The sin of David was very grievous, but his repentance was most heartfelt and earnest. No case of sin ever seemed so hopeless and desperate where God has condescended to send a message of rebuke and warning. David fell asleep in the arms of Satan. When he awoke to his own awful situation he acted with the energy and decision that his case demanded. He did not cover up his guilt. He did not excuse his crime. He did not attempt to throw the blame upon others. Nor did he seek to conceal from future ages the record of his repentance. He was ashamed, indeed, of his sin, and well he might be; but he was not ashamed to make known his penitence for his great transgression. In the fifty-first Psalm, he has placed on record one of the most humble confessions of guilt that was ever penned. Several things in this confession are worthy of special attention: 1. His sense of the greatness of his guilt. David did not think his wrong done to Uriah a light thing. He had been guilty of as great wrongs toward him, as one man can be guilty of toward another. But so great was his guilt toward God, and so derogatory to his infinite majesty and purity was his crime, and so calculated to bring lasting reproach and dishonor upon the name and cause of God, that even his wickedness toward Uriah was a small matter compared with that toward God. And so with the strictest propriety he says: “I acknowledge my transgressions; and my sin is ever before me. Against Thee, THEE ONLY have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest.” Verses 3, 4. 2. His intense desire to be cleansed from his sin. It was not the shame of his guilt, nor the pain that he experienced from the rod of God upon him, that gave him his greatest distress and solicitude. It was the fact that he was stained with sin, and polluted with evil and with blood-guiltiness, that caused him such intense anguish of spirit. Witness his words: Verse 2: “Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.” Verse 7: “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.” Verses 9, 10: “Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” Verse 14: “Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation; and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness.” 3. His zeal in seeking God, though he knew that the rest of his life was to be filled with affliction from God's chastening hand. When Nathan reproved David, he announced to him the judgments of God which were never to depart from his house. David did not say that it was no use to try, if such was to be his case. Not so, by any means. He knew that the chastening hand of God if it ever spared anything to him, would leave him more than he deserved. He accepted the chastening with thankfulness, and bowed his whole soul to the just judgments of God. There can be no doubt that David did truly repent. He was indeed guilty of dreadful crime toward God and toward man. But he was taken by the Devil in his snare before he was aware of his danger. The blindness which sin brings upon its victims was upon him till he was most pointedly rebuked by Nathan. Then he was made to see his awful guilt, and to arouse to the most heartfelt repentance. Had he ever afterward returned to the like transgression, we have no reason to believe that God would have extended pardon to him. Probably no man ever came so near perdition and yet escaped it as did David. Had there not been in his character some most noble qualities, he would never have been able to avail himself of the bare possibility of escape which alone remained to him. The fall of David is a warning to all who fear God, that they never for a moment forget their danger. His repentance does not furnish the slightest ground of hope for the deliberate transgressor of God's law.