Open Heaven 14 October 2024 MESSAGE

In my primary school days, our teacher told us the story of a man who offended his king. The king was very angry and called the man concerning the issue. The man immediately got on his knees and pleaded for mercy. He admitted his offence and said that he was very sorry. The king pardoned him because of his repentant heart. Our teacher told us that if we are wrong and admit it while asking for mercy, we will obtain mercy. However, if we try to cover our wrongs, we will surely get punished. The lesson stuck with me, and so, when I do something wrong, I don’t try to cover it. If I offend God, I turn to Him and say, “Lord, I have offended you, please have mercy on me.”

If you want to obtain mercy from God, you must not cover any sins that you commit. The reason God always had mercy on David is that he never tried to cover his sins; rather, he would confess them to God. In 1 Chronicles 21:1-16, when Gad came to tell David that he had offended God, not only did David accept his wrong, he called the elders to fast and pray with him for forgiveness. Compare that to Saul in 1 Samuel 15:20-21. After Samuel had come to tell him that he had not carried out God’s instruction to the letter, he made excuses instead of accepting his wrong. When Samuel refused to worship God with him, he did not plead with him to help appease God, rather, he pulled Samuel’s skirt just because he didn’t want the elders to see Samuel walking away from him. He clearly wasn’t making the sacrifice to ask for mercy, he was doing it to cover his sin and make everything look alright. 1 Samuel 3:19 tells us that God honoured Samuel and never allowed his words to fall to the ground, but in 1 Samuel 16:1, as much as Samuel pleaded for Saul, God said that he should not waste his time because He had rejected Saul.