If I hadn’t committed adultery, we wouldn’t have grown deeper in our marriage.
If I hadn’t left my wife and kids for a season, I wouldn’t have realized my need for them.
If I hadn’t gotten drunk, I wouldn’t have been bold enough to share the gospel with my friends that night.
If I hadn’t gone to the strip club that night, I wouldn’t have met ....
If I hadn’t gotten an abortion, I wouldn’t have finished college or gotten married to the love of my life.
If I hadn’t divorced my husband in frustration, I wouldn’t have ever seen my own brokenness.
If I hadn’t gambled that night, I wouldn’t have ever received enough money to pay that bill.
God is redemptive in nature. Therefore, although He can make a masterpiece out of a mess, don’t confuse yourself in thinking that it had to be a mess in order to be a masterpiece.
Let me say that again...
Your sin was not the necessity for God's masterpiece.
His Goodness, His Sovereignty, His Omnipotence, however, was and is.
And yet we tell ourselves this subtle lie to justify certain sins in our life or certain seasons of sin in our life to quiet the condemnation and shame that can seep forth from the remembrance of our own actions‒when in actuality, it’s the freedom found in Christ’s blood, through His forgiveness, that can only erase the shame associated.
Rest in God’s grace and goodness. Don’t rest in justifying sin upon seeing any good outcomes that can come from the sin and then reassure yourself by saying “Oh, well maybe it had to be this way in order for this good to happen in my life.”
No! It was the redemptive nature of Christ! And His redemptive nature ought to compel us to instead say, “Wow, look at God's grace in my life! Look at His goodness despite me! Praise the Lord for His mercy! He didn’t have to do it, but He did!!!”
Again, when we see glimpses of good that spring forth despite our sin- it’s easy to believe the lie that we had to sin in order for “this good” to occur. Not so. The truth is that God is just so sovereign that He has the power and authority for good to be brought forth despite your sin. Why? Because He is redemptive in nature.
“28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”
-Romans 8:28
What I learn from King David’s rape of Bathsheba is that the Lord used such a broken man to accomplish so many of God’s purposes. But we can’t gloss over the consequences that came with that sin too. A child died as a consequence of David’s sin. And we can’t ignore the generational consequences of his lustful actions that traveled to the next generation (his son raped his own half-sister, his other son had 700 wives and 300 concubines, his other son publicly raped David’s own concubines for all to see. )
Secondly, we can’t gloss over what was God’s intended plan for King David if he hadn’t sinned- something we will never know in its entirety. What did God intend on doing if David had remained faithful to one wife? If he hadn’t raped Bathsheba? If he hadn’t murdered another man in order to marry that man’s wife etc? I’ll never know. We’ll never know.
But here’s the main point.
God's intended plan never involves us sinning in order to accomplish what He wants to do in and through our life. There is never a time in which God smiles and is pleased when we sin.
3 quick scriptures to back up what I’m saying:
11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” - Jeremiah 29:11
Sin will forever and always be destructive in nature. Therefore, the plans that God intends for us do not involve the nature of death, which is sin. He wants us to forever choose life, which is contained in His Word.
15 See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. 16 For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess.
17 But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, 18 I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess. -Deuteronomy 30: 15-18
For the New Testament believer, this promise still holds true.
Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the Spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit. -Galatians 6:8
But you might say, “Yeah, but didn’t Jesus say, in this life, you will have many trials and tribulations and that you will go through?”
Yes, but some tribulations He never intended for us. They were brought on by our own sinfulness and foolishness.
People ruin their lives by their own foolishness and then are angry at the LORD. -Proverbs 19:3
We don’t know what God had planned for David if He had been faithful to his first wife. We don’t know what generational blessings would’ve been brought forth from His obedience to the Word.
Yet, we do know how the Lord still used David’s adultery with Bathsheba to accomplish God’s purposes, therefore, displaying His Own redemptive nature.
I’ll summarize by saying it again...
PonderedThought:
It’s never God’s will for you to sin in order for God to work in and through your life. God can use anything, yes! But don’t confuse yourself by thinking that the only way something good was brought forth in your life was because of your own personal sin. This is a dangerous trap, deceitful thinking, and quite frankly, a lie that many have believed throughout the years. That “good” was brought forth in your life because God is Good. He is Sovereign. And He is Redemptive in Nature.