Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Adult Sunday School Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/bb/bb20050731.htm

BIBLICALLY PARENTING THE MATURING CHILD
Part V: Handling Our OWN Sins To Be EFFECTIVE Parents To Our Children
(David, Amnon and Absolom - 2 Samuel 11-15)
  1. Introduction
    1. We parents are to rear our children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord, Ephesians 6:1-4 ESV.
    2. However, if we fail to handle specific sins in our own relationship with the Lord, we can develop blind spots in regards to those sins that actually filter down to obscure our objectivity with our children in our parenting roles with regard to those very faults, damaging our parenting effectiveness.
    3. The case involving the lives of David and his sons, Amnon and Absolom illustrate this fact as follows:
  2. Handling Our OWN Sins To Be EFFECTIVE Parents To Our Children, 2 Samuel 11-15.
    1. David had committed adultery with Uriah's wife, and had tried to cover up this sin that her resulting pregnancy threatened to expose by having Uriah killed and by taking her to be his own wife, 2 Samuel 11.
    2. The Lord had then led the prophet, Nathan to confront David about this sin; God had graciously forgiven David when he confessed without exercising capital punishment upon him, 2 Samuel 12:9-14.
    3. After this, David's son, Amnon sexually lusted after his half-sister, Tamar to the point he yielded to the temptation forcibly to author intimate relations with her, 2 Samuel 13:1-14.
    4. Amnon's rape of his half-sister was a capital offense according to the Mosaic Law, cf. Leviticus 20:17; Bible Knowledge Commentary, Old Testament, p. 203. David as Israel's king was supposed to have executed his son, Amnon for this sin; yet, out of apparent residual guilt from his sin with Uriah's wife, the similarity of Amnon's sin with his own adultery led David to fail to execute Amnon, 2 Samuel 13:21, 23a.
    5. This failure in turn led to a terrible series of tragedies for David's family and the nation Israel (as follows):
      1. Tamar's full brother, Absalom was infuriated at Amnon's deed, 2 Samuel 13:22. Had David taken immediate steps to punish Amnon appropriately, Absalom's anger would have been satiated.
      2. However, David failed to punish Amnon for two full years; hence, Absalom had Amnon put to death by others (as David had caused others to slay Urijah), 2 Samuel 13:23, 28-29 with 2 Samuel 11:14-27.
      3. When David heard Absalom had arranged for Amnon's death, he was angry, but did not execute Absalom as a murderer: after all, Absalom had done to Amnon what David had failed to do, 13:31-39. Besides, David himself had arranged for Urijah's death, a sin like Absalom's murder, and a possible failure on David's part to put his murder of Uriah behind him led to his innaction regarding Absalom!
      4. David continued to stay immobile regarding Absalom, a state that led to even worse tragedies:
        1. As David failed to deal with Absalom, Absalom lost respect for his father, and rashly burned the fields of Joab, David's commander, to force David to act regarding him, 2 Samuel 14:28-32b.
        2. Absalom then demanded he see David and settle the matter with his father: he demanded he either be forgiven or executed for his murder of Amnon, 2 Samuel 14:32c.
        3. David complied by meeting with and apparently forgiving Absalom, but his disrespect for David's delay to administer immediate justice had already done great harm; Absalom eventually led a civil uprising against David with the political platform that he would give Israel the justice that David had failed to administer as in the case with his sister, Tamar, 2 Sam. 15:1-6, 13-16:32. In that war, Joab got even for Absalom's burning up his fields; he in turn murdered Absalom, 2 Sam. 18:14-15.
      5. Accordingly, David lost both of his sons, Amnon and Absalom due to his failure to address their sins of immorality and murder in objectively due to his own failure to deal effectively with his own guilt!
Lesson: David's failure to deal with his own guilt over his past sins in the matter with Bathsheba and Urijah kept him from objectively handling similar problems in his sons; he reaped tragedy as a result.

Application: If we truly want what is best for our children, we parents must keep a CLEAN SLATE before the Lord in our OWN walk that we might OBJECTIVELY rear our CHILDREN in the Lord! (1) We should confess our OWN sins as SOON as is POSSIBLE to God and put them BEHIND us that so we can have an OBJECTIVE MIND about SIMILAR sins in our CHILDREN! (2) We must be CANDID with our children about our OWN failures they witness, ADMITTING them to be so, that we can relate to our children CREDIBLY without FRUSTRATING them [as DAVID errantly did]!