06-Dec-2025 | Week 49
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Escape Laziness
2 Then it happened one evening that David arose from his bed and walked on the roof of the king’s house. And from the roof he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to behold. 3 So David sent and inquired about the woman. And someone said, “Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” 4 Then David sent messengers, and took her; and she came to him, and he lay with her, for she was cleansed from her impurity; and she returned to her house. 5 And the woman conceived; so she sent and told David, and said, “I am with child.” 6 Then David sent to Joab, saying, “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” And Joab sent Uriah to David. 7 When Uriah had come to him, David asked how Joab was doing, and how the people were doing, and how the war prospered. 8 And David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.” So Uriah departed from the king’s house, and a gift of food from the king followed him. 9 But Uriah slept at the door of the king’s house with all the servants of his lord, and did not go down to his house. 10 So when they told David, saying, “Uriah did not go down to his house,” David said to Uriah, “Did you not come from a journey? Why did you not go down to your house?” 11 And Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah are dwelling in tents, and my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are encamped in the open fields. Shall I then go to my house to eat and drink, and to lie with my wife? As you live, and as your soul lives, I will not do this thing.” 12 Then David said to Uriah, “Wait here today also, and tomorrow I will let you depart.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. 13 Now when David called him, he ate and drank before him; and he made him drunk. And at evening he went out to lie on his bed with the servants of his lord, but he did not go down to his house. 14 In the morning it happened that David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by the hand of Uriah. 15 And he wrote in the letter, saying, “Set Uriah in the forefront of the hottest battle, and retreat from him, that he may be struck down and die.”
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“The first step in any fall, is slothfulness and negligence. David never fell in such a horrible sin (adultery), in his boyhood and youth, when he was shepherding the sheep; when he worked in the royal court; when he was a fugitive, and pursued by Saul; when he became a king over just one tribe; and even as he strove for the salvation of all the tribes of Israel. But now, as his kingdom got well established, increased in glory and got his own house of cedar, he forsook the war to Joab, the commander of his army, and slothfully relaxed in his house in Jerusalem. In the time of the evening, instead of praying for the sake of his men fighting the war of Israel, he arose and walked on the roof of the king’s house, “and he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to behold” (2 Samuel 11: 2) Life of slothfulness creates a void in the heart and senses, for man to seek fulfilment of his senses through an outer beauty.
~ Fr Tadros Malaty
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Question 1
In this scenario, King David’s laziness created a window of opportunity for the devil as he fought this spiritual warfare. Why do you think this is? What sins has laziness caused you to fall into in the past?