Through the Bible in 66 Days - 2 Samuel

Everybody loves a hero. King David was brave and handsome a brilliant musician, poet, leader and warrior. He was everything a good king should be. He loved God, ruled fairly, obeyed God’s commands and brought wealth, peace and joy to the people. But his story reminds me that the higher we rise the further we can fall. 

In the story of second Samuel we are confronted with the sins of David and the subsequent consequences for him and his family. He slept with another man’s wife, got her pregnant and then planned the man’s death so nobody would find out. He ended up

marrying her. His family was torn apart by these terrible choices. When He eventually repented of his sin, God forgave him but his rule as a king was never the same again. In fact, as you trace his family records we discover that the family suffered many things as a result of David’s sin.

So, what can we learn from a king whose life was a mixture of success and fear, good and bad, love and hate, inner peace and turmoil?

Do you make the same mistakes more than once?

 

All photos courtesy of Unsplash

One of the common problems we all have is our weakness to resist temptation. It is the same for every one of us. We often explain it away by saying ‘we are only human’ or ‘it’s my weakness’ or similar phrases. The simple fact is that we are flawed by nature and there are things in life that we find very hard to resist. Having said all that when a person gets saved or becomes a Christian, they are a new creation, 2 Cor. 5. 17. They will still feel the struggle that is caused by temptation, but they now have new life and the Spirit of God to strengthen them and keep them from falling.

Scripture Reading

Let no one say when he is tempted,

‘I am tempted by God’;

for God cannot be tempted by evil,

nor does He Himself tempt anyone

James 1:13

Today’s verse is saying that God does not have a problem with evil. He is not attracted to it. This is best illustrated in the life of the Lord Jesus. When the Devil came to tempt Him, it is stated that there was nothing in Him that responded to his advances, John 14. 30. So simply put God does not struggle with evil not did the Lord Jesus. If only we could say that; but things are so different for us.

We all have a daily battle, see Romans 7, with right and wrong. Some days are worse than others and some things are more of a temptation than others. Resisting thinking wrong things is a problem but once a person is saved it can get more intense as their conscience is keener than before. Thankfully, they have the Holy Spirit to appeal to for help. 

In closing do not lose sight of this. God never tempts us to do evil. He may test us at times, but it is never His purpose for us to sin. In fact, he wants us to learn to resist temptation and to be aware of our weaknesses. Submit to God. Resist the Devil and he will flee from you, James writes in chapter 4 verse 7.