HUMILITY OF RESTRAINT (26 OF 52)
Scripture: 2 Samuel 16:5-14
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Humility of Restraint (26 of 52)
Series: Discipleship Part ThreeHumility of Restraint
Christopher B. Harbin
2 Samuel 16:5-14
Restraint is not a trait we often prize very much. We will tell our children to stop and count to ten. We understand that thinking through a response and its consequences is a sign of maturity. Then we like to consider less thoughtful responses to those who offend us as easily justified. We have an ambivalent relationship with restraint. We elevate and promote the confrontational and aggressive. Then we hold up as saints the meek, peaceful, and restraint-filled. It would seem that we live by the one value while we hold out its opposite as an ideal for some ethereal existence far removed from daily life. As long as we cling to competing values, it becomes impossible to be clear about them. Can we learn to make God's values the ones that direct our lives?
David was rather depressed. He was struggling because his beloved son, Absalom, was trying to take the throne from him, and now David was fleeing for his life. He dearly loved Absalom. He did not want anything bad to happen to him, but this rebellion had forced David to flee the palace to protect his life. This was not a comfortable space to inhabit, torn between his love for Absalom and finding this son had no respect for him as father or king. In the midst of this flight and turmoil is where we find David in today's text. He was not in his happy place. Life had lost its luster. David was out of sorts, and it was a very short distance to the sloughs of despair.
We can all pass through bouts of depression during moments of crisis. That is far different from living with a disease we call depression. David was in the dumps as a result of life seeming to fall apart all around him. Absalom had usurped the throne, and David did not know how to respond. While he loved Absalom deeply, he did not consider Absalom the proper one to succeed him to the throne. He was unready to yield his po ...
Series: Discipleship Part ThreeHumility of Restraint
Christopher B. Harbin
2 Samuel 16:5-14
Restraint is not a trait we often prize very much. We will tell our children to stop and count to ten. We understand that thinking through a response and its consequences is a sign of maturity. Then we like to consider less thoughtful responses to those who offend us as easily justified. We have an ambivalent relationship with restraint. We elevate and promote the confrontational and aggressive. Then we hold up as saints the meek, peaceful, and restraint-filled. It would seem that we live by the one value while we hold out its opposite as an ideal for some ethereal existence far removed from daily life. As long as we cling to competing values, it becomes impossible to be clear about them. Can we learn to make God's values the ones that direct our lives?
David was rather depressed. He was struggling because his beloved son, Absalom, was trying to take the throne from him, and now David was fleeing for his life. He dearly loved Absalom. He did not want anything bad to happen to him, but this rebellion had forced David to flee the palace to protect his life. This was not a comfortable space to inhabit, torn between his love for Absalom and finding this son had no respect for him as father or king. In the midst of this flight and turmoil is where we find David in today's text. He was not in his happy place. Life had lost its luster. David was out of sorts, and it was a very short distance to the sloughs of despair.
We can all pass through bouts of depression during moments of crisis. That is far different from living with a disease we call depression. David was in the dumps as a result of life seeming to fall apart all around him. Absalom had usurped the throne, and David did not know how to respond. While he loved Absalom deeply, he did not consider Absalom the proper one to succeed him to the throne. He was unready to yield his po ...
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