“From Adultery to Rape”

If Longfellow could take a worthless piece of paper, write a poem on it, and instantly make it worth 1000’s of dollars. If Rockefeller could sign his name on a worthless piece of paper and make it worth millions of dollars. If an artist can take the course material, paint a picture on it and make it priceless. I often wonder...What do you think Christ can do with a sinful and desolate life?

In 1980, Johnny Lee sang some of the most famous words repeated for more than a decade. “Looking for love in all the wrong places.” In our society and culture today, we continue to endure this continued crisis as we continue to look for love in places and faces and it erases all hope of ever finding it. Specifically, we do find that one of the contributing factors to this problem, is the inability of being able to tell the difference between love and lust. In our promiscuously charged, pornographically pervasive, and crafty culture the distinction is getting blurred more and more every day. Pornography is now being called adult entertainment. If nakedness is on HBO or Cinemax or Showtime it’s being called visual art. Crafty is it not? Lust is called Love and it is leaving lives in utter loveless desolation. Fornication, Adultery, Rape are all too common and oh the ruined lives it leaves. It seems that it is the same today as it was back then.

But family… I want us to know that there is no life of ruin too great for our Lord to repair. He can take a desolate life and bring it out our darkness and into His marvelous light. He can take a life of ruin and make all things new. He can take a life stained with sin and turn it into the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. He can make us whiter than snow. He creates a symphony of salvation. True unconditional love is not found in places and faces, but in a place and a face. Being found in Christ.

Now remember David witnessed the early fulfillments of the covenant the Lord had made with him and the blessings were a wonderful and magnificent display of victory upon victory. But as we saw the unfolding of the Covenant, David, by nature, a man corrupted with sin, committed both adultery and murder. Consequences came. Not only did he lose a child, but his family will fall into chaos. Today the chaos begins.

Tamar was very very beautiful and the scriptures declare that Amnon her half-brother was desperately in love with her. He was so obsessed with her that he became ill knowing he could never have her. But never fear, Amnon, had a very crafty friend named Jonadab who was the son of David’s brother which would make him his cousin. He had an idea. Pretend to be sick and when David comes to check on you tell him that you would like Tamar to take care of you. She came and cooked for him, but when she served him the food, he refused to eat and told everyone in the room to get out. When Tamar began to feed Amnon he grabbed her and told her to come to bed with him. She said no my brother… this is an outrageous thing, you will be called a fool and I will be rejected in utter shame for the rest of my life. Just talk to the king and he will let you marry me. But Amnon did not listen and he raped her, but his love turned to hate. He told her to get out of his room. She begged him not to do it for it is worse than what he did to her already, but he told his servant to get her out and lock the door behind her. She tore her robe put ashes on her head and ran away crying. Her brother Absalom saw her and asked if Amnon had been with her. Don’t worry my sister, hold your peace. She lived with Absalom, but as a desolate woman.

2 Samuel 13:18–20 NLT

So the servant put her out and locked the door behind her. She was wearing a long, beautiful robe, as was the custom in those days for the king’s virgin daughters. But now Tamar tore her robe and put ashes on her head. And then, with her face in her hands, she went away crying. Her brother Absalom saw her and asked, “Is it true that Amnon has been with you? Well, my sister, keep quiet for now, since he’s your brother. Don’t you worry about it.” So Tamar lived as a desolate woman in her brother Absalom’s house.

2 Samuel 13:

The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever.

1. Deceptive Love

2. Loveless Desolation

3. All Things New

We will see characteristics of what it is be sinfully desolate because of deception. First, we will see the deceptive love of the crafty and second, we will see the consequences of an evil act leaving a life in loveless desolation. Finally, we will see how our Lord will take a life of deception and desolation and make all things new.

Thesis: Though the crafty deceptions of the pattern of this world and remaining sin in us, continue to leave us and those we love in sinful and loveless desolation, our Lord Jesus, the better King, renews, and restores our desolate life with a love that will never be shaken.

I. Deceptive Love

- Can we tell the difference between love and lust?

A. It’s getting harder and harder today. First we will look at the deceptive love. Amnon, yes it is said that he was desperately in love. But, back then, as it is today, we continue to confuse love with lust. And what a descriptive picture we have here concerning this. The passage said he was so in “love” that he got sick (the scriptures version of being love sick), but the reality was he was actually so lustfully obsessed that he probably got sick in despair for he could not ever have her. Anxiety, panic attacks, depression ect. Symptoms of a crack addict needing a fix and can’t get one. It is a despair over what we can’t have. If he really loved her, then he would not be being doing this.

B. Cue the sinister music… In comes Jonadab, his friend and cousin. Now this man was crafty. Now he was a crafty man. When I say that, it should remind you of something else that was called crafty? Do you remember the serpent in the garden? Craftiness came in.

C. He was skilled in problem solving and devised a plan to get Amnon what it is that he wants. He knows what he wants and helps him? He is going to use his God given innovative abilities to help his cousin rape his cousin. How could he? She was his cousin? He was even the cool head for David when panic ensued after Absalom killed Amnon. He is the evil politician. And in this fiasco probably the most dangerous man in this chapter and because we focus so much on what Amnon did that we can miss this import piece. This is the wickedness of deception by those who sow discord for political and or personal gain.

D. Dr. Davis writes, Amnon’s evil is relatively restricted; he will always be in bed with someone, tending his hormones. But Jonadab has the skill to leak evil everywhere. He is dangerous because he has skill without scruple, wisdom without ethics, insight without integrity.

E. Not only in secular culture, but also in the church we have probably seen how those with the greatest gifts in the church become the churches biggest threat. Here is a key point. If our gifts and abilities in the church is not wrapped in godliness, what a disaster for the bride of Christ. Disaster for the body of Christ. What do I mean?

F. It is extraordinary. This is one of the biggest effects of sin. It makes things that are inherently good, downright evil. A man who is a skilled orator can actually lead an entire nation into rebellion. Wealth can become the source of division and greed. Strength can be used to hurt instead of bring protection. And in our society today, sin is one of those topics that is simply cast aside, justified, magnified or just simply ignored. Because of the craftiness of the world…many are eternally condemned and now don’t even know it.

G. Let us not let the crafty deceptions of this world and remaining sin in us lie to us about sin. It is destructive, ripping people, families, societies, countries and churches apart. We cannot ignore it. We cannot treat it like it is not there. Craftiness has plagued the church from the very beginning.

H. We see it here, a prudent and skillful man does the unthinkable. Devises a plan for his cousin to sin against his godly and precious cousin Tamar and his Uncle David. This is an unthinkable act to do to people you are supposed to have natural affection for. It is the reality and the power of sin. Its real. Deceptions are real today. The deception is real and if we ignore it we will be trapped in it… and we wont see it coming until it is too late.

I. Not long after a wealthy contractor had finished building the Tombs prison in New York, he was found guilty of forgery and sentenced to several years in the prison he had built! As he was escorted into a cell of his own making, the contractor said, "I never dreamed when I built this prison that I would be an inmate one day."

II. Loveless Desolation

- Love is when someone is more concerned about what they can do for you than what they can do to you.

A. Tamar was a very very beautiful girl. When we look at the scriptures, it is amazing what happens to beautiful women. It seems like it could be more a curse sometimes. If you are like me, we can thank the Lord we are not one of the beautiful people. The sad thing here is that not only was she beautiful, she was godly. What a treasure. And we will see two desperate godly pleas, that are ignored to add to our sympathy for her.

B. This is the account of what happened to her that would affect her for life because of this one evil plan. She was trapped (vv. 5–11), ignored (vv. 14a, 16b), raped (v. 14b), despised (v. 15), banished (v. 17), and ruined (vv. 18–19, 20b). In one instance. In just a moment. The power of deception and the power of lust.

C. She cried out in a desperate plea for him not to rape her. She said No my brother, showing that what was about to happen was not just rape, but incest. She was pleading the scriptures…

Leviticus 18:9

Leviticus 18:9 NLT

“Do not have sexual relations with your sister or half sister, whether she is your father’s daughter or your mother’s daughter, whether she was born into your household or someone else’s.

D. She implored don’t do this… It is against God’s law, its godless; it is (Nevalah)outrageous. Two things will happen. I will be ruined and rejected in shame and you will be seen as a fool, this in the Hebrew is a good translation, but we need to understand it in this context as a wicked and foolish pervert. Amnon did not care and because he was stronger than her; he violated her and forced himself on her. How could this happen? How could he be so overwhelmed with passions that he would act this way? Its what happens when you feed the monster. And we are feeding it today.

What a mess is this thing called Pornography. In just one year (2016) we dedicated well over four and a half billion hours to watching porn on one porn site. On that single website humanity spent twice as much time viewing porn in a year as it has spent existing on planet Earth. The site had over 90 billion video views and 44,000 visitors every minute of every day. It all adds up to over 500 thousand years worth of porn consumed in the span of 12 months. Since 2015, human beings have spent one million years watching porn.

Porn seems to be America's favorite pastime. The porn industry is worth $97 billion, which is about 100 times higher than the $750 million it was worth 20 years ago. Today, porn grosses more in a year than Hollywood. It also brings in more money than the NFL, NBA, and MLB combined. And this is just "the porn industry," the legal, W-2 filing porn stuff. And we wonder why this is all happening in our culture today? Why all the loveless desolation of ruined lives? We see this and will we continue to wonder why we confuse lust with love?

E. We then find out the truth of Amnon’s desperate love for Tamar. It was not love, it was lust. Woman and men hear me… here is a key. Love is when someone is more concerned about what they can do for you than what they can do to you. A good friend of mine said it this way, Love is when a person likes what is good in you. Lust is when a person likes what is bad in you. In this case… it was lust not love.

F. What did Amnon show, he hated her and said Get up and Get out! Please brother, do not kick me out, this is an even worse thing you could do to me. Don’t kick me to the curb and treat me like trash. Please do right by me now! You violated me, don’t now destroy the rest of my life. Please don’t do this!

Deuteronomy 22:28–29 NLT

“Suppose a man has intercourse with a young woman who is a virgin but is not engaged to be married. If they are discovered, he must pay her father fifty pieces of silver. Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he may never divorce her as long as he lives.

Deuteronomy 22:28-29

G. Amnon does not follow the word of the Lord. He decides to ignore again her plea, ignore the sin, and ruin the life of his sister. He wanted to make it even worse and hasten her to leave asking one of his servants to get her out and lock the door behind her. He saw her as trash. This is why young women, today. Do not give in. Many times he will not respect you after, especially if you are a Christian. Same for you guys. You will not be respected. Love and leave. Then Tamar, overwhelmed with grief, tore her chastity robe, covered her head with ashes and ran away crying.

H. Her other brother Absalom uncovered the truth of the incident. She confirmed that Amnon had been “with” her, humiliated her, and then abandoned her. We need to understand that Amnon’s criminal activity condemned Tamar to live the life of “a desolate woman” no hope for a future because she was now disqualified from active consideration for any royal marriage contracts.

I. Nevertheless, Absalom attempted to provide her with some comfort and consolation. He could neither give Tamar a husband nor be one to her, but he did provide her with two of the amenities associated with marriage—a place to live and the attendant promise of protection. But no children. Loveless desolation with no hope in sight.

J. She would live out her life as a desolate woman. Just like we would have lived out our lives in sinful desolation. The author wanted us to truly feel Tamar’s pain. Yes, and we need to feel it again as we come to grips with the fact that our sympathies come because we can all relate to Tamar. Huh?

K. In sin, we are like Tamar in this situation. All of humanity was deceived by the serpent who like Jonadab was more crafty than the others and it led to an unfortunate act; the unfortunate fall that left us all in utter sinful desolation. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and the wages of sin is death. We had nothing, we had no hope.

L. This is not to take anything away from what happened to Tamar, but desolation and rejection in this life will not compare to eternal rejection and desolation in hell. I am hoping you see the parallel. Hoping you see the picture.

M. Many don’t realize this because of the crafty deceptions of the pattern of the world, and eternal consequences are in the future. Can you sympathize? We can sympathize with Tamar, but will we sympathize with the many deceived in our world who are on their way to hell…to eternal desolation. You know some of them right now. Are you gonna let them go?

III. All Things New

- Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.

A. Desolation in sin is a reality and was our destiny, but our better king gave us hope. When David heard about what happened, he was very angry. But that is all that happened. Justice? Was David not just here? No! Yes, David was the king after the heart of God, that is for sure, but as we have been shown by the scriptures, in this case we needed a better king. We needed one to bring justice and to bring restoration of desolation. Lest we live our life in sinful desolation. Why did David not bring restoration and justice for Tamar. But there is restoration for us all today. Tamar was restored ultimately by our better king. Our Lord Jesus.

B. Not only was our Lord just and is just in all things, he did not leave us to be desolate forever. All that was taken from us when Christ went to the cross he made all things new.

2 Corinthians 5:17 NLT

This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!

2 Corinthians

C. Christ brought restoration.

1 Peter 5:10 NLT

In his kindness God called you to share in his eternal glory by means of Christ Jesus. So after you have suffered a little while, he will restore, support, and strengthen you, and he will place you on a firm foundation.

D. There will be no more desolation.

Psalm 34:22 NLT

But the Lord will redeem those who serve him. No one who takes refuge in him will be condemned.

E. Sin is real. We are all affected by it; Its consequences are real. Today we can have hope. Jesus died for our sins according to the scriptures and he was buried and he was raised… The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance…

F. Yes, we can have hope today. If you confess with your mouth and believe in you heart that Jesus is Lord you will…

G. He became sin who knew no sin that we might become the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.

H. This is the gospel of Jesus. No more Isolation or desolation. But reconciliation.