Psalm 51 | Summer of Psalms

Well, joy should be a normal part of the Christian

life, even in times of difficulty, even in the

midst of trials, joy should be like the norm.

And I'm grateful this morning, I've been greeted

by a lot of joyful people, a lot of smiles and

a lot of stories, and I appreciate that, but

joy should be the norm. We have so much to be

grateful for as followers of Christ. We have

a hope to look forward to. We have an eternal

security in God. We have all these good gifts

he's given us, things like cheesecake. Mmm, cheesecake.

But God has blessed us so much. Joy should be

the norm in our Christian lives. And joy is not

just happiness, it's deep -rooted. Joy doesn't

flutter away when things get difficult in life.

Joy's roots go deep, and it endures all these

difficulties. But even though the Christian life

is joyful, it doesn't mean we bury our head in

the sands and are unaware of the pain and the

difficulty and the suffering in this world. It

doesn't mean we pretend like everything's okay.

It doesn't mean we pretend like we're perfect

and sinless. In fact, what we find today is if

we don't acknowledge our sin, if we don't confess

our sin, eventually it will suffocate and crush

us. And today we're looking at Psalm 51, and

kind of the overarching theme is rejoicing in

God's forgiveness. Rejoicing in God's forgiveness.

And I wonder if any of you have ever been in

the place that David was in this psalm, where

you were so overwhelmed by guilt, so overwhelmed

by your sin, that all of the joy was just squeezed

out of your life. It was just suffocating for

you. And this is what sin will do. This is what

guilt will do to us. It'll suffocate our joy

and it'll remove us from those relationships

that Pastor Jim has called us to, right? This

community of believers go deeper, he said last

week. It'll isolate us from the people God's

called us to and it'll isolate us from God. And

you may find yourself today overwhelmed by guilt,

by sin, and you would be in the company of a

whole lot of other people. Isaiah at one point

standing before this holy God. He said, woe is

me. I am a man of unclean lips. He recognized

his sin. He was overwhelmed by his sin. Paul

said, I am the chief of sinners. He was burdened

by his past, by his sin. At the beginning of

every single service at Munster Church, we begin

with God's greeting, this reminder that God's

grace and his mercy and his peace, we desperately

need it. And he offers it freely. So joy and

confession are both parts of the believer's life,

natural parts, everyday parts of the believer's

life, joy and confession. Psalm 51, as we come

to this today, we are in the second book, second

of five books in the Psalms, right? In this summer

of Psalms. And Psalm 51 is a Psalm of David.

Yes, that David, the giant slayer, the king,

the musician, the one who wrote about half of

the Psalms. And David is far gifted beyond what

many of us will ever be, but David, we also find,

is just as human as you and I, just as flawed

as you and I, just as sinful as you and I. And

the backdrop of this psalm, it says before verse

1, it was that time when Nathan approached David

about a sin in his life that he was overwhelmed

by. And you'll remember the story in 2 Samuel

11 and 12. David had seen this woman and he said,

I'm the king, I want her, I'll have her. And

he sent someone to get her and she became pregnant.

And now David's got a problem on his hands, not

only adultery, but now he realizes he's got to

cover up this sin. And so he sends for Uriah,

the husband, and has him come back from battle.

And when that plan doesn't unfold the way he

wanted to to cover up his sin, he realizes now

I'm going to have to send Uriah to the front

lines of this battle and Uriah is killed. So

now we've covered on top of adultery, now we

have murder. And David is just, in Psalm 51,

he is weighed down. He is burdened by this sin.

David, I mean, he goes big, doesn't he? But he

doesn't just slay giants, he sins big too, and

now he's covered in this, and he's joyless, he's

suffocated. And what we see in Psalm 51 is this

beautiful solution to this weight that we feel,

the weight of our guilt, the weight of our sin,

and it's confession. Now, often, a psalmist,

what they'll do is they will either blame their

enemies for their problems, or they'll blame

God for the problems they face. But there are

a few that don't do that. There are seven, in

fact, that we call penitential psalms. And these

are the psalms where the writer says, it's on

me. I got myself into this mess. I am a sinner.

Woe is me. And we see the same thing in Psalm

38, for example. David wrote this psalm as well.

And this is a really... clear picture of what

David was feeling at this time, the weight of

his sin. He says, he says, my iniquities have

gone over my head, like this heavy burden, too

heavy for me. He says, I groan because of the

tumult in my heart. My heart throbs, my strength

fails me, and the light of my eyes, it's also

gone for me. You can see it on a person that's

overwhelmed by guilt. All the joy is sapped out

of them. And David says, I confess my iniquity.

I'm sorry for my sin. This is a penitential psalm,

Psalm 38. And Psalm 51 will echo these same things.

David is not blaming God. He's not claiming innocence.

He's owning his sin here in Psalm 51. And we'll

see all three parts of the Heidelberg play out

in this psalm. Parts one, two, and three. It's

sin and misery. followed by God's deliverance,

and then a response of gratitude. That's what

we're going to see in this psalm. Now, last week,

Pastor Jim challenged you all to go deeper in

connection. This is the summer he said he wants

to see us as a church go deeper in these connections.

And one way for sure that you can squash that,

one way for sure that you can make sure that

never happens at Munster Church is, well... not

just stealing someone's wife and having their

husband murdered, but deeper than that. It's

this suffocating sin. It's this isolation that

happens. If we do not confess our sins, Scripture

says, we'll be isolated in our guilt, and we'll

be suffocated. And so if you find yourself in

that place today, I hope you'll find hope in

Psalm 51. It's a beautiful picture of the gospel.

This is David's confession, beginning in verse

1. Here's what he says. Have mercy on me, O God,

according to your steadfast love. According to

your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions.

Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse

me from my sin. For I know my transgressions

and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you

only, have I sinned and done what is evil in

your sight. So that you may be justified in your

words and blameless in your judgment. Behold.

I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did

my mother conceive me. Behold, you delight in

truth and the inward being, and you teach me

wisdom in the secret heart. And we see in David's

confession, he understood sin. David doesn't

try to redefine sin. He doesn't try to minimize

sin. He calls it what it is. In fact, he uses

the same language that throughout the Old Testament

is used, these three words, transgressions, iniquity,

sin. Words for rebellion and waywardness. This

missing the mark that God has called us to. David

calls it what it is. He understands. He's self

-aware. In fact, he's so self -aware that in

verse 3 he says, I know my transgressions. I

know them intimately, personally. Not like Uncle

Jimmy who stops in for Thanksgiving once a year.

I'm talking about the person I live with. I know

my sin that way, that intimately. He says, I'm

well acquainted with it because I've lived in

it. I know my sin. And then verse 4, he understands

the seriousness of sin. He says, against you,

you only have I sinned. Against this holy God.

And so he goes on to say, listen, whatever your

judgment is, whatever your words against me are,

they're justified. I brought this on myself.

He understands the weight of it, and he understands

how comprehensive it is. He looks and he says,

behold, I'm not going to hide this. I'm not going

to bury it. Behold, look at this sin of mine.

Behold, I was sinful at birth, sinful at conception.

This is in my heart. It's in my DNA. It's the

stuff I'm made of. I've inherited this from my

parents, and they inherited it from theirs, and

it goes all the way back to the fall. This is

deep in my heart. You may have at some point

gone to a self -checkout kiosk and noticed that

there's a mirror there at some of these. Have

you ever seen that? They'll put a mirror there

sometimes, and what they found is that people

are less likely to go against societal norms

or to break a law if they're self -aware. You

put a mirror in front of them and they're less

likely. Now, that doesn't fix the problem because

the problem isn't on the surface. The problem's

in the heart. And so we still have people shoplifting.

Whether or not you put the biggest mirror in

front of that kiosk or not, people are still

going to do it. It's like the people this past

Monday, they found themselves on Mount Etna in

Sicily. You may have seen this group of tourists

scurrying down a mountain. They were there to

hike and explore and enjoy this. And then you

see this mountain start to erupt in front of

them, this volcano, and they're panicked, and

it's like they're in shock, and they can't believe

this is happening to them. And it's like, well,

it is a volcano, though, right? This is what

volcanoes eventually do. Like, we shouldn't be

surprised. And it's like, David's like, this

is what's in me. And eventually, one way or another,

it comes out, and sometimes it's really destructive

to myself and to the people around me. It's deep

in my heart. David owns that. He takes full responsibility

for his sin. You look back through the six verses

and look at all the me's and the my's. It's on

me, God. He's not trying to fake out God. You

can't walk into God's presence and puff up your

chest and stand up a little straighter and act

like you belong there in front of a holy God.

A few years back, my wife and I were through

a connection. able to go to this four -star hotel

down in French Lick, Indiana. Beautiful place

called West Baden. And you walk in, and there

is this, it's much higher, 200 feet high. It's

this 180 -foot building, just grand and elegant.

And I walk in there, I'm like, I don't belong

here at all. And I can't even fake it. And I

tried. I walked a little straighter, and I talked

a little more confidently, but I knew this...

This is not my place. I don't belong here. And

David doesn't walk into God's presence. And you

and I, we can't walk into God's presence and

pretend like we belong. We can't puff up our

chest. We come to God in confession and humility

and say, I don't belong here. Woe is me, God.

You are holy. I am not. And it's only by your

mercy that I can stand in your presence. He understands

it, and so he confesses his sin. This is part

one of the Heidelberg. He's sitting in this sin

and misery, and he understands he has to own

his sin. But as much as he understood about himself

and his sin, he also understood something about

God, and that is that God is gracious and merciful

and patient, slow to anger. So he says, have

mercy on me, O God. That's how he starts his

appeal in verse 1. He says in verse 1, blot it

out, my iniquities. Blot them out. Like, erase

them from the court records for good. It's like,

maybe you had a parent or grandparent that had

one of those clickety -clack old school typewriters,

you know, click, click, click, click, return,

click, click, click, click, return, right? And

they had to use this whiteout. If you made a

mistake, you used whiteout to correct the mistakes.

Nowadays, we have autocorrect on our phones.

That's another sermon for another day, how maybe

the Holy Spirit or God's word is kind of our

autocorrect. But David says, no, no, what I need

because of my sin that I see in me, I need you

to wipe this off my record, God. And not just

that, I need you to wash me thoroughly, he says

in verse 2. In those days, to wash clothes was

to take a rod or a stick or something and you

would beat the dirt out of them. Or you would

put them in the water and you would stomp. on

those clothes to get them clean. He's saying,

tread on me, God. Get this filth out of my heart.

Get it out of my life. It's like a mama whose

son comes home from the baseball field, and there's

grass stains, and there's dirt stains from sliding

home, right? And we've got to get these clean,

and it's not just on the surface. It's deep in

the fibers. It's going to take something special.

David says, I need inward renewal here. This

is deep inside me. And so in verse 7, he begins

to plead and pray for this renewal. Purge me

with hyssop, and I shall be clean. Wash me, and

I shall be whiter than snow. Let me hear joy

and gladness. Let the bones that you've broken

rejoice. Hide your face from my sins and blot

out all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart,

O God. And renew a right spirit within me. Cast

me not away from your presence and take not your

Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of

your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit.

He reiterates, he understands his miserable situation.

And he says, God, I want to hear joy again. Restore

this joy that I had in the beginning with you

in that relationship. My bones have been broken.

Like this guilt, the weight of it. It takes a

physical toll. He says, my spirit isn't right

either. Make my spirit right. And then he goes

to God and he says, I need this inward renewal.

Create in me a clean heart, a right spirit within

me. And this heart is the center of your will.

It's your desires. He says, make me the kind

of person who wants what you want, God. Make

me the kind of person who desires what you desire.

I need inward renewal. I need a heart change,

not more information. It was the evangelist D

.L. Moody that said, if a man is stealing nuts

and bolts from a railway track, and in order

to change him, you send him to college, at the

end of his education, he'll come back and steal

the whole railway track. We don't need more information.

We have all the information we need. What we

need is a heart change. What we need is transformation,

and it starts. It's no different than that 12

-step program. It starts with a recognition.

I can't fix this on my own. I need God to step

in. And that's why in verse 10, he uses that

word create. It's only used in scripture of God

himself. You and I can't create in the way that

God creates. And David calls him, create in me

a new heart in the way that only you can do.

And as this psalm progresses, you actually see

this unfolding, this transformation. unfolding

in David. He's anticipating change in his life.

You'll see all the me's and the my's, if you

keep reading forward, transition to you and your.

And he starts to look outside himself because

you see sin, it turns us inward on ourself. But

joy turns us outward. Joy makes it so we can

see God and we can see others and their needs.

Sin keeps us focused on ourselves. And in the

beginning, he's all about me and my. And by the

end, he's beginning to change. And what he wants

is not just a quick clean up. What he wants is

not just a clean slate for the day so he can

go out and do it again tomorrow. What he wants

is really God himself. In verse 11 he says, cast

me not away from your presence. Don't take your

Holy Spirit from me. He desires God himself.

God, I want you. not just a quick fix. I want

you, God. And so he sees this need for renewal.

This is the deliverance part, part two of the

Heidelberg Catechism, deliverance. And so today,

if you find yourself in this place of this joyless

life, know that you don't have to stay there.

If you're feeling suffocated, and crushed by

the weight of guilt or sin in your life, you

don't have to sit in that anymore. God calls

you out of that. He actually, it says he delights

in forgiveness. He delights in mercy. Like he

is eager and waiting to forgive you. If only

you'll confess. And maybe you say today, Brian,

I'm not the problem. The reason I feel heavy

today, the reason I feel burdened today is it's

them. If you knew what she said to me, if you

only knew, Brian, what he did to me, and listen,

I'm not minimizing pain in this room, but let's

be certain that what's crushing us isn't their

actions, isn't their words. What's crushing us

is this self -righteous response, I would never.

Say, I would never do that. I'm not even capable.

God, thank you that I'm not like them. Thank

you that I'm more righteous than them. There

are superior sins, if you want to call it that.

We think superior sins of self -righteousness,

of keeping records of other people's wrongs,

of unforgiveness that might be crushing some

of us in this room. The weight you feel, the

guilt you feel, the heaviness you feel. Let's

be certain that You're not having the joy sucked

out of your life because of self -righteousness

or because of keeping records. It's time to let

that stuff go because hiding in your sins only

leads to misery. It's confession that leads to

joy, and that's what David shows us. In verses

13 through 15, he continues, then I will, then,

then, after you've restored, after you've renewed,

after you've changed my heart, then I will teach

your trans... teach transgressors your ways and

sinners will return to you. Deliver me from blood

guiltiness, O God, O God of my salvation, and

my tongue will sing aloud your righteousness.

O Lord, open my lips and my mouth will declare

your praise. It's like once he's confessed, all

of a sudden this dam in his heart bursts open,

right? And now he's able to begin looking outward.

and speaking outward, and he begins to praise

God. He begins to speak truth to other people.

He begins to see needs around. All of a sudden,

his energy is turned from himself to the people

around him and to the God above him. And this

is nothing new. This is what we saw in Isaiah.

Remember Isaiah, who the angel came and touched

his lips with the coal. And Isaiah's response

then after that was, here I am, send me. I'm

ready, God. After his confession, it was Peter.

Remember, he had denied Christ three times. And

after his confession in Acts chapter 2, if you

Acts 2 · chapter mention

read that sermon, it's a powerful sermon. Thousands

of people came to the Lord. This is the turning

point. All of a sudden, this dam burst, and we

open our mouth, and David says, I teach sinners,

and they return to you. My tongue sings. I declare

your praise. Verse 15. And God has put this joy

back in David's heart. And I imagine you could

see like the light restored in his eyes. And

he walked a little lighter. And he talked a little

lighter. And all of a sudden this burden was

lifted. It's a return to joy. This is part three

of the Heidelberg. It's this expression of gratitude

and response to God's deliverance. And the cool

thing is it's not just about our joy. What we

see in this psalm is God delights in all of this

as well. Our joyful response brings God joy too.

Look at verse 16. For you will not delight in

sacrifice, or I would give it. You will not be

pleased with a burnt offering. The sacrifices

of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite

heart, O God, you will not despise. This is the

stuff that brings you joy. A broken and contrite

and repentant heart. Verse 18, he's turning outward.

He says, do good to Zion in your good pleasure.

Build up the walls of Jerusalem. Then you'll

delight in right sacrifices and burnt offerings

and whole burnt offerings. Then bowls will be

offered on your altar. In other words, worship

will be restored. And you'll delight in it again,

but not because it's these outward rituals, not

because we prayed this familiar prayer or sang

this song that we didn't mean, but that something

changed inside us. And now you delight in what

you see because you delight in genuine repentance.

And moms and dads, you know this. You go to two

kids that have been fighting and you say you're

sorry. And they're like, sorry. Right? We see

through that. God sees through that. It's like

the gal who went to Chipotle and she... bought

her lunch, and then she threw it in the face

of the person who served her. And she's like,

I'm so sorry, I have this compulsive disorder.

Can I have another meal? And okay, that's, by

grace, she makes this other meal and gives it

to her, and then she throws it in her face again,

the waitress. Come on now. I'm so sorry I have

this disorder. I will go. I will get it fixed.

I'll go to this 30 -day clinic and I'm going

to check myself in and I'm going to deal with

this once for all. And she does it. She spends

30 days in this place and they educate her and

they train her and she knows all these coping

mechanisms now and she's ready to go again. She

goes back to Chipotle. She gets her order and

the lady's like, now wait a minute before I hand

this to you. You said you were changed, right?

Oh yeah, I'm changed. I'm cured. I'm all better.

hands it to her, right back on her face again.

I thought you were cured. Oh, I am cured. I still

have the compulsions, but I don't feel guilty

at all anymore. That ain't heart change. It's

not this self -satisfied contentment. It's not

this self -loathing on the other end. Tim Keller

says, here's what a broken heart is. Here's what

a contrite heart is. It's a heart that knows

how little it deserves and how much it has received.

That's a broken and contrite heart. And if this

all sounds familiar, in Hosea 6 .6, it says,

God said, I desire steadfast love, not sacrifice.

It's what's in your heart. It's real change.

I desire knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

And Samuel said to Saul, obedience is better

than sacrifice. And so you see, God is delighted

in genuine confession, in genuine repentance.

He's delighted by this joy -filled community

that results from that. This is what brings him

joy. And in verse 18, we see, like, this is what

it produces. Confession produces this joy -filled

community. All of a sudden, as we start to look

out to one another, we're not so consumed with

ourself anymore. And David begins to pray for

his people, to pray for God's people. This joy

that turns outward, it turns our me's and my's

into you's and yours. It's confession. It's gratitude.

It's joy. This is the joyful life that we're

called to. If only we'll start with confession.

So here's the challenge for this week. Number

one, don't wait. Today, if you have something

you need to confess, this ought to be a normal

part of our lives, that we are eager and ready

to confess, God, I have sinned, I have failed,

I have fallen short again, and I'm so grateful

that, God, you are willing and ready to forgive.

So number one, confess. And then that ought to

bring you some joy to know that God is eager

and ready to forgive. And here's the challenge

this week. You've been challenged to go deeper

in community. You've been challenged to invite

people into your homes. As you do that, share

with one person this week God's joy that he's

given you. And it could be as a result of forgiveness.

It could just be a result of his goodness and

faithfulness in your life. But share with one

person this week the joy that you have. in in

christ so listen there there is no ritual that

can replace a repentant heart first john 1 9

says if we confess our sins he is faithful and

just to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness

he is eager and ready to forgive today and for

david what we see is it happened in a moment

happened in a moment in fact it happened in a

verse in second samuel chapter 12 David is standing

2 Samuel 12 · chapter mention

before Nathan, and Nathan has told him this whole

story about a man who stole a lamb from a poor

man. And David couldn't believe that this rich

man stole a poor man's lamb. And he says, that

man must die. And Nathan says, David, that's

you. You are that man. You're looking at everyone

else's sin. He says, this is you. And David's

response in verse 13, this happens in a verse,

in a moment. David said to Nathan, I have sinned

against the Lord. And Nathan said to David, the

Lord has put away your sin. You see that it happens

in a moment. From this miserable state, from

this crushing, suffocating place, you don't have

to sit there anymore. It can happen in a moment,

forgiveness. If only you'll confess, if only

you'll own it as David did. And so today, all

we need to be aware of is number one, how lost

we are. And number two, how loved we are. Because

this God wants nothing more. He delights in nothing

more than enjoying you and seeing you enjoy him

and his glory.