(2 Samuel 11-12)
Uriah the Hittite died oblivious to the mess that King David had made of his life. He would surely be horrified that his name is remembered only for the sins done against him by the greatest of the kings of Israel. Uriah was a Hittite. A foreigner who distinguished himself in Israel’s army. He rose in fame to be counted as one of ‘The Thirty.’ The elite of the king’s troops.It was while he was gallantly and faithfully fighting the king’s wars, that the king was sleeping with his wife. He had no idea that Bathsheba had become pregnant to the king. When given ‘weekend passes’ to go home to Bathsheba, he wouldn’t go. He would not lay down with his wife while his comrades lay down their lives in battle. When David’s scheme to pass his baby off as Uriah’s failed (twice), he just had Joab murder him by proxy. By order his fellow soldiers abandoned him to be killed alone in the thick of battle—that was that!With adultery and murder now behind him, the king made Bathsheba his eighth wife.It was the prophet Nathan who God sent to confront David. Uriah was brought back to life by way of a ‘case’ he brought before the throne. Nathan told of a rich farmer who selfishly fed his guest with the much-loved pet sheep he had forcibly taken from the home of a poor man and his family. David’s anger boiled over into this harsh judgement. He cried, “He deserves to die…because he did this thing and had no compassion.” With David exactly where God wanted him to be, “Nathan then said to David, “You are the man!”” (2Sam.12:1-7). Old Testament sins are not scrubbed from New Testament pages. Within Jesus’ genealogy Uriah appears as a parenthetical poke-in-the-eye. Lest anyone might forget how his wife actually got there, Matthew records unapologetically: “Jesse was the father of David the king. David was the father of Solomon by Bathsheba who had been the wife of Uriah” (Mt.1:6).
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