Introduction
Text
The Lord’s anger burned against Israel again, and he stirred up David against them to say, “Go, count the people of Israel and Judah.”
So the king said to Joab, the commander of his army, “Go through all the tribes of Israel from Dan to Beer-sheba and register the troops so I can know their number.”
Joab replied to the king, “May the Lord your God multiply the troops a hundred times more than they are—while my lord the king looks on! But why does my lord the king want to do this?”
Yet the king’s order prevailed over Joab and the commanders of the army. So Joab and the commanders of the army left the king’s presence to register the troops of Israel.
*(8)*When they had gone through the whole land, they returned to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days. Joab gave the king the total of the registration of the troops. There were eight hundred thousand valiant armed men from Israel and five hundred thousand men from Judah.
David’s conscience troubled him after he had taken a census of the troops. He said to the Lord, “I have sinned greatly in what I’ve done. Now, Lord, because I’ve been very foolish, please take away your servant’s guilt.”
When David got up in the morning, the word of the Lord had come to the prophet Gad, David’s seer: “Go and say to David, ‘This is what the Lord says: I am offering you three choices. Choose one of them, and I will do it to you.’”
So Gad went to David, told him the choices, and asked him, “Do you want three years of famine to come on your land, to flee from your foes three months while they pursue you, or to have a plague in your land three days? Now, consider carefully what answer I should take back to the one who sent me.”
David answered Gad, “I have great anxiety. Please, let us fall into the Lord’s hands because his mercies are great, but don’t let me fall into human hands.”
So the Lord sent a plague on Israel from that morning until the appointed time, and from Dan to Beer-sheba seventy thousand men died. Then the angel extended his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, but the Lord relented concerning the destruction and said to the angel who was destroying the people, “Enough, withdraw your hand now!” The angel of the Lord was then at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
When David saw the angel striking the people, he said to the Lord, “Look, I am the one who has sinned; I am the one who has done wrong. But these sheep, what have they done? Please, let your hand be against me and my father’s family.”
Gad came to David that day and said to him, “Go up and set up an altar to the Lord on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.” David went up in obedience to Gad’s command, just as the Lord had commanded. Araunah looked down and saw the king and his servants coming toward him, so he went out and paid homage to the king with his face to the ground.
Araunah said, “Why has my lord the king come to his servant?”
David replied, “To buy the threshing floor from you in order to build an altar to the Lord, so the plague on the people may be halted.”
Araunah said to David, “My lord the king may take whatever he wants and offer it. Here are the oxen for a burnt offering and the threshing sledges and ox yokes for the wood. Your Majesty, Araunah gives everything here to the king.” Then he said to the king, “May the Lord your God accept you.”
The king answered Araunah, “No, I insist on buying it from you for a price, for I will not offer to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.” David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for twenty ounces of silver. He built an altar to the Lord there and offered burnt offerings and fellowship offerings. Then the Lord was receptive to prayer for the land, and the plague on Israel ended.
2 Samuel 24
We’ll that’s quite a story to end on! The author is bringing the book to a close, making his final points. And he concludes his 55 chapter account of the earliest kings of Israel by giving us this latest example of David’s moral failure. What a downer!
He’s showing us the same thing he’s been showing all along.
1. A man who is flawed and faithful.
A man who is flawed
Taking this census (or the way David went about it) was a sin, but it’s not spelled out exactly why.
The plain things are the main things,
Alistair Begg
and the main things are the plain things.
Most likely is that David did it to prepare for battle that God had not told him to go into, and/or to prop up his own sense of accomplishment and security as he neared the end of his life—pride!
The text doesn’t say why… but that itself is instructive for us.
There are lots of stages I’m looking forward to in Mabel’s life. The “why?” stage is not one of them!
Tell them to do something. “Why?!”
“Because I’m pushing forty, and you’re seven. And if you only obey adults when it makes complete sense to you, you might not live to be eight!”
Don’t you know we’re just like that? The difference between an all-knowing, transcendant God and you is infinitely greater than the difference between you and a 7 year old.
If an infinite, transcendant God exists, then of course many of the things he commands us will not make sense. If you say, “I’ll obey as soon as I understand why”. That’s not obedience, that’s just agreement. What you’re really saying is “I won’t follow a God who is wiser than me.”
It makes perfect sense that many of the things he commands us would not make perfect sense.
A big part of following God means obeying him even when you don’t understand why. Let God be God.
David is not perfect; he is fundamentally flawed, just like we all are. But he is also…192
A man who is faithful
David’s conscience troubled him after he had taken a census of the troops. He said to the Lord, “I have sinned greatly in what I’ve done. Now, Lord, because I’ve been very foolish, please take away your servant’s guilt.”
2 Samuel 24:10
David comes to his census.
Bob Deffinbaugh
“I have sinned…” We’ve heard David say these words before, after his sin against Bathsheba & Uriah. But this time, things are different…
- That time, God had to basically let Nathan the prophet smack David upside the head with a 2x4 to get him to admit his wrong. This time, David is confessing his sin before the prophet even shows up. That is progress.
- A man who is flawed and faithful.
2. A God who is holy and merciful.
A God who is holy
The Lord’s anger burned against Israel again…
2 Samuel 24:1
Atonement is ugly because sin is ugly. Death is sin in its true colors. And death is what is required for sin to be atoned for.
Tim Chester
A God who is merciful.
The pandemic didn’t go as far as it could have.
Then the angel extended his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, but the Lord relented concerning the destruction and said to the angel who was destroying the people, “Enough, withdraw your hand now!” The angel of the Lord was then at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
2 Samuel 24:16
The word translated as “relented” conveys more than just action, change of mind. It has implications of sorrow, pain, tears.
Mercy triumphs over judgment.
James 2:13
David understood that—he’d come to experience it himself, throughout his life. That’s why he can say with tremendous faith:
David answered Gad, “I have great anxiety. Please, let us fall into the Lord’s hands because his mercies are great, but don’t let me fall into human hands.”
2 Samuel 24:14
Because he had come to trust in God’s mercy.
- A man who is flawed and faithful.
- A God who is holy and merciful.
3. A hope that has come and is coming.
A hope that has come.
David was the first in a long line of kings, some good, some bad, one great.
This was a significant place.
Mt. Moriah, thousand years before, Abraham had went up the mountain to sacrifice his beloved son, Isaac. As the father’s hand was raised up against his son, God spoke, and said, “Enough! Don’t go any farther.” And God provides a ram that was sacrificed in his place.
Now here again, on the very same mountain, Moriah, the Father’s hand was raised against his people, but again he withdraws it, and again there was a sacrifice made for the sins of the people.
And David’s son, Solomon, would take that land that his father bought on the day God delivered his people, and he would build a temple there, so that for centuries God’s people could come and worship him there, and offer sacrifices, atonement for their sins.
David sees the angel striking down the people and he’s heartbroken. He can’t bear to see it. And so he offers himself.
When David saw the angel striking the people, he said to the Lord, “Look, I am the one who has sinned; I am the one who has done wrong. But these sheep, what have they done? Please, let your hand be against me and my father’s family.”
2 Samuel 24:17
“Let me take the judgment! Let your wrath fall on me.”
A thousand years before this, Abraham & Isaac. A thousand years after this, Jesus, the final, true Son of David.
“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.
John 10:11
He says, in effect, “I am the true Son of David. Let your hand be against me.”
Jesus sees the judgment of God hanging over the people of God, hanging over you & me, and he is heartbroken. He can’t bear to see it. So he offers himself as the sacrifice. “Let your hand be against me,” and let them go.
Once again, the Father’s hand was raised… but this time it was not withdrawn. There was no substitute for the sacrifice; this is the sacrifice—the sacrifice to which all the other sacrifices pointed to.
A hope that is coming.
God’s kingdom has arrived in David’s time, but it was not yet completed. God’s kingdom has arrived even more in our time, but not yet in its fullness.
These are the last words of David:
The declaration of David son of Jesse,
the declaration of the man raised on high,
the one anointed by the God of Jacob.
This is the most delightful of Israel’s songs.
The Spirit of the Lord spoke through me,
his word was on my tongue.
The God of Israel spoke;
the Rock of Israel said to me,
“The one who rules the people with justice,
who rules in the fear of God,
is like the morning light when the sun rises
on a cloudless morning,
the glisten of rain on sprouting grass.”Is it not true my house is with God?
2 Samuel 23:1-7
For he has established a permanent covenant with me,
ordered and secured in every detail.
Will he not bring about
my whole salvation and my every desire?
But all the wicked are like thorns raked aside;
they can never be picked up by hand.
The man who touches them
must be armed with iron and the shaft of a spear.
They will be completely burned up on the spot.
My house is with God, not based on my goodness, but because of “his permanent covenant with me, ordered and secured in every detail.”
Sealed it with his blood.