Outside the Box
THE TENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST
2 Samuel 11:1-15 • Psalm 14 • Ephesians 3:14-21 John 6:1-21
In one fierce battle with the Philistines, the Israelites had an idea. To turn the tide of the fight, they brought the Ark of God onto the battlefield (1 Sam 4.1-5).
The Ark was a box made of acacia wood, plated with gold inside and out. It was a little less than four feet long, and a little more than two feet wide and deep. The Israelites carried this box on gold-covered poles threaded through four rings. They kept the box in a Tabernacle—or tent. The box’s lid was called the “mercy seat” where cloud of God’s presence could rest. The lid was decorated with two angels made of hammered gold (Exo 37.1-9).
When the Israelite troops saw the Ark on its way to the battlefield, they shouted so loud that the Philistines heard them. But the plan backfired. The terrified Philistines fought their hardest, routed the Israelites, captured the Ark, and put it in a temple with a god of their own.
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Bringing the Ark of God to the battlefield was both a strategic blunder—and a theological mistake. The Ark provided a reassuring sense that “God is with us.” But the sense that “God is with us” easily slides into the belief, “God is on our side.” And the belief that “God is on our side” hardens into confidence: “God will destroy our enemies.” Our sense of God shrinks down to nothing but a tool we can use to our advantage.
King David had this problem with the Ark—treating the Ark as a tool he used to his advantage. A couple of weeks ago, we heard the story of David bringing the Ark to his new capital city, Jerusalem. The Ark was back in Israelite hands after moving from Philistine town to Philistine town, causing outbreaks of tumors and plagues of mice. When David summoned the Ark, he arranged for lyres, tambourines, and cymbals to accompany its journey. But when a man named Uzzah was instantly killed after touching the Ark, David didn’t want it anymore. He diverted the Ark to some other guy’s house.
But when David found out how the Ark had been blessing the whole household of its new owner, David wanted it after all. David’s outburst of dancing as the Ark arrived in Jerusalem may have been admirable for its zeal, but David’s framework for the Ark is less so. He kept wanting to know: What can the Ark do for my house? What can the Ark do for me?
In our reading last week, David proposed building a nice house for the Ark. David had his dream house, so why not the Ark? David’s house was made of cedarwood, courtesy of the king of Tyre, who was probably trying to stop David from invading (2 Sam 5.11-12). Now that his own house was built, David thought the Ark deserved a house as well. It was as though the Ark was one more warrior in David’s employ—someone who helped build his power and now deserved a cut of the spoils. Through Nathan the prophet, God tried to set David straight: The presence of God would not accept a house from David.
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Unlike David, Uriah the Hittite, who we meet in today’s reading, understands the Ark. David lived in a house and wanted the Ark to dwell in a house like he did. But Uriah wanted to mold his life to the Ark, to live the way the Ark lived, at a critical moment. If the Ark dwells in a tent, Uriah refuses to sleep in a house as well.
Uriah makes it clear to David where his own loyalties lie. Uriah’s loyalties lie with the Ark, with the people he fights with and for, and with Joab, his commander. With careful but astounding defiance, Uriah disobeys the king’s orders.
When David recalls Uriah from battle, David delicately phrases his orders: “Go down to your house, and wash your feet.” I imagine David winking at Uriah as he said this. What he really wants is for Uriah to sleep with Bathsheba, so she can pass off her infant as his. (Paternity tests were still three thousand years in the future.)
But Uriah disobeys David’s implicit command to sleep with Bathsheba and David’s direct order to sleep in his house. Instead, Uriah spends the night at the entrance to David’s house, with David’s lowliest household servants. Brilliantly, Uriah places himself among the servants most obedient to David while flagrantly disobeying the king’s commands.
When David asks Uriah why he didn’t go home, Uriah tells him that so long as the Ark and his fellow soldiers and his commander sleep in tents, he won’t sleep in a house either.
With these words, Uriah might as well have slapped David in the face. David, living in his big fancy house, is the precise opposite of Uriah. Uriah thinks of himself as no better than the Ark, no better than the people he serves alongside. He won’t sleep in a house if they don’t. Unlike Uriah, David lives in a house that lets him look down on all his subjects. David sits around at home while others do the fighting.
Uriah calls his military commander Joab “my lord,” not David. Joab is worthy of this loyalty. In the chapter just before today’s reading, while David was sitting at home, Joab came up with a plan to fight both the Ammonites and their allies at once. Before the risky battle, Joab gave a pep talk: “Be strong,” he said, “and let us find strength for the sake of our people and for the sake of the cities of our God, and the Lord will do what is good in His eyes” (2 Sam 10.12, trans. Alter). Joab wants his followers to be strong and strategic, but also to accept outcomes that are out of their hands.
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It’s not until years later that David has a personal breakthrough. In a civil war with his son Absalom, David flees Jerusalem. Zadok and the other priests come with David, carrying the Ark of God. But David tells them to turn back. Instead of taking the Ark with him, David leaves it up to God whether David ever lays eyes on the Ark again (2 Sam 15.24-27). This moment is David finally at his best.
David spent most of his life experiencing the Ark, and God, as tools he could use to his advantage. Many of us spend our lives relating to God in the same way. Some wonder, and worry, “How might God hurt me?” Or some ask, “How can God help me?”
But there are other questions we could ask. Not, “How can God hurt me or help me?,” but “How can I live in God’s wild presence?” Uriah and Joab might have asked the same. In the midst of their conflicted lives, they might have asked, “How can I be part of a kingdom that outlasts any one victory? How can I be part of a kingdom that transcends any one ruler?”
Uriah and Joab asked these questions in brutal circumstances. Uriah was murdered by David. Joab ended complicit in David’s crimes. But I believe we have people like them to thank—much more than David—for what fruits God’s people had to show for their faithfulness.
In our own hard circumstances, we can wonder too: How to live in God’s uncontainable presence, how to be part of a kingdom that outlasts one battle, a reign that transcends one leader. It’s how we come to know the immeasurable God, whose breadth and length and height and depth are beyond our comprehension, but whose power and presence are sometimes known through a mid-sized box.
© 2024 The Rev. Lora Walsh
St. Paul’s Episcopal Church – Fayetteville, Arkansas