Own It

April 5, 2o22

When I was growing up, one of my favorite stories of our founding fathers was the now debunked story of George Washington chopping down the cherry tree. In that story, he chopped down the tree. Later, when his father asked him who had chopped it down, he responded that he could not tell a lie. He was willing to take responsibility for his actions. He owned it.

Have you ever had a time when you did something wrong and instead of owning it, you either tried to shift the blame or make excuses? There have been times in my life when I have done the same thing. People who were not part of a situation were brought in, simply by association. Thinking further upon it, this has been a human condition since the beginning of our existence. Adam and Eve blame shifted to try to get out of the ramifications of their choice to eat the fruit and thereby reject God’s sovereignty over them. King Saul blamed Samuel for not coming fast enough to offer a sacrifice. Later, he blamed the men for wanting to offer a sacrifice, saying to Samuel that they had saved the animals to offer to “your God.”

Blaming others has been a common theme. How often do we want to follow in the same vein as Adam when he even blamed God, trying to shift all of the fault over. It would be easy to read the preceding verses to the one above and attempt to blame God. However, we see later in scripture that God does not tempt anyone to do evil. If indeed that is the case, then maybe we need to understand the reason that David could own the blame on this action of his. Could it be that David already had in his heart to do such a thing (call for a census) and God used that as an opportunity to bring about judgment upon Israel?

Yes, scripture does say that God incited David to number the people. However, in the same story, yet a different account (1 Chronicles 21), it is Satan who tempts David. Maybe it was the case that, similar to the account of Job, God allows Satan a bit of room. Yet, unlike Job, David follows the dictates of his heart, which Satan was able to draw out of him. This act in turn resulted in his sin.

Instead of choosing to blame shift, David owned it. He owned his fault in this matter. I wonder if we could take a cue from David. When we sin, instead of trying to get out of the consequences of our sin, like Adam, Eve and Saul, maybe we should be more like David, owning our fault and falling on the mercy of God. Is there some fault of yours that you need to own up to as opposed to blame shifting?