Uncommen: Heart ConditionsSample

Purity

Psalms 51:10 "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me."

The title of this chapter is "A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet went to him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba."

Interestingly, the word "purity" is more associated with women than men for some odd reason. Growing up, if a woman wasn't a virgin when she got married, she was looked down on. If a man wasn't, it was high fives all around.

If you haven't read the story of David and Bathsheba and the story of Nathan calling David out on his sin, I would encourage you to do it now. But Psalms 51:3 also stood out to me, "For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me."

Just like a child doesn't need to be taught to sin and lie easy enough, we know our transgressions. We know them and tend to tune them out when we don't want to deal with them. David knew what he was doing from the moment he started staring at Bathsheba from the rooftop. He knew well enough that he had her husband murdered. I feel bad for David because his story is on full display for all to see. If our sin was added to the Bible for all to see, we might feel a little different toward getting mercy and grace.

So what can we do to embrace purity?

• Don't put ourselves in bad situations; David should have gone off to war.
• Find a friend like Nathan to help keep you accountable.
• Keep your eyes on your wife.
• Don't make matters worse by trying to cover up sin.
• Repent of your sin to God right now.
• Learn from these moments

The balance of our verse is beautiful as it says, "and renew a right spirit within me." David had to pay the price for his sin but could renew a right spirit within himself by God's grace.

PS: David catches the brunt here, but Bathsheba was no angel and took part in this with David.

Uncommen Questions:

1. How would you rank yourself on a scale of 1-10 when it comes to purity?

2. How would others see you if your story was added to the Bible?

Uncommen Challenge:

I challenge us all to take steps to help ourselves with purity. Even if you have been married for years, we can still take steps toward purity.