2 Samuel 16:15-23

2 Samuel chapter 16 and verse 15 through the end of the chapter. And Absalom and all the people, the men of Israel, came to Jerusalem and Hitha fell with him. And it came to pass when Hushai, the archite, David’s friend, was come under Absalom, that Hushai said unto Absalom, God save the king. God save the king. and absalom said to Hushai, is this thy kindness to thy friend? Why wentest thou not with thy friend? Hushai said unto Absalom, nay, but whom the Lord and this people, and all the people of Israel choose, his will I be, and with him will I abide. And again, whom should I serve? Should I not serve in the presence of his son, as I have served? in thy father’s presence, so will I be in thy presence. Then said Absalom to Hithrafel, give counsel among you what we shall do. And Hithraelphel said unto Absalom, go in unto thy father’s concubines, which he hath left to keep the house, and all Israel shall hear that thou art abhor to thy father, then shall the hands of all that are with thee be strong. So they spread Absalom a tent upon the top of the house. And Absalom went in unto his father’s concubines in the site of all Israel. And the council of the Hithrafel, which he counseled in those days, was as a man had inquired at the oracle of God. So was all the counsel of the Hithafel, both with David and with Absalom. May God bless to us the reading of His sacred and holy. word this evening. Job’s calamities were certainly enormous. His oxen and donkeys were stolen. His sheep were burnt with fire. But that was just the beginning. A great wind out of the desert blew upon the house of one of his family members, were all his sons and daughters were gathered together. and collapsed the house and all his family died. And then, of course, Job himself was stricken with oozing, bleeding, pain for boils all over his body. And then his three friends came to give him so-called counsel how to deal with the disaster that ruined his house. So poor was their suggestions and their advice that Job cried out miserable counselors are you all? Absalon has been quickly notified that David has fled from the city of Jerusalem. And so he triumphantly enters into the city, as verse 15 indicates to us. Now he’s the master of Jerusalem, the capital. He hopes that the whole nation will now be his. Everything in his rebellion is going splendidly. It seems like it’s going well. He has the most celebrated politicians of his day here, Hithrafell, and Hushai, to counsel him. Hithrafowl, Abel, Absalom brings with him to the city. Hushai, you remember, was sent back by David to thwart the plants of Ahithrafelb. And so the latter meets him when he comes to the city. Aftelon considers himself very fortunate to have all this wisdom available to him, to advise him. Now, you’ll notice that Absalom does not seek the counsel of God. We don’t see him at all looking into the word of God or considering what God has to say. and we don’t see him counseling with the priest who were those who were knowledgeable about the word of God for his counsel. What Absalom will find is the Hithrafal and Husshi were also miserable counselors, as Job found with his counselor. One seeks to deceive him, and the other one counsels him to do an evil thing which brings down the wrath of God upon him. The lesson here is don’t put your trust in human counselors who are not guided by the principles of the Word of God. So I want to speak tonight on the topic of miserable counselors, and I’ll begin with this. People will deceive you and end up undermining your cause. In verses 15 to 19, we see the case. here with a Hushai. You find it’s a righteous principle with God to repay the wicked according to their own ways. Hushai has no intentions of advising Absalom well here or giving him good advice. He’s really an enemy. He is trying to undermine Absalom’s cause. Absalom could not have a more dangerous man to counsel him than Hushai. Because he’s actually working to help David, he’s using all his craftiness and his skill for that purpose. How appropriate that Absalom, who has proven to be a great deceiver himself, is now going to be deceived. Remember that Absalom, when he had his feast, when he was shearing his shearing his sheep, is now going to be deceived. sheep. He deceived the king and Amnon, his older brother, and at that time, of course, Amnon, unsuspecting that he goes to the feast and he is killed. He also deceived David and said, I have to go to Hebron and pay my vows to the Lord now that you’ve brought me back to the land of Israel. I made these vows that I said I would pay. But he will go to the headbron, of course, he announces his rebellion against King David. So twice David was deceived by his son. But here we’ll see that Absalon now is going to be deceived. The New Testament in 2 Timothy 313 says, that evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived. Evil men. Those whose attitudes, desires, words, and actions are contrary to God’s commandments. And seducers, who are the cheats or the charlatans, the impostors, crafty and shrewd individuals, both of these individuals, these people, intend to deceive others, and yet God says they also shall be deceived themselves. God sees. to it that these people reap exactly what they saw. In Psalm chapter 7, verses 15 and 16, we read that the wicked man makes a pit. He digs it, but he’s fallen into the ditch which he may. His mischief shall return upon his own head. We see that the wicked do not shy away from getting down to the dirty work of digging the dick. They don’t mind digging the ditch for someone to fall into. They don’t mind getting their hands dirty, so to speak. A man digs a deep pit, and he covers it carefully and disguises the danger, but somehow inadvertently, he forgets, steps on it and falls into it himself. And that’s the picture that God has with regard to the wicked. This is God’s God’s way. and there is a sense of poetic justice to this that if you are a deceiver, you shall be deceived. In the unfolding of God’s providence, Absalon has dug a pit of deception, but he’s going to fall into it and be deceived by Hushai. Remember Haman, who erected the gallows, 75 feet high to hang Mordecai on the Jew. Of course, he found out too late that he was actually building his own death sentence in the gallows. Joab, remember, deceived his father, or excuse me, Jacob deceived his father about the firstborn status, and he put on the goat skin and made himself hairy as he could be and pretended to be his older brother, Esau, so that he could get the birthright blessing, and then he goes to… to Laban’s house to work for his uncle far away. And guess what happens to him when he wants to marry Rachel, he ends up with Leah. Wakes up after his honeymoon morning and honeymoon morning and the next day. And here it’s Leah. And it’s not Rachel. When he complains about it, what does Laban tell him? Wow, it’s, you know, it’s not right to give the first, not to give the second born before the firstborn. And so he comes back. to haunt him. One of Esop’s fables is the wolf in sheep’s clothing. A wolf resolved that he would disguise himself in order to pray on the sheep. So he sneaks into the herd of sheep, and he’s there among them, and he’s clothed in this sheep’s skin. He’s grazing out of the fields, and he completely fools the shepherd. He figures, I’ll wait till all the sheep go back to the sheepfold, and then when darkness comes, I’ll snatch one of the sheep and get out and no one will catch me. Well, as the sheep are penned up that evening, the wolf is patiently waiting, but the shepherd decides he needs some meat to eat that night for dinner, for his family, and so he grabs one of the sheep and guess which one it was? It was the wolf in sheep’s clothing. And the lesson of that parable, of course, is you fall into the pit you dug for others for the shepherd kills him quickly with a knife and he loses his life. So you find it a righteous principle with God to repay the wicked according to their own ways. Now you’ll notice here that God uses pride, the pride of your own heart, to cause you to believe someone’s deception. The crafty Hushai here uses some ambiguous language in speaking, capable of double construction when he speaks to Absalon. So he fools him. Absalom is duped by Hushai’s carefully chosen words. He’s suspicious at first and he says, you know, what are you doing here? Aren’t you my father’s friend? Aren’t you his counselor? What are you doing here? But Hushai greets Absalom with a double long live the king. Sort of a formula recognizes royal authority. It’s sort of a more of a formula of a pledge of allegiance, if you would, to the king. One might assume by the king here that he met Absalom, but it could indeed mean that he was long live the true king. It means King. Who knows but that’s what he had in mind. When Absalom pressed Hushai on his loyalty to David in verse 17, Hushai insisted that he would be loyal to the one that Jehovah, the people, and all the men of Israel had chosen. What do you think that really was? It was the one that was chosen by the Lord to be king. So you can see that he is careful with his wording here, and so in a way, he’s confusing to Absalom, but he He also deceives him. Absalom like Haman in the book of Esther thinks that he’s talking about himself. He thinks that he’s the object of the person that’s speaking. As Haman thought the king was talking about him when he was really talking about a Mordecai. Well here, Absalom thinks that Hushai is speaking in him, but he may really be talking about David all along. And so he’s confused. Now, God suffered the pride of Absalom here’s hard to deceive him. He’s delighted to think that David’s close friend. David’s counselor would now be on his side and join in the rebellion and help him. How easily he believed what he wishes to be true. His own charisma and popularity can win anybody over. Look, even my dad’s friends are joining my rebellion. Obadiah, verse 3, says, the pride of thine heart hath deceived thee. This is a principle that God uses. God hates the proud look. But he uses the sinful disposition of the wicked against them. He uses their own pride against them so that they become deceived. God raises them up, puts them in a position of great height and power and position that their fall may be all that more devastating and humiliating. God, by granting success to their efforts, fuels their pride at first. And then they sinfully say, look at me, look what I’ve done. Look at me. Look who I am. And God uses that to bring them down. It’s amazingly how frequently the success of the wicked leads to them, leads to their undoing. It soes the seeds for their inevitable downfall. You know, Hitler was wildly successful in the early stages of World War II. You’ll recall how he overran nation after nation, and then even the world was shocked when France fell within two weeks. It was shocking that that would occur. The German army was overrunning everyone. Hitler began to think of himself as a military genius. Proudly thought that he could direct the troops better than his most skilled military officers. He ignored various warnings. He invaded Russia, thinking it was going to be an easy victory. After all, they had trouble with the Finnish people. And when they, Russia invaded Finland. And so they thought, well, he thought this was going to be easy. He didn’t even take winter clothing for the soldiers because he figured it would be all over by the summer. Of course, he was dead wrong. And his constant interference in the military decisions undermined the German cause. He actually gave no retreat orders. to the soldiers where they weren’t allowed to retreat and pull back and establish the line and so he ended up with millions of German soldiers. He had a whole army actually surrounded up there by Stalingrad and they all had to surrender to the Russians. They were captured. There is no question that God let Hitler be successful initially then puffed him up, that puffed him up with pride and that led to his downfall where he fought himself to be invincible in a military genius. Now, we as Christians rightfully mourn the evil that we see all around us. It’s scary to see evil men rise to power and get authority and be in these positions in the world. And you think to yourself, where is God? Why doesn’t he stop these evil people? Why isn’t he paying attention? We’re looking at saying, how could this happen? But as you watch, Watch these evil people and they’re proud, arrogant ways. They tend to self-destruct. They tend to invariably trip themselves up. And this is why you as a believer should not give weight of despair when the wicked are successful. Just patiently wait. While they are strutting about, like proud peacocks, they are on slippery ground and a terrible fall is about to occur. let this comfort you that pride causes people to misjudge situations and the misconstrued things and to think themselves much better than they really are and above being caught in their evil deeds and always ends up a fatal mistake. So God uses the pride of your own heart to cause you to believe something, someone’s deception. The third thing tonight is this. You should not be like the wicked and engage in deception even when you have a good purpose. Now, the question has come up. As to whether Hushai’s conduct here and then in the next chapter constitutes a mandate from God to engage what we call espionage. Are we allowed to deceive the enemy as he does in this text of Scripture. Is it right to deliberately use misinformation in the aid of a righteous cause? Now, it is true that Hushai’s deception was successful. And God uses it to undermine Absalon’s rebellion. The question is, does it make it morally right? Because remember, God can use evil. He can bring good out of evil. That doesn’t necessarily mean that the action is right in and of itself. All things, even sin, ultimately work together for the believer’s good. That doesn’t mean that we should do evil that good should come out of these things, as Romans 12-17 tells us. I think we can draw the wrong conclusion. This is a complex subject and believers have differed, and good men have differed on what we can and cannot do in this regard. but surely the principle that all’s fair and love and war is a worldly principle and not a biblical one. Care, I think, needs to be taken. Something more than a good motive is necessary for a deed to be right in the eyes of God. Good intentions must be carried out by the right means. It is praiseworthy for a parent to feed his hungry children. But it wouldn’t be good for him to steal from someone else to feed his hungry children. So he might have a good end, but the means by which he does it may not be right. It is good to prevent abortions and prevent babies from being slaughtered, but it wouldn’t be good for you to kill the doctor who’s performing abortions in order to prevent abortions from taking blouse. It is commendable for you to care for your aged parents. And yet you shouldn’t resort to lying on the insurance form or medical forms in order to obtain the care for them. So there is no reason to believe here that David would have lost the kingdom if he had said to Bush. I want you to just stay with me and stay with us as we flee here. And he just gave himself to prayer. Surely God would have still delivered David. The principle means which the believer should employ every time when there is a time. of trouble in emergency is prayer and not deceit. Remember Christ is our example in this regard. In 1. Peter 221 and 22, he says, Christ also suffered for us leaving us an example that ye should follow his steps, who did no sin, neither was Gile found in his mouth. But he committed himself to him, meaning God, that judgeth righteously. He gave himself to prayer. He didn’t engage in deceit or guile. And he’s our example. There’s nothing wrong with truth and sincerity. And Christ is the one that was truthful. He did not employ some type of deceitful double talk. His speech was not such that he left the wrong impression and asked directly if he was truly the son of God, he said it is as you say. He, you know, even though that was what they wanted in order to put him to death, he spoke and said some. At other times, he just didn’t speak at all. He didn’t respond. He didn’t give any answer. And sometimes that may be the best response for the Christian. But there were no deliberate lies. There are no sneaky ways of twist. the statement so that people would be deceived by what Jesus said. Your challenge is to be like him and commit your trouble to the Lord. So people will deceive you and end up undermining your cause. And we see that here with Hushai in what he says to Absalom. Secondly tonight, people will advise you to do evil, which assures your eventual down. fall. Versus 20 through 23, we see the advice given by Ahithafel to Absalon. Now, let me begin here on the second point by saying this. You find worldly wisdom pursues a goal without a consideration of God’s law. Ahithafel here was extremely gifted counselor, as we see in verse 23. In fact, we’re told that it was like you asked at the oracle of the Oracle of God here. He was brilliant in his counsel. He always proved to be politically expedient. He would give the best advice possible from a human perspective. Now, it’s very possible to be highly intelligent, possess earthly wisdom, and yet be very evil. Jesus himself said that children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light. As far as shrewdness, as far as earthly wisdom is concerned, certainly the people of this world may be very brilliant. They may be like Ahithafel. Spiritual wisdom is the Christian intelligence that God gives. But it’s not the same as a high IQ or being brilliant as far as being like Ahithelphel. There’s always going to be Athithel’s in this world as we go through this life. People with extremely gifted minds, but completely devoid of any moral compass. And so they are perverse. and they counsel evil that good, some good would come out at the end for them. Sadly, Ithafel’s counsel here was really like the oracle of the devil here rather than the oracle of God. The most evil thing you could do is the counsel people to act contrary to God’s revealed will. What else could you do more evil than that? How typical of our own politicians, the fall of the advice of the most astute counselors, and yet that may be directly opposed to what the Word of God says, but it accomplishes the end they want. They don’t care. This is always something that ends up sowing the seed for your own destruction. Put your feet on slippery ground. It brings about. your downfall. Look with me at Proverbs chapter 1, if you would, tonight. verses 25 to 33. Proverbs chapter 1 verses 25 to 33. God says this, and it’s wisdom that’s speaking, but God is speaking as the true wisdom, Christ actually. But ye have said it not all my counsel and have none would none of my reproof. I also will laugh at your calamity. I will mock when your fear cometh as a desolation. When your destruction cometh as a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you, then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer. They shall seek me early, but they shall not find me. For they that hated knowledge, for that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the Lord. They would none of my counsel, they despised all by reproof. Therefore, therefore, shall they eat of the fruit of their own way and be filled with their own devices. For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of the fools shall destroy them. But whoso hearkeneth unto me shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet from fear of evil. To despise God’s counsel and knowledge is dangerous. On the Fox River and chain of lakes waterways of northern Illinois, officials annually have to deal with an expensive program. And that expensive program is the 600 boys on the waterways, and they don’t expect them to even last through the season. In fact, they are being destroyed at 125%, they said. What happens is the boys are willfully smashed by vandals, running over them with their boats. They think it’s a fun thing to do to run over these boys, even though they provide safety and direction for boaters, like no wake zones where you have to slow down, or where there’s shallow water so you don’t run aground, they have the boys there, or even the direction pointing to the channel openings so that you could find your way through. Yet people purposely run them over. with their power boats. It’s a fun thing to do. Well, many people take great delight in running over, if you would, the commandments of God, thinking that it’s no big deal. There’s a spirit of lawlessness that pervades our own society, a total disregard for God’s moral laws. God’s commandments are just and holy and good. They’re given to man for his safe keeping, and yet man. hates them, would like to remove them from society. And yet, that indeed proves disastrous. You find worldly wisdom pursues a goal without consideration of God’s loss. Notice something else here. You find sexual sin is not a light sin, which can easily be overlooked. In verses 21 and 22, the Council of Ithethel is to go in, unto thy father’s concubines, which he hath left to keep the house, and all Israel shall hear that thou art abhorred of thy father. Then shall the hands of all that are with thee be strong. So, Absalom here is advised to sleep with David’s concubines, that he left to take care of the palace when he fled, the ten of them. To sleep with your father’s wife was a capital of offense under the law, according to Leviticus chapter 20 and verse 11. In other words, you could be put to death for it. The Apostle Paul later describing the sin of incest in the book of 1st Corinthians chapter 5 says that this is not even named among the Gentile. Even the Gentiles realize this is an evil action. The idea was to make himself so odious to his father that reconciliation would be impossible so that his army, that was Absalom’s army, would realize he’s never going to reconcile. Therefore, the rebellion is going to continue until he actually takes over completely. So they would be totally committed now. Now, this idea suited Absalom’s wicked mind, and he doesn’t delay in putting this plan into action. The tent is put on top of the past. palace roof and the concubines are rounded up and put in the tent and he goes in to them and commits adultery here or sexual sin incest with him and completes what he does in the open before all Israel so that all Israel would see, at least outwardly they would know what he was up to. Sexual sin is also full. flaunted in our day is no big deal that no one would care about even incest is often tolerated people cast aside God’s law they see nothing wrong with their actions it’s a natural thing they say what God classifies as sexual sin is often treated lightly and easily overlooked but according to God there are sexual sins that demand the death penalty these these sins are serious sins in the eyes of God you remember how Rubin the firstborn of Jacob went into Bilha, one of the concubine wives of Jacob, and he committed incest and how he was cut out of the position of the firstborn and the inheritance that he should have received. and it went to Judah and even was split actually between Judah and Joseph’s two sons. But scripture reveals that Ruben lay with Bill Haugh and it was a serious sin in the eyes of God. There are some sins that stain you and you can never really wash them off. Yes, we know that when David committed sin with Bashiba, that he has forgiveness of sin. But it isn’t interesting when you get to Matthew chapter 1 and you read about the genealogy of Christ, when he gets to Solomon, Solomon as the son of David of him or of the one who was Uriah’s wife. save Bashiba per se. It just says Uriah’s wife. It points out the sin in that passage of scripture of David. There’s a sense in which that sin always stays with David. It’s always something that he has to address. Yes, he’s forgiven. He’s not condemned for it, but it left a public mark upon him the rest of his days, so that we’re even talking about it now. And it’s written in the word of God. And so we find that is often the case. We should never treat sexual sin with indifference. God never does, even though society does. So you find sexual sin is not a light sin which can be easily overlooked. It has long-term repercussions. Thirdly, you find God uses the evil advised by the wicked to accomplish his will. Now, here we see in this incident the sovereignty of God in this vile deed. Ah, Hithrafel’s intent is only evil. He wants to strengthen Absalom’s rebellion here. He promotes an evil thought, an evil idea. He’s not thinking in terms of doing anything good and beneficial. God’s laws despised, great evil is proposed. But as you read this as a believer, do you not sense as you read this that there’s something more here? There’s something that you remember, even though it’s not in this sacred text, something comes to mind about what was said earlier in scripture. Look with me, at 2 Samuel 12, verse 10 to 12. After David’s sin with Bash Hego and after he’s confronted by Nathan the prophet, now therefore the sword shall never depart from thine house because thou hast despised me. Thou hast taken the wife of Uri Uri, the Hittite to be thy wife. Thus, saith the Lord, behold, I will raise up evil against thee out of thine own house. I will take thy wives before thine eyes and give them unto thy neighbor, and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight of this son. Thou didst it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun. Is not this passage of scripture that we just read tonight, our text, a fulfillment of what God said back here in chapter 12? And Hithertofell’s advice is meant to harm David. nevertheless, it carries out God’s purpose of chastening David. And guess what? God in chastening David is working for his good, isn’t he? So this vile sexual act, by the hand of God, by the purpose of God, has a gracious purpose for David because it fulfills the Word of God. This is always our hope as a voice of God. believer. Whatever wicked men proposed to do, they are actually doing exactly what God has in his eternal purpose from all eternity proposed be done. Whatever God ordains must come to pass. Ultimately, two ends are accomplished here. First, it worked for the good of God’s elect, but it works for the destruction of the reprobate. This same action worked for the destruction of Absalom. But it worked for the benefit of David, the child of God. Well, in Job’s many calamities, he frowned his counselors, three counselors, to be miserable counselors. You always find men to be miserable counselors unless their decisions are based upon the Word of God. Let us remember. that, even though they may be brilliant men. It doesn’t necessarily mean they were godly men and that their counsel should be followed. Well, let’s close with a word.