David's Repentance

If you will recall a couple of times over the last few weeks, I mentioned that there is a difference between feeling guilty about our sin and repenting of our sin.

We actually saw a great number of times in Matthew, where people at different times felt very guilty about their sin and about the things that they were doing to Jesus.

But sadly, too rarely did the people do anything about this guilt.

Instead of taking it a step further and asking forgiveness and repenting of that sin, they tried doing everything in their power to escape and hide their sin.

They tried to hide it from others.

They tried to hide it from themselves.

And they tried to hide it from God.

However, as we know this never worked.

Sure, they could hide it from others and sure they could even lie to themselves.

But they could never hide things from God.

And neither could we.

And tonight we are going to look at a time when King David, after trying to hide his own sin, is confronted and has to make a choice as to whether he will repent and follow God or whether he would slip into the abyss of sin and death like so many others have who came before and after him.

So, if you have found in your Bibles I’d invite you stand with me as we look at David’s Repentance.

Starting in verse 7 . . .

Scripture Focus

Psalm 51:

Psalm 51:7–12 NIV - Anglicised

7 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. 8 Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice. 9 Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity. 10 Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. 11 Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. 12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

Appeal for Mercy (vs 1-2)

Now, this Psalm is actually a prayer of David.

And it is a prayer that he uttered when he, the King of the people, the most powerful man in the ancient world at that time, had been completely brought to his knees by God.

And the reason he had been brought to his knees was because of his own sinfulness and unwillingness to repent and follow God.

This Psalm follows the events of David’s life, that is recorded in .

And if you are not familiar with , this is where David has an affair with Bathsheba, gets her pregnant, orchestrates the death of her husband Uriah and thinks he gets away with it.

The fact is, he didn’t get away with anything.

He had thought he fooled his soldiers.

Thought he had Bathsheba believing that her husband just died in battle.

Thought all was good and he was going to just get away with it all and everybody would forget about it.

But, that wasn’t the case.

God knew and God sent Nathan to let David know that He knew.

Getting right to the chase, Nathan confronts David, and without knowing anything other than what God told Nathan, he asks David . . .

2 Samuel 12:9 NIV - Anglicised

9 Why did you despise the word of the Lord by doing what is evil in his eyes? You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own. You killed him with the sword of the Ammonites.

2 Samuel 12:9

And not only did God know but David’s sin brought a curse on his entire household . . .

2 Samuel 12:10–14 NIV - Anglicised

10 Now, therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you despised me and took the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your own.’ 11 “This is what the Lord says: ‘Out of your own household I am going to bring calamity upon you. Before your very eyes I will take your wives and give them to one who is close to you, and he will lie with your wives in broad daylight. 12 You did it in secret, but I will do this thing in broad daylight before all Israel.’ ” 13 Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” Nathan replied, “The Lord has taken away your sin. You are not going to die. 14 But because by doing this you have made the enemies of the Lord show utter contempt, the son born to you will die.”

2 Samuel 12:10-

Notice here that only after Nathan confronts David, did he acknowledge that he had even sinned.

It was only after he was caught that he began to feel guilty for what he had done.

However, his guilt and his acknowledgment were just part of the whole package.

There had to be more.

There had to be actual repentance, which is finally what see take place in our text from tonight.

And there is actually a lot that we can learn about repentance from this Psalm.

Particularly what true repentance looks like.

David, sort of gives us a model or a roadmap of sorts of loosely the form repentance takes.

And the first part of that model is really and acknowledgment of our guilt and appeal for God’s mercy.

Starting out in verse 1 . . .

Psalm 51:1–2 NIV - Anglicised

1 Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. 2 Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.

Psalm 51:

It is really as simple as that.

David understands that he isn’t fooling anyone.

He also understands that he has hurt and betrayed not only Bathsheba, not only Uriah, not only his people who he was charged to care for, but he has also hurt and betrayed God.

And he feels guilty and feels remorse for that.

And we have already read his acknowledgment of that guilt in 2 Samuel, but here he finally takes it a step further.

Have mercy on me, O God…knowing that his only chance is God and God’s mercy because of God’s unfailing love and great compassion.

And finally after all of this time he asks God blot out my transgressions, wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.

Acknowledging Sinfulness (vs 3-6)

Which is good, but anyone can say this.

Anyone can feel guilty and try to ease their conscience a bit by asking forgiveness.

We can ask other people to forgive us, whether we mean it or not.

And I would probably bet it would be safe to say we’ve done that.

Said we are sorry just to get someone to leave us alone.

We honestly do that a lot and don’t mean one word of it.

Which is also one reason why we run into so much trouble in this area with God.

We try to do God like we do other people.

We are feeling guilty about something we have done so we ask God to forgive us just so God will leave us alone.

Just so our conscience is eased just a little bit.

Just so this nagging guilt will go away.

That is not repentance, and if David would have left things there it would not have done him one bit of good.

However, the good thing is David didn’t leave it there.

He recognized that there was more to it than just feeling guilty and saying he was sorry.

Psalm 51:3–4 NIV - Anglicised

3 For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. 4 Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.

Psalm 51:

David had hurt other people but his sin was against God as well.

He couldn’t go back and change what he did, but he could and did acknowledge it and understand that he had to make things right with God.

Which is what he does.

He not only does that but also acknowledges that there is nothing he can do to save himself.

He prays . . .

Psalm 51:5–6 NIV - Anglicised

5 Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. 6 Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.

Psalm 51:

And I think a lot of times we miss this part of David’s prayer.

David understands that this sinfulness is part of is very nature from birth.

He understands that, as powerful as he is, there is nothing he can do to save himself or gain favor with God, while letting this sin run rampant in his life.

He also understands that sin, all sin, is a violation of God’s trust and destroys our relationship with God.

It drives a wedge between us and God, separates us from God.

And until we make it right with God, it will continue to haunt us.

But what we tend to do is either cover it up or try to do some good to outweigh the bad.

That will never work and that is not what God wants.

Instead, as David points out . . .

Psalm 51:6 NIV - Anglicised

6 Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.

An intimate, one on one, true relationship with God.

Petitioning for Restoration (vs 7-12)

That is all God desires from us.

And if we have a true heart for God, that will be all that we really want as well.

Sin has many consequences, but the worst of all is separation from God.

Separation from the love and peace that a true relationship with God has.

Which is why David asks God to . . .

Psalm 51:7–9 NIV - Anglicised

Psalm 51:7–10 NIV - Anglicised

Psalm

David knows that these are things that he cannot do.

He knows he cannot cleanse himself.

He knows that he cannot forgive his sins.

He knows that he cannot create his own pure heart.

He knows that all of those things require God and God’s work.

And if we were going to be truthful, we know this as well.

We go through life hobbling along wondering why things are going the way they are going, well, have we ever given everything over to God?

That’s all David is doing here.

He is pouring his heart out to God, basically saying “God here I am, I can’t fix myself, I am giving myself fully to you.”

Life has broken David and broken his spirit, which is why he basically begs God to . . .

Psalm 51:10 NIV - Anglicised

10 Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

Things that only God can do.

He had gotten to that point.

And if we want a true and lasting relationship with God, we also have to get to that point.

We have to give everything to God.

And when we mess up, we have to really repent.

We have to take it further than just feeling guilty.

We have to take it further than just asking for forgiveness.

We have to seek God out for restoration.

For renewal.

For relationship.

And David knows and understands the danger he is in here.

In the last part of what we will cover David says this . . .

Psalm 51:11–12 NIV - Anglicised

11 Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. 12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

And I don’t know who in here has backslid in the past, or who may be backslidden right now, because frankly we can hide it well.

Psalm 51:

But, this is the greatest fear I had when I was backslidden and when I first came back to the Lord.

That the presence and the love from God I once felt was lost forever.

That it was gone.

I can’t really explain it but something central to my very being was missing.

And my fear was it was gone forever.

Altar Call

Maybe you are here tonight and this is how you feel.

Something is missing.

That love you once felt from God is no longer there.

That power and energy you once had from the Holy Spirit is gone.

Something is just not right, off kilter a bit.

Maybe you don’t even know what it is.

Well, I know where you can find out.

Maybe you are here and you’ve been playing the “I feel guilty game.”

You feel guilty and ask forgiveness just because its what you are supposed to do.

But you have not really been seeking restoration with God.

You have not really been in a state of repentance.

I don’t know what you need tonight, but I know there are needs.

And so does God.

So, whatever that may be I’d invite you to come and lay those needs and those burdens on the altar.

Will you do that tonight?

Are you willing?

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