David // David's Self Destruction // Pastor Josh Evans

Father, Lord, we love you. And God, I know there's not a person in this room that is not in need of the mercy that you have for us.

And God, I know that in a crowd this size, there's probably people that have come in here that have a lot of things in their life that maybe nobody else in here sees here today. Things that have happened this week, God, and I pray, Lord, that in the few moments that we have today, that it be a day that everyone could experience and realize their need for your mercy, your grace. God, we're all in need of it each and every day, Father. That's why your mercy is new every single morning. I'm thankful that even in the midst of our sin, your grace is more. Your mercy is more. Bless this time of preaching, for it's in your name we pray. Amen.

You can have a seat. Man, I hope that your heart has been blessed here today. And man, I love music.

And I love the music that our praise team and choir provide for us so that they can prepare our hearts for the preaching of God's Word. And I'm so glad that you are here today. And I really appreciate you being here.

And it's always good to see you in the house. If you have your Bible, go to 2 Samuel 11. And I wanted to mention, I know some of you have asked, at the end of the service, we're going to be taking up a special love offering. Some of our missionaries, David and Hannah Mora, if you're new to our church, Hannah grew up in our church. And they serve in Honduras.

They happen to be in the States right now and on furlough. And so we wanted to be a blessing to them. So at the end of the service, above our tithes and offerings, we're going to have a special offering. And all you need to do is hopefully you came ready to give. We tried to call you, email you, and things like that, and try to keep you in the loop as much as possible. And at the end of the service, at all of our exits, there'll be baskets at all the exits that you can just drop some cash, some spare change.

If you wrote a check, you can make that out to UGBC. And you can drop it off on your way out here today and hopefully you came ready to be generous. And I say this often because it's so true that we can be generous people because we serve a very generous God. And so it's important for us to be generous. We love our missionaries here if you're new to our church and you're learning a little bit about who we are. Let me just say this, that we are a missions-minded church, okay? And that's one of our values.

That's something that's super important here. And we support over 90 missionaries and mission partners around the world. And so when we get a chance to be a blessing to them, our church usually shows up for that. And so that'll happen at the end of the service here today.

And hopefully we'll be a blessing to the Moras and we'll get to see them very soon as they kind of make their way from Florida up here in the next several weeks. Well, hey, listen, we've been in this series through the life of David. And this is just, I know this series has challenged me. And if you're kind of just tuning in to that, I believe everybody to some degree can relate to David. And I hope that you noticed the theme of the music today. It's about the mercy of God. And even though David was a man after God's own heart, he was still in desperate need, like every single person in this room here today, for the mercy of God.

And we're going to see that here today. Second Samuel chapter number 11 in verse one it says this, and it came to pass, after the year was expired, at the time when kings go forth to battle, that David sent Joab his servants with him, and all Israel, and they destroyed the children of Ammon, and they besieged Rabbah, but David tarried still at Jerusalem. And it came to pass in an evening tide that David arose from off his bed, and he walked upon the roof of the king's house, and from the roof he saw a woman washing herself, and the woman was very beautiful to look upon. Now, just to kind of give you a little bit of where we're at, David, we've seen a lot of things over the last several weeks, and so David is the king of Israel, and he's been on his throne. Saul is dead, and David has actually been reigning for years at this point, and so he had all the power, all the prestige that he could ever dream of at this point. He had full control, so if he decided, hey, I'm not going to go to the battle, he had full control at this point to do basically what he wanted, and he had built this nation to where now nobody's going to question him at all, and so he decided to stay back when he should have been at battle. And he sees Bathsheba, and we know the story.

She is bathing on the rooftop. David is that late in the evening just kind of pacing around because he was bored, and he needed to be at battle, and he found himself in danger of sin. So here's what happened, verse 3. And David sent, he inquired after the woman, and one said, it's not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah, the Hittite. And I think that's very interesting, and we know that there's a sexual sin that is about to happen, but it's important that here in 2 Samuel that we're reminded that Bathsheba was a daughter of somebody and also the wife of somebody.

So David's sin was destroying other families. Verse 4, David sent messengers, and he took her. She came in unto him, and he lay with her, for she was purified from her uncleanness. She returned unto her house.

The woman then goes home. She conceived and sent and told David and said, I am with child. You can probably imagine how David's heart just sank in that moment, that his life was going to be completely changed. Verse 6, David sent to Joab, saying, Send me Uriah the Hittite, Bathsheba's husband.

And Joab sent Uriah to David. So here we see David is in sin, and he's the king of Israel. He knows that he's sinned. And by the way, this is maybe a different sin than what you have committed, and here's what I want you to understand. We all are sinners, okay? There's not a person in this room who does not sin. And so as we look through this story, I want you to think about the sin that you commit, not the sin that I commit.

We respond to sin in a lot of different ways, right? Sometimes, you know, when you do wrong, we sometimes justify it, right? Have you ever done that with something that you did? Maybe you lost your temper with somebody, and then you tried to justify it by, well, you don't know what they did. They made me this way, right? Have you ever done that?

Is that just me? Okay. And so I thought I would hit home on that one, you know? So must be preaching to myself. But no, we sometimes justify what we get caught up in based on the people around us, or have you ever blamed your circumstances for making you do things you're not supposed to do? You see what, man, if God hadn't brought me through this, then I wouldn't have done this. You see, sometimes we justify sin in our lives, or how about this? You do what we're going to find David doing. You try to cover it up. You try to hide it, right? Church people are great at hiding stuff, aren't they? And we try to hide it, and we try to cover it up, and we sweep it under the rug, and we're like, hey, guess what?

Nobody's ever going to find out about what I've done. Here we see this cover-up that David begins to go down this road. He calls for Uriah to come to him, verse 7. When Uriah was coming to him, David demanded of him how Joab did and how the people did, how the war prospered. So David's kind of, you know, he's there for a reason, but David's doing some small talk. He's like, man, tell me how the battle was, you know? How did it go? Did we win, you know?

I mean, did we lose anybody? He's asking all these questions, but he has an ulterior motive. So he says, man, you are awesome, Uriah.

Thanks for doing this. So he said to him, he said, verse 8, go down to thy house and wash your feet. And Uriah departed out of the king's house there and followed him a mess of meat from the king.

But Uriah slept at the door of the king's house with all the servants of his lord and went not down to his house. You see, here's what David was trying to do. David was saying, hey, you've, man, you've done your part being at battle and doing everything that you've done.

Why don't you go home? And he was hoping that him and Bathsheba would sleep together and conceive a child and then nobody would ever know that it was David's child. So he was trying to conspire this thing to happen so that his sin could just be personally dealt with and that nobody would ever find out. But Uriah slept at the door of the king's house. He did not go. Verse 10, when they had told David, saying, Uriah went not down into his house, David's thinking, my plan, plan A, did not work. So David said unto Uriah, camest thou not from thy journey? Why then didst thou not go down unto thine house? Uriah said unto David, the ark in Israel and Judah abide in tents. And my lord Joab and the servants of my lord are encamped in the open fields.

Shall I then go into mine house to eat and to drink and to lie with my wife? As thou livest and as thy soul liveth, I will not do this thing. Can you imagine what David felt in that moment? Uriah literally is looking at David and says, listen, all these these men are at battle and I'm going to go and have this this time with my wife. You see, he was more loyal to to the soldiers and David sitting there like, man, I didn't even go to battle and I sinned while I should have been at battle. Verse 12, and David said to Uriah, Terry here today also and tomorrow I will let thee depart.

So Uriah abode in Jerusalem that day and tomorrow. And when David had called him, he did eat and drink before him and he made him drunk. So David, now he goes to plan B and he says, you know what, I'm going to I'm going to get Uriah drunk and then send him home and then then they'll conceive a child and nobody will ever know what I what I did. So he made him drunk and at even he went out to lie on his bed with the servants of his Lord.

He went not down to his house. So plan A did not work. Plan B did not work. So now he's into plan C of this incredible cover up.

The destruction of his life is just unraveling. Verse 14, and it came to pass in the morning that David wrote a letter to Joab and he sent it by the hand of Uriah. And he wrote in the letter saying, set your Uriah in the forefront of the hottest battle and retire you from him that he may be smitten and die. Isn't that wild?

And here's what's amazing. Verse 14, at the end of it, he sent the letter by the hand of Uriah. Uriah carried his own death warrant to battle, not even knowing. It came to pass verse 16, when Joab observed the city, he assigned Uriah just like King David, the man after God's own heart, just like he told him to do that he assigned Uriah unto a place where he knew that valiant men were put him in a place in the battle, that there was no way that he would make it out alive. Verse 17, and the men of the city went out and fought with Joab and there fell some of the people, the servants of David and Uriah, the Hittite, he died also.

Isn't it interesting that a man after God's own heart is now found killing not just one man, but killing a bunch of soldiers for the sake of covering up his own sin. Joab comes back, he tells David that Uriah died and all these men died and then in verse 25 says this, then David said unto the messenger, thus shalt thou say unto Joab, let not this thing displease thee for the sword devoureth one as well as another, make thy battle more strong against the city and overthrow it and encourage thou him. And when the wife of Uriah heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she mourned for her husband. When the morning was past, David sent, he fetched her to his house and she became his wife and bare him a son. But the thing that David hath done, what's the next word, displeased the Lord. So what happened was Uriah is now dead, so David's like, I guess I'll take Bathsheba to be my wife and everyone will think that they have a baby in the first year of marriage and David thinks, I've gotten away with my sin. Let me just say a couple of things about this and then we're going to go deeper into this story. All of us sin, every one of us.

So here's what, if you're reading this story, you're probably thinking, wow, man, I'm not David, right? But a lot of times we do a lot of things that are pretty wicked, that are pretty displeasing in the sight of God. It might not be, you know, an affair. It might not be, you know, putting somebody in battle and killing people. Hopefully that's not you.

We do have security here. And so, you know, but it might not be something like that. But in a lot of ways, you and I, we struggle with different things, don't we? We struggle with sin and every sin that you commit is just as displeasing to the Lord as what we find in this story. And I want you to understand when we think about this, all of us sin. It's what we do with our sin that makes the difference.

It's what we do when we know that we've sinned that makes the difference. We're going to see David handle his sin. Now this was a bad way of handling it, but we're going to see something in chapter 12. If you drop down to 12 and then verse 1, the Lord sent Nathan. We learned about Nathan a few weeks ago. The Lord sent Nathan into David. David thinks he's gotten away with this, by the way. This is about a year later. And David's sitting there like, I mean, he's going on through life.

Him and Bathsheba, they're married. They have this kid. And David thinks, man, nobody knows what I did.

I've gotten away with it. The door knocks. Nathan's there. He came unto him and said unto him, there were two men in one city. Begins to tell the story. The one rich, the other poor. The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds, but the poor man had nothing. Save one little you 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. It was like their pet and drank of his own cup, lay in his bosom and was unto him as a daughter. There came a traveler under 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 coming to him. And he took the poor man's lamb and dressed it for the man that was coming to him. So Nathan shows up at David's house. He knocks. David's just kind of the king. He's doing his thing. And he thinks, I mean, he's probably not even thinking about his sin at this point.

He's he's kind of like, man, I've made it through. I got away with it. You know, Plan A didn't work. Plan B didn't work. But I'm the king of Israel.

Plan C worked. And he thinks he got away with it. And Nathan knocks on the door.

Nathan says, Hey, David, I want to tell you this story. Rich man, poor man. Rich man has everything. The poor man has nothing except for this little lamb that that was just a pet to to the family. And he says, this traveler came through and the rich man who had everything, all the the lambs and everything that he needed.

But instead of that and and living in his own stuff and possessions, he went over to the poor man and he took the only thing that the poor man had. Verse five. David, here's this story. He's he says, David's anger was greatly kindled against the man. He said to Nathan, as the Lord liveth, the man that had done this thing shall surely die.

He shall restore the lamb fourfold because he did this thing and because he had no no pity. And Nathan said to David in the most direct many sermon ever preached, he said, Thou art that man. Could you imagine being David? Have you ever sat in a service and you're sitting there and maybe you leave and you say something like it's like the preacher was speaking just at me. Have you ever felt like that? Raise your hand if you felt like that. Okay, good. I was preaching.

I'm just kidding. But I've sat through services, you know, growing up and it's just like, you know, you're like uneasy and you can hardly sit through it. And then you're like, man, it's like the speaker was speaking directly at me. It's like he knew everything about about my life. Could you imagine David? He's looking directly at Nathan, the prophet, and Nathan says, David, you are that man. You see, sometimes the conviction of God can be so real and work through people to speak directly to to you. And he said, verse seven, Thou art the man.

Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, I anointed thee king over Israel, and I delivered thee out of the hand of Saul. And he goes on and and for the sake of time, I want you to drop down verse 12. And he's going through and he's telling him what he did. And I can imagine David is is pretty humbled in this moment. But he, you know, he's starting to kind of feel anxiety, like man, people are about to find out what I have done. And he's feeling his life with anxiety and verse 12.

Nathan says this to him, he says, Thou did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun. Let me just say this, that private sin usually will result in public consequences. We've seen it. You don't have to look very far to see that.

Just turn on the news and watch politicians. Listen, follow celebrity pastors and you'll see very quick that private sin sometimes results in public consequences. Nathan says, You did it secretly. I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun. How does David respond? Remember, we're going to sin.

It's how we respond to our sin that makes the difference. Verse 13. David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord. Nathan said unto David, The Lord also, aren't you thankful?

This is it. Listen, if you're in here and you're in sin, I don't want you to leave here and just feel like man, there's no hope because there's hope for you. And it's found right here. The Lord also put away thy sin. The Lord hath also put away thy sin. Thou shalt not not die. Listen, it's what we do with our sin that makes the difference. You see, David was at the point in his power that he could do anything. And by the way, many of you, you lead businesses or whatever.

It's unhealthy to get to the point where no one is around you who could ever question you or hold you accountable. David was at that point in his reign. Have you ever thought if you look and just put yourself in this story, David is is he should have been away at battle and yet he finds himself, you know, not and he's at the palace and and in the evening time he he goes up onto the rooftop, which is unusual in and of itself and and he's just walking and and that that word actually means that he's pacing back and forth. He's kind of bored because he knows he should be somewhere somewhere else. And you can imagine there's guards, there's soldiers there that are probably wondering in their brains. I mean, like, man, why isn't the king doing what he's supposed to do?

Right. And they're probably wondering. And then David sees this woman and he sends a guard to go get. Have you ever wondered what was that guard even thinking? Have you ever wondered why didn't the guard say, David, do you realize what you're about to do?

Do you realize that making the mistake that I know you're about to make could ruin your whole reign? It could ruin your family, it could ruin her family, it could ruin all the respect that everybody remember we just learned a few weeks ago that man, they had number one hits in the nation of Israel saying David has slain his tens of thousands. Everyone loved David. And now, do you not think the guard know David had created a culture around him?

Nobody was going to question the king, which is an unhealthy place to place to be. I want you to understand that David, he was at this place where he could lead everybody was this incredible warrior, the king of Israel, the greatest king we've ever seen. But he struggled leading the hardest person to lead.

And that's himself. Do you know that in your life, the hardest person that you will ever lead is you? The hardest person that you will ever disciple is you. Because it's easy to see sin in everybody else, isn't it? But it's hard to see sin in us. Just by way of introduction, I want you to know that it's what we do with the sin that makes the difference. But also I want you to understand this, that every sin comes prepackaged with a consequence. Listen, I want you to know, I am thankful for the forgiveness of sins all day long.

I will aim in that 100 times. Listen, I am thankful for the forgiveness of sin. But I want you to understand something. And I'm not trying to scare you if you're in sin here today, but if scaring you makes you not sin, then I hope it works, okay? Listen, you can be forgiven, but you can't undo sin. I'm thankful for forgiveness, but there's been some decisions in my life that I've had to live with. And we have to understand that in life, you can live in the forgiveness of God and you can live under the mercy and grace of Jesus, which is awesome.

But there's still some consequences that can have in your life. You know what happened to David's reign? We don't have a lot of time to look at it, but I'll tell you this, we're going to see that that son that was born to him in Bathsheba dies.

The kid gets sick and dies. After that, we see that the nation of Israel begins to go crazy starting with David's family. David's first son Amnon.

Think about how crazy this is. David's first son Amnon actually raped his half-sister Tamar. Talk about a messed up family.

That's what happens. David's family after Absalom, which was David's favorite son. He hated Amnon after what Amnon had done and he tried to conspire to kill him and he did and he killed his brother. Then after that, Absalom and David have conflict.

David flees out of the nation that he is supposed to be leading. You see, there's all this downward spiral effect of the sin that he had and here's why. Sin can destroy your life. Sin can destroy your life. You see, unconfessed sin leads to a life of destruction.

It leads to a life of destruction and if sin is so destructive and if sin is, it can ruin our life. By the way, if you're a young person in here, you have a whole lot of life to live in front of you and if any of the older generation could stand before you today, they would tell you they would have made a lot of different decisions when they were younger and they would have saved themselves from a lot of pain that they've experienced over their years. I want you to really listen in and lean into this. I know this isn't the most encouraging message. You guys probably didn't come in and be like, man, you're not going to be amen in sin probably a whole lot today, right? But listen, this is something as practical as I could ever tell you because all of us sin. There's not a person in here that is exempt from sin or who can have victory over sin each and every day. We're going to all sin including your pastor. I'm going to mess up.

I'm going to fail you from time to time. But it's what we do with our sin that makes the difference. If sin is so destructive, if sin is so destructive, how can we avoid sin? I want to give you a few thoughts from this passage that I think are super important. Number one, you have to stay engaged in the battle.

You have to stay engaged in the battle. David was a warrior. He was the guy on the front lines of the battle. But now we find him in chapter 11 where he's not David the warrior anymore. He's David the relaxer. And David is just a chillin'. David can do anything he wants. You got to stay engaged in the battle. David was in a place to be tempted, wasn't he?

He was pacing around on a balcony. He was bored. By the way, boredom can lead to private sins. Don't get bored. Stay on mission for the Lord. Live on purpose for Jesus. And let me just say this, when I say stay engaged in the battle, think about the battle that we're facing.

By the way, the New Testament talks a lot about this. You're in a spiritual battle. I'm in a spiritual battle. We're in a spiritual battle every day that you wake up. You probably feel it from time to time. You say, what do you mean by that, Pastor Josh?

Here's what I mean. Have you ever felt like, man, I really want, Bob referenced this earlier, I really want to do right, but I find myself doing wrong. Have you ever tried to make a good decision, and it's almost like you have two different voices kind of coming in your head, like, yeah, you should really do this because the Bible says it, but hey, listen, you're trying to justify it on this side? That is the spiritual warfare that you and I face every single day. We are in a battle. And if you want to avoid the destructive nature of sin that can come into your life, that can come into your family, it can destroy your career, it can destroy everything about your life, here's what you have to do.

You have to stay engaged in the battle. You say, what does that even mean, stay engaged? Listen, think about the lives that you have right now. Many of you have a spouse, right?

It's a good spot to start. Stay engaged in the relationship that you have with your spouse. Stay engaged, work on it.

Try to stay healthy. Do all the things that you need to do to make sure that your relationship with your spouse is exactly where it needs to be. That's stay engaged.

Don't disengage as a couple because you're on your way to sin and we can see the destructive nature of sin. Stay engaged. How about you with your kids?

Stay engaged. Listen, fight for your kids. Fight for your kids.

Listen, create things around them that can prevent them from making mistakes. Kids might call it being sheltered. I used to say that all the time to my parents. Listen, I used to tell my parents all the time, like, man, I'm the most sheltered kid in my whole school. There's kids in here who feel that right now.

And listen, I'm 36 years old and I'm grateful for a lot of the shelter that I experienced growing up, if I'm honest, because it saved me from a lot of terrible decisions and saved me from some things in my life. Listen, parents, fight for your kids. Fight for your kids. Don't let what every other parent does influence what you think you need to do.

And by the way, every kid's different. Fight for your kids. Stay engaged in the battle of your life. Stay engaged. You want to avoid sin and avoid the nature of the destruction of sin. Stay engaged in the battle. How about this? Number two, stay away from places of temptation.

Stay away from places of temptation. David was bored. He should have been at battle.

He was pacing on the roof. He probably should have been getting ready for bed. He was putting himself right in the position of temptation.

He was flirting with temptation. Here's what I've learned about my life. It is much easier to avoid temptation than to resist it in the moment. I just don't want to be anywhere near temptation. You want to know why? Because I don't trust myself.

I don't. I don't trust the flesh that is inside of me. So I'd much rather avoid temptation and not find myself to be tempted than to be in the moment and get as close as I possibly can. It's always easier to avoid temptation than to resist it.

Don't believe me. Try to do a diet sometimes. I did a diet a few years ago.

Here's the thing. I did a diet just because everybody else was doing it. I was just kind of like, man, everybody in the office, I love going out to eat. You can't be a pastor if you don't like eating out at lunchtime.

I was pastoring in Florida. We'd always go out to eat several times a week as a staff. So we'd always go out. It wasn't long, this group of friends, these other pastors, they would all be doing this diet called the keto diet, if you're wondering. I was just like, I remember literally going out to eat. We went to this burger place with them and this place called BurgerFi.

We were there. I'm just excited because at the time, just give me a big old thick burger with bacon on it and a big old batch of fries. There we go. You feel what I'm saying?

This is like torture, isn't it? We should just dismiss and go to lunch at this point. I remember going in and I'm wanting to order.

I'm excited. I get there and these people, they're all ordering in front of me. They're like, yes, can I get a burger? But hey, no bun. Do you want fries with that? Oh, absolutely no fries. No, you can't have fries.

I'm thinking, man, why are you guys torturing yourselves? But it got me on it and it changed some of the way that I eat today as a result. But I'll tell you this, I can stay right in line with a diet until there's a few things found in my household. I'm going to tell you what they are. Number one, this is therapy for me.

So you guys just disregard what I'm about to tell you. If a Cheez-It is in my house, Cheez-Its are like the best thing. Manna from heaven. If a Cheez-It is in my house, and by the way, I still try to diet. And I talked about Cheez-Its recently. I'm not going to call out who in here, but somebody put a box of Cheez-Its on my desk the week afterwards. I'm thinking, man, I was trying to say I can't eat Cheez-Its.

They were gone pretty quick. I'll just tell you that. But listen, if Cheez-Its are around me, I lose all self-control. You know what else I lose self-control with? Is cookie dough. Any of you buy cookie dough to make cookies? And then when you actually go and have time to make cookies, there's like not enough cookie dough.

Anybody is not afraid to admit that, right? And so that's where I'm at. It's just like if that's in my house, it's just like that's a good snack for me, right? And then the third one's a little different, but Cinnamon Toast Crunch. This cereal, I eat it plain. I don't need milk, right? Milk's unhealthy for me.

So I'm going to eat Cinnamon Toast Crunch instead without it. See, all I'm saying is this. In my life, if I want to eat right, I don't need to be around those three things because I'm probably going to give in and do something I don't want to do, right? It's the same way in the Christian journey. It's like there's things in your life that you are weak at.

There's things that our flesh want and our flesh wants to get as close as possible to getting. And what I'm telling you this is just avoid it all together. If it's a person that pulls you down, try not to find yourself with that person as much. I know that's difficult, but try not to be around them as much because it's always easier for them to pull you this way than for you to pull them this way. You see, if it's a person, maybe don't be out or find yourself with them as much.

If it's maybe your language that you're trying to work on, then don't watch shows that have the language in the show because then you're going to just hear it and it's going to go into your brain and then you're wondering why you can't have victory over it. You see, we have to avoid the things because it's much easier to avoid temptation than to resist it. Listen, avoid it.

Don't flirt with sin. Set some boundaries. Look, I respect people with boundaries. My boundaries might look differently, but I respect boundaries. And if you don't have any boundaries in your life, you need to create some boundaries and some safeguards and guardrails in your life that will prevent you from heading over the cliff and experiencing self-destruction like David had to endure. But then the third thing, it doesn't end there, aren't you thankful?

You're like, aren't you thankful I'm not dismissing right there? Self-destruction? Don't destruct as you leave today? It doesn't end there. The story of David doesn't end there. I want you to go just for a moment over to Psalms 51. Psalms chapter 51. This is a psalm written by David.

After Nathan had come and said, thou art the man and David's repentance. Here's the third point is this. You need to first stay engaged in the battle. Number two, stay away from places of temptation.

Number three, and this is where I want to land the plane here today. Stay in a posture of repentance when you mess up. Stay in a posture of repentance when you mess up. Chapter 51 of Psalms, it says this, have mercy. This is David. Remember writing and he's writing it right after Nathan to think David's sin has been found out. And by the way, our sin will be found out. Scripture is very clear about that. Our sin has been found out.

What does David do in that moment? Verse 20 writes this, have mercy upon me, O God. According to thy loving kindness, according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity. Cleanse me from sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions and listen to this, my sin is ever before me.

You know what that phrase means? My sin is ever before me. It means that I can hardly sleep at night without it being in my brain.

Have you ever been there? I remember laying in bed growing up, you know, like, man, I hope nobody finds out, you know, that kind of thing. That's what David was experiencing for this whole year before Nathan came and exposed him. It says my sin is ever before me.

So thankful that it's off my chest and it's under the blood. Verse four, against thee, thee only have I sinned. And by the way, when you sin, it's ultimately a sin against God. Against thee, thee only have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight, that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest and be clear when thou judge'st. Behold, I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me.

Sound like you and me, that's all of us. We were born into sin. Behold, thou desire'st truth in the inward parts and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom. Then he says purge me with hyssop. The priest would dip the hyssop branch in blood as a sacrifice so that the people would be forgiven. So he says purge me with hyssop with your blood, I shall be clean.

Wash me and I shall be whiter than than snow. Make me to hear joy and gladness that the bones which thou has broken may rejoice. Guide thy face from my sins and blot out mine iniquities. Create in me a clean heart O God and renew a right spirit within me.

Listen, stay in a posture of repentance when you mess up. You know what David did? He covered it up, but he finally realized that he needed to repent.

You say what did he do? He found his hope in the mercy of God. He found his hope in the mercy of God. And by the way, for every person in here, your only hope is the mercy of God. There's not a way that you can defeat your sin. There's not a way that you could ever pay for your sin.

The only hope that your soul and my soul has in this life is by pleading and begging for the mercy and grace of God to be bestowed in our life. His hope, notice his hope was not in his past righteousness. Think about it, David, he didn't go to God and say, God, you know, like, man, you remember what I did with Goliath? I obeyed you.

You remember that? God, you know, I feel like I've done a lot of good things. I just did this one bad thing. He didn't do that.

He didn't justify anything. He took responsibility for his sin, and he just brought it and begged for the mercy of God to come over him. Let me remind you, there's more mercy in God than there is sin in you today. You say, man, Pastor Josh, you do not understand how much sin that I have in my life, whether you're a teenager in this room or whether you're an adult. And you say, Pastor Josh, I've been sinning. I don't want anybody in here to even know what I did last night or last week or last month or last year.

I don't care what you did then. There is always more mercy and grace in him than there is sin in you. And so I don't want any of you at the end of this service today.

We're gonna ask you to respond. If you came in here today and you're filled with sin and your life is torn apart and you need a new start in your life, let me tell you this, that Jesus is there waiting on you to fill you with the mercy and grace that you do not deserve today. You see, that's what David did.

He hoped in the mercy of God. The second thing, he owned his mistakes. We have to own our mistakes. It's nobody else's fault that you sinned. It's not. You know, it's your fault. It's your decision.

It's the fleshly nature in you. He didn't place blame. Look at Psalms 51. He constantly, my sin is personal.

It was about him and God. And then he recognized that his sin was against God. You see, when we sin, we're taking our trust off of God and we're putting it into whatever we're sinning with. You see, every sin that we commit is against a holy, righteous, perfect, sinless God.

Let me say this today as we kind of land the plane. Are you in sin today? Say, man, pastor, Josh, that's personal.

Yeah, it is. But listen, there is more mercy and grace in him than there is sin in you. In a second, we're going to respond. And here's what I really want you to consider doing. There's two types of people in here. There's some of you who have sin in your life right now that is unconfessed. Let me remind you.

First John 1.9. If you confess it, guess what? I'm thankful I serve a God who's faithful.

He's just. He will. It's a promise.

You can take it to the bank. You can come here today and you can leave here free from your sin. You can leave here forgiven of your sin.

I'm thankful for that. There's two types of people in here. There's some that have sin in their life. You could be a teenager and nobody know about it.

Your parents don't even know about it. You could be an adult in here and nobody knows about what you've done or somebody might know about what you've done. If you're in sin today, here's what I want you to do in a moment.

I want you to come forward. You don't have to confess it to the whole church, but I want you to come and I want you to beg and plead for the mercy of God and ask and repent of your sin. But then there's some of you who have experienced the goodness and mercy of grace and grace, right? Why don't we fill the altar and thank God for the grace and for the mercy because none of us deserve it. You're not sitting here today because you're worthy of the grace of God. You're sitting here today because you're unworthy of the grace of God and you're sitting here because of the grace and mercy of God. Would you bow your heads with me?

I'm not going to prolong this. I just want you're in one of those two camps here today. You're either in the sin category or you're in the one that you've been blessed by the mercy and grace of God. And listen, there ain't a person in this room who is not in need of the mercy and grace of God. I'm going to pray. We're going to stand and let's beg God. Some of you need to come and repent and some of you need to come and say thank you here today.

Would you stand with me? Father, bless in this invitation. God, I thank you for the mercy and grace that I do not deserve.

There's not a person in here who does. God, we're grateful. And Lord, for the one in here who's deep into sin, God, I pray that they would find in our church, a church who loves them and a church who wants to help them and that they'd find in you how grace filled and merciful and filled with forgiveness that you want to bestow. For it's in your name we pray. Amen. If God speaks to you, you come.