I think we learn a very valuable lesson in reading 2 Sam. 12 in connection with helping those who have failed, or who have become backsliders. It requires much spirituality in the one who takes the restorer’s place. The Lord must be the sender in such a case; for it is quite a mistake to suppose that any brother, whether he have the gift for it or not, can wash his brother’s feet. It is often the most unspiritual who are most ready to proffer themselves for such service.
We read that “the Lord sent Nathan unto David.” If it is I myself who go, be assured I shall do my brother more injury than good. “I” must be nowhere: the Lord must act through me. If ever an empty vessel is needed, it is when a brother’s feet need washing, lest anything save the water of the word be used. And it is not easy to obtain such a vessel, inasmuch as he who carries it is actually full of the filth he is coming in contact with. If I forget, I may let out the very sin about which I am a messenger to my brother—ay, let it out ere I leave his presence, if not kept by the power of God. I am utterly unfit to send, if I go saying to myself— “Nobody can accuse me of doing this: nobody can lay his hand on me about my walk,” &c., it would be my wisest course to stay at home and allow a more suitable vessel, because more empty of self, to go.
In Gal. 5:2626Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another. (Galatians 5:26), Paul says:— “Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another.” The gifted ones were apt to despise those who had less manifestation of power; whereas the latter were apt to envy those who possessed more knowledge than themselves. But the question in hand was-not power from gift or knowledge, but spirituality:— “If we live in spirit, let us also walk in spirit.” Hence he adds (ch. 6:1)— “Brethren, if even a man be taken (caught in the act-προληφθῦ) in some trespass, ye that are spiritual restore (fit up again into his proper place-καταρτίζετε) such in a spirit of meekness, considering (viewing as a marksman would-σκοπῶν) thyself, lest thou also be tempted.”
It is not merely that I am to restore my brother in meekness, but I must be “in a spirit of meekness” myself. I might do the work in a meek way, and yet not be inwardly moved by a spirit suitable to what I outwardly appear. “Ye that are spiritual” is collective: “considering thyself” is individual. It is made intensely personal. It was not two or three who came to David to correct him: Nathan came alone. An assembly may know of a brother’s delinquency: one goes to him—the most spiritual and most suitable. The task is not left to anybody, which often means nobody. It is an important one, and treated accordingly. The erring one to whom I am speaking will often have a clearer consciousness of my state of mind than I may have myself. If I am saying in my heart— “I think I am a suitable person to be speaking to him, because I am sure I would not commit the particular sin he has fallen into.” I may be certain he will feel I am thus thinking, and aroused flesh in him may at once be my recompense. He has the consciousness that I have a nature as bad as he; and it will not do for me to appear to act as if I am in no danger of falling.
Now, notice how Nathan came to David. He did not pounce down on him in reproof. He did not begin with the words— “Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the Lord, to do evil in his sight?” Oh, no! The suitable person comes, and he proves he is such by the way be speaks. Nathan was the one who knew David’s love to the Lord. Nathan had not to come to David in chap. 7. We read there— “And it came to pass, when the king sat in his house, and the Lord had given him rest round about from all his enemies: that the king said unto Nathan the prophet, See, now, I dwell in an house of cedar, but the ark of God dwelleth within curtains. And Nathan said to the king, Go, do all that is in thine heart; for the Lord is with thee.” The one who came to restore a sinning David was well aware that he was, in God’s sight, a whole-hearted saint. None other would do to send. The One who restored Peter had known his love— “Lord, Thou knowest all things; Thou knowest that I love thee.” So, in David’s case, the Sender and the sent one knew what David’s heart was towards God before he fell.
Remember, dear reader, when you are going to restore a brother, if you are conscious that that brother is doubtful about your thoughts concerning him—if he feels you never had any evidence to your own soul that his heart was, at one time, true to his Lord and yours—you are the most unsuitable person that could possibly help him. Let some Nathan go who has previously been sent to the sinning one with some message similar to what we have in 2 Sam. 7:4-174And it came to pass that night, that the word of the Lord came unto Nathan, saying, 5Go and tell my servant David, Thus saith the Lord, Shalt thou build me an house for me to dwell in? 6Whereas I have not dwelt in any house since the time that I brought up the children of Israel out of Egypt, even to this day, but have walked in a tent and in a tabernacle. 7In all the places wherein I have walked with all the children of Israel spake I a word with any of the tribes of Israel, whom I commanded to feed my people Israel, saying, Why build ye not me an house of cedar? 8Now therefore so shalt thou say unto my servant David, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, I took thee from the sheepcote, from following the sheep, to be ruler over my people, over Israel: 9And I was with thee whithersoever thou wentest, and have cut off all thine enemies out of thy sight, and have made thee a great name, like unto the name of the great men that are in the earth. 10Moreover I will appoint a place for my people Israel, and will plant them, that they may dwell in a place of their own, and move no more; neither shall the children of wickedness afflict them any more, as beforetime, 11And as since the time that I commanded judges to be over my people Israel, and have caused thee to rest from all thine enemies. Also the Lord telleth thee that he will make thee an house. 12And when thy days be fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will set up thy seed after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will establish his kingdom. 13He shall build an house for my name, and I will stablish the throne of his kingdom for ever. 14I will be his father, and he shall be my son. If he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men: 15But my mercy shall not depart away from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away before thee. 16And thine house and thy kingdom shall be established for ever before thee: thy throne shall be established for ever. 17According to all these words, and according to all this vision, so did Nathan speak unto David. (2 Samuel 7:4‑17).
Is it not lovely to look at the first verse of ch. 12 and read— “And the Lord sent Nathan to David,” and turn back to read of a former message through the same hands— “Go and tell to my servant, to David, Thus saith the Lord, Shalt thou build me an house for me to dwell in?... I was with thee whithersoever thou wentest, and have cut off all thine enemies out of thy sight, and have made thee a great name, like unto the name of the great men that are in the earth.... Also the Lord telleth thee, that he will make thee an house.... And thine house and thy kingdom shall be established forever before thee: thy throne shall be established forever. According to all these words, and according to all this vision, so did Nathan speak unto David. Then went King David in, and sat before the Lord.” This was the messenger suited to restore; and he so did his work that he was not satisfied until David entered again “into the house of the Lord and worshipped.” (Chapter 12:20.) On both occasions Nathan was the means of sending him into God’s presence. Truly Paul’s words can aptly apply— “Ye that are spiritual perfectly fit into his place again such an one in a spirit of meekness.”
So much for the person who was sent. Now let us see how fitly spoken were his words.
“And he came unto him, and said unto him.” The coming and the speaking are made two distinct things. One is as important as the other—our attention is fixed on both separately. A look is as important as a word: our very manner in entering the room where we are seeking the offender is of importance—the way we greet him will sometimes ruin the result if we do not feel as we ought in such a case. The smallest appearance of self is sure to make the same unpleasant companion appear at once in him to whom we come in supposed grace and nothingness. An appearance of humility and meekness when such are not really present in our souls is positive hypocrisy, and is sure to meet a due reward.
But we proceed. “And he came unto him, and said unto him, There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor. The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds: but the poor man had nothing save one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and nourished up; and it grew up together with him, and with his children; it did eat of his own meat, and drank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a daughter. And there came a traveler unto the rich man, and he spared to take of his own flock and of his own herd, to dress for the wayfaring man that was come unto him; but took the poor man’s lamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him.” Why this parable? Ah! it answers a question often put by fancied helpers of failing saints. “We must be honest and straightforward, must we not, and at once tell a brother his fault?” Or— “We do not think it right to be ‘beating round the bush’ in such matters. Is it not truth we have to tell to him; and, if he takes it unkindly, surely we cannot help it?” Indeed! I would ask such to study, word for word, the beautiful incident we are considering. Had not Nathan truth to tell? Could not he be honest and straightforward, and yet act with exquisite tenderness also? Perhaps not a few of our so-called “honest” reprovers would be half inclined to consider Nathan’s parable rather a roundabout way of bringing home what was true—and what must be true, for God sent him with his message. It was no accusation on “hearsay.” Nathan knew his ground, as led of the Lord.
I wish we had a little more of parabolic reproof in our dealings with one another. It would save immense pain, and have blessed results in multitudes of cases, where the doubtfully honest course of some very well-meaning persons would only succeed in arousing “the carnal mind” of the offending one in such a way that he has more self-judgment to exercise—perhaps for a long period—when he thinks of the would—be restorer, than he had in connection with the trespass in question. This is an exceedingly common thing. Ill-will is raised against the ill-timed, ill-managed mode of action carried on by him who professes to be the helper; so that his very presence afterward is the occasion of fresh cause of evil. Are such restorers (?) aware that they are accountable for this, amid all their complaining— “Oh! he took it so badly: he will not speak to me ever since I spoke to him on the subject!” I ask, in answer to such complaints—Are you an adept at parable-speaking, like Nathan? Or are you one of those blunt persons who cannot understand a parable at all? Well, if so, I would strongly advise you to read 2 Sam. 12 carefully and prayerfully, and in the meantime leave the restoring to other hands. You may be one of the “Ye which are spiritual;” but the individual part has yet to be studied by your own heart— “consider thyself.”
It is clear to me that Nathan’s course tended to open David’s heart to his sin without naming it to him. Thus he might have saved the fearfulness of the result— “The sword shall never depart from thine house.” “If we judged (discerned ourselves by our own investigation-διεκρίνομεν) ourselves, we should not have been judged” (1 Cor. 11:3131For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. (1 Corinthians 11:31)), says Paul. Could Nathan have succeeded, by any possibility, in making David remember his own sin, he would have saved him much misery. Had there been anything to act on in the conscience, surely the parable must have awakened self-judgment. I believe that a brother’s feet may be washed by us in this way without his ever knowing that we are doing it at all. Suppose that David said in his heart, while Nathan was speaking of the ewe lamb,— “Well, this is a case very like my own. Although Nathan may not know anything of my sin, yet I cannot but see I have sinned far more deeply than this rich man he tells me of. What a sinner I have been! How can I dare to condemn the man whose sin is as nothing to mine!” But no such discerning of self and its actings seemed to be the result of Nathan’s gentle and helpful course. He is ready enough to condemn another, just because he has so little sense of his own terrible fall. Nathan’s parable fails to make him judge himself.
How dreadful a thing it is to neglect confession of sin! The very moment we have sinned, we should at once honestly, unreservedly, and fully confess our sins. The result is— “He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Confession first, cleansing afterward. What! am I to go right into the presence of a holy God fresh from my fall, and in the wretched consciousness I have willfully done that which brings His wrath upon “the sons of disobedience”? No, I do not say you are to come into the presence of God; but I do say you are to come to your Father, The difference is immense. If I am trying to come before a God of holiness as a guilty sinner, I will surely keep back as long as possible; and fearful backsliding may be—and perhaps is sure to be—the consequence. But the words are— “We have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” The Judge pardons guilty sinners, the Father forgives sinning saints as His own beloved children.
Poor David had not thus confessed his sins. Hence the fearful results-backsliding, deadness to any moral sense of his state, and an unreserved and faithful statement of his crimes from the lips of him who would have fain retired in the background. “And David’s anger was greatly kindled against the man.” Alas! it does not say that his anger was kindled against the man’s sin. There is a vast difference between being angry with the person who sins, and our being angry against the offense committed. I think we often confound the two. Let us note well the difference. If love is to have full exercise towards my brother at all times, especially is it to be so when I, a poor thing full of sin myself, and moment by moment dependent on grace, am sent to bring my brother’s conscience and heart to the word. Let us take heed lest we may mistake our irritated spirit to be a desire to wash our brother’s feet. Our eyes will soon be opened by the terrible discovery—unless we are blind to it all—that we have succeeded in soiling the very feet we imagined we were so anxious to clean. Let us examine of what sort our anxiety is, especially if we happen to be an offended one in the matter ourselves. It may be our object is rather to justify self than aid our brother. The very one who may think he has done a duty by saying at once to some offender, “Thou art the man,” and be astonished at his want of success, is often ready to defend himself at all cost when another comes to him to tell him of something in himself painfully inconsistent, which he neither can nor will see, though ever so apparent to others—ay, and will run about from one to another, till he lights on someone as blind as himself, who will agree to the fact that he is blameless. It is quite time enough to say, “Thou art the man,” when all efforts have failed to make my brother judge himself, and when I hear him angry at the one he ought to pity condemning him for that which is as nothing to his own offense.
And such a case is by no means uncommon. I have seen a Christian speak quite bitterly of one who was doing something he had just been doing himself, in a way that plainly showed there was no self-judgment. He was blind to his own sin; but his eyes were fully open to the same in others. To such an one—when we are in a position to bring home that charge—the words, “Thou art the man,” are most suitable. How fearfully exact are the charges which Nathan brings up before the amazed monarch, when he must send home the arrow! One would suppose Nathan had been by the side of David all through his plotting, and accomplishing his dark deeds. Did Nathan wish to speak so when he entered the king’s presence? No. And his course of procedure proved this. And in it all we see the long-suffering of God. “Shall I suffer like David if I fail—if I fall into some sin?” asks some dear one, as he longs to be like Christ, and feels his sad deficiencies. I answer, No, most emphatically. It was because David fell, and continued in sin without self-judgment—without confession. Such is the maddest course we can possibly pursue. Everything that brings in faith, we are apt to treat lightly. Confession of sin is a real act of faith. In it I acknowledge at once my failure and my complete dependence on grace.
We sometimes think because we feel we may repeat the sin, perhaps immediately, that we may then say— “What is the use of confessing it I really want to overcome some sinful habit, we will suppose. I fail daily in my attempts to get over it. Am I to confess my failure honestly every time I fall? Why, my doing so will only remind me of my constant delinquency. Yes, just-so. Ah! pride makes the confession a painful thing in such a case. And if there was real, honest self-judgment and confession, there would not be the painful repetition of the offense. The repetition proves the lack of straightforward acknowledgment before our God and Father. If I see a believer continually falling, I am sure he is neglecting self-judgment. David neglected it, and tremendous were the consequences. Nathan had to tell him all he did, before the words were extracted from the hardened backslider— “I have sinned.” “The sword of the Spirit” had to act with its living and powerful piercings, ere a word of confession dropped from the wretched king’s mouth. The silent actings of the Spirit were discarded for many months; the clear tones of Nathan’s fitting parable were unheard by conscience; and now every word must be dropped like molten fire into David’s soul. One by one do the arrows stick fast in him. But God will, in grace, have His child brought back—as much His child when backsliding as ever—cost what it may. The acknowledgment must come— “I have sinned.”
I would draw attention to what Nathan said after David’s condemnation of the supposed injurer of the poor man, and the words he uttered after the confession— “I have sinned against the Lord.” When his crimes are fully brought home, and before any acknowledgment comes from the lips of the king, we have the judgment that God must send upon him declared— “Now, therefore, the sword shall never depart from thine house; because thou hast despised me, and hast taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be thy wife. Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will raise up evil against thee out of thine own house, and I will take thy wives before thine eyes, and give them unto thy neighbor, and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight of this sun. For thou didst it secretly: but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the sun.” I believe these judgments followed because David continued in sin without confession. Had he fully acknowledged what he had done at the time of his fall—had he humbled himself before the Lord at once, I do not think the words— “Now, therefore,” would have been uttered by Nathan. “When we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, in order that we should not be condemned with the world.” This is the result when we do not judge ourselves.
I ask my readers to examine the language of Nathan. He does not say— “Because thou hast fallen and hast given way to a sudden temptation.” Nor does he even say— “Because thou hast slain Uriah.” He accuses him of despising the Lord. Instead of immediate return to Him against whom he had sinned, David hardened his neck and despised that grace on which he should have at once thrown himself. David’s life was forfeited by his sin: acknowledgment would have brought on tremendous consequences. Again, the prophet adds— “and hast taken the wife of Uriah to be thy wife.” According to chap. 11:27, this did not take place until sometime after Uriah’s death. Nathan virtually tells the king that most of the sufferings he must now undergo were brought on himself because he hardened his heart, “as in the provocation, and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness.” The proof of David’s “finished” sin (James 1:1515Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. (James 1:15)) is laid before his eyes. Had he confessed his sin, and cast himself on the full and boundless grace of Him who had said to him before his fall, “I was with thee whithersoever thou wentest,” the words could not have been uttered in the terrible fullness in which Nathan must put them. Little the headstrong despiser of a Father’s grace knows what he is bringing on himself by continuance in sin because confession is neglected.
It is a truly humbling thing—is it not? —to have to come to our Father time after time and honestly make “a clean breast” of the matter before Him. How it reminds us of our own powerlessness to do, or give up, anything; and at the same time it proves that we know we are wrong, and want to give up all that is contrary to our God’s, “high calling.” How unspeakably precious are the words to him who sees what sin is and what a Father is— “If any sin, we have an Advocate (One beside our Father and in His presence for us—παράκλητος) with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: and he is the propitiation for our sins”!
“If failure and grievous failure,” writes this brother, “comes in through unwatchfulness, still don’t mistrust Him: He will never leave nor forsake you.” When ‘Satan’ brings in guilt upon the soul, and we feel we have dishonored the Lord, we feel it difficult then to come. But that is the time to come—remembering that it is to us a. throne of ‘grace’ —that we have an Advocate with the Father. When we are walking in communion, then it is easy to come; but when we fail, then it is difficult—and of course Satan, who has dragged us into the snare, seeks to drive us away the farther.
“The case must be fully laid before the Lord. Oh, what comfort when we could not tell man—perhaps even our brethren! We have such a One as ‘Jesus’ is, to whom we can unburden our whole hearts, and keep back nothing. What a sympathizing heart, what an attentive ear listens to us! Oh, that we could but realize this more—His care, His watchfulness, His tenderness, His sympathy in all our afflictions and trials, His unchanging love for us, even when we grow cold and forget Him!
“I suppose these exercises we are sometimes allowed to pass through, are needful. We have to learn the evil that is in our hearts—the love, the grace that is in His. We prize Him the more our hearts are the more drawn towards Him; we see we owe our salvation to Him from first to last, and that we cannot live or move without Him.”
“If you be still in distress, you must ask Him to undertake for you entirely. When you find you can do nothing, that is the time. Lean over ENTIRELY upon Him: He won’t complain: He wants you to prove His love—His strength—the sufficiency of His grace.”
“I hope —still continues learning of Him. If we begin to decline, there is no knowing where we shall stop; and there is often a great falling away INWARDLY when there is little or no noticeable change outwardly. We have a subtle enemy to deal with.
“It is going on with the Lord—learning His love, His faithfulness -that my heart is drawn out towards Him in love. The union is more and more realized, while I am, at the same time, kept faithful.
“I grieve to say that most of the Lord’s people I have met with here do not appear ever to have known what it is to be brought out of the world. It is not that they have fallen back; but they have never got up (to the place) to fall down.”
Surely this quotation is not out of place. May the gracious Lord give us to know what it means to have the heart “established with grace.” Such is truly “a good thing.” Heb. 13.
How marvelously the grace of the Lord shines out when David really makes confession of his sin. Nathan seems to have been longing to hear it come from his lips. Not a thought—not a word does he put in between the confession and the forgiveness:— “And David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord. And Nathan said unto David, The Lord also loath put away thy sin: thou shalt not die.” A doubt upon the mind after confession as to whether forgiveness is vouchsafed, like all unbelief, is often the cause of indifference in walk; and experience has to come in to prove what should have been simply received by faith, namely, that when I have confessed my sin, I have my Father’s forgiveness. Self-judgment —real and deep—will give my Father the joy of lessening the pain which judgment upon me must incur. We must not dictate to the Lord as to what way He may chasten us. It may be to draw us to Himself and whisper— “I am not going to chastise you this time: Keep close to my heart and voice in future.” Get in between His rod and His heart, and He will not smite you, unless it seems better to Him for your good.
Perhaps we have not a deeper or blacker instance of backsliding than David’s; but the moment he acknowledged his sin, God’s faithfulness is proved in the words— “The Lord also hath put away thy sin: thou shalt not die.”
But God’s ways must be vindicated before others. Hence, after David’s sin is put away, we read— “Howbeit, because by this deed thou past given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also that is born unto thee shall surely die.” Others could not understand how God could work in David’s conscience, how His Spirit could pierce him through and through with remorse and anguish on account of his sin. Oh, I have we not felt, when we have dishonored God before others, with painful reality, that all our explanations and honest confessions to them that we are deserving of their rebukes and scorn, will not remove the indelible marks we have fixed in their minds. They may never again credit the profession we make, but ever look upon us with suspicion. As far as we are concerned, we have proved to them that we have been but a huge lie. They are often more ready to believe this, than that we are liars. David’s child must die: God’s governmental dealings must take their course.
But let us follow the mercy remembered in the midst of judgment. It is true of the believer in everything that “all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” The child dies, and David arises from the earth, and washes, and anoints himself, and changes his apparel, and comes into the house of the Lord, and worships. The hand of judgment must fall; but the blow sends the now really humbled saint into the presence of the Lord. The last time we read of the king coming thither was in chapter 7. Can it be, as he now sits before the Lord once more, that he remembers that scene-the hour when he burst forth in thanksgiving for the intelligence Nathan then brought him— “Also, the Lord telleth thee he will make thee a house?”
Blessing comes, not from an attempt to recover that which God has pronounced irrecoverable, but by beginning with God himself Had not God said— “The child also that as born unto thee shall surely die?” David seemed to suppose the way of blessing was by repentance, in order to restore what God cannot give back. How often we hear of souls praying to have sin eradicated in them—to have “the old man” made better. Such prayers cannot be answered; for God has already pronounced the doom of “the old man:” he must return unto the ground whence he was taken. He is judicially crucified as regards the believer. He cannot be restored or improved. David had to learn God’s way of blessing. Through death he learns resurrection. He returns from, the house of the Lord with the consciousness that he is a heavenly man. What mean the words— “I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me?”! David, your eye is resting on “the sure mercies” —a Messiah after the flesh, rejected, and exalted in the heavens as “a Prince (Leader) and Saviour.” One declared to be the Son of God in power, out from resurrection of the dead. The child you have been mourning over is a type of Him who must die for sin; and you shall go to Him. Your body of humiliation shall be changed with ours, David; you shall assuredly find your place in the heavenly city. “The Lord will build you a house” above, for you are to have no rest below. You will be partaker not only of Jehovah’s rest, but also of the Father’s rest.
Your Solomon, no doubt, in the person of an exalted Lord, shall reign over the house of Jacob; but as Jedidiah he shall, in the same Lord, have a higher place still. Connect the words, “I shall go to him,” with the words, “Then David arose from the earth... and came into the house of the Lord and worshipped,” and we get, it seems to me, the earthly man passing into the heavenly in his own consciousness. As he arose and anointed himself and changed his apparel, he, no doubt, could utter the language of Psa. 16— “Thou wilt show me the path of life: in thy presence is fullness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.” What a coming into God’s house that was! “But as for me,” he could say, “I will come into thy house in the multitude of thy mercy; and in thy fear will I worship toward thy holy temple.” Did he learn there that, although the heir “according to the flesh” was passed away, he could gaze on the heir in the glory (as in Psa. 2, 110.) and say, not— “I shall remain on earth in millennial blessedness, and look up towards an exalted Lord in heaven,” but— “shall go to him?” And David will be amid the heavenly sons whom God is bringing into glory—having called them “by glory and virtue.”
There is something magnificent in all this. Judgment must fall on the beloved one for his sin, and ere he feels the blow he receives blessing in his own soul that he probably never received before. The same Nathan is again sent to him. He had fulfilled the “washing” so admirably that the repentant and restored one can happily meet him. How beautiful is this! When we have gone to restore. our brother, have we done it in such “a spirit of meekness” that he will gladly receive us again, as we run, with willing feet, to bring some news to gladden his heart? If we find him unwilling to meet us, let us take heed lest our own feet may not need to be washed (Num. 19:21, 2221And it shall be a perpetual statute unto them, that he that sprinkleth the water of separation shall wash his clothes; and he that toucheth the water of separation shall be unclean until even. 22And whatsoever the unclean person toucheth shall be unclean; and the soul that toucheth it shall be unclean until even. (Numbers 19:21‑22)) because of the uncleanness incurred by active flesh in ourselves. David needed support to be able to bear the afflictions he brings on himself because of his sin and hardness of heart in despising the Lord.
What! Will God send judgment and enable us to bear it? Does such not seem a contradiction? All our Father’s ways are manifest contradictions to the world. The father’s child must suffer. He is in a scene where all is under judgment. He must pass his time of sojourning here in fear, though he knows he is redeemed. If he falls before the world, and has caused enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, judgment—perhaps very heavy—may have to follow him. He bows under it, and can be filled with love, consolation, and his Father’s heart, all the way as he passes through it. It was so with David. The heart of man—the heart of the legal believer—cannot understand this. Man will stand amazed at the words that follow David’s confession— “I have sinned against the Lord.” What! was there immediate and unconditional forgiveness? Yes. “I should have thought he should have said, ‘I have sinned against Uriah—against man,’” says man. Nay, listen— “Against thee, thee only, have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight.” It was because David could thus confess his sin that the words followed— “The Lord also hath put away thy sin.” He had sinned before man too, and deeply injured his neighbor. That must not be forgotten either; and the believer who has really found out he has sinned against the Lord (against his Father now) is the very one who cannot have an easy conscience until the injury he has caused to others is—if possible—fully and straightforwardly made good. He must maintain a conscience void of offense toward God and toward men. But God first, man afterward. And that Father, to whom he has honestly confessed, will bear him up in his—often—painful work of restoring “fourfold.”
Such is grace. The blow must be given, and then grace comes in to support us under it—yes, and make all “work together” for our good. “Leave him to suffer as he richly deserves,” says law, and man the boaster of law. “I will take him in my arms,” says grace, “while the rod falls.”
And so it is, my reader. If so, how are we acting towards others? Are we not to act towards them as those who are under grace ourselves? Are we claiming our rights down here? A dead and buried man has no rights in the scene to which he is buried. “But I am alive,” says the believing reader. Yes, but it is a life belonging to another scene you have; and that life has no right to be asserted down here now. Our Life is sitting on a throne of grace.
It was this grace that David cast himself on:— “I have sinned against the Lord.” It was not— “I have transgressed against the law,” however true the latter acknowledgment might have been. His confession rose far above law, and went deeper than it could lead the soul. He cast himself on grace, and found it fully. The law claimed his life as a man; then “after this the judgment.” All is settled by grace. “The Lord also (what a contrast between law and grace!) hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die.” When a believer puts himself consciously under law when confessing sin, he adds to his misery, and wonders why. Has he not obeyed the words— “If we confess our sins?” Wherefore his wretchedness? Ought he not to feel relieved of his burden? Nay. “The law is not of faith:” it is “the strength of sin.” Resting on law may lead to attempted self-justification. “Neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment.” But faith believes what God says. As my Father, I—His child—confess my sins to Him. I must know I am coming to my Father, or—even if I confess them—I shall not be relieved, and the deeper the self-judgment, the greater the fear.
Two things, then, are needful in confession—honest, full, and unreserved acknowledgment of failure, and the consciousness that I am coming to my Father, from whose love nothing can sever me. This will lead to deeper views of sin: we shall not be afraid to estimate it fully.
Blessed Jesus! give us to know what that grace is into which Thou hast brought us, as highly-favored in Thyself—the Beloved.
S. O. M. C.
Note. —The word “burdens” in Gal. 6:22Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ. (Galatians 6:2) must not be confounded with that rendered “burden” in verse 5. They are different words in the Greek. The first implies oppression from some grievance—such as being weighed down by reason of affliction. We have it used in Matt. 20:1212Saying, These last have wrought but one hour, and thou hast made them equal unto us, which have borne the burden and heat of the day. (Matthew 20:12) in the complaint of the workmen wearied with work in the vineyard: they had “borne the burden and heat of the day.” The use of this word βαρος, seems very suitable in Acts 15:2828For it seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things; (Acts 15:28). It is not φορτιον, as in Gal. 6:55For every man shall bear his own burden. (Galatians 6:5), which gives the thought of responsibility, but the word is used which would imply a burden from inflictive authority. βαρος is the word rendered weight in 2 Cor. 4 it is not some burden I am carrying from a sense of bearing my responsibility before God. It is the oppression—if I might use such a word in connection with such a theme—from a sense of the fullness and depth of glory. The word is again used in Rev. 2:2424But unto you I say, and unto the rest in Thyatira, as many as have not this doctrine, and which have not known the depths of Satan, as they speak; I will put upon you none other burden. (Revelation 2:24), and in one other place-1 Thess. 2:66Nor of men sought we glory, neither of you, nor yet of others, when we might have been burdensome, as the apostles of Christ. (1 Thessalonians 2:6). The adjective βαρυς is used in 1 John 5:33For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous. (1 John 5:3)-” His commandments are not grievous; there is no oppression in them. The verb is used for being “heavy with sleep” in the Gospels; and in 2 Cor. 1:88For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life: (2 Corinthians 1:8) it is rendered “were pressed,” and in v. 4, “being burdened;” in 1 Tim. 5:1616If any man or woman that believeth have widows, let them relieve them, and let not the church be charged; that it may relieve them that are widows indeed. (1 Timothy 5:16), “be charged.”
In Gal. 6:55For every man shall bear his own burden. (Galatians 6:5), the word is from the same root as that rendered tribute, φορος, in Luke 20:2222Is it lawful for us to give tribute unto Caesar, or no? (Luke 20:22); Rom. 13:6, 76For for this cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God's ministers, attending continually upon this very thing. 7Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor. (Romans 13:6‑7). In Matt. 11:3030For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. (Matthew 11:30) it appears in connection with the blessed responsibility we bear with Jesus, the Son of the Father. Man may bind “heavy burdens” φαρτία βαρεα; notice-both words are here, oppression and responsibilities; his burdens are many; ours is one, as in Christ— “My burden is light,” and “each shall bear his own burden.” The grievances may be various, and we are, each one, to help one another in them—to “weep with those that weep,” and “lift up the hands that hang down, and the feeble knees.” It is the verb φορτιζειν which is used in Matt. 11:2828Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. (Matthew 11:28), translated “heavy laden.” Most suitable word! The poor repenting one cannot meet his responsibilities as one in the first Adam’s race, and such will ever be the consciousness of those repenting till peace is found.