David

The Difference Between Saul and David

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Today’s sermon was all about David and Bathsheba. You don’t have to be a rocket surgeon to realize that David messed up. Badly. He wasn’t where he should have been, he let his eyes control his mind instead of the other way around, and he let his desires control his actions. Basically, he screwed up big time.

In order to cover up adultery, he added the murder of Bathsheba’s husband Uriah, as well as those who just happened to be nearby, to his rap sheet. At some point, he had become spiritually numb to sin and was heading down a path to swift destruction. But God had mercy.

Nathan confronted David about his sin. That was God’s mercy. God could have let David keep going down the road to where his desires were taking him to a tragic end, but God intervened. Were there natural consequences to David’s sin? Absolutely. But it was nowhere near as bad as it could have been had David continued on his original path.

The difference between David and his predecessor Saul was in the way they reacted to being confronted with sin. Saul’s heart was hardened and doubled down on his defense and self-justification. David’s heart was broken and he showed real remorse and repentance. He told God that ultimately his sin was only against Him because it was a kind of cosmic treason.

By no means does David’s sorrow negate the egregious nature of what he did. It was awful. Ultimately, it lead to a divided kingdom as the seeds were sown that would eventually lead to strife and conflict between Judah and the rest of the tribes. But if you continue to read your Bible, you’ll find that God called David “a man after my own heart.”

Every one of us will mess up at some point. Maybe our sin won’t be as obviously blatant as adultery and murder, but sin is sin and all sin is rebellion against a holy God. The key is what we do with our sin. What do we do when someone confronts us? Do we make excuses or do we make it right? Do we harden our hearts or do we let the Spirit break our hearts?

The beauty of it all is that the seed from David’s line, Jesus, took all of David’s sins upon Him on the cross. He took all of your sins and all of my sins. He paid the infinite and eternal punishment that those sins merited and gave forgiveness and freedom to all who would believe in His name.

I think David understood a little of this Messiah and put his faith in what he understood and that’s what saved him. We on the other side of the cross can believe in the fully revealed, fully finished work of Jesus on the cross. That is our salvation.

May we never become callous to sin or disregard the consequences to the choices we make. May we always seek accountability from others who will tell us the truth even when it’s uncomfortable or painful. May we seek above and pleasure or profit to be people who are after God’s own heart.

The Blessing of No

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In my daily Bible reading, I ran across a bit of a strange event in the life of David. The text says that God was angry with David, so He incited David to to a count the number of people in Israel. Even Joab, the commander of David’s army who mostly looked out for himself, didn’t think this was a good idea. But why would God incite David to sin?

I think by this point, David has become a bit prideful and probably had the idea of taking a census so he could feed his own ego about how strong he was militarily. What God did was allow him to get what he wanted and to find out how bad that would turn out.

I think one of the hardest yet most worthwhile lessons we can ever learn as believers is that sometimes God not giving us what we ask for is a blessing rather than a punishment. He knows that if we got what we wanted when we were not ready for it, it would destroy us. Or He has something different and better in store for us that we would ask for if we knew what He knew.

Conversely, God often disciplines us by allowing us to have our own way for the sole purpose of seeing where our own desires lead us apart from God. One of the major points of Romans 1 was that one of the consequences of rejecting God was that they got everything they wanted and it only further alienated them from God, each other, and their very selves.

Sometimes, a NO from God is a blessing. He’s protecting you. He knows that you’re not asking from a place of faith but of lustful desire or a thirst for power or selfish ambition. He also knows that ultimately He can’t give you peace or security apart from Himself because He is our peace and security. He is the ultimate fulfillment of every longing and desire, even though we may not see it at the time.

Thank God for every time He says no or not yet. Trust that what He has for you is better. Believe and live in the knowledge that He is enough. Seek Him and His kingdom first above all else and everything else will fall into place.

God Uses Broken Things

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“The prophet Jeremiah said: ‘Break up your fallow ground, and do not sow among thorns’ (Jeremiah 4:3). You’ll never have the crop you ought to until you put the plow in, until the old clods are broken. Even the Lord Jesus Christ took the bread at the last supper and said: ‘This is My body which is broken for you.’ People throw broken things away. God uses broken things for His glory” (Adrian Rogers).

I’m thankful God uses broken things instead of throwing them away. God can turn broken circumstances for good for His glory. Best of all, God can use broken people to accomplish His purposes. In fact, He gravitates toward those kinds of people instead of those who have their act together (or at least act like they do).

If you pay attention to the characters in the Bible, you begin to realize that just about every one of them were hot messes. Every single one screwed up at least once or had a character flaw. That’s why the hero to look for in any given bible story isn’t David or Moses or Noah. It’s always God.

Face it. We’re all broken to one degree or another. None of us come close to being perfect. In fact, most of us are doing good to remember our own names some days. But the beautiful part is that God not only works in us in our weaknesses, but He intentionally works THROUGH our weaknesses. They’re the places where God’s strength is made perfect. Just ask Paul.

Remember when the world looks for the best looking or the most talented or the most ambitious, God is looking for the most available. He’s looking for the ones who have messed up multiple times but still show up with expectation, saying, “Here I am, God. Use me today.”

Those are the ones God chooses. Those are the ones God uses.

Saul

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Saul gets a bad rap sometimes.

I mean the guy who was king of Israel before David.

Of course, Saul did some fairly despicable things like trying on multiple occasions to kill David and having a multitude of priests massacred. It’s hard to overlook those, but David himself had some less than stellar moments when he was king.

What brought Saul’s reign to an end was impatience and insecurity. He got into trouble when he took matters into his own hands when he felt he had waited long enough, like offering the battle sacrifice himself instead of waiting for Samuel.

He also let insecurity get the best of him. His envy of David started when he listened to the people boast of how David’s conquests were so much bigger than his own. That envy spiraled into anger, hatred, and eventually murderous rage.

Most of us aren’t actively trying to murder our enemies, but I imagine more than a few of us can relate to Saul (not to be confused with another Saul who later became Paul and wrote a lot of the New Testament).

The issue is about who we trust and when we trust. Of course, we talk about putting our faith in God, but is that the automatic first response when things don’t go our way or when we have to wait longer than anticipated for something we want?

I confess that I am more like Saul sometimes in that I get overly impatient with God and envious of others who seem to have more than I do. I confess that I’m not alone in this.

While David had his numerous transgressions, he always made his way back to God. His repentance was genuine, as evidence by a changed lifestyle afterward. Saul said the words and felt bad, but nothing ever changed with his behavior.

I think I know who I want to emulate.

 

 

Who’s Who, Kairos-Style

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Mike Glenn made an interesting point tonight at Kairos.

When you think of the great heroes of the faith in the Old Testament, your mind immediately goes to Noah, Abraham, and David among others.

But who were these people before God called them? Would anybody have ever heard of them if God hadn’t chosen them?

Noah might have lived out his life in anonymity. Abraham might have stayed in his parents’ basement and never left his hometown. David? His own father forgot that he was one of his sons, so that probably wouldn’t have amounted to much.

The old saying goes that God doesn’t call the equipped as much as He equips the called.

Look at Zachariah and Elizabeth. They were just another old couple, one who was a priest and another who was a woman who was barren. Probably not too uncommon in those days.

Still, God chose them to bring John the Baptist into the world.

If I had a takeaway from tonight, it’d be this: if God can use Noah, Abraham, and David, then He can use you. He can take your life and use it to make a difference in the lives around you. He can make your life matter.

The best example is a poor carpenter and his teenage wife-to-be. Their names? Mary and Joseph? God chose them and though they may not have understood everything, they said YES to God’s plan for their lives.

The result? A Savior, who is Christ the Lord. Jesus.

Who knows how far God will take your YES to Him? Who knows where the ripples from your small acts of obedience will end? Who knows but that people you’ve never heard of and may never meet in this lifetime may reap the rewards of your faithfulness, even though it seems like nothing to you.

It may take nine months (as in the case of Zachariah and Elizabeth) or nine years or 40 years. Keep moving forward, keep being obedient, and keep being faithful to what you know God is telling you to do and be.

Don’t give up. God is faithful.

 

 

 

Followship

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“Walking along the beach of Lake Galilee, Jesus saw two brothers: Simon (later called Peter) and Andrew. They were fishing, throwing their nets into the lake. It was their regular work. Jesus said to them, ‘Come with me. I’ll make a new kind of fisherman out of you. I’ll show you how to catch men and women instead of perch and bass.’ They didn’t ask questions, but simply dropped their nets and followed” (Matthew 4:18-20).

Today at The Church at Avenue South, Aaron Bryant spoke on Matthew 4:18-22 where Jesus told Peter and Andrew, “Come follow me and I will make you fishers of men.”

I understand what they gained by following Jesus, but I don’t think I had ever really thought about all that they gave up.

Think about it. They walked away from the only livelihood they had ever known. They even walked away from their own father who was in the same fishing boat. There is no mention of any goodbyes or see you laters. They simply dropped their nets and followed Jesus, leaving everything else behind with no questions asked.

Aaron asked the question: what would you give up that might hinder you from fully following Jesus to wherever He wanted you to go?

He talked about David and Hannah, a couple who sold every bit of their furniture and moved into some friends’ apartment in view of a calling to missions in Northern Italy. They gave up good careers, extended family, and the comforts of the American middle class lifestyle because they felt Jesus calling them to go to a place where less than .1% of the population claims to be evangelical Christians.

I’ve asked myself if I could do that. I hope so. I do love my stuff. I love my family. I love where I live. Above all, I love the familiarity and comfort of where I live.

Still, I hope that I could give it all up if Jesus asked me to. Thankfully, I’m not given strength for the what-ifs and the could-bes. I believe that if the situation arose, Jesus would give me the courage and strength to lay it all down. That’s part what it means when people say that Jesus doesn’t call the equipped but equips the called. Part of that equipping means the ability to press forward and not look back to what you’re leaving behind.

In the end, though, we really never give up anything for the cause of Christ. I remember the words of one of my heroes, Jim Elliott, who said, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”

 

March Madness Yet Again??

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valpo

I have to confess that I’m not quite the sports fan that I used to be. Maybe it’s the absurd salaries and extreme lack of loyalty to anything other than the almighty dollar. Who knows?

I do know that when March rolls around, the sports fan in me awakens from hibernation and comes alive. Why? March Madness, i. e. The NCAA Basketball Tournament.

I’ll fill out my brackets and wait. Usually by the second round, my brackets have crashed and burned. Then I start rooting for the underdogs.

It seems like every year there’s a team that makes it further in the field than they should. A team that overachieves and who gets billed as the next Cinderella, the next David to knock off a Goliath.

I love those stories because I remember that I, too, was once an underdog with no hopes and no chance at all of winning. That’s my take on Ephesians 2.

But God who is rich in mercy (how I love that phrase) found me and rescued me and put me on His winning team.

Maybe one day one of those long-shot mid-major teams will finally win it all. I hope so. But I’m thankful to be reminded on a daily basis that in Christ, I’ve already won. I’m more than a conqueror.

So bring on those brackets this year. I’m ready.

Why I Love the Psalms

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Here’s my update on my Bible reading. I’m up to Psalm 127, which is probably ahead of the pace I need to get through the Bible in a year, but I’m okay with that.

I’m reminded of why I love the Psalms so much. Yes, there’s a lot of “praise the Lord” and “hallelujah” verses, but there’s also plenty of “Where are you, God” verses. There are stories of both victory and defeat, joy and sorrow, health and illness, strength and weaknesses. In other words, it runs the gamut of human experience.

I love the honesty. I used to feel like David, or whoever else happened to write the particular Psalm I was reading, was boasting about how perfect and obedient he was. Now I think I see it as a man who feels like he’s giving everything he’s got to do the right thing.

I see that life is hard, bad things happen, and sometimes the bad guys get the upperhand. Still, the last word is always how the loyal, steadfast love and faithful God (or the Eternal One, as my translation puts it) never ceases.

That’s a good reminder for anyone going through struggles and pain and loss. God’s faithfulness never runs out. His love never lets up. It always finds us and brings us back to His heart and one day will lead us home.

To paraphrase an old saying, victory is never final and failure is never fatal. It is trust in the strong arms of God that wins out in the end.

Frump Girl and God’s Grace

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Ian Miller: I know this great place… Zorba something… anyway, I’d love to take you there if you’d like to go.
Toula Portokalos: Uh, that place, Dancing Zorba’s…
Ian Miller: Dancing Zorba’s!
Toula Portokalos: My family kinda owns that place.
Ian Miller: [looking at her closely] I remember you. You’re that waitress.
Toula Portokalos: Seating hostess.
Ian Miller: I remember you.
Toula Portokalos: Look, I was going through a phase. . . up until now. I was Frump Girl.
Ian Miller: I don’t remember Frump Girl, but I remember you. (from My Big Fat Greek Wedding).

I love that last line. What Ian is saying is that he saw past the awkwardness and the insecurity to the inner beauty waiting to be revealed. An inner beauty that he had a hand in unveiling.

Sometimes with God, I feel like saying, “God, remember me? That promise-breaker? That doubter? That worrier?”

God’s response would be, “I don’t remember Promise-Breaker or Doubter or Worrier, but I remember you.”

You might remind God of a past addiction to pornography or alcohol or status. You might throw in adultery (like David), or deceit (like Jacob), or outright lying (like Abraham). You might show God Polaroids of the wreck your life used to be. God doesn’t see that.

What does God see?  Thanks to the cross, God sees you as though you had never sinned, never broken a promise, never doubted, never wavered in your faith at all.

He looks at you and sees the finished product, the stunning reveal. He looks at you right now and sees Jesus in all His perfection and glory. And He likes what He sees.

Better yet, He’s wildly in love with what He sees.

I know the mirror’s not a fun place to look at 5:30 am on a Monday morning. There can be some scary critters looking back.

But remember God not only has claimed you and renamed you, but He has redefined your past. Once you were an enemy, now you are an heir and a child of God. Your past no longer dictates your future. God does.

Just think about that and see how it changes your week.

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Things I Love 9: This Series Is Getting Completely Redonkulous

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I apologize for those of you who were anxiously awaiting the next installment of this series. Both of you.

I got off track in more ways than one, but now I continue this seemingly neverending series with #192.

192) A cool breeze on a hot and humid summer day.

193) Any time I get free food, even if it’s just a free dreamcone from Chick-fil-A (one of the perks of having the app foursquare on my iPhone!)

194) Knowing that even if the worst case scenario actually comes to pass, God’s taking care of me and everything will be fine in the end. If it’s not fine, it’s not the end.

195) The absolute magic of Fred Astaire dancing with Ginger Rogers.

196) Homemade bread.

197) Sweet potato french fries (I recommend Pucketts or The Pharmacy).

198) Knowing my family and friends are praying for me as I write this.

199) Being able to pray the prayer that never fails– Your will be done– and sincerely mean it.

200) Being okay after having my heart broken in a very failed attempt to take a friendship to the next level.

201) That the best things in life really are free.

202) GPS for those like me who are directionally-impaired.

203) Ice cold water on a hot day.

204) Unexpectedly seeing old friends at Kairos.

205) Having peace even in the midst of spectacularly blowing a friendship to smithereens.

206) When technology works like its supposed to.

207) Getting all green lights on my way to church.

208) That I am an heir with Christ and no longer a slave to fear but now possess a spirit of adoption and can cry, “Abba, Daddy” to the God and Maker of the Universe.

209) That low sexy voice you get when ever you have a cold or hay fever.

210) Hearing a favorite song at just the right moment.

211) The effortless artistry of Ella Fitzgerald’s voice.

212) That God hears my feeble prayers– and even my sighs and groans when I don’t have the words.

213) That God can use messes like Moses, Abraham, David, Peter, and (most amazing of all) me.