2 SAMUEL 12 RECOVER FROM THE BURDEN OF GUILT2018 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: 2 Samuel 12 Recover From The Burden Of Guilt

You are listening to FerventWord, an online Bible study ministry with teachings and tools to help you grow deeper in your relationship with God. The following message was taught by Jerry Simmons in 2018. This morning as we look at 2 Samuel chapter 12, I'm speaking with you this morning about something that is pressing upon every one of us, something that is important for every one of us, something that we all deal with, and it's the issue of guilt.

Guilt is a very real problem for us, and it's a problem that each and every one of us will face. I've titled the message this morning, Recover from the Burden of Guilt. And there are those times in our lives where guilt weighs upon us to such a degree that it feels like we are being crushed, that it has a real impact upon our attitude, upon our hearts, upon us physically. It can impact every aspect of us.

And that's what we see happening with David here in 2 Samuel chapter 12. We're jumping into the point where he has, in the previous chapter, committed adultery. And in committing adultery, he, of course, sinned against the Lord. And the result of that was, well, Bathsheba, the woman, she became pregnant.

and her husband, you know, wasn't aware yet. And so David, in seeking to cover up his sin, brought Uriah, Bathsheba's husband, home and tried to arrange for things to be covered up so that Uriah would think that the child was his. But

Uriah didn't follow into David's plan. And so David instead hatched a new plan in where he puts Uriah to death. He tells the commander Joab to put Uriah in a situation where he would be killed in battle.

And so we find David, the man who God declared was the man after his own heart, the man who is looked upon in many ways as a godly example for us, and yet we are reminded that even the best of men are still men, and we fall short. We are human, and we have sin issues, and sometimes they are as great as adultery and murder as we see in the life of David.

Now, for David, about a year has passed since that has happened in chapter 12. And so we see the sin unfold there in chapter 11 and some time passes. During that time, David is suffering greatly from this sense of guilt that he has.

I like the way that Charles Swindoll describes this time in David's life. He says this, David wasn't relaxing and taking life easy. He wasn't sipping lemonade on his patio during the aftermath of his adultery and murder. He says, count on it. He had sleepless nights. He could see his sin written across the ceiling of his room as he tossed and turned. He saw it written across the walls.

He saw it on the plate where he tried to choke down his meals. He saw it on the faces of his counselors. He was a miserable husband, an irritable father, a poor leader, and a songless composer. This season in David's life was one that was filled with great burden as he had this sense of guilt and it was unresolved for such a long time.

He wasn't just relaxing and chilling and thinking, you know, hey, I got away with it. He may have thought he got away with it, but he felt miserable as a result. David himself describes this a little bit for us in Psalm chapter 32. He says,

David here describes this time of silence, the time of not dealing with his sin, the time of this burden of guilt, and he describes it as his bones internally. This affected him to such a great degree. He was getting older, he felt like. He was aching within. He was just being completely silenced.

down and feeling the pressure. He says, day and night, your hand was heavy upon me. The heavy hand of God he fell to really the sense of guilt that he had. And this is something that, hey, if David could face it, you and I will face it as well. This is what guilt does in our lives. And it's why God wants us to recover from that burden. He doesn't want us to live in that condition, but he's provided means for us to be released from

from that guilt. But if we don't follow God's plan and pattern, then that guilt weighs upon us and it affects us spiritually. It impacts us emotionally. It affects our health and our physical self as well. It impacts our relationships with the people around us. It affects our productivity and effectiveness. It affects us in the workplace. If it's left untreated or undealt with,

will become worse and worse and worse upon us. Yesterday, I had the great privilege and honor of cleaning out behind our stove that has been in place for about 10 years. And I don't know if you've ever had that kind of experience, but boy, is it a joy, right? It's just so awesome and amazing. I pulled out the stove and there was all the glory of all that was the remnants, you know, from the past 10 years or so. And

Kim came out and said, well, how's it going? And I told her, don't look at things you don't want to see. That there's just some stuff to clean up. And there's, remember that the grease from the tacos that kind of spilled over a little bit? You know, there it is, found it. It's been there for a little bit. And those, you know,

M&M's that I don't remember the last time we had those, but one of them was melted into the tile underneath the blue one. And so in case you were wondering, and so there was just all of this, right? Well, here's the thing. We could have went another 10 years and you know what? All that stuff would have still been there. It doesn't just go away. It doesn't just resolve itself. It just begins to clutter up more and more and more and more. And guilt is the same way in our lives.

That if we don't deal with and process the guilt that we're experiencing, it doesn't just dissolve on its own. You may have a self-cleaning oven, but it only cleans the inside. It doesn't clean behind it and underneath it, right? And it needs to be dealt with. It needs to be cleansed. It needs to be addressed so that you and I can have a full recovery from the guilt that we experience. I like that word recovery.

It means a return to a normal state of health, mind, or strength. And that is so appropriate as you consider this concept or subject of guilt. Guilt breaks us. It really does have an impact in our lives in a way that is damaging and breaks us internally. And God desires to give us

from that, a return to full health, a normal state of mind, not the broken state of mind that we are in when we are filled with guilt. It's a really amazing aspect to God's work in us. And so we want to walk through David's experience here and see how to recover and how to experience that releasing and that forgiving that God desires to give to us. And so we're going to start here in verse 1 with point number 1, and that is love.

Let God speak to you. If you're ever going to recover from the burden of guilt, it's going to begin here. It's going to begin with God speaking, with God working, with God revealing his will, his desires, and his word. Check out verse one again. Here's what it says. Then the Lord sent Nathan to David. And we'll just stop there for now. And just stop and think about that sentence.

The Lord sent Nathan to David. Here's David having committed gross sin, having committed adultery, having murdered to cover up his sin, having carried on as if nothing had happened. He has violated God's law without question. And some time has passed. But God here in his mercy and grace is the one who is initiating this recovery here.

The Lord sent Nathan to David. Nathan didn't just come up with an idea and see a need and I need to go help David get right with God. The Lord sent Nathan to David. David didn't recognize his condition and say, man, I'm really messed up. I need to get right with God. No, no. It was the Lord who began this whole thing because God cares about our recovery from guilt more than anybody else.

God is the one who is most interested in you being released from your guilt and you being cleansed from that sin. We know, of course, that sin separates. It breaks our fellowship with God. But don't get the wrong idea from that phrase, that sin separates. It's not that sin separates in the sense that God says, okay, you have messed up, so you're on timeout.

And I'm not going to speak to you and I'm going to hide over here. You're not going to find me and I'm going to keep myself apart from you. It's not that God is punishing you by removing himself. Here's why sin separates. It's because it keeps you from listening to God and looking to God and turning to God. Sin separates. It impacts us. God's the same. He's still right there. He's still the same as he always has been.

But the way that sin separates is it causes us to keep ourselves distant from God. So the reality is there is nobody more interested in resolving your issue of guilt than God is. He's the one who has the idea. He's the one who has the solution. He's the one who sends Nathan to David. And here's David crushed by the weight of his guilt.

paralyzed really by the weight of his guilt and the thing that has gone on. And it's God who is reaching out to him in his mercy. Pastor David Guzik says it this way, David's sin displeased the Lord, but David wouldn't listen to the conviction of the Holy Spirit or to his conscience. Now God will send someone else to speak to David. God mercifully kept speaking to David even when David wouldn't listen.

We estimate probably about a year has passed since David's sin with Bathsheba because the child was born. And so time has passed. And all that time, the Lord was speaking to David saying,

And David was not listening. But in his mercy, he continued to speak. He continued to reach out. He continued to the point now where he sends Nathan. David wasn't responding as the Lord spoke by the Holy Spirit. He wasn't responding as his conscience was crying out. And so God sends the prophet Nathan.

To help David see the issue and respond to it. Again, it's God who's initiating. It's God's idea. Let God speak to you. Now, a lot of times when we're in the position of guilt, we don't, like I said, sin separates us from God. We're afraid of what's going to happen if we let God speak to us. But this is the important point that God loves you.

And he wants to restore and bring health and resolve these things. He proved it once and for all. In Romans 5, verse 8, Paul says, God demonstrates his own love toward us and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. From the very beginning, Christ died for us while we were in the condition of sin and opposition to God, having no desire to get right with God. God shows us how much he loves us.

By dying upon the cross for us in that condition. You can let God speak to you. Because God's not out to get you. Even though you feel like that. That's part of the guilt and the way that it twists your mind. But God's not out to get you. He loves you. Let him speak to you. Invite him to speak to you. Your sin separates you from God. But it never stops God from loving you. It never stops God from wanting the best for you. He is still loving.

Desiring to accomplish his purposes in your life. That you would experience the best of the best of the best that is possible for you. God loves you. Let him speak to you. Well, continuing on here in verse 1 all the way through verse 6, we get point number 2. And that is recognize the signs of guilt. Here David is feeling this way for a long time. But he's not feeling it.

but not really recognizing why. Because like David, we are so good at distracting ourselves about our guilt. We start to feel guilty. We don't like that. And so we change the subject in our mind. We try to compensate or relieve that pain in some way, in some fashion. And so David has been in this condition. But

He's not connecting it in his mind. I feel like this because I committed this sin. That connection isn't made. It's not clear to him. We can read it and we see chapter 11 and then chapter 12. It's like so clear. But for David, just like for us, those things get buried and they get distracted because we don't deal with them and we deal with them inappropriately. And so there can be situations. David is here like you and I many times and

experiencing the effects of guilt without really recognizing, I'm feeling this way, I'm feeling this pressure, this burden, I'm in this condition because of the guilt that I have. But there's some evidences, there's some signs that manifest and we can begin to recognize when we're in that position.

We see that begin to develop here in verse 1. Again, the Lord sent Nathan to David, and he came to him and said to him, there were two men in one city, one rich and the other poor. And I'm not going to go into all of the verses here in this chapter. I do encourage you to spend some time reading through it on your own. But just kind of summarizing some of the things that happened here, Nathan comes to David with a story. He says, let me tell you about two guys.

There's a rich guy and a poor guy in the same city. And the rich guy is wealthy. He has abundant flocks and herds. And the poor guy, he's got hardly nothing. He has his family and he has one little ewe lamb. And this little lamb is like family to him. It's like a daughter to him. And he eats his food and drinks his drink and lays with him. I mean, this was his favorite pet. Well, the rich guy has a guest.

And when the guest comes, the traveler comes, the rich guy decides, you know, I'm not going to choose from one of my own flocks and herds of which I have abundance and serve that to my guests. No, I'm going to take this poor guy's precious little pet. I'm going to take that, cook that up and serve that to my guests. And this is the story that Nathan tells David. Notice how David responds in verse 5 and 6.

So David's anger was greatly aroused against the man. And he said to Nathan, as the Lord lives, the man who has done this shall surely die. And he shall restore fourfold for the lamb because he did this thing and because he had no pity. Notice that David's reaction here is an overreaction. David's response is not appropriate considering the crime that had been committed.

What was the crime that was committed? Someone stole a sheep. Now, it was a precious sheep to be sure, but someone stole a sheep. And what David declares in verse 6 is what the law required. That sheep be restored, can't be given back because it was cooked, but a new one be given and then additional added on to it so that the person would be compensated for their loss.

That's what the law of Moses required. And so David says, well, we're going to do that for sure. But also, this guy shall die. Sheep thief, death penalty. It's an overreaction to the crime. It was a crime, and it was offensive, you know, this idea of what happened. But not to that level. And David's response here shows the guilt that he is experiencing within. His response shows the sensitivity that he has within.

David's response was harsh because his conscience has been hurting him for a long time. It's like those occasions where you have a headache. I'm sure you've had this experience, right? You have a headache and maybe you've had a headache all day and then something happens. Now, normally it wouldn't really bother you that much. You'd kind of let it go. But your spouse says that one thing, right? And it's like, you've been hurting all day long. And then that was like the final straw. And then boom, you know, there's the overreaction, right?

On a different day, you wouldn't have responded the same way. But because you've been in pain, oh, you respond very differently. It's the same way. When we have this sense of guilt and we're burdened by it, then things that really shouldn't cause that kind of reaction, well, it begins to provoke a dramatic reaction within us.

Again, David described his time of this season of guilt as his bones growing old through his groaning all day long. He's miserable. And so he hears something that offends him and he responds in a way that is a dramatic response, an overreaction. He's unaware really of why he feels this way. It's been suppressed. It's been buried.

We all do this. We change the subjects in our head, right? We don't want to think, oh, that's painful to think about. Let me change the subject. Okay, what kind of candy am I going to get, you know, on Halloween, you know? Or what kind of presents am I going to get at Christmas? Or when can I do this? Or when can I do that? We change the subjects in our minds. We distract ourselves. We can find ourselves similar in a miserable condition, but not really recognizing why. We've caused ourselves to forget the real issue that's at hand.

And that's why we need to recognize the signs. You ever overreact to situations? You ever overreact to stories that you hear? Do you ever overreact to what's posted on Facebook? You ever overreact? Not that every time we overreact, it's an issue of guilt, but it's a good reminder to stop and consider. Maybe there is an issue of guilt. Now, guilt can manifest itself in many different ways. And overreacting to a situation is just one of them.

Sometimes guilt manifests itself in self-destruction. And a person will go about, you know, kind of sabotaging themselves in the workplace, in the home, you know, causing issues, causing problems. But it comes down to this sense of guilt that they have, this need for punishment or this sense of, I need to be punished. And so they bring about the punishment that they think they deserve. Sometimes guilt manifests itself in a pursuit of pleasure.

which is really just a distraction, you know, like, well, let me just chase after this and I'll fulfill myself and I'll forget about the pain and what I did and the hurt and the issues. I'll forget about how I feel. And so this substance or that substance or, you know, this venue or that venue, and there's this pursuit of pleasure to try to alleviate the guilt and that pain and that burden that is felt. Sometimes guilt manifests itself in legalism and condemnation.

Where there's a legalism and a harsh condemnation of others as a result of the sense of guilt that I feel. Everybody else should feel as miserable as I feel. And so there's this condemnation that we tend to bring on others and this legalistic approach that we have towards others that

Because we have this sense of guilt. And so those are a few different examples. But again, guilt can manifest itself in a variety of ways. I'm not trying to cover all of them, but just to encourage you to consider perhaps the way that you're behaving, perhaps the way that you feel, perhaps the way that you're acting comes back to this issue of guilt that is unresolved.

I found this one article that I thought had some good perspectives. It's not from a Christian perspective, but it's from a business perspective. And so this article in Forbes walks through six signs that you are suffering from guilt.

And are not aware of it. And so the author goes through these. He says, first of all, you will not allow yourself to succeed. And that's kind of like that sabotage, you know? Like you have this sense of guilt and so it's preventing you in the workplace. That's his focus. But it's keeping you from progressing in your career. Keeping you from moving forward because you don't feel like you deserve it and so on and so forth.

Number two, guilt makes you paranoid. And that's another aspect of guilt that we haven't really talked about yet. But that paranoia, because, well, there's the fear of being found out. There's the fear of being discovered. And it's not just limited to that one aspect of your life, but it overflows. And you're paranoid of relationships. You're paranoid of people's activities and behaviors. You're paranoid as a result of the guilt that you feel.

Number three, he says, you explode in response to minor constructive criticism. And that's similar to what we see David do here in chapter 12, right? He's overreacting, he's exploding, and it's not appropriate according to the situation that's at hand. Number four, he said, your jokes aren't funny, they're offensive.

This one might be a good one to consider. He says, look, guilt affects your humor, your sense of humor. It's twisted. It's distorted. And so, you know, you say, oh, I'm just trying to be funny, but people are always offended by your jokes. Hey, if people are always offended by your jokes, that's not a guarantee that you have some suppressed issues of guilt that you need to deal with. But,

it might be an indication that there is something there that's going on and you need to let the Lord speak to you about that. Number five, he says you're chronically a day late and a dollar short. You're always behind. You know, you're always trying to catch up and it's affecting you in that way because of you're not sleeping. You know, you're restless and your mind's not there. It's

It can have a great impact on you. And then finally, number six was my favorite, random mood generator. And guilt can have this effect on us, right? Because some days you're pretending you're not guilty better than other days. And some days you've distracted yourself sufficiently more than other days. And so you're up, you're down, you're all around as a result of this turmoil that is within, this raging that is within, this burden that is happening within. And so it's important for us to begin to recognize those signs of guilt, right?

Again, so going back to point number one, we can let the Lord speak. The real issue here is not that you have to go and like go to great lengths to track down and find out, you know, some hidden sin that was there. Listen, if there's a sin that God is wanting to address and that's why you feel guilty, God will speak it to you. But many times we just need that prompt. We need that recognition of the way I'm behaving is not reasonable for what's going on.

And to give God an opportunity to speak, Lord, is there something happening within? Is there some unresolved issue within that you want to address and to deal with? And God does want to address those things. He wants you to recover from the burden of guilt.

Moving on to point number three in verses seven through 13, here we begin to see the resolution of guilt and it starts with confessing your sin. As God speaks to you, as God begins to reveal what it is that is going on and the issue that he wants to address, there's a great temptation for us to confess

Try to explain it away. Try to blame it on others. Try to, you know, handle that in a variety of ways. But here's the way that we need to respond to resolve our guilt. And that is confess. In verse 7, Nathan says to David, you are the man. Remember that story, David? Here's the rich guy. Here's the poor guy. That's what you did. You're a rich guy. You saw everything.

Uriah, poor man, you took his only wife to be your own. You killed him. You are that man. You have committed a great sin. And the Lord goes on in the next few verses to lay out really a whole case against David, how God had done so much for David, and then for David to behave this way was so wrong. And David's response is found in verse 13-14.

So David said to Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord. Here David responds the right way. And it's one of the reasons why David still, even though this event happens in his life, David is still referred to and known as the man after God's own heart. Because it's not that he was perfect and flawless and never had issues, but it's

That from those issues, he turned back to the Lord and resolved these things in the way that God desired for him to. And so David here confesses his sin. Face to face with his sin, face to face with it. And it must have been painful and it must have been humiliating and shameful. Face to face with it. He doesn't try to pretend like it didn't happen. He doesn't try to escape from it. He owns it. And he says, I have sinned.

There's a lot that's happening in David's heart that we don't see here in this chapter. But if you want to dig in a little bit into what was happening for David in his mind and his heart during this time, you can check out Psalm chapter 51, the Psalm of repentance, where David describes there this repentance that's happening in his heart as these things are unfolding. But the bottom line is David confessed his sin. He acknowledged it. He owned it.

The commentator Thomas Constable says it this way, David did not utter one word of excuse for the sins he had committed, nor did he seek to tone down the gravity of his offenses or blame others for what he had done. He's not trying to sidestep it, not trying to pretend like it didn't happen, not trying to say, hey, I could have done so much worse or I wasn't that bad. He's not trying to do any of that. He just accepts and owns, this is what I did. He confessed his sins.

It's a great contrast to King Saul, who was the king before him, who every time God confronted Saul with some issue of sin, Saul had some reason. The people did this, and I didn't want to confront them. It was too hard, or I thought this, and the time was running out, and so I had to do that. And Saul always had a reason to try to tone down the gravity of, I didn't do something so terrible because of all of these reasons. But David doesn't try to do that. He simply acknowledges that

and confesses his sin. There's a lot of wrong ways to deal with guilt. We try to pretend like it didn't happen or that it's not so bad. We try to blame others. We try to distract ourselves with entertainment or whatever it might be. We try to make up for it with good works. We try to do all kinds of things to deal with our guilt and none of those things are effective. The only thing that is effective is to confess. Confess your sin.

This is important because sin and guilt, it doesn't just get resolved on its own. Just like all the gunk and junk behind my stove. It doesn't just get resolved on its own. And if you leave it there for 20 years, guess what? It's going to be there 20 years later. We see this played out in the brothers of Joseph.

Back in the book of Genesis where Joseph's brothers, you know, are jealous of him. And so they throw him in a pit and then they decide, well, we're not going to kill him. Let's sell him into slavery. And they sell him into slavery and convince their dad that Joseph had died in the wilderness. And for the next 20 years, they live with the burden of guilt. And as God works out miraculous things, then one day because of a famine, they go to Egypt and they're seeking to buy grain for their family. And Joseph is there in charge and

And Joseph recognizes them and he begins to like give them a little bit of a hard time. And they look at each other and they say, oh, we're guilty. It's because of the way we treated Joseph. You can imagine every time the brothers encountered any hardship or difficulty, oh, we're guilty. It's because of what we did. They had this unresolved guilt. They hadn't dealt with the issue yet.

And so 20 years later, they're still feeling the pain of that issue, what they did and how they had covered it up and that it wasn't resolved. Things don't go away. David in Psalm 32, again, describing this same scenario. He says,

But then he goes on to say in Psalm 32 5, I acknowledged my sin to you and my iniquity I have not hidden. I said I will confess my transgressions to the Lord and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Confessed sin is forgiven sin. And that's why this is such an important point for us to understand. Explained away sin is not forgiven sin. Sin blamed on others, it's not forgiven sin.

Sin excused, you know, for whatever means, it's not forgiven sin. Confessed sin is forgiven sin. And that's what David discovered and models for us here. Here's how you recover from the burden of guilt. You confess. You acknowledge. You own. Yes, no getting around it. This is what I did. And that brings us now to the next point.

Verses 13 through 22, and that is receive God's forgiveness. When you confess sin, you are then in a place to receive the forgiveness that God offers. Again, look at verse 13. So David said to Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord. And Nathan said to David, the Lord also has put away your sin. You shall not die. Right there in one verse, we see it all happen. Verse 13 is huge. It changes everything.

David says, I have sinned against the Lord. And the Lord responds, you are forgiven. The Lord has put away your sin and you shall not die. According to the law of Moses, David, as well as Bathsheba, could be, should be executed. It was a capital offense in the law that God had established. Adultery, capital offense. Murder that David committed, capital offense. David, David committed.

According to justice, there would have been no problem with him being executed as a result of his crime, as a result of his sin. But God decided to show mercy. In addition to forgiving him, he also withheld that death penalty. There was not just the issue of forgiveness in the sense of David's relationship with God, but God also showed mercy in the life and the consequences of the sin that David had committed.

There's a great promise that we hold on to many times in 1 John 1, verse 9. It's a promise that we can hold on to. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we confess. That's the question. Will you confess? That's the condition. If we confess. And then the promise is he is faithful and just to forgive us, to cleanse us.

He washes us. This is the only way that guilt can be really resolved, to receive the forgiveness of God. It requires faith. It really does require faith. We have to believe God. If you think about, put yourself in David's shoes, you know, accepting God's forgiveness when I have committed so great a crime. Oh man, that's hard for me to stomach. That's hard for me to do. It's hard for me to believe that God could be so merciful and gracious. It requires faith.

You have to believe God at his word. Here's what he says. If you confess, I will forgive. It's going to require you that you believe God. And probably not just once, but that continually. And sometimes your conscience will be afflicted again about the same thing. And you come back to this promise. You come back to faith and say, no, I believe God at his word. I am forgiven of this sin.

David received forgiveness. And we see that demonstrated in a couple ways in the following verses. And again, I'm not going to go into the details here, but I do encourage you to spend some time in reviewing that further. But just to summarize it for you, David received forgiveness. We see that in the fact that he accepted the consequences.

David accepted. God goes on to lay out, look, for the rest of your life, there's going to be war. There's going to be battles. You're going to have issues within your own family. There's going to be these results of sin. There are consequences to sin. Even forgiven sin still has consequences. And David accepted that. He didn't

Try to explain to God, no, no, you don't understand. Look, what I did wasn't so bad. I don't deserve all of this. He acknowledged he deserved it. He received God's forgiveness and he accepted. There are the consequences. There is the aftermath of that. But combined with that, and very important, we also see David receiving forgiveness in the reality that he was bold and asked for mercy.

David here showed great boldness in asking God for mercy. We're going to jump into verse 14. It says,

on the ground. This child that was the result of his adulterous relationship with Bathsheba, God says, you've given great occasion for the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme the Lord, and so as part of the consequences, this child is not going to survive. And David does something really bold, and he pleads with God for the child, fully recognizing the

I don't deserve for God to listen to me. Fully recognizing I don't deserve for God to heal. Fully recognizing I don't deserve anything. But God, I'm asking you to show mercy. Now David here, he fasts and prays and in such a way that his servants are kind of concerned for him. They're trying to get him to eat and he's refusing to eat. And later on when the child dies,

David hears his servants talking. They're kind of murmuring to each other like, oh man, what are we going to do? We can't tell David the child's dead. Look how he's reacted when the child was just sick. And so, man, when he finds out he's dead, David's going to flip out. The servants probably had good reason to think like this because they've been living with David for the past year where he's been overwhelmed with guilt. He probably flipped out a lot during that time. And so they're like, how do we tell David about this? But David saw what was going on. He said, oh, the child's died, huh? They said, yeah, the child has died.

So David got up, took a shower, worshiped the Lord, had food brought to him and had a meal. And his servants were really perplexed. They're like, what? This is so backwards. We wouldn't expect you to be behaving this way. Why are you behaving this way? And David explains himself in verse 22. Here's what he says. While the child was alive, I fasted and wept. For I said, who can tell whether the Lord will be gracious to me that the child may live?

Here, David is explaining, here's what I was doing. Here's why I behaved the way that I did. I was asking God for mercy. I was asking God to be gracious. I was asking God to do good things that I don't deserve. I was asking him to withhold the judgment that I do deserve. I was asking for God. I was pleading for God to be merciful. Did David deserve for God to heal? No. But was it okay for David to ask for it? Yes. On the basis of God's mercy.

In fact, I would encourage you, I would declare to you that when you receive God's forgiveness, you're able to ask God to be merciful. It requires faith to receive God's forgiveness. And if you believe God at his word and you can't ask God to be merciful, you don't really believe God at his word.

It uncovers an issue there. If you can't ask God for mercy, I don't deserve it. That's the definition of mercy. Getting what you don't deserve and not getting what you do deserve. That's the very definition and that's what God is declaring. I want to work in your life in ways that you don't deserve. David asked God for mercy. It reveals he really had received the forgiveness that God offered to him. He accepted the consequences.

When we receive God's forgiveness, listen, your life will not be the same as it would have been if you had not sinned. But don't go too far and let that idea convince you that it's over and that God never has anything for you again. No, God wants to continue to show himself merciful and gracious towards you. Receive God's forgiveness. Psalm 147, 11 says, "'The Lord takes pleasure in those who fear him, "'in those who hope in his mercy.'"

When you're there saying, man, I hope God is going to be merciful to me, God takes pleasure in that. He doesn't say, you don't deserve that. Why would you, you're such a fool to hope in that. No, no, no. He says, oh, I love that. You, you hoping for mercy, first of all, means you acknowledge you're confessing your sin. You, you recognize you don't deserve it, but you're also receiving my forgiveness and hoping that I'll show myself merciful to you. God loves that.

He loves that. Receive God's forgiveness and be bold and ask for mercy. Accept the consequences. And God may not grant you the mercy that you want or he may grant you mercy in a different way, but ask for God to be merciful. Ask for God to work. And then finally, we're going to look at verses 19 through 31. Again, not all the verses, but looking at this aspect that is starting to live again. When you're burdened by guilt,

It really paralyzes your life. I mean, life goes on. Careers go on and relationships go on and families go on and, you know, life goes on just like it did in David's life and time passes, but it's not really life. You're not really living. You're not progressing. You're not moving forward. Things aren't happening. But now,

As God has spoken to you, as you've confessed sin and received God's forgiveness, now is the time, now is the opportunity to start to really live once again. In verse 20 again it says, So David arose from the ground, washed and anointed himself, changed his clothes. He went into the house of the Lord and worshipped. Then he went to his own house, and when they requested, they set food before him, and he ate.

Here we see David begin to live again. What does he do? He gets up and he takes a shower. Just like recovery from some type of physical break or physical issue, recovery from guilt isn't just an instant overnight thing. It is often a process and it starts with some simple things. Sometimes it's just, hey, get up and take a shower, put some clothes on,

Maybe your sense of guilt has really kind of hindered that normal behavior for a time. And so let's start to do some simple things. Have a meal. Begin to recover from that. Again, this word recovery, it means a return to the normal state of health, mind, or strength. And David is just beginning that right now. He's beginning to recover. He's returning to his normal mind. Previously, his life was paralyzed by guilt. He could not progress. He could not move forward.

Any attempt to is just a distraction. They're trying to bury the feelings. Here David begins to move forward. There's an appropriate time for mourning over sin. There is, for sure. But there also comes a point where that's not pleasing to God any longer. God doesn't want you to live for the rest of your life beating yourself up over that issue, over that situation, over what you did. God wants you to own it and accept it

so that you can be forgiven and then start to live again. And there's a new life in Christ that he has for you. It is important, it is appropriate to own the sin, to mourn the sin, but then it is also important and appropriate to get up, take a shower, have a meal, and start to live the life that God wants for you. And there's some

evidence of this in David's life here in three different ways. I'll point out really quickly. First of all, David is reconnecting with God. Here as he gets up, he takes a shower, he puts some clothes on, he goes and he worships the Lord in the house of the Lord. He goes to church. Now I would venture to say, it's not recorded to say definitely, but I would guess David probably went to church throughout the time in between as well.

He went to church. He participated in the religious activities. He was around, but he was not worshiping the Lord during that time. He was disconnected from God because of his sin, because of his guilt. But here, for the first time in a long time, he worships the Lord. He reconnects with God. He begins to have that relationship with God again. He begins to walk in that, and he spends some time in prayer and worship, reconnecting with the Lord.

But then we also see him go on and reconnect with people. Check out verse 24. Then David comforted Bathsheba, his wife, and went into her and lay with her. So she bore a son and he called his name Solomon. Now the Lord loved him and he sent word by the hand of Nathan, the prophet. So he called his name Jedidiah because of the Lord. Here, David now reconnects with Bathsheba. Now, again, they were around each other for this whole time.

David married her soon after Uriah was killed. And so she's been his wife for this whole time, but their relationship was paralyzed by their guilt. And I'm sure there's a whole other account that we don't have the privilege of seeing, but God was working in Bathsheba as well during this whole time. And they have been paralyzed by their guilt, by their sin. They've not really been able to move forward and progress in their relationship, but now they're able to reconnect.

And they're able to begin to move forward and to live again. And God gives them a son. And they call his name Solomon. And the beautiful thing here is the Lord loves him, he says. And he sends word by Nathan the prophet, I love this boy. He's going to be the next on the throne. So they called him Jedidiah, beloved of the Lord. God's doing a new work. David's beginning to live again. His relationship with God is beginning to be reestablished and to flourish. His

Family life is beginning to be reestablished and to flourish. God's doing new things in his family now and blessing his family. And then thirdly, we see that David gets back to work. In the closing verses, David goes back to the battle that he should have been in when the issue happened with Bathsheba, but now that same battle happening again, David gets back to work. In verse 29, David gathered all the people together and went to Rabbah and fought against it and took it.

This whole time, David's been paralyzed, crippled. Guilt has messed up everything. But now he's restoring, being restored by the Lord, returning to a normal state of health and mind and strength. He's becoming again that David that we once knew, that trusted in God, that walked with God, that was blessed by God. There is an appropriate time for mourning over sin. And there is the need for us to acknowledge our sin in that way. But that time comes to a close.

And it's not on a set schedule, but it does come to a close where God says, that's not pleasing to me anymore. I don't want you to live in that state of punishing yourself for what you did. Yes, you did something terrible. It was wrong. It was bad, but you need to start to live again. I have new life for you. Think about what the Lord told Peter in Luke chapter 22. The Lord said to him, Simon, Simon, indeed, Satan has asked for you that he may sift you as wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith should not fail and

Peter, you're about to go through some great trial and you're going to feel really guilty about it. When you get through that, when you return to me and get to work and strengthen your brethren, your ministry is not over. Your life is not over. You may feel that way. It may have all kinds of condemnation and thoughts within. You may have all kinds of things that give you that impression. But here's what God says. It's not over. I'm not done yet.

You need to start to live again as you have confessed and received the forgiveness of the Lord. You are in a place now to start to move forward. God still has a plan for you. Guilt sure does have a way of wrecking that. It weighs heavy on us and it messes up our spiritual life. It messes up our family life and it messes us up emotionally and physically and across the board.

But God loves us greatly and has provided a solution so that you can recover from the burden of guilt. Let God speak to you. Is there something he needs to bring up? Is there something that needs to be addressed? Are you recognizing some of the signs? Maybe there's some things that you're like, oh, okay, well, maybe there is something that needs to be dealt with. It's not dealt with by running away, by hiding, by pretending, by blaming. It's dealt with confession. Before the Lord.

Own your sin. Acknowledge your sin and receive God's forgiveness. It's going to require faith. I mean, it's going to be great faith because you feel terrible about what you did, but believe God. You're washed. You're cleansed, and you can live the new life that God has for you. I'm going to invite the worship team to come up and close this in a song, and as they do, I would encourage you to just let this be a time where you give God opportunity to speak to you.

It's not something that, you know, again, you have to yourself track down and come up with something if there's some issue. No, no. God can speak to you. If there's an issue he wants to address, just invite him to speak to you about it. Ask him to show you. Ask him to speak. But then as God speaks, respond appropriately. Confess it. Own it. Receive his forgiveness. And look forward to the new life that he has for you.

We pray you have been blessed by this Bible teaching. The power of God to change a life is found in the daily reading of His Word. Visit ferventword.com to find more teachings and Bible study resources.