The Next Right Move

Introduction

We’re talking about getting unstuck

2 stories of being stuck

“Honey, I saw someone who looked like you” .... “Really? Was she pretty?”

“You’re not a big fat failure, you’re a big fat beautiful women”

The camper in Rapid City

I know what it’s like to be stuck. We’re going to take time to talk about getting unstuck spiritually.

David found himself stuck

2 Samuel 11 (ESV)

In the spring of the year, the time when kings go out to battle, David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel. And they ravaged the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained at Jerusalem. In a time when David was supposed to be out leading the army, he was resting. Laziness had set in.

It happened, late one afternoon, when David arose from his couch and was walking on the roof of the king’s house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful. Temptation set in. And David sent and inquired about the woman. And one said, “Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” So David sent messengers and took her, and she came to him, and he lay with her. (Now she had been purifying herself from her uncleanness.) Then she returned to her house. David commited adultry and sinned. The man of Psalm 23, The boy who killed Goliath, The king with a whole heart for God. And the woman conceived, and she sent and told David, “I am pregnant.” David was extremely stuck. How will he respond? Will he turn from his sin and repent?

So David sent word to Joab, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” And Joab sent Uriah to David. When Uriah came to him, David asked how Joab was doing and how the people were doing and how the war was going. David is confronting the man he sinned against. Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” And Uriah went out of the king’s house, and there followed him a present from the king. But Uriah slept at the door of the king’s house with all the servants of his lord, and did not go down to his house. When they told David, “Uriah did not go down to his house,” David said to Uriah, “Have you not come from a journey? Why did you not go down to your house?” Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah dwell in booths, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are camping in the open field. Shall I then go to my house, to eat and to drink and to lie with my wife? As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not do this thing.” David’s plan was to bring Uriah back and hope that he’d sleep with his wife so he wouldn’t know the child wasn’t his. David is covering up. Then David said to Uriah, “Remain here today also, and tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. And David invited him, and he ate in his presence and drank, so that he made him drunk. And in the evening he went out to lie on his couch with the servants of his lord, but he did not go down to his house. David even tried to get Uriah drunk to make his coverup work.

In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. In the letter he wrote, “Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting, and then draw back from him, that he may be struck down, and die.” And as Joab was besieging the city, he assigned Uriah to the place where he knew there were valiant men. And the men of the city came out and fought with Joab, and some of the servants of David among the people fell. Uriah the Hittite also died. Then Joab sent and told David all the news about the fighting. And he instructed the messenger, “When you have finished telling all the news about the fighting to the king, then, if the king’s anger rises, and if he says to you, ‘Why did you go so near the city to fight? Did you not know that they would shoot from the wall? Who killed Abimelech the son of Jerubbesheth? Did not a woman cast an upper millstone on him from the wall, so that he died at Thebez? Why did you go so near the wall?’ then you shall say, ‘Your servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also.’ ” David dug even deeper into sin and commited murder to coverup.

......

When the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she lamented over her husband. And when the mourning was over, David sent and brought her to his house, and she became his wife and bore him a son. But the thing that David had done displeased the Lord.

- David believe’s he’s gotten away with his sin.

- Where was David’s relationship with God at this point? Where was the breakdown?

- David had become complacent. He stopped making the next right move. he got lazy and was setup for a fall.

As men, before God, what are the primary distractions that hinder our relationship with God? What keeps us from making the next right move?

Busyness

“If the devil can’t stop you, he’ll get behind you and push you. he’ll make you go so fast that you’ll become ineffective” - Jon K

1 corinthians 13:1-3 “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.”

God IS love. This isn’t talking about just a kindness form of love. this is talking about God living in us. This only comes through relationship with him, and our excessive busyness will not allow for it.

Laziness

Maybe you have a character flaw here that you need to surrender to God and you need to get into accountability.

Maybe you’ve been so busy that you’ve burned out.

Sin patterns

Sin seperates us from God. We cannot expect to walk in relationship with God if we’re holding onto our sin.

Confession will Break the grip of your sin.

James 5:16 “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.”

David walked through all 3

2 Samuel 12 (ESV)

And the Lord sent Nathan to David. He came to him and said to him, “There were two men in a certain city, the one rich and the other poor. The rich man had very many flocks and herds, but the poor man had nothing but one little ewe lamb, which he had bought. And he brought it up, and it grew up with him and with his children. It used to eat of his morsel and drink from his cup and lie in his arms, and it was like a daughter to him. Now there came a traveler to the rich man, and he was unwilling to take one of his own flock or herd to prepare for the guest who had come to him, but he took the poor man’s lamb and prepared it for the man who had come to him.” Then David’s anger was greatly kindled against the man, and he said to Nathan, “As the Lord lives, the man who has done this deserves to die, and he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity.”

Nathan said to David, “You are the man! Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you out of the hand of Saul. And I gave you your master’s house and your master’s wives into your arms and gave you the house of Israel and of Judah. And if this were too little, I would add to you as much more. Why have you despised the word of the Lord, to do what is evil in his sight? You have struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and have taken his wife to be your wife and have killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.’ Thus says the Lord, ‘Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house. And I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun. For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun.’ ” David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” And Nathan said to David, “The Lord also has put away your sin; you shall not die. Nevertheless, because by this deed you have utterly scorned the Lord, the child who is born to you shall die.” Then Nathan went to his house.

And the Lord afflicted the child that Uriah’s wife bore to David, and he became sick. David therefore sought God on behalf of the child. And David fasted and went in and lay all night on the ground.

David’s sin had found him out.

What was differnet about David, that after the wreck he had made his life, we would still god him a man with a whole heart after god?

Psalm 51 (ESV)

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet went to him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba.

Have mercy on me, O God,

according to your steadfast love;

according to your abundant mercy

blot out my transgressions.

Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,

and cleanse me from my sin!

For I know my transgressions,

and my sin is ever before me.

Against you, you only, have I sinned

and done what is evil in your sight,

so that you may be justified in your words

and blameless in your judgment.

Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,

and in sin did my mother conceive me.

Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,

and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.

Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;

wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.

Let me hear joy and gladness;

let the bones that you have broken rejoice.

Hide your face from my sins,

and blot out all my iniquities.

Create in me a clean heart, O God,

and renew a right spirit within me.

Cast me not away from your presence,

and take not your Holy Spirit from me.

Restore to me the joy of your salvation,

and uphold me with a willing spirit.

Then I will teach transgressors your ways,

and sinners will return to you.

Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God,

O God of my salvation,

and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness.

O Lord, open my lips,

and my mouth will declare your praise.

For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it;

you will not be pleased with a burnt offering.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;

a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

David’s heart exploded in repentence. Not out saddness for himself, but of Sorrow and brokeness before the Lord.

Still David Must’ve thought. “I’m stuck. It’s over for me. There’s no next move for me here” Even though David’s natural life was not as peaceful after his sin, God still used him in his master plan. He wasn’t done with David. More than 1000 years later, from the lineage of David, came the lion of the tribe of Judah. Jesus was his Heir.

- No matter where you are, it’s never too late.

So what’s the next right move?

My testimony here, if time allows.

- If you’ve reached you breaking point, this can be your turning point.

1. turn your heart from your busyness, laziness or sin pattern

Maybe you haven’t surrenendered your life to Jesus.

2. Confess to God and to someone else

3. Ask God to give you a goal to help you in your next step. That could be time in the word, time in prayer, an apology, or some other step the lord leads you in. This is between you and God.

Get accountability and mentorship to walk it out. you cannot do this alone

There’s no way to go forward if you’re looking in the rearview mirror. No matter where you are or what you’ve done, You can make your next right move.