Go, do all that is in thine heart.
Divine correction of a prophet’s mistake and Divine denial of a king’s desire
1. It is pleasant to glance at the circumstances which gave birth to David’s desire to build the temple. The regal position into which he passed on the death of Saul was no bed of roses. The land was still over-run by the Philistines, who held many of its strongest fortresses. Jerusalem was in the hands of the Jebusites. There was hard and long-lasting work to be done, but David gave himself to it with full purpose of heart; and his God who had called him to it did not suffer him to labour in vain. Victory after victory crowned his arduous struggles, until, at last, the Philistines were for ever banished; the Land of Promise was fully possessed by the Israelites; and David’s unresisted rule extended over all the twelve tribes. It was a happy time for the king and his people. Peace had come into the land, and prosperity was in her train. “The king sat in his house, and the Lord had given him rest round about from all his enemies.” We can scarcely enter into the joy which all this created, and the thankfulness it inspired; not because we know nothing of such circumstances, but because we have-always lived in them. Those who have never mourned on account of the deep darkness of midnight, cannot appreciate the beauty of the dawn and the splendours of the noon like men who through long hours of thick gloom have watched and waited for the morning. How can we estimate the blessedness of peace and security, as it was estimated by the Hebrews after nearly a life-time of constant disquiet and bloody strife, and well-grounded dread of national annihilation and of individual slavery or death? It may be asked, if David were so joyous and thankful, could he not have taken his harp of sweet and solemn sound, and have expressed his new-born praise in some new-born psalm? Doubtless he did this, but it was not enough to satisfy his gratitude. The truly thankful heart is glad to put on its singing robes, and lift its exultant strains to heaven; but it cannot be contented with words and music alone, even though another David should pen the hymn, and an inspired Handel should compose the melody. It will want to express its emotion in works, to put on the garb of a willing servant, and, in addition to saying great things about God, to do right and good and noble things for God. Let us be assured that if “we know and believe the love that God hath to us”--if His love have enkindled ours--we too shall be eager to embody our living thankfulness in deeds of truth, and kindness, and purity. The praise that expresses itself in action is not only the most acceptable to God, it is also the only praise which can give relief to the spirit burdened with a sense of what it owes to Him, whose mercy is like Himself--without beginning of days or end of years.
2. We must turn from the origin and nature of David’s purpose to Nathan’s mistaken sanction of it. A sympathetic heart is a great quickener of the brain. If your spirit be in unison with that of another man, how readily you and he can understand each other. Half words are enough, and either of you can fully discern the other’s desire or purpose long before his language has fully disclosed it. It is this taw of our nature which makes it so much easier for a man to find out the Divine Will when his heart is brought into living sympathy with God. Then his faculty of discernment is so perfect that to him God can say, “I will guide thee with Mine eye.” Between Nathan and David there was this sympathy, so that the latter had scarcely begun to speak about his purpose before the former divined all that be intended. Here is a most instructive case of the fallability of an always good and ofttimes inspired man! It is frequently difficult to distinguish between the inclinations of our own wills and the guidance of God’s hand. It is so easy to mistake the bent of our own desires for the intimations of Providence; and when our own hearts are in favour of a thing it requires little argument to convince us that God is in favour of it too. No matter how wise or right any course may appear to be, if we would be always safe we must always distrust our own unaided judgments, and cherish the dependent and teachable spirit, which cries, “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” Nathan went home to his evening prayer, and his nightly rest, and was speedily made aware of his error.
3. We have now to look at the denial of David’s desire, and at the facts and promises which were set before him to reconcile him to his disappointment. There was neither disdain of his gratitude nor condemnation of his idea that the prospered nation ought to have a better house for holy service. The Lord in His great kindness was careful so to convey the denial that it could not possibly impair David’s faith in the Divine love, nor excite his hostility to the Divine plan. He testified that God’s gentleness had made him great. Of that gentleness he seldom had richer experience than on this occasion.
(1) The first words in the message were calculated to pacify David’s conscience, which had been troubled about the poverty of the place wherein God was worshipped. He was reminded that the matter which had distressed him had called forth no complaint from the Lord.
(2) Having referred to the forbearance which others had met with, the Divine message proceeds to speak of what had been done for David. The Lord spake as if He feared that by thwarting David’s purpose He might expose His love to unjust suspicion; and therefore He was careful to show that He had already done so much for His servant that, whatever course He might see it best to pursue, His love ought not to be suspected for a moment. Surely He had placed that beyond the shadow of a doubt! The way in which David’s doubts were prevented is the way in which ours must be checked and cured. If God’s nay to our requests should tempt us to distrust His love, we must meet the temptation with memories of the many times and the manifold ways wherein He has heard our prayer and enriched us with His blessing. There is great significance in the fact that in refusing David the coveted honour of building the temple, the Lord reminded him of the glory as well as the mercy already bestowed upon him. Was it not telling David that the fame he had secured was enough for any one man’s lawful ambition? Why should he want to add to that the glory of being the greatest temple-builder the world had seen? He must not aspire to that crown too. God would reserve it for another. Men righteously denounced Napoleon for his desire to make a French empire of all Europe. There is too often a Napoleonism in commerce which is not a whit more admirable. Instead of vigorously and contentedly pursuing their own proper business, men have sought profitable pecuniary connection with ten or twenty other totally distinct enterprises. In how many cases this vaulting ambition has overleaped itself!
(3) From another part of the inspired history we learn that the character of David’s preceding work was given as one reason why the present purpose was to be laid aside. It should not be supposed that this implies censure of David’s warlike course. Had he not been qualified for it, and called be it, by God? Was it not a necessary work, and had he not Divine succour in it? It was both lawful and expedient; and yet it had unfitted him for the new kind of work to which he wanted to put his hands. In our present imperfect state, ability for one thing may involve disability for another thing. As no one man is intended to gain everything, so no one man is endowed with all the talents. Happy is he who finds out what he is fit for, and devotes himself to it; and is either so wise or so busy that he does not attempt numerous other achievements.
(4) Another way in which the Lord sought to reconcile David to the denial of his desire was by promising that his purpose should not perish, but be carried out by his own son. It is no wonder that God’s message checked all murmuring all rebellion in David’s heart. He did more than cheerfully submit; he exulted in the decision and purpose of the Lord. Instead of weeping and wailing, because his plan had not been adopted, he broke out into an impassioned and sublime strain of thanksgiving. Let it be remembered to the honour of his piety that such was-his confidence in the wisdom and love and faithfulness of God that one of the most fervent songs he ever sung was inspired by the very message in which he was told he was not to do what he had asked to do. It ought to be easier for us to imitate David’s hearty acquiescence, because we know that subsequent events proved how wise it was. According to God’s promise, Solomon succeeded to the throne, and was in every way fitted for the task assigned to him. It was a magnificent testimony to the truth that God’s “Nay” and God’s “Yea” are only two different forms in which the same everlasting love and infinite wisdom are expressed. (C. Vince.)
Nathan’s mistake
David’s proposal was so generous and so religious that the prophet Nathan didn’t have a question that its prompting was from the Lord. He was ready to bid the king God-speed, without a doubt as to the propriety of the thing proposed. But the sequel showed that David’s plan didn’t have the Lord’s approval. Nor was this the last time that a man of God made a mistake in supposing that because a proposition was a religious one it necessarily had the Lord’s approval. A young man comes to his pastor, and says that he has decided to give up everything else and study for the ministry. It doesn’t follow that the minister ought to say, “Go, do all that is in thine heart; for the Lord is with thee.” It is still a question whether this well-intentioned proposal is really of the Lord. So again, it may be, when a man comes with a proposition as to the use of his property, in establishing a local fund for the support of the ministry, in founding another college, or in building a new hospital. To show a religious purpose is one thing. To be sure that that purpose has the Lord’s approval, or that just as it is it deserves the approval of the Lord’s ministers, is quite another thing. Other men of God need to learn caution from the experience of Nathan. (H. C. Trumbull.)
A noble purpose unrealised
I. A conception of a noble purpose. It was a great thought that came to David. It was in part suggested by the exigencies of the situation. After the ark had come to its new home, Asaph and others had been appointed to celebrate, and thank, and praise the Lord, and minister before Him (1 Chronicles 16:4-37); and it is supposed that, at this period, the twenty-four courses of priests were appointed, an arrangement which lasted to the time of our Lord. It is thus, especially in young life, that great conceptions visit the soul; ideals of surpassing beauty cast a light forward upon the future; resolves of service for God and man brace the soul as the air from the glaciers does the dwellers in the plains; and all life assumes a nobler aspect, and is set to a higher key. Secretly that lad resolves to be a preacher, missionary, or philanthropist; and that girl, to be queen in an ideal home, or to go far hence to the zenanas of India. “I will do this great thing for God,” the young heart says to itself, altogether heedless of sacrifice, tears, blood. The bugle-notes of lofty purpose ring out gladly, summoning the soul to noble exploit; and it is saved from the low levels which satisfy others by the immortal hope that has already gone forward to occupy the future. Young people, never surrender your ideal, nor act unworthily of it, nor disobey the heavenly vision. Above all, when you come to the house of cedar, and God has given you rest, be more than ever careful to gird yourselves, and arise to realize the purpose that visited you when you kept your father’s sheep.
II. The ideal is not always realized. There is no definite “No” spoken by God’s gentle lips. He presses His promises and blessings upon us, and leads us forward in a golden haze of love, which conceals this negative. The plant is conscious of a great possibility throbbing within it; but somehow the days pass, and it does not come to a flower. The picture which is to gain immortality is always to be painted; the book which is to elucidate the problem of the ages is always to be written; the immortal song is always to be sung. The young man is kept at his desk in the counting-house instead of going to the pulpit; the girl becomes a withered woman, cherishing a faded flower; the king hands on to his son the building of the house.
III. God explains his reasons afterwards. What we know not now, we shall know hereafter. The blood-stained hand might not raise the temple of peace. It would have wounded David needlessly to have been told this at the time. It was enough to wrap up the Divine “No” in a promise of infinite blessing; but, as the years passed, the reason for God’s refusal grew clear and distinct before him. Meanwhile, David possessed his soul in patience, and said to himself: God has a reason, I cannot understand it; but it is well.
IV. An unrealized conception may yet be fraught with immense blessing. Solomon completes the story. David was a better man because he had given expression to the noble purpose. Its gleam left a permanent glow on his life. The rejected candidate to the missionary society stands upon a higher moral platform than those who were never touched by the glow of missionary enthusiasm. For a woman to have loved passionately, even though the dark waters may have engulfed her love before it was consummated, leaves her ever after richer, deeper, than if she had never loved, nor been loved in return. God will credit us with what we would have been if we might. In the glory David will find himself credited with the building of the temple on Mount Zion.
V. Do the next thing. The energy which David would have expended in building the temple wrought itself out in gathering the materials for its construction. If you cannot have what you hoped, do not sit down in despair and allow the energies of your life to run to waste; but arise, and gird yourself to help others to achieve. If you may not build, you may gather materials for him that shall. If you may not go down the mine, you can hold the ropes. There is a fact in nature known as the law of the conservation of force. The force of the accumulating velocity of the falling stone passes into heat, of which some is retained by the stone, the rest passes into the atmosphere. No true ideals are fruitless; somehow they help the world of men. No tears are wept, no prayers uttered, no conceptions honestly entertained in vain. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
Our hearts the measure of our work
Think much about intentions. Give, and it shall be given you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again. After which Bengel acutely annotates that it is by our hearts that we both mete out to others and have it meted out to ourselves. It would have gone hard with-the poor widow if she, had only had a farthing meted out to her in her Lord’s judgment on her. But her Lord looked on her heart. And thus it is that she sits in heaven to-day among the queens who sit there on their thrones of gold, because she had such a queenly heart that day in the temple porch. Both from David’s intended temple, from the poor widow’s actual collection at the door of David’s temple, and from Bengel’s spiritual annotation let us learn this spiritual lesson, that our hearts are the measure both of our work and of our wages in the sight of God. You cannot build and repair all the churches and mission-houses and manses at home and abroad you would like to build and repair. You cannot endow all the chairs of sacred learning you would like: You cannot contribute to the sustentation of the Christian ministry as you would like. You cannot visit and relieve all the fatherless and widows in their affliction as you would like. You cannot stop all the sources of sin and misery in this world as you would like. You cannot make the reading, or the religion, or the devotional life of your people what your heart is full of. You wish you could. So did David. David had magnificent dreams about the temple. He built the temple every night in his sleep. And had he been permitted he would not have slept with his fathers till he had dedicated a most magnificent house to the name of the Lord. But it stands in God’s true and faithful Word, that it was all in David’s heart. And He who looks not so much on the action as on the intention, He saw in this also a man after His own heart. May all David’s good intentions, and generous preparations be found in all our rich people, and may all the widow’s love and goodwill be found in all our poor people. For the heart is the measure. And as we measure our good words, and good wishes, and good purposes, and good preparations, and good performances in our heart, so will it be measured back to us by Him who sees and weighs and measures the heart and nothing but the heart. (Alex. Whyte, D. D.)