ME AND MY SHADOW
Opening Prayer
With you is grace, Father, wide and free. I gladly confess to you that I am in need of your Holy Spirit to make me whole.
Read 2 SAMUEL 24:1-17
David Enrolls the Fighting Men
24 Again the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and he incited David against them, saying, “Go and take a census of Israel and Judah.”
2 So the king said to Joab and the army commanders[a] with him, “Go throughout the tribes of Israel from Dan to Beersheba and enroll the fighting men, so that I may know how many there are.”
3 But Joab replied to the king, “May the Lord your God multiply the troops a hundred times over, and may the eyes of my lord the king see it. But why does my lord the king want to do such a thing?”
4 The king’s word, however, overruled Joab and the army commanders; so they left the presence of the king to enroll the fighting men of Israel.
5 After crossing the Jordan, they camped near Aroer, south of the town in the gorge, and then went through Gad and on to Jazer. 6 They went to Gilead and the region of Tahtim Hodshi, and on to Dan Jaan and around toward Sidon. 7 Then they went toward the fortress of Tyre and all the towns of the Hivites and Canaanites. Finally, they went on to Beersheba in the Negev of Judah.
8 After they had gone through the entire land, they came back to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days.
9 Joab reported the number of the fighting men to the king: In Israel there were eight hundred thousand able-bodied men who could handle a sword, and in Judah five hundred thousand.
10 David was conscience-stricken after he had counted the fighting men, and he said to the Lord, “I have sinned greatly in what I have done. Now, Lord, I beg you, take away the guilt of your servant. I have done a very foolish thing.”
11 Before David got up the next morning, the word of the Lord had come to Gad the prophet, David’s seer: 12 “Go and tell David, ‘This is what the Lord says: I am giving you three options. Choose one of them for me to carry out against you.’”
13 So Gad went to David and said to him, “Shall there come on you three[b] years of famine in your land? Or three months of fleeing from your enemies while they pursue you? Or three days of plague in your land? Now then, think it over and decide how I should answer the one who sent me.”
14 David said to Gad, “I am in deep distress. Let us fall into the hands of the Lord, for his mercy is great; but do not let me fall into human hands.”
15 So the Lord sent a plague on Israel from that morning until the end of the time designated, and seventy thousand of the people from Dan to Beersheba died. 16 When the angel stretched out his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the Lord relented concerning the disaster and said to the angel who was afflicting the people, “Enough! Withdraw your hand.” The angel of the Lord was then at the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
17 When David saw the angel who was striking down the people, he said to the Lord, “I have sinned; I, the shepherd,[c] have done wrong. These are but sheep. What have they done? Let your hand fall on me and my family.”
Footnotes
- 2 Samuel 24:2 Septuagint (see also verse 4 and 1 Chron. 21:2); Hebrew Joab the army commander
- 2 Samuel 24:13 Septuagint (see also 1 Chron. 21:12); Hebrew seven
- 2 Samuel 24:17 Dead Sea Scrolls and Septuagint; Masoretic Text does not have the shepherd.
New International Version (NIV)Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Reflect
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? (Jeremiah 17:9)This is an example of another story that occurs earlier in David’s life, recorded beginning in 1 Chronicles 21:1. The implementation of a military census to recruit more soldiers probably doesn’t strike us as a sign of spiritual compromise, but this is exactly how God views it. Why so?
Joab, David’s commander in chief, seems to get to the heart of it (v 3). If you need more fighting men, God will give them to you, but this seems like you’re going behind his back. In other words, David isn’t trusting God with his needs. This has been a theme in David’s life – manipulating events for his own gain. His affair with Bathsheba and its aftermath is another example of this (2 Samuel 11).
Psychologists often refer to the ‘shadow’ side of our personalities: habits, motives, and actions that we try to conceal, but which often influence our lives, sometimes unconsciously. David is confronted about the shadow side of his personality and learns the hard way. Have there been times in your life when you, too, have seen the poverty of your motives and desires?
Apply
God brings sin to light in the lives of those he loves. If there are places in yours where repentance is required, be quick to seek and know his forgiveness.
Closing prayer
Holy God, I don’t want to cloak my sins as I come before you. Show me where I have wandered from your way. Have mercy on me, according to your great lovingkindness shown in Jesus.
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