2 Samuel 18:5-9, 15, 31-33
The king, David, ordered Joab and Abishai and Ittai, saying, “Deal gently for my sake with the young man Absalom.” And all the people heard when the king gave orders to all the commanders concerning Absalom. So the army went out into the field against Israel; and the battle was fought in the forest of Ephraim. The men of Israel were defeated there by the servants of David, and the slaughter there was great on that day, twenty thousand men. The battle spread over the face of all the country; and the forest claimed more victims that day than the sword. Absalom happened to meet the servants of David.
Absalom was riding on his mule, and the mule went under the thick branches of a great oak. His head caught fast in the oak, and he was left hanging between heaven and earth, while the mule that was under him went on.
And ten young men, Joab’s armor-bearers, surrounded Absalom and struck him, and killed him.
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.” 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.”
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!”
I have a fragment of a memory from when I was a young child. I don’t know how old I was, but I was not yet tall enough to see over the top of the counters in our kitchen. My mother was in the kitchen, cooking, and I was reaching my hands up over the edge of the counter, probing with my fingers amongst things unseen. It must have been near the stove, because I remember her warning me to keep my hands away or I would get burned. But her words did not deter my efforts and soon her attention was elsewhere. What I remember next was the shock and pain of the heat, the little welts where the coiled burner had touched my finger, and my mom holding my hand under cold water as I cried.
My mother did not cause the burn as a punishment for ignoring her warnings. Nor did she desire that I experience the pain of the burn in order that I learn an important life lesson. There was no higher meaning, no greater purpose accomplished in that experience. Rather, sometimes there are consequences for our actions, natural and as inevitable as burning your finger when touching a hot stove.
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When David received word of the success of his plan to have Uriah killed on the front lines in order to hide what David had done to Bathsheba, he famously told Joab, “Do not let this matter trouble you, for the sword devours now one and now another.” (2 Samuel 11:25)
Now, decades have passed, and David has grown to understand the terrible truth of the words he uttered so callously all those years ago. Now, David receives the terrible news of the death of his son, Absalom, who has been devoured indeed by the sword. Absalom, his child whom he loved, but who had grown so estranged from his father that he started a rebellion and ignited a civil war in Israel.
David and Absalom are caught in a vast web of the choices and actions that each of them made, the consequences of which have reverberated across their family and all of Israel. Because that is the thing about our actions, the consequences take on a life of their own and grow beyond our control. And now, though David has absolute power in his kingdom, he is utterly powerless to stop this tragedy. His own orders cannot stop his commanders and his army from ruthlessly killing his son.
But all of that is unimportant, because at its core, our reading this morning is about the raw grief of a parent over the death of a child. We may understand the long chain of actions and consequences of both David and Absalom that have led up to this moment, but they do not supply meaning. Absalom’s death is not a moral lesson.
Indeed, we must resist the urge to moralize this story! Because God did not do this to teach David a lesson or as a means of making David work out his past sins. God did not desire this. God did not cause this. Sometimes tragedy and grief is senseless and without meaning.
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Years ago, when I was working in a hospital as a chaplain, I had the experience of accompanying a grandmother as she grieved the sudden, tragic, and senseless death of her grandson. He was only thirteen. She cried out to God, over and over again, demanding to know why God had allowed this to happen. She had gone to church faithfully. She had followed God’s word. She had kept the faith. And yet her grandson still died. “What have I done wrong?” she demanded of God.
But there was only silence. Because sometimes there is no answer to that question.
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Here in the midst of scripture is the story of raw, profound grief. There is no resolution to the grief either—no happy ending, nor silver lining, no moral lesson to be gained, no meaning-making—no answer to the question, “Why?” Just as is so often the case with the profound grief in our own lives. Rather, just as it does in our own lives, it sits here in scripture like an open wound.
And, it is important that it is here in scripture, just as it is, because our grief, our tragedy, is also a part of the sacred story. Our wounds and the broken places in our lives are a part of the story of our relationship with God.
God does not cause this to happen. God does not desire it. God does not allow it in order to teach us a lesson, or punish us, or make us stronger, or bring us into closer relationship with God, or any other such nonsense.
Rather, God is with us even in our tragedy. God is with us even in our most profound grief. And God was with the grandmother who wept over her grandson, just as God was with David as he cried out for Absalom, his son.
God wept with them. Just as God weeps with us over the profound and unresolvable grief in our lives. Just as God wept over the death of Christ, turning the sky black and rending in two the curtains in the temple as Jesus hung upon the cross.
My friends, there is no good news in this story, only pain and loss and the grief of a parent for a lost child. But there is a promise.
Because God chooses to be with us, and God comes among us even in the worst moments of our lives, even in the most broken parts of our lives, in order to be with us and bring us healing. Just as God came to us in Jesus, so that we might know God once more and experience the healing and life that God brings, even knowing that it would lead, inevitably, to the cross.
Because God chooses us and God weeps with us. God promises to be with us, even in our grief. Even in God’s grief.
Preached by the Rev. Adam Yates