Building My Own Prison

In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. 2 Samuel 11:14

Have you ever been a victim of your own behavior, being trapped in a prison of your own making? In my addiction, when I first tried to get sober, I told those providers around me about my problem so they wouldn’t prescribe opioids for me. So, when I relapsed, I had nowhere to go but to use my own prescribing power. Sinking further and further into the abyss, I wanted out, but I couldn’t stop. I knew I needed treatment, but confessing my drug use and my opioid diversion likely meant losing my job and my marriage. I was trapped in an addiction and I just couldn’t see any way out. I was a victim of my own behavior to which I’d become enslaved, and I just kept making things worse.

Though it didn’t involve drugs, I’ve got to think King David once felt the same way. Having impregnated a married woman, Bathsheba, David was forced to try and cover up his sin. Sure, he could have confessed, but the fallout would have been too great and so, he tried to trick Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband, into thinking he was the father. Unwilling to cooperate with David’s deception, Uriah unknowingly signed his own death warrant. Once David sinned, he felt he had to cover it up. If Uriah couldn’t be swindled, then he had to die.

In today’s passage, we read how David sent a letter with Uriah, to Joab, the commander of Israel’s armies. In that letter, which Uriah himself carried, David described how Uriah should be killed in battle. This is treacherous, appalling behavior. Not only did David usurp his power for sex, but then he killed to cover it up and in a bitter twist of fate, he commanded Uriah to carry the very letter that would ensure his own death. What makes a good man behave so badly? Sin. David sinned terribly and instead of confessing, he decided he’d go to any length to cover it up. David built his own prison, becoming trapped by his own terrible decisions.

I’ve been there. Recovery then, has been the process of leaving my prison. This required confession and it required a radical change of behavior to stop doing the things that created my prison in the first place. This wasn’t and isn’t easy. Daily, I’m still learning to think things through. Where will this take me? Does this thought or behavior lead me towards God or is it a step towards building my own prison again? I don’t want to go back there, and so, I must daily point my life at God who will never imprison me in my own corrupt behavior.