The Little Lamb and the King Who Wept

Do you know what it feels like to hide something?

Not a toy under your bed, but something heavier. Something you did, that you wish you hadn't, sitting in your chest like a stone. You can smile so no one will guess. But it is still there.

King David had a stone like that.

David was the best king Israel ever had, the shepherd boy who fought the giant, the singer of songs, the very king who had just made room at his own table for a forgotten boy. And yet one terrible day, David wanted something that was not his. He took it. And to keep anyone from finding out, he did a thing so wrong that a good man died because of it.

Then David smiled, and ruled, and hoped no one would ever know.

But God knew. And God did not send an army. He sent a man named Nathan, with a story.

"There were two men," said Nathan. "One was rich, with more sheep than he could ever count. The other was poor, and had only one little lamb. He loved that lamb. He fed it from his own plate. It slept in his arms, close to his heart, the way you hold the thing you love most.

"One day a traveler came to the rich man's house. And the rich man, with all his thousands of sheep, would not give up even one of his own. Instead he took the poor man's lamb, the only one, and made it into supper."

David jumped to his feet. His face went hot. "That man deserves to die!" he cried. "Who is he? Who would do such a thing?"

Nathan looked at his king with gentle, sorrowful eyes.

"You are the man," he said.

Then David felt the stone, all at once. There was no more hiding. The thing in the dark had been pulled into the light, and it was his, and it was ugly, and there was nowhere left to put it.

David did not run. He did not make excuses. He fell down and he wept, and out of him came three small words: "I have sinned."

And God, who had loved David all along, did not turn away. He forgave him. Right there. And the stone was lifted off.

But wasn't David the good one? Wasn't David God's own chosen king? Even he carried a stone. Even the best king did a terrible thing and needed mercy he could never earn.

So deep inside Israel, an ache began, an ache for a different kind of king. A king with no stone hidden anywhere. A king who would never take the little lamb, but would be the Lamb himself, and give his own life so the poor and the guilty could go free.

One day that King would come, and he would weep too, not for himself but for the people he loved. He would gather up your heavy, hidden stone and carry it all the way to a cross, and lay it down in the grave, and walk out into the morning without it.

As for David, he took that terrible, wonderful day and turned it into a song, a prayer for a heart washed new and clean. Turn the page, and you can hear him sing it.