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was David's conscience quiet? To take the lowest view of it, he could not be ignorant
that the law of God pronounced sentence of death on the adulterer and adulteress
(Leviticus 20:10). Nor could he deceive himself in regard to the treacherous, foul
murder of Uriah. But there was far more than this. The man whom God had so
exalted, who had had such fellowship with Him, had sunk so low; he who was to
restore piety in Israel had given such occasion to the enemy to blaspheme; the man
who, when his own life was in danger, would not put forth his hand to rid himself of
his enemy, had sent into pitiless death his own faithful soldier, to cover his guilt and
to gratify his lust! Was it possible to sink from loftier height or into lower depth? His
conscience could not be, and it was not silent. What untold agonies he suffered while
he covered up his sin, he himself has told us in the thirty-second Psalm. In general,
we have in this respect also in the Psalter a faithful record for the guidance of
penitents in all ages - to preserve them from despair, to lead them to true repentance,
and to bring them at last into the sunlight of forgiveness and peace.
Throughout one element appears very prominently, and is itself an indication of
"godly sorrow." Besides his own guilt the penitent also feels most keenly the
dishonor which he has brought on God's name, and the consequent triumph of God's
enemies. Placing these Psalms, so to speak, in the chronological order of David's
experience, we would arrange them as follows: Psalm 38, 6, 51, and 32^302 - when at
last it is felt that all "transgression is forgiven," all "sin covered."
It was in these circumstances that Nathan the prophet by Divine commission
presented himself to David. A parabolic story, simple, taken from every-day life, and
which could awaken no suspicion of his ulterior meaning, served as introduction.
Appealed to on the score of right and generosity, the king gave swift sentence. Alas,
he had only judged himself, and that in a cause which contrasted most favorably
with his own guilt. How the prophet's brief, sharp rejoinder: "Thou art the man"
must have struck to his heart! There was no disguise now; no attempt at excuse or
palliation. Stroke by stroke came down the hammer -each blow harder and more
crushing than the other. What God had done for David; how David had acted
towards Uriah and towards his wife - and how God would avenge what really was a
despising of Himself: such was the burden of Nathan's brief-worded message. Had
David slain Uriah with the sword of the Ammonites? Never, so long as he lived,
would the sword depart from the house of David. Had he in secret possessed himself
adulterously of Uriah's wife? Similar and far sorer evil would be brought upon him,
and that not secretly but publicly. And we know how the one sentence came true
from the murder of Amnon (2 Samuel 13:29) to the slaughter of Absalom (18:14),
and even the execution of Adonijah after David's death (1 Kings 2:24, 25); and also
how terribly the other prediction was fulfilled through the guilt of his own son (2
Samuel 16:21, 22).
(^)