Hi Folks:
Hope your week went well. We had a roof leak in all the wind and rain. Fortunately damage seems to be limited to a sheet of gyp-rock. I was invited to go hunting with a few teachers from Jan's school. I really enjoyed myself. Didn't see any deer, but we had a good time in camp and I saw a number of other different kinds of wildlife.
Read all the way to the end to see some of last week's responses. I think you'll enjoy them for their insight.
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In the replay of David’s train wreck, we are at the last frames before the locomotive jumps the tracks. We can see the engineer looking at a bank of flashing warning lights. He says to himself, "They sure are pretty."
2 Samuel 11:3-4 "David sent someone to find out about her. The man said, ‘Isn't this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite?’ Then David sent messengers to get her."*
I wonder what David was thinking when he invited her over. I think its too easy to suggest it was lust, pure and simple. I’ve just come back from a few days of deer hunting. (I didn’t see a thing, so the deer are safe once again. This is becoming a running joke among people who know me.) During this time of year, the bucks have just about only one thing on their minds. Some might compare David to one of those bucks, but I think the situation was more complicated than that. We are capable of sophisticated thinking. We rationalize our decisions and we often end up with mixed motives.
So, here’s what I suggest David may have been thinking when he invited Bathsheba to come over. "I bet she would get along great with my other wives." "Her husband, Uriah, is away so much - she needs a break." "I bet the kids would play well together."
Whatever reason David used, I’m sure it was noble. But the fact is, David made arrangements to log time together alone. If he were single, we might call it a date. But he was married so it was probably a playdate, dinner appointment, social event, business meeting, counselling session, mentoring meeting, or helping a neighbor. If the internet had been involved, we might say it was checking email or surfing the internet.
Please don’t misunderstand - all of these can be legitimate. But, they can also be noble excuses to cover mixed motives.
Mixed motives are among the more difficult internal struggles to recognize. We can fool ourselves that we do not feel attraction. And even if we recognize it, we have to be honest enough to admit we might be attracted to someone. Its easy to go into denial or to rationalize.
Every once in a while, someone will catch my eye for some reason or another and I find myself thinking, "She would be interesting to know better." This is a warning light best not ignored. They say curiosity killed the cat. It can certainly kill a marriage.
Hope this helps. Be On Fire,
ON FIRE is a weekly letter of encouragement
by
*All scripture references from the New
International Version, copyright 1973, 1978 by the International Bible Society.
Some of Last Week's Responses ---------------------
T wrote, I appreciated your thoughts today. It is true I think for women too. We have to train our eyes also, but maybe more so our hearts. We may be more attracted to the smile, attention, soft voice, kind heart etc. Things that more tug on the heart strings than the eye's glance. Men are more motivated by what they see, women by what they feel.
A wrote, I've loved this story since I was young, and others for the same reason, mostly because it shows us "simpltons" that even those in high positions and dressed in kingly guise, are suseptable to the same crap as the rest of us. Yet it shows us we can still keep on keepin on. Even with all of King Daves' mess-ups God considered him "a man after God's own Heart" .It just shows that an average "Joe Sixpack" still can please the Lord (with a little effort perhaps) . It just makes a great character a little more human, or true to life. Along with the great deeds came a few screw ups. If that were now we would call them people "Peeping Davids"