Dear Parents,
This week in High Life we continued our series called Happy with a lesson on being pure in heart. Purity is a high calling. Imagine if you were offered a plate of cookies, and as you dug in, you were told that something weird was thrown in, like a tablespoon of eyelashes or toilet water. The whole batch would be tainted! God calls us to purity of heart, not a hint of sin present. Talk about a high standard. This may seem unattainable, but to help our students see how to take steps towards a pure heart, we looked at the story of David.
Many people think of David and Goliath or David and Saul when they think about the Old Testament king David. David was known as a “man after God’s own heart.” He wrote so many inspiring Psalms. But David also had a time of his life when his heart was less than pure. His affair with Bathsheba was not his finest moment. David made three basic mistakes that led to his impurity in this situation.
First, he believed that he was stronger than temptation. He saw Bathsheba bathing, and he went ahead and looked anyways. If we believe that we are stronger on our own than the temptations we face, we will surely fall. Many of us spend a great deal of time flirting with sin, standing right by the line, so to speak. We are foolish to think that we can continually hang around with people continually engaging in sinful behavior without eventually falling ourselves.
Secondly, we can easily fall into impurity if we are selfish like David was in this story. He ignored the fact that Bathsheba was married because he selfishly wanted her for himself. Nothing else mattered. When we put ourselves first, we fall right into impurity. Jesus set an example of humility, selflessness, rather than selfishness. He is God, yet he chose to come down to earth as a baby, to live as a man, and to die a horrible death. That is selflessness.
Finally, we see that David’s impurity leads him to try to cover up his sin. He wove a tangled web to try and keep everyone from finding out that he and Bathsheba had an affair and conceived a child. David’s web led to Bathsheba’s husband Uriah basically being murdered. And there were dire consequences for his sin. His young son, the Bible tells us, did not live, as a consequence for his sin.
Thankfully, we know that David’s story ends well. He repents for all his sins. And, decades later Jesus is born in the line of David. Jesus comes down to earth to set us free from the bondage of sin and impurity. No matter how deep we think we are in, there’s nothing that Jesus’ blood doesn’t cover. No sin is too great.
Next week we will conclude our six-week series on happiness. I hope that this series has been enriching to our students and to your families as well.
Blessings,
Shane, Chris, and Catherine