FBC Daily Devotional – November 2, 2021

Faith Baptist Church

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00:05

Well, good morning to you, and I have to, first of all, correct my math error from yesterday.

00:11

I was doing math on the fly, and for some reason I thought, let's see, ten months down, two months to go comes out to four -fifths, but let's see, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, that should be dividing the year in sixths and realizing that five -sixths of the year is gone, not four -fifths.

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But anyway, I did learn fractions when I was in elementary school, believe me, but that's what

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I get for trying to think on the fly. But anyhow, I hope your week's gotten off to a good start, and on this

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Tuesday, we're reading in 2 Samuel, chapters 19 and 20.

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What I want us to ask ourselves today is, what does it take to get us to repent? What does it take to get us to repent?

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And the reason I ask that question is that sometimes what we might call repentance isn't really repentance.

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We see that illustrated in the life of this man, Shimei. Remember Shimei? You have to go back a few chapters here in 2

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Samuel when Absalom usurped the kingdom, the throne, and David and his men had to leave the city, and they're going into exile.

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And as they're walking along, journeying out of the city, walking along an area where there's an elevation off to the side, this guy,

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Shimei, is up on the top of this ridge, and he's throwing stones and throwing dust down, and he's cursing

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David. He's calling David a man of blood, and he's like, you're getting what you deserve, and he's ridiculing him and mocking him and so forth.

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And one of David's right -hand men said, hey, why should this dog be cursing you?

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Let me go kill him. David says, no, no. If the Lord told him to curse, let him curse. David was acknowledging that he really deserved what he was getting, even though he wasn't guilty of the blood of Saul, as Shimei was blaming him,

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David did know that he was guilty of shedding blood, the blood of Uriah.

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So he let the guy go. He didn't do anything about it. Well, a lot's happened since then.

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Absalom's rebellion has been squashed, and David is now on his way back to resume the throne, to retake the throne in Jerusalem.

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Many have come out to welcome him back into the city. And along comes this guy,

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Shimei, and he kind of has his hat between his knees, and he's really nervous.

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And he comes up to David in verse 18, and this is what it says.

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It says, Now Shimei, the son of Gerah, fell down before the king when he had crossed the Jordan. Then he said to the king,

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Do not let my lord impute iniquity to me, or remember what wrong your servant did on the day that my lord the king left

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Jerusalem, that the king should take it to heart? Yeah, you remember what I said. You remember what

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I did. And Shimei is saying, you know, don't hold that against me. Don't hold that against me.

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He says, he goes on to say, For I, your servant, know that I have sinned. Therefore here

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I am, the first to come today of all the house of Joseph, to go down to my lord, to my lord the king.

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Well, sure, he's the first to go down because he knows that now that David is returned to the throne, resumed his position of authority, that all he has to do is say the word and it's off with Shimei's neck, head, if you will.

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He could have him executed for what he did. So it's kind of like, you know, Shimei is caught red -handed in his offense and he knows full well that he could face some very severe consequences for that sin.

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So cut your losses is the way he's thinking. I'm going to go and, you know, humble myself before him and, you know, maybe

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I'll get off. Maybe he'll let me go. Now here's the question. Is that real repentance?

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Has Shimei had a real change of heart or is Shimei just afraid of the consequences for what he has done and now he's in a position of vulnerability?

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Now he could actually pay some of those consequences. That's the question. And if our practice of quote -unquote repentance is that, you know, we do wrong and we don't deal with it until we get caught or we're about to get caught, then that's not real repentance.

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That's trying to finagle our way out of facing the consequences of our sin or our transgression, our wrongdoing, just like Shimei tried to do.

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Now in the end, David let him go. He didn't execute him.

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But the reason he didn't execute him, the reason he let him go, is David said, you know, this is a day of joy.

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This is a day of celebration. I'm not going to order an execution of somebody, a personal enemy, on this day.

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And he let him go. But he kept a short leash on Shimei.

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And if you fast forward in the story, Shimei's life, it turns out that Solomon dealt with Shimei because Shimei demonstrated that he wasn't really submissive to the authority of the king,

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King David and King David's successor. But anyway, for right now,

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I just wanted to focus on this expression of confession, repentance, and asking for forgiveness.

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I think it's easy to make a case that Shimei's repentance wasn't genuine.

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And what I want to challenge us with is that we make sure ours is. You know, there's a basic principle when it comes to our sin.

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As soon as we're convicted of it, as soon as we know we've done wrong, we need to deal with it.

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We need to go before our God and confess that sin before him and forsake it.

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And if that sin has been committed against somebody else, we've transgressed against someone, we've sinned against somebody.

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As soon as we're convicted of it, we need to go make that right with them. And not wait until we're about to suffer the consequences for it and then try to get out of those consequences.

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All right? So let's learn that lesson today. So our Father, I pray that we would keep, as often is said, short accounts with you.

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I pray that your spirit, he convicts us of sin and I pray when he does, that we would respond to it immediately and confess it and turn from it, forsake it.

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I pray that we would learn this lesson even from the feigned repentance of Shimei.

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We pray it in Jesus' name and for his sake. Amen. All right.

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Well, I hope you have a good rest of your Tuesday and that, you know, God will bless you in it. Good day.