So we are in 2 Samuel chapter 14 this morning, 2 Samuel chapter 14.
Before I read the passage for us, let me just give a few words of introduction.
What you need to know if you're new this morning or you're visiting or here for the first time,
let me tell you that we are partway through a series in the book of 2 Samuel.
We had a pause for the summer holidays and we are now back in 2 Samuel.
So I haven't just picked 2 Samuel chapter 14 at random,
what we try and do as a church is work our way through the Bible together,
taking each passage as it comes.
Our conviction is that as the Bible is opened and explained,
we experience God speaking to us because this is not just human words.
This is not just what people have thought.
This is what God himself has thought.
And so our pattern as a church is just to take book by book and work our way through chapter by chapter.
That's the sort of the common diet, if you like, on a Sunday morning.
But before I read this passage, and in case you're new to it,
it might just be helpful for me to give you a few words of introduction.
2 Samuel is the record of King David, King of Israel.
You might have heard of King David, Israel's most famous king.
And 2 Samuel is the sort of the account about how David became king,
what happened while he was king, and what it was like to live in his kingdom.
There's a historical record of that.
But it's a mistake to think that 2 Samuel is just history.
You know, this is not written so that you could pass a GCSE history exam.
You know when you had to remember all the dates for GCSE history or that sort of thing?
And it's not that. It's not written so that you might just remember what happened in a kind of,
these are important facts for you to know.
No, it's not that.
It's better to think that 2 Samuel, he's a preacher.
And what he's doing is he's taking these historical accounts of the life of David,
and he's preaching them to you, to me,
that we might learn not just about King David and life in his kingdom,
but that we might learn about King David's God and life in his kingdom.
So 2 Samuel is a preacher. He's got a message for us to hear.
So with that in mind, I'm going to read to you 2 Samuel chapter 14.
I'm going to read the whole chapter.
I'm going to try and read it a balance between not being too fast,
but not so slow that we're still reading at lunchtime.
So here we go, 2 Samuel chapter 14.
Joab, son of Zariah, knew that the king's heart longed for Absalom.
So Joab sent someone to Tekoa and had a wise woman brought from there.
He said to her, pretend you are in mourning.
Dress in mourning clothes and don't use any cosmetic lotions.
Act like a woman who has spent many days grieving for the dead.
Then go to the king and speak these words to him.
Joab put the words in her mouth.
When the woman from Tekoa went to the king,
she fell with her face to the ground to pay him honour.
And she said, help me, your majesty.
The king asked her, what's troubling you?
She said, I am a widow.
My husband is dead.
I, your servant, had two sons.
They got into a fight with each other in the field
and no one was there to separate them.
One struck the other and killed him.
Now the whole clan has risen up against your servant.
They say, hand over the one who struck his brother down
so that we may put him to death for the life of his brother whom he killed.
Then we will get rid of the heir as well.
They would put out the only burning coal I have left,
leaving my, sorry, leaving my husband neither name nor descendant on the face of the earth.
The king said to the woman, go home and I will issue an order on your behalf.
But the woman from Tekoa said to him,
let my lord the king pardon me and my family
and let the king and his throne be without guilt.
The king replied, if anyone, if anyone says anything to you,
bring them to me and they will not bother you again.
She said,
Then let the king invoke the lord his god to prevent the avenger of blood from adding to the destruction
so that my son shall not be destroyed.
As surely as the lord lives, he said, not one hair of your son's head will fall to the ground.
Then the woman said,
Let your servant speak a word to my lord the king.
Speak, he replied.
The woman said,
Why then have you devised a thing like this against the people of God?
When the king says this, does he not convict himself?
For the king has not brought back his banished son.
Like water spilled on the ground which cannot be recovered, so we must die.
But that is not what God desires.
Rather, he devises ways so that a banished person does not remain banished from him.
And now, I have come to say this to my lord the king because the people have made me afraid.
Your servant thought, I will speak to the king.
Perhaps he will grant his servant's request.
Perhaps the king will agree to deliver his servant from the hand of men
who is trying to cut off both me and my son from God's inheritance.
Now your servant says,
May the word of my lord the king secure my inheritance.
For my lord the king is like an angel of God in discerning good and evil.
May the lord your God be with you.
And the king said to the woman,
Do not keep from me the answer to what I am going to ask you.
Let my lord the king speak, the woman said.
The king asked,
Isn't this the hand of Joab with you in all this?
The woman answered,
As surely as you live, my lord the king,
no one can turn to the right or the left from anything.
My lord the king says,
Yes, it was your servant Joab who instructed me to do this
and who put all these words into the mouth of your servant.
Your servant Joab did this to change the present situation.
My lord has wisdom like that of an angel of God.
He knows everything that happens in the land.
The king said to Joab,
Very well, I will do it.
Go, bring back the young man Absalom.
Joab fell with his face to the ground to pay him honour
and he blessed the king.
Joab said,
Today your servant knows that he has found favour in your eyes,
my lord the king,
because the king has granted his servant's request.
Then Joab went to Geshurah and brought Absalom back to Jerusalem.
But the king said,
He must go to his own house.
He must not see my face.
So Absalom went to his own house
and did not see the face of the king.
In all Israel,
there was not a man so highly praised
for his handsome appearance as Absalom.
From the top of his head to the sole of his foot,
there was no blemish in him.
Whenever he cut the hair of his head,
he used to cut his hair once a year
because it became too heavy for him.
He would weigh it
and its weight was 200 shekels by the royal standard.
Three sons and daughters were born to Absalom.
His daughter's name was Tamar
and she became a beautiful woman.
Absalom lived for two years in Jerusalem
without seeing the king's face.
Then Absalom sent for Joab
in order to send him to the king,
but Joab refused to come to him.
So he sent a second time,
but he refused to come.
Then he said to his servants,
Look, Joab's field is next to mine
and he has barley there.
Go and set it on fire.
So Absalom's servants set the field on fire.
Then Joab did go to Absalom's house
and he said to him,
Why have your servants set my field on fire?
Absalom said to Joab,
Look, I sent word to you and said,
Come here so that I can send you to the king
to ask,
Why have I come from Geshur?
It would be better for me if I were still there.
Now then, I want to see the king's face
and if I am guilty of anything,
let him put me to death.
So Joab went to the king and told him this.
Then the king summoned Absalom
and he came in and bowed down
with his face to the ground before the king
and the king kissed Absalom.
As we start this morning to look at that passage,
let me ask you a question.
The question I asked to the children earlier, really.
If you've fallen out with somebody,
what do you do?
What do you do if you've fallen out with someone?
You see, it's not uncommon, is it?
Relationship problems exist wherever there are people.
So what is it that you do
when you've fallen out with others?
When it's tense?
Yes, when you can't look each other in the eye?
When crosswords have been spoken
and there's a barrier between you?
What do you do if it's more serious than just that?
What do you do if your husband or your wife
has been unfaithful to you?
What do you do if your parents neglected you
or abused you?
What do you do if you've been accused
of something that you didn't do
or treated unfairly at work and lost your job?
What do you do if you've been racially abused
or excluded because your face doesn't fit?
What is it that you should do?
What do you do?
Now we know, don't we,
those aren't hypothetical questions.
I'm not asking those to say,
listen, let's enter a pretend world
where those kind of things happen.
No, we live in a world
where those things happen all the time.
They happen to all of us, don't they?
How do you fix problems like that?
Well, in a way, that is the question
behind 2 Samuel chapter 14.
In 2 Samuel chapter 14,
the background is a massive relational breakdown.
It's a bad one.
It's a relationship breakdown
between a son and his father.
And the backstory involves rape, murder, and neglect.
So this is not kind of light stuff this morning.
And 2 Samuel chapter 14 is an attempt
to fix the relationship breakdown
between the son and his father,
between Absalom and David.
But what we'll discover as we go through it
is that this attempt to fix it
doesn't actually work.
And it doesn't work
because it's founded on flawed ideas,
a faulty worldly wisdom,
wisdom that can never actually address
the big issue in the relationship breakdown.
A worldly wisdom, if you like,
that is massively popular,
but ultimately doesn't fix anything.
Now that's the background to the story.
What I want to do
before we kind of get into the detail of that
is I want to retell you the story of 2 Samuel chapter 14.
Don't know if you're like me,
but when you hear the Bible read,
sometimes it's quite difficult to follow the story.
So let me retell you the story of 2 Samuel chapter 14
so that we can get it in our minds what's going on.
The relationship breakdown, as I said,
is between Absalom and his father, David.
So you may remember that Absalom has killed his brother,
a guy called Amnon.
He didn't kill Amnon without reason, though.
Amnon had raped Absalom's sister,
his own half-sister, Tamar.
Absalom waited two years after that event
to get his revenge on Amnon.
He eventually killed him at this sheep-shearing party.
He gathered all of his brothers together,
said, hey, you know, I'm shearing the sheep,
let's have a party.
And it was really a false pretense
to get Amnon in the room
so that when he got him, he could kill him.
And that's what he did.
Following the murder,
Absalom fled to his grandfather's house,
his maternal grandfather's house,
which was just over the northern border of Israel,
where chapter 13, verse 38,
tells you, just before our passage,
that he was staying there for three years.
Three years in exile.
And verse one of our passage
tells you this morning
that Joab, who is the commander of David's army,
his kind of right-hand man, if you like,
Joab knows that David is still thinking
about that event three years later.
It's not that surprising
when you think about it, is it?
I think sort of relationship problems
or difficulties are the most difficult thing
to get out of your mind, aren't they?
And David is still chewing over this heartbreak.
It's not going to pass easily.
I don't think you should read chapter 14, verse one,
as seeing that David is full of sympathy,
though, for Absalom.
The word long is not actually there
in verse one in the original.
English translators have added it
just to try and make the English flow a bit better.
But the sense really is more
that David is on Absalom.
His heart is weighed down by him.
He is thinking on him.
David can't shake the sadness of Absalom.
It's like a thing that he is carrying around,
a relational pain that wakes him up at night,
that is there with him in the morning,
takes up that mental processing space,
chewing it over and over.
And because of that,
Joab, as David's right-hand man,
goes, well, I'm going to help out, David.
I'm going to fix that problem for him.
And to accomplish his plan,
he takes a woman from Tekoa,
a wise woman, you're told,
to come and speak to the king.
Now, Tekoa is south of Bethlehem.
Bethlehem is south of Jerusalem.
So it's kind of near enough for the woman
to get to Jerusalem and speak to David,
but it's far enough away
so that her story could be made up
and David wouldn't know about it.
So this nameless woman comes and speaks to David.
Now, this is not unusual, right?
So David as the king would listen
to the complex legal cases in the kingdom.
If you had a simple case,
you'd take it to the elders of your town,
they would agree it for you.
You know, I've parked my camel on a double yellow line.
What are you going to do?
Well, there's a ticket, right?
That would be solved by them.
But something more complicated,
you had to take up the courts.
And the highest court is the court of the king.
And so this case is brought before David.
It wasn't unusual for him to listen to complex cases.
But this woman's story is particularly complicated.
Her husband is dead.
Her two sons have got into a fight
and one of them has killed the other.
Now, justice would demand that the murderer
be put to death for his crime.
That's what the leaders of her town
were responsible for doing.
And verse seven tells you that the whole clan
have risen up against the woman
in order to enact justice like that.
But clearly then, if they did that,
it would leave this woman in a perilous position
because her husband's dead,
one of her sons is dead.
And if the other son is killed in justice
for what he has done,
it would lead her with nobody to provide for her,
no protector, no heir, no family line.
It would essentially leave her destitute.
David listens to the woman's case
and tells her in verse eight
that essentially it's going to take some time
to think about her case.
So go home and wait for the verdict.
Of course, though, there's no son, is there?
She's not actually a desperate widow.
She's there for something else.
So she presses him further
for an immediate answer in verse nine.
So much so that David gives his verdict,
telling her that her son should not die
and that he has the protection of the king.
He ends up repeating the point twice
just to make it super clear to her.
But by verse 12,
David's answer is clearly not enough
because actually it's not really
why the woman is there, is it?
The woman has a further point to make
and reveals her true agenda.
She says, you know,
why if this is the case,
if this is the answer you're giving me for this case,
why is it that Absalom is still in exile
for murdering his brother Amnon?
Why won't you bring Absalom back from his banishment?
Now, it's quite clever, really,
when you think about it, isn't it?
The way the story is set up is clever.
It even, her story even sounds a bit like
a story you might have heard in the Bible
about Cain and Abel, right?
When God didn't enact the death penalty
against Cain for killing Abel,
but instead put a mark on him
so that no one would touch him.
But however clever the story is,
David sees right through her, doesn't he?
He sees Joab pulling the strings in verse 19.
Aha, I know why you're here, he says.
This is Joab trying to fix
the Absalom problem, isn't it?
So much so that she says,
oh yes, you have the wisdom of an angel
in verse 20 to David.
You really know what's going on
in your kingdom, don't you?
Before in verse 21,
David then speaks to Joab
and says, listen, okay,
bring Absalom back to Jerusalem,
but he must never see my face.
He's not allowed to enter the palace.
He mustn't come in here.
He can go to his own home.
So Joab brings Absalom back to Jerusalem
and for a while,
everything seems as though it's going okay,
but not for long
because Absalom is not happy
about being in Jerusalem,
but not being allowed to see David's face.
So he calls Joab
to tell him that he's not happy
and Joab just buttons him
on his mobile phone.
I just ignore him.
I don't ignore Absalom.
So Absalom does what you do
when anybody buttons you
on their mobile phone.
You set fire to his crops.
Yeah, that's how you get his attention.
So that's what he does.
And Joab goes, hang on a minute.
Why are you doing that?
He says, well, I called you
and you didn't answer.
So he comes in and says,
listen, I want to see David.
If I don't get to see David's face,
I might as well be in banishment.
It's like banishment by any other name.
And so Joab goes to David
to see if Absalom
can come into his presence,
which he does at the end of the chapter
as David kisses him
and is seemingly at least reconciled
with his oldest son
and heir to the throne.
Now that is the chapter in a nutshell.
Now it might seem
as you just glance through it like that,
that Absalom appears at the end
to be reunited with David.
The family seems to be stable again.
And perhaps that's what Joab thought.
You know, perhaps Joab's
patting himself on the back going,
I'm the fixer.
I have nailed this right now.
And that's great.
But actually, as you read the story
more carefully,
that is not what's happening at all.
Instead, what you'll find in the story
is it's hinging around this word wisdom.
Okay?
The woman from Tekoa,
you're not given her name,
but she's called a wise woman.
David is called a man of wisdom
in verse 20.
But what it turns out
is that there is in 2 Samuel chapter 14
a kind of fatally flawed wisdom,
a worldly wisdom.
And I want to try and show you that.
Let me try and show you that
in three ways.
The first thing to see is this,
that worldly wisdom,
the wisdom of 2 Samuel 14
uses feelings to deny truth.
That's how you know
that the wisdom here is not good.
Now, if you've been here
for the series on 2 Samuel,
then the chapter might be
sort of vaguely familiar.
You know, someone standing
in front of King David
with a made-up story
trying to change his mind.
If you know the story
of David and Bathsheba
and the prophet Nathan
coming to David
to try and convict him of that sin,
it might be familiar to you.
That's in chapter 12.
Nathan the prophet
made up a story
about a guy with a sheep
that got killed by a rich man.
If you don't know it,
you can go and look at it
in chapter 12.
And the similarities are clear.
Both stories are trying
to pull on David's knowledge
of the scriptures,
trying to get him
to come to a certain conclusion.
Like I said before,
here is the story
of Cain and Abel
in Genesis 4
where there's a biblical precedent
for not enacting
capital punishment.
But despite the similarity
between those two occasions,
actually there's a massive difference.
You see,
in chapter 12,
David is full of sinful passion
for this woman Bathsheba.
He is lustfully desirous
of this beautiful woman Bathsheba.
He longs for her
so much so that he takes her
to himself.
He sleeps with her
and gets her pregnant
and kills her husband.
Right?
And Nathan the prophet
comes and tells that story
to arouse David's conscience
to what his feelings
have led him to do
which is wrong.
And here in this story,
it is the opposite way round,
isn't it?
Here in chapter 14,
David's conscience
is firmly settled
against Absalom
which is why he's still in exile.
David in chapter 14
has been doing
the right thing.
David knows
that Absalom
has done wrong
and that this premeditated
killing of Amnon
was a short circuit
of justice.
Justice which David
had failed to
or been unwilling
at least to enact.
But still it was not
to be taken on
by Absalom.
So for Absalom
to be in exile
was a fitting thing.
So notice that
the woman's story
is trying to do
the opposite
of Nathan's story.
The woman's story
is trying to pull
on David's feelings
to make him do something
which is wrong,
untrue.
The story of the sons
is designed
to make David
pity Absalom
and lead him
to believe
that exile
is harsh or unfair.
to think
that maybe
it would be okay
just to let Absalom
off
even though it wasn't.
See here's the
twist of worldly wisdom.
You know God's wisdom
sends Nathan
to stop a sinner
in his tracks
while worldly wisdom
does the opposite
of that.
It seeks to
short circuit justice
when it feels
a little harsh.
You see one
is an act
of mercy
and love.
The other
is an act
of manipulation
and self-interest.
and that's
the warning
to you here.
The warning
is that there
is a kind
of wisdom
in the world
a worldly wisdom
that simply
cannot handle
the truth.
It can't.
More specifically
it can't handle
the fact
that the truth
does not necessarily
feel good
all the time.
Do you know
what I mean?
Here
the truth
of Absalom's exile
did not feel
good to David
and so the worldly
wisdom of human
hearts seeks
to change
the truth
in order to
make it
accommodate
our feelings
editing God's
plans and God's
truth accordingly.
Now you don't
need me to tell
you now
hopefully
that that is
exactly what
the world
is still doing
isn't it?
This is very
contemporary.
We live in a
world of Joab's
worldly wisdom
don't we?
We live in a
world that loves
to edit truth
by feelings
over and over
and over
and over again.
Think about
what Jesus says
in John 14
when he tells
the disciples
I am the way
the truth
and the life
no one comes
to the Father
but by me.
You know
worldly wisdom
hears that
goes
what really?
That's really
the truth?
No one comes
to God
except through
the Lord Jesus
Christ?
Is that really
right?
It doesn't feel
like that does it?
You mean
do you mean
to say that
my lovely
non-Christian
neighbor
my neighbor
who's nicer
than quite a lot
of my Christian
friends
the one who
looks after my
cat while I'm
away who took
in my Amazon
parcel yesterday?
You mean
to say
that they're
going to hell?
That doesn't
feel right.
That doesn't
feel true.
Just because
they don't
trust in Jesus?
Are you sure?
Surely we have
to find a
different reading
of the word
no one
don't we?
So worldly
wisdom sets
about unpicking
the uniqueness
of Christ
because it
doesn't just
feel right.
But 2 Samuel
chapter 14
says listen
beware of that
worldly wisdom.
I'll give you
another example
can't you?
What about
the Bible's
teaching on
marriage to
mean that all
sexual activity
outside of the
marriage of a
man to a
woman is wrong
and immoral?
I mean you
really think
that?
You really
think that?
Is that how
the world feels?
Does that mean
that loving
same-sex couples
or those
cohabiting that
all sexual
activity outside
of human
marriage, the
marriage of a
man to a
woman, all of
that is wrong?
Are you sure?
Is that really?
You can't believe
that.
That doesn't feel
right, doesn't
feel loving.
So we bend the
truth to match
what we feel.
All the time we
do it.
Worldly wisdom
where feelings
override the
truth because they
can't handle the
truth.
And so
consciences are
compromised.
And that's why
the wisdom of
Joab here is
never going to
fix the problem
because it can't
face up to the
truth.
Second thing
though here,
there's a
worldly wisdom
which is impressed
by appearances.
Impressed by
appearances.
I think this is
almost amusing
here in the
passage but if
you notice that
verses 25 and
27 are sort of
out of place,
aren't they?
If you look down
at your Bible
you'll notice that
there is a
strange detail
here.
Why in all
that's happening
are you told in
great detail about
Absalom's appearance?
You are told about
the weight of
Absalom's hair.
Absalom cut his
hair once a year
and it weighed
two kilograms.
I mean I think
these are some of
the most offensive
verses in the
Bible.
I mean I find
this very difficult
to accept.
Imagine having
two kilos of
hair.
I would be
grateful for a
few grams of
hair, right?
But why is this
detail in here?
I mean if you
look at the
passage, verses
24 and 28 would
go perfectly well
together.
The writer is
putting this in.
Why the
interruption?
Well I think
because they're
another example of
the fact that
there's a twist
on wisdom here.
If you jump
back a few
pages in your
Bible to 1
Samuel chapter
16 you'll
notice this
why.
So just over
a few pages
back to 1
Samuel chapter
16.
This is when
David is chosen
to be king in
1 Samuel chapter
16.
1 Samuel chapter
16 verse 6.
It will come on
the slide behind
me as well.
Let me read
those verses to
you.
When they
arrived, Samuel
who's the
prophet saw
Eliab and
thought surely
the Lord's
anointed stands
here before the
Lord.
But the Lord
said to Samuel
do not consider
his appearance
or his height
for I have
rejected him.
The Lord does
not look at the
things people
look at.
People look at
the outward
appearance but
the Lord looks
at the heart.
When Samuel was
going to anoint
David as king
he was really
impressed by his
brothers.
They're tall,
handsome,
got a great
voice,
luscious hair.
Surely,
surely this is
who God wants
to be king.
And God says
no, you're
looking at it
as man looks
at it.
I am looking
at the heart.
Now you come
back to 2 Samuel
chapter 14.
Don't you see
that this is an
exact example of
that kind of
worldly wisdom?
That's what's
happening here.
The narrator is
telling us that
Israel are doing
the opposite of
what God does.
God looks at
the heart.
Israel are
impressed with
two kilos of
hair.
It's really
laid on thick
as well,
isn't it,
in verse 25.
In Israel,
there was not
a man so
highly praised
for his
handsome appearance
as Absalom.
From the top
of his head
to the sole
of his foot,
there was no
blemish in him.
That's one
good-looking guy,
isn't it?
There is not a
guy in the room
who matches up
to that.
But the heart
of Absalom,
which we have
seen and will
see again,
is selfish and
arrogant,
opposed to David
and opposed to
the Lord.
There's more
than this as well.
I think you can
probably make a
pretty good case
that hairy men
in the Bible
and Samson.
Perhaps the writer
had them in mind.
It's also,
though,
a point of forward
to how Absalom
will die.
You don't know
how Absalom dies.
I'm not going
to give it away
to you.
You can have
to read on
in 2 Samuel,
but it is
connected to his hair.
That will come
in a few weeks.
There's also
something here
as the mention
of three sons
and a beautiful
daughter called Tamar.
Tamar is given
the same name
as his sister
who was attacked
in chapter 13.
It's a sign,
I think,
that those events
are still fresh
in Absalom's mind.
By the time
you get to
chapter 18,
you find that
Absalom has no heir,
by which I think
you're to presume
that his sons,
his three sons,
have died.
You see,
here's the point.
Worldly wisdom
would rather look good
than do the right thing.
That's the point,
isn't it?
Worldly wisdom
would rather swap
deep truth
for shallow appearance.
So much so
that murder
in 2 Samuel chapter 14
is covered
by good looks,
by glorious locks
of hair
and stunning good looks.
And it happens
all the time,
doesn't it?
It's why
kind of wicked
and deceitful politicians
can still get
a really popular following
because we would
rather work
on appearances
than we would
on what is right.
But notice
that this appearance
over reality
is absolutely
no help
in the face
of relational breakdown.
Absalom's good looks
are never going
to atone
for the fact
that he's killed
his brother.
The royal photos
will look miles better
with Absalom in them,
right?
Because he's the best
looking guy
in the family.
But the relational tension
will not go away.
It's still there.
You see,
Joab's worldly wisdom
really can only ever
tell David and Absalom,
listen,
I know that you guys
have got a problem
with each other,
but can't you just
fake it?
Can't we just take a selfie
and smile,
post it on Instagram,
everyone will think
we're all right?
Can we just do that?
You'll look great.
Let's do it.
It has no other option.
Listen,
I want you to face
this this morning.
Think back to how
we started.
The wisdom of the world
has nothing to offer you
in the face of the
relational breakdown
that you feel and
experience every single
day of your life.
It has nothing to offer you
because there's a price
for every relational
breakdown,
isn't there?
Justice is demanded
by Absalom's murder
of Amnon.
For a wife to reconcile
with an unfaithful husband,
for a brother to forgive
his sister who has hurt him,
there is a hurt
that needs to be absorbed.
There is a truth
that needs to be dealt with.
There is the fact
that something has been
done wrong.
Someone has abused you,
mistreated you,
looked over you
because of the color
of your skin.
There is a price
to be paid for.
Justice is demanded
because of that.
And all the world
can say to you is,
smile, let's take
a nice looking selfie
and everything will be okay.
It has nothing to offer you
when it comes to justice.
All they can do
is fake it
and pretend it's okay.
So it leaves you
with nowhere to take
the ache,
the tears,
the pain.
Joab says,
listen,
I know it's difficult
but it looks good,
doesn't it?
But it doesn't deal
with a problem.
Which brings us
to the final point
this morning
which is this,
worldly wisdom
ignores God's king.
What you cannot help
but miss in these chapters
is that great King David
is basically a passenger.
David in 2 Samuel 14
is the one
who's not doing anything.
Joab is kind of
captain of the ship.
He's manipulating David
with this woman at Tekoa.
Absalom is then
manipulating Joab
going as far as burning
his crops
to get his own wear.
Interestingly,
in the passage,
the only mention
really of the Lord
as well
is in his relationship
to David.
David is like an angel
of the Lord
in verse 17
and verse 20.
And he's recognized
in verse 16
as the holder
of the covenant
heritage of God.
But for all that,
David in chapter 14
is not leading.
He's not being kingly.
He's not being listened to.
Worldly wisdom
is leading the way
in chapter 14.
The king is silent.
That should be
a kind of pointer
to you
that not all
is well
in chapter 14.
But let me show you
something brilliant
about this.
If you've zoned out
for a moment,
just tune back in
because this is,
I think,
the brilliance
of 2 Samuel chapter 14.
You and I are reading
this account
probably three and a half
thousand years or so
after it happened.
You and I know,
don't we,
that God's king
is not really
King David.
King David is,
if you like,
a prototype,
a type of the real
king of God's people
who is the Lord
Jesus Christ,
the one who
is the ultimate
person who has
a good heart,
yeah,
a heart after the Lord
because he is
God in flesh,
God the eternal son
come down,
born as a baby,
living,
dying for us.
So we know that,
don't we?
So think of a time
then when,
when God's real king,
God's king Jesus
is a passenger
of worldly wisdom
in the same way
as 2 Samuel chapter 14.
Can you think
of a time
when King Jesus,
the real king
of God's people
is treated like David
where he's manipulated
and twisted
and pushed into doing
all sorts of things?
Can you think
of a time like that?
Do you see
the Jewish leaders
and the Roman rulers
and the puppet kings
conspire to drag
King Jesus
out of Jerusalem
and nail him
to a cross?
I don't think
that's the ultimate
victory of worldly wisdom.
That is the ultimate
victory of feelings
tripping over justice.
We're jealous
of this man Jesus.
Let's put him to death.
This is appearances
winning over hearts,
isn't it?
Jesus is naked
and bleeding
and mocked
by the people.
I don't want anything
to do with him.
He looks terrible.
What is going on
when that happens
to the Lord Jesus?
Let me tell you
something fantastic.
In that moment
when worldly wisdom
seems to be winning,
what you are witnessing
is the wisdom of God
in providing atonement
for relational breakdown.
That's what you're seeing.
So much so
that the worldly wisdom
of the crowd
that nails Jesus
to a cross of shame
does not defeat Jesus
but glorifies him.
As in his sacrifice
on the cross
he is providing the means
for relational forgiveness
and atonement.
Not so much
to be able to bring
Absalom back from exile
with his grandfather
but bringing sinners
back from exile
into relationship
with the God
who made them
so that people
like you and I
who have sinned
against God
and fallen out with him
and broken our relationship
with him
might be brought back
into relationship
with the God
who made us
through the atoning power
of Jesus on the cross.
Even at the point
when he was a passenger
of worldly wisdom.
Jesus dying in our place
paying the cost of justice
facing up to the hard truth.
This is the very definition
of not putting appearances
above truth and reality
as Jesus the bleeding
dying suffering one
naked on a tree
is the most beautiful
wonderful and glorious saviour.
It's hard to capture this
but try with me if you can
in the face of the tragic relationships
in 2 Samuel chapter 14
all Joab can do
is fake it
and cover it over.
He just can't go deep enough
to solve the problem
between Absalom
and his father David.
He had no means
to provide justice
for Absalom's wickedness
and reconciliation
for David's love.
All he had was
shallow solutions
for deep problems
and it's always
the way in the world.
The worldly wisdom
will take in the face
of the relationship problems
that we all suffer from
the world will just say
oh just forget about it.
Just go on a nice holiday
buy yourself something new
pretend it doesn't happen
but you know it doesn't work
and you know it doesn't work
because you still wake up
thinking about them
it's still chewing you up inside.
But then in the great triumph
of God's glorious wisdom
Jesus dies on the cross
seemingly the victim
of this kind of fake it
and cover it up world
but he hangs there
because the Jewish leaders
were so jealous of him
but in those moments
as Jesus breathes his last
he accomplishes relational harmony
not only between God and men
but between brothers and sisters
men and women
as he provides the means
for us to forgive one another.
1 Corinthians chapter 1 verse 25
puts it like this
because the foolishness of God
is wiser than human wisdom
and the weakness of God
is stronger than human strength.
Here's the point
as simply as I can try
and put it this morning
relationship breakdown
comes with a price
a cost
a justice.
So with us and God
if you're not a Christian
you will never know
the God who made you
without coming through
the only one
who can pay the price
for your reconciliation.
That remains true
even when you're a Christian
and it's true also
in our relationships
with one another.
That only Christ
has the resources
for you to forgive another.
Only Christ can offer you
the deep solution
because only he
has the capital
if you like
to pay the price
for justice and truth.
Perhaps this morning
you know that there is
someone that you've
fallen out with.
Maybe it's a small
maybe it's a petty matter
or maybe it's a really big deal
maybe it's as big as
Absalom and David here.
What do you do?
Let me say to you
the only thing you can do
is come to the Lord Jesus Christ
and find in him
all the resources
that you need
for forgiveness and grace
so that you can move
towards another person
and say with genuineness
without covering everything over
with genuineness
you can say to them
I forgive you
I love you
because Jesus
has paid the price of justice
that our relationship
reconciliation requires
and he did it on the cross.
And maybe in some
of these situations
reconciliation like that
won't be possible
because the other person
won't speak to you
or won't engage with it.
What comfort is there then?
Well you know don't you
you and I live in a world
where the wisdom of God
can take the worldly wisdom
the folly of man
and use it
to accomplish his great purposes.
So you don't need to be afraid
you need to trust the Lord
and press on
because in this world
God can be trusted
even to accomplish
his great purposes
through the tragedy
of our worldly twisted wisdom.
Let's pray
together as we close.
Let me just leave
a bit of quiet
for you to pray
in your own hearts.
Maybe come to the Lord
with a situation
or a problem
that's troubling you.
Thank the Lord
that he alone
has the resources
to help you face it.
Heavenly Father
we want to say
thank you for Jesus.
Thank you that in Jesus
we can face
truth and reality
and find grace
and mercy
resources to forgive
one another
reconciliation with you.
Thank you that in the end
the twisted worldly wisdom
of 2 Samuel chapter 14
does not win
but your wisdom
is stronger
than the wisdom of man.
thank you that your weakness
is stronger
than our greatest power.
So thank you
that we can trust you
and turn to you.
Our Lord please
we pray
might we be a church
that love one another
because we find
the resources
for loving one another
in the Lord Jesus Christ
and his work
for us on the cross.
In his name we pray.
Amen.