Tuesday, September 20, 2005
We lived in the same town for over 25 years, so I could almost drive our town blindfolded. And sometimes I acted like it. Then one day, I suddenly realized how casual I was cruising the streets close to home - too casual, really. When I'm in an unfamiliar situation; both hands on the wheel, all eyes and ears. I'm intent. I'm focused. But, hey, these streets? I've driven these a thousand times, so I just sort of would go on automatic pilot, and frankly sometimes I didn't pay much attention. For some reason, one of those National Safety Council factoids popped on the screen in my brain: the vast majority of accidents take place within a few miles of home. Interesting - it's when you feel the safest that you're really in the greatest danger of all.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Most Dangerous Time of All."
That, in fact, is a lesson learned by King David with lifelong tragic consequences. Our word for today from the Word of God comes from 2 Samuel 11:1-4. "In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king's men and the whole Israelite army ... but David remained in Jerusalem. One evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing ... David sent someone to find out about her." It turns out it was Bathsheba, the wife of one of his most trusted military leaders. It says, "David sent messengers to get her. She came to him and he slept with her."
We might as well just add, "And David's life was never the same." This awful sin led to his conspiring to have Bathsheba's husband die in battle and then to a series of events in his family that included the incestuous rape of his daughter, the deaths of his children, the temporary overthrow of his rule by his son. It was one disaster after another that began with the sin of one ugly night - close to home.
We're talking about the man that God called "a man after His own heart." If it could happen to him, it could happen to you. Notice, David didn't fall in battle. He was spiritually alert then, like me driving in unfamiliar territory where I know I have to drive carefully. David's deadly moral "accident" happened close to home - in a setting where his guard was down - where he became spiritually casual.
There have been many Davids over the years; godly men and women who sinned or compromised in a way they could never have imagined. And it didn't happen on the battlefield. Many people go down spiritually during their "down" time - those times and places where we're relaxing, where we lower our guard, where we become spiritually careless. David's experience would suggest that the time when you feel safe and relaxed may be your most dangerous time of all.
It could be when you're just laying back to watch or listen to a little entertainment; entertainment that contains sinful ideas and acts that you just can't afford to have get into your heart. They're the seed of tomorrow's temptation and tomorrow's fall. Time off can be vulnerable time because we mistakenly take time off from our spiritual discipline, too. Travel times are dangerous times. You feel the seeming anonymity and the seductive freedom of being away from the people who know you. And often the times after periods of intense spiritual battle are dangerous, too, because we let down and inadvertently we let the roaring lion in to devour us.
So, don't make the mistake of becoming spiritually lazy when you're in a cruising time. Remember, most accidents happen in the place where you feel safest. Keep both hands on the wheel, keep your eyes and ears open, give the "safe" part of the trip to Jesus as much as you do the risky part - the battles. You don't need the wreckage that can come from letting your guard down during the most dangerous time of all.