Why the Mule is So Sad

If you're new to us.

We have been in a summer sermon series on what the Bible teaches about how to be happy in life and there is a sermon outline.

If you didn't get one, our ushers would be happy to hand you one.

Just lift your hand and they'll get you a handout to follow along.

Sometimes my sermons are very confusing so it's helpful to follow along in an outline.

You know, over the years people have told me that I exaggerate a lot.

I would just like to say to that that this is one of the most outrageous, incredibly unsubstantiated, widely unfounded observations about me that I've ever heard, but on the other hand, mostly true than I've ever heard, but on the other hand, mostly true.

My kids used to tease me about that.

I'd exaggerate about everything.

Sorry about that, but not the word.

I'm not going to exaggerate about that.

But you know, people thought Marco Polo exaggerated a lot.

You people thought Marco Polo exaggerated a lot, you know, marco Polo.

Marco Polo was a very famous explorer, world traveler, born in Venice 1254.

And the Polos traveled all over much of Asia.

They arrived in China.

Marco served in the court of Kublai Khan, the Mongol emperor of China, and then, as he kept moving on his travels.

He went to Italy.

He was captured and imprisoned there, and while in the prison he dictated his stories of his travel to a fellow prisoner by the name of Rusticello of Pisa, who wrote them down, and it became called the Travels of Marco Polo.

Polo's writings actually became very valuable information for later explorers, navigators, helping them plan voyages and understand the geography of regions they were exploring.

But when Marco Polo was dying, those attending him said please recant all your exaggerations, all those fanciful stories of your adventures.

Now is the time to do it.

He responded by saying quote were the whole truth known about what I have seen, the half could not be told.

Marco Polo's stories were so fantastic that people didn't believe them.

You know what the Bible describes heaven as something so wonderful we don't have the words to describe it really.

What we can experience right now, though, is a little taste of heaven that I've been showing in our sermon series.

The word of God is filled with what I call clues leading to God's heavenly happiness, and you can see them signaled by the phrase blessed is the one.

In fact, the biblical words, for blessed can be thought of as experiencing a little taste of heavenly happiness, so we're going to look at the next heavenly blessing today in Psalm 32.

If you brought your Bible, you want to turn there.

Follow along, that'd be great.

I'm going to read Psalm 32 and then talk about it for a few minutes.

David is writing this psalm and he begins by saying oh, how blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered, how blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity and whose spirit there is no deceit.

You know, when I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long.

For day and night, your hand was heavy upon me.

My vitality was drained away, as with a fever or heat or summer, selah.

But I acknowledged my sin to you and my iniquity.

I did not hide.

I said I will confess my transgressions to the Lord and you forgave me the guilt of my sin, selah.

Therefore, let everyone who is godly pray to you.

In a time when you may be found, surely, in a flood of great waters, they will not reach him.

You are my hiding place.

You preserve me from trouble.

You surround me with songs of deliverance, selah.

I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go.

You surround me with songs of deliverance.

Selah, I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go.

I will counsel you with my eye upon you.

Do not be as the horse or the mule, which have no understanding, whose trappings include bit and bridle to hold them in check, otherwise they will not come near to you.

Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but he who trusts in the Lord, loving kindness, shall surround him.

Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, you righteous ones, and shout for joy, all you who are upright in heart Now to experience one of God's richest blessings.

Psalm 32 encourages us to seek God's forgiveness for our sins.

David can't help himself, and you'll see why.

The truth is, we will not be happy with heaven's blessings going around with unconfessed sin in our heart or in our life.

We're going to look at three things today from this psalm the need for God's forgiveness, receiving God's forgiveness and the lessons of God's forgiveness.

First, we all need God's forgiveness because we have all sinned.

King David prayed this later, psalm 143, 2.

He asked God please don't enter into judgment with your servant, for in your sight, your sight, no man is living righteous.

No man living is righteous.

Or New Testament for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

No one's exempt All Psalm 32 is also a song in which King David is literally celebrating the joy of God's forgiveness of his sins.

In a minute you'll see why.

Hopefully, many of us can experience that same joy, that same blessedness, a little taste of heaven.

But first we have to ask what sins is David talking about?

Probably, no, very likely.

He's referring to his sin of adultery with Bathsheba Broken one of the Ten Commandments there and his sin of murdering Bathsheba's husband, uriah, to cover up his sin.

Well, two Ten Commandments right off the bat.

Perhaps there were more?

2 Samuel 12.

You see all of that unfold.

What you need to know to understand Psalm 32 is that in the law of Moses, when it talks about sacrifices for sins to receive God's forgiveness, there was no atoning sacrifice for willful sins, only unintentional ones.

You didn't realize.

If you sinned willfully, there was no atoning sacrifice for you and the penalty was death, death, you must die.

That was the law of Moses.

You couldn't just bring a lamb, put your hand on it and say there, that takes care of my sin.

Couldn't do that.

Not for sins of adultery and murder, and any willful sin against God had no sacrifice of atonement.

You need to realize that or you won't understand Psalm 32.

David's sin was willful, it was flagrant.

He knew what he was doing.

He knew it was an offense against God and the penalty was certain death.

When David confessed his sin to Nathan, he knew he was going to die for that.

He knew it.

I'm caught Got it.

Well then, how did David experience the heavenly blessing of God's forgiveness?

Oh well, he.

If you look at Psalm 32, the song David wrote is the result of his receiving heavenly happiness after he confessed his sin and he heard the prophet Nathan say this.

Let me read 2 Samuel 12, 13.

Then David said to Nathan I have sinned against the Lord.

And Nathan said to David here's the prophetic word of God the Lord also has taken away your sin.

You shall not die.

Whoa, what.

He's not going to die.

Can you imagine what David must have felt like to hear that God forgave him?

He wasn't going to die.

I have my life still.

I'm not going to die for that sin.

He forgave me.

And so that's why he starts the psalm a little taste of heaven.

He cries out twice blessed is the man, blessed is the one.

You can't believe this blessing.

And you know what Psalm 32 also is.

It's an invitation, as we read.

It's an invitation for us, those who read and sing this psalm, to enjoy a little taste of heaven, experiencing being released from our sin and guilt by God's prophetic word that he's going to do that Now.

First let me say to impute he mentions that the Lord does not impute iniquity.

It means to charge someone with a crime, a death penalty crime in the scripture.

It's to hold someone responsible for that kind of sin that they committed.

Psalm 32 teaches us two things about God he is the one who judges our sin and he is the one, only one, who can forgive our sin.

Who can forgive our sin?

David reflects that in Psalm 51.

Again, confession of sin and so on in his life, psalm 51, 4.

Against you, he says you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight so that you, god, may be justified in your sight in your words and blameless in your judgment.

Psalm 32, I'm telling you, helps us come to grips.

David's helping us come to grips with the truth of our sin, our guilt before God and our need for forgiveness.

For his forgiveness we must need, for forgiveness, for his forgiveness, we must being released from the guilt and judgment for our sin is a fantastic blessing, as David is trying to tell us A little taste of heaven and something only God can give us, only him, god can give us.

Only him.

It does not matter whether you think you've sinned or not, it does not matter.

It does not matter if you measure your sin by the moral standards of the culture and saying it's okay, no, it's not.

What only matters is what God thinks.

He's the only one who imputes and he's the only one who forgives.

And, as David said, I've sinned against you and only you.

The sooner we realize that, the sooner we can understand and experience this blessing.

When we realize what matters is what God thinks, we realize that we've fallen short.

And if you look at this passage closely, you see the verbs describing God's forgiveness are all in the passive voice, meaning the sinner is being acted upon by God.

The sinner isn't getting his relief from guilt on his own.

Transgressions are forgiven.

Sins are taken away.

Someone else is doing this to the sinner.

Iniquity is not imputed Passive voice.

God is the one who does the imputing.

God is the one who does the forgiving.

And when we know, like David did, that God has forgiven us and taken away our guilt, and we know that we've just received God's mercy.

We're not getting what we deserve, but instead we're receiving God's grace, getting something very precious we don't deserve.

David is telling us it is a blessed thing indeed, indeed, a little taste of heaven, the very definition of heavenly happiness.

You know what His son, solomon, agreed If you read Proverbs 28, 13,.

Solomon says he who conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain compassion.

Now let me add in this passage that we're studying did you notice here the Bible describes not only here but anywhere there are three different kinds of sins we commit against God.

Three different Hebrew words for sin Pasha, hatat and avon, transgressions, sins and iniquities.

Three different kinds.

They're all synonyms for sinning against God, but they each have their own distinctive way that we sin against God.

Pasha or transgression means just to break through a barrier, to step over a line God's drawn in the sand.

Step over it like Adam and Eve.

Transgression, transgression I know what God has said.

I don't care.

I think I would like that.

Pasha, transgression, hatat, sin this is the word mostly translated sin.

It means to miss the mark.

You're trying to throw a rock.

You know 50 feet you can do it, but God's standard is 200 miles.

Can you make it?

Can you do it?

No, you can't.

You're going to miss the mark every time.

As hard as you try, you've never achieved God's perfect righteousness.

That's what the scriptures say and call sin Hatat.

We miss the mark and Jeremiah says our righteousness.

God says just like filthy rags, not even close to God's glory.

Avon, iniquity.

This word means.

It literally means to be bent away from something, or twisted, just not oriented to God at all, just bent away.

We ignore God's word, follow our own way, our own way.

It's this way.

Oh man, transgressions, sins, iniquities.

Oh man, transgressions, sins, iniquities.

It's a heavy, heavy load to bear.

But let's go to the second point of how we can receive God's forgiveness.

David actually refers to it as a double blessing.

Notice how David repeats the blessing in verses 1 and 2 of Psalm 32.

He's actually doing that to invite us to experience this double blessing God has for us, based on knowing, knowing that he has promised to forgive us.

32.1,.

How blessed is he.

Let me repeat that.

How blessed is the man.

Little taste of heaven.

But here's what you learn Confession always precedes God's forgiveness.

Always Notice, nathan didn't say God forgive you, you won't die until he confessed it.

And humility precedes confession.

Confession precedes forgiveness, humility precedes confession.

In order to confess our sins to God, we must humble ourselves, admit I have done this, god, I confess it, I admit it.

Psalm 32 goes on and David then describes the inner turmoil of guilt he carried when he went through because his reluctance to confess his sin.

Listen to him Psalm 32, 3 and 4,.

When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long.

For day and night, your hand was heavy upon me.

My vitality was drained away, as with the fever heat of summer.

Selah, oh, david wasn't experiencing heavenly happiness in his unconfessed sin.

His guilt was causing him to experience physical failings in his body.

It caused him to experience multiplied misery in his mood.

It caused a sapping of his spiritual strength, dried up, dry, desert.

Do you know how long David lived with the turmoil of his guilt before he was ready to confess it?

Because of God, bless Nathan, who confronted him about his sin, because he loved him.

Nine months he carried it around, mercifully.

Mercifully, david was convicted by a sin, by the faithful wounds of a friend, nathan.

The prophet spoke to him You're the man you did this.

David said oh, you're right, I confess my sin.

You know, the same can be true of us, god's spirit, when he speaks to us, especially in his word.

A lot of times he's pointing out where we have dropped the ball, sinned against God, maybe in the way we treat people, maybe in our attitude, maybe in our unbelief, maybe some way.

But God's word is here to help us, as Nathan was to David, so could I encourage you?

It's very important in your spiritual life to be in God's word so he can say something to you and his spirit can chime in.

Listen, then, to how David confessed his sins.

When confronted by Nathan and he mentions this in verse two he stopped trying to hide it, hide it.

He stopped trying to minimize it.

No big to minimize, no big deal, no big deal.

He stopped trying to defend it.

Hey, what about me?

I should get?

He stopped trying to deny it.

He said I have sinned against the Lord, plain and simple.

I'm ready to die.

Basically, he thought he was going to die at that moment.

That was the penalty.

But look, he says in verse 2, he said oh, the Lord doesn't impugn and in whose spirit there's no deceit.

The Lord doesn't impute and in whose spirit there's no deceit.

Stop lying to yourself and others about the sin you're committing.

David was thorough, he tells us in verses 1 and 2.

He acknowledged his sin.

He missed the mark verses 1 and 2.

He acknowledged his sin.

He missed the mark of being faithful to God.

He didn't hide his iniquity.

He said he turned his heart away from the Lord to satisfy his lust.

But then covered it up.

He acknowledged it and he confessed his transgressions to the Lord, flagrantly stepping over the line of God's commands Do not kill, do not commit adultery.

And that leads me to the final point where I think we can learn some lessons from David about God's forgiveness.

God knows, he knows us.

He knows we want to hide.

He knows we don't want to lose face and acknowledge we've sinned.

He knows that and he knows because of that we're going to miss his blessing of forgiveness, of joy in our heart overflowing.

He knows we're going to miss his blessing of forgiveness, of joy in our heart overflowing.

He knows we're going to miss it because we're so stuck and we'll hang on to our guilt and hide and deceive ourselves and others to hide it.

Don't do that.

Psalm 32, 6 to 11,.

David leaves us three exhortations to help us experience heavenly happiness and joy of God's forgiveness.

The first lesson is that we can come to God without reservations or fear, and he will forgive us.

Look at his invitation in verses 6 to 8.

After describing his own blessing of forgiveness and the pain of the guilt and torment he went through, he said now look.

Therefore, let everyone who's godly pray to you.

In a time you may be found, surely, in a flood of great waters, waters they won't reach him.

You're my hiding place.

You surround me with songs of deliverance.

Second lesson so we can come to God, come, come to him.

Second lesson, david is don't be.

This is probably the core of his lessons, because it's what he struggled with the most In verse nine don't be stubborn like a horse or a mule.

Be stubborn like a horse or a mule.

Do not be as the horse or as the mule, which have no understanding, whose trappings include bit and bridle to hold them in check, otherwise they won't come near you.

Yank, yank, don't be like that.

God says.

I can't help you when you're that stubborn.

Open your heart.

Agree with me that you've sinned, not against that person, against me.

Do you know why the mule is so sad me?

Do you know why the mule is so sad?

Because he's so stubborn.

He's stubborn.

He doesn't want anybody leading him around telling him where he's wrong.

No, sir, I'm a good person.

Look at the analogy.

David gives us the antithesis, the opposite of experiencing the blessing of God's forgiveness is the stubbornness of a mule Not going to get there, not going to have a little taste of heaven.

Horses and mules won't come unless they're bridled.

Stubbornness is like that.

It's like the sin of iniquity.

We're bent away from God.

We're staying there.

Thank you very much.

I think I got it figured out.

Don't bother me with the details of how I've fallen short, because I'm a good person, ouch.

Third lesson David leaves us with is okay, don't be stubborn like a mule.

What should I do?

Come running to the Lord.

His love and support awaits you.

Psalm 32, 10, 11.

Many are the sours of the wicked, but he who trusts in the Lord, loving kindness and shall surround him, be trusts in the Lord, loving kindness and shall surround him.

Be glad in the Lord and rejoice you, righteous ones, shall for joy, all you who are upright in heart and the only way you can be upright in heart, come clean with God, receive his forgiveness.

He's the only one who can give it to you.

Doesn't matter what you think about your sin matters what he thinks.

There's nothing, I'm telling you.

There's nothing like, I think, the blessing of experiencing God's forgiveness when you feel I've experienced this many times the release of the guilt and the presence of God's favor, but on the other hand, I've also felt the torment, inner, outer torment, of living with the guilt of my sin.

Don't want to do that, and you understand right that.

That's why God sent Jesus Christ, so you wouldn't have to.

When he died on the cross, he died for all our sins once and for all.

God's forgiveness in Christ is given to anyone who believes in Jesus for God's gift of eternal life.

Leave in him as your Savior.

Forgiveness is part of that deal.

Now listen to me If Christ, who satisfied God's judgment for sin, is in you when you do sin, the Apostle John tells us God's blessing of forgiveness, his prophetic, inerrant word of truth, is just a confession away to return to the blessing, heavenly blessing, he has for you.

Listen to the Apostle John, his first letter.

If we say we have no sin.

We're just deceiving ourselves.

The truth is not in us.

But if we confess our sins, god is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, there's the blessing.

Don't be like a mule.

I know how easy it is to do that.

We don't want to lose face, we don't want to diminish the way we think of ourselves.

But all through the scripture, you can't escape.

You will never make God's righteousness fulfilled.

We're constantly stepping over the line.

Make God's righteousness fulfilled.

We're constantly stepping over the line.

We're constantly being bent away to this and to that and leaving God over here.

Don't do that.

Come as soon as you realize it, boom, oh Lord, please, I confess that is sin.

Thank you that your word tells me you're going to cleanse me because you're just.

Jesus already died for me from that sin.

Thank you, I hope you can experience that.

If you haven't, let's pray Now.

I want us just to take a moment, personally, individually, quietly, to confess any sins the Lord might bring to mind in moment, personally, individually, quietly, to confess any sins the Lord might bring to mind in your life, in your heart, in your mind.

Go ahead and confess that to the Lord, and maybe you're not sure whether Jesus is actually in you.

Maybe you're not sure whether you believed in him as your savior for the gift of eternal life.

Well, acknowledge that and ask him to make Jesus real to you, in you, to be born again.

Take a minute, heavenly Father.

Thank you that you promised us, just like you promised David through the prophet Nathan, to forgive our sins as we confess them to you, because Jesus has already taken the judgment as our substitute.

Help us not to hide our sin, because nothing's hidden from you.

Help us not to be proud and stubborn, but to acknowledge our sin to you when we are aware of it and receive the blessing of your gift, gracious gift, merciful gift of forgiveness.

I pray all this in Jesus' name, amen.