A Day for Forgiveness

A Day for Forgiveness

Shimei Throwing Stones at David

Collect of the Day: O God, who hast prepared for those who love thee such good things as pass man’s understanding; Pour into our hearts such love toward thee, that we, loving thee above all things, may obtain thy promises, which exceed all that we can desire; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Old Testament: 2 Samuel 19:16-23

16 And Shimei the son of Gera, a Benjamite, who was of Bahurim, hastened and came down with the men of Judah to meet King David.

17 And there were a thousand men of Benjamin with him, and Ziba the servant of the house of Saul, and his fifteen sons and his twenty servants with him; and they went over the Jordan before the king.

18 And there went over a ferryboat to carry over the king’s household, and to do what he thought good. And Shimei the son of Gera fell down before the king as he was coming over the Jordan,

19 and said unto the king, “Let not my lord impute iniquity unto me, neither do thou remember that which thy servant did perversely the day that my lord the king went out of Jerusalem, that the king should take it to his heart;

20 for thy servant doth know that I have sinned. Therefore, behold, I have come the first this day of all the house of Joseph to go down to meet my lord the king.”

21 But Abishai the son of Zeruiah answered and said, “Shall not Shimei be put to death for this, because he cursed the Lord’s anointed?”

22 And David said, “What have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah, that ye should this day be adversaries unto me? Shall there any man be put to death this day in Israel? For do not I know that I am this day king over Israel?”

23 Therefore the king said unto Shimei, “Thou shalt not die.” And the king swore unto him.

(Today’s homily is based on today’s Old Testament Lesson. It deals with a situation that forms the historical context of last week’s homily from Psalm 63. In Psalm 63 David is in the wilderness of Judah because his son Absalom it trying to take the throne. David abandoned Jerusalem and fled to the wilderness. In today’s Old Testament lesson David is on the way back to Jerusalem when he meets a man named Shimei, a man he had met earlier as he headed for the wilderness to try to save his kingdom.)

Have you ever experienced a person who turned against you when you were down and who later, when things turned good for you, tried to get back in your favor? That’s what happened with David and a man name Shimei.

1. Shimei’s Sin against David

• David had traveled about a mile and a half from Jerusalem when he was confronted by Shemei. Shemei was from the tribe of Benjamin which was the tribe of the first king of israel, Saul, who had committed suicide in battle and had been replaced by David.

• Shimei had walked along a hill overlooking the road on which David was traveling, and he hurled curses at David and all those who were accompanying David. In addition to to insults and curses, Shimei threw stones and dirt at David and all the members of his his court who were accompanying him.  

He yelled insults at David and at  David’s family, court, army and advisors:

“Get out, get out, you man of blood, you worthless man! The Lord has avenged on you all the blood of the house of Saul, in whose place you have reigned, and the Lord has given the kingdom into the hand of your son Absalom. See, your evil is on you, for you are a man of blood.” (1 Samuel 16:7,8).

Shimei resented that David and David’s family had supplanted Saul, and he blamed David for the murders of Saul’s general, Abner, and Saul’s son, Isboseth, though Scripture makes it plain that David was not responsible.

• What Shemei did was stupid. Why curse the king is you do not yet know what will be the outcome of the coup that Absalom was staging. We has Anglicans may remember the history of the Tudor family and how those who joined in potential rebellion against Henry, Mary, and Elizabeth, were brutally suppressed and executed. Shemei must have had a great deal of resentment against David to risk his life in denouncing David.

Shimei’s act was not only stupid. It was sinful. The law of Moses said:

“You shall not revile God, nor curse a ruler of your people” (Exodus 22:28).

It was a great sin to revile God or to curse the King. Shemei deserved to die. And one of David’s men named Abishai was ready to take care of him. He said:

Why should this dead dog curse my lord the king? Let me go over and take off his head.

• But David  would have none of it - for four reasons: 1) David believed that it was possible that Shimei’s cursing was the Lord’s chastisement for David’s past sins. 2) Whether that was the case or not, David knew Shimei’s cursing in the Lord’s providence, and he submitted to that providence. 3) If David’s own son was out to kill him, why resist the cursing of this man? 4) Perhaps the Lord would set things right in the future.

• However none of this had any effect on Shimei. He followed David, looking down on him at from the ridge and continued to curse, to hurl stones, and to throw dirt.

David continued on into the Judean wilderness while Shemei looked forward to the defeat of David’s army and the death of David himself.

2. David’s Forgiveness of Shimei

David’s army organized itself in the Judean wilderness and fought a battle with Absalom’s army. Absalom’s army was routed, and Absalom was killed by David’s general Joab.

• With the defeat of Absalom David and his people began the march back to Jerusalem. A large group met David at the the crossing of the Jordan. Men from David’s tribe of Judah, 1000 men from Saul’s tribe of Benjamin. A man named Ziba who had been one of Saul’s servant came with his 15 sons and 20 servants to see get the king’s household across and to do whatever David needed or wanted. These people had not gone into the wilderness with David when retreated there. They had not shown loyalty to David, and their meeting David at the river was an apology, an expression of loyalty to David, and an effort to reconcile with the king. Were they sincere? Some perhaps were. Others no doubt were dealing with political reality. If Absalom had won, they would have met him. But David had won, so they met him.

• Most prominent among them was Shimei who had cursed David and thrown stones and dirt at him when David was weak and on the verge of losing the kingdom. Shimei knew he was in serious trouble and likely to be executed when David and his victorious army returned from the wilderness. He probably decided he had nothing to lose. He decided to take his chance, meet David as he crossed back into Judah, and cast himself on the king’s mercy.

He fell on his knees in front of David and said,

Let not my lord impute iniquity unto me, neither do

thou remember that which thy servant did perversely the day that my lord the king went out of Jerusalem, that the king should take it to his heart; for thy servant doth know that I have sinned. Therefore, behold, I have come the first this day of all the house of Joseph to go down to meet my lord the king.

It was a hail Mary pass to try to save his life.

• Abishai, who had volunteered earlier to cut Shimei’s head off, spoke up again. Shimei must be executed. Abishai said, “Shall not Shimei be put to death for this, because he cursed the Lord’s anointed?” In the movie, Elizabeth the Golden Age, Queen Elizabeth, must deal with the treachery of her cousin, Mary Queen of Scots. Because Mary is her cousin, Elizabeth is inclined to spare Mary. But her Secretary of State, William Cecil, tells Elizabeth that it is not safe for her or her county to ignore Mary’s treachery, so Elizabeth orders her executed. Abishai argues that David must kills such a scoundrel as Shimei.

• But, as David would not allow Abishai to kill Shimei when he cursed David as David left Jerusalem, so now he will not consent to Shimei’s execution as he heads back to Jerusalem.  David rebuked Abishai:

What have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah, that ye should this day be adversaries unto me? Shall there any man be put to death this day in Israel? For do not I know that I am this day king over Israel?

David asks “What have I to do with you?” Even though

Abishai is a loyal citizen and soldier who has shared in

David’s hardships and fought for David’s cause, David sees

that he and Abishai are of different spirits. David’s kingship

is now secure. This day is not a day for killing enemies.

• No doubt there was political calculation in what David did.

There has been a civil war. David’s army has put down the

rebellion. Now is a time for healing the rifts, not for

creating resentments. National unity is more important

than revenge on enemies.

But there is more than politics at work. David knows the Lord has been gracious to him and therefore he will show grace to his enemies. It would have been just had the Lord taken David’s kingdom from him. His sin with Bathsheba which involved not only adultery but the arranged death of her husband. He had betrayed the nation by his sin, and had dishonored the name of the Lord. But the Lord did not give David what he deserved. He preserved David’s kingdom. He saved David’s life. Now, because of the goodness of the Lord he is on his way back to Jerusalem to live in his palace and reign from his throne. This day calls for mercy in gratitude for the Lord’s mercy.

One day St. Peter asked Jesus, “How often do I have to forgive someone who sins against me? Is seven times enough?” Jesus said, “No, you should forgive seven times seventy - 490 times.” Then Jesus told the story of a servant who owed a great debt to his master. When the master called him in to settle accounts, the servant could not pay, so the master ordered that the man, his wife and children, and all he owned be sold with the proceeds to go to settling the debt. The man fell on his knees and pleaded for mercy and time to repay. The master had pity on his servant. No only did he rescind the order, but he forgave the man the whole debt. The man received great mercy.

There is coda to the story. The man left his master’s house forgiven and encountered a fellow servant who owed him a small debt. The forgiven servant grabbed the debtor by the throat and demanded immediate payment in full. He had the man thrown in jail. Other servants who witnessed this reported it to the master. The master had the forgiven servant brought back and said,  ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’

He had this ungrateful, unmerciful servant thrown into to jail to be kept till he payed all the original debt. And Jesus said, “So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.” If we have any idea of how greatly we have sinned against God and how merciful he has been toward us when we could never make up for our offenses against him, we must be merciful to those who sin against us. If we are unmerciful  to others it reveals how little we grasp the gravity of our sin, how much we have been forgiven, how great is our debt of gratitude. The first Christian martyr, St. Stephen, understood that, and died saying, “Lord, charge not this sin against them.”

• David said to Shimei, “Thou shalt not die.” He swore an oath that he would not have Shimei executed. Unfortunately that is not the end of the story. When David was near the end of his life, and his son, Solomon, was anointed his successor he said to Solomon, “And behold, thou hast with thee Shimei the son of Gera, a Benjamite of Bahurim, who cursed me with a grievous curse in the day when I went to Mahanaim; but he came down to meet me at the Jordan, and I swore to him by the Lord, saying, ‘I will not put thee to death with the sword.’ Now therefore hold him not guiltless, for thou art a wise man and knowest what thou oughtest to do unto him; but his hoary head bring thou down to the grave with blood.”

The further David got from his own experience of God’s

mercy, and the more he brooded over what Shimei had

done, the more resentful he became and the more he was

determined that Shimei should get justice - should pay for

      his sins. And eventually Solomon executed justice.

• There is an important question for us. The Lord has forgiven our sins. Not once, but over and over, day after day. We never stop sinning, never stop needing mercy and forgiveness. Now how do we know that in the end God will not decide to give us what we deserve? How do we know his forgiveness is not temporary? How do we know God will not in the end rescind his forgiveness? How do we know we will finally get justice?

The answer we find at this Table. Christ has died for our

sins - all of them, the big ones and the little ones, the ones

committed once and the ones committed many times, the

ones done in public and the ones done in secret, the ones

People know about and the ones even we are not aware of,

known only to God. Jesus has paid the penalty for our sins.

God cannot and will not rescind the pardon he has issued.

It is sealed with the blood of his Son. Christ “by his one

oblation of himself once offered” made “a full, perfect, and

sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction” for our sins.