All right, let's turn to 2 Samuel
chapter 11. Title of this message, The Fall
of a King. The Fall of a King. Whenever
you think of King David, you mainly think of two episodes
in his life. One was a time of great victory.
You think of David and Goliath. David standing before the giant
Goliath in the power of the Lord and slaying him by the power
of the Lord. It was a time of revealed grace,
the grace of God. It was a time of revealed power,
the power of God. And it was a time of great humility
because David said, it's the Lord's battle. He knew that he
didn't defeat Goliath. He knew that it was of the Lord.
It's like our whole salvation is of the Lord. He knew it was
the power of God. He knew it wasn't the wisdom
or the power or the connivance of men. It was totally of the
Lord. And what a great episode in his life that was. He was
a shining example of a sinner saved by grace there. He was
also a type of Christ. That's what we've been focusing
on as we go through David's life. How he, number one, is a type
of the Lord Jesus Christ who is our deliverer. who is our
Redeemer, who is our power, who is our glory, and who is our
King. And David, at times, has shown
forth by the grace of God in that capacity as a type of Christ. We have also been looking at
David as an example of a sinner saved by grace. Typically, David
is a type of Christ. Personally, David is a sinner
saved by grace. And here tonight we're going
to look at one of the dark episodes of David's life. This is not
one of his shining moments to say the least. As in the episode
with Goliath, it was revealed the grace of humility. Here in
this episode with Bathsheba, we're going to see revealed the
sin of humanity. And that's what it is. We're
going to see the power of the flesh. And so, David, as we know,
we've seen it before, this is not the only bad episode. You
see, when we talk about David being an example of a sinner
saved by grace, we have to understand that there are good examples
and there are bad examples. There are examples to be followed,
and then there are examples not to be followed. Well, obviously,
here's one not to be followed. We understand that. But we do
understand, and we've seen it before in his life. We know it
because of God's Word. We know it by the power of the
Holy Spirit. We know it by our own experience that David, like
all of us, was nothing more than a sinner saved by the grace of
God, in and by the Lord Jesus Christ. We cannot applaud David
in any sense or fashion for anything good that he's done, and we're
not going to condemn David for anything bad that he's done,
for his only hope was in the Lord, Jehovah, our Savior, just
like ours. And so when we do study the life
of this man, understand we're not just studying a man. This
is not just a biography of David. These are lessons. These are
lessons in grace and mercy. We've often said, and it's always
true, that man's problem is a little word, but it's a huge problem.
It's sin. S-I-N. And we're going to see
that illustrated greatly in this passage. You know, man has wrestled
with the issue of human nature, fallen sinful human nature, the
issue of sin, and how to deal with it, how to respond to it,
how to fight it. how to curb it, how to even punish
it, how to kill it. And you know what the bottom
line is as far as our efforts in those areas, in every one
of them? And it's this. Here's the bumper sticker that
we can wear on the back of our cars that sums it all up. We
have failed miserably. We've failed miserably. Sin is
a small three-letter word, but oh, how big are the consequences.
Think about it. Now, of course, the ultimate
consequence of sin is what? Death. The wages of sin is death. Death in every facet of it. Ultimately,
eternal death. Eternal damnation. But thank
God, and this is what lies in the background of David's life,
and in the forefront of David's life, and in the center of David's
life, and ours too if we know Christ. Thank God that Christ
by His obedience unto death, took care of death on the cross,
by His own death for us, for our sin. And this is why He was
made sin. I know people are throwing around
that term a lot out of 2 Corinthians 5.21. Some people try to cut
it up and mantelize it. Let me tell you something. Christ
became totally responsible for all my sin, all David's sin,
all the sins of all his sheep. He said, I laid down my life
for the sheep. And when he did, he drank the
damnation that David deserved and that David earned and that
I deserved and that I earned. He drank it dry, didn't he? There
is therefore now no condemnation to us who are in Christ. And
so this is why he was made sin. And so we know that the only
victory that we can have over sin is the blood of Jesus Christ,
which cleanses us from all sin. For his name shall be called
Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. And that's
what he's done. Christ, on the cross, made an
end of sin. If it were not so, sin would
have made an end of David. We can see it right here. We
can see it in ourselves. Made an end of sin. He finished
the transgression. He brought in everlasting righteousness
so that God, a holy God, who could do nothing but punish sin,
could look at sinners like us and be just when He justifies
us and shows mercy. You see, without Christ, Sin
would make an end of all of us. And though you may look at David
in 2 Samuel 11, you may say, how in the world could he have
done that? Could he have done all that he
did? If you know your own frame, as the psalmist prayed there
in Psalm 38, If you know your own heart and your own weaknesses,
if you know your own depravity, you'll understand fully how David
could have done this and how we could do it but for the grace
of God. If God doesn't keep his hand
of power and restraint upon us and lets us go the full measure
in fulfilling the lust of the flesh, even as believers, You
see, we still have to deal with this problem of sin. And those
who think they don't are just fooling themselves. They're deceived.
1 John 1 says that. They're deceived. The truth is
not in them. Paul described it in Romans 7,
verses 14 through 25, talking about the warfare of the flesh
and the spirit, also in Galatians chapter 5. It's a warfare within
us. It's a warfare. And sometimes
the flesh gets the best of us. And don't relegate that off to
another person like a little devil on your shoulder holding
a pitchfork. It's you and it's me. I'm the problem. You're the
problem. We're our greatest enemy. But thank God we have the means
to fight sin in a way of grace. And that's the Holy Spirit who
indwells us and who inspires us and motivates us and energizes
us and guides us by the Word of God. Now, having said all
that, we need to understand this, and this is so, there are still
some effects and consequences of sin that we have to face.
We don't have to face condemnation and eternal death. Christ took
that fully for us. But I'll tell you one consequence
that we can see every day of our lives, especially us who
are getting up in years. And that is, the body is dead
because of sin, but the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
His body is dead, isn't it, because of sin. It's dying every day.
We see the effects of it. Even in young people who suffer
through illnesses, those are the effects of sin. We pray for
them, pray that the Lord will leave them with us, heal them.
But we know, and you Octogenarians, you know even more so that the
ultimate healing is when the Lord takes you to be home, to
be with Him. And you see Him with unhindered
eyes, pure eyes. See Him as He is. Be like Him. And that's the ultimate goal
of all of it. But some sins, now think about this, some sins
have immediate consequences. Others have far-reaching effects.
This chapter speaks of David's great fall into the sin of adultery. of lying, of murder, of deception,
of denial. There's all kinds of things.
We could just make a grocery store list of them right here
out of 2 Samuel 11. And this is truly David now.
This is not David's alter ego, or this is not just the old man
David. This is David. This is the man
after God's own heart. If you've read this chapter,
you've read about the sweet psalmist of Israel. That's who you read
about, but not another guy. Not a Mr. Hyde to a Dr. Jekyll
or anything like that. Not a black dog or a white dog.
It's David. And when he prays, he tells you
who it is. He said, Against thee and thee
only have I done this evil in thy sight. I did it, Lord. I'm
not going to blame anything in me. I'm going to tell you who
did it. I did it. I'm a sinner saved
by the grace of God. I have no hope. I have no hope. Now, he's a new man in Christ. Scripture teaches that. That's
what we are. We're new creatures in Christ. We have no sin in
Christ, but in ourselves, we're anything but what we ought to
be. We've never had a second in our lives that we could say
is a second of sinless perfection within our hearts and in our
thoughts, in our intentions or our motives. Even what we think, say, and
do has to be washed clean by the blood of Christ. Isn't that
right? Do you believe that? I do. Even our best attempts
to worship God, huh, have to be washed in the blood of Christ.
One of the statements that I remember before I was converted, that
I heard Brother Mahan make, I almost got up and walked out of the
building here. He said, there's enough sin in the best prayer
I ever prayed to sink a world into hell. And I thought, what
in the world's wrong with that guy? Well, when the Holy Spirit
showed me myself, then I found out what's wrong with that guy.
What's wrong with all of us? Sin. And that's the problem.
But you see, somebody said, well, could a believer really do these
things? You know, there are people who
teach, well, David lost his salvation here. No, he didn't. I'm going
to tell you something, and if he did, he never got it back. And you know better than that.
You know what the Scripture teaches on that. Somebody said, could
a believer really do these things? Oh, I know a believer could think
them. But David not only thought them, David did them. What could
a believer do? What will a believer do? He'll
do anything an unbeliever will do but for the grace of God.
And as far as my reading of the Scriptures, and you elders and
older statesmen here, you can Correct me if I'm wrong and bear
me out, but the only thing I read from Genesis to Revelation that
you'll ever find a believer not doing, absolutely not doing,
is totally forsaking the Lord Jesus Christ unto perdition.
Apostasy. He cannot do that. That's what
1 John 3 is about. He cannot sin. He's the seed
of Christ. And Christ said, no man shall
pluck him out of my hand. He said he cannot sin. That means
he cannot finally, totally, Fall away, because God's going to
keep. He keeps His people. We hesitate
to speak of falling into sin, because we know that we're always
sinners. Saved by grace, but always sinners.
Washed in the blood of Christ, but still a sinner. Clothed in
His righteousness, but still a sinner. Not condemned. Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? Don't you love that? It's God
that justifies it. Who can condemn us? It's Christ
that died. Yea, rather He's risen again.
Seated at the right hand of the Father which is ever living to
make intercession for us. But we're still sinners. Never
a moment in our lives we can say we're not. Sleep or awake. In our right mind or not in our
right mind? Still sinners. Again, we're perfectly
righteous and holy in Christ right now. Right now. That'll
never change. That'll never change. Because
He never changes. He's the same yesterday, today,
and forever. Our goal in ourselves is to be perfectly righteous
and holy as He is. To be conformed to His image.
That goal will not be attained until He delivers us from the
body of this death. from this life to the next. And
also, all sin is ultimately against God. All sin deserves death.
You know, people talk about little sins, big sins, sins of thought,
sins of acts. And they segregate them and separate
them. And there is some. Now, listen
to me. Now, if you're going to read the Scripture and study
the Scriptures, you're going to have to make some distinctions
there. But here's the bottom line. All sin is against God,
ultimately. And all sin deserves death. The black lie and the white lie
both deserve death. All sin, am I right? All sin
is against God and all sin deserves death. Therefore, there is none
of us off the hook as far as sin goes. We are all just as
much in need of God's grace in Christ as anybody in this world. I don't care who it is. Anybody. You look at some of the awful
things that go on in this world and those who perform these gross
acts of immorality, and I've got to tell you, and you know
it's so, that we're no more deserving of God's blessedness and salvation
and eternal life than they are. That's right. But yet there are
some sins that have more consequences than others. You know that's
so. For example, Committing the act
of murder has more consequences than the thought of murder. Isn't
that right? Don't you believe that? Have you ever said, well,
that person who committed that murder should be punished under
death? Capital punishment? Well, I have,
and I believe that. I believe that's the state acting
under the authority of God to do that. Now, what if they said,
well, everybody who thinks about murdering somebody is going to
be punished that way. Well, where would it all be?
So there's some sins that have more consequences than others.
There was a man in the church at Corinth who was committing
incest with his stepmother. An open act of immorality that
brought open public scandal upon the church, and Paul wrote the
church and admonished them for not taking care of that problem,
letting it go, acting as if, well, it doesn't matter what
you do. Now, I guarantee you that man's Committing incest
with his stepmother began with the lust of the eyes. Now, don't
you believe that? That's a sin. Lust of the eyes
is a sin that deserves death. But you see, when he fulfilled
that lust in action, then they had to do something about it.
There was a distinction there. Now, all sin deserves death.
But they had to deal with it, didn't they? Bringing open and
public scandal on the church. Well, here's what David did. The Bible here tells us, it came
to pass, verse 1, after the year was expired, the year was over. At the time when kings go forth
to battle, that's in the spring of the year, when the weather
was better and kings took their armies out to do battle, that
was common, custom, that David sent Joab and his servants with
him and all Israel. And they destroyed the children
of Ammon and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried still at Jerusalem. He waited at Jerusalem. Now that's
where it all begins. Right there. That's the first
step in David's decline. Right there. What did he do?
He failed to fulfill his responsibility as king. He sent his army out. You notice there it said, this
is the time when who goes to battle? Kings go to battle. Kings
lead their army. Now it was common amongst a lot
of the heathen kings not to do that. Just send out everybody
else and I won't be in danger. But a true king, this is what
the Bible is teaching us, a true king is the one that leads his
army into battle. David said, I'm not going to
do that today. I'm going to send Joab with the army. And I'm going
to wait here at Israel. David was to lead them into battle.
But now here, let me give you this thought. Not only did David
fail to fulfill his responsibility as king of the land, he failed
to fulfill his responsibility as a type of Christ. In essence,
he forsook his responsibility to represent and typify the king
of kings, his savior. You see, Christ Christ is the
King of Kings who has led and always will lead his people in
the battle. He'll never say, Ron, he'll say,
now, Ron, you go out there and fight it. I'm going to sit here.
Because if he does that, what's going to happen? You're going
to fail. He never does that, you see.
He always leads his people. Now, obviously, the greatest
place we see that is, again, on the cross. He led the battle.
He went to the forefront and he went alone. He walked that
winepress alone, but not as a private person, as the representative
of his people. And he, as our Redeemer, defeated
sin, defeated Satan, and defeated the world on the cross. And he
brought forth that righteousness by which his scepter is titled,
and described the scepter of righteousness, shall he rue.
Christ leads us even now in all our battles. For if he's not
our banner that we lift up, we'll fail in every way, no matter
what battle we're fighting, whether it's a battle against the flesh,
against the world, against Satan, Christ is always leading. He
said that we have victory because he's already won the victory.
He says faith is our victory. What is that? That means looking
to Christ. That's what that means. David's decline here begins with
his forsaking that responsibility. and not leading his people. Now,
we know, as we are in Christ, as I said, no sin can condemn
us and no obedience of ours can save us. But when we, as God's
children, neglect obedience, we will suffer the consequences.
Somebody said, well, what are those consequences? Well, I don't
know all of them. We really don't. We don't. I
know this, those who neglect the study of God's word, they're
not going to grow in grace and in knowledge. That's a consequence.
It just comes with the territory. Those who neglect the fellowship
of God's people and the worship of God, they're not going to
grow in grace and knowledge. Whatever else comes along with
it, that's up to God. I don't know. I don't have the
wisdom, and you don't either, or the foreknowledge to make
such judgments and say, well, I know that guy's suffering because
of this or that or the other. But there are consequences. And
because of our limited understanding and view of things, we can't
always connect disobedience with consequences. I'll give you a
prime example of that. Read the whole book of Job. Job
suffered, but it was a test of his faith. It was not for any
specific sin. In fact, that's what his three
miserable, friendly comforters were trying to figure out. What
did you do, Job, to bring us all on you so we can fix it?
That's what we can fix. Some sins have obvious consequences. It usually begins gradually,
just staying home when every able believer is in the battle.
That's what's pictured here in David. Here David, he was, you
know, by this time he was about some, most scholars say between
50 and 55 years old. He'd reigned in Jerusalem. He'd
been king for about 20 years. He'd reigned in Jerusalem about
12 years. He was at the height of human
glory. But look what he does with it.
Look at where God had brought him. And what does he do? Well,
it's a time when kings go forth to battle. But David said, no,
I'm not going. I'm going to send Joab. And I'll
wait at Jerusalem." And then what happens? Well, look at it.
Verse 2. It came to pass in an eveningtide that David arose
from off his bed. Somebody said, what's he doing
in bed at eveningtide? Well, just think about it. Apparently
David did get lazy. I don't know what was going on
with him, but he says he walked upon the roof of the king's house,
and from the roof he saw a woman washing herself, and the woman
was very beautiful to look upon. There's the lust of the eyes.
Somebody said, well, just pluck those eyes out, or just don't
look. Well, the thought is still there now, isn't it? You're not
going to get rid of the thought. And it says, And David sent and
inquired after the woman. There he is beginning to fulfill
the lust of the eyes. And one said, Is not this Bathsheba,
the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite? David sent
messengers and took her, and she came in unto him, and he
lay with her. For she was purified from her uncleanness, and she
returned unto her house. And the woman conceived, and
sent, and told David, and said, I am with child." There you think about it. Somebody
said, well, David just hadn't gone out on that roof. Well,
let me tell you something. Do you know David really sowed
the seeds of this problem that he had? a lot earlier than the
time he stepped out on that roof. Do you remember back in 2 Samuel
5, verse 13, where it said, And David took him more concubines
and wives out of Jerusalem after he was come from Hebron? And
there were yet sons and daughters born to David. David sowed the
seeds of lust and adultery, fornication, long before this. Remember what
God told Moses about the kings? That would represent him back
in Deuteronomy chapter 17. The king was forbidden to do
three things. A godly king was forbidden to do three things.
Number one, he could not accumulate horses. Do you remember that?
Deuteronomy 17 verses 14-17. We read that a few weeks back.
You can write it down. Deuteronomy 17 verses 14-17. God said, I'll give you a king.
He cannot accumulate horses. Why? Because God is his power.
The power is of God. Secondly, he was not to accumulate
wives, because his focus was to be on the things of God in
the kingdom. And then, thirdly, he was not
to accumulate gold and silver. His riches were the blessings
of God. He was to rely upon God. So here's David. He steps out. And this is the next step in
his decline, fulfilling the lust of the flesh. James chapter 1,
verse 14. Let me just read that to you.
It says, but every man is tempted when he's drawn away of his own
lust and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived,
it bringeth forth sin, and sin when it's finished bringeth forth
death. Now, in David's case, sin did not finish its work unto
death. Now, how do we know this? Well, I'll tell you how we know
it. was a chosen, justified, redeemed,
regenerated sinner, and David was brought to repentance. We're
going to read about that in 2 Samuel 12. We'll read about it in Psalm
51. He was brought to repentance.
Godly repentance. You know, I said before, sin
is a small three-letter word, but how big are the consequences?
You know, that David's sin is only described in three verses
of Scripture. Now, of course, that wouldn't
be good enough for Hollywood. They'd have to expand that script,
wouldn't they? Because that's what they'd major
on. That's all it says. Three verses of Scripture. He
walked down on the roof, he lusted after this woman, had her brought
to him, he lay with her, she conceived and had a child. And think about it. Three verses
right here. But the rest of the chapter describes David trying
to cover it up. Because of verse 5, look at verse
5, the woman conceived sent and told David, said, I'm with child.
And so David starts out, verse 6, David sent Joab saying, send
me Uriah the Hittite. And Joab sent Uriah to David.
When Uriah was come unto him, David demanded of him how Joab
did and how the people did and how the war prospered. Now we
know David's conniving here. Normally he would have sent for
either Joab himself or one of his captains, not just the warrior
like Uriah. And David said, verse 8, To Uriah,
go down to thy house, and wash thy feet. And Uriah departed
out of the king's house, and there followed him a mess of
meat from the king, batting. But Uriah slept at the door of
the king's house with all the servants of his lord, and went
not down to his house. And when they had told David,
saying, Uriah went not down into his house, David said unto Uriah,
Camest thou not from thy journey? And why then didst thou not go
down into thine house?" Now, David didn't figure on this.
He figured he didn't measure up Uriah quite right, did he? Verse 11, Uriah said unto David,
The ark, and Israel, and Judah abide in tents. And my lord Joab,
and the servants of my lord, are encamped in the open field.
Shall I then go into mine house to eat, and to drink, and to
lie with my wife? As thou livest, and as thy soul
liveth, I will not do this thing. This is amazing. You know, back
then they took the ark and it went before him in the battle.
And what Uriah the Hittite, this Gentile, is saying, he says,
I've got more regard for the ark and for Israel and Judah
and the people of God than I do, than to take out and fulfill
my own pleasures. All the indication here is this
was a man who worshipped God. When you have respect for the
ark, what do you have in respect for? The God of Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob, the God of the covenant, the God of the gospel. And that's
what he's saying. David had forgotten all that.
David the king, the sweet psalmist of Israel, the man after God's
own heart, the man whom God had put in this position. And here
comes this Gentile, Uriah the Hittite. And the worship of the
Lord and the respect of God and the love of God's people is in
his heart. And he expresses it. Look at verse 12. Now you'd think
after Uriah would come up and say what he said, that might
bring David to repentance, but it didn't. He said, I'll get
him drunk. And then he'll go and lay with his wife, and I'll
get out of this mess. It says in verse 13, And it even
he went out to lie on his bed with the servants of his Lord,
but went not down to his house. And it came to pass in the morning
that David wrote a letter to Joab." Now here's the next step
now. You see here, nothing's working
for David. to get him out of his mess. So
he says, David wrote a letter to Joab, sent it by the hand
of Uriah. And he wrote in the letter saying,
set Uriah in the forefront of the hottest battle and retire
you from him that he may be smitten and die. Put him at the front,
the hottest battle, and then pull back from him. And it came
to pass, verse 16, when Joab observed the city that he assigned
Uriah into a place where he knew that valiant men were. The men
of the city went out and fought with Joab, and there fell some
of the people of the servants of David. And Uriah the Hittite
died also." So David was successful there. Even though he didn't
deal the death blow, he murdered this man. He murdered Uriah. Not only the thought of murder,
but the act. Now verse 18, it says, Then Joab
sent and told David all the things concerning the war, and charged
the messenger, saying, When thou hast made an end of telling the
matters of the war unto the king, and if so be that the king's
wrath arise, and he say unto thee, Wherefore approach ye so
nigh unto the city, when ye did fight, knew ye not that they
would shoot from the wall? Who smote Abimelech, the son
of Jerobesheth? Didst not a woman cast a piece
of millstone upon him from the wall, and he died in Thebe?"
Now he's going back to a prior incident, and he says, Why went
ye nigh unto the wall? Then say thou, Thy servant Uriah
the Hittite is dead also. What Joab's doing there, in essence,
he's saying, basically, David, I worked for you, now you work
for me. And that's the issue here. And so he says in verse 22, so
the messenger went and came and showed David all that Joab had
sent him for. And the messenger said unto David,
surely the men prevailed against us and came out unto us in the
field. into the field, and we were upon
them even unto the entering of the gate. And the shooters shot
from off the wall upon thy servants, and some of the king's servants
be dead, and thy servant Uriah the Hittite is dead also." This
is how it happened, you see. Verse 25, Then David said unto
the messenger, Thus shalt thou say unto Joab, Let not this thing
displease thee, for the sword devoureth one as well as another.
You see what he's saying there? Don't be displeased with this,
Joab. One fellow's killed just as much as the other. I mean,
that just stands to reason. So he says, Make thy battle more
strong against the city, and overthrow it, and encourage thou
him. And when the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband
was dead, she mourned for her husband. And when the morning
was past, David sent and fetched her to his house. That's the
same word, fetched, that David used when he said, Go down and
fetch Mephibosheth. This is how much he wanted this
woman. And it says, And she became his wife, and bare him a son.
Now, listen to these last words. This is it. But the thing, not
the things now, plural. David did a lot of things here,
didn't he? There's one big thing in the eyes of the Lord. You
say, all sin deserves death. But the thing that David had
done, displeased, literally was evil in the eyes of the Lord. There it is. Now, one thought here again.
You know, we're told that God does not see our sins. We're
told by some that God does not see our sins because he sees
us in Christ. Let me tell you something, God
does see our sins. And even Nathan later on in chapter
12, he says, you've done this evil in the sight of God. You
think God's not aware of what we do? Now, If God wasn't aware of what we
do, there'd be no chastisement. There'd be no displeasure. We
don't really know how to describe that in the mind and in the makeup
of God. We don't. But we know He said
it. It was evil in His sight. Now, there is a sense in which
God does not see our sin in the sense that He does not hold them
against us because they're imputed to Christ. And Christ died for
those sins and put them away. And the scripture says, he said,
I'll remember them no more. But my friend, don't ever think
that our lives are not under the all-seeing eye of God, because
they are. Again, he doesn't remember our
sins in the sense that he doesn't hold them against us. We're righteous
and holy in Christ, but he does see our sin. Now, what do we
learn from all this? We learn that God justifies and
saves and keeps sinners in and by the Lord Jesus Christ. David
had no righteousness of his own by which to brag. We must be
ever aware of our sin, even within our own hearts. At no time can
any believer say now, now I've made it, now I'm not a sinner,
now I've earned salvation, now I deserve salvation. You can't
say that ever. Our eternal song will be worthy
of the Lamb that was slain. Always totally dependent upon
God's grace and mercy and power in Christ. David wrote in one
Psalm, one Psalm 130, verses 3 and 4, it says, If thou, Lord,
shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? Not David, not
me, not you. But he went on to say, but there
is forgiveness with thee that thou mayest be feared. God justifies,
forgives sinners. Secondly, God's grace knows no
limitations or bounds. It knows no limitations or bounds.
Romans 5.20 says, moreover, the law entered that the offense
might abound, but where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. That
as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through
righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. And
God forgives us our sins. And then we learn this. Our only
righteousness before God is the imputed righteousness of Christ.
My friend, that's our only righteousness before God. That's why David
wrote in Psalm 32, Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth
not iniquity, whose sins are covered. And Paul, inspired by
the Holy Spirit, quoting David in Romans chapter 4. He said,
and by that David was praising God for the blessing of righteousness
imputed. Christ bore my sins. And then
lastly, we're certainly we're going to see this in chapter
12. Our sins will find us out. They will. And we're certainly
not to follow David as an example. You know, David himself. And
I'll just give you a little preview and then I'll quit. David himself,
he recovered from this. He was recovered. And thank God
for 2 Samuel 12. We're going to see that. You
know how it goes. Thou art the man. And then comes
that penitent Psalm 51. David himself recovered. But
you know the effects of this episode in 2 Samuel 11 lasted
all his life and beyond. his family, his children, his
kingdom. Finally, even on his deathbed,
the effects of what had happened here remain with him, although
my house be not so with God. It's important for us as believers
to give every attention to the details of our spiritual lives.
It is. that we might not fall into the
same kind of sin into which David fell. We have to pray, Lord,
keep us from the evil one. We know our potential. We know
what we're capable of, were it not for the grace of God. As
sinners saved by grace, we cannot kill sin within us. But we do
have the grace of God and the means to fight. And that's the
Holy Spirit by the Word. Let us walk after the Spirit
and not after the flesh. And our only hope Our only hope
is the grace of God in Christ.