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The First Proclamation
For the king said to Joab.…, Go now through all the tribes of Israel…, and number ye the people, that I may know the number of the people …. Joab gave up the sum of the number of the people …there were in Israel eight hundred thousand valiant men that drew the sword … the men of Judah were five hundred thousand men... And David said unto the Lord, I have sinned greatly in what I have done: and now, I beseech thee, O Lord, take away the iniquity of thy servant; for I have done very foolishly…. the word of the Lord came unto the prophet Gad, David’s seer, saying, Go and say unto David, Thus saith the Lord, I offer thee three things; choose thee one of them, that I may do it unto thee …. Gad came to David …, and said unto him, Shall seven years of famine come unto thee in thy land? or wilt thou flee three months before thine enemies, while they pursue thee? or that there be three days’ pestilence in thy land?... David said unto Gad, I am in a great strait: let us fall now into the hand of the Lord; for his mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man. So the Lord sent a pestilence upon Israel…. and there died of the people … seventy thousand men …. David spoke unto the Lord … and said, Lo, I have sinned …done wickedly: but these sheep, what have they done? let thine hand …be against me, and against my father’s house.
Fix your gaze on Jesus
Awaken us O Holy Spirit! Indeed let us become aware of the great injury we do to ourselves and Your blessed creation when we sin!
It is well, when a man has sinned, if he has a heart within to smite him for it. Indeed if we have a heart (if we are not benumbed by selfish thoughts and beliefs and create isolationist existence) we will feel smitten when we sin.
When we turn back and confess our sins, we must faithfully pray that God would forgive and in His pardoning mercy take away the sin which we cast away by sincere repentance. If we habour pride within, it is just in God to take from us what we are proud of, or make bitter to us, and make it our punishment. Today’s scriptural situation must be such a punishment, for though it was David’s sin that opened the sluice, the sins of the people (pride in their might!) all contributed to the flood. In this difficulty, David chose a judgment which came immediately from God, whose mercies he knew to be very great, rather than from men, who would have triumphed in the miseries of Israel, and have been thereby hardened in their idolatry. In choosing the pestilence, he and his family were equally at risk as the poorest Israelite; and he would continue to experience the Divine rebuke for a shorter time, however severe it was. The rapid effects of the pestilence shows how easily God can bring down the proudest, and how reliant we are on Divine patience and mercy.
Prayer Starter
O for a heart and mind that admits our ability to respond freely in Love….
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