A King is Rebuked.

As time passed on, David’s sin toward Bathsheba became known, and suspicion was excited that he had planned the death of Uriah. The Lord was dishonored. He had favored and exalted David, and David’s sin misrepresented the character of God and cast reproach upon His name. It tended to lower the standard of godliness in Israel, to lessen in many minds the abhorrence of sin; while those who did not love and fear God were by it emboldened in transgression.

Nathan the prophet was bidden to bear a message of reproof to David. It was a message terrible in its severity. To few sovereigns could such a reproof be given but at the price of certain death to the reprover. Nathan delivered the divine sentence unflinchingly, yet with such heaven-born wisdom as to engage the sympathies of the king, to arouse his conscience, and to call from his lips the sentence of death upon himself….

The guilty may attempt, as David had done, to conceal their crime from men; they may seek to bury the evil deed forever from human sight or knowledge; but “all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do” (Hebrews 4:13).

The prophet Nathan’s parable of the ewe lamb, given to King David, may be studied by all…. While he was following his course of self-indulgence and commandment breaking, the parable of a rich man who took from a poor man his one ewe lamb, was presented before him. But the king was so completely wrapped in his garments of sin, that he did not see that he was the sinner. He fell into the trap, and … passed his sentence upon another man, as he supposed, condemning him to death….

This experience was most painful to David, but it was most beneficial. But for the mirror which Nathan held up before him, in which he so clearly recognized his own likeness, he would have gone on unconvicted of his heinous sin, and would have been ruined. The conviction of his guilt was the saving of his soul. He saw himself in another light, as the Lord saw him, and as long as he lived he repented of his sin.
Conflict and Courage p. 179
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Prayer Requests
—–Please pray for Eileen as she is having more pain and some numbness since receiving electro-stim and doing certain exercises the physical therapist has given her. Rose
—–My daughter and husband need God’s leading today. L
—–Please pray for the Motley family as they lay their grandmother to rest tomorrow. She was like a mother to them. Rose
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Dear Friends,

When Eileen was three, we were living in Pennsylvania . That spring, she and I took the train to Michigan to visit my mother for two weeks. While we were there, my mother decided to show me the mall that had recently opened. As we entered the main area, I noticed a woman, who was sitting on a bench by the fountain, watching us. As we drew nearer, her face suddenly “lit up” in recognition and she exclaimed, “I’d know that nose anywhere!” I was shocked! Who was this woman who sprang to her feet and was coming towards me with joy on her face? As we talked I found that she was my half-sister, Rosalie, whom I had not seen for about ten years. In fact, we have only seen each other about five or six times in our whole life. We look and act nothing alike. She is thin, has olive skin and dark hair like her mother, and is very outgoing. I am shyer and look like our father, who was fair-skinned and heavy.

Just as Rosalie recognized me because I look like our father, so we have the privilege of representing our Heavenly Father to those around us. Paul tells us, “Know ye therefore that they which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham.” “Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.” “For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.” Gal 3:7, 4:28 , 3:26 Think of it! We are the children of the Great King of the Universe, the Creator of all! What a privilege is ours!

All around us are those perishing in darkness, “but ye, brethren, are not in darkness, . . Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep, as do others, but let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep sleep in the night, and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and for an helmet, the hope of salvation.” 1 Thes 5:5-8 “Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men. Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” Matt 5:13-16

May we, in all that we do, in all that we say, rightly represent Him, Who “so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16 May we “put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created ” us. Col 3:10 May we ever walk as children of light, having no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but keeping our eyes focused upon the One Who loves us so.

Rose