Psalms 51:1-12

Psalm 51, I want to begin reading with verse 1 and read through verse 12. A Psalm of David, when Nathan, the prophet, came unto him after he had gone in to Bashiba, verse 1. Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness, according under the multitude of thy tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. wash me throughly from my iniquity, cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against thee, the only have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight, that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest. Behold, I was shaping an iniquity and in sin, did my mother conceive me? Behold thou desirest truth in the inward parts, and in the hidden part, thou shalt make me to know wisdom. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean. Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. Make me to hear joy and gladness, that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice. Hide thy face from my sins and blot out all my iniquities. Created me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence. Take not thy Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation and uphold me with thy free spirit. the Lord bless us tonight from his word. There was a policeman. It was on duty during an ice storm. And it seems that the ice was about a half inch thick on every tree branch in the area. And he was called to a site where the ice and the falling branches had caused the power line to come down. And his duty was to keep people away from that area. There was a small, tree near the power line and had a short trunk with a lot of long thin branches. While the fallen power line was crackling and sparkling, popping on the ground with electricity, it was throwing out sparks through the branches of this small tree. And the sparks would reflect off the ice-covered branches, sending out a small tree. a rainbow of glimmering colors. As the policeman stood there and watched this, he was amazed that something so lovely could be so deadly. Sin is a very dangerous thing. It may appear to you to be somewhat beautiful, but when you reach out to touch it, it’s deadly. When Satan dangles a temptation to sin before your eyes, It’s like a fishing lure. It’s attractive. It’s shiny, but you don’t see the barbed hook. David beheld the lovely figure of Bashiba while she was bathing. He liked what he saw. He reached out to take her for himself. But like the glimmering tree with the rainbow colors. Because of the fallen power line, David’s sin was danieling. and had a deadly effect upon his life. We should always realize that there is something that’s hidden from your eyes when you first are tempted to sin, and that is this danger that’s inherent in all sin. Psalm 73, David here laments the terrible consequences of his sin, and he provides a warning for you and I. about sin and how we must be very careful with regard to sin in our life. Let us see in verse tonight that your sin brings guilt. We see here in verse 3, the psalmist says, for I acknowledge my transgression of my sin is ever before me. Now there is a distinction between real guilt and guilt feeling. It’s possible to feel guilty about something without actually being guilty. You may think something is sinful when actually it’s not. When I was growing up, the Roman Catholics were not allowed to eat meat on Friday. That was a terrible sin to eat meat on Friday. Not was it sinful to eat meat on Friday? No. They would eat fish, which if you read John’s Gospel carefully, you notice in the last one, they went out of fish, and Jesus calls from the shore, do you have any meat? It is meat, but they distinguish between the two. So they were very diligent about eating fish on Fridays, not hot dogs, or any type of meat, that we would call meat. And so that you can feel guilty. He said, oh, I ate meat on Friday. But that’s not sin. But it’s also possible to be guilty of actual sin and not immediately feel guilty about it. The Bible recognizes what are known as sins of ignorance that people commit. And perhaps sometimes sin is sin without being aware that you’ve sin. Because you don’t feel guilty, at least at first, before God. There are those who profess to be Christians, have a wrong view of the Christian Sabbath. So they may go out and cut their grass on the Lord’s Day, but actually they’re violating the law of God. But they may not feel that because they don’t believe that that commandment applies to them. Suppose you are driving and somehow or other where you’re not paying real close attention, maybe you’re talking on the cell phone, maybe you’re talking to somebody else in the car, and you drive right through a school zone lots along down. Now, you may not feel guilty because you didn’t realize you had done it. But when the policeman pulls you over and gives you a ticket, you say, oh, hi, I drove through a school zone. I shouldn’t have done that. Suppose you’re driving down to the Pennsylvania Interstate somewhere and a police car pulls up behind you and starts slashing his lights for you to pull over. And as you’re pulling over, you’re looking down at your speed was I going too fast? And did I committee in infractions while I was driving? But when the policeman gets to the car and begins to talk with, he says, I noticed that your back tire has a bubble and it could blow out and be very dangerous. That happened while you were driving on the interstate. You need to get that fixed immediately. You felt guilty, but you weren’t guilty in that particular case. But David tells you here that he is haunted. by his actual guilt. My sin is ever before me. He has a deep sense of guilt. It constantly fills him. With shame and remorse, how could he ever walk on the roof of his house again without thinking of what happened when he walked on the roof of the house when Bathsheba was bathing? How could he ever lay down its house? sleep at night in that bed of his without a sorrowful reflection on what he had done there and how he had committed adultery in that very bed. How could he ever send a messenger off to the army without a sorrowful reflection of the fact that he sent Uriah with his own death warrant to Joab, the commander, the army, put him up in the front lines and withdraw and have him put to death? How could he ever drink a cup? of wine without a sorrow for reflection on how he had made Uriah drunk in order to try to force him to go down to his house and to his wife. How could he ever besiege a walled city without a sorrow for reflection on the treacherous way that he had murdered Uriah? How could he ever pass judgment on matters that were brought before him? When all he can think about is what he had done with Nathan’s little story and how he, as the judge, made his decision about it. That man deserves to die. You’re the man I’m talking about, David. You can imagine. This is why you can’t get rid of it. He can’t get it off his mind. What a humbling experience that have your sin always before you, no matter which way you turn, no matter what you’re doing, it seems to just stay there. It haunts you day and night. You feel like one of those criminals on the chain gang and you drag about this bald chain wherever you go. Well, you’re constantly weighed down by your guilt. Seems everything you do in some way or another reminds you of your past sin. You rise in the morning and think about it. It breaks into your mind during the day. And at night as you toss and turn on your bed, it comes into your dreams. David realized he was profoundly guilty. I acknowledge my transgressions. Now there was a period of time when David tried to keep it all secret. Kep it hush-hash as much as he could. He schemed to get Uriah and Bashiba together again, perhaps. If I could just get them together, Uriah will think it’s his son that’s being born. Try to hide his sin. But Uriah refused to enjoy his family life when his fellow soldiers were out there on the battlefield with their blood on the line. What a noble man he was. One of David’s mighty man we read in the scripture, he’s put to death. Months we said, we talked about it. Months went by, and David has not really addressed his sin. Yet the day came when he’s confronted by Nathan, and when Nathan said thou art the man he had to confess, I have sinned against the Lord. it wasn’t a matter of false guilt he knew he was guilty the feelings of guilt were genuine and it was a profound guilt that he felt you notice here David doesn’t cry out here God make me feel better I don’t like the way I feel no I’m guilty I acknowledge my sin have mercy on me my friend until we reach this point we can ever really true peace before God. We can’t just hope to get rid of our guilty feelings. We must be willing to admit our wrongdoing and confess our guilt before God first. David didn’t bargain here on the avalanche of guilt that was going to fall on him and bury him when he sinned against the Lord. But it’s a package deal when you sin. You never know what’s going to happen. your sin brings guilt. Secondly tonight, your sin creates defalment. I don’t know this one to four here with me tonight. Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness, according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies, blood out my transgressions, wash me throughly from my iniquity, cleanse me from my sin, for I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against these. be the only have I sinned done this evil in thy sight that thou mightest be justified when thou judgest or thou speakest and be clear when thou judgest. And then verse seven, purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean, wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. David’s sin is multifaceted. We already talked about this under the various terms. He uses transgression. Sin, iniquity, evil. so forth. And we see how he longs here for some type of cleansing. He feels the record of his sins against him. And he needs them purged. He needs them erased. God’s keeping track. He’s written them down, so to speak. The psalmist says in Psalm 130, verse 3, If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stink? and you marked up all my iniquities. David sees the guilt of his sin as deeply as some indelible dye that’s upon him, like the blackest ink spot upon him. The dye is ingrained, and he feels as a sinner he’s marked by his sin. Daniel Hawthorne wrote a book. the scarlet letter. In that book, there was a young woman who was guilty of adultery, and she had to wear on her dress a red A so that everybody would know she was an adulteress. Think about that. David’s saying, I’m marked. Everybody knows what I’ve done. I’m guilty before the Lord God. Now, because we’re used to automatic washers and what a blessing that is, perhaps we don’t realize and always grasp the picture that’s here portrayed under the word wash me from my sins. Some of you may remember, if you’re old enough, you may remember your mother had a scrub board. With those metal bridges in it, and she worked those clothes up and down in the soap and get the dirt off of them and get the marks off of them and so forth. She would scrub the dirt out of those clothes with the board. It was hard work to do that. David seized that he needs God to give him a vigorous washing. He needs to be put on the scrubboard, so to speak. Get this stain off of him. It’s interesting. Jeremiah in chapter 2, verse 22, says, this, for though thou wash thee with nitry or soda, and make thee much soap, yet thine iniquity is marked before me, saith the Lord God. You can’t get rid of it. You as a human being cannot scrub yourself. You can’t wash it off. But I can, God tells us in his word. What a truly awakened conscience then. It cries out for a complete washing. from sin. You know, many murderer is probably alarmed when he would see an electric chair or maybe that room where they give you the lethal injections because that’s the punishment. The thief may love all the goods and possessions he can steal, but he doesn’t like the jail cell. But David isn’t like this. He’s sick of his own sin. He wants it removed from his life. Not just the punishment, but the sin itself. He’ll bear the punishment. He’ll bear the consequences. He’ll bear the sword never departing from his house as a chastisement if the Lord will remove his sin from. This may explain why. You remember when David fled from Jerusalem, when Absalom raised an army against him and Shimei came out, a man from Benjamin and cursed him. Throw rocks and dirt on him and his peoples. They were passing. Men of him. With David, said, Let me go up there, I’ll take his head off of him. Day said, let him curse. The Lord has bid him to curse. He was accepting it. I accept this. I deserve this. He’s accepting it. This is why he’s so concerned. About the army officers, going out against Absalom’s army in battle, and he says, please, dear tenderly, with the young man, my son. Don’t kill him. It’s my fault. He wouldn’t be in this situation and won’t my guilt. Is this the priority that we have? That our guilt would be taken right? That our sin would be removed? Or do we just want to get rid of the consequences? David prays for cleansing here in verse 2. This is more expressive, Lord. If washing won’t do, try some other process. If water won’t do, try some other process. do tri-fire. Purge me from my sin. You know, under the law, everything got perched by two ways. One, it got washed, or was placed like metal objects and so forth, we’ll put through the fire. Malachi tells us when God wants to cure the disease of sin, and talks about the Savior coming. Who may abide the day of this coming, and who shall stand when he appeareth? For he is like a refiner’s fire, and like fuller soap. He shall sit as a refiner and purifier is silver, and he shall purify the sons of Levi and purge them as gold and silver. Through the fire and through the water, whatever it takes, he’ll cleanse them. In Isaiah chapter 6, we have that wonderful chapter, where he has this vision of the Lord God, Jehovah, high and lifted up. It is a chapter that reveals this conversion and also his call to be a prophet and to speak for the war. And so when he sees this vision of the Holy One of Israel who really, according to New Testament, is Jesus Christ, he sees him sitting upon a throne as a king and he is such a long train that it fills the whole temple. And he sees the angelic host and the seraphim calling out and crying out, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of host. And Isaiah cries out, whoa, me for I’m undone because I’m a man of unclean lips and I dwell in the midst of the people of unclean lips from my eyes have seen the king the Lord of glory. Then what does God do? He does an amazing thing, doesn’t he? He sends one of the chair of him to the altar of God with some tongs. Takes out one of the coals from the fire. Takes it over and presses the coal on Isaiah’s lips. This is what he sees. and the vision and he’s purified by this, the Bible tells us. His lips are purged. Thy iniquity is taken away. Thy sin is purged, God says to it. Not only is he forgiven to be saved, but now his lips are clean and he can speak for the Lord. He can be the prophet that God wants him to be. Nothing will suffice than cleansing from your defilement, whether it comes by washing it, whether it comes by fire or purging it somehow. Either way,, we’ve got to get the sin out. We have to get it removed, and God can remove it from us. Have you ever pled to God like this for the removal of your sin? Your sin creates defilement. Thirdly, tonight, your sin causes spiritual helplessness. Look at verse 6 and verse 10, if you would. Behold, Behold thou desire, truth in the inward parts, and in the hidden part, thou shalt make me to know wisdom. Verse 10. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. You recall that David was given great strength so that he could do amazing feats. You recall that he was able to pick up the bars and the gates of the city of God. Can you imagine how massive they were? Pick them up and carry them off. Set him up on a high hill some distance away. He did this by the power of God that rested upon him. But he had a stipulation. Do not cut your hair. You’re a Nazarite from birth. So he never had a haircut. About every couple months, I don’t have a lot of hair, but I’ve got to go get a haircut every couple of us. We all have to get our hair cut. Samson didn’t get his haircut. He couldn’t. But the scripture reveals that Samson was kind of careless about his faith. He failed again and again to do what was right in the eyes of God. But he retained his might. Even though he was guilty of fornication with Delilah. He continually was able to overpower the Philistines that came up against him. wasn’t. But one day through the urging and the pleading of Delilah, he finally tells her the secret of his strength. And the secret of his strength was that the Spirit of God would rest upon him and give him his strength as long as he didn’t get his haircut. As long as he obeyed what God told him to do. What did Delilah do, she was his enemy. She really, wasn’t his friend. He cuts his hair, doesn’t she? And the Philistines then appear and she shakes. Samson, wake up, the Philistines be upon thee. And he thinks, just like normal, I’ll just go out and shake them off, because I have this strength from God. But he couldn’t. He wished not that the Lord had departed from him, and he lost his strength. And they captured him and put out his eyes and made him a slave, and he was down the mill pushing his big stone grinding the grain and getting the chaff off of it. What a terrible thing. And then this blind man is brought before the Philistians on one of their high holidays for one of their gods. And they’ve brought to this huge temple and they’re trying to get him to make, do all these feats of strength for them. How God gives him. him his strength one more time to defeat the Philistines and bring the whole temple down. Samson’s sin costs the Lord’s preserving and protecting presence in his life. Sin makes you an unstable person. Hence David prays for the right spirit. It makes you unreliable. It makes you foolish. He needs truth and wisdom on the inward parts. He’s lost something. David’s sinful heart has deceived him and driven him into thoughts and plans and actions that marked they were marked by complete fault. You may be tempted to think that God doesn’t see your thoughts or doesn’t know about all your acts. He knows everything about you. There’s nothing that escapes his attention. James describes the situation. In James chapter 1 in verse 14 and 15 where he talks about every man is tempted when he’s drawn away at his own lust, by his own lust and enticed. It wasn’t God, it wasn’t Bashiba, but David who bore the responsibility. He should have left that palace rooftop and prayed that the Lord would take that lust out of his heart when he first was tempted, but he didn’t do that. And when lust hath conceived, James tells us, it bringeth for sin. And we see what happened. A lustful heart in David’s case led to the adultery, led to the murder of Uriah. And when sin is, when it’s finished, when it’s fully developed and grown, leads to death. People died because of his sin. The baby that was conceived why Bathsheba died. Amnon died. Abs 1 died. Oh, this flows out of David’s sin. What a tragic reminder of the consequences of sin. And James ends this section of scripture saying, do not err, my beloved brother. Don’t make any mistakes about this. This is exactly what happens. David cries out here, creating me a clean heart. The verb here that’s used for create is the same one that’s used the verb. form of it is used in the creation account. And by the way, only, it’s only used of God. God’s the only one who can create. See, you are the only one who could give me a clean heart. Create it in me. Once again, you can make it pure. Your sin causes you to be spiritually helpless. Finally, your sin brings you into danger. Notice is verse 8 and with me again. Make me to hear joy and gladness that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice. Hide thy face from my sins, blot out all my iniquities. And then, if you would, verse 11, cast me not away from thy presence, take not thy Holy Spirit from me. Verse 14. Deliver me from blood, guiltiness. Oh, God. In 1981, there was a Minnesota radio station that made a frantic announcement. In fact, many of them were making the same announcement that were about a stolen car in California. It seems that the police were desperately searching for the vehicle that was stolen stolen and they were looking frantically for it. And so it went out over all the radio stations, evidently, in more than one state, about this situation. Announcements were placed, and they wanted to contact the car’s thief. You wonder, why would they want to do that? Because on the front seat of that stolen car, there was a balk of, box of crackers. Now, unbeknownst to the thief, that box of crackers was laced with poison. It was actually going to be set out by the owner of the car as rat poison to kill the rats. Only no one would know it if they just looked at the box. And if the driver got hungry and started munching on those crackers, it would kill him. And so he does he’s blissfully, you know, driving his stolen car unaware that right next to him is danger that could kill him. How often we are like that thief or bliss to be unaware of what sin, the danger that sin brings in our life. David recognizes now that he needs to be delivered from blood guiltiness. Murder and adultery were not sins, as we talked about before, that had a sacrifice for him. The only sacrifice we know is Jesus Christ. And so he had his stained hands. He can’t bear to know that God is looking upon him angrily because of his sin. He fears even more that the Lord would cast him away from his presence as if God would not allow him to have fellowship anymore. with him. And then he uses this phrase that may make us a little bit concerned when he says, take not your spirit away from me. Now, it’s interesting that Kelvin, in commenting on this, mentions the fact that he didn’t have his spirit taken away yet. The God’s spirit wasn’t taken away yet. He must have still had it. But what is this concern here? I think he’s looking at Saul. Remember in the case of Saul? where God took his spirit away from Saul? So that there was no answer by Yerum or Thumman or the prophet or by a dream. Now, if you read dispensationalist or if you read the Armenians, they’ll tell you well, you see, you could lose your salvation or in the Old Testament, the Spirit didn’t indwell anybody. It was only in the new Testament, they end well people, they came and go in the old testament. That’s not what Dave is talking about here. What we have to understand here is that God has withdrawn his spirit with the wisdom to govern from Saul so that he could no longer properly govern the nation. So he’s foolish. He is feeble. He is confused at the end. You notice how at the end he was going to a witch, I’ve got to get help, I’ve got to get help. He doesn’t know what to do. I think here that David is concerned that the wisdom to govern to lead the nation may be taken from him. And how is he going to function as a king when he’s lost his counselor and assistance? Every good and every perfect gift comes comes from God. Even non-saving gifts. Wisdom, discernment, the strength. Saul lost these gifts and was befuddled in the end, indecisive, and so forth, as we mentioned. It’s not that he had a regeneration of the spirit, but he did have some type of help that the Spirit of God gave him to do that task as king. We see that Samson that the Spirit left him. Does that mean he lost the salvation? No, he’s mentioned it was one of the heroes of the faith in the Hebrew chapter 11. But he lost his power and strength to carry on in his capacity as the judge of Israel at that time. In the Tudan Testament, it’s interesting if you look at it careful and you read it carefully. You find in chapter 2 the Spirit of God comes upon the disciples in the upper room. Or as something, they were actually at the temple at the time when that occurred so that they could speak to the people. But either way, the Spirit of God came upon them and they were gifted with speaking in different languages so that other people could understand the message of the gospel. Now, we must not think that the Spirit somehow and that power remained on them all the time. For in Chapter 4, we read, again, they pray for boldness and the Spirit of God again falls upon them. They’re empowering and given boldness to witness. That’s different than the regeneration of the Spirit of God. In the Old Testament, it’s interesting. the false prophet Balaam as well as Saul had the Spirit of God come upon. Balim prophesied. He prophesied correctly. remember Saul prophesied too. when he was trying to get David and he came past the school of the prophets and God caused him to prophesied. He’s fallen down on the ground and everything else. Remember that? In the New Testament, Caiaphas, the high priest in John’s Gospel. Chapter 11. He is said to prophesy. Now he didn’t know that he was prophesied. He was probably thinking he was using human wisdom, but God caused him to prophesy about Christ’s death, one man dying for the nation. That all the children of God may be gathered together were scattered abroad and so forth. And so we have this idea. I think David is not saying that he’s going to lose his salvation here. Remember Psalm 73? You’ll guide me by by Cal’s and receive me up the Lord, right? As Asaph mentions. They had that belief in the Old Testament. They believed that they were eternally secure in Christ. But to lose your joy and gladness, aren’t they gifts of the Spirit? I want you to restore that to me. I lost it. You know, when you look at the gifts of the Spirit that we have, the fruit of the Spirit, you’re not always at the same level. It can fluctuate. And so he’s saying here, if I don’t have your spirit, I’m going to lose this. And I don’t feel like I have the joy and the wisdom and gladness that I need. My friends, we’re not going to lose our salvation. Once we’re regenerated, we’re always regenerated. You’re not born again and not unborn again. That never happens. God doesn’t begin a work and then give up. Paul tells us in Philippians, he which have begun a work in you, a good work in you, will complete it until the end and so forth. You may lose your Christian joy. You may lose your wisdom. You may lose some type of special gift that God has given you. The Bible talks about there’s a sin under death, and sometimes God cuts off people, even those who profess to know the Lord. Some of the people would corner us or put to death for how they handled the Lord’s supper, you know, in a careless manner without thinking about what was it all about. And so forth. So I think the concern here with David is this. And he doesn’t lose, as I mentioned, Kelvin says, you know, God didn’t take it away because he still has it. He still believes he has the spirit. But don’t take it. Don’t take these gifts away from me. I need them. to do the work. Let’s remember that, too. What we lose in this department. Well, the ice-covered branches sending off that beautiful rainbow of colors were deadly because of the fallen power line. Sin may appear to be beautiful, but it has lots of dangers associated with it. We see some of the things here tonight that we mention. It brings guilt. It creates defalment. It causes spiritual helplessness. It brings you into danger. It causes you to lose spiritual gifts. Like boldness and strength and discernment and wisdom and so forth. The spirit gives us. Let’s remember this. Because sin is a dangerous thing. Let’s close with prayer.