I'm taking a class called Interpreting Genesis to Song of Solomon at Western Seminary right now. It has been incredible. I've been reading through the Old Testament at a pretty quick clip and watching in depth lectures by Dr. Tim Mackie on each book and reading other great overview material on each book in "The New Bible Commentary." I've read the entire Bible several times, but I've never read it this fast or understood it this well. I am so grateful for this class. The main thing I'm getting out of it is that the people can not shema. They can't listen and obey. They hear the voice of God or words of God through a prophet and they know what they are to do and they're promised land and blessing and children if they obey - but they just cannot maintain obedience. It's the same story over and over again. Then this week I'm reading about King David. He is finally a man who does obey. He's doing so great, refusing to kill the man who is trying to kill him, Saul, when he had many opportunities to do so because Saul is still God's anointed.
THEN I GOT TO CHAPTER 11.
David sees Bathsheba bathing on the roof, sleeps with her, calls her husband Uriah back from war to try and get him to sleep with his wife, the honorable man refuses to go home in a time of war when all of his companions are out at war so David sends Uriah to the front lines so that he will be killed and he is. AND I WEPT LIKE A BABY. I wept because my heart was broken for God who is always faithful while the people he loves continue to turn from him and his ways. I wept for all of my sin and the sin of the whole world. I, in a very small fraction of understanding, felt God's broken heart for his stiff-necked and rebellious people and I prayed that God would help me with his Spirit to seek righteousness that I may be used by him and walk in righteousness.
2 Samuel chapter 11 wrecked me. God is a God of love and covenant faithfulness and we all cheat on him all the time. Our idolatry comes out in anything we put before God claiming our own version of good for ourselves to rule, and from this God's heart is left deserted, rebelled against, and cheated on in the destructive wake of our sin. He loves us and yet we turn from him. My heart is broken for God this morning, in the small diminished way I can even feel that.
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