King David's Sin
While I'm on a roll about forgiveness of sins, will post this too. Dave, I was going to use the title "David's Sin" but thought you might have got twitchy, thinking I was going to spill the beans on you!!
A friend wrote of King David:
David has been on my mind that last few days also. The fact that someone mentioned recently that if David lived now he would not be able to participate in our church because he was an adulterer. Well maybe he would have been able to after he killed Bethsheba's husband. :-) David a man after God's own heart.
Yep, he resorted to murder to cover his adultery. And do you know what he then said about himself? Here:
2Sam22:21-22 "The LORD has dealt with me according to my righteousness; according to the cleanness of my hands he has rewarded me. For I have kept the ways of the LORD; I have not done evil by turning from my God"
This was after David's sin with Bathsheba and murder of Uriah. Was David kidding himself, talking about his (David's) righteousness, clean hands, not turned from God? The remarkable (absolutely fundamental to our Christian lives, I believe) truth here is that David, a very obvious sinner, after he turned (in repentance) back to God after that horrible time in his life, was in fact totally reinstated into a position of righteousness in his relationship with God.
That's grace!
David didn't go about in sackcloth and ashes after his repentance, feeling unworthy and living like a failure - rather, he rejoiced in God's forgiveness and his restored righteousness. Praising God in 2Sam22.
True repentance brings assured forgiveness (God is faithful and just to forgive our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness), and we are saved from the penalty and power of sin in our lives. But God never promised to save us from the natural consequences of our sin - which in David's case manifested themselves in his children (also sexual immorality), the nation he ruled, and in his own inability to build the temple he desired for God.
And yet he is totally forgiven and deemed righteous for all eternity by his heavenly Father.
Sadly, as my friend says above, part of the natural consequences of sin (that we're not saved from whether we repent or not) is man's judgement and long memories!
# posted by geoff @ 12:04 pm
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