Restoration after a moral failure

[Jay]

I have heard of some very conservative ministers who found another preacher or a preacher's wife to be in adultery, who quietly went to the man, reproved him, and enabled him to be restored, and might use him as a nameless example. They also kept an eye on him to catch him before he fell again, and could say that the man went on to do a good work. It is only if the sin must be confronted openly that the minister actually forfeits his position. This might actually have been the case with David. Nathan could have confronted him before all the children of Israel, but the confrontation was done in private where David could repent. Had Nathan taken him before the people, then there David would have gone beyond the place of repentance.