"Grace and Glory"

"Grace and Glory"  

     Despite King David's significant failures (Bathsheba; consigning of Uriah to death; numbering Israel), the Lord nevertheless refers to him as "a man after Mine own heart" (Acts 13:22).  Moreover, the New Testament never references David in any negative manner whatsoever, even referring to the Lord Jesus Christ in its opening verse as "the son of David" (Matthew 1:1).

    This does not absolve David of the sins recorded in the Old Testament, nor does it lessen the severity of their consequences.  God's affirmation of His servant rather confirms the declaration that "the Lord looketh on the heart" (I Samuel 16:7).  Therein, David trusted God in the limited but redeeming manner available to Old Testament saints.  He knew grace, the grace of God's coming promise of redemption.  "The Lord will give grace and glory" declared David, who realized that God's favor must be freely given in order to genuinely experience His glory (Psalm 84:11).  Thus, David came to the know the Lord in personal terms, as the Psalms vividly confirm by revealing a Heart to heart relationship between the King and the king.  "I have made a covenant with My chosen, I have sworn unto David My servant… I have set the Lord always before me" (Psalm 89:3; 16:8).

    Presently, born again believers in the Lord Jesus possess a far greater bond with God than David ever knew during his earthly lifetime.  The Holy Spirit permanently indwells all who believe (I Corinthians 3:16).  Christ in the heart, however, does not guarantee that our thoughts, words, and actions will always proceed from the fountain of His life within us.  Many examples of wayward believers occupy New Testament chronicles of the early church.  Like David, we can distrust and disobey our Heavenly Father in ways completely unbecoming to the grace we have received in Christ.  Never is there an excuse for sin, and never is it inevitable.  Moreover, like David, the Lord may allow us to experience severe repercussions for unbelief and disobedience.  Nothing, however, changes the fact of the Holy Spirit's indwelling presence, or the truth that we are "new creatures" in Christ (II Corinthians 5:17).  When God "looketh on the heart" of His trusting children in Christ, He sees the presence of His Son.  "Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying Abba Father" (Galatians 4:6).  Growing awareness and affirmation of such "grace and glory" results in growing experience of a life David never knew, the life of "Christ in you, the hope of glory."

"For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."

(II Corinthians 4:6)

Weekly Memory Verse 

   One thing have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to inquire in His temple" (Psalm 27:4)