Stake Presidency Message 

“The Son of David”

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One day, as a king was going about his work, a wise prophet came before him with troubling news from the kingdom. He told the king about two men. One man was exceedingly wealthy, with vast herds of sheep and cattle—more than he could ever use. While the other man was poor, owning almost nothing except for one little lamb. But this lamb was more than merely livestock. This man had raised it from the time it was young. It ate from his table, drank from his cup, and slept in his arms. It was not just an animal; it was like a daughter to him. 

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One day, an honored guest came to visit the rich man. Wanting to impress him, the rich man prepared a feast—but he refused to take from his own abundant herds, and instead, he went to the poor man, took his only lamb, slaughtered it, and served it to his guest. Hearing this, the king exploded in anger and demanded to know the identity of this man. “This man deserves to die,” the king declared. 

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To which the wise prophet paused, looked steadily into the king’s eyes, and said, “You are the man!” (2 Samuel 12:1-7 NIV) 

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The king was David! David, the brave warrior who slew Goliath. David, the gifted Poet and Psalmist. David, the shepherd boy who rose to become Israel’s greatest king, wielding more power, privilege, and potential than he ever imagined. And now standing before the prophet Nathan, his eyes are opened to a devastating truth: that in Bathsheba and Uriah (2 Samuel 11), he is the very thing he despised, a wealthy man who stole a life and a wife from the poor! A man whom Isaiah would metaphorically describe as a majestic tree hewn down to a stump—calling him the “stump of Jesse”, after his father. (Isaiah 10:33,34; Isaiah 11:1 NIV) 

    

At first glance, this is another heart-wrenching story. A story and person referenced more than a thousand times in the Bible. And yet the biblical obsession with David’s story, stretching from the Old Testament into the New, is not merely about exposing and humiliating a flawed man; it is about revealing our story. Different mistakes, perhaps. Different details. But the same shared humanity! 

   

How often can life feel stump-like? Cut down by our own failures, the failures of others, or simply the frailty of mortality? How many moments or seasons have missed the mark of what we had hoped for? How often has optimism faded into feeling overwhelmed, hope into despair, or faith into fear? 

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Standing in the stump-like moments of life can feel so much like how a despondent David must have felt standing in this moment of his life. A horrifying reality rendering the future as bleak as it must have felt unbearable. No way to fix it, no way to go back, and in the moment, it would seem no way to go forward. 

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But thankfully, astoundingly, miraculously, David’s story does not end with a stump. As Isaiah declares: “A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.” (Isaiah 11:1 NIV) In the face of all this stumpiness, of loss and failure, a Branch, even Jesus Christ, sprouts forth from David’s stump! 

    

Think of it! The King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the very creator of heaven and earth, not only sprouts forth from this stump, but He adopts a title that is as perplexing as it is astonishing: being called The Son of David! (Matt 22:41-46) How could the Savior and Redeemer of the world be called the son of someone so flawed, so broken, so human? 

   

This title: Son of David is a declaration! It proclaims that no failure is final. That God does not abandon the stump—but works through it. Declaring that if God can redeem David and his throne, He can redeem you and me! Restoring and redeeming the thrones of all His children. 

  

As Joseph Smith taught: 

“God knows the situations of both the living and the dead and has made ample provision for their redemption, according to their several circumstances.” 

(Ch 35: Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith) 

  

Some sufferings are known by many, but most sufferings are known only by God. There are undoubtedly many silently suffering, perhaps feeling overwhelmed, helpless, or hopeless. David knows what that feels like, and more spectacularly so does the one whom we call the Son of David! He who is eager to sprout forth in those moments with “ample provision”, to rescue and redeem at all cost. I am indeed ‘that man’ just like David was, and yet I have become acquainted with the Son of David, not in spite of my stumps but because of them. Jesus Christ, our Savior and Redeemer, King of Kings and Lord of Lords, is also the Son of David!