A Strategy For Forgiveness - [Psalm 51]

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Thank you, Father, for all that you've done today. It's been a good day to worship you.
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It's been a good day to recall your faithfulness, your great covenant -keeping love. Father, we are thankful that we have just received your good grace.
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There's nothing we could do to earn your favor. There's nothing we could do to please you and make you love us more.
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It's all been done for by Christ Jesus Himself. And we're thankful that as you've loved Jesus, so too have you loved your people because truly we are in Christ.
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We would just ask tonight, as we look at this psalm, that you would help us to be men and women who are quick to forgive, quick to confess, and quick to give you praise that even though we deserve your wrath, you have granted us adoption as children and then quick forgiveness because Jesus, in fact, has paid it all.
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In His name we pray. Amen. Well, if I give you a quote, your job tonight is to tell me who said this.
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Who said this quote? I have had a vastly greater sense of my own wickedness and the badness of my heart than ever
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I had before my conversion. It has often appeared to me that if God should mark iniquity against me,
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I should appear the very worst of all mankind, of all that have been since the beginning of the world to this time, and that I should have by far the lowest place in hell.
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My wickedness, as I am in myself, has long appeared to me perfectly ineffable and swallowing up all thought and imagination, like an infinite deluge are mountains over my head.
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I know not how to express better what my sins appear to me than by heaping upon infinite and multiplying infinite by infinite.
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Very often for these many years, these expressions are in my mind and in my mouth. Infinite upon infinite, infinite upon infinite.
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Last sentence of the quote, when I look into my heart and take a view of my own wickedness, it looks like an abyss, infinitely deeper than hell.
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Who said that? Close. What did you say? John Bunyan.
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That would have been an excellent guess. Luther would be an excellent guess. Erickson? Pardon me?
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David Brainerd would be an excellent guess. We know it probably is not somebody today because of the language, because of the long sentences, because of the words like ineffable.
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Luke? John Calvin, that's a good guess. You're a better clapper than guesser.
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Jonathan Edwards, that's who it was. Edwards said, I feel more sinful now than I did before I was converted.
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And I think what happens is as we look at Edwards' quote, that quote could easily have been
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David, the king of Israel. And if you'll open your Bibles tonight to Psalm 51, we're going to look at David's prayer.
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I'm going to call this the sinner's prayer, found right in the middle of your Bible, except not the sinner's prayer like an unbeliever would pray,
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Lord have mercy on me, a sinner, the sinner. But this is the sinner's prayer, the sinner who's already a child of God, who has repented of their sins, believed in the gospel, believed that the only hope they have is to have someone else pay for their sin, to have a sin bearer in their place, in their stead, on their behalf, a sin bearer that's not just dead but alive, a sin bearer that is not imperfect but perfect, a sin bearer that's divine so all the worth of a divine
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God could be applied to their account. And so this is the contrite sinner's prayer, Psalm 51.
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And it's amazing because when we talk about sin today, it seems like society doesn't like it.
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It seems like it's almost unhealthy. If you met someone that talked like Edwards did, you'd say, you know what, you've got a bad self -image.
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I think you're a little introspective. I think you're kind of looking at yourself in an unhealthy way.
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And what I would say is how far society has drifted from talk like that because as Edwards would talk about sin, he's getting it right from the
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Bible. He's talking like Psalm 51 talks. And I think the need of the day is forgiveness.
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You can have it all and without forgiveness, you're in big trouble. A London psychologist once told
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Billy Graham that 70 % of people in mental hospitals in England would be released if they could just find forgiveness.
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And so as Christians, we need to deal with sin. And that's exactly what this whole passage is tonight. This whole passage is not just about sin but how to have forgiveness of sin as Christians.
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And I agree with John Stott. He said, we are not in the least ashamed of the fact that we think and talk a lot about sin.
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And here's the line. Don't forget this. We do so, Stott says, for the simple reason that we are realists.
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We realize we sin because we are sinners. It's a fact. We can't hide it.
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And tonight, we're going to look at Psalm 51. And I believe that as you have an increased prayer life that includes confession and asking for forgiveness, your life of intimacy with Christ will increase.
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If you want a higher degree of holiness in your life, then you will have confession that increases.
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If you'd like more closeness to the Lord in your walk, then you will see a direct correlation to quick forgiveness, rapid forgiveness, full forgiveness.
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And I think Psalm 51 gives us a nice template for forgiveness. How do we ask for forgiveness?
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This is the psalm, by the way, that Lady Jane Grey recited as she was going up the scaffold in the days of Henry VIII and Queen Mary before she was martyred.
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This is the psalm that Henry V wanted to be read at his deathbed. And this is the psalm that William Carey, the great
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Indian missionary, wanted to be preached at his funeral. Psalm 51.
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Let's take a look at the background. And of course, as we dive into the psalms, we know these are songs. We just don't have the music.
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We have the lyrics, but we don't have the music. And so there's lots of poetry. They don't read like an epistle.
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They don't read like Genesis and narrative. They read with poetic fullness.
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And there's lots of repetition. There's lots of parallelism. And we'll take a look at that tonight.
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But the background, lots of times, is found right up at the very beginning.
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And in my particular Bible, it's before verse 1. It says, a psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came to him after he,
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David, had gone into Bathsheba. So it's a psalm of David, and it's a certain kind of song or psalm, and this is called a lament.
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This is a sorrowful song. You know, there's songs on the radio, and some are poppy and peppy, and some are dirges.
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We know of major key songs, minor key songs. This is a minor key psalm, as it were.
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It is a psalm of lament. It is a penitential song, a song of forgiveness.
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It is a psalm that says, I had a close relationship with you, God. I blew it by sin, and I'd like to be restored.
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And so this is not just David's psalm. This is our psalm. We'd like to have a close relationship with the Lord after we've sinned.
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God, in His rich mercy, gives us this psalm. And if this psalm could be used for David, it certainly can be used for us.
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David, the man who was the king, and you could see the spiraling vortex of sin in his life. He had lust in his heart.
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He began to covet someone who wasn't his. He commits adultery, then he commits murder, and then he covers everything up.
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David deserved death four times over. He was deliberate, and yet he has forgiveness.
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And yet the Scripture tells us exactly what he says. So for an outline tonight, let me give you four strategies for confessing sin and getting forgiveness, four strategies for dealing with sin before God, four ways we can break this passage out so we can have some pegs to hang on to, and so we can think about the passage in sections.
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The first strategy for dealing with sin is that you can only find forgiveness in God alone because He is gracious.
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If you want forgiveness, there's only one person who can truly grant you forgiveness, and that is
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God. Of course, we ask for our wives or other people we work with for forgiveness, but here we're going to start with God because that's the main person we've sinned against.
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If you have a desperate attempt to find forgiveness, you must find that forgiveness in God and God alone because He is gracious.
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Look at verses 1 and 2. This gracious God is being called upon by David.
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Be gracious to me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness, according to the greatness of thy compassion, blot out my transgressions.
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Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, verse 2, and cleanse me from my sin. How many different words does he use there for sin, by the way?
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He uses three different ones, and in Hebrew, lots of times if you want to emphasize something, you can either say it three times, holy, holy, holy, for emphasis.
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You could say six things the Lord hates, yes, even seven to emphasize the seven, or you can say one thing three different ways, and that's exactly what happens here.
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He calls sin transgression. Transgression is a rebellious crossing the line.
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Here's the line that's drawn, and the person says, I don't care, I'm going to do this in your face anyway. I know what you expect.
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You draw the line, God, and I'll cross over it. Iniquity, he uses as well, and iniquity is something that is all twisted up.
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Have you ever seen a tree, and the way the tree grows, maybe there's three different stalks, and you kind of combine those three stalks, so they just kind of grow up together, it's all twisted?
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That same word is iniquity, twisted, or crooked, or perverted. And David said,
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God, you're going to have to grant me forgiveness because I have crossed the line, I've gone astray and been perverted in my actions and thoughts.
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And then he also calls it sin, and sin, you know, is missing the mark.
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I haven't met your standard, God. Your standard is fidelity, and purity, and holiness, and I now am aware of these things, and I'm going to you.
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Listen, if you were a king and you sinned, what would you do? What have the kings and the queens in the past, when they have committed treacherous acts of adultery, infidelity, betrayal, what did they do?
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They had enough power to cover it up. We have people in our own government that they're high enough up that they can cover things up.
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I never have seen a quote like this in a long time by Margaluth, when he said,
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Mary Queen of Scots would declare that she was above the law if this happened to her. Charles I would have thrown over Bathsheba.
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James II would have hired witnesses to swear away her character. Muhammad would have produced a revelation authorizing both crimes.
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Charles II would have publicly abrogated the Seventh Commandment. Queen Elizabeth would have suspended
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Nathan. Who has ever acknowledged an error of any magnitude if it has been in his power to maintain that he was right?
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Cain's plan, that of silencing the accuser, and Adam's plan, that of shifting the responsibility, seemed to exhaust the range of human expedience when an error is brought home.
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He who has escaped from both, though, was a man after God's own heart. David, he could have covered it up, but he didn't do it.
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He didn't blame. He said, God, you're going to be the one that has to be gracious to me.
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And if you notice the text, he says, God, be gracious to you. God, show me favor.
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God, you're generous. Please be generous to me. That's what he's saying. With kind of a prodigal generosity,
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I'd like you to help me. I have a need. I can't forgive myself.
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I can't earn forgiveness myself. You are going to have to grant it, and you're the king.
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You're the prince, as it were, and I'm your subject. And as this word is often used for a king granting a subject who's lower than they are something here, what is granted to the lower person is grace, non -deserved grace.
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I don't think unmerited favor is a good word for grace. I think demerited favor might be the better way to describe grace.
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And what does David do? And this is what we should do. He appeals to God's kindness, God's nature,
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God's warmness, God's emotional love for his people. And then he says,
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I want you to be gracious. To what degree? To a little degree, to a number degree, to a place degree, to a kind degree.
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No, I'm going to appeal to your nature, God. Be gracious to me, oh God, according to your what? Loving kindness, according to your love, your promised love for your people.
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I'm going to appeal to your nature. I need it all. I don't need just a little bit. I don't need just a drip or a dribble.
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I need it all. I'm desperate. I can't do anything except I throw myself on the mercy of the courts.
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And this particular court and judge is very compassionate. Do you see the passage? According to the greatness or vastness of thy compassion.
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And the word there, compassion, comes from the word womb. You can almost imagine a woman after she's given birth and she has the baby that's come from her womb and the tender bond that's between the mother and the daughter, our son.
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That's what David's saying. He's saying on my own, I can't earn it. I can't get it. God, you're by nature a savior and a forgiver and I'm going to come to you for that.
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And as there's three kinds of sin, he asks three different ways for those to be blotted out. To be taken away.
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To match. Trifold saving for trifold sin. What does he say about his transgressions? Blot them out.
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This is an imperative. God, I'm not ordering you to do anything, but please get them away from me.
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Obliterate them from your memory. Wipe them out. One of the ways you translate to blot out is to exterminate.
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If you have bugs in your house and you call the termite man, what do you want him to do with those termites?
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To just kind of, you know, make them dizzy for a while until next year. You want them gone, exterminated, destroyed.
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Obliterate them. Pulverize them. Get rid of them. And this language has kind of a, there's an accounting.
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I've got an accountant CPA kind of language and I'm tallying things and I'm marking things.
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And David said, I know you've marked all my sins against me because you're omniscient. You know everything and I'd ask you to just blot those out.
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When Moses said, blot my name out of the book, exact same kind of language. God, get rid of it all.
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My sins with indelible ink, except with you. I remember my buddy back in college,
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University of Nebraska. One night he just went off on some kind of partying rampage and he got some markers out.
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And so he thought he would, in his hallucinogenic state, he would take the markers and he would write some cool poetry on the wall.
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And he thought it was just brilliant. And just the way he'd write the letters and the phrasing and the parallel language.
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And then he woke up the next day and then too much to his chagrin, he found out,
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A, it wasn't cool, B, it didn't rhyme, C, it looked stupid and four, it was indelible permanent ink.
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That's exactly what sin is. It can't be erased unless God himself erases it. In this particular case, it's so erased because in the future there was going to be a sin bearer
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Christ Jesus. Well, not only that, but look at, wash me thoroughly from my iniquity. Like you wash a garment, like you're scrubbing on a washboard like they used to wash things.
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God, I want you to just get every little bit of it out. As we look at some kind of grass stain on a knee, if there's just one little bit of that grass stain still there,
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David's not satisfied with that. He wants everything gone. And the best illustration I can think of is this. When you want to win your girlfriend one of those dolls at the carnival and you've got that machine gun and there's a star there and you've got to shoot out all the star.
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And you think you did and you think you're so cool and you shot it all out and it's kind of a one -handed shooting and stuff and you're bragging and you're going to win the cupid doll and all that.
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And then they pull the thing up and they take a look at it and they said, you know what? There's still one little piece here, no price.
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And David said, I want everything gone. Sin is so bad against you, God. I want literally to have you multiply your washings to me.
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Multiply your washings. I am foul and God, would you wash me over and over and over again until I'm clean in your sight.
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And speaking of clean, getting scrubbed thoroughly, look at thirdly, cleanse me from my sin.
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God, purify me. As you would cleanse a land that had corpses on them to get rid of the corpses, as you would take dross away from metal,
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God, get rid of my sin dross out of me. I can't stand it anymore. I'm sick of myself.
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I'm sinful. Remove it entirely. Make me pure. That's a good way to pray, isn't it?
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That's a great way to pray. And I like it that it's very general so we can come and no matter what sin we've committed as Christians, we can pray these exact words,
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God, I will acknowledge these things to you and you and your nature must forgive me. It's my only hope.
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R .L. Wheeler has a popular quote, if I had the wisdom of Solomon, the patience of John, the meekness of Moses, the strength of Samson, the obedience of Abraham, the compassion of Joseph, the tears of Jeremiah, the poetic skill of David, the prophetic voice of Elijah, the courage of Daniel, the greatness of John the
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Baptist, the endurance and love of Paul, I would still need redemption through Christ's blood and the forgiveness of sin.
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So just get rid of it all. As far as the east is from the west, God, I need it gone. Sin should be a burden to us.
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It should be trouble. And we should cry out to God and His nature who is generous and compassionate and willing to forgive.
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That's the first strategy. You must find forgiveness in God and God alone. Number two that goes with it, found in verses 3 to 5, is that you must confess your sins to God.
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You must confess your sins to God. And He did that at the beginning. But look at how He does it here, verses 3 to 5.
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For I know my transgression and my sin is ever before me. It's haunting me actually. Against thee and thee only,
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I've sinned and done what is evil in thy sight, so that thou art justified when thou dost speak and blameless when thou dost judge.
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Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin my mother conceived me.
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David said, my sins have found me out. There's no way I can run. My sins are before me.
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I wake up in the morning, they're there in front of me. I wake up in the afternoon, they're there before me. They're often and early in my mind, slow motion, rewound.
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I don't know if you've ever had some kind of sin in your life that you've committed and you just can't believe you've committed it. And then you just keep thinking about it over and over and over hauntingly, why would
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I do that? You might ask yourself the question, why did God not send
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Nathan to David right away? And I think it was God's goodness and kindness that he was going to teach
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David a lesson. So David would say, I've got to get rid of this. If he would have just sent David right away,
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David might have not backed down as fast. But here, in addition, David knows over and over and over, as Psalm 32 would say, when
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I kept silent, my bones waxed old, the King James says. When we confess, the main thing we need to do is not to blame other things.
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Here's how people blame other things today when they sin. God, I did what I did because I have a natural desire that you gave me.
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God, David could have said, she should have taken a bath with the clothes on. God being a king is stressful.
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God, all the other kings do so many more things than I do. God, the serpent made me do it.
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God, it's my heredity. It's in my genes.
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I'm only human. This was way before the
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Twinkie defense, where it's the same kind of thing. People blame all the time, except David didn't blame, did he?
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There's no blame here in this Psalm. This Psalm is, you know what, God? If confession is agreement, that's exactly what confession is.
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I agree, God, with you. Help me to see sin as you see it. David just said, you know,
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I'm not going to blame anyone. I'm not going to say I'm dysfunctional. I'm not going to say I've got a syndrome. I'm not going to say that it was a blunder.
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You know, what I did, God, is boo -boo. No, I'm going to agree with God.
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1 John 1 says, if we confess our sins, he's faithful and righteous to what? To forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
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We need to call sin, sin. That's what confession is, agreeing with God, admitting, declaring, yes,
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God, this is what it is. I love Proverbs 28, he who conceals his transgression will not prosper.
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But he who confesses and forsakes them will find compassion. And look what
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David says in verse 4. Did he ask forgiveness from Bathsheba? From the nation?
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Oh, he could have, but look at who he asked to forgive him because primarily, he has aggravated and sinned against God, against thee and thee only.
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Of course, he sinned against Bathsheba. Of course, he sinned against Uriah. Of course, he sinned against Israel. But here, against thee and thee only, he knows the main person he sinned against,
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God. And I've done what is evil in your sight. God, you've seen me.
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You've seen it all. And I'm going to understand sin when I see that it is mainly against you.
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If you've ever had to forgive someone else of sin to say... Let's turn that around. If you've ever had to say to someone, please forgive me, you also know that the person you've mainly offended is not that person but God himself.
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Listen, why have you despised the word of the Lord by doing evil in his sight? You've struck down Uriah the
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Hittite with the sword and taken his wife to be your wife and you have killed him with the swords of the sons of Ammon. Now, therefore, the sword will never depart from your house because you have despised me and have taken the wife of Uriah the
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Hittite to be your wife. Now, here's David's response. Then David said to Nathan, I have sinned against the
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Lord. And Nathan said to David, the Lord also has taken away your sin. You shall not die.
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Basically, David says, I know I've committed high treason against God and it's been against him.
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I can't blame anything and I'll accept your chastening hand, God. This is what confession does. Look at verse 4.
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When you confess to God, you're saying, God, it's against you and I'll take any kind of parental chastisement so that thou art justified when thou dost speak and blameless when thou dost judge.
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God, when you judge me, when you chasten me, certainly we're a child of God and David was a child of God, so he can't be unsaved or unregenerated, but I'll just take whatever punishment you would give me.
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By the way, that's a good thing for kids to do. Kids, if you ever get in trouble and you go before your parents and you say, please forgive me, your next thought should be...your
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thought is probably, I hope they're lenient with me. But if you have given true repentance and true asking for forgiveness, you should basically say to them, whatever you want to do to punish me,
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I'll accept. That's exactly what David did here. Why? Because look at verse 5.
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He understood the true depth of his sin and it goes way back. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity because of the fall.
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I was born a sinner and in sin, my mother conceived me. Not the act of sin, not the act of procreation.
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That's not sinful. In sin, my mother conceived me. As I was conceived, there was already sin there in the womb.
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It was so ingrained, stained my nature. Sin isn't what we do, it's who we are.
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First and foremost, first and foremost, when I came out of the womb, when I was brought forth, do you see the passage there?
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Brought forth, that word means to twist and to writhe, and it talks about a baby coming out of the womb with a twisting and writhing motion, talking about the pains of childbirth.
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Baby's coming out of the womb sinful. God, I want forgiveness. What's our strategy?
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Strategy number one is go to God and God alone for forgiveness. Number two, confess your sins to God and agree with Him.
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Number three, rely on God alone for restoration. Rely on God alone for restoration.
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That's what you should do. Look at verse 6. Behold, I'm reading from the New American Standard, 78.
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Behold, thou dost desire truth in the innermost being, and in the hidden part, thou will make me know wisdom.
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God, I know you want truth on the inside. External obedience is fine, but it's from the heart is what you want,
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God. And in the hidden part, thou will make me know wisdom. I'm going to need your help,
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God, to teach me what is right and what is wrong, and have wisdom to surmise everything. I'm going to need you,
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God, to help me with Augustine's stages of sin, these are the three stages of sin for Augustine.
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Lord, make me good, but not yet. Lord, number two, make me good, but not entirely.
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And then when God gave him the true wisdom, he could say, Lord, make me good. And as you go to God for restoration,
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David gives 12 restoring prayer requests. These are my 12 steps for all those who are stuck with sin, want to deal with sin.
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We've heard about 12 -step groups all the time. This is actually Bible 12 steps. Just happened to work out perfectly, 12 steps.
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They asked, do you have a 12 -step group at the church? You can now say, we have a 12 -step prayer of restoration in our church.
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We'd love to teach you. First prayer, first step, verse 7, purify me with hyssop.
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This is how David prayed, purify me with hyssop and I shall be clean. I'm spotted,
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I'm sullied, and I want to be clean, I want to be clear. Hyssop was a leafy plant.
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Who's ever seen hyssop? I think probably Fred and Maxine have been to Israel and seen hyssop. I bought a little thing of hyssop, chopped up leaves in this little kind of container.
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It almost looked like a salad dressing container when you get a salad to go.
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And it's just a little container and I bought it for a dollar. And I said to the people I was buying in Israel, this was back in 2000,
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I said, I'd love to buy some of that hyssop because I wanted to be reminded of hyssop back in the Old Testament and here in Psalm 51 as well.
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And they said, well, here's what you do. And they took a big pinch of the hyssop and they just went like that. I thought, you know, a little between your cheek and gum for hyssop and it's supposed to kind of clear your palate and I don't know if it's supposed to give you a little energy, some kind of Guarana stuff.
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I had no idea, but she couldn't speak English and I could only get that right there.
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So I don't think David's talking about that here. He's talking about when you use hyssop to cleanse a leper ritually, when you use hyssop for cleansing and you dip it in the blood for Passover.
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He's saying God, he knows the Bible. He's steeped in the Bible. I basically want you to de -sin me by using hyssop, purge me with hyssop and I will be clean.
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God, un -sin me is what he's saying. Well, not only that, but he says, wash me. If you want 12 steps for restoration, this is step number two.
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Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow. We sing that song, don't we? It's right from this text. Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.
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I'm defiled, I'm dirty and I'd like to be whiter than snow. You've all seen snow that's got dirt and mud and crud and everything there.
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He says, I'd like to be clean again. I think of Isaiah chapter one, though your sins are scarlet, they will be white as what?
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Snow. And he's pouring it on. Do you notice, by the way? Let's think about this for a second. This is not one of those,
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I've sinned. You know, at nighttime, God, please forgive me for all the sins that I committed today. I can't really think of any, but I know that I could probably say this umbrella sin.
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And I'll just ask for complete forgiveness for all the things I've done or not done today. In Jesus name, amen.
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He's detailed, isn't he? He's going over. He's just not saying, you know, everything's fine.
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He's really praying. This is a great way to pray for sins forgiveness. Prayer request number three, the third request for restoration.
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Any guesses what it might be? Well, we just follow along. Verse eight, make me to hear joy and gladness.
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It's like he's been hearing everything else. He's sorrowful. His conscience is getting him.
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He can't undo his own conscience. And he wants not just gloom, he wants festivity.
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He wants gaiety. He wants pleasure again instead of this foolish kind of everything's going to work out and nobody will know.
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And as long as no one gets hurt, as long as it's between two consenting adults and all the excuses, no, his conscience is very alerted.
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Number four, mend me. This is the fourth prayer request, the fourth step. Let the bones which thou has broken rejoice.
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When Nathan came to him and pointed at him and said, thou art the man that broke the bones as it were of David, that crushed him, that fractured him.
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And he said, I was the man. And so God straighten those out.
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This is just a figure of speech for the entire person. I just want to be straight. I want to be used.
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The fifth request, hide my sins for good. Hide thy face from my sins and blot out all my iniquities.
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God, when you see me, don't think of sin. Have you ever done that before and you've seen some horrible person on TV and they've committed some horrible crime?
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There's even a huge crime that's going to be in on the news now for years probably where the man killed his wife and daughter.
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When you see that man on TV, if in fact he did it, when you see someone who's committed a horrible crime, when you see a
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Hitler, when you see them, you think of the sins that they have committed because they're just going together.
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And David is saying, God, when you see me, I don't want you to see that act of adultery and that act of murder and that act.
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Hide your face from that. Number six, blot out all my iniquities. Blot out all my iniquities.
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Red sin stain, just make it wonderfully white. Number seven, give me the miracle of inward renewal.
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And here's one of the greatest verses in all the Bible. I used to sing it back in Lutheran church, created me a clean heart, oh
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God. What is he saying there? Do you know he's saying that forgiveness is a miracle? Tell me the first time in the
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Bible where the word create is found. Genesis 1 .1.
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Boy, you guys are all looking tired tonight. Is it hot? It's been a hot day. There's usually sleepers on Sunday night, but you're the elect anyway and you show up on Sunday night and some of the other non -elect from Sunday morning, they didn't show up.
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So I always want to grant you grace, but boy, you got a lot of sleepers tonight. I'm going to have to, you know, it's a sin to make the
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Bible boring. So now I'm going to have to start going for it from here on out. All right. It's going to, I'm going to have to keep you awake.
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In the beginning, God created. That is a word that mean
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God's creates by himself, for himself and of nothing. There's other kind of creation where I say, all right,
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I take this paper and I can create an airplane out of this paper. But that word in Hebrew is
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I'm creating something out of something that already exists. That's not the word that's used here in Psalm 51.
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It's not creating out of something that exists. David says, I want you to create in me a new heart by a divine fiat, like in Genesis chapter 1, 1, as you create out of nothing, ex nihilo,
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I want you to create in me a clean heart because it will take a divine miracle to make this sinner clean.
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That is amazing language. God, make me so new that this won't happen again.
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When you see that word create in the Bible, God and God alone is the subject. You can't make yourself alive.
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You can't create anything. It must be God. Number eight out of the 12 steps, fix me on the inside and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
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Help me stand up straight is the language in Hebrew. Sin is going to make me crooked.
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As people get older and they kind of start hunching over, as they get older and their bodies wear out, so too when people sin.
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It's like their body's hunched over and God says, I'm a hunchback. Straighten me up. Number nine, do not leave me in my sin and guilt found in verse 11.
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Do not cast me away from my presence and don't reject me. Don't abandon me. Don't leave me where I am.
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He just keeps adding all these things. And you say, I get the point already. Well, I think we only get the point already when we pray like David does for forgiveness.
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And I personally will tell you this is not how I pray. This is how
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I want to pray. Number 10, keep me able to serve you. What does he say in verse 11?
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Don't take thy Holy Spirit from me. I don't have time tonight to tell you all the ministry of the
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Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. But here's what David is saying. In the Old Testament, oftentimes the
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Spirit of God would come upon a person for a divine task. Yes? Saul needed to have
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God come upon him. 1 Samuel 16, 14, Now the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul and an evil spirit from the
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Lord terrorized him. Saul was the king and Saul needed divine enablement to do the job that God wanted him to do.
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Saul sinned and God took away his spirit of divine enablement. And what do you think David is thinking?
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David is thinking, I know what happened to Saul and how the Spirit of God left him to do the work of being a king on his own.
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God, you have enabled me with the special work of the Holy Spirit to do your work and I don't want to be like Saul.
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So don't leave me. Continue to enable me. David's not thinking about losing his salvation here.
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Why? Because in the 11th step of the 12 step renewal, he says what?
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Verse 12, restore to me the joy of thy salvation. He's not saying restore to me salvation.
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He's saying, you know, when I was saved and I was following you, I just had joy and rejoicing.
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It was even emotional. I was enthusiastic. I love to serve you.
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It was a pleasure to serve. It wasn't I had to, I got to go to church. My mom's making me go. I just wanted to do it.
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I was content and resting in you. And so God, give me that again. God, give me joy knowing that I'm your child.
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And then lastly, number 12, give me a heart of obedience. See that in verse 12, and sustain me with a willing spirit.
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God, support me. Uphold me is the Hebrew word. Freely, voluntarily, might
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I serve you. Sustain me so I just, I just have a desire to serve. May I have my will be liberated from my sin so I might serve you.
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Well, time's fleeting. So let me give you strategy number four. How do we deal with sin as a
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Christian? Strategy number one, find forgiveness in God alone. Strategy number two, agree with God about your sin.
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Strategy number three, rely on God through prayer for restoration.
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And finally, after God has forgiven you, worship him. Verses 13 and following.
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After God has restored you, don't you think that'd be good to worship him? That's the response.
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David said, I'm going to worship you by teaching other people about you. Then I will teach, verse 13, transgressors thy ways and sinners will be converted to thee.
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David says, I've got my joy back. And as I've got my joy back, I'm an infectious evangelist.
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I'm going to teach other people about you. That's going to give you worship. Not only that, he says, I'm going to worship you by singing. Verse 14, deliver me from blood guiltiness,
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O God, thy God of my salvation. Then my tongue will joyfully sing of thy righteousness. I'm going to sing is what
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I'm going to do. God, if you do that for me, since you've done that for me, I'm going to intensely sing for you.
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I'm going to give, the Hebrew would say, a ringing cry of exaltation. He says in verse 15,
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O Lord, open my lips that my tongue may declare thy praise. God, when my mouth opens, may it be praise.
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It doesn't matter who shows up. It doesn't matter who's in my path. When I open my mouth, may it be conspicuous praise.
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I want to make you known. I want to publish you. I'm not going to be in some kind of secret service Christianity, kind of behind the scenes.
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Nobody knows. David also says, I'm going to worship from my heart. Verse 16, for thou does not delight in sacrifice.
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Otherwise I would give it. Thou are not pleased with burnt offering. God's not saying, here's,
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I want a thousand cattle. He wants his worship from the inside. And that's what a restored worshipful heart will do.
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Verse 17, the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. A broken and contrite spirit,
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O God, thou will not despise. God, you've crushed me, restored my joy, and I'm going to worship you.
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And I'm going to worship you even with other people. Look at verse 18. He's worshiping with the whole community. By thy favor, do good to Zion.
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Build the walls of Jerusalem. His prayer expands, not just for himself, not just me, myself, and I, but I want
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Israel to be strengthened. I want Jerusalem to be strengthened. Then verse 19, thou will delight in righteous sacrifices, in burnt offering and the whole offering.
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Once the inside's there, of course, the externals are there with all the Old Testament law. Then young bulls will be offered on thine altar.
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We all sin. What do we do as Christians? We go to God and God alone because he's gracious.
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We confess our sins to God. We rely on God for restoration through prayer, and then we worship him.
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Let me give you a few takeaways as we go. One, there is hope for sinners.
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The vilest offender who truly believes, yes? If God can forgive that sin, he can forgive any sin of any unbeliever.
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If you are a sinner here tonight, and you aren't a Christian, and you say to yourself, God knows what
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I've done, and I've done so many wild, sinful, perverted things, God could never forgive me.
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Well, you would be mistaken because Jesus Christ is a great
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Savior. And at Calvary, for all his people, he bore the punishment of all their sins.
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Number two, when you pray, beware of cheap confession. I think this confession of David cost him something.
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And he wasn't worried about what other people thought. He wasn't worried about trying to quickly get this over with.
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He wanted to praise God in such a way that it cost him.
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Can't hide from God anyway. Number three, remember that all this restoration is because of Jesus Christ and his perfect death at Calvary.
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Good works can't forgive sin. Good prayers can't forgive sin. Religious works can't forgive sin.
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1 John 2 says, my little children, I'm writing these things to you that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the
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Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And he, Jesus himself, is the propitiation, our wrath bearer for our sins.
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Number four, if God has forgiven you of all your sins, ought you not to be a quick forgiver of other people?
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James Coulter said, an unforgiving spirit is the number one killer of personal spiritual life.
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Martin Lloyd -Jones says, I say to the glory of God and in utter humility that whenever I see myself before God and realize even something of what my blessed
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Lord has done for me, I am ready to forgive anybody anything. Leon Morris said, we can always think of some good reason why in a particular case we need not forgive someone else.
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And Leon Morris said, that is always an error. C .S.
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Lewis said, everyone thinks forgiveness is a lovely idea until he has something to forgive.
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And my last quote that's, I think, very effective by the golden mouth preacher named
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John. Nothing causes us to so nearly resemble God as the forgiveness of injuries.
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Well, it's a great psalm. And here are my closing words. How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven.
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Whose sin is covered. How blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity and in whose spirit there is no deceit.
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When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night, thy hand was heavy upon me.
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My vitality was drained away as with the fervent, fervent heat of summer. I acknowledge my sin to thee and my iniquity
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I did not hide. I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord. And thou disforgive the guilt of my sin.
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Therefore, let everyone who is godly pray to thee in a time when thou may be found. Surely in a flood of great waters, they shall not reach him.
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Then he says at the end of Psalm 32, David, be glad in the Lord and rejoice you righteous ones and shout for joy.
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All you who are upright in heart. Let's pray.
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Thank you, Lord, for tonight, for Psalm 51. I pray for all of us that we would confess our sins more like this.
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That we would just seek your throne and seek your face in such a way where it's cognizant of how bad our sin is.
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And even the lightest sin is against you and infinitely holy
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God. So it is infinitely horrible. So Lord, we would ask by your spirit's power and grace and mercy that we might be quick forgivers, thorough repenters, and we would keep our slates clean as it were before you.
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And Lord, out of all that, how good you are to restore to us joy and rejoicing after we have sinned.
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We thank you tonight that even though you knew all the sins that we would commit, you still sent your son to die for those sins and cleanse us and call us a people of your own.
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Thank you that Jesus Christ is alive and well and soon returning. In Jesus' name, amen.