2 Samuel 15:4 – Absalom said moreover, Oh that I were made judge in the land, that every man which hath any suit or cause might come unto me, and I would do him justice!

Hello readers, new blog time today, and a blog today on Absalom. It’ll just be a short blog but there’s something simple from his life, yet which applies so powerfully today. So many people today become an Absalom. Something happened in Absalom’s upbringing… his sister got raped by his half brother, her life was shattered by it. Noone would dispute that this was wrong and a horrible thing. It didn’t happen to Absalom, Absalom wasn’t the one directly wronged, but he cared for his sister, and so this episode really burned him out.

His dad David did nothing about it. Absalom’s half brother, Amnon, who raped his sister, Tamar, seemed to get by with it. David dealt with it by not dealing with it. David should have done better. So often when it comes to family, judgement is corrupted. David should’ve dealt with Amnon as Amnon deserved, but because he was David’s son, he seemed to get a free pass. Justice was not done, and David failed his duty as a parent.

But does this excuse Absalom? Absalom could be rightfully upset over David’s lack of justice in dealing with the matter. His sister’s life was obliterated by being raped. You’d think it would’ve made Absalom a better person, but instead what would follow was the path of a rebel… a path that took Absalom to the same territory his father and his brother had discovered… sexual depravity. There’s something to be said for sins of the parents, and so often in the Bible, and throughout history, the parent’s sins plague the following generations. David commited adultery with Bathsheba, Amnon raped his half sister, and then Absalom to get back at David… raped all of David’s concubines. It was a mess.

So many people become an Absalom. Filled with bitterness. Granted, David’s actions were wrong. But it doesn’t legitimize Absaloms behavior thereafter. Because it went from David being in the wrong, to Absalom being very much in the wrong. The way Absalom turned out, could he really blame it all on his dad? The problem with today is that people BLAME. It’s everyone else’s fault but not my own. Does wrong having been done to someone you know or even to you really justify you going and doing wrong as well? Absalom became worse than what he hated in his dad.

People today don’t just blame others, they ultimately blame God. After all, the fault is in everyone else BUT me… right? David was supposed to be a man of God. His sin wasn’t God’s doing, it was David’s own sin… David’s sin with Bathsheba was AGAINST God. Yet people like Absalom become all bent out of shape towards others, and ultimately towards God. Hey, God never approved of David’s actions, and David’s sin didn’t justify Absalom. Absalom was full of murder and rebellion and vengeance, and it destroyed him. At the end of his life, as he was hanging in a tree, moments before being thrust through by darts… could he really pin all of it on his dad?

See, what we do with injustice is crucial. People let it define their life, rather than taking it to God, rather than laying it down at the cross.  Absalom perceived an injustice… a lack of judgement. This is why he said… oh that I were a judge… I would do everyone justice. He thought he was better than his dad. How often we can go past boundaries. David was God’s anointed, Absalom was not. One sin does not excuse another. If you talk to people, they always justify themselves based on others. This is what Absalom did. Hey David did wrong and that becomes their get out of jail card they play their whole life. They’d do it so much better. Absalom thought he’d do better, the thought he knew better. But he didn’t. Because he didn’t do better, he was full of wickedness, and he was confused, so much so that he made wrong tactical decisions, and listened to the wrong advice. He lost all judgement.

Ironically, so many people think they know better than God, they’re better than other “Christians”… yet the mess they make is worse than the mess that they criticize in other people’s lives. No wonder Jesus said to take the beam out of our eye first, before tackling the speck in someone else’s. You talk to people today, and they talk about the hypocrisy of Christians so called. They rag on people that profess to be Christians who should know and do better, yet don’t. They point out hypocrisy in their lives and on and on. Absalom did this. He pointed fingers, but he was no better than his dad, in fact he was much worse. David at least had the capacity to repent, to humble himself before God.

So like Absalom, pepole today… yeah they know better than God. Just like Absalom… oh that I were judge. People love to sit in the judgement seat. They say don’t judge me, but they are the first to judge. It’s not they hate judging, they just hate God judging them, because they want to do the judging. They pick holes in everyone else, but they are worse than the people they murder in their speech. Isn’t that the truth? You talk to people today, and everyone has an opinion, everyone has life sorted out, they do so much better, they are so much better, they are so much better than Christians… they aren’t the hypocrites that Christians are right. These same people who are experts in everything, yet their own lives are flaming wreckage, yet their own lives are filled with worse hypocrisy than what they accuse others of, than those that they use to legitimize their own actions.

I could sin, and yet sin still be wrong. God’s word is the judge. Jesus himself said that the word he has spoken shall judge us at the last day. Judgement belongs to God, after all, God is judge, and Jesus said God has delivered all judgement into his hand. You will be judged according to God’s word. You don’t know better than God. Absalom’s today are rebels ultimately against God. The real issue with Absalom was that he was never right with God. Sure, the Tamar incident was very sad, and sure David stuffed up. But this, like all issues of life, just served to flesh out who and what he really was as a person. He was full of himself… he loved himself because he was a good looking guy, he made a regal tomb for himself to one day be placed in after his glorious life, he knew better, he thought better, he was better than others, particularly better than David… does this all sound like you? Absalom is a picture of pride, a picture of bitterness, he’s a picture of someone who thinks they know better, who justify themselves based on other people, who legitimize their own sin by pointing fingers, who live a life of blame. Absalom was the very thing he hated, he thought he knew better, he thought he did better, but he wasn’t, and in fact he was worse.

Oh that I were made judge… people love to be the judge. People think they know better than God, people scoff at God’s word, they know better than God. Even Christians supposedly… they think they love people more than God does. God condemns things like sodomy as an abomination, God calls for the believer to be separate from the world unto him… yet Christians think they know better, they think they love the sinner more than God does. Last time I checked, it was Jesus Christ that died for the sins of the world, you wouldn’t even die for your best friend. God loves people more than you or I do. So get in his word, and reach the sinner his way. The theme with this whole Absalom saga was… God’s word was put on the backburner. People took charge of things rather than consulting God’s word, rather than putting God first. The Bible is a book of judgement. It is God’s judgement… so Absalom thought he’d make the best judge… but no, God’s word is the best judge. After all his word is what made the world, and what will judge the world, and what is truth. Absalom got a lot of people to join his cause, who went down with him.. and so people today follow the wrong judgement and perish following the wrong guy. Oh that Absalom would’ve got his head in God’s word that would’ve straightened him right out, because he was a completely corrupted, fallen, sinful man who didn’t know a thing.

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