Tag: guilt

The Effects of Bad Decisions (2 Samuel 12:15-25)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year BLeave a comment
David and Nathan, by Angelika Kauffman (1741-1807)

After Nathan had gone home, the Lord struck the child that Uriah’s wife had borne to David, and he became ill. David pleaded with God for the child. He fasted and spent the nights lying in sackcloth on the ground. The elders of his household stood beside him to get him up from the ground, but he refused, and he would not eat any food with them.

On the seventh day the child died. David’s attendants were afraid to tell him that the child was dead, for they thought, “While the child was still living, he wouldn’t listen to us when we spoke to him. How can we now tell him the child is dead? He may do something desperate.”

David noticed that his attendants were whispering among themselves, and he realized the child was dead. “Is the child dead?” he asked.

“Yes,” they replied, “he is dead.”

Then David got up from the ground. After he had washed, put on lotions and changed his clothes, he went into the house of the Lord and worshiped. Then he went to his own house, and at his request they served him food, and he ate.

His attendants asked him, “Why are you acting this way? While the child was alive, you fasted and wept, but now that the child is dead, you get up and eat!”

He answered, “While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept. I thought, ‘Who knows? The Lord may be gracious to me and let the child live.’ But now that he is dead, why should I go on fasting? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me.”

Then David comforted his wife Bathsheba, and he went to her and made love to her. She gave birth to a son, and they named him Solomon. The Lord loved him; and because the Lord loved him, he sent word through Nathan the prophet to name him Jedidiah. (New International Version)

The backstory to today’s Old Testament lesson is that King David not only screwed up, but he also jumped off the diving board into a big nasty pool of immoral excrement.

He saw a woman, Bathsheba, and had to have her. Thinking of only his desire, and not her needs, or that she was a married woman, he used his royal authority to get her. And he slept with her. What’s more, she became pregnant by the king.

At that point, David went to the dark side by covering up his immorality and shame. He eventually went so far as to ensure that Bathsheba’s husband, Uriah (who was both an upright man and an innocent victim) was killed in battle. The king again used his authority to arrange a murder to look like a death in military battle.

With Uriah dead, David brought Bathsheba to his palace as another one of his wives. And no one was the wiser… Except God, who was very displeased with the entire affair. So, the Lord sent Nathan the prophet to David. Through the savvy use of parable, Nathan was successful in helping the king to see his own terrible guilt.

To King David’s credit, he came to the point of recognizing his great faults, and repented of his awful doings. And to God’s credit, David was forgiven.

However, despite the reality of repentance and forgiveness, there are still consequences to our actions. And what is heartbreaking, is that the effects of our bad decisions and bad actions can and do affect others.

As a result of one man’s sin, a woman was violated, a man was murdered, and a baby was conceived, born, and soon died.

Bathsheba attends to her child as David fasts and prays, by W.A. Foster, 1897

King David came to the point of understanding this reality. True repentance, forgiveness, and faith, leads us to a real life which exudes genuineness and authenticity. It won’t undo the past; yet, it will affect the present, and can change the future – that is, if we let mercy and grace have its way.

David’s genuine fatherly love came from his restored place, and was shown by his authentic grieving and mourning. He did not want Bathsheba’s baby son to die. Yet, the child did die. Unfortunately, innocent people often become collateral damage because of another’s unthinking actions.

The king’s behavior, after the child died, shows his pained acceptance of the situation. And his consoling of Bathsheba is the first real evidence we have of David thinking of her instead of himself.

The story reassures us that God loves the next child born from Bathsheba and David. This baby (the future King Solomon) will not pay for his father’s crimes; nor will any other child that David fathers.

The typical trajectory of David’s life was to learn from God’s law and from the experiences God gave him. Yet, in the case of Bathsheba and Uriah, King David ended up learning the hard way that he could not rest on his laurels once he was in a secure and successful place in his life.

Maybe because David spent so much of his adult life facing life-and-death situations, that once he could relax a bit and not have to worry about his life, he let his spiritual and emotional guard down and fell into sin.

After committing adultery, David found himself in a spiritual and emotional place he had never been in before. Yet, instead of confessing his crime to God and making things right with Bathsheba and Uriah, he worked to cover up everything.

Specifically, shame is the place that David had never experienced before, at least to this degree. And when shame gets its poisonous talons into us, it is very hard to be open, real, genuine, and authentic.

In an effort to keep the secrets, the lies morph into more bad decisions, and more bad decisions become ever-increasing bad actions. It becomes a downward spiral of icky guilt which will never be assuaged apart from the divine tools of confession, repentance, faith, and reconciliation.

I trust and hope that it will not take a prophet like Nathan to show you and I how egregious some of our decisions and actions actually are.

Instead, we can make the daily decision to practice our spiritual disciplines, so that when we find ourselves in that good position of no longer having to fight for survival, we will be able to exercise wisdom from the largess of God’s grace which fills us.

Have mercy on me, O God,
    according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion
    blot out my transgressions.
Wash away all my iniquity
    and cleanse me from my sin. Amen. (Psalm 51:1-2, NIV)

Return to the Lord (1 Samuel 7:3-15)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year BLeave a comment
Samuel prays to the Lord on behalf of the people, by Bible Art

So Samuel said to all the Israelites, “If you are returning to the Lord with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the Lord and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines.” So the Israelites put away their Baals and Ashtoreths, and served the Lord only.

Then Samuel said, “Assemble all Israel at Mizpah, and I will intercede with the Lord for you.” When they had assembled at Mizpah, they drew water and poured it out before the Lord. On that day they fasted and there they confessed, “We have sinned against the Lord.” Now Samuel was serving as leader of Israel at Mizpah.

When the Philistines heard that Israel had assembled at Mizpah, the rulers of the Philistines came up to attack them. When the Israelites heard of it, they were afraid, because of the Philistines. They said to Samuel, “Do not stop crying out to the Lord our God for us, that he may rescue us from the hand of the Philistines.” Then Samuel took a suckling lamb and sacrificed it as a whole burnt offering to the Lord. He cried out to the Lord on Israel’s behalf, and the Lord answered him.

While Samuel was sacrificing the burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to engage Israel in battle. But that day the Lord thundered with loud thunder against the Philistines and threw them into such a panic that they were routed before the Israelites. The men of Israel rushed out of Mizpah and pursued the Philistines, slaughtering them along the way to a point below Beth Kar.

Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, “Thus far the Lord has helped us.”

So the Philistines were subdued and they stopped invading Israel’s territory. Throughout Samuel’s lifetime, the hand of the Lord was against the Philistines. The towns from Ekron to Gath that the Philistines had captured from Israel were restored to Israel, and Israel delivered the neighboring territory from the hands of the Philistines. And there was peace between Israel and the Amorites.

Samuel continued as Israel’s leader all the days of his life. (New International Version)

Faithfulness to God matters. One cannot worship the Lord by day, then have a moonlighting job with other gods.

The priest and prophet Samuel helped lead Israel to repentance, and thus, a restoration of right relationship with their God. His leadership made all the difference. Samuel was not like the previous priests of Eli and his sons; nor was he like anyone else who didn’t really know what they were doing.

Samuel performed the appropriate sacrifices correctly; interceded with God on behalf of the people; enabled them to achieve victory; and continually and carefully watched over everything. Samuel was a needed stabilizing force in Israel. He identified sin in the nation and dealt with it wisely. Samuel led them to do right.

I confess my iniquity; I am troubled by my sin.

Psalm 38:18, NIV

Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. (2 Corinthians 7:10, NIV)

Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. (James 4:8-10, NIV)

Today’s Old Testament lesson brings up important questions of acknowledging disobedience, ignorance, and guilt; and how we are to respond to it.

Whenever we say or do something that we ought not to, it’s like squeezing a big tube of toothpaste out; there’s no way you can get it back in.

I actually did that once when I was a little kid. I saw new tube of toothpaste in the bathroom and wondered what it would be like to squeeze out a big amount. So, I did. It was fun. I did it again, then again and again, until it was all gone.

Knowing that perhaps this toothpaste thing might be a problem, I made an artwork out of it. After I was done, I turned off the light, shut the door, and in my little four-year-old brain, hoped nobody would see it. But oh my, they did!

As we get older, and into adulthood, we discover that we have a capacity to do a lot worse than toothpaste escapades. When we sin, there’s no way to put everything back the way it was before. Everything has changed because of our actions (or inactions). And we cannot make it look better, or put a positive spin on it.

There needs to be repentance – a confession of sin, a coming to God, and letting grace and forgiveness have its way. This is the path to restoration in returning to God, in bringing relational connections together again.

Repentance means that we tell God what we did; and that we’re sad about it. Instead of running away, we run to God and admit our guilt. This, by no means, is easy; but it’s the only way to take care of the problem and to feel better about it. And the Lord won’t make us feel worse, but will help us, no matter what.

Everybody is sad when they are caught doing something bad. But there is a good kind of sad, and a bad kind of sad. The bad kind of sad thinks to self, “I’m so stupid; I can’t do anything right,” and punishes myself for the wrong. On the other hand, the good kind of sad helps us realize that we never want to do that thing ever again; and we look to Jesus to forgive us and be our example of what to do right.

Good leaders, like Samuel, assist us in this process with grace, sensitivity, humility, respect, and a forthright spirit.

Most merciful God, we confess that we have sinned against you in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone. We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We are truly sorry and we humbly repent. For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ, have mercy on us and forgive us; that we may delight in your will, and walk in your ways, to the glory of your Name. Amen.

A Prayer of Confession (Ezra 9:5-15)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year BLeave a comment
Ezra In Prayer, by Gustave Doré, 1866

Then, at the evening sacrifice, I rose from my self-abasement, with my tunic and cloak torn, and fell on my knees with my hands spread out to the Lord my Godand prayed:

“I am too ashamed and disgraced, my God, to lift up my face to you, because our sins are higher than our heads and our guilt has reached to the heavens. From the days of our ancestors until now, our guilt has been great. Because of our sins, we and our kings and our priests have been subjected to the sword and captivity, to pillage and humiliation at the hand of foreign kings, as it is today.

“But now, for a brief moment, the Lord our God has been gracious in leaving us a remnant and giving us a firm place in his sanctuary, and so our God gives light to our eyes and a little relief in our bondage. Though we are slaves, our God has not forsaken us in our bondage. He has shown us kindness in the sight of the kings of Persia: He has granted us new life to rebuild the house of our God and repair its ruins, and he has given us a wall of protection in Judah and Jerusalem.

“But now, our God, what can we say after this? For we have forsaken the commands you gave through your servants the prophets when you said: ‘The land you are entering to possess is a land polluted by the corruption of its peoples. By their detestable practices they have filled it with their impurity from one end to the other. Therefore, do not give your daughters in marriage to their sons or take their daughters for your sons. Do not seek a treaty of friendship with them at any time, that you may be strong and eat the good things of the land and leave it to your children as an everlasting inheritance.’

“What has happened to us is a result of our evil deeds and our great guilt, and yet, our God, you have punished us less than our sins deserved and have given us a remnant like this. Shall we then break your commands again and intermarry with the peoples who commit such detestable practices? Would you not be angry enough with us to destroy us, leaving us no remnant or survivor? Lord, the God of Israel, you are righteous! We are left this day as a remnant. Here we are before you in our guilt, though because of it not one of us can stand in your presence.” (New International Version)

God had made a covenant with the Israelites. The Lord graciously gave them laws and stipulations to live by before entering the Promised Land.

Yet, much of Jewish history during the times of the kings was characterized by a breakdown in morality. Cheating on workers and preying upon the weak became commonplace. The poor were fleeced for what little they had, and reduced to servitude.

Failing to obey God completely, the people intermarried with the surrounding nations. The worship of Yahweh was, at times, in severe neglect, due to worshiping the gods of other places. As a result, divine judgment brought a Babylonian captivity and an exile of the people to a foreign land.

But God, who is rich in mercy, brought many of the people back to Palestine and Jerusalem. The Babylonians were conquered by the Persians, who had a different philosophy about how to handle the nations within their empire. And they were open to Jerusalem being rebuilt and the temple restored.

Ezra was a scribe (a copier of Scripture) and one of the returning exiles. Ezra left Babylon in 458 B.C.E. with a considerable group of people. Because of Ezra’s position as a Jewish scribe, and as a descendant of Levi, the Persian king authorized him to reinforce the Torah (the Law) by reading it and setting up the necessary administrative systems to ensure it would be followed.

Under Persian rule, each subject people was allowed to live by its ancestral laws, which were enforced by the imperial government. Violations of the laws of the group to which one belonged constituted an offense against the state precisely because they led to instability.

Soon after Ezra arrived in Jerusalem, he learned of the spiritual state of the Jews there. They had intermarried freely with the non-Jewish women of the land, and had ceased to keep the Jewish holidays and other commandments.

This situation devastated Ezra. He tore his clothes and sat in mourning the entire day until evening. After the evening sacrifice was brought, he got up and began praying loudly to God, weeping for forgiveness for the sins of his people.

Ezra read the Torah publicly to the entire people. Indeed, this was a covenant‑renewal ceremony in the strict sense. To make the Torah understandable to them, he had it explained, because Hebrew was no longer in most people’s vernacular. (Nehemiah 8:1-18)

In today’s Old Testament lesson, we have Ezra’s prayer, his great confession of sin, and concern that the people not get into the same situation which brought God’s judgment and exile upon them to begin with.

It is a prayer laced with love for the covenant code, the Jewish people, and most of all, for God. A very complicated situation prompted Ezra’s prayer, and would take much courage and wisdom to confront and deal with.

Whenever things are awry, circumstances are less than desirable, and situations seem overwhelming, the place to begin is to pray. Admittedly, prayer is not everything; but it is certainly something – and something powerful – for which we have both the duty and the delight to engage in.

And in praying, there is perhaps no better way to begin, than with a heartfelt prayer of confession:

Gracious God, our sins are too heavy to carry, too real to hide, and too deep to undo. Forgive what our lips tremble to name, what our hearts can no longer bear, and what has become for us a consuming fire of judgment.

Set us free from a past we cannot change; open to us a future in which we can be changed; and grant us grace to grow more and more in your likeness and image; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Mercy Is Coming (Micah 7:8-20)

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Christian Spirituality Blog, Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year BLeave a comment
“Justice Tempered with Mercy,” an oil painting by Emil Bisttram, 1936

Do not rejoice over me, my enemy,
        because when I fall, I will rise;
            if I sit in darkness, the Lord is my light.
I must bear the raging of the Lord,
    for I have sinned against him,
        until he decides my case and provides justice for me.
    He will bring me out into the light;
        I will see by means of his righteousness.
    Then my enemy will see;
        shame will cover her who said to me:
            “Where is the Lord your God?”
    My eyes will see her ruin;
        now she will become something to be trampled,
            like mud in the streets.

A day for the building of your walls!
        On that day, the boundary will be distant.
        On that day, they will come to you from Assyria and the cities of Egypt,
            from Egypt to the River,
            from sea to sea,
            and from mountain to mountain.
And the earth will become desolate because of her inhabitants,
        because of the fruit of their actions.

Shepherd your people with your staff,
        the sheep of your inheritance,
        those dwelling alone in a forest in the midst of Carmel.
    Let them graze in Bashan and Gilead, as a long time ago.

As in the days when you came out of the land of Egypt,
        I will show Israel wonderful things.

Nations will see and be ashamed of all their strength;
        they will cover their mouths;
        their ears will be deaf.

They will lick dust like the snake,
        like things that crawl on the ground.
They will come trembling from their strongholds to the Lord our God;
        they will dread and fear you!
Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity,
        overlooking the sin of the few remaining for his inheritance?
    He doesn’t hold on to his anger forever;
        he delights in faithful love.
He will once again have compassion on us;
        he will tread down our iniquities.
You will hurl all our sins into the depths of the sea.
You will provide faithfulness to Jacob, faithful love to Abraham,
        as you swore to our ancestors a long time ago. (Common English Bible)

The prophecy of Micah was directed to the people because of the nation’s messed up social and political relations. Unrighteousness had thoroughly drenched the land. In this situation, the nation groaned; Micah responded to them and interceded for the people; God agreed with it all; and Micah concluded with a theological reminder of who God is and what God is like.

The nation of Israel was in a bad way during the eighth century B.C.E. because of their injustice toward one another. The leaders only thought of themselves, and not the people as a whole. Unfaithfulness ran so deep that not even one’s closest friends or relatives could be trusted.

To be a faithful and righteous person during that time required a resolve to wait for God’s deliverance – because there was no way any one person or group of people could fix any of it.

And this is the nature of hope – it can only be understood and realized by knowing, sensing, and feeling hopelessness in all of its despair. We do not hope for something we already possess.

The prophet Micah recognized the situation of the nation for what it was, as well as the consequences to having injustice throughout the land. Yet, he also looked forward to a time when God’s wrath will move from God’s people to the people’s enemies.

It may seem as if the Lord is either slow, not paying attention, or doesn’t care; but God’s timing is not the same as ours. Divine deliverance will come when divine deliverance will come.

The circumstances of Israel’s national sins were ripe not only for God’s judgment, but also for Micah’s prayers on behalf of the people. He called on the Lord to shepherd Israel, while at the same time, to put Israel’s enemies in their place.

And God, out of the storehouse of divine mercy, granted an assurance of pardon.

But if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from everything we’ve done wrong. (1 John 1:9, CEB)

Micah affirmed the grace and mercy of God. He had the confident expectation that the Lord would cast all of Israel’s sins into the depths of the sea. Guilt, shame, and despair will not have the last word; the final word belongs to mercy.

Into a world full of cynicism and sarcasm, hopelessness and despair, it is vitally important that we have faithful and godly individuals who have a settled hope. This is what it means to be a remnant, a small minority of people who hold onto that which is just, right, and good.

We are to quietly go about our business of bringing justice, mercy, and love to this world with a quiet and confident expectation that God’s grace will overcome and overwhelm everything in its path.

Most merciful God, we confess that we have sinned against you in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone. We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We are truly sorry and we humbly repent. For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ, have mercy on us and forgive us; that we may delight in your will, and walk in your ways, to the glory of your Name. Amen.