’s reading from 2 Samuel. In this story, the greed of King David is exposed. This story makes clear the destructive nature of our self-indulgence and our tendency to horde. Nathan makes King David, and each of us who reads of the encounter, aware that sexual lust isn’t the temptation to be most feared. It is our coveting which separates us from God and from one another.

This reading is in our regular cycle of appointed texts. I should admit that I look forward to its arrival. I didn’t look ahead, so I could request this as one of my Sundays to preach, but I would have, with the knowledge that this would be the reading. Few texts provide as clear an opportunity to address the misconstrued hierarchy of sin, so often championed in our self-centered and self-serving society. This reading is like a fat fast ball, delivered to the middle of the plate. The only regret I have is that my fixation with 2 Samuel won’t allow me to also speak of Luke 7. That story makes the same point. Here again, it is envy – envy of Jesus’ acceptance of the woman… who was a sinner – which erects a barrier between Simon and his guest of honor. Rather than be grateful for all that Jesus is offering him, Simon wants more. He wants to be the one to whom Jesus gives his full attention. Simon doesn’t want anyone to be more important in Jesus’ life than himself. It is a bit like those who think that being a Christian is all about getting to heaven. Their misplaced focus prevents them from receiving the goodness of God’s grace and mercy and living the life which is its self eternal. Like I said – lots there. But too little time to touch on it all.

Because, I want to take you back to the story of David and Bathsheba and Uriah and Nathan. It is never safe to assume that folks know the story. A bit of what happened is repeated in Nathan’s words to David, but let’s make sure what have the whole picture.

It started with a look. David is on his roof-top and he looks over and sees Bathsheba bathing. He desires her, even though he already has many wives. He also knows that she is married, to Uriah, the Hittite, a soldier in King David’s army. Never-the-less, David insists on having her as his own. When a child is conceived, David tries to hide his transgression by calling Uriah home from the battlefield. Being a devoted soldier, Uriah sleeps on the doorstep of his house, refusing the comforts of his bed while his fellow soldiers are still in the field. David tries to get Uriah drunk, so he will forget his dedication. This doesn’t work either.

Finally, King David sends Uriah, the soldier, back to the battlefield along with the instructions that Uriah is to be placed at the front and when the battle becomes fierce, the rest of the soldiers are to fall back. Uriah does die, at the sword of the Ammonites. But they are merely the vessel in King David’s plan. He is the man - the rich man - who takes from the poor man his one precious little lamb. His coveting lies at the root of his transgression.

We are a culture which has become obsessed with sex. It is used in order to sell products as diverse as wristwatches and low-fat cereals. As a result, the Church has all too often seen sex and sensuality as the core cause of all transgression. We have made sexual sins the most damning, ignoring along the way – perhaps - other sins and transgressions. As a result, when we read the story of David and Bathsheba we think of it as a tale of lust. Nathan’s confrontation with David allows us to see God’s concern with the root problem – David’s desire for more, his addiction to excess.

It has been argued that Augustine is at least in part to blame. It was in the 4th century that the Church fathers began to write of sin as those prime urges which we could not control. They had good reasons for this. The Stoics had for hundreds of years insisted that moving to a higher consciousness involved domination over our more base selves. They attempted to be more in control - in control of one’s thoughts, one’s emotions. Controlling these made it easy, or so it was suggested, to control our actions.

When St. Paul spoke of sin he spoke of desiring what we wanted, but could not have. He suggests that “coveting” is where all sin begins.

We do covet our neighbor’s wife (or husband.) The 9th commandment also speaks of coveting the neighbor’s manservant or maidservant. Perhaps these might be suggestions of sensuality. But I don’t think so. I believe Luther had it right when he says that this commandment is about helping our neighbor remain in loyal relationships with spouse, servants, and even cattle. Transgression occurs when we lure them away.

King David wants what isn’t his. He takes it. He denies his neighbor his one price possession. David didn’t need Bathsheba. He wanted her. He wanted her even though she belonged to another.

How many wives did David need? How many lambs could he place upon the table? How could he be so blind as to think that he was entitled to whatever he saw? Who would be so cruel as to take what little another has?

In the end, what I want to say is that one of the advantages in making sexual sins front and center of our religious zeal is that all the noise can help drown out talk of the sins of which Jesus most often spoke. He does talk about physical stuff, a little. But, you would be hard pressed to read a full page of any of the Gospels and not come across a reference to wealth and riches. Heck, rich and poor are even the framework for Nathan’s story to David. It is much less discomforting to focus on sexual sins, because it is pretty easy to feel okay about ourselves – at least most of the time. But, when we talk about our wealth things are more upsetting. And, it is not as easy to do something about. Not as easy, because it is really difficult for us to admit that we are the ones who need to do anything at all.

I own a house, five cars, four TV’s, three laptop computers – and I have the audacity to act like I am doing a wonderful thing when I spend three hours on a Saturday morning putting shingles on a Habitat house.

American Christians do have a problem. It is our wealth. It is our un-checked belief that we have a right to all this and that it is okay for us to continue to use more and more of the world’s resources in order to feed our out-of-control appetites. When we see what someone else has – we want that, too.

I hope and pray that you will never again be able to read the story of David and Bathsheba and think of it simply as a story about lust. Nathan, the prophet, tells David that his sin is the sin of coveting. Nathan, the prophet, helps David to see that having a lot sometimes blinds us to the realities of life for those who have very little. With a long and cruel finger, Nathan points out to David that he is “the man”. This same finger needs to be pointed at each of us.


Amen.