Whether you are a Democrat or a Republican, no one supported Bill Clinton’s torrid behavior in the White House with a certain intern. His actions were inexcusable and his character was completely unbecoming of the Commander in Chief of the most powerful nation on the planet. He abused his power and influence to attain what he wanted. No matter what we think of Clinton’s sins, they literally pale in comparison to the sins of King David in his affair with Bathsheba. The two chief sins that we identify are adultery and murder, but I don’t think this comes close to the actual truth. Because David abused his kingly influence, his affair with Bathsheba was not just adultery, it was rape. To rape, adultery and murder, we should also add betrayal. He betrayed his family. He betrayed his army troops and commanders. He betrayed the entire nation of Israel. He had built his reputation as a valiant soldier, but I cannot imagine how the men in his army could have ever trusted him again after what he did to the brave and selfless Uriah. Finally, to rape, adultery, murder and betrayal we must add infanticide. His sinful actions led directly to the death of his son born from rape, so it is as if David himself slew the newborn child.
Not only did David commit all these outrageous sins, he continued to live as if nothing had happened. He seemed to be completely blind to his own evil heart. In one of the most understated sentences of the Bible, 2 Samuel 11 ends with these words: “The thing that David had done displeased the Lord.” If David had been just another character in the Old testament who committed atrocious acts like these, we wouldn’t think too much of it. We would put him in the same category with men like the Pharaohs in Egypt and Nebuchadnezzar from Babylon. But David not only doesn’t belong with these men, God himself refers to David as “a man after my own heart.” How can this be? What was it about David that separated him from all of the other evil men in the Old Testament? What prevented him from becoming like them? The answer to these questions is found in Psalm 51. This is David’s psalm of genuine repentance, and genuine repentance is the only thing that separated David from Pharaoh in Egypt, who slaughtered not one baby, but thousands of newborns.
Genuine repentance is what we all need just as much as David needed it. But the problem is that many Christians don’t teach about repentance any more. Some Christians look at the word repent the way the world sees it. They only see the sign waving, hatemongers who walk the streets and scream at people to repent. It is sad that the church has such a low view of repentance, because it is one of the indispensable keys to spiritual growth. Genuine repentance is what separates those believers who walk with the Lord their whole lives from those who fall away. We must not only come to understand genuine repentance, but we must also come to love it and long for it, like a cup of cold water in the desert. For the Christian, repentance is not an occasional practice, but must be developed into a lifestyle. Let’s allow David to teach us about genuine repentance.
1 Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion
blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash away all my iniquity
and cleanse me from my sin.
3 For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is always before me.
4 Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you are proved right when you speak
and justified when you judge.
5 Surely I was sinful at birth,
sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
6 Surely you desire truth in the inner partsa;
you teachb me wisdom
in the inmost place.
7 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;
wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness;
let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins
and blot out all my iniquity.
10 Create in me a pure heart, O God,
and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
11 Do not cast me from your presence
or take your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation
and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.
13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
and sinners will turn back to you.
14 Save me from bloodguilt, O God,
the God who saves me,
and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.
15 O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
16 You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;
you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
17 The sacrifices of God arec a
broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart,
O God, you will not despise.
18 In your good pleasure make Zion prosper;
build up the walls of Jerusalem.
19 Then there will be righteous sacrifices,
whole burnt offerings to delight you;
then bulls will be offered on your altar.
Confession of Sin
The first thing genuine repentance requires is a confession of sin, and David does it better than anyone else. In verse three he wrote, “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.” David had an overwhelming sense of his own sin, but how did reach this point? Did he feel this way when Nathan first approached him? Not even close, right? Therefore, even before we get to confession of sin, it is necessary to have a conviction of sin. For David, that conviction came through his friend Nathan. The definition of a true friend is one who is willing to risk your friendship in order to point you back to the Lord. But that’s a different sermon. Suffice to say that confession of sin first requires a conviction of sin, whether that comes from a friend or directly from the Holy Spirit.
Notice that in his confession, David did not make any attempt to make excuses for his sin. He did not say, “”If Bathsheba had not been taking a bath, I never would have gotten myself into this mess!” “If Uriah would have been a good husband and visited his wife, I wouldn’t have had to kill him.” David does not argue about God’s standards. He does not excuse his sin by saying God’s standards are too high. David’s sin loomed large at this moment. He claimed tha he was sinful at birth and even from the point of conception. David develops a pretty complete doctrine of sin in this psalm. In the N.T., the book of Romans contains the most complete teaching on sin. 3:23 For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God
3:10 There is no one righteous, not even one…no one who seeks God.
5:12 Sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin
We are born with a sinful nature and then we prove this by setting about sinning from the earliest possible age. This is the difference between Biblical Christianity and most of the world. Most people believe that children are born innocent. There is no question that babies and small children have a innocent nature about them because they are learning and exploring their new world, but they are not innocent in terms of being perfect and without sin. David did not have the apostle Paul to explain this to him, but he knew it from his own experience
But then David says something that is a bit shocking. In verse four he wrote, “Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.” Some people like to use the term victimless crime to describe things like the legalization of drugs. Not a few people in the Viroqua area would present a strong case that marijuana should be made legal, because after all, smoking marijuana is a “victimless crime.” If you were reading this psalm for the first time, you might think that this is where David was headed when he concluded, “Against you, you only, have I sinned.” My first thought is, “Oh yeah, I wonder what Uriah’s mother have to say about this? If he could speak, what would the dead newborn have to say about this? What would Joab, the commander of the army have to say about this? What would all of the other troops have to say about this? What would the average Israelite have to say about this? Did David only sin against God? No, his crimes and sins were not so-called victimless crimes. Many people suffered because of his sins, at least two of them to the point of death. So how could David say that he only sinned against God?
This is a potential stumbling block for some, but it is one of the most important truths in the entire Bible: all sin is fundamentally a sin against God. David did not mean to imply that he did not also sin against Uriah, Bathsheba, the baby and the entire nation. David’s sin left a wake of dead and hurting victims. One could argue, and I will next week, that the consequences of David’s sins were passed down to at least the next generation. If any politician in our 21st century nation committed these same crimes, at best, they would be facing a life sentence in prison, just as the apostle Paul would have been sentenced to prison for racketeering, terrorism and murder if he were alive today. But whether you have ten thousand victims or one, every sin is, at its very core, a sin against God. This may be the primary reason why the cross is called a stumbling block to those who are perishing. Christ’s bloody sacrifice on the cross was so severe because our sin is so severe, but the average person cannot accept this. I have never hear anyone claim moral perfection, but most are quick to say, “I’m not really that bad of a person.” David had a right view of his sin and he believed that God was perfectly just to condemn him.
One of the great things about this Psalm is that we not only can read the facts about what David thought, but we can almost feel his emotion when he says, “my sin is always before me,” and in verse eight, “let the bones you have crushed rejoice.” David did not dismiss the consequences of his sins. On the contrary, he felt their weight to the point of being crushed by it. This is a necessary part of genuine repentance, that we not only confess our sin, but we begin to feel it as God feels it. Because of the holiness and justice of God, the weight of our sin should be nearly to the point of crushing us. It’s this correct view of sin which leads to the next step of repentance.
An Appeal for Mercy
David began with a cry for mercy in the first verse of the psalm, but I think that chronologically speaking, his confession of his sin would have come prior to his request for mercy. I think this is true, because without a recognition of sin, one will never feel a need for mercy. What if you received a statement from your credit card company saying that they were erasing the $25,000 you owed them? Wouldn’t that be a great feeling to have such a debt forgiven? It would, unless you didn’t owe them any money in the first place. If you had a zero balance on your credit card and you received such a letter, it would be meaningless. The mercy of forgiving your debt would have no meaning because there was no debt in the first place. In the same way, a cry for mercy can only truly come when the debt is real. David’s debt of sin was real and his need for mercy was acute.
Please notice the way in which David asked for mercy. He wrote, “Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your unfailing love.” David was asking for mercy that would be equivalent to and flow out of God’s unfailing love. If you remember, a few months ago I explained a Hebrew word that we should all be familiar with. The word was hesed—translated as lovingkindness, steadfast love, or in Psalm 51 as unfailing love. David was asking the Lord for hesed. He was asking that the Lord show him mercy, but mercy that was consistent with God’s perfect love, God’s hesed. Of course that is the only kind of mercy that the Lord can show, and that is the key here—David was asking God to show mercy that matched his character. David already knew that God was a merciful God. He knew it in his head and he knew it in his heart. And this knowledge of God is what gave David the courage to repent.
I believe there are two main reasons that we do not practice genuine repentance. The first is that we love our sin so much that we simply do not want to repent. The other reason is that we lack the courage to repent. We don’t believe God to be a merciful God. We have not experienced his hesed, his lovingkindness and his mercy; therefore, we are afraid to repent. We feel that if we admit our sin, God will crush us and cast us away. In one sense, that is what the Lord should do. If we want God to deal with us according to his justice, then we are doomed and we should be afraid to repent. From a worldly perspective, it was not fair for David to ask for mercy and it was not fair for God to grant it. Like I said before, if David were alive today and did these things, he would be stripped of his power and probably imprisoned for the rest of his life. So when David received mercy, wasn’t God just letting him off of the hook? Why should David receive a get out of free jail card and it didn’t cost him anything? No, it did not cost David anything, but it did cost God everything—the life of his son, Jesus. Every act of mercy shown by God is completely bound to the sacrificial death and resurrection of Christ.
This is what makes mercy so fantastic, and it is also why people stumble over God’s mercy. It seems too good to be true. This is what leads some people to confuse repentance with penance. Penance is best a doctrine which states that the Godly sorrow of repentance must be joined with good works. That is, to practice penance means that we must do something to earn God’s mercy. We must do acts of penitence before we are granted mercy. You may not officially believe the doctrine of penance, but many of you may practice it.
I am going to show a video clip of the movie called The Mission. The movie is about a group of monks who worked with a South American tribal group in the 1700’s. One of the monks in this scene is a recently converted slave trader who used to enslave the very people to whom he is now supposed to minister. But the problem is that he is carrying the weight of guilt of his former days as a slave trader. This scene is a perfect example of penance—trying to earn mercy.
God’s Miraculous Work of Mercy
The next part of repentance is exclusively a work of God—a miraculous work of mercy. The granting of mercy is not merely a forgiveness of outstanding debt; it actually changes the person who receives the mercy. Look at all of the ways that David asks for God to change him.
· blot out my transgressions.
· wash away all my iniquity
· cleanse me from my sin.
· cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;
· wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
· blot out all my iniquity
· create in me a pure heart, O God
I believe this last phrase is the most telling of all. David asked God to create a pure heart within him. This is another Biblical phrase that is so common that we miss its significance. David is not asking God to help him be pure. David did not say, “Lord, my heart is so impure. Help me to live with a pure heart.” David was not asking for assistance, he was asking for creation. David was asking the Lord to create a pure heart within him, in the same way that God created the universe. Let me show you the significance of this word. Until we get to Psalm 51, the word create is used very sparingly in the Bible.
Gen 1:27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
Gen 2:3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created…
Gen 2:4 These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created…
Gen 5:1 This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man…
Gen 5:2 Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created.
Gen 6:7 And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth…
Deut 4:32 Since the day that God created man upon the earth…
There are only seven uses of this word and six of them are from the early chapters of Genesis. God’s act of creation is always ex nihilo, which s the Latin phrase for “out of nothing.” When the footers of our building are poured tomorrow, they will be built using existing materials. When the framing starts in three weeks, we will use existing materials—concrete, wood and steel. What basic material did God use to create the universe? God started with absolutely nothing. His creative activity is always ex nihilo—out of nothing. Therefore, when we get to verse ten, David is asking God to create, out of nothing, a pure heart within him. In other words, David is admitting that he brought nothing to the table. His heart was impure and needed to be recreated. Only a miraculous work of God could accomplish this.
A Response of Worship
Genuine repentance will always result in a response of worship. Notice the words of worship in the following verses.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation
and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.
13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
and sinners will turn back to you.
14 Save me from bloodguilt, O God,
the God who saves me,
and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.
15 O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
David was so stunned at God’s mercy that it naturally resulted in joyful worship. This is part of the fruits of repentance. Someone once asked me how do you know if another person has actually repented or not. That’s a great question, and my simple answer is, you will just know it when you see it. The fruit of their repentance will result in joy, good works and praise. I don’t mean to say that every time you confess a sin you will break out into a song. But for the bigger roadblocks in life, those sins that seem to loom large, even if they are not as large as David’s, the experience of mercy will result in a joyful life and a changed life. You may not even be able to see it at first, but it will be there and will eventually be evident.
I want to show you the next part of that video clip to see what happens when a person lets go of penance and receives real mercy. This kind of mercy cannot be earned. It can only be received in faith.
Rich Maurer
June 22, 2008