The judgement immediately starts to take effect. Now some may ask does this mean that Amnon sinned only because of God's judgement on David, and so it wasn't really his fault. (Paul considers similar questions in Romans 9). I believe we need to hold two concepts in tension. One is the sovereignty of God, the other is human responsibility. With our limited minds we can devise a theory that gives full weight to one or the other, but only at the expense of the other. Calvinists tend to emphasise the sovereignty of God in such a way that seems to negate human responsibility. Those who emphasise free will and responsibility tend to negate God's sovereignty. My approach is to accept that with my limited mind I cannot work everything out. Perhaps this is a cop-out, but so be it.
The upshot of the sorry tale of this chapter is that Amnon slept with his sister, or half-sister to be more precise. His adviser Jonadab was not very helpful as he merely advised Amnon how to fulfil his desires, rather than advising him that his desires were wrong. So Tamar was lured to Amnon's bedroom and he raped her. After the act Amnon hated Tamar. This is typical of sin. It promises all sorts of things, but then produces only poison.
Absalom heard about this, as did David. David was furious and Absalom hated his brother. Absalom harboured this hatred in his heart and two years it gave fruit to the murdering of Amnon. Absalom then fled, and David mourned for his two sons.
The most important message of all this is that our sins have consequences way beyond what we imagine. Moreover, the goal of life is not to meet our desires. Some desires should be positively resisted.
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