In light of the helicopter crash that took nine lives, we are all quickly reminded how delicate life is. We can be about our business and in a blink of an eye be looking into the face of God. Death comes for us for all. It comes for the young, the old, the weak and the strong. You can’t buy your way out of it. It’s hard enough when someone dies of old age but knowing three thirteen-year-old girls won’t be getting their driver’s licenses or go to the prom is heartbreaking.
Times like this makes us reflect on what is important. Each of us will meet our Maker. When all the offerings of this world are stripped away, God is what is left. When we are faced with eternity, we look up. If we have hit rock bottom, we look up. When we think we can’t keep on, we look up. We look up for God to help us out.
What about during the good times, when life is going our way? Why do we look around instead? Why do we think that the offerings of this world can help us out more than God? We are so trustworthy in our own efforts, aren’t we? God created us to live in harmony with Him in all areas. Yet, our world deems importance by status and money. If you are famous or wealthy, you get first priority. Kobe Bryant was on board that plane. It was all about him dying rather than nine people, three of them being minors.
We have come to understand that because of sin, we lost this harmony and are now separated from Him. In this separation time, until Jesus returns to restore harmony back to creation and to realign priorities, we have to find our way back to Him. The only way back is via a cross. Christ’s death and resurrection assures us that our lives on earth are not in vain.
Vanity, or self-love, trips us up. Romans 1:25 speaks of what happens to us when we place anything or anyone above God Himself, “They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator Himself.” When this happens, we lose our focus and adultery happens. We place what we love on earth over God.
Despite the many gifts that God gives us, we are to not let worldly
success cloud our view of God. For in the end, His Presence is all that will matter.
David, a man after God’s own heart, see Acts 13:22, struggled with adultery. When we take our eyes off of God, we wander. We become infatuated with our senses. Why do you think many of us have a love affair with food? David looked upon a beautiful, married, woman. Want to know more, read 2 Samuel 11. David allowed His eyes to wander which led to adultery with a woman which caused him to murder her husband! Much blood is on his hands.
I want us to understand God’s grace through David’s life. This grace is available to us. Despite his sins, God never forgot how David was a man after His own heart and God still used him. At the end of Acts 13:22, God says that “David will do everything I want him to do.” This is a key to walking with God, obedience to His voice.
In Psalm 51, we see the relationship between God and David. David is confronted by his friend. Another key to walking with God, confess your sins. David confesses to Nathan and to God. We must get real with God in who we are as sinners and how God’s love is greater than our sins.
David understands his place when it comes to God. He asks God for mercy. Due to the severity of sin, none of us deserve mercy but God gives it anyway. David is humbled by God’s compassion. Why would God blot out his sins and wash him clean from guilt? Grace should cause us to walk on our knees before Christ!
David recognized that he rebelled against God. He does not sugar-coat his sins. He doesn’t make excuses for them. When we sin, it is always against God. He says in verse 5, “For I was born a sinner – yes, from the moment my mother conceived me.” He goes on in the Psalm with what God will do for him. He will purify him and return David’s joy. Sin keeps us locked up with dead weights wrapped around our ankles. Jesus can break the shackles that entrap us and set us free! He will lift us up out of the mire with new vigor.
his back legs. Even with a marred body, he was able to swim with joy and be who
he was meant to be! God used David despite many indiscretions. God
heals us and restores us.
Each of our hearts should cry out, “Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a loyal spirit within me.” We cannot live this life on our own. We need God. David cries out for God to not banish him from His presence and for God to not remove the Holy Spirit from him. Do we truly understand how needy we are for God or do we live our days in self-confidence?
David asks God to be restored. He understands that he needs God to help him with obedience. We won’t obey on our own. Our flesh loves itself too much. David understood that he needs to be taught and he asks God to unseal his lips so his mouth will praise Him. David is giving us a picture of a humble and broken spirit before his God. We are to be the same.
Another key to walking with God is found in verse 17 of Psalm 51. “The sacrifice you desire is a broken spirit. You will not reject a broken and repentant heart, O God.” David understands his flesh. He understands God. He knows what to do when the relationship between himself and God gets messed up.
When we understand the amazing love that God is offering us, we become like David. No, not perfect, but very useable by God. David’s life will be remembered through eternity. How about your life? Whenever the day comes for you to pass through death’s door, are you ready to be remembered in His presence or will God find you full of yourself? No one knows when their time will come so we must be ready now.
Three keys to being prepared for when God calls you home – obey His voice, confess your sins and have a humbled and broken spirit. God is waiting for you to look up. His love will embrace you, I promise!
Carol J German 