A murderer, an adulterer, a man after God’s own heart. David knew something about repentance. What do we think of when we think of repentance? When facing difficult times, it is often a season of self-examination. When trouble comes, we tend to reform our ways and shore up our walk with God through intensified fasting and prayer. Is that the kind of repentance God is looking for?
Psalms 21:3 For thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness: thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head.
Interestingly, David repented as deeply in the good times as he did in times of trouble and perplexity. In Psa. 21:3 he remarks that God “prevented” him with the blessings of His goodness. I heard a cancer patient make a statement that “if God wants me to have cancer, then I accept cancer as coming from His hand…” My, doesn’t that sound spiritual? Is this how God brings us to the end of ourselves (by bringing calamity and death)?
In the verse above, David insists that God dealt with Him not by sending calamity but by sending blessings. The word “prevent” in Psalms 21:3 means “to confront.” In other words, David’s understanding was that God “confronted” him with an outpouring of goodness. Many prophets and preachers today insist that God is sending difficulty to provoke us to repent, but that is not how David understood God to work. When God wants someone to repent, He sends “blessings of goodness” to confront us. Paul understood this, as well:
[Rom 2:4 KJV] 4 Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?
In the verse above, we see that by God’s GOODNESS, He leads us to repent. Many prophets prophesy hard things and denunciatory messages, and they excuse themselves for their harsh words by saying, “I’m a prophet! It’s my job to step on toes and slap the people around because REPENTANCE is my highest ethic!” Really? That is operating in a Baal spirit. Baal means “dominative father.”
I’ve heard prophets say “God loves you so much He might kill you and take you to heaven early…” or, “God loves you so much He prepares for every believer a designer hell to go through to bring you into your destiny…” Is that so? Are you volunteering? That may sound spiritual to many people, but both David and Paul (to name a few) understood that it was GOD’S GOODNESS by which He would lead us to repent. If you are giving those around you something other than God’s goodness, it is because you want something other than their repentance.
Do you know some folks that need to repent? Do you need repentance in some area of your life? Look for God’s goodness to motivate you to change. Isn’t this what Paul is getting at in Rom. 5:20?
[Rom 5:20 KJV] 20 Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound:
God doesn’t bless to excuse sin but to cause us to see that His love supersedes our sin that we might be confronted by His goodness and prompted to correct our sinful behaviors. Let the Lord love you with His goodness today.
