HERE are three kings, and which is the happiest? Why David, to be sure. And why? Because he says (Psa. 32:55I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Selah. (Psalm 32:5)), “I acknowledged my sin unto Thee, and mine iniquity I covered not. I said, I will confess my transgression to Jehovah; and Thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin”; and this I take to be the way of real happiness for a sinner.
The king had made a clean breast of it before God, and therein lay the basis of his happiness. He had not, as with so many, asked forgiveness and never got the assurance of it. No. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
David had anticipated the work of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross, and by the Spirit describes his own state in this Psalm. Guilt had been brought home to him by the Word of God through Nathan the prophet. He had said, “When I kept silence my bones waxed old through my groaning all the day long; for day and night Thy hand was heavy upon me.” He then finds a resource in the God against whom he had sinned,—as he says, “Against Thee, and Thee only, have I sinned;” and God compassed the repentant king with songs of deliverance, until David himself began to sing, and to call others to join him. Psalms 33 is his song of praise, as “he entered into the house of Jehovah, and worshipped.” It is the expression of a conscience relieved and a heart unburdened.
Depend upon it, dear unconverted reader, that God will have it all out with you. Like a photographer, He has the plate of all your sins. Time will not efface them from the “book.” It only needs the development of the great white throne to bring them all before you. (Rev. 20).
There was once a mighty King of Babylon, Belshazzar by name, whose sinful condition was shown to him by a candle, which threw its light on God’s written verdict of him, and who after hearing his own sentence was killed in his own capital. But to you God is waiting to be gracious. “He willeth not the death of sinners;” but He does will that you should turn and repent.
Now what is sorrowful as to the other two kings, is that there is no mention of anything as to confession of sin. In the history of King Solomon, the richest and the wisest, we read (Eccl. 1 and 2) that he strained every physical and intellectual power to reach happiness, yet had to exclaim at the end of his search, “Vanity, and the pursuit of the wind.” Ah! he did not go the right way to get it, and what was so joyous to his father was unknown to him; for he sought mirth and gladness in the gratification of lusts and pleasures. He made trial of the world in every sense of the term, and bitter disappointment was the result. Listen to him as he says, “The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing!” What a sad experience. And further on he adds, “Wherefore I praised the dead who are already dead, more than the living who are yet alive!”
What a verdict! What a sentence to pass on all the greatness of man! His heart was wrong, for it was turned away from God who had so blessed him with such wealth and such honor, and was turned to idolatry of the worst stamp, for he was a worshipper of Moloch, and possibly died as such.
Dear reader, are you a believer or an unbeliever? You may hug the world, but it will tire of you and jilt you in your last moments; and then what bitter remorse!
But for a moment listen to the voice of another, “But surely I count also all things to be loss on account of the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, on account of whom I have suffered the loss of all, and count them filth that I may win Christ.” (Phil. 3:88Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, (Philippians 3:8). N.T.)
What a blessed conclusion at the end of one’s days on earth. He had said, years before, “I counted;” now, at the end of his course, “I count.”
As we close the history of the son of David, another mighty monarch comes before us and presents another condition of soul. He has summoned before him “the certain man, left prisoner by Felix, whose testimony was concerning one Jesus, who was said to be dead, whom Paul affirmed to be alive” (Acts 25 and 26). Indeed, this was the theme of the poor but happy prisoner. Now this king had had the testimony of both Old and New Testaments. As Paul affirmed, he believed the prophets, and these had testified of Christ, and being foster-brother of Manaen (chap. 13.), who is found among the prophets and teachers in the assembly in Antioch; and moreover this aged and bound prisoner boldly stated that the king was “a stranger to none of these things,” ―the Gospel and the truth of Christianity. And though we cannot tell what inward effect it had on him, he scoffingly replied to the Lord’s beloved servant, “In a little thou persuadest me to become a Christian;” which brought forth the magnanimous reply from the aged Paul in bonds; an expression of his intense desire for the blessing of the king and all present with him. But from all accounts, after the evidence of Judaism and Christianity, and the voice of a living apostle whom he exonerated from the accusation made against him, he parried the thrust of the Word of God, and dismissed the faithful witness. Not so the word of God. This will bear testimony in the day of judgment.
Reader, consider these three kings, and receive the truth of God.
J. S. B.