Day 7: Guiding Texts

Biblical Texts: 2 Samuel 11 and 12

I'm excited to write about this passage today, and think I might use it for a class in a few weeks. After all, we've all heard the story of David and Bathsheba a million times and been reminded not to commit sexual sin. But I've never heard this story preached from the standpoint of wealth and power.

David uses his power to have Uriah killed on the battlefield. The author uses irony to show the blind obedience of Uriah, who refuses to sleep with his own wife and even carries his own death-letter back to Joab without a thought beyond serving his king. After Uriah's death, who should arrive but Nathan who, like most prophets, cares about justice, the poor, and the misuse of power by the rich.

What is the first line in Nathan's story, after all? "There were two men in a certain town, one rich and the other poor..." This whole problem stems from money! Meanwhile David gets indignant without noticing the mote in his own eye. David is blinded by his wealth and power. Meanwhile, Nathan's message says that David's actions demonstrate that he despises God (v. 10)! Chew on that for a while.

And the worst part is, I don't think David ever really gets it. When he says, in Psalm 51, "Against you, you only, have I sinned," I think he is demonstrating the typical wealthy person's idea of following God. He has what we would call "a personal realtionship with God," which means, to put it bluntly, it's all about him and God and if he's a jerk to other people it doesn't matter. The two quotes below from W.S. Coffin explains it better than I can. All I'll say is that you should reread these two chapters from Samuel and choose to read them from the lens of social/financial sin and see if it hits you differently. The sexual sin was bad, but it was only the aftermath of a much more pervasive, harder to identify sin.

Secondary Text #1: Ronald J. Sider
The following comes from the conclusion to his book Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger. As a quick sidenote, he is Mennonite, which just goes to show how cool he is.

"We know that our Lord Jesus is alive! We know that the decisive victory over sin and death has occurred. We know that the Sovereign of the universe wills an end to hunger, injustice and oppression. The resurrection of Jesus is our guarantee that in spite of the massive evil that sometimes almost overwhelms us, the final victory will surely come. Secure on that solid rock, we will plunge into this unjust world, changing now all we can and knowing that the Risen King will complete the victory at his glorious return."

Secondary Text #2: Two from William Sloane Coffin in Credo

"Public good doesn't automatically follow from private virtue. A person's moral character, sterling though it may be, is insufficient to serve the cause of justice, which is to challenge the status quo, to try to make what's legal more moral, to speak truth to power, and to take personal or concerted action against evil, whether in personal or systemic form."

"In times of oppression, personal faith has to lead us to political choices; otherwise Christianity encourages fatalism on the part of the poor who, to keep themselves going, have only the promises of a better hereafter, and cynicism on the part of the rich, who feel they can do almost anything to the poor as long as they attend church and baptize their children."