SA 11-19" He restoreth my soul," says David, while recounting in the twenty-third Psalm, the wonderful ways of his Divine Shepherd. And who, among all the sacred penmen, could be better prepared than David, to sing of restoring grace? Precious was the grace that had chosen him when least in his father's house, and taken him from the sheep-fold to be ruler over God's people, Israel. But surely the grace which restored his soul, when, through his own sin and folly, he had fallen from the eminence on which he had been placed, shines more brightly still. May our hearts be humbled and refreshed while we meditate a little on the above scripture, unfolding to us, as it does, a part of the process by which the Lord restored the psalmist's soul; as well as revealing something of the tone of his soul when thus restored.
Nothing can be more solemn than the proof afforded us by David's history, of what our poor hearts are. Does it not rehearse to us the serious lesson which, alas! we are so slow to learn, that no past experience of the Lord's goodness, no measure of communion with Him in bygone days, no amount of favor shown us by the Lord, is any safeguard against present temptation? Nay, that without the present exercise of His gracious, preserving power, to keep and to uphold us, all the blessing we have enjoyed in the past, is in danger of being perverted by our wretched hearts into an occasion of self-complacency and self-indulgence. It was when David had been brought by the hand of God, through all the dangers and trials of his exile under Saul, when he had obtained undisputed possession of the throne, to which God had appointed him;-it was after he had Celebrated the Lord's dealings with him thus in a number of those wondrous Psalms in which we may see how his soul had been leaning on God, and learning God, amid the many trials which had marked his path;-it was after all this, when God had given him rest and prosperity on every side, that he for-gat God, and was left of Him to experience the meaning of that word, " Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin! And sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death" (James 1:14, 1514But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. 15Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. (James 1:14‑15)).
Not to dwell on the well known circumstances of David's fall, there is one fact claiming special notice, as showing that there is no more natural or inherent power of recovery in a saint, then there is in an unconverted sinner. A saint when fallen, can no more restore himself, than a poor sinner can save himself at first. The alone Savior is the alone Restorer too. When David's eye had enkindled the unholy flame in David's heart, and when, left to himself, he had plunged headlong into sin, were there immediate risings of compunction in his breast? Did he at once perceive how deeply he had fallen, and how terribly he had dishonored God? Did he at once confess his sin, and return to the Lord with weeping and supplication? Alas! no; we read of no such thing. So far from this, when David had defiled himself, and dishonored his God, his only thought seems to have been how he could shield his own character from infamy by the concealment of his sin. And it was thus he was led into still greater enormities. If, by pretended kindness, he could have made Uriah the instrument of hiding the wrong which had been done to him, as well as the dishonor done to God, David was' willing enough that it should be so; and he tried this plan first. But at any cost his character must be maintained, and his shame Concealed. And hence, when Uriah's fidelity to his master, and his deep sense of the honor put upon him, as a soldier of Israel, leads him to decline the king's offers, and prefer fellowship with his comrades in the hardships they were enduring in the open field, to resting comfortably in his own house, and in his own bed, this noble, self-renouncing fidelity makes him the victim of David's pride. Uriah's life must be sacrificed rather than David's character be stained. He is to be slain too by the sword of the children of Ammon. And as a still further illustration of the hardening effect of sin upon the conscience, Joab is selected as the agent to execute the king's will. As I remember another to have observed, when David's heart was right, the sons of Zeruiah were too hard for him; but now the most crafty and cruel of Zeruiah's sons is the instrument well suited to the work in which it was in David's heart to employ him. And all was permitted, for the time being, to succeed. Everything occurred exactly to his mind. The voice of the only one, as he thought, who could bear witness against him, was hushed in death. His faithless wife, when she hears that her husband is dead, mourns for him. "And when the mourning was past, David sent and fetched her to his house, and she became his wife, and bare him a son." "But," adds the sacred penman (and how it falls upon the ear like the death-knell of all David's prospective enjoyment) "the thing that David had done displeased the Lord." Better for us, infinitely better, to be wading through deepest waters of trial, with the smile of God upon our ways, than in circumstances of ease and prosperity, to have it recorded of us, "the thing that he had done displeased the Lord."
Nearly twelve months, at least, had elapsed, and there was not the slightest symptom of contrition on the part of David. Nay, so deep was the slumber into which he had sunk, that when Nathan, commissioned of the Lord, had addressed to him the parable of the rich man who passed by his own flocks and herds, to regale himself and his friends on the one ewe lamb of his poor neighbor, the indignation of the monarch arose, and he passed immediate sentence on the wretch who had done this; never perceiving that he was thus passing sentence on himself: It was requisite for the prophet to apply the parable as well as to speak it, before the least vitality was manifest in David's conscience. "Thou art the man," however, comes home to his conscience; and David at once acknowledges "I have sinned against the Lord." As immediate is the response to this confession, "the Lord also hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die." Thus does the Lord meet in full grace the first motion of the wanderer's heart towards Him; yea, knowing as he did, that that heart would never have moved towards Him at all, if left to itself. It was the Shepherd who had sought the sheep, not the sheep that had sought the Shepherd. And now that the first bleat of penitential sorrow bears witness that the stray one had been not only sought but found, how does the joy of the Shepherd's heart flow out, in the consolatory assurance " The Lord also hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die." Would that this touching display of the perfect grace of God might be used of the Holy Spirit, both to break and to comfort the heart of some stray sheep of His flock, whose eye may rest upon these pages.
Here then let us pause for a moment, and contemplate the first stage in the restoring process. Bitter and heavy, and long continued chastenings from the hand of God, are to follow this first step; but before a single stripe is inflicted, the soul is brought to perfect rest before God in the assurance that it is for edification, not for destruction, that it is thus dealt with. A ministry is needed, it is true, to make David sensible of his sin, and willing to acknowledge it; but the moment that ministry is successful, and David acknowledges his iniquity, that moment he is assured of full forgiveness. " The Lord hath put away thy sin." All the chastening follows in the train of this. " Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death." Grace rescues David, so that he dies not; but the child must die. The Lord's enemies have had fearful occasion given them to blaspheme; and before all the Lord must make it manifest that He neither sanctions David's sin, nor winks at it. David himself, moreover, has to learn through all this, what an evil and bitter thing it is to forsake God. All these, and other objects, have to be accomplished; and in order to them, the sword is never to depart from David's house. The indignity and wrong he had done to Uriah secretly, has to be done to him openly before the sun. But needful, yea, indispensable, as all this is, 'ere a single stroke of the rod descends, David is assured that his sin is put away, he shall not die. And is not this the Lord's way with us still, beloved? Many a question He may have to settle with us in detail; He may have, as it were, to disown our ways in the sight of all; that so His name be not dishonored; but is it not still his way to strengthen us to endure all this, by assuring us of free forgiveness for all; and that, however he may have to sift and chasten us, it is not in anger, but in love; that it is because he is for us, and not against us. Yea; and the heart, thus strengthened, can take God's side against our own crooked ways, when his grace has assured us that it is against our ways, not our persons, that His dealings are directed.
And yet let us give ear to the exhortation which speaketh unto us as unto children, "My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord." It is no trifling matter to be under the chastening hand of God. He is not like the soft and indulgent parent, who spares the rod and spoils the child. True, he afflicts not willingly; nor does he administer a single stroke that is not absolutely needed. But then on the other hand, He does not withhold a single stroke that is needed. He has no false tenderness. Think of what David passed through-the death of his child, after all his fastings and prayers, and wearing of sackcloth, in the vain hope of turning aside the stroke:- the dishonor of another child of his, leading as it did to the slaughter of the guilty Amnon, by his brother and hers, the willful Absalom. What a voice must all this have had in David's conscience! How, at every turn, it must have reminded him of his own sin. And then, after the lapse of years, Absalom, first exiled, and now restored, rebels against his father. Having stolen the hearts of the people, the conspiracy being ripe, he gets himself proclaimed king, and David has to flee for his life from Jerusalem. His long tried and hitherto faithful counselor, Ahithophel, is banded with his own son to destroy him. And when Ahithophel advises to pursue after the hoary-headed king, and come upon him while he is weary and weak-handed; "and I will smite," says he, "the king only;"-this infernal counsel meets with the warmest response from Absalom and his followers. "And the saying pleased Absalom well, and all the elders of Israel." What must David's heart have felt, when, in banishment from his beloved Jerusalem and the house of his God, he hears of. Absalom's thirst for his blood. And Israel, too, ready and eager to fight the battles of the rebellious son against his father, the Lord's anointed. Little did David anticipate this when fulfilling the lusts of his flesh and of his mind. But such were 'the bitter consequences of his ways; and if by all this God was sheaving his hatred of the sin which, nevertheless, he had put away, surely David must have learned by it all, with deepening horror and self-loathing, what the true character of his sin was.
And so he did. Beautiful is the meekness with which he bows to the hand that smites him. See his care for the ark of God. " And all the country wept with a loud voice, and all the people passed over: the king also himself passed over the brook Kidron, and all the people passed over, toward the way of the wilderness. And lo, Zadok also, and all the Levites with him, bearing the ark of the covenant of God: and they set down the ark of God: and Abiathar went up, until all the people had done passing out of the city. And the king said unto Zadok, carry back the ark of God into the city: if I shall find favor in the eyes of the Lord, he will bring me again, and show me both it, and his habitation." Precious as it was in his eyes, he would not have the ark of God to be the companion of his wanderings, when these wanderings were occasioned by, and the witness of, his sin. If it please God, he shall be brought back to it; but if not, still let not the ark of God be disturbed. " But if he thus say, I have no delight in thee: behold, here am I, let Him do to me as seemeth good unto Him." What prostration of soul is here I How conscious is David of having no claim by nature, and of having forfeited every title resulting from the relationships which grace had established. He is cast entirely on mercy, and mercy is not to be, cannot be dictated to. He is content that it should be with him in everything as the Lord pleases. "And David went up by the ascent of Olivet, and wept as he went up, and had his head covered; and he went barefoot; and all the people that was with him covered every man his head, and they went up weeping as they went up." What a procession. At Bahurim, Shimei curses him and casts stones at him, crying after him, " Come out, come out, thou bloody man, and thou man of Belial: the Lord hath returned upon thee all the blood of the house of Saul, in whose stead thou hast reigned; and the Lord hath delivered the kingdom into the hand of Absalom thy son: and behold, thou art taken in thy mischief, because thou art a bloody man." How every word must have gone to his heart. It was not, indeed, as the reviler said, because of the blood of the house of Saul. David had never taken pleasure in their blood; he had spared Saul himself once and again when he had his life in his hands. But this is no comfort to him now. He knows that he has shed blood, innocent blood, and though Shimei be ignorant of it, every word he utters, revives the whole scene in David's memory, and gives it a voice in David's conscience. And see how softly he treads and how meekly he bows. Abishai would go over and take off Shimei's head. But what says David? "What have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah? So let him curse, because the Lord hath said unto him, Curse David. Who shall then say; Wherefore hast thou done so?... Behold my son, which came forth of my bowels, seeketh my life; how much more now may this Benjamite do it? Let him alone, and let him curse; for the Lord hath bidden him." And what is it that enables David thus to "accept the punishment of his iniquity?" The next verse discloses the secret. "It may be that the Lord will look on mine affliction, and that the Lord will requite me good for his cursing this day." His soul has drunk in the consolation of that word. " The Lord hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die;" and now, severe and complicated and apparently interminable as his trials are, he has in the depths of his soul a confidence in God which keeps him from fainting under the rebukes of His holy hand. And now that in the depths of his distress, this expression of confidence in the Lord's grace has been drawn out of him; now that he has fully bowed to all that has come upon him (" I was dumb, I opened not my mouth; because thou didst it") the fact becomes apparent that the worst is over. From this time, the Lord turns his captivity, It is not that it is all over—that he has seen the last of it. No, the sword is never to depart from his house as long he lives. But there is in important turn in his affairs. Instead of being, as it were, given up into the hand of his enemies, the Lord begins now to act manifestly on his behalf. Ahithophel's prudent counsel is rejected by Absalom, and in despair he goes and hangs himself. The two armies of David and Absalom are drawn out for battle, and David receives an affecting proof of the place he fills in the hearts of those who still cleave to him. They insist that he shall not go out to the battle. " The people answered, Thou shalt not go forth; for if we flee away, they will not care for us; but now thou art worth ten thousand of us; therefore now it is better that thou succor us out of the city." The battle is set in array, and very soon the followers of Absalom are discomfited before David's servants. But alas, victory, in a case like this, has its pangs and, its sorrows, scarcely less pungent than those of defeat. When the just judgment of God has armed brother against brother, and father against child, even though victory should be on the side of righteousness, at what a fearful cost is it won. Twenty thousand men of Israel dead on the field can be no matter of rejoicing to Israel's king. Nor is this the worst. David had charged the captains concerning Absalom. (It may be that it was tenderness of nature, but what, save tenderness became one in David's circumstances?) " Deal gently for my sake with the young man, with Absalom. Such were his words and he returned into the city to await the result. Tidings are brought him of the victory which God had graciously wrought. " Is the young man Absalom safe?" was his only reply. Another messenger arrives and proclaims the victory; the same question is proposed to him; and when he replies, "the enemies of my lord the king, and all that rise against thee to do thee hurt, be as that young man is," he can contain no longer. He sees in himself the cause of all these calamities to the nation and to his household-he thinks not of his own deliverance and triumph but of his son's destruction- and he goes away to weep. " And the king was much moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept; and as he went, thus he said, O my son Absalom! my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!" The people catching the spirit of their king and taking his tone, mourn with him. " The victory that day was turned into mourning unto all the people: for the people heard say that day how the king was grieved for his son; and the people gat them by stealth that day into the city, as people being ashamed steal away when they flee in battle." Joab, consummate politician as he was, fears the result of this, and remonstrates with the king. But how apparent in what he says is his total want of sympathy with the feelings of the king, and with the true character of that day's victory. It was the victory of grace, delivering David out of the hands of his willful, rebellious son; but delivering him in such a way as to speak most loudly and distinctly to his heart, that it was for chastisement on his own sin that all this had been permitted to take place. But what is all this to Joab? His heart has not been softened and broken and molded by restoring grace; and so he can taunt the heart-broken parent with his grief. "For this day I perceive, that if Absalom had lived, and all we had died this day, then it had pleased thee well," David makes no reply to his reproaches; but for the people's sake he arises and sits in the gate. The people strive with each other as to who shall have the honor and the joy of bringing the king back. " So the king returned, and came to Jordan. And Judah came to Gilgal, to go to meet the king, to conduct the king over Jordan." There he is met by Shimei of Bahurim. Not that Shimei's heart was changed, or that he had any more love for David than when he had cursed and east stones at him as he went. No; he was one of those whose conduct changes with the change of circumstances. He went with the stream. When David was fleeing for his life, he would heap reproaches and curses upon him. Now that he is returning in safety and triumph, he crouches at his feet, and sues for mercy. " Let not my lord impute iniquity unto me, neither do thou remember that which thy servant did perversely the day that my lord the king went out of Jerusalem, that the king should take it to his heart." Abishai would fain have him put to death. But what says the king? "What have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah, that ye should this day be adversaries to me? Shall there any man be put to death this day in Israel? For do not I know that I am this day king over Israel?" Have we not here two precious secrets as to the spring whence flow the forgiveness of injuries, the long-suffering, the forbearing one another in love, which are so largely enjoined on us in the New Testament. David was here acting on principles altogether beyond the dispensation under which he lived. His personal need and failure had made grace everything to him. And if there was a triumph that day it was the triumph of grace. And shall he celebrate the triumphs of the grace that had delivered him out of the pit which he had dug for himself, and was now restoring him to Jerusalem and the sanctuary and the throne from all which his own sin had banished him-shall he celebrate the triumphs of restoring grace like this by avenging his own quarrel and executing justice on Shimei? His heart recoils utterly from the thought. " Shall, there any man be put to death this day in Israel!" Besides, what need? Is it questionable whether David is to wield the scepter and fill the throne? If it were still a disputed point, there might be some ground for proceeding to extremities with one like Shimei. But when God has fought our battles, we surely have no need to fight them ourselves. " Do not I know that I am this day king over Israel. Therefore the king said unto Shimei, Thou shalt not die. And the king sware unto him." Thus did the grace which had restored his soul, and the assured certainty of all the blessing which that grace had bestowed, become with David the ground on which to act in full grace to his now humbled and crouching adversary. It was not a question of what Shimei deserved, no, nor whether Shimei was really humbled. His deservings were evident enough, and his humiliation was sufficiently questionable. But was it for the one who owed all he had twice over to the boundless grace of God, and who had all secured to him by the certainty of that grace, to avenge himself or enforce the claims of justice on another? The Lord grant us, beloved, to walk towards each other, and toward all, in the deep and abiding sense of what grace has done for us; not saving grace alone, but restoring grace as well.
But another scene invites our attention here. Mephibosheth, the son of Saul, whom David had taken into his house and fed at his table, to skew the kindness of God to him, comes down to meet the king. Ziba, his servant, had belied him to the king. The provisions which Mephibosheth had prepared for the king when he was leaving Jerusalem, Ziba, his servant, had carried (taking advantage of his master's lameness), as though they were his own gift to the king, and, misrepresenting his master, had obtained possession of his master's inheritance. Now Mephibosheth comes out to meet the 'king. And it is the Holy Ghost, not Mephibosheth himself, that says, "he had neither dressed his feet, nor trimmed his beard, nor washed his clothes, from the day the king departed, until the day he came again in peace. How affecting is this testimony! And what a specimen of what we should be, beloved, during the absence of Jesus. Rejected by his own people, and by the earth, as David was driven from Jerusalem, what joy can we, poor debtors to his love, find in anything here, till the moment of his return? "Can ye make the children of the bridechamber fast, while the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come," said Jesus, "when the bridegroom shall be taken away from them; and then shall they fast in those days." Surely this is the period of the Church's fasting; and to the heart that knows the Bridegroom's love, what joy can be afforded by the world that once crucified and still rejects Him? Would that we were more constrained by the love of Christ, Mephibosheth-like, to value nothing, care for nothing, attempt to satisfy ourselves with nothing, short of meeting the Bridegroom on his return with joy. Mephibosheth now had what satisfied his heart. He had the king back again. He makes no complaint of Ziba, save in answer to the king's inquiry, "Wherefore wentest thou not with me, Mephibosheth?" He says enough to explain the cause; but he leaves all in the king's hands. "He hath slandered thy servant, unto my lord the king; but my lord the king is as an angel of God; do, therefore, what is good in thine eyes. For all my father's house were but dead men before my lord the king; yet didst thou set thy servant among them that did eat at thine own table. What right, therefore, have I yet to cry any more unto the king." Blessed reasoning! All that Mephibosheth had to look for naturally at the hand of David, was death. But David had shown him mercy. He had not only spared his life, but set him at his own table, and treated -him as though he had been his own son. What right then has he to complain, or to cry any more to the king? Nothing slays the disposition to assert our rights and defend ourselves, but the knowledge of the grace which, when we had no right to anything but death and perdition placed us amongst God's children at our Father s table..But there is something more blessed still. Not only does the sense of the degradation of his own natural condition, reconcile Mephibosheth to forego any vindication of himself; his joy, his delight in the king's presence, leaves him no motive for self-vindication, no wish for anything but what he has. The king says, " Thou and Ziba divide the land; and Mephibosheth said unto the king, Yea, let him take all, forasmuch as my lord the king is come again in peace unto his own house. Oh that there were more of this spirit in each of us, beloved. When Jesus actually returns, and we meet him in the air, how insignificant will all those things appear about which so many are so anxious now. And what is the province of faith, but so to realize in the present, what we know will be in the future, as to be enabled to act as though it were existent now. The Lord grant us all that deadness to the world, that weanedness from its pleasures and its cares, which we should feel became us, if we were actually present with Jesus, and beholding His glory. He is as really ours, and His love should be as distinctly the one satisfying portion of our hearts, as though these eyes had actually beheld Him, and these ears heard His shouts of gladness, as He descends into the air to take His ransomed to Himself. Who are they that will participate of His joy in that day? Who but they that like Mephibosheth, have been waiting, with world-weaned affections, and longing eyes, and breaking hearts, for His return. Surely to such, that return will leave nothing to desire or ask.
One scene more is opened to us in this scripture to crown the triumphs of grace. David, in his exile, had not only a Mephibosheth behind him, whose love made him a stranger to all joy till he returned; he had those, who with equal love, ministered to his refreshment, and that of his followers, when they had crossed the Jordan. "And it came to pass, when David was come to Mahanaim, that Shobi, the son of Nahash of Rabbah, of the children of Ammon, and Machir, the son of Ammiel, of Lo-debar, and Barzillai, the Gileadite of Rogelim, brought beds, and basins, and earthen vessels, and wheat, and barley, and flour, and parched corn, and beans, and lentiles, and parched pulse, and honey, and butter, and sheep, and cheese of kine, for David, and for the people that were with him, to eat; for they said, the people is hungry, and weary, and thirsty, in the wilderness" (chap. 17:27-29). Before this, when the king was just setting out from Jerusalem, Ittai, the Gittite, came after him. " Then said the king to Ittai, the Gittite, wherefore goest thou also with us? Return to thy place, and abide with the king; for thou art a stranger, and also an exile. Whereas thou camest but yesterday, should I this day make thee go up and down with us? Seeing I go whither I may, return then, and take back thy brethren; mercy and truth be with thee." But Ittai could not be dissuaded. His attachment to David was independent of circumstances. It was an attachment to his person that made him covet a share in his sorrows and his toils, as much as in his honors and his joys. " And Ittai answered the king, and said, As the Lord liveth, and as my lord the king liveth, surely in what place my lord the king shall be, whether in death or life, even there also will thy servant be" (chap. 15:19-21). What does all this remind us of, beloved. Surely there are lessons for us here. This is the period during which David's royal, Son and Lord is rejected by Jerusalem and the earth just as David was exiled and driven across the Jordan, by a rebellion of a great part of the nation in that day. An interval occurred between his journey from Jerusalem and his return to it in peace and triumph. Was his exile altogether unpitied and uncheered? No, there was a Mephibosheth to mourn for him, and Ittai to accompany him, and Ammonites, Gileadites, and others, to minister to him. Is there nothing here to remind us of Jesus, cheered and refreshed during his exile from the earth, by the faith, the devotedness, the service, the longing of heart for His return, of poor sinners, chiefly of the Gentiles, like Ittai and Shobi, whose hearts have been won by His grace, and made to prize HIM, and covet to know HIM, and to serve HIM, even though it be in the fellowship of His sufferings; and in being made conformable to His death. And what is the issue of this on his return? " Now Barzillai, the Gileadite, came down from Rogelim, and went over Jordan with the king, to conduct him over Jordan... And the king said unto Barzillai, Come thou over with me, and I will feed thee with me in Jerusalem." Barzillai's reply shows clearly enough that it was love to the king, and the joy of ministering to him, which had been the spring of his service; not any selfish eye to a reward. "Thy servant will go a little way over Jordan with the king; and why should the king recompense it with such a reward?" He asks that Chimham, his son, may go. "And the king answered, Chimham shall go over with me, and I will do to him that which shall seem good unto thee; and whatsoever thou shalt require of me, that will I do for thee." And will not Jesus, when He returns, have His rewards for those who have continued with Him in His temptations, who have shared the fellowship of His sufferings, and who, in the patience of hope, have waited 'for Him till then? Oh yes! Whether we view the Church as a stranger to all earthly joy, like Mephibosheth, her heart breaking for the return of her absent lord; or whether we regard her in the activities of affectionate service, like these honored Gentiles, and others, who ministered to David in his exile, the perfect answer to all will be found in His return. The heart that has sighed for HIM will find in HIM then the fullness of eternal joy. The cup of cold water administered to any in His name, will not fail of its reward then. They, who through grace, have known, and loved, and owned, and served Him, now, during His rejection, will be owned, and blest, and rewarded both by Him and with Him, then. May He Himself be more singly the object of all our hearts!