I have preached sermons on grief, but had never preached this text. I found David's words about Absalom to be very powerful. As a side note, last night as I was working on this sermon we were watching "The Miracle Season," a movie about the death of high school volleyball player. Watching her father grieve in the movie added to my sense of David's grief.
I had a couple of comments about the sermon being so serious or a "downer," but I also had comments bout it being a powerful sermon.
“Grieving” August 12, 2018, SAPC, Denton; 2 Samuel 18: 19-33
2 Samuel 18: 19-33 When Ahimaaz son of Zadok said, “Let me run, and carry tidings to the king that the Lord has delivered him from the power of his enemies.” 20 Joab said to him, “You are not to carry tidings today; you may carry tidings another day, but today you shall not do so, because the king’s son is dead.” 21 Then Joab said to a Cushite, “Go, tell the king what you have seen.” The Cushite bowed before Joab, and ran. 22 Then Ahimaaz son of Zadok said again to Joab, “Come what may, let me also run after the Cushite.” And Joab said, “Why will you run, my son, seeing that you have no reward[e] for the tidings?” 23 “Come what may,” he said, “I will run.” So he said to him, “Run.” Then Ahimaaz ran by the way of the Plain, and outran the Cushite.
24 Now David was sitting between the two gates. The sentinel went up to the roof of the gate by the wall, and when he looked up, he saw a man running alone. 25 The sentinel shouted and told the king. The king said, “If he is alone, there are tidings in his mouth.” He kept coming, and drew near. 26 Then the sentinel saw another man running; and the sentinel called to the gatekeeper and said, “See, another man running alone!” The king said, “He also is bringing tidings.” 27 The sentinel said, “I think the running of the first one is like the running of Ahimaaz son of Zadok.” The king said, “He is a good man, and comes with good tidings.”
28 Then Ahimaaz cried out to the king, “All is well!” He prostrated himself before the king with his face to the ground, and said, “Blessed be the Lord your God, who has delivered up the men who raised their hand against my lord the king.” 29 The king said, “Is it well with the young man Absalom?” Ahimaaz answered, “When Joab sent your servant,[f] I saw a great tumult, but I do not know what it was.” 30 The king said, “Turn aside, and stand here.” So he turned aside, and stood still.
31 Then the Cushite came; and the Cushite said, “Good tidings for my lord the king! For the Lord has vindicated you this day, delivering you from the power of all who rose up against you.” 32 The king said to the Cushite, “Is it well with the young man Absalom?” The Cushite answered, “May the enemies of my lord the king, and all who rise up to do you harm, be like that young man.”
33 [g] The king was deeply moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept; and as he went, he said, “O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! Would I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!”
Introduction: This is a particularly dark part of Israel’s history, full of betrayal and and treachery - brother against brother, or half-brother; father against son; Israelites against God.
A time when it’s hard to find many redeeming qualities in anyone.
but this sordid plot is interrupted by the death of Absalom, King David’s son and David’s grief.
Move 1: Grief overwhelms and impacts us, no matter the circumstances.
a. Absalom and his father king David have had a difficult relationship, to say the least.
1. Rooted in the rape of Absalom’s sister and Absalom’s revenge because he did not believe his father dealt with it, not to mention the usual lust for power, Absalom has turned against his father.
2. In fact, Absalom’s warriors have chased David and his army out of Jerusalem.
3. David has been working to defeat Absalom.
4. Although when David gives the pep talk to his army as they do into battle against Absalom’s army, he does that they not kill his son.
5. then, in a bizarre scene, Absalom dies.
6. when David hears the news, he utters perhaps the most gut-wrenching words we have in Scripture: “O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! Would I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!”
7. Each time David utters “my son,” he reveals his regret; his guilt; his anger; his grief.
8. Even when David is a war with his son, he griefs his death.revealing
b. A reminder - none of us can escape grief.
1. rabbi Lewis, in his sermon on his looming death, tells the story of the minister who begins his sermon by announcing, "everyone here in this parish [congregation] is going to die." A man breaks out into a smile, which causes the minister to stop and ask him, "Why are you smiling?" "I'm not from this parish [congregation]. I'm just visiting today." Mitch Albom, Have a Little Faith: a true story (231)
2. None of us will escape death or dealing with the death of friends and loved ones.
c. Even our faith does not shield us from grief.
1. As Christians, we still experience death and loss that lead to grief.
2. Even the most faithful among us, will grieve.
3. Everyone, regardless of their faith or lack of faith, will experience grief.
4. To live means to participate in the cycle of life and death.
Move 2: Grieving is personal
a. in my role as minister, I have held hands with family members as their loved one died;
1. I have been the one to tell someone their family member has died;
2. I have walked the journey of grief with many people.
3. I have dealt with the death of close friends and other relatives.
4. Many of you have done so as well.
b. But, when I found myself grieving the death of my father and sister, it was different.
1. It was personal. No one could know exactly what went through my mind, or what memories kept filling my dreams.
2. No one, not even my brother, who I suppose would have the most similar relationship with my father to mine, knew exactly what I felt and thought.
3. I can tell you both from the theoretical of studying grief; from the real-life experience of having watched others grieve; and from the personal experience as one who has grieved, that grief is personal.
c. that is not to say that others cannot share with us from their own grief and help us based on their own experience of grief.
1. We know the grief and despair of our own loss, so we can offer great comfort to others out of our grief.
2. comfort that comes from sharing in a similar sense of grief, but still not knowing exactly what the other person feels as she grieves.
3. one of the powerful roles a community of faith brings is comfort
4. From Stephen Ministers who visit those in grief to cards sent to those grieving to the warm hug to someone who sits with you when you feel alone in church, the church community can play a critical role as we grieve.
Grief is personal, but we need support.
Move 3: We need to grieve, and grief plays an important role for us.
a. “all those years I fell for the great palace lie that grief should be gotten over as quickly as possible and as privately. But what I’ve discovered since is that that lifelong fear of grief keeps us in a barren, isolated place and that only grieving can heal grief; the passage of time will lessen the acuteness, but time alone, without the direct experience of grief, will not heal it.” (I found this qoute with my sermon illustrations, but it had no reference. It was with several other Ann Lamott qoutes from her book Traveling Mercies, so it may be from there.)
b. I can say with certainty that we must grieve when people we are close to die.
- we can put it off - I have had people face death and tell me that they are going to put off their grief until some particular point in the future. But, the plan to put off grieving never seems to work very well.
- We can run away from it.
- But grief will find us one way or the other.
4. and that's a good thing.
5. Until we grieve and move through our grief, th grief controls us.
6. As we grieve, we open ourselves up to new possibilities and the hope God gives to us.
Move 2: Grieving brings us back to God.
a. Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann writes about David’s story and the whole of Israel’s story during this time of life and death in the 10th century.
1. he notes that David’s experience is paralleled by Israel’s experience.
2. That is, David, the king with all the power and the heart for God is looked to as someone who can give life, but instead, David is the bringer of death, instead of giver of life (Journal of the American Academy of Religion; 40 no 1 Mar 1972, 96-109; Walter Brueggemann; “Life and Death in Tenth Century Israel;” 106).
3. David, who is arguably the greatest of all the leaders of Israel, even David is surrounded by death.
4. Likewise, Israel, which seeks powerful leaders to give it new life, instead discovers death and destruction again and again.
5. The only place David and Israel can look to find hope and new life is God.
6. As David cries out, “O Absalom, my son,” the only one who can answer his cry is God.
b. Facing death and going through the grieving process brings us face to face with the questions about life and death that matter.
1. In other words, death and grief send us back to God.
2. Grieving can call into question who we are and whose we are.
c. we Christians have a word to speak about God in the face of death.
1. I hear lots of things said to people in their time of grief. I had lots of things said to me as I stood in line and greeted people.
2. Much of it is well-meaning.
3. some of it has theology that I do not think is true to the God we discover in the biblical text.
4. But we have a word of hope.
5. Hope grounded in the love of God - the God who created us out of love; the God who loves us every day of our lives; the God who sends Christ to join us in our death; Christ whose death saves us; the God who resurrected Christ to offer us hope in the face of earthly death.
6. Frederick Buechner writes this about David: ”If David could have done the boy's dying for him, he would have done it. If he could have paid the price for the boy's betrayal of him, he would have paid it. If he could have given his own life to make the boy alive again, he would have given it. But even a king can't do things like that. As later history was to prove, it takes a God.” http://www.frederickbuechner.com/blog/; August 6, 2018;Frederick Buechner blog
It takes God.
Conclusion: David cries out, “O my son, Absalom, my son, my son Absalom…”
To which God replies, “O my son Jesus, my son my son Jesus - he has come to give life, even life after death.
Amen.
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