July 24, 2016 Sin – A Realistic View by Pastor Josh Sheldon

The Reading of Ezekiel 36 and 2 Corinthians 4

In the book of Ezekiel and 2 Corinthians, please stand for the reading of God's Word. I'm going to be reading from Ezekiel chapter 36, beginning in verse 22. This can be found on page 724 of your Pew Bibles.

Ezekiel chapter 36, we'll be reading from verse 22 to 32. Therefore, say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God, It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came.

And I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them. And the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Lord God, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes.

I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries, and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness. And from all your idols I will plunge you, and I will give you a new heart and a new spirit.

I will put within you a new spirit, and I will put within you, and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my sanctuaries, and be careful to obey my rules.

You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God. And I will deliver you from all your uncleanness, and will summon the grain and make it abundant, and bring no famine upon you.

I will make the fruit of the tree and the increase of the field abundant, that you may never again suffer the disgrace of famine among the nations. Then you will remember your evil ways and your deeds that were not good, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominations.

It is not for your sake that I will act, he said to the Lord. Let that be known to you. Be ashamed, and be founded for your ways, O house of Israel. Please turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 4. This can be found on page 965 of your key Bible.

2 Corinthians chapter 4, beginning in verse 7, and through 18. Let us treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God, and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed.

Perplexed, but not driven to despair. Persecuted, but not forsaken. Struck down, but not destroyed. Always prepared to give the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.

For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death is at work in us, but life in you. Since we have the same spirit of faith according to what has been written, I believe, and so I spoke.

We also believe, and so we also speak. Knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus, and bring us with you into his presence. Pouring us all for your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people, it may increase thanksgiving to the glory of God.

So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this life, momentary affliction, is preparing for us an eternal way of glory beyond all comparison.

As we look not to the things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. Amen. Blessed Father, Father in Heaven, as we come before you this morning, gathered in anticipation of what you would have us say to us through the preaching of your word, I pray that you would give us each that grace, Lord, to keep short accounts with you of the sins that invade our lives, the sins that we so readily and quickly run into, those sins that beset us, Lord.

That you would strengthen us from them, that you would give us courage, Lord, and wisdom to stay away from those sins that beset us, Lord. Give us your Spirit, I pray. Help us, Lord, to worship you aright today.

Help us, Lord, to discern the meat that will come from the preaching of your word. Help us, Lord, to grow thereby, and to be able to touch the meat as it were, to take the onus of responsibility. As it were, and find that meat, that your people give to us.

May your Spirit do this work. May you lead us, Lord. May we be submissive servants. We ask for this in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Be seated.

Psalm 39 and a Realistic View of Sin

Well, this morning, our text will be Psalm number 39. So if you turn there, please. If you're following in the Pew Bible, that's page 467. For Psalm number 39. It's a Psalm of David. It's to the choir master to Jeduthun.

This Psalm of David. This is the word of the Lord. It says, I said I will guard my ways that I may not sin with my tongue. I will guard my mouth with a muzzle, so long as the wicked are in my presence.

I was mute and silent. I held my peace to no avail, and my distress grew worse. My heart became hot within me as I mused the fire burned. Then I spoke with my tongue. O Lord, make me know my end, and what is the measure of my days.

Let me know how fleeting I am. Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath. Selah. Surely a man goes about as a shadow.

Surely for nothing they are in turmoil. Man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather. And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you. Deliver me from all my transgressions. Do not make me the scorn of the fool.

I am mute. I do not open my mouth, for it is you who have done it. Remove your stroke from me. I am spent by the hostility of your hand. When you discipline a man with rebukes for sin, you consume like a moth what is dear to him.

Surely all mankind is a breath. Selah. Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear to my cry. Hold not your peace at my tears, for I am a sojourner with you, a guest like my father's. Look away from me that I may smile again before I depart and am no more.

And the title of this message was to have a realistic view of sin. To look at our sin in the way that the Scripture would have us to look at it realistically, honestly, harshly, in comport with reality.

You know, a man named Johann von Staupitz was the vicar of the Augustinian order at the University of Wittenberg when a young monk named Martin Luther came there to teach. And Luther felt this need to confess everything he had ever done wrong with von Staupitz, who was, of course, his confessor.

They both being Roman Catholics at the time. And it's said that Luther wore out von Staupitz with his long remembrance of every sin. That on one occasion, he actually confessed to him sins for six hours straight.

Six hours, kept him there confessing everything he could think of that he had ever done, including that day and going back and sins that in decades he had previously confessed, but they came to mind again, so spent all this time.

And Staupitz is said to have said to him, look here, brother Martin, if you're going to confess so much, why don't you do something worth confessing? Kill your mother or father, commit adultery, quit coming in here with such peccadilloes.

And of course, Martin Luther simply kept confessing everything that came to mind, what Staupitz called a peccadillo. And I ask you this morning, before we delve into our text, Psalm 39, this realistic view of sin that I think it gives us, I ask you this morning, who was right?

Which one of those two men was correct in their view of sin? Was it Staupitz for wanting the sins to be worth confessing? Or was it Luther for his insistence that any sin deserves our most stringent attention?

Which one of these two had the realistic view of sin? Which one of these two had the Bible's view of sin? Would look upon it the way Jesus does or God does? As I read the psalm, you might have noticed that the psalmist comes at us right where many of us are.

Many of us who know Jesus Christ are right where the psalmist is. He's struggling with the aftermaths of our sin. We're not told what his particular sin was in the psalm. We're not given clear historical indicators.

I scanned a number of commentaries and I found none that would really even hazard a guess as to what exactly David was struggling with here and trying to bring to us. We know there's a psalm of David.

We know it was set to music by one named Jeduthun. We know him to have been one of David's chief musicians, the choir master even. And this man, Jeduthun, actually arranged three psalms. See, we arrange this one.

Psalm 62, which is in the second division or book of the psalms. And then Psalm 77, which is in the third division or book of the psalms. And that third one, 77, is a psalm of Asaph. So we know only that it is a psalm of David.

We don't know exactly what it is that he was struggling with, what the historical context is. And we know it was arranged by this Jeduthun. What we can ask as we read this psalm, I can ask you, are you troubled today because of your sins?

Are you stirred up, roiled up in your spirit because of your iniquities? The things you've done that go against what God would have you to do. The things we've done that are sins because the Bible says do otherwise.

Do they bother you? Do they have you disturbed? Depressed? Discouraged? Do the consequences of your sins in the past seem to rise up again and again? I mean, many of us can look back and shudder to remember what we were, the things we did before Christ took hold of us and brought us to himself.

And sometimes when we think that way and remember them that way, we end up being trapped. And what was just read to you by our brother John from Ezekiel 36 and verse 31? Let me read it one more time to you.

Then you will remember your evil ways, then mean when I put my spirit in you, when I've removed your heart of stone and given you that heart of flesh. Then when you look back, when you've seen all the good I've done for you, then you will look back and remember your evil ways and your deeds that were not good, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominations.

And what's he speaking here? Except of iniquities and abominations that have been forgiven. Speaking of the new heart. Someone who can respond to God that way, who is now tender to God and recognizes the iniquities and abominations, falls down before God and seeks forgiveness.

Then by faith, going to the temple and bringing the sacrifice, now by faith to the cross. Do your old sins and the consequences of them. Trouble you like that. Are you still in loathing of self? It doesn't say loathe the things you do, you'll loathe yourself.

And there we stay in self-deprecation, trapped in this sort of self-torture. It seems to me that extremes are always wrong, or almost always wrong. I mean, if we swing too far one way, if we treat our sins too lightly, we lose sight of the cross, and we lose sight of the terrible price that was paid on the cross for our sins.

If we treat our sins lightly, we lose God's view of sin, which was poured out on His Son, His only beloved, the only one man never to sin, Jesus Christ. Now we dare not swing that way and treat our sins lightly, as if it's no big deal, and just kind of look up to heaven and say, sorry, no.

That kind of extreme is no good. But if we go too far the other way, if we never forget what worms we were before God, if we never forget that our greatest righteousness is but a filthy rag before God because our worms should never die, and we're unworthy sinners, and that God came to us despite our complete lack of any worth or merit, looking to earth, as it were, or from heaven, looking for anyone who does good, anyone who seeks after God, and what does he find?

No, not one. And we get trapped there, remembering only that. And I would suggest to you that if we are there on that extreme, the cross is as much lost as it is when we're on the side that I just described, taking it too lightly.

Because then, if we never forget and let go of the self-loathing for our abominations and iniquities, we're acting as though our sins were never dealt with. As if when Jesus said, it is finished, it wasn't.

As if when Paul says that he makes up in the flesh what was lacking in Christ, and what he did, he did that in a very literal wooden way where we have to, through our life, make up for what Jesus didn't do, and that is heresy, if not bordering on blasphemy.

No, we dare not go on either side, because either side is not a realistic view of sin. Either side is not a realistic view of sin. On the one side, it's not horrible enough, and on the other side, Christ's work is not given the power that God gives it.

Psalm 39 gives us a better way. Psalm 39 gives us a more realistic way to look at our sin. Not to take it lightly. Not to just shrug it off. But also not to dwell in it. Not to be that dog returning to its vomit.

That swine that just can't get out of the mire, because that's the way they're made. It's a better way, a more realistic way, a more redemptive way to deal with our sin. Psalm 39 sounds a little pedantic, but it gives us a biblical view of our sin.

How obvious, because Psalm 39's in our Bible, so of course its view would be biblical. But we need to look at this. We need to consider this psalm as we look to ourselves and ask ourselves, how do I consider myself in light of my sin?

Past, present. Look again at verse one, if you would. It says, I will guard my ways that I may not sin with my tongue. I will guard my mouth with a muzzle so long as the wicked are in my presence. You notice where the focus is there.

Do you not? It's with the tongue. It's with the mouth. It's with what we say. As Jesus says, the tongue, the mouth, doesn't just work on its own. It's not your mouth that makes up what you're going to say.

It comes from the heart. It comes up from the heart and comes out the mouth. Our words mean something. And here David, as he's struggling with the sin, as we will see, as he's roiled up about these things, what's the first commitment he makes?

Can I put it a little bluntly? He says, now shut up. I'm not going to say a word until I have this dealt with, until I've done business with God, until God by His Spirit releases me. I've got a muzzle.

I'm not going to make it difficult to talk. I'm going to make it impossible. I'm just going to be quiet. It's an ongoing resolve he has here to do what was really a very great deed, a very big deal, so great a deed in fact that James in his book in the New Testament says if we can do this one thing, if we can do this, we are a perfect man.

James 3 .2. If you can bridle your tongue, you're a perfect man. Now, of course, that doesn't mean perfect like Jesus is perfect. And we're not going to go into James 3 .2 in any detail. But he actually says if you can bridle your tongue, if you can control the words that you speak to others, you can have control of your entire body.

Greatest self-control. He says, I will guard my ways that I might not sin with my tongue. There's hardly a more effective way to continue in sin than the tongue. By it, as James says, we set forests on fire.

By it, we murder others, often doing violence to them. Too often, once is too often, we make their behavior the cause of our sin. Do we not? Is that not our tendency? We've spoken of this before. If you hadn't, and then fill in the blank, then I wouldn't have, and then you fill in the other blank.

David makes a note, a whole different commitment. He says, I will not do this. I will not speak with my tongue. I'm not going to self-justify. I'm not going to blame. I'm just going to be quiet. And we'll see how he deals with this in his quietness.

We need to ask ourselves right away as we delve into this psalm, how grave is sin? How serious is it? I mean, if we view it realistically, if we view it biblically, it's terribly grave. Terribly serious.

Look at the struggle that David had with it. See how hard the battle is. He said, I held my peace to no avail. He's saying, God, why are you waiting so long? Can't you see how pious I'm being? Can't you see that I'm at the end of my rope?

You'd better do something quick, or I will, because I can't take this anymore. I've been doing what I should be doing, and it's not doing me any good. He goes on. He says, My distress grew worse. And verse three, he says, My heart became hot as I mused.

The fire burned. We don't know what led up to all this. He's not agitated about sin generally, as if he looks out in the world and sees men stumbling around in their transgressions, and that's what's got him so roiled up about this.

We know that because in verse eight, he asks to be delivered from his transgressions. It seems that the wicked people who are watching knew what was up. And so, I don't want to guess really at what the historical situation here is, but there are some that would fit, and these could apply to us as we learn how to deal with our sin by taking it realistically, by looking at sin biblically.

Think to the incident of King David with Bathsheba, and that whole business, that whole sordid business that happened there in 2 Samuel 12. And one of the consequences of that was the death of the son that was born as a result of that.

Remember that the child was going to die, and David went on for many days fasting and praying for the child. And we also think of the presence of the wicked men in the psalm. Think still with that same incident with David and Bathsheba that when David was confronted, when Nathan went to him and told him that parable, and David said, okay, we're going to do justice to that man, and Nathan said, you are that man.

Remember that that was public, that all the emissaries, all the ambassadors, all the hangers-on were there in court. So he was in the presence of wicked men. And I think this psalm could have been written about his time of fasting and praying for that child.

But even if it's not that, and this is only a theory because the text doesn't give us anything conclusive here. I would only say it seems to fit. Even if it's not that, the situation is common enough, isn't it?

I mean, have the consequences of your sin risen up in your life? There are few times in our Christian walk that so clearly prove our faith as this, when we must deal with sin's aftermath. Do we ignore it?

Do we blame others? Do we dissimulate by concealing our guilt? And the problem with sin made public as it was with David in 2 Samuel 12, if that's the situation of Psalm 39, the problem is often just the sheer embarrassment of it.

And the more embarrassed we are, the more we're going to dissimulate, the more we're going to blame others, the more we're going to try and find an excuse for anything just to get the red off our face.

The tongue employed when our spirits are agitated like this, when it's engaged while our hearts are burning, hired as our advocate while the distress is getting worse, is only going to cause more trouble for us.

And so immediately we see an application as one that's very simple, easy pickings from the text. When you are stirred up like this, when the consequences of sin, whether it's an immediate sin that you did just a few hours ago or something from your long ago past has risen up finally, the tongue is the first thing that needs to be restrained.

The tongue the first thing. And we can ask, when do we speak again? Do I have to just shut up until I'm completely reconciled? When do I talk again? Can I talk to other people? Is it when I finally calm down?

The answer from the psalm, which of course would be the right answer, is no. It's when we're ready to speak to God. We open our mouth and we're ready to pray. We're in our prayer closet as Jesus calls it.

And see how he begins. Look at verse four again. Actually through verse six. Oh Lord, make me know my end and the measure of my days. Let me know how fleeting I am. My days are a few handbreadths. I read a background commentary that said a handbreadth was the width of the king's four fingers.

Sort of like merry old England where a yard was the king's measure. I heard this once from the shoulder to his fingertips. So the yard could change depending on who a king would be. But the idea here in the psalm, whatever if that's even actually true or not, still a few handbreadths.

And what's he saying? It's short. It's a quick time. My lifetime is as nothing before you. Not it's worthless. Note well that he doesn't say it's worthless. He doesn't say it's meaningless. He's saying that compared to God, man's life is a breath.

It's like on that cold day, which we haven't had one like this here in a long time. Do you remember what it's like to see your breath on a cold day? How long does it last? Half a second? Whatever it is.

Our life compared to God's eternality is like that one quick breath and imagine it being dispersed throughout all of Earth's atmosphere. That's our life compared to God. Compared to the eternal God. That's how fleeting we are in relation to him.

My life is as nothing before you. So what's he saying here? As he wrestles with his sin, as he gives us this realistic view of sin to take it rightly? Well, two things I think. One is a prayer to God to take pity on him during this short life.

It's like what Moses prayed in the psalm that he wrote. The years of our life are 70 or even by reason of strength 80, yet their span is but toil and trouble. They are soon gone, and we fly away. Remember what Peter said.

All flesh is like grass, and all is glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever. You see, brethren, we just don't last that long. We have only so much time to live and enjoy life.

Only so much time to make things right. We're only here for, as it were, a few days, just a moment, a flash in the pan. He's saying, Lord, I just don't have time. You know how brief this life that you gave me really is.

And he goes next to the futility of what most people strive for. Surely for nothing they are in turmoil, meaning they're growling, they're grumbling. There's this constant murmur of discontent as men strive.

For nothing they are in turmoil. Man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather. And most of us hope it'll be our children. But our confidence in that even can go no further than Lord willing. Lord willing, I'll go to this city and do this and that and make so much money and bring it back and reinvest it.

Lord willing, as I build up some assets to leave to my children, they'll actually get it. It'll actually still be there while I'm still alive even. Lord willing. I mean in Luke 12, Jesus told the parable of the man who had so much that he needed more and bigger barns.

And what did Jesus call him? He called him a fool. He says, you fool for concentrating so much on this fleeting life rather than the condition of his eternal soul. That's what Dave was looking upon. How fleeting this life is.

How little time he has to make things right because of his sin. How little time the wicked have to stop building their barns, stop heaping up riches. Riches they have no idea really what's gonna happen.

Only a hope, at best a hope, as to where they'll go. There could be an idea here in this part of David's prayer in the psalm that the sheer brevity of life is what makes the struggle bearable. In light of eternity, it's only a flash in the pan.

2 Corinthians 4, 16 to 18. Again, it was read to you, but let me read it one more time. Just those few verses. So we do not lose heart. Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day.

For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things which are seen, but to the things which are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

See, what's he saying here? Paul's immediately speaking of the persecutions, the trials that we bear from the world because of our testimony of Jesus Christ. But I would expand that just a little bit and say by Christ's word here in 2 Corinthians, by the Spirit of Christ, we can bear it.

We can bear up. But don't wait to repent. Don't wait to repent. There's not enough time. Don't let shame stifle you. If your offense was with brothers or sisters, you need to trust us to forgive and move on.

We need to confess. We need to trust Christ to be there amongst us as he promises in his word. The affliction is only slight. It's only momentary. The redness in our face of the embarrassment will go away.

In verses 7 -9, David casts himself on this sword of mercy of God. My hope is in you. Hope for deliverance from sin. Hope for salvation. And then he goes on. He says, for what do I wait? He waits on God in whom is vested all his hope.

Not on riches that moths can eat and rust will destroy, but on the unchanging God. In verse 7, here is what he hopes for from God. Here is the real substance of his prayer. When he finally speaks, here is what he asks for.

He says, deliver me from my transgressions. Lord, deliver me while I still have breath. Time seems so long to us. Don't make me lose precious days being scorned. Now David may have deserved it. We often deserve it.

But he's pleading just because of the sheer brevity of life that the Lord would bring that to a close and let him move on to the next. If you look at verse 9, I am mute. I do not open my mouth for it is you who have done it.

He continues in silence. And the reason is because it is God who has brought him to this pass. The sins are his own. As we say today, he owns them. The price can be brutal, you see. It can be hard to bear.

But no temptation has overtaken you. But what is common to man, and in the temptation, God will give you a way of escape. I would suggest the way of escape is usually acknowledging our sin with a realistic view of what sin is in God's sight and repenting.

The price can be tough. But only in this life and as he said, in this life, this life is very short. You know, we have to thank God when sin comes like the repo man demanding its price. We really do need to thank God for that because it's not some thug at our door.

It is God treating us as if we are truly his adopted sons and daughters. Because except the Lord should chastise us, without his correcting rod, we have no evidence that he loves us. That's what the Scripture says.

He's treating you as children. He's showing you his love. Our loving Father won't let us go on blithely through life as though sin is no big deal. He does chastise. He does rebuke. James says our trials are meant to teach us something.

And I found that often is not. That lesson is just what Psalm 39 is driving at. James says, really, in a way, he says, learn the lesson. Take heed to the lesson and get through the trial and get on with the rest of your Christian walk.

What is Psalm 39 driving at? It's telling us that sin is serious. It's telling that God brings circumstances that allow us to see how serious it is. It's saying the sooner we learn the lesson, the sooner his chastising hand might move on.

In my experience, these 10 or 11 years as your pastor, I found that that lesson that needs to be learned is more often than not, far more often than not, repentance. It's repentance. It's hard. It's embarrassing.

David, again, whether Psalm 39 was written in relation to his conviction before those others for his sin with Bathsheba, whether that's the case or not, it is embarrassing. But he got past it. By falling down before God, by true repentance, by knowing God's forgiveness, rather than repentance, if it flows from a realistic view of sin, it's not easy.

It's a hard thing. We need to wrestle with God. We need to wrestle with ourselves. I said before, fall too, ditch on the other side too quickly, and sin is treated with just a shrug of the shoulders and kind of a flippant, sorry.

No. Few things can damage our Christian testimony more than this, which is a failure to repent. The only cause for anybody being put out of the church is this. Read Matthew 18, 15 and 22. Failure to repent.

Why does Jesus say treat them like a tax collector? As an unbeliever? Failure to repent. Well, nothing is harder or more damaging to our walk with Christ than that. Repentance can be a private matter between you and God, but the vast majority of the time it demands one-on-one repentance.

We must go to that brother or sister we offended, and usually with our tongue, I would say always with our tongue, the one that was restrained in verse one, we need to open that tongue up and confess and seek forgiveness.

Sometimes our bank accounts must be depleted before we repent and learn to trust God and not money. And maybe it's a job we over-relied upon or a relationship that rose in prominence to overtake God in our life that needs to be removed or put on hold.

And so the last part of the prayer in Psalm 39, it closes with this plea that the chastising would come to an end. Remove your stroke from me, he says. Remove your stroke from me. I'm spent by the hostility of your hand.

The lessons that God teaches us are hard lessons. The lessons we need to learn, dear ones, are hard lessons because never does God give us more than we can handle. We can sort of take that from 1 Corinthians 13 at the end, can't we?

Why are the lessons hard? Because our spirits are stubborn. Because we make it hard. Because we delve into sin again and again and again. We give into the flesh over and over and over. But know this, that God never does more or less than is needed.

That God in his kindness, his wisdom, his sovereignty, his mercy, does exactly what we need to learn the lesson. And I would suggest that as we fail to learn the lesson, as we refuse, it's better said, to learn the lesson, he's going to turn up the heat.

Remember when our brother went through the book of James, Brother Steve, when he preached through that. It's one of the important lessons we learn from that book is stop. See that it is God who did it.

Just as it says in the psalm, come to a halt and pray and confess the sin. Learn the lesson that God is teaching. Remove your stroke from me, I am spent by the hostility of your hand. When you discipline a man with rebukes for sin, you consume like a moth what is dear to him.

That's what I was speaking of before about jobs and banks, accounts, and relationships. God can take it all away in a moment. And he finishes, surely all mankind is a breath. Selah. Here's the plea. Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear to my cry.

Hold not your peace at my tears, for I am a sojourner with you, a guest like all my fathers. Look away from me that I may smile again before I depart and am no more. He reminds God once more that his life is no more than a breath, it's just a vapor, it's insubstantial.

That if he should continue, then he'd be consumed as something no more substantive than a moth. He pleads that God will take note of his tears and turn away. He calls himself a sojourner, a stranger on earth, a sojourner with God.

He's a guest here by sovereign invitation. He's asking God to remember that he has nowhere else to turn but to him. Do you take your sin seriously? I mean, many of us are Biblical enough to cite verses about sin and how awful it is.

We can all say, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. The wages of sin is death. We can all cite from Romans 3, all have turned aside. Together they become worthless. No one does good.

No, not one. So we have this Biblical view of sin. But are we realistic about it? Is it just quoting verses? Or do we take it seriously the way David did in the psalm, the way God does? Ask yourself, does it cause you distress?

Does it cause you enough distress to pray to God and say, God, is it you who have done this? Is it you who have brought these hard providences in my life? I plead with you, Father. What is my lesson? What is the lesson I need to learn?

Show me now. Remove your stroke from me. That's not just asking for a more comfortable life here and now. That's taking sin realistically. That's taking sin the way the psalmist does, the way God does.

Does your sin cause you distress? Does it make your heart burn within you? I don't mean the Mormon burning in the bosom. I mean pain. I mean anguish. I mean a stirring of the spirit because of the knowledge of sin that is so real that it hurts.