Sunday Bible discussion with Father Dave

This week's reading from the Hebrew Bible (2 Samuel 11:26 - 12:13) is the well-known confrontation between King David and the Prophet Nathan, who confronts the king over his affair with Bathsheba and his murder of her husband, Uriah. It may seem odd at first that Nathan’s primary grievance with David is that he “despised the word of the Lord” (2 Samuel 12:9). One might have thought that David’s acts of rape and murder were more serious than his lack of faith. Even so, all sin, from a Biblical point of view, is ultimately a form of idolatry.

In David’s case, this is quite clear. He is behaving like the other oriental despots of his day. If he wants a woman, he takes her. If he wants someone killed, he only has to say the word. He does as he pleases because he is king! But in the nation of Israel, kingship wasn't supposed to work that way. God is king, and the earthly ruler was only ever supposed to be the ‘nagid’ (prince) as spelt out in 1 Samuel 19:6. David usurped God’s authority by making himself answerable to no one.

David accepts the word of the prophet and so resumes his rightful position in submission to the true king. If only more of today’s political leaders had the humility to do the same.

Our second reading is from St Paul’s letter to the Ephesians (4;1-16), where the Apostle is swept up in wonder at the unity of the body of Christ – “there is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling” (Ephesians 4:4-6).

Of course, this heavenly vision of the church united doesn’t seem to bear much resemblance to what we see around us, and things probably didn’t look a lot better in St Paul’s day. Even so, Paul sees the spirit of God at work in the church, pulling people together despite themselves! It will do us all good to latch on to this vision.

Our Gospel reading form John 6 (24-35) introduces us to Jesus’ dialogue on the ‘bread of life’. The crowd who come to Jesus are looking for answers but, like us, they are asking all the wrong questions. Over this and the Gospel readings in the following four weeks, Jesus will try to lift our understanding of life and of God to a new level.

Dave
www.fatherdave.org
www.fighting-fathers.com