It is an amazing thing–not only that Christ’s genealogy includes these names associated with shameful stories, but in the case of David and Bathsheeba, lest anyone forget the story, we are specifically reminded of it “..of her that had been the wife of Urias”!

This story has always amazed me. The ‘man after God’s own heart’, this righteous slayer of the mighty Goliath, falling into such grievous sin–not in his naive and ignorant youth, but after years of loving and serving the Lord. And Urias, whose wife he stole, was not just any man, but one of David’s closest men, a trusted and trusting friend–one of the thirty mighty men of David who hid out in caves with him and defended him when he was being pursued by Saul.

Lust, adultery, betrayal, deception, murder and the death of an innocent baby– yet in the end a child is born from the married union of David and Bathsheeba, who we know as Solomon but whom God would call Jedidiah-’beloved of God’ and who would become an ancestor of the Lord!

Perhaps not in as outwardly dramatic ways, but I am no better than David. Self sees something it wants and cannot understand why, being king, it cannot have it. I take what is not mine and attempt to bend reality to my own will. I betray, I lie and commit adultery and murder in my heart, which the Lord tells us, has the same effect on our souls as committing these sins, outwardly.

And, like David, who tried to cover his sin with Bathsheeba, first by trying to make it look like the child she was carrying was Urias’, then finally by setting Urias up to be killed in battle, I try to cover my sin and shame with self deception. I’m no more successful than David with his cunning and wicked plans or Adam with his fig leaves. Nothing can be hidden from the Lord and all things will be revealed.

And yet, although there would be lasting consequences from this sin for David and his children, in the end, forgiveness, salvation and joy for the whole world came to and from the House of David.

This gives me great hope.