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From: Judy <judy_boli@ecunet.org><br>
To: Propertalk <propertalk.topic@ecunet.org><br>
Sent: Sat, Jul 25, 2015 9:38 pm<br>
Subject: [propertalk.topic] Sermon for Proper 12B<br>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal; mso-mirror-indents: yes;"><font color="#000000" face="Times New Roman" size="3">Dear Friends,</font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal; mso-mirror-indents: yes;"><font color="#000000" face="Times New Roman" size="3">This Sunday’s sermon is entitled “Now What?” or “Living Like an Atheist?” or “Sin Is Like Being Pregnant- Starts Small, but Watch Out!” and deals with the Old Testament lesson (2nd Samuel 11:1-15).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here it is:</font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal;"><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman"><font size="3">On March 22</font><sup><font size="2">nd</font></sup><font size="3"> of this year (the fifth Sunday in Lent), we read Psalm 51, the Psalm that David probably wrote after his affair with Bathsheba, and derived two Bible truths from David’s shameful episode: (1) No one is immune to sin- not even mighty King David and (2) Sin hurts the innocent as well as the guilty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Since the “David and Bathsheba” incident is today’s Old Testament reading (2</font><sup><font size="2">nd</font></sup><font size="3"> Samuel 11: 1-15), and since it has so much wisdom for our lives today- I’d like us to look at it again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You remember what happened.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bathsheba was married to Uriah the Hittite.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>King David was walking around on the flat roof of his palace when he looked below and saw Bathsheba taking a bath in her courtyard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He sent for her and had sex with her.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Since kings at that time had absolute power, if a king called for you- you came and did what he wanted or were killed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This means David’s actions were probably rape.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some time later, Bathsheba discovered to her dismay that she was pregnant, so she sent King David a note informing him of the news.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>David was caught in adultery, and there was no way anyone would think that Bathsheba’s husband was the father of this child.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was away in the military.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>David cooked up a scheme to pass this baby off as Uriah’s child.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He sent for Uriah, inquired about the war, and then sent him home- assuming that he would make love to his wife.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After all, he’d been gone a long time at war.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Uriah didn’t, because he didn’t want to diffuse his energy- wanted to stay loyal to King David and his fellow soldiers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>David tried again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This time, he invited Uriah to the palace for a meal, and served lots of alcohol so he would get drunk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When King David observed that Uriah was sufficiently intoxicated, he sent him home again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Uriah did the same thing- slept outside away from Bathsheba, his wife.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>King David’s scheme of passing off this child as Uriah’s baby was not going to work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Uriah was too loyal to the king- wouldn’t sleep with his wife and diffuse his energy for the upcoming war. It seems like decades ago, but do you remember how President Clinton lied and did everything he could to avoid being caught in his sexual sin?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s how King David felt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He decided he would do whatever it took to avoid being caught as having committed adultery with Bathsheba.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He wrote a note to Joab, his general at the war front, ordering him to place Uriah in a dangerous spot in a battle, then withdraw support so Uriah would be killed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Joab did exactly as King David had ordered, and Uriah was killed in battle (fighting for King David- one of his most loyal soldiers).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bathsheba mourned for her husband an appropriate length of time and then moved in with King David at his palace as one of his wives.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It looked like all was well and no one would find out what had happened; David had gotten away with both adultery and murder.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You know how scripture says, “Be sure your sin will find you out!” (Numbers 32: 23).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, the next thing David knew, he had a visitor- the prophet Nathan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nathan told David about a poor man and his family who had a pet lamb.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The lamb ate at his table and was the pet of his wife and children.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One day the rich man down the road had a guest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was too stingy to butcher one of his own lambs to feed his visitor, so he took the beloved lamb belonging to the poor family and butchered it to serve his company.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>King David was outraged, started listing all the terrible punishments that should happen to the rich man, and then asked his identity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The prophet Nathan simply said, “David, you are the man.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nathan reminded the king of all the wives and riches he had, yet he took the one wife of Uriah, his faithful soldier, and then had him killed as a cover-up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nathan told David that his punishment was that the child in Bathsheba’s womb would die.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>David wept and prayed, perhaps using the words of Psalm 51.</font></font></font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal;"><font size="3"><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman">This atrocious episode contains much wisdom for living, but I’d like to point out two more Bible truths.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One comes from our Psalm (14:1): “Only a fool would say ‘There is no God.’”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>King David wouldn’t have been stupid enough to say there was no God, but he acted like either God was blind and deaf or didn’t exit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Do you remember the old story of the little boy who was in the lunch line at his parochial school?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the front of the line was a beautiful bowl of apples.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In front of the apples was a sign- “Take only one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God is watching you!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When he got to the end of the line, he saw a bowl of even-better-looking cookies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He got his pencil and made a matching sign, which read- “Take as many cookies as you want.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God is watching the apples.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m here to tell you- he had it wrong!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God was watching the apples and the cookies and King David and us when we do things in secret that we’d be ashamed to be seen doing in public.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Be sure your sin will find you out!” (Numbers 32: 23).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My friends- you can hide from me, you can hide from your mother or father or boss or wife or husband or kids or friends- but <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">YOU CAN’T HIDE FROM GOD!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>GOD KNOWS!</b><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></font></font></font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal;"><font color="#000000" face="Times New Roman" size="3">The second Bible truth:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Either you root out sin or it grows- like Bathsheba’s pregnancy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Have you ever had a day when everything seemed to go wrong- not big things, just picky, annoying things?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I still remember the day some time ago when I had to get to the doctor’s office and I was running late.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I opened the medicine cabinet in our bathroom to get an Advil, but the Advil bottle dropped out of the cabinet onto the cup that holds our toothbrushes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That tipped over and landed on the tube of toothpaste which bounced against the full cup of water which spilled all over the sink and knocked my earrings on the floor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Been there- done that?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s how sin works.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The progression is easy to see in this David-Bathsheba episode.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First David looked where he had no business looking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What should he have done then?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Sure- looked away and moved on.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then he appreciated, lingered, dwelt on what he had no business looking at.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Still time to save himself.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Next he planned how he could get something he had no business having.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Still time, but not much!)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After that, he gave the orders; carried out his plans to rape Bathsheba; and thought all was well- BUT... “Only a fool would say there is no God...be SURE your sin will find you out”- and it did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bathsheba was pregnant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It escalated as he tried to outslick God, but Uriah was too good a person to fall for David’s tricks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>David still had a chance of sorts- could have confessed- in that day, kings could get away with anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He didn’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead, his rape became also a cover-up-murder.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Did it work?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was the prophet Nathan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Only a fool would say there is no God...be SURE your sin will find you out”- and it did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their precious baby died and violence ruled in David’s family until the exile.</font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal;"><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman"><font size="3">In summary: From March 22</font><sup><font size="2">nd</font></sup><font size="3">s- (1) No one is immune to sin- not even mighty King David; and (2) Sin hurts the innocent as well as the guilty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From today- (3) You can’t hide from God- God knows; and (4) Stop sin while it’s small, because it escalates.</font></font></font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal; mso-mirror-indents: yes; tab-stops: .25in;"><font color="#000000" face="Times New Roman" size="3">For anyone who is interested, this sermon and updated African-American wisdom statements are posted on our parish’s web site under “Sermons & Stuff”. The address is: </font><a target="_blank" href="http://www.stpaulsepisag.org/"><u><font color="#0000ff" face="Times New Roman" size="3"></font></u></a><u><font color="#0000ff" face="Times New Roman" size="3"><a href="http://www.stpaulsepisag.org" target="_blank">http://www.stpaulsepisag.org</a></font></u><font color="#000000" face="Times New Roman" size="3"> .</font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal; mso-mirror-indents: yes;"><font color="#000000" face="Times New Roman" size="3">Blessed preaching,</font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal; mso-mirror-indents: yes;"><font color="#000000" face="Times New Roman" size="3">Judy Boli</font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal; mso-mirror-indents: yes;"><font color="#000000" face="Times New Roman" size="3">St. Paul's Episcopal Church</font></div>
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<div style="margin: 1em 0px; line-height: normal; mso-mirror-indents: yes;"><font color="#000000" face="Times New Roman" size="3">Saginaw, Michigan</font></div>
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