Paul’s teachings about David in Rom 4:6-8 are sometimes taken to support the doctrine of positional forgiveness. Paul describes David as a blessed man because God imputes righteousness apart from works. David was a man who was justified before God through faith, as was Abraham (Rom 4:1-5).
Paul refers to Ps 32:1-2a to demonstrate David’s blessedness:
Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven,
And whose sins are covered;
Blessed is the man to whom the Lord shall not impute sin.
The doctrine of positional forgiveness would hold that David is proclaiming that all his sins have been forgiven. When David believed in the coming Messiah, even his future sins were forgiven. Positionally, the Lord will not charge the one who has believed with sin.
There are major problems with this view. The main theme of Romans 1–4 is justification. Justification by faith does not deal with forgiveness.
Another problem is that Psalm 32 is not talking about when David believed in the coming Messiah for eternal life. It describes a time when David sinned grievously. Most accept that this psalm describes David’s confession after he committed adultery with Bathsheba and murdered her husband, Uriah.
David had been a believer for many years before he wrote Psalm 32. He is talking about the forgiveness of sins that believers experience after they have eternal life. He says that he received the forgiveness of sins only after confessing those sins to God (Ps 32:5). Before his confession, he experienced God’s discipline (vv 3-4). When he was honest with God, shown through his confession, God forgave him.
David expresses that truth in the phrase immediately following the verses from Ps 32 that Paul refers to. The man who is blessed is the one “in whose spirit there is not deceit” (Ps 32:2b). Before his confession of sin, David was living a lie before man and God. But when he acknowledged what he had done, God forgave him.
As a justified believer, David learned his lesson. Sin brings the discipline and wrath of God upon a believer. But he had the privilege of going to Him in prayer and confessing his sin (v 5a). God is merciful and would forgive him (Ps 32:5b).
It is interesting that this reference to the forgiveness of sins in David’s life is the only reference to forgiveness in the book of Romans. It does not refer to a positional forgiveness of sins that the unbeliever receives at the moment of faith, but to the forgiveness of sins that a believer receives when he confesses his sin.
In Romans, Paul takes up this theme. The book speaks of God’s judicial decree: The one who believes is declared righteous (justified). After speaking about David’s experience, Paul says that the justified believer has access to God (Rom 5:2). With this access comes the privilege of walking by the power of the Spirit. This can be described as walking in life (Rom 6:4). As in the case of David, this would include obtaining the forgiveness of sins after the believer sins. As David experienced, sin in the believer’s life brings destruction and the wrath of God (Rom 1:18). One of the blessings of justification is that one’s sins are forgiven, but only after he confesses those sins.
The believer is still justified, even when he sins. When he does not confess those sins, he is an unforgiven, but justified, believer. He is out of fellowship with God and subject to His discipline. The believer’s permanent justification allows him to receive the forgiveness of sins when he calls upon the Lord—when he confesses—for that forgiveness. Justification does not mean that all the believer’s sins have been forgiven. David knew and experienced that.
