Christ Church

Old Testament

The David Chronicles 49: A Toxic Civil War

Douglas Wilson on

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Introduction

We see here in this passage that God is always sovereign, and His Word always comes to pass—regardless of who seems to be in power, and who seems to be powerless. Shrewd counsel is disregarded, and bad counsel followed, and why? Because God determines the movements of men.

The Text

“Moreover Ahithophel said unto Absalom, Let me now choose out twelve thousand men, and I will arise and pursue after David this night . . .” (2 Sam. 17:1-29).

Summary of the Text

Ahithophel advises immediate pursuit with 12,000 men, which would represent all of Israel (v. 1). They are vulnerable, they will all scatter, and David only will be struck (v. 2). The people will become Absalom’s and there will be peace (v. 3). Absalom and all the elders were pleased with this advice (v. 4). But Absalom wanted a second opinion and called for Hushai (v. 5). When Hushai arrived, Absalom summarized Ahithophel’s counsel, and asked Hushai what he thought (v. 6).

Hushai began diplomatically—Ahithophel’s counsel is not good this time (v. 7). Hushai then begins to undermine the revolt with bad counsel (v. 8). David’s men are chafed and David is shrewd (v. 9). He will be hidden, and so our first assault will not go well (v. 10). Rumor of disaster will spread and Absalom’s brave warriors will be rocked (v. 10). So Hushai advises him to take time to assemble a huge host, and to lead it himself (v. 11). We will come upon David in “some place” and fall on him like the dew (v. 12), killing everyone. If he retreats into “some city,” we will have enough troops to level that city (v. 13). And so Absalom and all the elders were persuaded by Hushai (v. 14)—because it was the Lord’s purpose to thwart the good counsel of Ahithophel.

David had left Zadok and Abiathar the priests behind, and Hushai told them what Ahithophel’s counsel had been, and what he had said (v. 15). He told them to send word to David to get across the Jordan (v. 16). Now two priests had been stationed at En-rogel, and a maidservant carried the message to them (v. 17). They were spotted, but got away to Bahurim (Shimei’s hometown), and a man there had a well in his court which they hid in (v. 18). And the housewife there spread a covering over the well, and spread grain over it (v. 19). When Absalom’s servants came, they were searching for Ahimaaz and Jonathan by name, and the woman said, “Thataway” (v. 20). When it was clear, the two men came out of the well, and went and warned David (v. 21). David heeded the warning, and everyone got over the Jordan (v. 22).

When Ahithophel saw what had happened, he went to his hometown, put his affairs in order, and hanged himself (v. 23). This is probably due as much to his foresight as to the fact that he had lost face. One of the principles of war is pursuit, and he knew that neglect of that principle here meant that the revolt would fail, and that he would be punished for his treachery. David came to Mahanaim, a walled city across the Jordan, and Absalom followed (v. 24). Amasa was made commander—he, like Joab, was David’s nephew, making him Joab’s first cousin (v. 25). This was a toxic civil war. Ahithophel was David’s grandfather-in-law, Absalom was his son, and the rival commanders were first cousins, nephews of David.

Absalom’s army pitched their camp in Gilead (v. 26). When David was holed up in Mahanaim, provisions were brought to him by the Ammonites (v. 27), and by Machir and Barzillai. You should remember Machir as the kind-hearted man who had been taking care of Jonathan’s son Mephibosheth (2 Sam. 9:4-5). These men brought all kinds of provisions (vv. 28-29), for David’s men were hungry, thirsty, and weary (v. 29).

Cloak and Dagger

This section contains a great deal of high intrigue. Secret agents at court, high priests playing politics, a handmaiden carrying a message, priests on the run, and loyalists to the king hiding in a well.

All this serves to illustrate a point we have made before, but which needs to be made again with a passage like this one. Nothing is more obvious than that deception is a lawful weapon in time of war. As killing and murder are related, so also are deception and lying related. From Hushai’s valiant and courageous behavior in the court of the enemy to the behavior of the woman of Bahurim (let us call her Thataway Jane), we see that this is part of the arsenal of warfare. Contrary to the beliefs of some pietists, this is not simply “excused” behavior. Rahab was justified by her works when she sent out the spies another way than she said she did (Jas. 2:25).

Rightly understood, this does not undermine sola fide—the only point I am concerned to make here is that Rahab’s deception was a good work that needs to rightly related to her faith, not a bad work that her faith brought about forgiveness for.

Our Sovereign God

The reason why Absalom and the elders believed Hushai can be answered on two different levels, and both of them are genuine. First, Hushai deceptively used both flattery and fear, and in addition he played to Absalom’s lust for blood. He flattered Ahithophel (“this time”) and Absalom (“you well know). He then played to Absalom’s fears, invoking David’s experience and military genius, the anger of his men, the way rumors fly through armies, and so on. And in contrast to Ahithophel, who counseled that they seek to take just David, Hushai’s strategy played up the potential for a bloodbath. So that was one reason he was believed. He knew his audience well, and played them that way.

The second reason he was believed is that the Lord had ordained or appointed evil for Absalom. Absalom would make all the decisions that would place his neck in the crook of that tree, and he would do so because God had willed it.

A New Rahab

God’s people are called to prevail by means of faith. This is what Rahab did. She acted, certainly, but her actions were resting on the foundation of faith (Jas. 2:25). The woman in this story is another Rahab, delivering two spies just as Rahab had done—hiding them, and sending them out by another way. She also was a woman of faith, and was used by God to deliver a king. Rahab did it by becoming that king’s great great-grandmother. This unnamed woman did it by delivering that king from the schemes of his own son.

Contrasted with this faith we see in this passage the impotence of worldly wisdom. Ahithophel sees the situation very clearly, but he can’t steer it contrary to what God has settled. “The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, as the rivers of water: He turneth it whithersoever he will” (Prov. 21:1).

A member of Christ’s council chamber was also too clever by half, and Judas went and hanged himself. And if the rulers of this age had know what all their scheming was going to result in—your salvation—they wouldn’t have done it (1 Cor. 2:8).

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Working on a Building III

Douglas Wilson on

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Introduction

Water brings life, and living water more so. We have spoken before on the importance of “assuming the center,” and one of the central ways to do this is to create a place where living water can flow. Water is a gathering force.

The Text

“Afterward he brought me again unto the door of the house; and, behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward . . . Now when I had returned, behold, at the bank of the river were very many trees on the one side and on the other . . . And by the river upon the bank thereof, on this side and on that side, shall grow all trees for meat, whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall the fruit thereof be consumed: it shall bring forth new fruit according to his months, because their waters they issued out of the sanctuary: and the fruit thereof shall be for meat, and the leaf thereof for medicine” (Ezek. 47:1-12).

Summary of the Text

In Ezekiel’s vision, when the hand of the Lord was upon him (Ezek. 40:1-2), among other things, he saw this: Water flowed out of the house of God, over the threshold (Ezek. 47:1). Water ran out of the Temple on the right side also (v. 2). A man with Ezekiel was measuring, and thousand cubits out, the water was ankle deep (v. 3). Another thousand and it came to the knees (v. 4). Yet another thousand and the water was waist deep (v. 4). When he went another thousand, the water was too deep to pass over (v. 5). The man asked Ezekiel if he saw that, and then brought him back to the river bank (v. 6). When he got there, he saw that there were many trees, on both sides of the river (v. 7). The water will flow east, down to the sea, and heal the waters there (v. 8).

Everything will live, wherever that water flows (v. 9). There will be a multitude of fish, and the apostle Peter with the others will become fishers of men (v. 10; Mark 1:17). Even in that glorious day, there will remain some salt marshes (v. 11). Not everyone will be converted, though most will. The trees on both sides of the river will produce abundant fruit, according to month, and watered by the river from the sanctuary, the leaves will be for healing (v. 12).

Now remember from last week that the New Jerusalem is the Christian church. We can also see, by comparing text with text, that Ezekiel’s Temple is also the Christian church, out of which the living water flows. As we seek to understand this passage, we should begin with this as the key. The key for Christians is always to let the New Testament interpret Old Testament passages, particularly when they are difficult for us. In the book of Revelation, we are plainly told the meaning of this vision.

“And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations” (Rev. 22:1-2).

In both cases, we have living water, a flowing river, trees on both sides of the river, monthly fruit, and leaves for healing. So the New Jerusalem is the same thing as Ezekiel’s Temple, and both of them are the Christian church. We have a similar picture in microcosm when it comes to the righteous man (Ps. 1:3; Jer. 17:8).

Living Water

The church is the place from which this living water flows. Recalling what we established last week, this living water flows out of people. Jesus promises living water to the Samaritan woman at the well, and He was talking about Himself (John 4:11). Whoever drinks of the water that Jesus gives will find that he has become a well of that living water (John 4:14). He drinks and then God makes him a source of living water for others, which is what happens in this instance (John 4:29-30). A few chapters later, Jesus shows how all His people become this source of living water. We come to Him and drink because of our thirst (John 7:37), and then living water flows out of us for others (John 7:38). John also tells us in this place what the water is exactly. The water of life is the Holy Spirit (John 7:39).

Jesus said this on the last day of the Feast of Booths, when the Jews had a ceremony of pouring water out at the altar.

“For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes” (Rev. 7:17).

While Remembering the Point

Now all this is glorious, but what does it have to do with our pump hou . . . our new church building? The church is not supposed to function as a rain barrel, or a collection tank. The church is a place from which the water is supposed to flow everywhere else. The way that the earth will come to be as full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea is because it will flow out of the church (Is. 11:9; Hab. 2:14). Do this, and people will gather to water.

Having said that, we do not reject intelligent craftsmanship that comes with building particular institutions. So long as we remember the central point, there is no problem with building irrigation ditches, or pumps, hoses, water trucks, channels, canals, or helicopters with buckets below them. Indeed, whenever there are large amounts of water (which we pray for), such things become an absolute necessity. The danger, of course, is to forget what these projects are all for, and then you start to complain about the water—it keeps getting your precious equipment all wet.

Another danger, a great one, is expecting any one building to accomplish what we need to accomplish in our community. But that is like building a rain barrel, and then you are done. No, think of it more like tide pools filling up—first here, then here, then over there.

Assuming the Center

But when the people of God remember who they are, this mistake is not made. The water flows out of human hearts. The Spirit comes from people, and not from this wooden pulpit, or from that table, or from the bread and wine, or from the baptismal font . . . or from the building which contains all these God-given activities.
We assume the center when we are filled with the Spirit, and when He flows out of us. The Spirit is the center. This happens using physical things. Spiritual does not just mean like a spirit. Spiritual also means obedient. When we offer our bodies rightly, it is our spiritual worship (Rom. 12:1-2). The devil is a spirit who is unspiritual in this sense, and you have ten toes, which can be spiritual—if they are shod with the gospel of peace.

This is because the living church is always waterfront property. Many trees grow there, and their leaves have healing properties. The trees grow on both sides of the river, and the river is full of life and brings life. All it has to do is be what it is, and flow. Each one of you is a spigot—and what I want to press upon you is this. Each one of you should walk away from here knowing that you have a critical role in how God is going to cause this water to flow.

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Why Children Matter #2

Douglas Wilson on

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Q&A

Introduction

This is a message on “discipline basics.” Remember that we not only want to learn how to discipline our children in a biblical fashion, but that we also want to do so in a biblical context. This means that we are not using the Scriptures as a quarry for gathering up our self-help rocks. We want only one Rock, the cornerstone, the Lord Jesus. We are bringing up our children as Christians do, and we are doing it in the context of gospel grace.

The Text

“Thou shalt also consider in thine heart, that, as a man chasteneth his son, so the Lord thy God chasteneth thee” (Deut. 8:5).

Summary of the Text

The Lord has a relationship with us that is mirrored in the relationship that a father has with his son. This is a truth that needs to be considered, and not just acknowledged. Moses tells the people that this is something that has to be considered in the heart. This is therefore a topic for meditation. A man chastens his son, and God does the same thing for His children.

Scripture distinguishes justification from sanctification. Justification establishes the fact of the relationship, while sanctification addresses the direction of the relationship. We see there how God corrects and trains us. The pains of sanctification provide testimony to the reality of justification. We will return to this point later.

A Principle of Discipline

Discipline, rightly understood, is a form of wisdom. If it is not a form of wisdom, then it cannot be used to impart wisdom. Water does not rise above its own level. And if it is not imparting wisdom, then it isn’t discipline. Discipline is painful, but not everything that is painful is discipline.

Discipline is Not a Punishment

Discipline has correction in view, while punishment does not have to. Punishment is about retribution; discipline is about correction. The Bible teaches us that parents are to discipline their children, not punish them. “Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby” (Heb. 12:11). Discipline has the harvest in view.

A Few Principles, Not Many Rules

Specific applications can always be deduced from the principles, but it is not necessarily the same for inducing the principles from a host of particular commands. When I was a child, my father delivered three rules to me. No disobedience. No lying. And no disrespecting your mother. What is not covered by that? Focus on the root law, and not on the leaves out at the ends of the branches (Matt. 22:40). This instills wisdom and obedience at the same time.

Keep Calm

Correction is only needed when someone has messed up. But the Bible tells us how the correction is to be brought. “Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted” (Gal. 6:1). When it comes to the kids, when you are highly motivated to discipline, you are (according to this passage) not qualified to do so. And when you are qualified to discipline, you don’t feel motivated to do so. This means that your discipline must be principled. It is based on what God tells you to do in that moment. In order to teach obedience, your disciplining must be obedient.

Related to “qualifications to discipline,” you are not disqualified because of your sins in years past.

Discipline is about Restored Fellowship

Sin has disrupted fellowship in the family. Discipline seeks to address that disruption in order to undo the effects of it (Eph. 4:32). There are two ways this can go wrong. If there is no fellowship to begin with, it is hard to restore it. A child who does not want back into the garden of fellowship may be living outside the garden all the time. Secondly, if discipline is meted out in anger then this simply adds to the disruption of fellowship, and we didn’t really need any more disruption. Discipline subtracts from the number of offenses—it does not add to them.

Keep Calm an Spank Anyway

The discipline of spanking is not to be understood as a form of self-expression. It is a form of correction. It is a way to please God. “Withhold not correction from the child: For if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die. Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from hell” (Prov. 23:13-14). God scourges every son that he receives (Heb. 12:5-6). We live in a time when a number of very foolish parents have attempted to discipline foolishly, found out that doesn’t work, and so they conclude that the problem must be with God’s Word, and not with their own inept applications of it.

Spankings Should Sting, Never Damage

Spanking “fails” happen in two ways. One is when you clobber the kid, and he learns to pull away every time you scratch your cheek. This kind of thing is simply abuse. The other kind of fail is when you deliver the occasional and very inconsistent whomp on top of the diapers. Your demon child responds to this by saying to herself, “Ha! I defy you and all your pitiful attempts at intimidating the queen of the world.” Of course, she doesn’t have this kind of vocabulary, being only two, but every aspect of this sentiment is present and active in her manipulative calculations.

Discipline is a Universal Language

Many times parents are reluctant to discipline when it is needed because they think their child is feeble-minded when it comes to godly cause and effect. “I don’t think my little baa-lamb [known to outsiders as demon child, and to his siblings as “Rasputin in footer jammies”] understands the relationship between the whining and the spanking. He looks so sad and bewildered.” But how can this be when he is a veritable genius when it comes to ungodly cause and effect? Tell me, does he understand the connection between whining and whatever it is he wants? “A man of great wrath shall suffer punishment: for if thou deliver him, yet thou must do it again” (Prov. 19:19).

Discipline is Love

The Bible states this both ways. It is said positively—“For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth” (Heb. 12:6). The principle is stated negatively just a moment later. “But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons” (Heb. 12:8). “He that spareth his rod hateth his son: But he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes” (Prov. 13:24).

And this is how we see that disciplining children is the Christian life in microcosm. This is not some secular pursuit, detaching from issues like sin and forgiveness, gospel and redemption. Child discipline is all about Jesus. We are nurturing souls, after all, not training puppies.

And this is where we return to the question of justification and sanctification. You don’t earn your justification by undergoing discipline. Rather, you receive the gift of (sanctifying) discipline as a result of the gift of free grace.

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Why Children Matter #1

Christ Church on

Q&A

Introduction

A family is a divinely-ordained community. It is a set of defined relationships, with obligations and privileges assigned by God accordingly. It is not an arbitrary collection of individuals, and it is not something that we get to define. God created the family—it was not invented by us in the first place, and so we do not get to reinvent it. For this reason, parents must beware of treating the family as an “assemblage” that results from “techniques” developed by “experts.”

Young parents should therefore come to the Scriptures with a true hunger and openness. This is particularly true of those young parents who didn’t see a good model growing up—God is the God of new beginnings. He breaks the cycle, blessing to a thousand generations, and cutting off disasters after three or four. Be encouraged.

The Text

“Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children” (Eph. 5:1, ESV).

“The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with singing” (Zeph. 3:17).

Summary of the Text

The juxtaposition of these two passages is intended to make the foundational point that, as God treats us as His children, so also we, in imitating Him, must seek to be like Him in our treatment of our own children. As He deals with us, so also must we deal with our own children.

God has created us as reflective and imitative creatures. We become like what we worship. Idolaters do this (Ps. 115:4-8), and worshipers of the true God do it (2 Cor. 3:18). This is the way human beings are. There are few places where the ramifications of this are as important as they are in child-rearing.

In the Zephaniah passage, consider first that the Lord our God is mighty. You are much stronger than your children. But His might is deployed for the good of His people, for their salvation, and not for their suffocation. Your purpose is to be used as the instrument of your children’s salvation. You are not the ground of that salvation, but you are an appointed instrument. You obviously cannot be saving grace, but you are commanded to imitate it, and to facilitate it.

When the mighty God intervened to save, He did so at great cost to Himself. Jesus, when He took the loaf of bread that represented His broken body, He began by giving thanks. When Jesus went to the cross, He did so for the joy that was set before Him (Heb. 12:2). The sacrifices that you will make for your children should therefore be something you sing over. You are not just to sing when they are being adorable, asleep in the crib. Life is messier than that, and the whole thing should be met with a song. The delight we are imitating here is not “unrealistic.” It takes account of the world as it is, and rejoices still.

A Garden of Grace

When God created us, He placed us in a garden full of delights, and with just one prohibition in the middle of the garden. Nothing was prohibited out in the world, and only one thing was prohibited in the garden. A severe penalty was attached to that one prohibition, but then God saw to it that when the restriction was disobeyed by our first parents, the severest blow of retaliation would fall upon Himself. What kind of God is this?

So the environment of your home is grace. All that you have is theirs. There are standards within this—grace is not an amorphous, gelatinous mass. Grace has a backbone. Grace is a vertebrate. And yet when the standards are broken, the heaviest sacrifices in the work of restoration are made by the guardians of grace—not the enforcers of law, not the pointers of fingers, not the parental accusers, and not the quiver in the voice of parental self-pity.

A garden of grace can contain a tree of law. A garden of law cannot contain a tree of grace. Whatever you do, an attempted tree of grace there will turn into a tree of reward, a tree of merit, a tree of earnings.

Discipline as Structured Delight

We have a tendency—when in the grip of our own unguided wisdom—to get everything exactly backwards. We think that the gold sanctifies the temple (Matt. 23:17). We think that man was created so that there would be somebody around to keep the sabbath (Mark 2:27). We think that goat milk was created so that we would have something to cook the young goats in (Dt. 14:21).

But discipline is directed toward an end; it is teleological. And no discipline seems pleasant at the time, but the glory of discipline is found in the harvest (Heb. 12:11). Discipline and fruition occupy time, just like your children do. Bringing children up is not abstract bookkeeping, but is rather a story—from planting to harvest. Hardship in a story is grace. Hardship without a story is just pain.

Three L’s

When it comes to Christian living, there are three l’s to choose from. There is legalism, there is license, and there is liberty. In the home, legalism occurs when parents try to establish “traditional values” or a “disciplined atmosphere” on their own authority, or in their own name. Strictness becomes the central standard, and parental law is central. License happens when it turns out that legalism involves a lot of work, and there is not a very good return on it. And so parenting turns into a long stream of excuses and lame theories about the ineffectualness of spanking. If you have told 28 people this week that “he didn’t get his nap today,” then perhaps you should reevaluate.

Liberty is not some middle position between these two—it is another thing entirely. Liberty is stricter than legalism, and liberty is freer than license. Liberty—purchased for us by Christ on the cross—lines us up with how God made the world. None of our shifts or evasions can do that for us. The righteousness of liberty outdoes the Pharisees (Matt. 5:20), and the joy of liberty outdoes the libertine.

Why Children Matter

We will address this in much greater detail in the conclusion to this series, but it will be helpful for us to take a look at where we are going. Children matter because as creatures they bear the image of God, as sinners that image is defaced in them, and as saints that image is being restored in them.

By creating the human race in one fertile man and woman, God was declaring that His image was going to grow and mature over the course of generations. When we fell into sin, the curse of our loss was extended over generations. And now that the promised seed of the woman has come, we are given the opportunity to bring up our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord (Eph. 6:4). This is part of what it means to put off the old man, and to put on the new (Eph. 4:20-24). God is after a lineage.

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