Hold My Beer | Sunday, September 5, 2021

Good morning, Cross Connection. It's Pastor Mark. Pastor Miles asked if I would teach for him this morning while he takes a little well-earned rest and relaxation. This morning, we're going to be in the book of 2 Samuel, which is one of my favorite books. There's a lot of action in this book and many great life lessons. We will be focusing on chapter 11, so if you want to turn there in your Bibles, please do.

You probably noticed the background behind me, and I think it represents some of the things that are going on in the world. It's kind of like one big ugly dumpster fire. There are just a lot of things happening out there that defy good sense, wisdom, and explanation. This morning, I want to look at something I think is really important: how we, as believers, make good decisions.

We've all seen those videos on YouTube that start with the phrase, "Hold my beer." Someone hands off their beer and then proceeds to do something idiotic and dangerous, often resulting in them hurting themselves or others. It seems like the world has a little bit of that "hold my beer" mentality. Unfortunately, I think sometimes even as believers, we can do the same thing. We want to say to God, "Hey, hold my beer. We're going to take care of this, Lord, and we're going to do it the way we want to do it." This usually has disastrous results, much like those videos.

When I look at the world's decisions and some of the things currently in the news, I often find myself thinking that I could have done better than that, and I'm not even a world leader. What we're seeing are decisions, policies, and actions that lack God's methods, God's influence, and God's wisdom. I believe the world needs Christian leadership—people who will avail themselves of God's wisdom, His Word, and His methods. If we are ever going to find a solution to the perilous times that the world has lived in for thousands of years, we must recognize that this is the period we are in, and this is the period we are called to influence.

I look at one of the things we see in the news right now: the heartbreak and disaster of what is going on in Afghanistan. I don't want to be political about this because there are many people who were part of this decision. However, many of you probably don't know that before I was a pastor, I was actually an international arms dealer. Yes, I know, kind of funny, huh? It's a little different from what I do now.

Through the company we owned, we shipped firearms all over the world, almost to every part of the globe. I have a unique understanding of what happens in the international traffic of arms and how that's regulated. When I was in that business, we would get an import certificate from a country, from a customer. We would take that import certificate and fill out all the necessary paperwork. It's a form I believe is called a DSP-83. We would send that form off to the United States government, specifically the Department of Defense Trade Controls. They would examine the end user and the end use, and then, as a licensed arms dealer, they would give us a yes or a no.

Most of the time, they would give us a yes. After that approval, we would ship those particular firearms to a known entity in a foreign country. That entity had been investigated to ensure that those arms wouldn't leave that country and go to another place. The potential for disaster is significant, especially with over 600,000 small arms alone falling into the hands of a known terrorist group. The risk of those arms ending up in the wrong place and causing harm in the world, with no regulation and no oversight, is alarming. It becomes a situation where the highest bidder pays and gets what they want, not to mention the tanks and over 20 million rounds of ammunition out there.

As I reflect on this potential for chaos, it definitely causes you to look up and realize that we need the Lord, His methods, His wisdom, and ultimately, we need Him. As we go through this, we recognize that sometimes good people make bad decisions.

We all make bad mistakes, and those mistakes don't just affect us; they can affect everyone around us. If there was ever a time for Christians to step up, make good decisions, and be men and women of good reputation—people that the world looks to for answers—it is now. I believe we are on the cusp of God doing something significant, pointing men's hearts towards Him. I believe we are already experiencing a move of the Lord.

So, join me as we pray for our lesson. Father, I thank You so much for the experiences and challenges You give us. We get through those things by leaning on You and submitting them to You, Lord, and You make us triumphant in those situations. The world has many challenges, problems, and issues, largely because it is devoid of Your wisdom, Your methods, and Your Word. As we study a good man, a man You love—someone who made mistakes—let us learn to make our own decisions in a godly way. We pray that You would impart this into our hearts. In Jesus' name, we pray, amen.

Now, a little background on our hero, David. Most of you know that he was a shepherd boy. He spent his days on the hills, a very young man who loved God and had a heart for Him. He communicated with God, spent time in worship, and sang to Him when nobody was watching—just him and the Lord. David was called a man after God's own heart, and he was someone that God cared deeply about and loved profoundly.

However, David was also a man who made mistakes. He was called to great bravery, and there was a time when he faced a giant, which made him famous throughout all of Israel. Like us, he depended on God and rose to the occasion when facing giants in his own life. But, also like us, later in his career as king, he suffered from challenges that tested his faith and character.

I would call it affluenza. One of the greatest difficulties we will ever face is not just confronting giants, but also dealing with affluence, success, and the absence of significant challenges. This is one of the toughest spiritual battles we will ever fight because we tend to drift away from God. We tend to drift away from dependence on Him. We often think that we have everything figured out, as if to say, "Hold my beer." We convince ourselves that we’ve got this.

One of the incidents we will look at is the most famous one involving David, although there were worse ones. This incident is with Bathsheba. David sees Bathsheba and purposes in his heart to commit adultery. He goes through with the act of adultery and then attempts to cover it up. However, he cannot completely conceal it, which leads him to resort to murder. After the murder, he believes he has it covered up, but God knows the truth and calls him out.

I want to go through this with you and examine some of the decisions David made that he could have handled much better, which likely would have led to a different outcome. I am also very thankful that God records these mistakes. He allows these errors to be documented for you and me to learn from.

As we delve into 2 Samuel, we start in verse 1, which states, "It happened in the spring of the year, at the time when kings go out to battle, that David sent Joab and his servants with him and all Israel. They destroyed the people of Ammon and besieged Rabbah, but David remained at Jerusalem." One of the things Bible commentators agree on is that David was not supposed to be in the palace; he was supposed to be at war.

In your outline sheet, consider this question: Am I in a place of obedience? It is very important that when you are faced with a significant decision, you take a step back. You need to evaluate your overall spiritual well-being and ask yourself, "Am I in the right place?"

A place of obedience is where I'm fit and focused to be able to make a decision like this. For David, he clearly was not. David was off mission, so to speak. He was not in obedience to what God had called him to do.

If you know anything about David, it is that he was a warrior king. He was not a country club king; he was a warrior. What brought him fame was the slaying of the Philistine giant, Goliath, in front of all of Israel. People would sing the song, "Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands." This was a cry that the people of Israel wanted—a warrior king, a victorious king. Part of David's mission was to conquer the nations around him, to defend and unite Israel, which was ultimately part of his call.

When people sent their sons off to battle with David, they knew that he would be there with them. God's anointed and appointed would be with their sons, giving them confidence in David and in the outcome, because they knew that the Lord would be with them in battle. This was part of David's mission.

We also know this was part of David's mission because later on, as he comes to the Lord and becomes more successful, he gets it in his heart to build God a temple. The Ark of the Covenant was sitting in a tent, and he wanted to create a permanent residence for it, which wasn't necessarily a bad thing. However, when he comes before the Lord, thinking this is a great idea and everyone in the room agrees, God stops him and says, "No, this is not your job; this is not your mission." He tells David that he has blood on his hands, which meant that he was a warrior, a killer, a general. This was a significant part of his reputation and his role to the people in all the lands around him and to the people of Israel.

Our obedience affects our interior, how we view God, and how we view ourselves and our position with God.

The book of Hebrews 10 is pretty specific about judgment, and I thought it was very telling. In verse 26, it states, "For if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sin, but a certain fearful expectation of judgment and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries."

So, what does that mean? It means that our view of God is that we will be judged when we live in disobedience to Him. When we know His word, when we taste and live in the truth, and then suddenly we get off track, we develop a guilty conscience. This expectation that we are not right with God colors and taints everything we view as believers. We get a warped view of God; we see His judgment perhaps coming, and we view His rules or our disobedience to His rules as a burden rather than a blessing. This shift changes our interior and impairs our judgment.

I would equate it sometimes to driving under the influence. Not only is it illegal, but it's wrong. We could hurt somebody. It's the same thing when we are under the influence of sin. When we are in a lifestyle that is not pleasing to God, it can lead us to have judgment that is just not in line with what God's word is and God's expectations for us.

It affects our external lives, too. It is refreshing and wonderful to see a man or a woman walk into a room, knowing that they are anointed and appointed for a task. They are blameless before the Lord, and there is a confidence that follows them when they are about God's business. The enemy has nothing on them; he can't crush them, push them, or make them feel guilty because, before the Lord, they are blameless through Jesus Christ. They conduct themselves in a way that is righteous, and it is evident to all those around them—not self-righteous, but truly righteous.

They can see God's blessing on your external actions, what you're doing, and how you conduct yourselves. They say that wisdom is justified by her children. People can see the work of your hands being blessed and done by the Lord. It is an incredible example of something that is a light and an attraction to others, and there's a confidence about that.

David exuded that confidence when he was still a young boy. There's the story of him fighting off a lion with a sling to take care of his father's sheep, the flock, and then another time when he drove away a bear. Generally, it is not a good idea to confront a bear with a rock and a sling, but David had the confidence that came from being inspired by the Lord. He believed that God was going to take care of him. That confidence allowed him to defeat the bear and the lion, and ultimately, as a young man, to stand before the giant Goliath in front of all of Israel in this great showdown. God had already built that confidence into him through his previous experiences.

Our obedience brings glory to God. Our obedience is better than sacrifice, as it says in the book of Samuel. Our obedience serves as a light to others because there are results from that obedience. Hebrews 11:16 is a very important verse; it talks about Abraham, the patriarch. It states, "But now they desire a better, that is, a heavenly country. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them."

I sometimes wonder, as believers, when we make poor decisions and damage God's reputation, if God looks at us and thinks, "Oh gosh, I wish they wouldn't tell someone they're a Christian; they don't represent me at all." I know I never want to be in that position.

So we want to be in a place of obedience. Let's go to verse 2. It says that David is now in Jerusalem. He's kicking back and letting everybody else do his work for him. They say that idle hands are the devil's playthings, or the devil's tools, and this seems to be the case here.

It says, "Then it happened one evening that David arose from his bed and walked on the roof of the king's house. From the roof, he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to behold." So David sent and inquired about the woman. Someone said, "Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?" Wow! David is not busy; he's not doing what he's supposed to do. With this spare time on his hands, he's looking over the balcony and observing another man's wife.

This leads to a question that you have to consider when making a decision: Am I seeking and heeding wise counsel? This is in your outline. You see, this servant tried to throw the boss a bone, so to speak. The servant saw that his boss, David, was looking at another man's wife, and everybody knew who she was. This was not a big secret, and perhaps this isn't the first time that David was considering this.

However, his servant was trying to be a friend, a protector of David, a guardian, so to speak. He uses that four-letter, very simple word, "wife." It should have been a trigger for David to know that this is another man's wife. "Don't go there, David. Don't do this." Proverbs 11:14 says, "Where there is no counsel, the people fall, but in the multitude of counselors there is safety."

Getting counsel before we make a decision is vital. So many times, we can see and think one certain way and be so sure of something, but we never sought another opinion, so to speak, from a person that is godly. You have to pick...

Good counselors are a great blessing in life. I have always had good counselors around me, and I have always had people to go to when I needed advice. I have never seen it as a failure to ask for advice from someone who knows more about the subject I am trying to investigate or deal with, especially when it comes to making a big decision.

When it comes to matters of the church, I reach out to people who are authorities and have experience in the subjects I am tackling. It has always worked well to seek godly counselors who are knowledgeable and experienced.

Now, how do you pick a counselor? There is a lot of advice out there. I remember when we started raising our children; there was so much information available. As a parent, you might reflect on some of the things your parents did. Some of those methods worked fantastically, while others did not work out as well. You tend to lean on those experiences, but there are stacks of books, websites, and various resources to consider.

When I looked for a good counselor during our parenting journey, I sought out people whose children I admired. I would meet their kids and think, "Wow, those are great kids! They are respectful, normal, fun, and they seem to have joy and balance." I would ask those parents what they did regarding discipline, schooling, and other aspects of parenting. I gathered that information and then prayed about it to see how it could work in our lives.

Another way to gain valuable advice is to ask people who have no idea what they are doing. I won't name names, but I have asked some individuals about raising children who had poorly behaved kids. They were hellions, and I would never want my children to be like them. However, I asked what they did because I wanted to know what not to do.

I cannot stress enough the importance of seeking wise counsel in whatever you do, whether it involves finances, raising children, or buying a house.

Those big decisions, like getting married, require seeking wise counsel from people who have godly wisdom and from God's Word. There is no substitute for that. Without a biblical method and a biblical standard, you will never achieve a biblically based, blessed result. It just won't happen.

We think, and I'm so thankful that God's grace is mixed in there too, so it's not that we have to be perfect. However, that effort is important. I believe that God blesses the effort we put into seeking wise counsel, and His Word certainly stresses that.

Read with me in verses four through five. David is warned that this is another man's wife, and David makes a choice. This is a bad choice. It says, "Then David sent messengers and took her, and she came to him, and he lay with her, for she was cleansed from her impurity, and she returned to her house." The woman conceived, so she sent and told David, saying, "I am with child." Well, the problem just got bigger.

A question you have to ask yourself when making a decision is, "Am I in agreement with God's Word?" For David, this was very simple in this situation. It says, "David took her and lay with her." He realized, "I know what the rules say, Lord. I know what's right and what's wrong, and hey, I'm just going to step out of the kingdom for a little bit because this is what I want to do."

David chose to ignore the godly wisdom that was put before him as king. He decided to disregard the rules and regulations that were good for him. He essentially said, "Hold my beer, so to speak. I'm going to go do this, whatever comes."

If you spend any time in the world at all, you'll know about the Ten Commandments. In Exodus 20:14, it says very plainly, "You shall not commit adultery." David knew this; it's one of the basics, one of the big ten. Exodus 20:17 says, "You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife."

David proceeds in this story to break all ten commandments. If you go through and look at every action he takes throughout this entire narrative, he wasn't intending to do this. If he had sat down and prayed about it, or just waited and brought it before the Lord, asking these things, had it come out of his mouth towards the Lord, he never would have done this. However, he didn't take the time. He went ahead with what was in his heart, and the heart is the wellspring of life; guard it with all diligence.

He breaks all ten commandments. Did he honor his mother and father? No. Did he put other things before God? Yes. Every commandment is broken in this whole situation, and I'm sure that was not his intention. I’m sure that is not our intention when we do these things. Our decisions made in opposition to God's word will have catastrophic results for us and for those around us. Our families, our friends, our employers—when we act outside of God's will and God's word, it will have catastrophic results for those around us, for those we associate with, our employers, our friends, and our family.

God gives us His word not as a set of rules to box us in. Instead, God provides us with a set of loving curbs. They are not fences; we can certainly climb over them, but they serve to keep us on the straight and narrow because they are loving and good for us. Psalm 119:105 says, "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path." The light of God's word for the Christian sheds light on the potholes and the things that we would normally stumble over. If we avail ourselves of it, we can save so much heartache, both for ourselves and for those around us and for the world.

So, read along with me in verses 6-13. Bathsheba is pregnant, so David needs to do something.

So he hatches a plan. In verse 6, it says, "Then David sent to Joab, saying, 'Send me Uriah the Hittite.' And Joab sent Uriah to David." When Uriah had come to him, David asked how Joab was doing, how the people were doing, and how the war prospered. David then said to Uriah, "Go down to your house and wash your feet." So Uriah departed from the king's house, and a gift of food from the king followed him.

However, Uriah slept at the door of the king's house with all the servants of his lord and did not go down to his house. When they told David that Uriah did not go down to his house, David asked Uriah, "Did you not come from a journey? Why did you not go down to your house?" Uriah replied, "The ark and Israel and Judah are dwelling in tents, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are encamped in the open fields. Shall I then go to my house and eat and drink and lie with my wife? As you live and as your soul lives, I will not do this thing."

Then David said to Uriah, "Wait here today also, and tomorrow I will let you depart." So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next.

A couple of things stand out to me here. One is that David is trying to cover his tracks. He is attempting to get Uriah to go home and be with his wife, effectively blaming the pregnancy on Uriah, so to speak, to make it look like it is Uriah's child. But Uriah is not going for it.

It's purely speculation on my part, but I have worked a lot with people who work for others, particularly in manual labor. One thing I know about working on boats or construction sites is that the guys on the lower rungs often know a lot more than you'd think. I honestly believe that someone told Uriah what had happened. It is very hard for people to keep their mouths shut when it comes to injustice and wrongdoing, especially by their leadership.

Uriah seems to perform a very honorable act, going above and beyond what he is called to do. There is no regulation preventing him from going home to be with his wife, yet he chooses to act heroically. I think there is probably more to this situation. I believe he knows what has taken place, and he is going to push David to the point where he is confronted with his sin. Or perhaps this is all circumstantial, and he does not.

God is using Uriah's honorable character to push David to make a decision. This raises a question: Am I needing to repent? David has a choice. He is in a situation where he can repent, apologize, and ask for forgiveness. I believe this story would have turned out much differently if David had chosen that path. Instead, he is trying to cover his tracks and maintain a good appearance for others. But God knows the truth.

In aviation, for those who have ever taken flight classes or flown an airplane, there is something called the four C's of aviation. This concept is taught in school for situations when you are lost or unsure of your surroundings. The four C's are: confess, which means acknowledging the problem to the tower; communicate with the tower to inform them of the situation; climb, which helps you get out of harm's way and aids in radar tracking; and comply with the instructions given by the tower. This advice is crucial for saving your life and your passengers.

Similarly, it is important to remember these four C's when we find ourselves in a place where we need to repent. Repenting and asking for forgiveness is always a better path than trying to cover things up or complicate matters further. Confessing the problem to God and to others is essential. We need to communicate with God, pouring our hearts out to Him and expressing our need for forgiveness. Being honest with God is vital because He already knows our hearts.

We should also strive to climb to a higher elevation, so to speak. Our attitude should match our altitude. Bringing our thoughts and perspectives to a higher level, having a God’s eye view of our situation, allows us to think spiritually and communicate with heaven. Finally, we must comply with what is right and wrong as outlined in God's Word, ensuring that we follow His guidance specifically.

What you're told is to be able to mend these fences, to seek forgiveness, to make this right, to pay back, or whatever that is in the situation. Those are things that will save your soul, so to speak, and your reputation. Anybody can make a mistake, but it's how you deal with a mistake after you've made it that is very telling about your character and who you are.

Let's go to verses 14 through 27. In verse 14, we see that David tried to get Uriah drunk and do all kinds of things, but Uriah wasn't falling for it. The verse states that in the morning, David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. He wrote in the letter, "Set Uriah in the forefront of the hottest battle and retreat from him, that he may be struck down and die."

While Joab besieged the city, he assigned Uriah to a place where he knew there were valiant men. The men of the city came out and fought with Joab, and some of the servants of David fell. Uriah the Hittite also died. Joab then sent and told David all the things concerning the war, charging the messenger to say, "When you have finished telling the matters of the war to the king, if it happens that the king's wrath arises and he says to you, 'Why did you approach so near the city when you fought? Did you not know that they would shoot from the wall? Who struck Abimelech, the son of Jehozabeth? Was it not a woman who cast a piece of millstone on him from the wall, so that he died in Thebes? Why did you go near the wall?' then you shall say, 'Your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.'"

The messenger went and told David all that Joab had sent by him. He said to David, "Surely the men prevailed against us and came out on us in the field, and we drove them back as far as the entrance to the gate. The archers shot from the wall at your servants, and some of the king's servants are dead, and your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also."

Then David said to the messenger, "Thus you shall say to Joab, do not let this thing displease you, for the sword devours one as well as the other. Strengthen your attack against the city and overthrow it. So encourage him."

When the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah, her husband, was dead, she mourned for her husband.

When her mourning was over, David sent for Bathsheba and brought her to his house. She became his wife and bore him a son. However, the thing that David had done displeased the Lord.

Am I making a decision that will affect others? David thought he had gotten away with it, right? I mean, Uriah was gone, and Bathsheba was in his house. In fact, the people of Israel most likely thought he was just being a great king. He took this poor fallen soldier's pregnant wife into his house and took care of her, so he appeared to be a hero. It looked great, I'm sure, on the outside. But inside, David knew, and most importantly, God knew.

Am I making a decision that will affect others? It's a good question to ask yourself when you go to make a major decision, or sometimes even a minor one. Who did David's decision affect? We know it affected Bathsheba; her life was much different and would never be the same. We know that it affected Uriah, who was killed by a man he loved, served, and was faithful to, and he was betrayed.

The servants in the house saw all this unfold and knew all about it. They had to either keep it to themselves or let the word out, and I'm sure it affected them greatly. They were drawn into this web of lies and this conspiracy, so to speak. They had to keep it covered up.

Joab, David's general, was a man who trusted David and fought for him as he would for the Lord, with all his heart and all his might. Suddenly, he found his boss to be fallible. He discovered that the king had done something horrible by killing a man of honor. This revelation surely bred distrust and disgust for what David had done. As Joab went on to serve David later, I'm sure he often wondered if David would do the same thing to him, so it affected Joab as well.

David's child ultimately perished as part of God's judgment against him, and it affected others. If you look at David's family tree, it is horrendous.

He has a son who rapes his half-sister, one of David's daughters. He has another son who kills that son to avenge that death. He has yet another son who ends up trying to take over the kingdom later on, and then lies with David's wives in front of all of Israel as he takes over the kingdom. This small part of his immediate family, the tragedy of it, stems from the sexual sin and the murder of Uriah the Hittite, as well as the sexual sin with Bathsheba. It all originates from that. The curse would be on David's house for many, many years.

Our decisions affect other people. I know that over the months, the leadership of this church has had to make many decisions regarding how we deal with the pandemic, what is healthy for our people, and how to sort out what is truth from fact, and what is politicized from what is real. As the leadership of the church, we have marched through this with the understanding that our hearts every weekend were desperately wanting to open up the church. However, we also prayerfully moved forward, knowing that our actions would affect others.

We are a church that is very much a part of the community, and we had to make decisions that would also be viewed by the community. One of the first things we realized was that we wanted to represent God, His care for the sheep, and His care for the people of Escondido that we minister to and are involved with. Throughout this whole situation, we wanted to be part of the solution, not part of the problem.

As we ministered to those in the fire department, the Escondido Police Department, and the public sector first responders, we wanted to ensure that we were sensitive to the needs of the community. We aimed to represent godly wisdom, looking at God's Word and taking the time, without rushing, to do what we believe God would do. I am thankful for having a leadership team that shared this attitude of not being in a hurry.

We could have negatively affected many people in the community had we simply opened the church and ignored the needs of those God had given us to minister to. Does what you and I do affect others in the community? Absolutely. We have a responsibility to that.

Alright, as we start to wrap up, we go to chapter 12. About a year had passed, and God has not forgotten us. David has marched on, and Bathsheba has marched on.

It says, "Then the Lord sent Nathan the prophet to David. He came to him and said, 'There were two men in one city, one rich and another poor. The rich man had exceedingly many flocks and herds. But the poor man had nothing except one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and nourished. It grew up together with him and with his children. It ate of his own food, drank from his own cup, and lay in his own bosom. It was like a daughter to him.'

A traveler came to the rich man, who refused to take from his own flock and from his own herd to prepare one for the wayfaring man who had come to him. Instead, he took the poor man's lamb and prepared it for the man who had come to him. David's anger was greatly aroused against the man, and he said to Nathan, 'As the Lord lives, the man who has done this shall surely die. He shall restore fourfold for the lamb, because he did this thing and had no pity.'

Then Nathan said to David, 'You are the man. Thus says the Lord God of Israel: I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. I gave you your master's house and your master's wives into your keeping. I gave you the house of Israel and Judah, and if that had been too little, I also would have given you much more. Why have you despised the commandment of the Lord to do evil in His sight? You have killed Uriah the Hittite with a sword, you have taken his wife to be your wife, and you have killed him with the sword of the people of Ammon.

Now therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife. Thus says the Lord: Behold, I will raise up adversity against you from your own house. I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of the sun. For this you did secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel, before the sun.'

So David said to Nathan, 'I have sinned against the Lord.' Nathan replied, 'The Lord also has put away your sin; you shall not die.'

However, because of this deed, you have given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme. The child who is born to you shall surely die. This is not good; it's a bad situation. You see, David went from thinking he got away with it to God calling him out for him to get busted. His acts were going to be not only noticed by God, but they were also going to be made public.

An important question, which is in your outline, is: when you go to make a decision or do something, am I bringing glory or dishonor to the Lord? I can bring glory and honor to the Lord as a man or woman of God, and I can do that in many different ways. There are also many ways to bring dishonor, and our reputation is important in the community and in the world. Our reputation is important to God because God's reputation, His name, is important.

I can express my honor to God through my thankfulness. A thankful person is so noticeable. People who give thanks for what God has done for them, as well as for the things that haven't been given to them—such as sickness or trials—stand out. Thankfulness is something that, as you walk as a man or woman of God, follows you and is noticeable to others. It says so much about God because we give the glory and thankfulness to our Lord, which is an important component of honoring Him.

Another important aspect is compassion. You see, David wasn't thankful at the time he committed this sin. God was going to give him so much more, but David also recognized his own sin. Our sin looks so much more evil and is so easy to call out when it's on somebody else. When David thinks he's talking about someone else, he says, "This man did this because he had no pity," or it's also translated as "no compassion." No compassion for a fellow man—that was David's sin. He had no compassion; he did not reflect the compassion of God, and our God is a compassionate God.

He misrepresented God as a leader. He misrepresented God to the world. My conduct as a Christian man counts for something. It's important, or your conduct as a Christian man or woman says volumes about our Lord and our Creator.

You see, ultimately, the thing that really upset God was that David gave the enemies of the Lord a cause to blaspheme the name of the Lord. They spoke ill of God because His servant did dishonorable things, not just in God's culture, but in the world's culture. He had done a wrong thing.

So where does that lead us as we wrap up? Know that if we've gone forward and messed up, if we've trespassed and haven't gone through all the necessary steps to make a decision, we've done something wrong. Know one thing for sure: there is forgiveness and grace in Jesus Christ if He is your Lord and Savior. You can be forgiven, and these things can be gone eternally.

That's not to say we won't deal with real repercussions from our sin and our transgressions. It is very important to put time and effort into not transgressing and not making these mistakes or bad decisions. But there is eternal forgiveness, and we can go to be with our Lord and Savior.

As we live and go through these times, we watch, and I'm sure every generation sees the catastrophe of their time. They always think they have it the worst or are in their most perilous of times, but these are the times we live in. The answer to the world's problems is Jesus Christ.

As we go into countries and try to Americanize them or change them to think like we do, that's not the solution. You can spend $8 billion in 20 years and countless lives, and you won't change it. But what is transforming? What is changing? What will make a difference is if that type of effort and commitment is put into spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ.

When the gospel of Jesus Christ seeps into every corner of the world, there is no ISIS, there is no Taliban, there is no terrorism.

When the gospel of Jesus Christ is present, though it may seem aberrant to God, it is not something that a Christian would dwell on. The battle we are engaged in is not over arms, guns, or material things. This battle is a spiritual one, and the way we will lead people in the coming months and years is for the church to set aside those distractions and move forward, knowing that there is one answer. That answer is God.

There is only one way that this situation will be resolved, and that is through the gospel of Jesus Christ. We must share that good news story, that gospel message, with as many hearts and minds as we can. This involves doing the work of evangelism and making disciples. That is what will change the world, and it is up to us to avail ourselves of the Lord, His methods, His wisdom, and His word to lead that charge.

So, God bless you all. I pray that you are refreshed, encouraged, and that you have direction. See you next week.