There are people we enjoy seeing walk through the door.
Nathan probably wasn't one of them.
David had committed adultery with Bathsheba. She became pregnant. David attempted to conceal what he had done and eventually arranged for her husband, Uriah, to be killed in battle.
Time passed.
From David's perspective, perhaps the crisis seemed to be over.
Then Nathan arrived.
Nathan told David a story about two men. One was rich and owned many sheep. The other was poor and possessed only one little lamb that he dearly loved. When a traveler came to the rich man's home, instead of taking one of his own sheep, the rich man stole the poor man's lamb.
David was furious.
He immediately pronounced judgment against the man.
Then Nathan looked at the king and delivered four words that must have landed like a hammer:
“You are the man.”
Suddenly David wasn't judging someone else's sin anymore.
He was looking at his own.
There is an important lesson here for every believer.
Sometimes God loves us enough to confront us.
We don't usually think of confrontation as love. We prefer encouragement. We like affirmation. We enjoy sermons that send us home feeling better than when we arrived.
But sometimes God's grace comes through an uncomfortable conversation.
Sometimes it comes through a sermon we wish had been preached to somebody else.
Sometimes it comes through a spouse.
A friend.
A pastor.
A consequence.
A passage of Scripture that simply will not leave us alone.
God puts His finger on something in our life and says, in effect, “We need to deal with this.”
Our first instinct may be defensiveness.
“That's not what happened.”
“You don't understand.”
“Other people do worse things.”
“You don't know what I've been through.”
But God wasn't interested in helping David protect his reputation. God was interested in restoring David's heart.
There is an enormous difference between condemnation and conviction.
Condemnation says, “You are hopeless. Run away from God.”
Conviction says, “You have sinned. Run back to God.”
The enemy wants failure to drive us into hiding. God uses conviction to bring us home.
Nathan's visit was uncomfortable, but imagine what might have happened if Nathan had never come.
How much longer would David have hidden?
How much harder would his heart have become?
How much more damage might have followed?
The conversation David probably least wanted to have became one of the most important conversations of his life.
Maybe God has sent a Nathan into your life.
Before becoming angry, ask whether God might be trying to get your attention.
Perhaps somebody loves you enough to tell you something you don't want to hear.
Perhaps Scripture has been exposing an attitude, relationship, habit, or secret you've been defending.
Don't waste the conviction.
Listen.
David finally did.
When Nathan confronted him, David answered simply:
“I have sinned against the LORD.”
No excuse.
No blame shifting.
No carefully constructed explanation.
And with those words, the hiding began to end.
The Nathan moments in our lives are rarely pleasant.
But years later, we may look back and realize:
Thank God He loved me enough not to leave me where I was.
