- David, he's the largerthan life biblical character

with a gigantic fallfrom grace, but what else

do you really know aboutthe life of King David?

That's the question raise by a new book

on Israel's most famous leader.

Take a look.

- [Announcer] New YorkTimes best selling author,

pastor, speaker andformer college president,

Dr. Mark Rutland believesthat it's time to tell

the whole story of King David,

not just the Sunday school version.

- So this guy points hisfinger in the king's face

and says, you're the man.

I denounce you, adultery and murder.

And David shocks the whole nation,

David says, you're right, I did it.

God give us leaders that are able to say,

all right, I did it.(audience applauds)

- [Announcer] In his newbook, David The Great,

Dr. Rutland peels backthe controversial layers

of King David's life and shares the key

that made him a man after God's own heart.

- Please welcome back to The700 Club, Dr. Mark Rutland.

It's always great to have you here.

- Thank you, nice to be back.

- You know, David is one ofthose figures in the Bible,

that everybody that hasbiblical knowledge knows about.

Why did you decide tochoose to write about him?

- That's a really good question actually,

because the challenge is howmuch he has been talked about

and preached about and written about.

- [Terry] Exactly.

- So one asks oneself,

do I have anything unique,

or new or different to say about it?

What convinced me to write about it,

I had lectured, taught and preached it.

I served as the president oftwo different universities

over a period of 16 years andthe fascination of Millennials

is actually what convinced me.

- [Terry] Really.

- They would pack auditoria,classrooms, special lectures,

and then faculty, so Iwould have a PhD in his 70s

sitting next to a freshman who's 17

and they were both intrigued with David

and I began to be inundated, literally,

with letters and emails,

please write a book, write a book,

and I decided there are some aspects

of this complicated multifaceted genius,

that needed to be explored in a new book.

- Pages are so flat.

We read this story, butwhen you dig into the life,

you say, in your book,that for every Goliath

in the life of David there was a Bathsheba

around the corner.

What do you mean by that?

- Well, David's life is anabsolute roller coaster.

The itinerations of hislife and history are,

they are shocking but at the same time

they enable us to relate to him.

So at our points of successwe say, oh, I fit there.

Which of us is perfect?

So we also find someidentification at his failures,

and you will read a purelife like Joseph or Daniel,

and there are times where you just say,

yeah, that guy's so far beyond me.

- [Terry] I could never be that.

- I could never be Joseph,

but you can say David now,okay, David, I'm there.

- So is that the reasonthat it's so important

for us to examine the, ifyou will, dark side of David,

because it's relatable?

- Well, on the one hand it is.

Another and more important aspect

of the reason for thatexamination is the grace of God.

David is, certainly his sins are majestic,

but we daren't use David's sins

to justify or rationalize our own,

instead we use hisrepentance to inform our own,

and David's repentancealways led him back,

not simply to remorse, but to God himself

and that's the critical issue.

- Yeah, you know, Ithink in David's story,

how it wasn't just one choice,

but one bad choice can lead toanother, can lead to another,

and he finds himself insuch a terrible situation,

and yet God says he's aman after his own heart.

How do you reconcile thedark side of David's life,

the choices he made with astatement like that from God?

- Yeah, not only is thatstatement made by Samuel

before we really meet David,

but 1,000 years later, SaintPaul layers that statement

and Paul says, and God testified of him,

he is a man after mine own heart.

- Hope, there's hope.

- There's hope and what I came up with,

I mean that's the conundrumof David isn't it?

Why is he called, why isn't Joseph

called a man after my own heart?

Certainly, this is what I've come up with.

David was like one of thesepowerful running backs

in American football that crash

through the line and they come at you.

Okay, you may bring 'emdown, but they're gonna fall

for three and a half yardsand they're gonna get,

you know you've only got'em down temporarily,

they're gonna get up andcome again and again,

and they're gonna punish youall the way to the goal line

because they're so fastened

on that goal and I think that's the thing.

David fell, but if he werespeaking into the camera

right now, he'd say, okay, you fell.

Fall forward, fall atthe foot of the cross.

Get up and go again.

David was fastened on the goal line.

- And you know, we're talking about some

of the things thathappened that were so dark

in the latter part of his life,

but David waited

on the prophecy that was given,

the anointing that was calledforth in him for a long time.

What can we learn fromhim about waiting on God?

- Good, I'm really glad you asked that,

because I don't want to just talk

about the dark things in David's life.

David is a majestic man of God

who accomplished incrediblethings, the founder of a nation,

the founder of the city of Jerusalem,

the eternal capital of the Jewish people,

and a complex genius, a poet.

His poetry has endured for 3,000 years,

and he was a musical genius,

he was an administrative genius,

a builder, a contruc,so all of those things.

So I think that when welook at the life of David,

we need to not just concentrateon those darker areas,

but on the wonderfulaccomplishments of King David.

- It's the combination of the two

that makes his story so compelling

and gives us such foodfor thought and such hope.

Mark's book is called David The Great,

Deconstructing the Manafter God's Own Heart.

It's an amazing book,it's available nationwide.

Be encouraged in your own walk

and inspired, as well, bythis man from the word of God.

Mark's also the featured speaker

at our Let's Pray ForAmerica Chapel today.

You will be live streaming thatservice at noon eastern time

if you wanna join us or justlog onto CBN.com to do that.

He's a powerful speaker,you don't want to miss it.