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“Seeing The Heart”
Categories: OLD TESTAMENTWhat were king David’s good attributes, and what were his bad ones?Sincerely,
Pros And Cons
Dear Pros And Cons,
That is the kind of question that is hard to answer because David, like all people, was a complicated man with a long list of strengths and weaknesses. Since it would take a novel to describe the intricacies of David’s character, we will focus on what God says was David’s greatest strength and what He said was David’s greatest weakness.
David’s greatest strength was that He was a man after God’s own heart. God specifically chose to make David king because of David’s attitude and faithfulness (1 Sam 13:14). David didn’t always make good decisions, but he looked at the world through the eyes of a man that wanted to do what God said. When David took on Goliath, he had courage because he saw Goliath’s immorality instead of Goliath’s size (1 Sam 17:45-47). David sought to follow God’s laws and let God’s Will be his guide.
David’s greatest weakness was his sin with Bathsheba. In 2 Sam 11, David yielded to temptation and slept with another man’s wife and then attempt to cover it up by having her husband killed. David allowed his power as king to cloud his judgment, and he fell into a tangled web of his own creation.
However, in the end, David received forgiveness because when Nathan confronted him with his sin, David’s heart shone through. Instead of denying the sin or killing the messenger, David uttered the humble words, “I have sinned against Jehovah.” (2 Sam 12:13)
