Psalm 130
2 Samuel 18: 5-9, 15, 31-33
“He Would Protect Him As a Father Cannot,
Defend Him with a Strength He Does Not…”
It’s one of the saddest stories in the whole Bible, David and his son Absolom.
A complicated family history (as they all are). This last leg of the story is the son betraying his father (…the son believing he has good cause). And the father needing to defeat the son to save his throne. But wishing for his son’s safety. And when the son is lost nonetheless, the father is inconsolable.
Our specifics are surely different. But don’t we all know somewhat of the searing pain when someone you love seems to turn on you? Or when someone has let you down terribly, or been lost despite your every effort to prevent that outcome?
We all know, perhaps in greater and lesser measure, in every relationship some experience of betrayal that cannot turn away our abiding devotion and love…