For all his greatness, David was tempted and fell into sin. He was a godly writer of Psalms, a brave warrior, a King who stood head and shoulders above other kings of the time, BUT sex was his weakness and downfall.
David would have understood the pressure of our time and our culture’s preoccupation with sex. The warning and lesson from this episode in David’s life is loud and clear.
v 13. Then David invited him to dinner and got him drunk. But even then he couldn’t get Uriah to go home to his wife. Again he slept at the palace entrance with the king’s palace guard.
David saw … David wanted … David got … and then David schemed to cover his tracks. Just how ordinary and everyday is that! From the child who grabbed a sweet off the table and said ‘I didn’t do it’ to the Banker who fudged the accounts to hide his thefts, covering one’s tracks to avoid facing discovery is a common response to misdoing. David knew he had done wrong and he couldn’t face being found out.
No matter how cunningly David schemed to avoid being unmasked, the problem just wouldn’t go away. Uriah regarded himself as a faithful soldier and he was on duty. He wasn’t even a Jew, he was a Hittite mercenary; no way was he going home while he was on active service in the King’s army! So David had to stew on it and find a way out of the dilemma.
This fear of being found out is something that dogs some of us at times. A promise gets broken, so a lie gets told. We were irresponsibly late for that appointment, so a traffic jam was invented. You would like (?) to help someone in need, but of course there simply isn’t the time – or was there? Excuses, excuses, lies, lies, – that’s the way it goes occasionally; we feel a wee bit bad about it at the time, but, hey, nobody will know.
So David – you’ve got a problem, but you are an inventive character and you’ve got power. He was forced to sleep on it for another night. Can you imagine his feelings and thoughts that night? I guess it kept him awake for longer than usual, because that’s what happens to everyone who schemes to avoid responsibility for sin. Ever been there? Can you remember how it felt?