Temerity Makes Us Do Things Improperly

From: February 7 – 13, 2012 TOPIC: “Temerity Makes Us Do Things Improperly” 2 Samuel 6:6-11

When a person is fearless it is because he chooses to be imprudent and acts insane without considering the consequences. Those who do such things think that the bolder they are the better off they will be. Proverbs 19:2 says about the bold and important: “It is not good to have zeal without knowledge, nor to be hasty and miss the way. “Boldness by means of imprudence is temerity. TEMERITY is defined as an imprudent and risky action. It is to DO OR SPEAK FLIPPANTLY WITHOUT REASON OR FOUNDATION. That drives a person to become bold who is not capable of seeing the consequences of what is said or done. There are examples in the Bible such as the case of one of the judges of Israel named Jephthah (Judges 11:30-31). In a moment of difficulty he said to Jehovah: “If you give the Ammonites into my hands, whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.” That temerity led that person to sacrifice his daughter to Jehovah, but such sacrifice did not please God. HE DID AND THOUGHT WITHOUT REASON OR FOUNDATION. In I Samuel 14:24 we can read that King Saul also acted with temerity when he sentenced those who ate before nightfall to be cursed. The Bible says: "Now the men of Israel were in distress that day, because Saul had bound the people under an oath, saying: “Cursed be any man who eats before evening comes, before I have avenged myself on my enemies!” So none of the troops tasted food. Jonathan, his own son, was not present among those men to hear the curse casted by his father. Then, Jonathan ate! What does the food have to do with all that! Their victory or their defeat was for God. But Saul was hasty, imprudent, and very bold. He also DID AND THOUGHT WITHOUT REASON OR FOUNDATION. In 2 Samuel 6:6, 7 we see that Uzzah was also a hasty man. David wanted to transport the Ark of the pact. To transport it they were using a cart with oxen, which was improper, because the Ark had to be carried by hand as ordered according to the Law of Moses. "When they came to the threshing floor of Nacon, Uzzah reached out and took hold of the ark of God, because the oxen stumbled. And the Lord's anger burned against Uzzah, and God struck him for that TEMERITY, and he died there beside the ark of God.” When does God need a man to care for him? The power comes from God; He cares for what belongs to him. There are serious things that happen and then someone is blamed. And they are not valued because they can be considered unimportant. The great wickedness is the temerity, the boldness in people. That temerity can be seen in a person as the years pass by. It is seen when they improperly touch what is holy and God comes out to do the corresponding justice. It is when the mind is given permission to act, without the mind having any reason or foundation. The holy must be seen as such: HOLY! Uzzah must have thought: "The Ark has been in my house and therefore close to me." But Uzzah was a Levite, not a priest. Only the priests could touch the ark. He must have thought: "The Ark is obstructed, let me take it out of the hole it is in” Well, it wasn’t for him to touch and he was very bold because of the proximity he had with it. It was God who spoke of what had to be done and what not to do with the Ark; God was challenged with Uzzah’s temerity. "I can!", he must have said. What an offense towards the holy! How much temerity is lived! How much boldness in people! Nothing could set him free from death. The reason: his temerity which was what killed him. God saw in Uzzah’s heart a certain presumption, and disrespect, for such reason he acted. Since the Ark had been at his service, he wanted to show before the whole assembly how well he could manage it. This happens when we are capable of being reckless, bold and imprudent. We lose our fear towards God; we think we have the holy grabbed by the hand. What belongs to God is for God, we only enjoy the comfort of it. Do not think that you have any rights towards the holy because God will come out to defend it. What happened to Uzzah will happen to those who are too bold. David blamed himself, but we should remember that it was Uzzah and his brother’s decision to transport the Ark and how. It is in God’s interest that we show a certain respect towards the holy things. There is no greater respect than to show reverence towards what is holy, it is given a place of honor. When the Ark was being transported, this does not mean that the Ark was not worthy of respect for going through humble circumstances. We should always trust the holy with fear and great reverence. "Then David was angry because the Lord’s wrath had broken out against Uzzah” 2 Samuel 6:8 That was his attitude before God for what he did. David’s responsibility was to subject himself to the wisdom and to the justice of God for what he did instead of disagreeing or to sadden. We are capable of expressing an opinion of what God does. David wanted to arrive with the glory of the Ark, but first he had to learn how to carry what was sacred. For this, he prepared a warning to the posterity to avoid any precipitations and disrespect in the handling of the sacred things. 2 Samuel 6: 9-11 "David was afraid of the Lord that day and said, “How can the ark of the Lord ever come to me?” He was not willing to take the ark of the Lord to be with him in the City of David. Instead, he took it aside to the house of Obed-Edom the Gittite for three months, and the Lord blessed him and his entire household.

The humble Obed-Edom had his blessing, and the arrogant presumption of Uzzah was punished. Temerity makes us do and speak improper things. Let us be fearful and be reverent with the sacred, this way we will have blessings and will not have to face evil for being disrespectful. Amen.