2 Samuel 13:37
Now Absalom fled and went to Talmai son of Ammihud, the king of Geshur. But David mourned for his son every day.
Sermons
ChastisementR. E. Faulkner.2 Samuel 13:30-37
Parental SorrowsB. Dale 2 Samuel 13:30-39














2 Samuel 13:30-39. - (JERUSALEM)
And the king also and all his servants wept very sore (ver. 36). David's intense feeling appears in his affection (vers. 6, 25, 39), his wrath (ver. 21), and his grief (ver. 31). The delight which a father finds in his children is seldom unalloyed. His sorrows, on their account, are -

I. OFTTIMES PECULIARLY SEVERE.

1. Their misbehaviour. "A 'house cross' is the heaviest of all earthly crosses. The gall which is mingled in our cup by those who are nearest to us surpasses all others in bitterness" (Krummacher).

"How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is
To have a thankless child!"


(King Lear.')

2. Their misfortune (ver. 19).

3. Their disappointment of his hopes; his consternation, trembling anxieties, exaggerated fears (ver. 30); his bereavement by death (ver. 32) and by enforced exile through crime (ver. 34); his son a fratricide, like Cain, alive yet dead. What a heavy burden of trouble was thus laid upon David! It is not surprising that it was followed by serious and protracted bodily affliction, favourable to the designs of his enemies and conducive to still deeper distress (2 Samuel 15:4, 30), as several psalms seem to indicate (Psalm 38., 39., 41., 55.).

O Jehovah, rebuke me not in thine anger,
Nor chasten me in thy hot displeasure.
For thine arrows stick fast in me,
And thy hand presseth me sore," etc. (Psalm 38:1, 2.)

II. SOMETIMES DUE TO HIS OWN FAULT.

1. His sinful example. Children are more ready to imitate their father's vices than his virtues.

2. His defective discipline. "David's failure in the government of his family was due in part to the excessive, even morbid, tenderness of his feelings towards his children, especially some of them. He may also have thought of his family circle as too exclusively a scene for relaxation and enjoyment; he may have forgotten that even there there is a call for much vigilance and self-denial" (Blaikie). "By this example we see that children whom their parents spare to correct will in the end be a grief unto them" (Wilier). "Chastisement without love is an outrage; no father is at liberty to plague or torture his child; but a love that cannot chastise is no love, and reaps a poor reward. A child that does not at the proper time feel the father's rod becomes at last a rod for his father" (Schlier). "Ofttimes the child whom the father loves most (as David did Amnon) becomes his greatest grief by too much indulgence" (Guild).

3. His culpable clemency in the case of a great crime (ver. 21). Even if David did inflict some punishment on Amnon, as it has been supposed (Chandler), yet it was altogether inadequate to the offence. The sorrows of a father over the sins and sufferings of his children are intensified by the knowledge that they are, in some degree, the result of his own errors and transgressions. "A parent can have no sharper pang than the sight of his own sin reappearing in his child. David saw the ghastly reflection of his unbridled passion in his eldest son's foul crime (and even a gleam of it in his unhappy daughter) and of his murderous craft in his second son's bloody revenge" (Maclaren).

III. NOT WITHOUT MERCIFUL ALLEVIATION.

1. The occasion of trouble is less calamitous than it might have been; less than it was feared to be (ver. 32).

2. Grief is assuaged by the lapse of time (vers. 37, 38).

3. It is vain to mourn over what is irreparable (ver. 39; 2 Samuel 12:23; 2 Samuel 14:14).

4. These afflictions are chastisements from the heavenly Father's hand, and should be endured with patience and hope (Psalm 39:7, 9; Psalm 38:15).

5. They are mingled with tokens of Divine favour (2 Samuel 12:13, 25; Psalm 41:1-3; Isaiah 27:8).

6. Their purpose is morally beneficial (Hebrews 12:11). "It may seem strange to say it, but it is most true, that the tears which flow from the eyelids of a man are as needful to the fruitfulness of his heart as the dews which descend from the eyelids of the morning are to the thirsty ground" (E. Irving). - D.

Absalom hath slain all the king's sons.
The fulfilment of the curse on David's house now begun.

I. OBSERVE THE JUSTICE OF GOD'S DEALINGS IN CHASTISEMENT. A comparison of David's sin and its punishment shows that free forgiveness does not remove consequences in this life.

1. David had wounded Uriah in his best affections. He himself was allowed to suffer the keenest sorrow through the son he best loved.

2. He had to see the evil heritage of lust develope in that favourite child.

3. He took the one ewe lamb. Absalom stole the hearts of all Israel.

4. David made Joab his tool to carry out his treachery. Henceforth he was Joab's tool, obliged to bear with him, and leave his punishment to Solomon.

II. SIN HAD WEAKENED HIS POWER. He no longer possessed the respect of the nation. The reins of government were dropping from his hands. Yet he recognised love in it all, and God meant it in love.

(R. E. Faulkner.).

People
Absalom, Ammihud, Amnon, David, Jonadab, Shimeah, Talmai, Tamar
Places
Baal-hazor, Geshur, Jerusalem
Topics
Absalom, Ab'salom, Ammihud, Ammi'hud, Ammihur, David, Fled, Flight, Geshur, Mourned, Mourneth, Talmai
Outline
1. Amnon loving Tamar, by Jonadab's counsel feigning himself sick, ravishes her.
15. He hates her, and shamefully turns her away
19. Absalom entertains her, and conceals his purpose
23. At a sheep-shearing among all the king's sons, he kills Amnon
31. David grieving at the news, is comforted by Jonadab
37. Absalom flies to Talmai at Geshur

Dictionary of Bible Themes
2 Samuel 13:36

     5799   bitterness

2 Samuel 13:23-36

     5737   sisters

Library
Saurin -- Paul Before Felix and Drusilla
Jacques Saurin, the famous French Protestant preacher of the seventeenth century, was born at Nismes in 1677. He studied at Geneva and was appointed to the Walloon Church in London in 1701. The scene of his great life work was, however, the Hague, where he settled in 1705. He has been compared with Bossuet, tho he never attained the graceful style and subtilty which characterize the "Eagle of Meaux." The story is told of the famous scholar Le Clerc that he long refused to hear Saurin preach, on the
Grenville Kleiser—The world's great sermons, Volume 3

Blessed are they that Mourn
Blessed are they that mourn. Matthew 5:4 Here are eight steps leading to true blessedness. They may be compared to Jacob's Ladder, the top whereof reached to heaven. We have already gone over one step, and now let us proceed to the second: Blessed are they that mourn'. We must go through the valley of tears to paradise. Mourning were a sad and unpleasant subject to treat on, were it not that it has blessedness going before, and comfort coming after. Mourning is put here for repentance. It implies
Thomas Watson—The Beatitudes: An Exposition of Matthew 5:1-12

No Sorrow Like Messiah's Sorrow
Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Behold, and see, if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow! A lthough the Scriptures of the Old Testament, the law of Moses, the Psalms, and the Prophecies (Luke 24:44) , bear an harmonious testimony to MESSIAH ; it is not necessary to suppose that every single passage has an immediate and direct relation to Him. A method of exposition has frequently obtained [frequently been in vogue], of a fanciful and allegorical cast [contrivance], under the pretext
John Newton—Messiah Vol. 1

Exhortations to Christians as they are Children of God
1 There is a bill of indictment against those who declare to the world they are not the children of God: all profane persons. These have damnation written upon their forehead. Scoffers at religion. It were blasphemy to call these the children of God. Will a true child jeer at his Father's picture? Drunkards, who drown reason and stupefy conscience. These declare their sin as Sodom. They are children indeed, but cursed children' (2 Peter 2:14). 2 Exhortation, which consists of two branches. (i) Let
Thomas Watson—The Beatitudes: An Exposition of Matthew 5:1-12

Repentance
Then has God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life.' Acts 11: 18. Repentance seems to be a bitter pill to take, but it is to purge out the bad humour of sin. By some Antinomian spirits it is cried down as a legal doctrine; but Christ himself preached it. From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent,' &c. Matt 4: 17. In his last farewell, when he was ascending to heaven, he commanded that Repentance should be preached in his name.' Luke 24: 47. Repentance is a pure gospel grace.
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments

Samuel
Alike from the literary and the historical point of view, the book[1] of Samuel stands midway between the book of Judges and the book of Kings. As we have already seen, the Deuteronomic book of Judges in all probability ran into Samuel and ended in ch. xii.; while the story of David, begun in Samuel, embraces the first two chapters of the first book of Kings. The book of Samuel is not very happily named, as much of it is devoted to Saul and the greater part to David; yet it is not altogether inappropriate,
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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