5 So David’s anger was greatly aroused against the man, and he said to Nathan, “As the Lord lives, the man who has done this1 shall surely die!
6 And he shall restore afourfold for the lamb, because he did this thing and because he had no pity.”
7 Then Nathan said to David, “You are the man! Thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘I aanointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul.
8 I gave you your master’s house and your master’s wives into your keeping, and gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And if thathadbeen too little, I also would have given you much more!
9aWhy have you bdespised the commandment of the Lord, to do evil in His sight? cYou have killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword; you have taken his wife tobe your wife, and have killed him with the sword of the people of Ammon.
10 Now therefore, athe 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.’
11 Thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, I will raise up adversity against you from your own house; and I will atake your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun.
Nathan had to teach David the seriousness and repulsiveness of his concealed sins by seeing it mirrored in someone else. God often uses negative behaviors in people with whom we come in contact to reflect the hideousness of our sins. Like so many faults I see in others, they are often mirrors of my own shortcomings and failings. The problem when I use others' proverbial specks as mirrors of my planks is that I fail to reflect upon the warning etched on the bottom: “Objects in mirror are closer than they appear.”
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