Caught again, your faithless friend.
Don’t you ever tire of hearing what a fool I’ve been?
(“Stubborn Love” by Kathy Troccoli)

King David wrote Psalm 38. It seems like it has to be about the Bathsheba incident because he is crushed and repenting for some grave sin. It might not be, though, because the story in 2 Samuel 11 & 12 says nothing about David losing his health. Psalm 38, though, has him so sick that his “wounds stink and fester” (v. 5, ESV). This is “because of my foolishness” (also v.5).

It seems odd, then, very odd, that David would close the Psalm with:

They who render evil for good are also adversaries to me,
because I follow what is good.
Don’t forsake me, Yahweh.
My God, don’t be far from me.
Hurry to help me,
Lord, my salvation. (Ps. 38:20-22)

Whaaat?? He follows after good? I don’t think so. He did something so bad that “my iniquities have gone over my head. As a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me” (v. 4). How can he possibly say he follows after good?

I confess to complaining often that we ignore warning verses in the New Testament that are preceded by “don’t you know?” and “don’t be decieved” (1 Cor. 6:9-11), “I forewarn you even as I also forewarned you” (Gal. 5:19-21),  and “let no one lead you astray” (1 Jn. 3:7).

I can write about the requirement for righteousness and good works if you want eternal life (Rom. 2:6-7; 6:22; Gal. 6:7-9) because I know what the Scriptures say about righteousness and the mercy of God. Jude, our Lord’s human brother, warns us not to turn the favor (grace) of God into a license for sin (Jude 1:4), but let’s talk about the difference between turning the favor of God into indecency and turning the mercy of God into indecency.

Jude uses “favor” (grace) in his warning, not mercy. Here’s why:

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to the intent that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we would live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age; looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify for himself a people for his own possession, zealous for good works. (Tit. 2:11-14)

God’s grace, better translated his favor, is all about releasing us from sin. Romans 6:14 says that sin won’t have dominion over us because we are under favor rather than law. God’s favor triumphantly makes us, who were but are no longer dead in our sins, alive in Christ (Eph. 2:5). It stays with us, empowering us to take our stand as servants of Jesus Christ (Rom. 5:1-2). It teaches us, which means we are continually being taught by his favor, how to live righteously (quote above).

Don’t falsely teach his favor as though it were merely mercy. Don’t tell people, “Oh, don’t worry, God’s favor means he won’t attribute sin to you (Rom. 4:8).” That would be turning favor into a license for sin.

On the other hand, mercy is an allowance for sin. The same God our Father, the same Lord Jesus, that teaches you by favor and calls you to deny yourself and take up your cross, knows “we all stumble in many ways” (Jas. 3:2). The same God who said, “your iniquities have separated you and your God and your sins have hidden his face from you” (Isa. 59:2), also said:

Let the wicked forsake his way,
and the unrighteous man his thoughts.
Let him return to Yahweh, and he will have mercy on him,
to our God, for he will freely pardon. (Isa. 55:7)

The apostle John understood these things, saying that those who claim to be without sin are deceiving themselves and are liars (1 Jn. 1:8 & 10). In the next verse, he tells us he is writing his letter so that we don’t sin, but “if we do sin, we have a Helper with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”

Don’t let anyone tell you that the Greek word parakletos means “defense lawyer” in that verse. We don’t need a defense lawyer with God. He is not waiting to kill you for every sin you commit, only prevented from doing so because he sees that he already killed his Son, relieving his blood-wrath against you. That’s an insult to God and a lie from the devil. Here is what God is like when we sin:

Yahweh passed by before [Moses], and proclaimed, “Yahweh! Yahweh, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness and truth, keeping lovingkindness for thousands, forgiving iniquity and disobedience and sin; and who will by no means clear the guilty …” (Ex. 34:6-7)

God our Father and Jesus our Lord have the same will and the same heart. Isn’t that what the doctrine of the Trinity is all about? It’s crazy to think that the Father wants to kill us, but the Son wants to have mercy on us. It’s God the Father who so loved the world that he send his only Son to save us. The Son loves us just like the Father, not differently, laying down his life for us while we were yet sinners (Rom. 5:8). That verse points out, too, that when Jesus laid his life down for us, it was “God commend[ing] his own love toward us.”

In 1 John 2:1, the word I translated “Helper,” and that most Bible translations translate as “Advocate” or “Counselor,” is the same word that Jesus uses to describe the Holy Spirit 4 times in John, chs. 14-16. There translators use “Helper” or “Comforter” almost exclusively.

When we sin and have to go to the Father, here is what the Bible says is happening:

Let’s therefore draw near with boldness to the Throne of Favor, that we may receive mercy AND may find favor for help in time of need. (Heb. 4:16)

Let’s try to “see” the picture of Jesus helping us when we sin. We are  running to the Throne “boldly,” because Jesus has cleansed the throne room, the Holy of Holies, with his blood. Hebrews compares this to the priest cleansing the Ark of the Covenant, and especially its cover, where God dwelt between the cherubim, with the blood of animals on the Day of Atonement (Heb. 9:7-12). The high priest had to do that every year under the Old Covenant. Jesus, however, has purified the heavenly Holy of Holies of our sins forever and ever with just one offering that never needs repeating.

Righteousness in the New Testament is not pretend righteousness, where God pretends you are as righteous as Jesus is. The righteousness of Jesus for those who are actually doing righteousness (1 Jn. 3:7 … “let no one lead you astray”). But it is the commonly pushed misunderstanding of doing that I am warring against today.

Note: I don’t want to lose anyone. I am arguing that you are probably already doing righteousness if you are following Jesus. People tell you that you can’t be worthy, can’t do good works–or at least not enough good works, and that you can’t be righteous. Don’t believe them. If you’re trying at all to follow Jesus, then God is creating you in him to do good works. Don’t deny that he is being successful in his work; give thanks for it! David did!

Okay, back to the throne room. According to Ephesians 3:12 as well as Hebrews 4:16 we are coming to the Throne of Favor in confidence. There, we are obtaining mercy from our merciful Father, who sits on a Throne of Favor because favors us! Another acceptable translation would be that he sits on a Throne of Grace because he is gracious to us all the time.

At the Throne of Favor, the Son is sitting at God’s right hand, ready with his Father, to bestow mercy and forgive your sins. The reason he is called parakletos (1 Jn. 2:2) at that Throne is because he is the one who helps us. We are not only receiving mercy, but also favor to help in time of need.

Jesus is our Helper in exactly the same way the Holy Spirit helps us. Normally, we have to go to John 14-16 and explain that Jesus is saying that the Holy Spirit he will send is exactly like him, like Jesus. In this post, though, I have to refute the false idea that Jesus is a defense attorney and tell you that Jesus is just like the Holy Spirit. He is providing favor so that you can be helped through your time of need, a need that probably had a lot to do with the sin you are, hopefully boldly, confessing at the Throne, which you came to on a path made for you by the blood of Jesus.

As a side note, you don’t need to ask for the blood of Jesus at the Throne. It was applied to the Throne itself and made a path for you a long time ago.

Back to righteousness. David’s claim that he  follows what is good (Ps. 38:20) was true, despite the fact that he was temporarily under severe physical chastisement for severe sin that he had done against God. The sin was the exception; the fierce loyalty to God that David was famous for was his norm. Thus, he was a righteous before God.

Just keeping us on track, God is looking for a pattern of righteousness, not sinless perfection. It is the sacrifice, the animal, that had to be perfect, not the one offering. Jesus had to perfect and without sin, and so he was, but we who follow Jesus are called to patiently continue to do good (Rom. 2:7) without growing weary of doing so (Gal. 6:9), not to sinless perfection.

We can see this in many of David’s psalms. In Psalm 25, David sings, “Pardon my iniquity, for it is great” (Ps. 25:11), yet he begins Psalm 26 with “Judge me, Yahweh, for I have walked in my integrity. I have trusted also in Yahweh without wavering.”

Both these things are true! The righteous are rewarded for a habit of putting God first; they are not rendered unrighteous because “we all stumble in many ways” (James 3:2). We have been taught that God requires sinless perfection of us, but it is actually only the lamb of the offering that has to be spotless, in our case, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

I thought of an objection here. Colossians 1:22 says God will present us “holy and without defect and blameless.” But how do we obtain this blamelessness: simply by continuing in the faith, grounded and settled therein, not moved away from the hope of the Gospel (Col. 1:23). We must  remember that although we are not to be deceived about the fact that only those who do righteousness are righteousness as Jesus is righteous, those who faithfully and patiently do good are righteous like Jesus. Imparted righteousness is real for those who continue to do good, which will happen for all who remain grounded and settled in the faith, all who are being created in Christ to do the good deeds our merciful and loving Father has prepared for us to do.

People freak out when I tell them that God rewards those who patiently do good with eternal life, but it is exactly what Paul said in Romans 2:7. People don’t believe Romans 2:6-7 because they don’t understand what it means to be a doer of righteousness and a doer of good works. To be a doer of righteousness and of good works is to be like David, Daniel, Job, and Noah, imperfect but wholly devoted to the Lord.

I have good friend who told me he could not listen to the things I was saying because if going to heaven had anything to do with works, he was doomed. Nonsense! He is one of the most righteous men I know. In fact, he is a lot like Job. He never lets a morning pass that he does not cry out for his children to know the Lord.

He sees his sins. I am sure he cries out with David, “Pardon my iniquities, for they are great.”

God, though, says that if a wicked man will  repent and do good, he will forget all the wickedness that man has ever done (Ezek. 18:21-23). He’s not waiting to kill because someone sinned. He’s not looking at the blood of his Son, reminding himself that he slaughtered his Son so he could feel better. No, he’s waiting for you to come boldly to the Throne of Favor. He’s waiting for you to come reason together with him so that your sins of scarlet can become white as snow (Isa. 1:16-20).

Yes, God will by no means clear the guilty (Ex. 34:7), but let’s not be foolish about who the guilty are. The guilty are those who refuse to repent. It’s as simple as that because God says he is delaying Jesus’ return waiting for every last one who will repent to repent because he doesn’t want anyone to perish (2 Pet. 3:9).

God save us from the false Calvinist idea that you are a bloodthirsty God who will not forgive without killing! We repent and humble ourselves for insulting you with such talk when you created us out of your delight in us (Prov. 8:22-31), and loved us so much that you sent your Son to save us from our slavery to temptations of the world, the lusts of our body, and captivity to wicked spirits.