The Wages of Sin
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David had pronounced the death sentence upon himself (2 Samuel 12:5), but God said Bath-sheba’s child would die (v. 14).
“To David the death of the child would be a far greater punishment than his own death. As a result of the bitter experience he would pass through, David would be brought to a full measure of repentance and conversion. “. . . Even after He has pronounced judgment God has sometimes seen fit to turn aside the penalty in response to sincere repentance and earnest petitions to Him (Ex. 32:9–14; cf. Jonah 3:4–10). David knew that God was ‘merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth’ (Ex. 34:6). He therefore pleaded earnestly for forgiveness and for the life of the child. However, this does not imply that he refused submission to the divine will. He simply hoped that God’s mercy might spare the child.” It was not to be.
David, learning of the infant’s death, cleansed himself and went to the house of the Lord to worship. The servants were amazed by his reaction.
“And he said, While the child was yet alive, I fasted and wept: for I said, Who can tell whether GOD will be gracious to me, that the child may live? But now he is dead, wherefore should I fast? can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me” (2 Samuel 12:22, 23). “These words portray David’s resignation to the will of God, and his understanding of the state of the dead. After the child had died, there was nothing further he could do about the matter, and he humbly accepted the inevitable.” The people of Israel understood one who died went into the grave to sleep with his fathers (2 Samuel 7:12; 1 Kings 1:21; 2:10; 2 Kings 22:20).
David was saying he would eventually join his son in death, but his son would not be returning from the grave. There was nothing he could do to change these facts (Ecclesiastes 9:5, 6). “The judgments upon him [David] and upon his house testify to God’s abhorrence of the sin.”
