King David is an example to us of what to do when we fall. David prayed. David repented thoroughly. God forgave David. The first child died. The second child was Solomon, whom the Lord loved.

David had much trouble after his sin but he died in glory. His Psalms have brought forth incalculable fruit among the righteous.

The main thing is that we do not quit. No matter what happens we are not to quit. We must continue pressing forward in the Lord. If we stumble we must repent, turn from our wicked ways, get up again and continue pressing forward. We must accept our chastisement, making restitution if necessary, and not question the Lord's love or His wisdom.

We are speaking here of the believer who falls into sin or error while seeking God with all his heart. We are not referring to willful sin, to the individual who deliberately sins with the idea in mind that afterward he will return to the Lord and receive forgiveness. There is no provision in the old covenant or the new for deliberate, willful sin.

For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, (Hebrews 10:26)

The victorious saints, the ones who finally will inherit all things, are not those who never have made a mistake. They are those who have profited from their mistakes and have gone on to greater heights in the Lord.

Hopefully, in this short article we have exposed some of God's people to an element sometimes missing in today's preaching. The missing element is the understanding that after God forgives us He judges our personality. The main part of the Christian discipleship is the working out of the lawlessness that dwells in us.

The battle rages as Satan accuses us, and we struggle to stand in Jesus during the time that God moves against the evil in our personality.

Satan has his way for awhile. God uses Satan to buffet the elect.

And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure. (II Corinthians 12:7)

Satan sifts us, tempts us, accuses us, afflicts us, harasses us in every manner that God permits. Our Christian life, which commenced in a joyous exodus from the bondages of the world, settles into a prolonged hunger and thirst in a wilderness of chastisement. Our hunger and pain is to teach us to obey God and to live by the Word that continually comes from the mouth of the Lord.

And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no. And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live. (Deuteronomy 8:2,3)

To be continued.