Ninth Sunday after Trinity (2024)
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Psalm 51:1-12
Psalm 51:1-12
My Brothers and Sisters in Christ, I’m preaching today on this beautiful Psalm of Confession that seeks forgiveness from God for all of one’s sins. It comes from a dark and difficult place in the history of Israel, but it is one that shows that no matter who you are, and no matter the great and wonderful things that you have accomplished that when Jesus comes from preaching Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand, that He willed all of our lives to be one of repentance both great and small.
The Strength of God’s Word
In Jeremiah, it is called a hammer.
For the world, words are treated as something cheap or simple that they can use or disregard as they so choose. But the Word of God has strength that is unparalleled. Not only were all things made through the Word, but the Word of God is living, active and its power comes from the Holy Spirit.
One of the hardest objects on earth is the heart.
The Hammer of God is able to crush it utterly. It’s surprising when it happens, because you have a person who has rejected and wants nothing to do with God’s Word, but the Word comes to them, even though everything else they can brush off the Law of God they strive against and want nothing to do with it. The truth is
The greater a person’s pride the harder it is.
The more we take pride in something the more resistant we are to admit that we are wrong. That is why Pride has been called one of the deadly sins, because when it takes hold of a person’s heart it hardens them against God’s word, and they refuse to admit they are wrong. It was the Word of God that motivated the Psalm for today.
God’s Word Reaches A King
David’s sin started as lust.
He saw Bathsheba bathing when he was walking up on the palace, and that lust increased and led David down a dark path that lead him further and further away from the Lord even though David knew God’s commandments, David walked a path that resulted in great sin after the Lord had kept him safe for many years.
David became an adulterer, murderer, and traitor.
The took a man’s wife that was not his own, and the punishment for that in Israel was death, but David was above the Law, and tried to cover it up by tricking Uriah. When he couldn’t trick Uriah, he had Uriah carry the order that woudl result in his own death back to the commander on the field. So David became a traitor Uriah wasn’t just some random soldier. He was counted among David’s 30 great warrior who had helped him win the kingdom. Your heart has to be quite hard to do that to someone who shared bread with you, fought for you, and trusted you.
It was God’s word that broke David’s heart.
The Prophet Nathan confronts him after the child is born, and finally David’s sin is revealed and David repents. Cries out for mercy.
David was forgiven, but there was a terrible cost.
The child that was born to David and Bathsheba would die, for David’s sin, and so he fasted the next week hoping that the Lord would relent. The child perishes and David’s hope was to see the child in the life to come. That’s the context of this Psalm.
A Sinner Seeking Mercy
No one denies Davd’s sin.
Not even David, it was a sin that magnified and grew as the months went by, and it involved not just David, but also involved Bathsheba that was she was willing not only to cheat on her husband, but deceive him as well. It involved the servants who brought Bathsheba to David, and tried to get Uriah drunk and reported back that Uriah hadn’t gone home, and it involved his army leaders as well. Though David deserved to die
The Lord did show mercy to him.
For what David did, the Lord could have let him die in his sins since he had utterly scorned the Lord. But God showed mercy and forgave his sin, even though there was going to be a cost that David, Bathsheba, their child, and even the nation would pay.
It was recorded that we might learn.
Not only to avoid sin’s like David, but to learn that even when our sin is forgiven there can be costs that remain in this life. If you go around committing a crime and you can receive the absolution on a Sunday morning for your sins, but that doesn’t remove the fine, or jail time that you owe society. Those who say well then what is the point? Show that they care more about this world, then God’s eternal kingdom.
A Psalm for Confession
David thought he was fine for months.
The prophet Nathan showed up after the child had been born, Uriah was long dead, Bathsheba had been taken into the King’s palace. It seemed as though David was in the clear. The king mistook what God was doing,
The Lord was being patient and kind.
Giving the King the chance to repent, to acknowledge his sin, and seek forgiveness. At that this point David’s heart was hardened to the point of unbelief. If David had died during this time, he would have ended up in hell.
How do our sins compare?
It is easy to look at someone else and see their sin, while ignoring the logs in our own eyes. We might say, well we would never do what the King did. Taking our neighbor’s wife, committing murder, etc. and yet the more dangerous are the ones that we treat as trivial. To borrow a bit of language from another church body, those sins that we treat as mortal are venial because we know to repent, but the venial sins those become mortal
Have we misused God’s grace?
Do we say well since Jesus’ blood has covered my sins, it doesn’t matter if I live in sin. Do we come again to the altar and confess our sins, but have no intention of amending our lives or opposing sin and instead have just embraced it. That is impenitence to you Christ will say I never knew you.
The Penitent Heart
Don’t let your sins overtake you.
As the saying goes, we cannot stop the birds from flying overhead, but we can prevent them from building a nest in our hair. Don’t wallow in your sins and remain in them, oppose them for what do you have to gain from them except death, shame, and guilt.
God shatters our hard hearts to save us.
When God sent the prophet Nathan, it wasn’t because God desired David’s death, but that David might be brought to repentance. Whatever your sin is, whatever secrets you hide, they are not hidden from God. If a King who penned how many Psalms was in danger of hell, what of you?
What happens to those who remain in sin?
If you persist in your sin be it blasphemy, be it hatred and anger, be it unfaithfulness, be it coveting, all of it is evil. It will take ya to hell itself so join with David in this confession we find in this Psalm, and seek instead
God’s Grace and Mercy
It is greater than God’s wrath.
God’s steadfast love and abundant are the only thing that are greater than God’s wrath towards sin. It is God’s love and mercy that is able to take away our sins. God’s love and mercy isn’t just an abstract idea or something that cannot be seen.
God’s mercy is made manifest in the cross.
For there is the Son of God who has given up His life for your forgiveness. God answered the prayers and cries of David, and He answers all those who call upon him pointing them to teh Cross. Asking to be cleansed from our sins and our iniquity which is our guilt and our shame that come with the sins we have been committing. This is another reason that we harden our hearts against dealing with our sins, we don’t want to feel the guilt, or the shame, and it’s why folks respond strongly to the Law.
In God’s grace, we find joy.
That’s what David seeks but the joy comes only through the cleansing that comes from God’s forgiveness. For God gives to us a new heart, and renews within us His Holy Spirit. It is terrifying to be faced with God’s wrath against sin, and realize the great danger we are in, but this is why we must fix our eyes on the Cross to see God’s love for us. To hear the absolution, and the promise that we are forgiven.
So my brothers and sisters in Christ, David’s psalm is with us 3000 years later, that we might learn from David’s fall from grace where we are to go when sins surround us. Do not treat your sins lightly as David did and risked eternal damnation. Heed the call to repentance today, whatever your sin is, and join your voice with David’s seeking God’s mercy and love. You dear Christian fix your eyes on the Cross of Jesus, and there see God’s answer that He did not withhold His only-begotten son for your salvation. For in the Cross of Jesus we find our joy, hope, and salvation. Don’t seek it elsewhere, for those are temporary and fade away soon for they seek feelings themselves instead of that which endures.
