David’s heart was loyal, some might even say it was stubborn. When he gave his heart to someone, he didn’t take it back. When David loved you, you stayed loved, even if he hated you sometimes.
Think about the people in David’s life. First, there was
King Saul. He was once a promising young king, but then he became increasingly
corrupt, tormented by a pathological jealousy of David, paranoid and eaten up
by his own anxiety. Several times he tried to kill David, but David just kept
loving Saul. Twice David could have killed him, but he wouldn’t. He probably
would have been justified in doing it, still he refused. And when Saul
eventually died, David wrote one of his most heart-rending poems for the king, “How
the mighty have fallen,” he sang (see 2 Samuel 1.19-27). Knowing everything he
knew of Saul, he wept at his death. He loved Saul to the end.
Then, of course, there was Jonathan. He was Saul’s son and
could have been David’s rival for the throne. You might have expected them to
be at each other’s throats, but instead they had one of the great friendships
in all of literature.
Many years later, after both Saul and Jonathan were dead,
David started looking for someone from their families, just so he could show
that person kindness. Someone eventually found a little-known guy named
Mephibosheth, Jonathan’s son who had been crippled in a childhood accident. David
sent for him and had him brought into the royal court. He treated Mephibosheth
like a son because of his intense love for Jonathan.
And his own son, Absalom, who tried to overthrow his father
and take the throne. He actually took over the capital city and forced David
into exile. As soon as he was in power, he staged an elaborate orgy held in
broad daylight on the rooftop with all of David’s mistresses involved. That’s
detestable. But when David was finally restored to power and received word that
Absalom had been killed, he did not rejoice in the fact that he was safe and
secure. Rather, he cried out that he would gladly have exchanged places with
his son. He wished that he had died in Absalom’s place.
When David loved you, you stayed loved no matter what you
did to him. That’s the kind of heart God wants His children to cultivate, a
heart that says, “Regardless of what you’ve done, are doing, will do, might do,
you are loved.”
That is, after all, God’s own heart. When God loves you, you
stay loved. No matter what you pull. No matter how much you never realise your
potential. No matter how distant and separated you may be. No matter how
rebellious you’ve been. God says, “I wish I could die in your place.”
And that is precisely what He did.
Lord God, Your love for me is causeless and ceaseless and
measureless. You have loved me because You have chosen to do so, not because of
anything I am or have done. This is the wellspring of my true security, and I
revel in Your unconditional love and acceptance, knowing that I could never
have earned it or merited it. This frees me to be the person You intended me to
be, secure enough in Your love so that I can love and serve others. May I show
kindness and compassion for people, even when they may turn against me. Give me
the grace to be a peacemaker and a reconciler with the people You sovereignly
place in my path. Let me learn to see my love, fidelity and service to them as
an expression of who I am to You and who You are to me.
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