Hello, and welcome to the Westside churches special Monday Morning Coffee podcast on this podcast, our preacher Mark Roberts will help you get your week started right. With look back at yesterday's sermon so that we can think through it further and better work the applications into our daily lives . Mark will then look forward into this week's Bible reading so that we can know what to expect and watch for. And, he may have some extra bonus thoughts from time to time. So grab a cup of coffee as we start the week together on Monday Morning Coffee with Mark.

Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to the Monday Morning Coffee podcast for Monday, April the seventh. I'm Mark. My Bible is open to second Samuel chapter 10 because that is where we're doing daily Bible reading this week. We're starting in second Samuel 10. I am of course, holding a great cup of coffee. Mm-hmm <affirmative> . But what I'm not holding is sermon notes from yesterday's lesson at West Side because, because I didn't preach yesterday at West Side . I'm with the Campbell Road congregation in Garland this week, Sunday to Wednesday gospel meeting. So I wasn't at West Side yesterday, so I can't talk about the preaching at West Side . Oh , well, I might do that anyway. On Friday when we talk a little bit about the Psalms, because I think there was some things going on yesterday at West Side that'll help us there, but for now it's straight to daily Bible reading. Get that cup of coffee. Let's get ready. Let's get set. Let's go. Welcome to Monday. Monday's reading is second Samuel chapter 10, the entire chapter. Really glad to have the podcast to talk with you a little bit about this chapter because I think it's very easy to dismiss this chapter and say it's just another battle story, more Joab David winning, crushing their enemies, all the things that go with that. But notice if we work along here, we can get a lot more out of Second Samuel chapter 10 than dismissing it as simply another chronology, another account of David's triumphs over everybody. And let's just start by noticing verse one after this, that's a chronology marker after this chapter 10 verse one and chapter 13 verse one. Both begin with that phrase. And so we are stepping more into a timeline. We're setting up a sequence of events in chapter 10 is important. In chapter 11 and chapter 12, it will explain why David's army is at battle out in the field. And of course, notably in chapter 11, David does not go with them. Where are they? What are they doing? Chapter 10 sets that up. But I think there's more here than just, Hey, get ready for chapter 10. I think we're learning some things about David's heart here. I think we're learning some things about what God is doing. Let's work on that. Of course, David, then verse two is being kind. That's the theme out of chapter nine. He was kind to Mephibosheth and now he's being kind to henan the son of Nash because his father dealt loyally with me. Verse two, we don't know when that happened. We don't have any record of that. But of course, that doesn't mean it didn't happen. There's a lot of things that happen in David's reign that we don't have full records of David here being magnanimous. But the next thing that happens is there's some evil suspicion in verse three, and that feeds some paranoia. And in just a moment, we've got all kinds of problems. In verse four, they shave half a beard, which would be a huge insult even today. If you shaved half a man's beard, that would be a problem in cutting off the garments where in the middle of their hips, where their backside would be exposed. Israelites are enormously modest. This would be a gigantic insult. This is some scholars say tantamount to a declaration of war. And when you go to war with David, what you're going to get is you're gonna get Joab verse seven. And Joab really comes off well here. Joab takes on the Ammonites in front of him, verse nine, and the Syrians behind him, and it doesn't matter, Joab triumphs here. Anyway, he doesn't panic. He takes the toughest assignment for himself. And this is a place where Joab appears to show some faith in God. Verse 12, be of good courage. Let us be courageous for our people and for the cities of our God. And may the Lord do what seems good to him. Joab is certainly a mixed bag, but this is probably one of the better places in his career. There'll be some things coming up that are an awful lot more troubling than this. So Joab and his people, they win. Verse 13, which results then in additional battling because Joab doesn't finish them up. Verse 14, maybe because it was winter, verse 11 , uh, chapter 11 verse one will say In the spring of the year, Joab goes out to finish off this battle. And the result then verse 17 in our text today, is that David leads the army, David fights and David overcomes. David gets the victory here. And so everyone sees that you can't overcome the empire that David is establishing. Now, what are we doing with this? Is all of this nothing more than a precursor to the terrible events of chapter 11? I want to say, I think not. I think not. What we need to see here is that you can't beat the Lord and God is setting up David. And God has promised David two Samuel seven, that he is going to make his name great and his kingdom will be secure. And if you get in the way of that, you're going to get run over. Chapter 10, reinforces chapter seven. And in some ways, I'm hoping I'm not doubling back on myself too much, it does set up chapter 11 . It does set up chapter 11 because when the prophet comes and rebukes David, one of the things that the prophet will say is God really puts you in a special spot. You fell into a tub of butter, king David, and this is how you act in chapter 10, details how good things were for David. If you wanna be a person after God's own heart, you want to acknowledge God's victories, God's blessings in your life. I think that's absolutely right. We've talked about that a lot. But maybe chapter 10 says, when things are going really well, look out. Something terrible could happen. You could be tempted. You could be tempted to get above your raisin. That's a good old fashioned East Texas expression. And that's what's gonna happen to David in our reading tomorrow. Monday's reading Second Samuel chapter 10. Welcome to Tuesday, Tuesday's. Reading is second Samuel chapter 11. And of course, this is the chapter that I've been dreading ever since we started on the life of David. There's so many great things to be said about King David, and he is a man after God's own heart. But this is, this is a complete and total disaster. It is a complete mess and it will make a mess out of David's life for a long time here. Now, there's a number of things to be said out of Second Samuel chapter 11, but I would just call your attention to several key points, one of which is we wanna watch how sin forces us into a progression of sin. Once the devil gets ahold of you, he will not let go easily. And then you should note here, as you're reading along just how many people know about this sin, it is not the secret that David wants to make it out as . And keep your eye on Joab because I think David's relationship with Joab changes here in Second Samuel chapter 11. And then maybe the biggest thing to say here is that this chapter just underlines again and again, anyone can fall into sin. And it particularly reminds us men of the power of sexual temptation. David is a remarkable and amazing and godly man. And one look at a woman he should not have been looking at and everything falls apart. Some terrible things happen here. And that's what second Samuel, chapter 11 details for us. So it's the spring of the year verse one, we talked about that yesterday. Joab takes the army out. We don't know why David isn't out with him. David didn't go out with him in Second Samuel chapter 10 when we read there that David sent Joab out verse seven, second Samuel 10, verse seven. So maybe he didn't think he needed to go. Whatever the reason is he's back in the palace and he sees Bathsheba bathing. One of the huge questions that's always asked about Second Samuel chapter 11 is what's bathsheba's culpability in this scenario? And the answer to that is we do not know and we cannot know. Speculation in that regard is absolutely vain. The text doesn't treat that because that's not the question the text wants us to ask. One of the things that good Bible readers learn to do is keep their eye on the ball, keep their eye where the camera is looking. Don't be looking off stage and seeing what they're doing. No, no , no. What's the camera looking at? The camera is looking at David, where's the ball? The ball's in David's court. What is David doing? That's what we need to think about. That's what we need to focus about. I understand why we have curiosity about Bathsheba. I have curiosity about that. Why is she out there bathing on and on and on and on? We've got a lot of questions about that. Did she know the king could see? I get it, but that's not what the text is treating. Stay with the text. Stay with what the Bible is telling us and what the Bible is telling us is that a very good and very godly man lost his way spiritually in a heartbeat because he saw a beautiful woman. So verse four, he took her, that ought to remind us of First Samuel chapter eight, where Samuel warned them, the king will take yes, he takes her. And we do get verse four. We get the purifying herself. We get that she is pure in stark contrast to David's impure lost . And that does mean that the child that will be born is certainly not Uriah's. And David comes to understand that. And so there is the plot to murder, Uriah that he hatches up verses six to 21. Some questions here, we wonder about the arc. Is the arc out on the battlefield? Verse 11, that's not entirely clear. What? What is David referencing there? But then he tries to get Uriah drunk and it has been well remarked, verse 13, that Uriah is a better man drunk than David is when he is sober. And so ultimately Uriah ends up carrying his own death warrant. This would be sealed verse 14, back to the front lines. And there's an amazing reference in verse 21 to a Bemo hack . He's a judge. Well, is he a judge? He's gonna come up this summer in our summer series on the judges. And so just make a little note there. You wanna know more about Alec ? That's a crazy story. And we get a little taste of it here in verse 21. The most important thing I think to see here is right at the end of the text, verse 25, David said to the messenger, Hey, this is what I want you to tell Joanne . Don't let this matter displease you. But the last word of the chapter, verse 27, is the thing that David had done, displease the Lord and the Vs . Done a marvelous job of preserving the Hebrew there because the text is saying very strongly, David is callous and indifferent to this, but God most certainly was not. God was not pleased. David didn't care. God certainly cared. That will figure in to the discussion of tomorrow, reading for Tuesday. Second Samuel chapter 11. And I guess I should remind Westsiders there is of course no zoom call tonight because I'm in a gospel meeting the Campbell Road Church, see you tomorrow. A reading for Tuesday, second Samuel chapter 11. It is Wednesday. It is Wednesday. And today we're reading Second Samuel chapter 12, verses one to 15. The key word in this text today is in verse one, the Lord sent Nathan to David. If you go back to chapter 11, sent , occurs everywhere in this text, David sins, Bathsheba sins, Joab sins, everybody is sending. Now the Lord takes action, the Lord does the sending. Nathan the prophet, comes chapter 12 verse one and tells a parable beginning in verse one, the end of verse one, end of verse two and three. And that parable reminds us that when Jesus tells parables in the New Testament, that's not a brand new thing. People have heard parables before. That's the kind of thing that people use to teach because a parable can get right up next to somebody before they realize the truth that the parable, the story is about to uns sheath. And that's verse four. There came a traveler to the rich man. So he took, remember what David did in chapter 11? He took the poor man's lamb and prepared it for the man who had come to him. So David gets all up in arms about all of that. And you may be thinking, as one scholar noted that the case presented by Nathan for David's decision can appear to the reader to have nothing to do with David's crime since it deals with neither adultery or murder. But the case demonstrates that adultery and murder were only the end results of a much more serious crime. The abuse of power. Read what Nathan says here against that backdrop, and you will see that what's happened here is the king's just gotten full of himself. Is it too much to say? David's acting like Saul. He's behaving like Saul. And so this sin, verse eight is born out of in gratitude. Anytime our sins are painted against the backdrop of God's blessings, that is very, very painful and punishment is going to come, the punishment will fit the crime. It's a twofold punishment. His wives, he took somebody else's wives, okay, your wives be taken away from you. And then two , the sword will not depart from your house. Death and adversity will come to your house just like you have brought death and adversity to the house of others. Please notice here, David does not blame anyone. He does not say, you know that woman was out there. Mm mm David does not blame Bathsheba. He knows this is on him and this is his problem. Note particularly verse 12, David is under the curse of God. Curse. It is the man who kills his neighbor secretly. Deuteronomy 27, 24. And Nathan tells David he killed Uriah using the word that's found in Deuteronomy 27 and verse 24, and he did it. Now , verse 12, he did it secretly. Same word. Deuteronomy 27, 24, a , reading today on Wednesday, second Samuel, chapter 12, verses one to 15. It is Thursday. It is Thursday today begins my favorite golf tournament, many people's favorite golf tournament, the masters just amazing and wonderful. So I'm looking forward to watching the masters this afternoon and maybe that'll kind of mitigate some of the terribleness of our Bible reading today. Sometimes we read the Bible and it just lifts us up and it's wonderful and and we just love it and enjoy it. And then some days we read Second Samuel chapter 12 verses 16 to 31 , our reading for Thursday, second Samuel chapter 12, verses 16 to 31. This is the account of course, of David's punishment for the terrible episode, the terrible adultery with Bathsheba. And there's a lot of praying here. I'm so impressed that David stays with God in the face of terrible circumstances. I think we can learn that you can pray about anything, but you can also, you can also learn that God says no to our prayers sometimes. Now, there's lots, lots of questions about this text. Why did the baby die when David is the one that sinned? Why did Bathsheba and David get to stay together? Why wasn't David put to daf ? There's lots of conversation about a lot of things. Remember though, good Bible readers keep their eye on the ball. What is the text teaching here? The text to teaching about the power of sin and the punishment of sin and that God takes sin seriously. That's what the text is teaching. I do love verse 23, the note of hope. Some have tried to diminish that and say that David is just saying, we're all gonna be together in the place of the dead when we die. Absolutely not. There's no hope in that. What David is certainly saying here is he's articulating a belief in the afterlife that is not on every page of the Old Testament. We really need the New Testament to put together what the afterlife is and how that is and all of the things that provide for hope for Christians. But David certainly knows something about that. And verse 23 is certainly giving voice to that. So Solomon is born. We're not sure exactly why he is given two names. One of them may be a throne name to be taken when he assumed the throne. And then there is the conquest of Augh . And notice verse 27, I have fought against the city, Joab says, and taken the waters. If the city doesn't have a water supply, it's not going to last. And that's what, that's all about it . So David comes , Joab is concerned that David get the victory. And that brings us full circle back to chapter 10. That's where all of this began. Clearly, this is about the power of sin. Clearly this is about God taking sin seriously. Clearly this is about a man after God's own heart who got tripped up, who fell into sin as a warning for all of us. Let's continue to think about that. Next week we'll start on the consequences of this sin. The sword shall not depart from the house of David. And that's going to be rough. Very, very rough. But tomorrow we'll be in the Psalms. It is Friday. It is Friday, and today we're in the Psalms. We're in Psalm 51. And I'm gonna let Rusty sermon Sunday stand for most of this. If you were not at West Side Sunday, go and listen to that. It'll be on the website, it'll be on the Facebook page. Rusty covered Psalm 51 on Sunday. Let me just give you a couple of quick notes here. This is a penitential psalm, which is a subset of the laments. It's a specific kind of lament. I need help with my sin. There are seven penitential Psalms, Psalm 6, 32, 38, 51, 1 0 2, 1 30, and 1 43. This is without any question, the most famous of the penitential Psalms. And I love every bit of this. I love every bit of this because David talks so much about how he sees himself after he is brought to conviction of sin by Nathan, the prophet. And I mentioned on two Sundays ago now on q and a Sunday, what's said sometimes out of Psalm 51 to try to support the idea of total depravity in verse five. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity. I'll get to that again on q and a morning. But I would just say this, that is nothing but poetic language. And there is a ton of that in the Psalms. We never make too much of poetic language. Just think about love songs that we hear on the radio, or younger people here on their Pandora, Spotify, when when someone says, your eyes are like blue , blue pools. We don't literally think that she has swimming pools in her face. And in the same way David is just saying here, I feel like I've been a sinner since I hit the ground. I just, I, I, I feel like this is become who I am. It's my identity and I need your help, God to become what you want me to be. So verse seven, literally the text there is unsend me with his up . David sees himself as being dirty and unclean. I need you to cleanse me and wash me and make me clean. I wonder how many people think of sin as getting them dirty. Maybe there wouldn't be so much resistance to baptism if people saw it that way. But what David really wants, verse 10 is internal renewal. He does not want a bath. He does not want outward cleansing. He needs God to clean his heart. That's the emphasis here. And so as he moves into the vow of praise, verse 13, that's very common in lament, God, if you will do this for me, then I will sing your praises. Or I'm gonna teach sinners about you. I'm gonna offer a sacrifice. It's not a deal. It's just out of gratitude in my heart. This is what I'm going to do. And so he talks about teaching transgressors, verse 13, your ways I need to be delivered from my blood guiltiness, verse 14. And he understands clearly this is about mercy and grace. David says, verse 16, I can offer a million sacrifices that wouldn't get it done. What matters to God is the heart. Verse 17, read that. Read that in two translations. Listen again to Rusty sermon. Psalm 51. That's our reading for Friday And that brings a close to the podcast. Thanks so much for listening to the podcast and reading the Bible with me this week. I have not been at West Side this week, but I will be home on Sunday. And I am looking forward to preaching and being with you on Sunday. I have two very important sermons, some very provocative and important ideas that I want to talk about from the word of God. Cannot wait to be home with you on Sunday morning. And of course, as I always say to all the podcast listeners, I appreciate you for listening. Leave us a rating or review. Point somebody to the podcast. Tell 'em it will help them understand God's word better and stay with daily Bible reading. Thanks so much for listening to the podcast. I'm Mark Roberts . I want to go to heaven, and I want you to come to see you on Monday with a cup of coffee.

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