This is My Story 2026, Part 6: David and Bathsheba // Jamie Nunnally

You will face temptation. How will you respond? In this message, Pastor Jamie Nunnally shares how we can recover from temptation and sin. David and Bathsheeba’s story illustrates God’s path for restoration after moral failure.

The story of David and Bathsheba is the account of the biggest moral failure by Israel’s greatest king.

2 Samuel 11:1-12:10

When we stop walking with purpose, we start getting in trouble.m

Ephesians 5:15-16 NLT “So be careful how you live. Don’t live like fools, but like those who are wise. 16 Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days.”
When you’re not where you’re supposed to be, it’s easy to do what you’re not supposed to do.
 
Sin grows when it’s covered instead of confessed.
Proverbs 28:13 NLT “People who conceal their sins will not prosper, but if they confess and turn from them, they will receive mercy.”

James 1:15 NLT “These desires give birth to sinful actions. And when sin is allowed to grow, it gives birth to death.”
Just like a seed, burying sin makes it grow into something much bigger.
 
God’s forgiveness doesn’t always erase sin’s consequences.
Inside each sin is a built-in consequence. Not all are immediate or obvious, but they are inevitable.
Galatians 6:7 NLT “Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant.”
God’s forgiveness restores your relationship with Him, but it doesn’t always reset every outcome of your choices. Grace cancels the debt, but it doesn’t always cancel the damage.
 
Psalm 51 is a song of repentance David wrote after Nathan confronted him.
Psalm 51:10-13 ESV “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right [steadfast] spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit.”
Sin doesn’t just break laws, it breaks fellowship with God, and it damages our joy.

Psalm 32:1-2
 
The same God who received David again is still responding to repentance today. His mercy meets you right where you are and His grace begins to rebuild what sin tried to break.
So the question isn’t whether you’ve failed.
How do you respond when God confronts you with truth?
The same God who sent Nathan to David is still sending His Holy Spirit to you.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:08

You're listening to the VFC Sermon Podcast. At the end of this episode, please take a moment to download our free VFC Thomasville app, where you can access all of our messages, sermon notes, announcements, and small group lessons. Our app is the easiest way to keep up with everything going on here at VFC. We hope that this message helps you in your walk with Jesus and encourages you to belong, believe, and become.

SPEAKER_01 1:04

Why do we do this? When your story is history, that means it no longer has any hold over your life. It can become his story and it turns into ministry. Your past can help someone's future. If God did it for you, he'll do it for them. That's why we do this. Today I'm going to tell you a story from Scripture. It's the story of David and Bathsheba. It's the account of the biggest moral failure by Israel's greatest king. Because of the adult themes, today's sermon is for middle school and up. It's rated PG. I won't do anything too crazy, don't worry. But we have kids' stuff, so I can share what scripture actually says. One step at a time, one choice at a time, David traveled a path that took him to the wrong destination. We're going to get started, and uh the story is found in 2 Samuel chapter 11. Sometimes I tell the whole story and then I'll kind of come back at the end and talk about what we can learn. This is a longer story, so I'm going to kind of bring out some points as we read the story, uh, and you can follow along in your Bibles, or I'll have the scripture up on screen. 2 Samuel chapter 11, verse 1, it says this in the spring of the year, when kings normally go out to war, David sent Joab and the Israelite army to fight the Ammonites. Joab was the head of the army. They destroyed the Ammonite army and laid siege to the city of Rabbah. However, David stayed behind in Jerusalem. First point. Did you notice it? David's not where he's supposed to be. When we stop walking with purpose, we start getting in trouble. But when we lose vision for what we're supposed to be doing, we are susceptible now. See, David's in a season where he should be on the battlefield with his men. This is who he's always known to be. He was always someone that led by example. He was always someone that was a warrior surrounded by his warriors. But now, for whatever reason, he stayed back in Jerusalem. My guess, because he's around 50 years old at this point, is his lower back. That's just. Anyone? Anyone? Yeah. Okay. That's just my thoughts, but it's not scripture. So this point, he's done nothing wrong. He's just in the wrong place. He's not where he's supposed to be. Ephesians 5, 15 through 16 warns us be careful how you live. I say this all the time. If you can be careful, then you can also be careless. Be careful how you live. Don't live like fools, but like those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. Well, if it was evil back then, guess what it is now? Same. People be peopling, whether it was ancient Israel or modern America, right? Wisdom leads us into intentional living. Foolishness leads us into idle living. When you're not where you're supposed to be, it's easy to do what you're not supposed to do. Our environments affect us greatly. Next verse, 2 Samuel chapter 11, verse 2. Late one afternoon. After his midday rest, his nappy nap. David got out of bed and was walking on the roof of the palace. He looked out over the city. He noticed a woman of unusual beauty taking a bath. All right, let's talk. Let's talk about this. Here's our next point. Predecide before temptation comes. Predecide. That means to make a decision beforehand before you're at the point of decision. Again, at this point in the story, no sin has been committed by anyone. Bathsheba is simply taking a bath. There is no reason to assume anything improper or manipulative on her part, although I've heard some preachers say that. She's not described as trying to be seen by anyone. Also, David hadn't sinned yet either. He sees something he didn't intend to see. There's nothing wrong with seeing someone and thinking, oh, whoa, wow. Okay. She's attractive. But David didn't have a decision made before the moment arrived. See, we can pre-decide our response for when temptation shows up unexpectedly. Because if you don't decide before the moment, the moment will decide for you. If you don't have a plan, life will make a plan for you. This is why wisdom is not just about resisting temptation. It's about avoiding temptation. It's about removing the opportunities for temptation to take root in our lives. Make your decisions before your desires make them for you. Amen. Guys, men, for us, we tend to be turned on visually. That means that we have to guard our eyes. We have to watch the things that we watch. We have to be aware of the TV shows, the movies, the things that we see. Because we are hardwired to respond to the female form. And so we are accountable to that. And to act like it's not a big deal is to not be honest with yourself and is to take the first step toward the progression in the direction you don't want to go. Ladies, it's different for you, but you still have the same issue. In general, women tend to respond emotionally and relationally. There's going to be similar media inputs for you. You ever notice guys don't read romance novels? There's going to be certain things that are going to take you down steps as well in the wrong direction. You got to pre-decide. No, I don't do that. That in itself may not be the big thing I'm trying to avoid, but it might take me towards that thing I'm trying to avoid, so I'm not going to do it. That's wisdom. It's wisdom. It's knowing yourself. Don't wait until you're in the moment to decide who you are. Pre-decide. God tells Cain when he's being tempted with hatred for his brother, Genesis 4, 7, sin is crouching at the door, eager to control you. But you must subdue it and be its master. Notice God doesn't say, but I'm going to subdue it for you. He doesn't say that, does he? Because, no, but you must subdue it. Sin is just called personification. This is when you take an idea and you give it human properties. Sin is crouching. I mean, imagine someone hiding behind a door waiting to jump out. See, sin doesn't usually announce itself, it lies in wait. And the only way to win against a hiding enemy is to already be prepared for when it pounces. It's to get ready, to be to be ready. If you've ever gone through like a like a scary house, a haunted house, and you're about to round the corner, you know something's around the corner. So you keep telling yourself, all right, don't be scared, don't be scared, don't be scared. You are planning for what you know is up ahead. Guys, the days are evil. The temptation is up ahead. Why don't you go ahead and plan now? If we don't predecide our response to temptation, our impulses will write our story. What we feel in the moment will make the decision for us. Let's keep reading verse 3. He, David, sent someone to find out who Bathsheba was. He was told, she is Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite. What David should have done at this point is say, good for Uriah. That's awesome. Honey, where are you? I mean, he should have left it alone. In other words, she's taken, right? But instead, verses four and five, then David sent messengers to go get her. And when she came to the palace, he slept with her. She had just completed the purification rites after having her menstrual period. Then she returned home. Verse 5 later, when Bathsheba discovered she was pregnant, she sent David a message saying, I'm pregnant. Very efficient message. Pregnant. Okay. For the record, this was sexual assault. When the king summons you, you can't say no. There was no consent here. She was made to come up and be before David. Now, it includes a really interesting detail where many of us, we read scripture, we're like, whoa, why would you put that in there? It talks about that she just completed her ritual purification after a monthly period. This isn't the biblical author just giving us too much information. There is a point, whenever you see stuff like this, there's always a reason. The reason was there were no DNA tests back then. There was no Mari Povich TV show back then. David, you are the father. There was none of that. And so this is the author's way of saying, hey, the only way she could have gotten pregnant is by David because her husband had already left. So this little detail, which is kind of like, ugh, it's very important to the story. That's why no one ever questions who the father is because of this information. So David's in trouble. So when you're in trouble, he does what we do: we hatch a plan. He sends for Uriah, he gives him the weekend off, so he'll have happy time with his wife and think that he's the father of David's child. The problem is, Uriah doesn't feel right taking the weekend off while everyone else is still at battle. So he doesn't go home. He sleeps at the palace entrance with a palace guard. I don't know about that, I'm just being honest, but hey, that was his decision. David tries again the next night. This time he gets him drunk. And then he sends him home again, but again, Uriah refuses to go home. David starts to panic because his plan isn't working. And then we get to verses 14, 15, and 17. So the next morning David wrote a letter to Joab and gave it to Uriah to deliver. The letter instructed Joab station Uriah on the front lines where the battle is fiercest. Then pull back so that he will be killed. Verse 17. And when the enemy soldiers came out of the city to fight, Uriah the Hittite was killed along with several other Israelite soldiers. Here's our next point. Sin grows when it's covered instead of confessed. It grows when it's covered instead of confessed. Instead of coming clean about what he did, David tries to control the outcome. This is what sin does. It moves beyond the moment of failure and it creates a web of deceit that affects many. Now you're not the only one dealing with a sin. You're managing consequences, you're manipulating people, you're trying to rewrite reality. But sin doesn't ever stay private. It always demands more from you. And it affects other people. Now, Joab is arranging for someone's murder. And did you notice it wasn't just Uriah who was killed, other people were killed too? Well we do, it affects others. Proverbs 28, 13 says, people who conceal their sins will not prosper, but if they confess and turn from them, they will receive mercy. Burying sin only fertilizes it to make it grow. What happens when you bury an acorn? Eventually it'll turn into an oak tree, right? Imagine you're driving down the road and there's an acorn on the street. You're gonna run right over it, aren't you? Not a big deal. No big problem, right? But imagine that acorn has been buried, and now there's a big oak tree in the middle of the road. What's gonna happen? Now you're gonna destroy your car. What's the difference? One was buried, one wasn't. See, lust may be the acorn, but adultery is the oak tree. Anger may be the acorn, but murder is the oak tree. Greed may be the acorn, while theft is the oak tree. You say, Well, I would never steal. Yeah, but you're not dealing with the acorn of greed. And if you plant it, just like any seed, it will grow. It'll grow beyond what you can handle, causing irreparable damage. James 1:15 says, These desires give birth to sinful actions. And when sin is allowed to grow, it gives birth to death. Well, how do seeds grow? By concealing them, covering them, and planting them. Just like a seed, burying sin makes it grow into something much bigger. But here's the good news confessing sin uproots it. The acorn doesn't have to turn into the oak tree. But we do it through confession and repentance. We'll talk about that in a little bit. Back to the story, 2 Samuel 11, 26 through 27. When Uriah's wife heard that her husband was dead, she mourned for him. When the period of mourning was over, David sent for her and brought her to the palace, and she became one of his wives. Then she gave birth to a son. But the Lord was displeased with what David had done. Chapter 12, verses 1 through 3. So the Lord sent Nathan the prophet to tell David this story. There were two men in a certain town. One was rich and one was poor. The rich man owned a great many sheep and cattle. The poor man owned nothing but one little lamb he had bought. He raised that little lamb, and it grew up with his children. Verses three and four. It ate from the man's own plate and drank from his cup. He cuddled it in his arms like a baby daughter. One day a guest arrived at the home of the rich man, but instead of killing an animal from his own flock or herd, he took the poor man's lamb and killed it, and prepared it for his guests. Verses five and six. David was furious. As surely as the Lord lives, he vowed, any man who would do such a thing deserves to die. He must repay four lambs to the poor man for the one he stole and for having no pity. Verse 7. Then Nathan said to David, You are that man. Sin must be confronted with wisdom. Notice Nathan doesn't walk into David's house in a rage. He starts with a story instead of an accusation. If he came in, I mean, you guys know, if he came in with guns blazing, David probably would have dug his heels in. He probably would have denied everything, it would have turned into a fight. He would have made excuses, he would have doubled down. Well, here's why. But the story Nathan told allowed David to see his sin from an objective outsider's point of view. Because here's the point spirit-led confrontation is never about being right, it's about bringing redemption. It's not just about I'm right, you're wrong, it's about here's how we solve the problem. Galatians 6, 1. Paul says, Dear brothers and sisters, hey, that's you. If another believer is overcome by some sin, you who are godly, some translations say spiritual, should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path and be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself. Imagine someone's holding like a really dangerous item in their hands. How are you gonna help them? You're not gonna be like, give me that. You're gonna be like, let's deal carefully with this. I don't want to get any on me. Right? Nathan is modeling what it looks like when God confronts us through people who care more about our restoration than our punishment. Hasn't the church, unfortunately, not been like Nathan? Hasn't the church often shamed people for their sin instead of walk them through the path of restoration? It's like we either ignore sin altogether, like it doesn't exist, or we're obsessed with everyone else's sin. There is a biblical, balanced way to deal with this. And it's laid out in Scripture. God doesn't just want to adjust our behavior, he does. But even more, he wants to affect our hearts. He wants to change our want to, where we don't want to do the things that harm us anymore. The goal of godly confrontation is not to win an argument, it's to win a believer back. It's to save a soul, it's to deliver someone from what they're enslaved to. And Nathan models this perfectly for us. He also shares the unfortunate reality of what will happen now. 2 Samuel 12, verse 10. From this time on, he says, Your family, David, will live by the sword, because you've despised me, the Lord, by taking Uriah's wife to be your own. And that's an understatement. If you read the rest of David's story, it gets really bad from here on out. You see exactly what that looks like. The child dies. One of David's sons sexually assaults his half-sister. Another of his sons tries to steal the throne and sleeps with his concubines. It turns into like a real housewives episode. I mean, it gets bad. It gets bad. What started in secrecy became generational instability. Which brings us to our next point. God's forgiveness doesn't always erase sin's consequences. This is so important for us to understand. This is one of the hardest truths in this story. Nathan had said, he'd already said that God forgave him. But inside each sin is a built-in consequence. Not all of them are immediate, not all of them are obvious, but they are all inevitable. Not because God's cruel, he hates you, always trying to hurt you, but because sin is serious. It's built in to the sin itself. God is full of mercy towards the repentant heart, but he doesn't always remove the natural fallout from our choices. We've experienced that, right? I have. I've done something stupid, and I'm like, Lord, I'm so sorry. Forgive me. And if I hurt anyone, I go to them, look, I'm so sorry, forgive me. But I gotta still deal with what happened. It's the nature of sin. And this is why Scripture takes sin so seriously. It's not that God's just waiting to punish us when we mess up, but it's that sin has been prewired to produce destruction in our lives. Galatians 6 7 says, Don't be misled. Or don't be deceived. And whenever you see this in scripture, it's highlighting an area of life where we are more likely to be deceived, where we're more likely to be misled or get it wrong. So it's kind of like, hey, red flag, pay attention. Do not be misled. You cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant, you will reap what you sow. What you put out will come back. See, God's forgiveness restores your relationship with Him, but it doesn't always reset every outcome of your choices. Grace cancels the debt, but it doesn't always cancel the damage. Now, 2 Samuel is largely a historical record of what happened in David's life. But we have another account, and I love this. It's so cool. You know, sometimes you see Paul's letters in the New Testament, but then you read the book of Acts, and you can actually read what was happening while he was writing the letter. In the same way, not only do we have the story of David found in this book of the Bible, but we have some of David's words himself in the Psalms. David was a songwriter, and a lot of what he went through, he put to song, and you get to hear his thoughts. When we go through the songs that he wrote, we're given a window into what his repentance, his feelings, what it actually looked like. After Nathan confronted David, David didn't defend himself, he didn't excuse himself, he didn't minimize what he had done. He did write a song about it. It's Psalm 51. It's a song of repentance. Look at verses 10 through 13. It's a famous, there are about three sections that are fairly well known in the church. Psalm 51, 10 through 13 says, Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right or steadfast or loyal spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence. Take not your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit. That's an obedient, willing spirit. See, sin doesn't just break laws, it breaks fellowship. Our conscience condemns us, even if we've been forgiven, and it damages our joy. So David asked the Lord for a new heart. He doesn't say, Lord, give me a new reputation. He doesn't say, Lord, change what people think about me. He says, Lord, change my heart. Change my heart. David also wrote another Psalm around this time, farther down the chronological timeline. It's Psalm 32. I know numerically it's first, they didn't number stuff chronologically. This is after David knew he had been forgiven from what he did. Psalm 32, 1 through 2, he says, Oh, what joy for those whose disobedience is forgiven, whose sin is put out of sight. Yes, what joy for those whose record the Lord has cleared of guilt, whose lives are lived in complete honesty. Notice the lesson. When you don't cover your own sin, but you confess it and repent of it, God will cover it for you. Did you get that? Don't cover it yourself. You confess it. Now you don't confess it to everyone. That's not wise. You confess to the Lord to be forgiven. You confess to others to be healing. You confess to someone healed. You confess to someone who needs to hear you say you're sorry. So that there's relational healing. You don't have to tell the whole world. But when you uncover, God's mercy will cover. Which leads me to my final point. This is good news. God responds to repentance with forgiveness. 1 John 1.9. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. He does all the heavy lifting. You just got to confess it. You just got to admit it and quit it. And he does all the hard work. The process of forgiving the blood necessary to atone for your sin, he spilled that for you. You don't have to spill it yourself. The process of cleansing you, making you whole, making you new, he does all that. You don't have to do that. He does all the hard work. He's just asking you to confess. He's just asking you to admit. This part of David's story is rough. I like David. He's a hero. But this is a tough part. There's also hope in David's story, though. He didn't stay there. He didn't stay in his sin. He didn't make excuses for his sin. He repented. He came back to the Lord. God met him there not with rejection, but with restoration. David was still. No, this is kind of hard to wrap your mind around. Scripture called him a man after God's own heart. How can a man after God's own heart do such terrible things? Because he repented. Solomon didn't repent. But David did. See, being after God's heart doesn't mean you got everything together, you do everything right. It means you're running after him. It means when you make a mistake, you admit it. You confess to him, you confess to who else you need to, and you let the Lord bring restoration. Despite his egregious, gross sin, David still ran after God. And the same God who received David again is still responding to repentance today. His mercy will meet you right where you are, and his grace will rebuild what sin has tried to break in your life. So the question this morning isn't whether you failed. I know the answer to that. The answer is yes. It's the answer for me too. It's the answer for everyone that's ever lived. Yes, of course we've failed. But this is the question: how do you respond when God confronts you with truth? How are you gonna respond? Excuses, but Lord. Are you yeah, that was me? That was me. Here's the good news: the same God who sent Nathan to David is still sending his Holy Spirit to us. He's still willing to confront us, not to bring shame, not to throw us away in our guilt, but to remove our shame, remove our guilt to free us from the sickness that sin brings. How are you responding when God confronts you? Let's stand for prayer. Our international friend Zizi is gonna lead us in our final song. But before she comes, I want you to do some business with the Lord. Close your eyes for a moment. Ask the Lord the question I asked you. Lord, how do I respond when confronted with the truth of your word? Am I defensive? Hey, another extreme is just to leave, is just to say, I can't do this whole Christian stuff. I'm not good enough. Yeah, that's the point. No one's good enough. Where's your heart this morning? Are there areas of your lives that you need to confess? Do you need to get right with him? Do you just need to just be honest and say, Lord, I want to be a man after your heart, but I just, this is an area where I've messed up. I confess it. I uncover it in your presence so that your grace can cover it. Speak to us, Holy Spirit. As always, I'm going to invite you to pray this prayer after me. If you will say, Father, I thank you that you love me. Even though you know me, you know everything I've ever done or ever will do. Yet you invite me into fellowship with you. So I confess my sin because you are faithful and just to forgive me of my sin and to cleanse me from all unrighteousness. I repent. I turn from the world's way, and I turn to your way. Do a work in my heart and restore me. In Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen.

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