SermonStudio

Above my desk at home is a single pine shelf that holds a row of books, books which through the years have meant a whole world to me. You may have such a collection of such treasures, too, volumes by favorite writers of poetry, prose, narrative, non-fiction. Some of my books are so old that the covers are frayed and the pages yellowing. There is a volume I read for the first time last summer that is crisp and clean. Some have markers to note a beloved section or a poem I'd like to find with dispatch. Some are helpful in a direct manner, some reflective.

My line-up includes Strunk and White's Elements of Style, Willa Cather's My Antonia, St. Exupery's The Little Prince. William Zinnser's Willie & Dwike is the one I read last summer. I have Edna St. Vincent Millay's Collected Poems, in which the poetry reflects labor, love, loss. Her sonnet on grief moves me no matter how many times I reread it. "Time does not bring relief. You all have lied. Who told me time would ease me of my pain? I miss him in the beating of the rain." Two tales about the force of friendship are on the shelf, Charlotte's Web and Fried Green Tomatoes.

This little line of books is precious to me, I suppose because the books reflect, each in their own manner, my own life as I am living it: memory, experience, sadness, hope. Together, they give me pleasure, spirit, perspective, spunk, revealing what it means to be human, underscoring that ultimately life is good. What volumes would you place in your collection? What books are most precious to you?

The Bible is, of course, such a collection, by favorite writers of prose, poetry, narrative, non-fiction. The Bible reflects memory, experience, sadness, hope. The Bible can give us pleasure, spirit, perspective, spunk, revealing what it means to be human, proclaiming that ultimately life is good. But distinct from the little collection of mine, the collection of books which make up the Bible tells, not only what it means to be human, but also what it means to be chosen - chosen by God, loved by God, led by God.

The section of the Bible appointed for the next four Sundays is a history book, or maybe it's an historical novel, or historiography. The writer is an exceptionally skilled historian, who is drafting an account of the final turbulent years of David's reign. The writer is looking back on David's long life and trying to explain what went wrong, why it all falls apart for David. David, whose love of God is intimately connected to his rise to power; David, who sings the psalms of praise to God like no other ever had; David, who embodies what it meant to be chosen. Why does it all unravel? What are the reasons for David ending his reign a beaten and a brokenhearted man?

The writer is also explaining why Solomon succeeds David to the throne of Israel, which is why scholars call this history the "Succession Narrative." The "Succession Narrative" runs from 2 Samuel 11 to 1 Kings 2. Most scholars date the narrative to the time of Solomon. Some scholars believe Solomon commissioned it. If so, then Solomon demonstrates his wisdom. For he chooses a writer who tells the gruesome tale of David's downfall, with precision and understanding, with integrity and a thread of hope. The narrative is a history, exquisitely written, revealing what it means to be human, our frailties and failures, as well as what it means to be chosen, chosen by God, lead by God, loved by God. And finally the narrative observes how it is that God redeems us.

The text appointed for today is the introduction, the beginning of the end of David's reign. The text opens with David, King David of all Judah and Israel, rich and at the height of his power. It is spring: "The time when kings go out to battle." But David has sent Joab out to battle and remained in Jerusalem, so spring in the air means something besides battle for him.

David is taking a stroll on the roof of the royal residence, late in the afternoon of a leisurely day, when from his vantage point, his eyes chance to fall on an arresting and intriguing sight, a beautiful woman who is bathing. And David says to himself, "Mmm-Muhh" or words to that effect. Well, David makes a few quick inquiries and finds that she is Bath-Sheba, the wife of Uriah the Hittite. But spring is in the air. Uriah is away at battle. David is king and invites Bath-Sheba over and one thing leads to another, and that leads to a note that says, "Dear David, I am having a baby. Yours, Bath-Sheba."

Now I think you can see how this development could simply ruin David's arrangement. But after all, David isn't king for nothing. He does a little scheming and sends a letter off to Joab to have Uriah rotated back to Jerusalem for a little R & R. When Uriah arrives at the palace, King David calls him in to see how everything is with carrying on Holy Wars these days, and the food in camp and the weather.

But then David shifts the conversation a little. "Well, Uriah, you are here for R & R. I don't want to hold you all day. I know you're worn out from all that fighting, so why don't you go on home? You have relatives in Jerusalem? Oh, a wife? Well, bless my soul. You hurry home to her, and take tomorrow off, go ahead and take tomorrow off."

But, it turns out that Uriah was a real Eagle Scout and he refuses to break the rules of cleanliness and purity befitting a warrior in a Holy War. He rests and relaxes all night, but with the soldiers at the palace gate. He rests and relaxes, but not in the way that David envisions, not with Bath-Sheba.

Next David tries to break down Uriah's resolve with great food and good wine, but all this is to no avail, for Uriah never goes near Bath-Sheba, which makes it tough, impossible that Bath-Sheba is carrying Uriah's child. Finally, David sends Uriah back to General Joab with a note to see to it that Uriah is given such a dangerous assignment that he gets killed sooner or later, preferably sooner.

The tale is the beginning of the end for David, in one glance across the royal rooftop. David, who was the boy warrior and had faced the giant Philistine, Goliath with only five smooth stones and an unswerving faith in the name of the Lord of Hosts. David, who was made King over all of Israel, kept the covenant of the Lord. David, who was poet and musician par excellence, who composed and sang psalms of glory to the Lord, stunning songs like "The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein. Who shall ascend to the hill of the Lord and who shall stand in God's holy place ... the one who has clean hands and a pure heart ..." (Psalm 24) But when David strolls across the royal rooftop and catches a glimpse of Bath-Sheba bathing, his heart is anything but pure, and he rubs his previously clean hands together in a gesture of urgency and desire and calls to his servants, "Who is that woman; get her for me." It is the beginning of the end for David, who forgets the word of the Lord that fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and because of this "now the sword will not depart from his house."

And what does the text say about God? What does it mean to be chosen by God as David is? What does it mean to be loved by God as David is? What does it mean to be led by God as David was, at least until he took his very human stroll across the royal rooftop, and caught his very human glance of the beautiful Bath-Sheba bathing? How does God relate to those God chooses, loves and leads?

God is, in fact, strikingly absent throughout these opening verses of the Succession Narrative. God doesn't happen by, to place a cloud between David and Bath-Sheba, to save David just in the nick of time. God doesn't intervene, not once, to save David from himself. David, who has offered so much and accomplished so much for God's chosen people of Israel. God doesn't come along to help David out, by somehow breaking down Uriah's soldierly resolve. Might not a merciful God have forgiven David's little lapse of good judgment into lust, lead Uriah to Bath-Sheba's side and saved everyone all the agony that is to come?

No, at least not according to the writer of the Succession Narrative. This writer has observed the history and understood God's presence in a very different manner than miracle-maker or intervener. This writer observes the history and holds to a theology that is more like that of the wisdom tradition than it is of the earlier stories when God was parting the seas and dispensing manna. The wisdom tradition probes the human condition and God's subtle and mysterious relation to us. God acts in history, yes, but not directly. God acts in history, yes, but in a manner that always takes human freedom into account. God acts in history, yes, but more often than not in and through the human heart. God moves in a mysterious way, an unknowable way, God's wonders to perform.

Out on the royal rooftop in the spring of the year, the whole earth coming alive with the pleasures of propagation, the air filled with the lovely aromas of spring, of wisteria, and spicebush, bees buzzing as their work begins, the thrushes sweetly singing spring's song, David takes a stroll that becomes the beginning of the end.

So how do you imagine David, chosen by God, loved by God, led by God, feels in the last verse of today's text as he writes Joab in charge of the troops. "Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting and then draw back from him so that he may be struck down and die." How do you imagine David, King David, who sang the song, "The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and they who dwell therein?" How do you imagine he felt when he placed the letter to Joab in Uriah's hand?

How do you imagine David felt about Uriah, Bath-Sheba, himself, God? Is this command an act of desperation or of royal arrogance? Does David feel confused, guilty, angry, afraid of being found out, all of the above? And too ashamed to share any of this with God, who has been David's strength and shield all along?

Can God be trusted at the end as well as at the beginning? Will God be present to David through his sin? Will God redeem God's chosen one? Amen.