Tag Archives: 2 Samuel

Finding Hope After Life’s Mistakes

Life can sometimes feel like spilled water — messy, irreversible, beyond fixing. There are days when we carry the weight of mistakes we can’t undo or words we wish we could take back. Like water soaking into the ground, those moments seem lost forever.

David certainly had one of those moments. His family is in turmoil after a series of events; David is mourning the loss of a son, and he is needing to reconcile with another son who is estranged. David is visited by a wise woman, and her advice to David is an encouragement to us all.

“Like water spilled on the ground, which cannot be recovered, so we must die. But that is not what God desires; rather, he devises ways so that a banished person does not remain banished from him” (2 Samuel 14:14).

God’s heart is not to leave us in our brokenness.
He devises ways — not half-hearted attempts, but intentional plans — to bring us back to Him. His nature is not to abandon, but to restore. Even when we feel banished by guilt, shame, or regret, God is actively working to open the door for our return.

This verse reminds us that while our past may be out of our hands, our future is not. God invites us, even now, into grace, into hope, into new life with Him.

Enabling Grace

David was reminded of God’s grace.

David was in a season of turmoil. His family was a mess; there were many reasons for the messiness, and one of David’s advisors wanted to help him clean it up. He drafted a woman to tell David a parable.

The parable consisted of a widow with two sons. One son murdered the other, and the community shouted for the murderer’s head. If he was convicted, the widow would have no hope of continuing her family line. She pleads for mercy from the king.

David compassionately says she should receive mercy. Then, the woman applies the parable to David’s situation.

She points out David has a banished son needing reconciliation, and reminds David God himself makes plans to enable a banished person to be reconciled to the Lord. 2 Samuel 14:14 says, “All of us must die eventually. Our lives are like water spilled out on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again, but God does not just sweep life away. Instead, he devises ways to bring us back when we have been separated from him.”

Mistakes; they have been made. Regrets exist. The list of things we would not do or redo can be extensive, but God knows how to handle all of it.

God has devised a plan to restore us to the family.

“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only son, so everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his son into the world, not to judge the world but to save the world through him,” Jesus explains in John 3:16-17.

Jesus also says in John 10:10, “The thief’s purpose is to steal, kill, and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.”

Jesus is the plan which enables man and God to reconcile.

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