Nevertheless, for David's sake the LORD his God gave him a lamp in Jerusalem by raising up a son to succeed him and by making Jerusalem strong. For David had done what was right in the eyes of the LORD and had not failed to keep any of the LORD's commands all the days of his life--except in the case of Uriah the Hittite.
Wikipedia defined prequel as a work that supplements a previously completed one, and has an earlier time setting. In movies, it usually points back to how dark characters arrived to being Godfathers, Darth Vader or Hannibal Lecter. It presents them young as orphaned, deceived, and traumatized, which explains their inclination to the dark side. That without those incidents, they might have taken the good path. But there are prequels too that were created to expose our heroes’ dim past. We saw Wolverine murder his father and violently fought alongside his villain half-brother Sabretooth; we hope to watch soon that it was really a son of Adam (the Pevensies’ uncle himself) who woke up the White Witch in Narnia; and next year, we’ll witness how Bilbo steals the ring, and the dragon’s cup, and Thorin’s dynasty heirloom. Not so admirable for our well-loved hobbits :<
We’re almost two generations past David and still we find him here acknowledged for his devotion to God. More or less a thousand years more, that is, twenty eight more generations, his name will be most favored as people will call Jesus ‘the Son of David’. Read ‘til the last book, and we’ll still find him mentioned. Why so much credit for someone with an adulterous and murderous background? Surely parents would not recommend such a role model for their children. Was it his devotion? Will our service outweigh our offense? How about this word: GRACE. There was nothing in David to deserve nor earn such favor. It all God’s choosing. Grace called him from tending sheep to ruling a nation; grace empowered his sling to kill a goliath; grace forgave his scandalous sins and with that same woman the wisest king that ever lived became his son; and, grace kept his royal line a thousand years more, despite his sons’ unfaithfulness.
The Bible saw it fit not to hide David’s flaws. It did mar his image. It even outlived him. But not so we would feast around his disgrace. It was meant to encourage us with the truth that ‘where sin increased, God’s grace abounds all the more’. Our past may be dark and dim and degrading, but in light of His salvation, all has been forgiven and we are made new. Yes, new. Remember we don’t have a God who just reinvents junks, He is the Creator who starts from scratch. The enemy will surely try to deceive us with guilt-tripping, but we have His Word to confirm that in Jesus, we are His new creation. So if anyone tries to resurrect your old life again, we can have this script: ‘Dark past? Oh, you mean God’s grace?’. Now, that’s a prequel worth sharing :>
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