In 2015, Christian hip-hop artist Andy Mineo released the album Uncomfortable that explored the typical themes of a mainstream Christian rap artist – namely, going against culture when it comes to living a pure life, asking for forgiveness to those he has wronged, growing more mature in the Spirit – but the topic that is front and center throughout the whole album is comfort. 

Mineo starts the first verse of track one, Uncomfortable, with this line, “God prepare me for the war, comfort be the thing that’ll make a king fold.” By track six, Mineo circles back with a jazzy composition while Spanish vocals extol, “Prepararme para la guerra porque comodidad es la caída de reyes. Es la caída de reyes.” Prepare for war because comfort is the fall of kings, it is the fall of kings. Track six is titled, “David’s Roof.” 

That section alone will preach and you don’t need me to expand, but I’m going to because I’m a writer and contrary to what my boss says, brevity is not always better. 

“In the spring when kings march out to war, David sent Joab with his officers and all Israel. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah, but David remained in Jerusalem.” – 2 Samuel 11:1. 

That opening line of the verse, “In the spring, when kings march to war” speaks volumes of shade so loud, even Andy Cohen and the rest of his Bravo crew are wincing. The author of 2 Samuel might as well be saying, “When kings, like you, David, are supposed to be marching off to war – you’re sending your men to do the work for you.” 

Already we have some tension in this story just from verse one alone. David, King David, is supposed to be with his men fighting the Ammonites. But for reasons we are not told, he stays behind in his palace, with sin crouching at his door. 

The passage goes on to say David wakes in the middle of the night and walks out onto his roof where he sees Bathsheba, wife of Uriah the Hittite, bathing. In fact, the Bible says she is doing a ritual cleansing, which means she is obeying God’s law. 

David sends a messenger to find out who she is, “Bathsheba, wife of Uriah the Hittite.” Wife of one of your soldiers, David. The king, who, at this point, is very acquainted with getting what he wants at this point in his life, then tells the messenger to go get her. 

Now, the next verse says, “She came to him, and he slept with her.” – 2 Samuel 11:4, but I think there is quite a bit of “yada-yada-yada-ing” over what happens between “She came to him” and “he slept with her.” We can go into the sexual assault/coercion implications of this section another time. For now, I want to zoom in on that in-between space. 

In between “she came to him” and “he slept with her” did he have a plan? He already knew she was the wife of Uriah, so he knew what kind of sin he was walking into. I wonder just how comfortable David had grown in his ways – had his heart become hard while his hands grew soft?

I’m a 27-year-old American, with a job that is practically 9 to 5, an apartment that I have filled with art and furniture for me to admire and lounge on, DoorDash on my phone, and almost any entertainment I could want at my fingertips. Comfort is not a foreign idea to me, in fact, most would probably say we are well-acquainted. 

It’s something that I’ve grown to despise in recent days. Like repeating a word often enough, it begins to sound mangled, strange, bordering on gibberish. I look at the times I have chosen to worship at the altar of comfort with a bitter taste in my mouth and mourn at the time I have lost choosing comfort over work or relationship. 

I don’t have to wonder about the position David put himself in, I know it far too well. David, lounging in his palace when he should be fighting with his men, peeks out to see sin crouching at his door, but instead of locking it, he flings the door wide-open. 

That is what comfort gets you – it’s the soft-spoken whisper of the serpent, slithering up to your ear saying, “But is it really that bad?” Your conscience doesn’t work because you have not used it and when the Spirit tries to move on you, you push Him away with an excuse of, “But I want this” or “I don’t want to do that.” 

One more important note I’d like to make, I am not only talking about deliberate disobedience. Comfortability also leads to the slow rot of your fruits. 

“I know your works, your labor, and your endurance, and that you cannot tolerate evil people. You have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and you have found them to be liars. I know that you have persevered and endured hardships for the sake of my name, and you have not grown weary. But I have this against you: You have abandoned the love you had at first.” – Revelation 2:1-4 

Many of us, like the church of Ephesus, are very comfortable becoming heresy hunters. But more than that, I think some of the more recent cultural shifts have made many in the church become very, very comfortable pushing people away who do not align to their political party. Not even just pushing away – saying hateful, rude things, sometimes in the name of Jesus at people who shade in a different box at the ballot. I just want to be clear, this happens on both sides. 

Here’s the honest truth – and please know, I’m preaching to myself, not just to you – the Christian life was never meant to be easy. Even when perfection was on the face of the Earth, work was still expected of the first people. (Gen. 2:15)  Love was always expected of us. Cultivating a relationship with our community and Creator was always expected of us. 

I think sometimes we begin to treat Jesus as a Tamigotchi: I’ve done all the things in the day I’m supposed to do with you, so now we are good. But just like person-to-person relationships, our relationship with Jesus is alive and must be tended to daily with fresh eyes. To abide is to continue to grow, not stay how or where you are. He will pull you out of your comfort to grow you but also to keep you from becoming complacent. 

In C.S. Lewis’ The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, Lucy finds out the ‘Aslan’ all the Narnians have been talking about is a lion. She says to Mr. Beaver, “I’d thought he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion.”

“Safe?” said Mr. Beaver, “Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.” 

He’s the King, I tell you. A good king. A king who does not sit idly by as his people rush to war without Him. He rides on the frontlines, protecting them, but also inviting them into the trenches with Him because we still have a job to do. We still have to push the darkness back. We still have to be violent against our sin. We still have to love the ones we do not want to love. We have to be uncomfortable because we were never called to comfort. We were called to war.