Friday 29th November
Read 2 Samuel 24:15-17
“So the Lord sent a plague on Israel from that morning until the end of the time designated, and seventy thousand of the people from Dan to Beersheba died. 16 When the angel stretched out his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the Lord relented concerning the disaster and said to the angel who was afflicting the people, ‘Enough! Withdraw your hand.’ The angel of the Lord was then at the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
17 When David saw the angel who was striking down the people, he said to the Lord, ‘I have sinned; I, the shepherd, have done wrong. These are but sheep. What have they done? Let your hand fall on me and my family.’” (NIVUK)
The judgment falls. A plague upon the nation. We may feel this is harsh, but then we don’t know what Israel did to deserve this.
Things change suddenly however, with a ‘when’ (v16). The Lord relented. There is a second ‘when’ (v17) and the author carefully crafts the message such that we don’t quite know which ‘when’ came first. Did David pray and the Lord relent, or did the Lord relent and David recognise his responsibility for the people? The answer is meant to be yes.
However, we know something David did not. He thought his people were innocent (‘What have they done?). Would David have felt the same way if he knew what Israel had done to incur God’s wrath?
“You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:6-8) (NIVUK)
