Sermons

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A Change in Plans
January 14, 2001
Series on the life of King David: "A Heart After God"
Pastor Dan Baumgartner

2 Samuel 7

This morning we want to continue our series on King David, entitled “A Heart After God.” We are skipping over a number of chapters and landing today at 2 Samuel chapter 7. You may want to put your finger there…I’m going to actually read different parts as we go. I want to set the background for this passage by just saying this:

“Once upon a time…”

Isn’t that the way that all fairy tales start? Well, the place that David finds himself in by this chapter 7 sounds like an absolute fairy tale:

• David, anointed to be king years before, patiently waits for God to remove King Saul…even resisting two different opportunities to get rid of Saul himself.
• But Saul eventually does die.
• And David is acclaimed by the people first as King of Judah (the southern tribes of Israel),
• and then several years later as the king of Israel (the northern tribes of Israel). So all of Israel is unified in David.
• In addition…he marries the king’s daughter,
• wins the city of Jerusalem for a capital city,
• brings the ark of the covenant there,
• and has a huge palace built.

David is on top of the world. Never was there a better rags to riches story.

But that’s not it. David is not through. In fact, he decides to do a very, very good thing. He decides that, now that he is so well settled and established…that he ought to do something for God. He is, in fact, a little embarrassed that he himself lives in a beautiful palace, but God’s only residence is a moldy, well-traveled tent. He approaches Nathan the prophet with his idea, and Nathan says “Great! Wonderful! You’re on a roll, do whatever you think!” Perfect Yes-Man. Perfect ending… “and they all lived happily ever after.” But…wait. God speaks to Nathan that very night, and here is what he tells him to tell David:

“This is what the Lord says: Are YOU the one to build ME a house to dwell in? I have not dwelt in a house from the day I brought the Israelites up out of Egypt to this day. I have been moving from place to place with a tent as my dwelling….did I EVER say to any of (Israel’s) rulers … “Why have you not built me a house of cedar?”

David’s building permit has been snatched away. And I have a hunch that he is a little taken back. Who wouldn’t be? Isn’t David just trying to give back to God? Isn’t he just sharing with God the spoils of becoming a king with authority and strength? Sometimes I wonder if we fall into something very similar.

I’ve had many conversations with people who develop a sort of 20-year plan for their career. They say “I’m going to work my tail off for 20 years, make a bunch of money so I don’t have to worry about finances, and then do something for God. Go to the mission field, start a charity, etc. Now, if God’s leading that way, wonderful. But in general, it makes me a little squeamish. “Once I get myself set, I’ll take care of God.” That’s what it sounds like. What might be wrong with this strategy? We may not even live 20 years. OR We may be missing what we’re supposed to be about right now.

And…it tends to make us operate out of our strengths, on our terms…not God’s. Here’s David’s big chance to help God out…but God radically changes his plans. Why?

If God is interested in one thing, it is David’s heart. That’s the way it was from the beginning. God wanted David to be a different kind of king than other countries had. He wanted him to be a king that represented the Lord God Almighty…not himself.

Have you ever been in a position where you need to represent someone else? Perhaps at the cost of being recognized yourself? It’s so hard to do. Years ago, I occasionally had to write a speech for my boss at work. I knew him pretty well. After a while, I could write something that would strike me as a very natural thing for him to say. And so we would go to a marketing conference, and my boss would stand up to speak.

And I’d sit out in the crowd, and I’d observe the people listening to my boss. They were interested. They’d laugh at the jokes. And it made me want to stand up and say: “You like this? Well I wrote it!” But of course, that wasn’t my job. My job was to stay out of the way. It was to help my boss communicate, and help him look good, and accomplish something. If I would have taken credit, it would have ruined everything.

I wonder if God felt that David was on the verge of something like that. Of building something so that people could say, “Look at what David did for God. What a guy.”

I’ve thought about this story many times as we have moved closer here at Bethany to adding a third worship service. For a whole year we’ve wrestled and prayed and talked. We’ve had to ask questions…awkward questions: “What are our motives? Are we building ourselves up? Is it done in God’s name, but actually just makes Bethany look good?” I’ve had to ask myself the same questions: “Am I doing this it so I can say the church grew numerically, or that I helped start something new? Or is this what God really is about, and we are called to follow Him into it?” I believe this IS what God has for us. I firmly believe it’s part of us being faithful to kingdom work. But Lord help us if we do it out of any sense of “We have lots of gifts and skills to offer people.”

As I’ve prayed about this in the last year, God has taken me back several different times to a passage in Isaiah 54, where the word of the Lord to Israel is a word of great blessing, and God tells Israel to “enlarge the place of your tent, stretch your tent curtains wide, do not hold back; lengthen your cords, strengthen your stakes, for you will spread out to the right and to the left.”

But the context of the passage is not that Israel is being rewarded for good behavior. Rather, it comes out of a call to repentance and brokenness towards God. God wants Israel’s heart. God wants Bethany’s heart.

God has a very emphatic way of telling David, “No. There’s a change of plans.” He reminds David of the truth. …This is what the Lord Almighty says: I took you from the pasture and from following the flock to be ruler over my people Israel. I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have cut off all your enemies from before you. Now I will make your name great, like the names of the greatest men of the earth. And I will provide a place for my people Israel and will plant them so that they can have a home of their own and no longer be disturbed…I will also give you rest from your enemies.

David has been talking about a house of wood for a temple, but God now talks about a house of ancestry. The Lord declares to you that the Lord himself will establish a house for you: When your days are over…I will raise up from your offspring to succeed you…He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be his father, and he will be my son…my love will never be taken away from him…Your throne will be established forever.

God didn’t want David in the way of what he was doing. But more than that, he wanted to use him…in a mighty way. God had big plans for David. But they were different than David’s plans for God.

Eugene Peterson says: “God showed Nathan that David’s building plans for God would interfere with God’s building plans for David.” In order for God to use David, he had to have his heart focused not on himself, but on God. And so God overwhelms David with the truth…he replays all that HE has done for David. Twenty-three times in this section God says “I.” “I’ve done this, I’ve done that.” He wants to make sure that David understands how dependent he really is on God. Because dependence produces a soft heart. And God can build things with soft hearts.

Would David have a heart after God? Would David be a different kind of king?

It strikes me that God may not be so very interested in what our strengths are. He’s interested in our heart. These days we put a lot of emphasis on discovering our gifts and following our passions. Those are fine things. But when those things are put first, it can just be another way of building ourselves up, or feeling good about ourselves. When Jesus called people into the kingdom, he didn’t get a resume of what gifts people had. He just asked one question: “Are you willing to follow me?”

I think God essentially asks that of David: “Are you willing to do what I want? Will you allow me to build you instead of you building yourself?” As Nathan the prophet finishes his lengthy word…there must have been a long silence.

What was David going to do? When David finished hearing Nathan, every bone in his body must have shouted out, “But it just makes such good sense! Of course I’m supposed to be the one to build!” He could have ignored Nathan, snapped his fingers and had stonemasons and carpenters at work within the hour. He could have had Nathan carried away for his impertinence. The temple could have gone up just like David planned. But instead, David listened to the entire word. The scripture says, “Then King David went in and sat before the Lord…”

It may be the single most important thing that David ever did. He went in and sat before the Lord. He prayed.

That doesn’t sound like such a difficult thing, really. He prayed.

Have you ever tried to pray when you know exactly what you want to do? When you know what needs to be done, and that you could pull it off? It’s very difficult at that point to do much listening. Very hard. It’s often where we really need to hear the voice of God through the community. People who have a more objective position, who can listen for God’s voice on our behalf without the loud noise coming from what we want or know we can accomplish.

Does sitting before the Lord mean doing nothing? Sometimes for a time it does. I remember when Anne and I first wondered if God was calling us towards full-time ministry. We’d begun to think a great deal about the idea, and talk about how it would all work. But we hit a period of time where we weren’t really on the same page about it, and we agreed to just drop it for awhile. It turned out to be several months before God raised the issue again, and then we were in a very different place.

Sitting before the Lord may mean a change of plans, or doing nothing for a while…but ultimately it is not a call to inactivity. The chapters after this one will show David continuing on about living life as God’s king, doing battle, teaching justice and kindness, leading his country, showing love to an old enemy.

Does sitting before the Lord mean that until we hear the audible voice of God we do nothing? No…there are many things we know we are to be about. The prophet Micah says, “You KNOW what the Lord requires of you: to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.” Sometimes, sitting before the Lord gives us the answer to an immediate direction or specific question. More often, I think it reminds us that we are not in control of everything. It quiets our hearts so that we might actually be able to hear if God speaks. It turns our hearts towards God. God does not always function like the Life Question-Answer Man. But He does want our hearts.

This is what David’s sitting before God does. After David sits, he begins to speak to God. There is no hint of independence, no indication that David will proceed with his own plans. Instead, there is a long, long prayer that starts like this:

“Who am I, O Sovereign Lord, and what is my family, that you have brought me thus far? And as if this were not enough in your sight, O Sovereign Lord, you have also spoken about the future of the house of your servant…” Seventeen times in the next 10 verses of prayer, David will address God as “O Sovereign Lord,” or “O Lord Almighty, God of Israel” And he will say, “Do what you want with me and my family.” David’s heart has been turned back towards God. He has been reminded of God’s grace in his life… “Why me, Lord? Why would you do all this for me?” David receives God’s grace, and responds.

The grace of God calls to our hearts too. In Jesus Christ, the Son of David, God reaches out longingly towards us. Even when we aren’t ready. Even when we have built up layer after layer of our own plans for life. In Jesus Christ, when we were no different than anyone else, God says “I choose you. Will you follow me?”

I read about a woman this week who had embarked on a very demanding career, and came to the realization that she was doing it totally on her own. “At one point in my life,” she said, “I had a faith so strong that it shaped the very fiber of each day. I was conscious of God’s presence even in stressful situations. The fire of Christ burned inside of me. Slowly, though, and almost imperceptibly, I stopped sitting at the fireplace” [from Brennan Manning's "Ruthless Trust"].

The good news is that the fireplace remains lit and welcoming. God’s grace calls us to come and sit with Jesus there. And as with David, it calls us to lay aside our strengths and our illusions that we need to do God a favor. It calls us to lay aside the building plans that we have…so that God’s building plans for us…and for His kingdom…might take shape. Amen.