One evening David got up from his bed and strolled around on the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing-a very beautiful woman. So David sent someone to inquire about her and he reported, “This is Bathsheba, daughter of Eliam and wife of Uriah the Hittite.”
David sent messengers to get her, and when she came to him, he slept with her. Now she had just been purifying herself from her uncleanness. Afterward, she returned home. The woman conceived and sent word to inform David: “I am pregnant.”         2 Samuel 11:1-5 HCSB

Uh-oh.  David is considered to be a great man of God.  Up until this time in his life, God had blessed him richly.  You might say he was a bit of a golden boy.  God had helped him to slay the giant.  He had grown him into a mighty warrior.  He had found favor with King Saul who had given him his daughter in marriage and then turned on him in a jealous rage.  God had not only saved David numerous times from being killed by Saul, but He had anointed him king after Saul’s death.  In the chapter prior to this, we see David honor Saul’s crippled grandson.  So up until this time we see David as this great guy, a hero of sorts.  But here in just a few short verses, David goes from hero to zero.  He messes up big time.

He has committed adultery and to cover up his sin of adultery he winds up committing murder by having Bathsheba’s husband killed in war.  God’s not happy with David.  God sends his  prophet Nathan to ask David why, after all He had done for him and given him, did he despise Him in such a way?  God was furious with David, but David was God’s child.  David messed up but he loved the Lord with all his heart, all his soul, and all his mind.  He just messed up big time.  Sound familiar?

In 2 Samuel 12, Nathan rebukes David for what he has done.  He lets him know that even though he tried to hide his sin and committed a sin to cover up the first one, that God is well aware of what he has done. In verse 10, he tells him that the Lord says that , “the sword will never depart from your house because you despised me and took the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your own.” In verse 11 Nathan tells David that the Lord says, “Out of your household I am going to bring calamity on you.  Verse 13 says,  Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord”.  Nathan replied, “The Lord has taken away your sin.  You are not going to die.  But because by doing this you have shown utter contempt for the Lord the son born to you will die.”

If we go all the way back to the first sin when Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, we see that sin can’t be covered up.  Adam tried to hide from God after he had done what God had told him not to do, but we can’t hide from God.  God banished Adam and Eve from the garden of Eden.  Their sin not only brought punishment on them, but for all mankind.  Had they not sinned we would all be living in this garden of Eden type world, a heaven on earth.

We can learn two things from these stories.  One thing is that sin does not go unpunished and the other thing is that we can still have eternal life.  In 2 Samuel 12:13 Nathan tells David that the Lord says, “you will not die”.  This not only means that he is not going to strike him down this very minute, it means that when he passes away from his earthly life that he can still spend eternity with God the father.

Even though David messed up, he confessed his sin and Nathan told him that the Lord had taken away his sin.  God is faithful to forgive us.  He is faithful to forgive us of our sin.  However, there may literally be hell to pay.

Now we know that we all sin and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23) but we must confess our sin, repent and ask God to not only forgive us strengthen us and help us to turn from our sin.  Through our faith in Jesus and God’s grace He can take our sin away just as He took David’s sin away.  God doesn’t only forgive us of our sins, but he takes them away.  Psalm 103:12 says “as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.”

So today is a new day.  No matter what you have done in the past, it’s not too late.  As long as you are breathing, you can turn to God.  You can cry out to Him and confess your sins.  You can ask him to forgive you and to take away your sin.

No matter how much of a mess you have made of your life, Jesus’ blood can wash your sins away and make you white as snow.  He can take your broken life and make it whole if you will only trust in Him.

Have a great day!