by Sandy Kirby Quandt

This past quarter our Sunday School class has studied the life of King David in 2 Samuel. Anyone who has read Woven and Spun for any length of time probably realizes David’s life is one I never get tired of studying.

Why?

Through David’s life God allows us to see the good, the bad, and the ugly. That gives me comfort because I, and possibly you, have my good, my bad, and my ugly. It comforts me to know when I repent of my sin and turn back, God forgives over and over and over again. Just like he did with David.

Following our lesson a week ago, I spent the days thinking about David and the later part of his life which was anything but commendable, yet this was a man God called a man after God’s own heart.

If we look at David’s life and focus on some of the things he did that make us shake our head and ask, “How could a man after God’s own heart do that?”, and falsely believe his sins were more grievous, more sinful, more heinous than our little mistakes, errors of judgments, and short comings, we forget an important thing about God’s holiness.

ALL sin is against God. All sin is grievous and heinous in God’s eyes. There is no big sin. There is no little sin. Sin is sin, and God hates sin. Not the sinner. He hates the sin because that sin separates us from him.

Looking at the record of David’s life we may say, “I’ve never committed adultery or had their spouse murdered to cover up a pregnancy that resulted.” The Bible tells us anyone who looks on another with lust in their eye commits adultery in their heart.

If we have maligned another, spewed venomous words, slandered, or gossiped, we’ve left mortal wounds just as deadly as an onslaught of enemy arrows to the heart. The book of James has a lot to say about the tongue.

We might look at David’s parental skills and find them lacking compared to ours. None of our sons raped their sisters, or murdered their brothers, or overthrew the throne. But have we ever displayed less than stellar parenting skills through our humiliating words of condemnation, or comparisons? Have we lashed out in anger or refused to forgive? Proverbs tells us to train up a child in the ways of the LORD, and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

Then there is the issue of that census David took which brought calamity upon the nation of Israel. Was it pride? Lack of trust in God? Boredom? When we examine our lives, have we ever taken credit for something we didn’t deserve the credit for? Have we ever gone ahead of God out of fear he might not take care of things the way we know they should be taken care of? Have we grown lazy in our devotion to God? Jesus said to seek first the kingdom of God and all the rest will be given to us.

Lots to think about. Lots to reflect on. Lots to be grateful for. Especially the fact God does not treat us as our sins deserve. His mercies are new every morning. He loves us with an everlasting love. He allowed his son to die a horrendous death and be separated from him so we wouldn’t have to be. And he tells us to judge not lest we be judged, and to be sure we get the plank out of our eye before we attempt to remove the speck from our brothers’.

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No condemnation now hangs over the head of those who are “in” Jesus Christ. For the new spiritual principle of life “in” Christ lifts me out of the old vicious circle of sin and death. Romans 8:1 (JB Phillips)

I wish you well.

Sandy

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