II Samuel 14:3 And come to the king, and speak on this manner unto him. So Joab put the words in her mouth.
I have found that in my life that it is much easier to give advice than to take it. I’m not simply stating the fact that it is more humbling to take advice than to give advice. What I mean is that a lot of times I know the answer for someone else’s situation when I cannot find the answer for a similar situation in my own life. It has something to do with being too close to the action to see what the answer is. There have been times when I have done this kind of mental trick on myself when I think, “What would I advise a friend if he were in my position?” Strangely enough, it is easier for me to advise my friend than for me to know what to do for myself. That’s true, and that is because none of us are objective.
Objective means “expressing or dealing with facts or conditions as perceived without distortion by personal feelings, prejudices, or interpretations.” It is hard for me to know what the right thing is when I am the guy who can stand to benefit or lose from the advice given. That’s why it is easy to give advice to others and sometimes difficult to give it to oneself.
That is also why in II Samuel 14 we find David giving advice to a woman when he didn’t know what to do in his own situation. The Bible says, “Now Joab [David’s general] the son of Zeruiah perceived that the king’s heart was toward Absalom [king David’s estranged son].” Basically, Joab finds a wise woman who lived in Tekoah and tells her, “And come to the king, and speak on this manner unto him.” Joab put the words in her mouth. He finds a lady to whom he gave a story about two sons, one of whom killed the other, and now the family was seeking revenge on the murderous son. She comes to the king asking for mercy and for the king to protect her son.
After a long discourse, the king grants her request to protect this son. Then she gives the bottom line. She says, “You are the man! What about your son Absalom who has killed your other son Amnon? Why will you give me help when you won’t give Absalom help? What is more important, my family or an entire country that is looking to Absalom to be your heir?”
The fact of the matter was that David probably should not have granted her request in the first place, but it was easier for him to speak to someone else’s situation than to his own situation.
Back in II Samuel 12, when David had committed adultery with Bathsheba and then murdered her husband Uriah, Nathan the prophet told him a story that got his ire up. When David basically pronounced judgment on this similar story, Nathan pointed his finger at David and said, “Thou art the man.”
Why was it so necessary on two occasions, in a relatively close proximity, for people to essentially trick David into getting an answer from him? The reason is because we are not objective. We have feelings, families, biases, prejudices, and interpretations. Is there no hope for our doing the right thing when we are flawed in so many ways? Yes, there is hope. We are not objective, but we can be consistent. Let me tell you how.
First, there is authority. We have to have an authority and we have to accept it. Authority is not our feelings or our perspective however valuable or invaluable those may be. It is not our interpretation. It is what God has said about the issues regarding our lives. There are times when we wonder what God has actually said. That is a valid discussion to have and a question to answer. What does God say? Does God speak to my situation? If you have God’s authority on your issue, then you have an answer for your question. So, we are not objective, but we can be consistent by accepting the authority over us. What does God’s Word actually say?
Second, there is honesty. We may have an authority, but we need to be honest with our authority. We may know a lot of the Bible, but if we don’t have the ability to apply God’s truth to our particular question, then we are going to be inconsistent for the rest of our lives.
So, there may be a number of issues coming up today for which we can easily grant advice to others when we don’t know what the advice is for ourselves. There are two things that will help us. Make sure God is our authority, His Words are our answer, and then make sure that we are honest with what God has given us.