2 Samuel 23:1-7: in context

In the last words of David, the aged king reflects on his life and his hope. He speaks of the righteous ruler, who is like the light of morning at sunrise. But when he turns to the ground of his own confidence, it is not his achievements or his reign that he names, but God's covenant. Although my house is not so with God, he says, yet he has made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and secure; for this is all my salvation and all my desire. At the end of his life, David rests his hope not on himself but on God's sure covenant.

What David rests his hope on at the end is worth noting. He does not point to his own achievements, his victories, his reign, his righteousness; he was aware of his failures, and says his house was not all it should have been before God. Instead he rests his hope entirely on God's covenant: God has made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and secure. And he says this covenant is all his salvation and all his desire. At the end of his life, when all else falls away, David's confidence stands on the sure, ordered, everlasting covenant God had made with him, not on anything in himself. This shows us where a secure hope rests, especially as life draws toward its end. Our own achievements, our righteousness, our accomplishments, cannot bear the weight of our final hope; they are uncertain, marred by failure, unable to save us. But God's covenant, his sure promise, his binding of himself to us, is ordered in all things and secure, an everlasting foundation on which our hope can rest. David rested his final confidence not on himself but on God's covenant; and so may we. We have this hope, Hebrews says, as an anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast; and the anchor holds not because of our strength but because of God's covenant faithfulness. This is a comfort for the end of life, and for every uncertain time. When we come to the end, or to any time when our own achievements and strength fall away, our hope can rest secure on God's covenant, his sure and everlasting promise, ordered in all things and unshakable. I know whom I have believed, Paul says at the end of his life, and am persuaded that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him. The secure hope rests not on ourselves but on the faithful God who has bound himself to us in an everlasting covenant. This calls us to rest our hope on God's sure covenant rather than on ourselves. David, at the end of his life, aware of his failures, rested his hope not on his own achievements but on the everlasting covenant God had made, secure and ordered in all things, which he called all his salvation and all his desire. And we too are called to rest our final hope not on ourselves, our achievements, or our righteousness, which cannot bear the weight, but on God's sure covenant, his everlasting promise, ordered in all things and secure, in which alone our salvation and our hope truly rest. This is all my salvation and all my desire, David said of God's covenant; and it is the sure ground of our hope as well.

Do I rest my hope on my own achievements, righteousness, and strength, which are uncertain and cannot bear the weight of my final hope, or can David, who at the end of his life, aware of his failures, rested his confidence not on himself but on God's everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and secure, calling it all his salvation and all his desire, move me to rest my hope on God's sure covenant, his unshakable promise, in which alone my salvation and hope truly rest?