King David gets brought up a lot when someone makes a mistake. People say, "Well, David slept with Bathsheba, and God forgave him."
What they leave out is that David experienced extreme consequences for his behavior. The baby he and Bathsheba had as a result of his adultery died. The prophet Nathan told David that terrible things would happen within his household. Later, his son tried to take his kingdom away, and that son ended up dying. There were also consequences when David counted his fighting men.
It wasn't as simple as "God forgave David," and then everything was fine. But sometimes we use that story as a justification any time somebody does something wrong.
"Well, David slept with Bathsheba."
Yes, he did. He also had another man killed. And there were consequences.
The truth is, there are consequences to our behavior. Those consequences don't necessarily change how we're loved and cared for by the people around us. They may, or they may not. But being loved and being forgiven don't make the consequences disappear.
For example, if I take on debt, there are consequences: interest charges, payments, and other things I have to work through. I can acknowledge my mistake. I can decide to make different choices. But I still have to deal with the debt.
So what do we do with those consequences?
We can let them destroy us, or we can learn from them and keep moving forward.
We can't always undo the consequences of our mistakes. Maybe our mistakes aren't as radical as King David's adultery or having a man killed. But whatever they are, the consequences still need to be worked through.
And we can work through them.
That doesn't mean it's easy. It doesn't mean we enjoy it. It means we can look at what happened, take responsibility for our behavior, and make better choices moving forward.
Your consequences are there. But so is your future.
Your consequences are the result of past behavior. They don't have to determine future performance. You can learn from them and do things differently.