Oh beloved, turn with me in your Bibles to Ephesians chapter 3. I'm going to read briefly from Ephesians chapter 3, only to provide a little context for our sermon passage. This is the first Lord's Day of the month, and so I'll be preaching from Psalm 51. Our Psalm of the month, Psalm 51. But before we go to Psalm 51, let's read first from Ephesians chapter 3, verses 14-21. Just this brief paragraph here at the very end of Ephesians chapter 3. Ephesians chapter 3 verses 14-21. Hear now the word of the Lord. For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He might grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen. The Apostle Paul confesses to the church in Ephesus that he prays for them, and he specifies two things that he is praying for. First, he prays that they would be full of the Spirit and the Spirit's strength. Second, he prays that they would be filled with Christ himself, that Jesus would dwell in their hearts through faith. But then he supplies the reason. Why does the Apostle Paul want the church to be full of the Spirit and full of Christ? He says in verses 18 and 19, that you might know the unknowable endless love of Christ. You need the Holy Spirit to dwell within you in order to supply the strength To reach the boundary of the boundless love of Christ. Isn't that marvelous? We are so weak and so frail that in and of ourselves we can neither imagine nor reach the end of Christ's love. It is too broad, it is too deep, it is too high, it is too long. This eternal and endless love of Christ requires supernatural strength for us to appreciate it and understand it. In fact, we might say it this way, if we were to sit down and to study all the depth and height and breadth and length of the love of God in Christ, it would take us an eternity to do it. Conveniently, He has supplied an eternity for us to do it. Let us begin eternity now. Turn back to Psalm 51. We will look this morning at Psalm 51 and begin our practice of eternally meditating on the endless love of Christ. Our Psalm of the month, Psalm 51. Here again, the word of the Lord. To the chief musician, Psalm of David when Nathan the prophet went to him after he had gone in to Bathsheba. Have mercy upon me, O God, according to your lovingkindness. According to the multitude of your tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against you, you only have I sinned, and done this evil in your sight. That you may be found just when you speak, and blameless when you judge. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, in sin my mother conceived me. Behold, you desire truth in the inward parts. and in the hidden part you will make me know wisdom. Purge me with hyssop and I shall be cleaned. Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow. Make me hear joy and gladness that the bones you have broken may rejoice. Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me by your generous spirit. Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will be converted to you. Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, the God of my salvation, and my tongue shall sing aloud of your righteousness. O LORD, open my lips, and my mouth shall show forth Your praise. For You do not desire sacrifice, or else I would give it. You do not delight in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart, These, O God, you will not despise. Do good in your good pleasure to Zion. Build the walls of Jerusalem. Then you shall be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness, with burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings. Then they shall offer bulls on your altar." Amen. And amen. Growing up on a farm, I thought I knew what filthy was. Certainly, my mom had long complained of the mess that we boys made and brought home. But that was before I moved to Pittsburgh. No offense. You see, Pittsburgh was a city that had supplied coal and cloud and dust to its neighbors for a very long time. And when I was a poor seminary student willing to make a buck any way I could, a friend of mine bought a really old cheap house in Pittsburgh and paid me to help him tear it apart to rebuild it. I remember very vividly the first time my crowbar sunk into the wall, and this giant cloud of soot and ash came billowing out. A hundred years of coal dust had collected into those walls. And all day long, we banged away, tearing down the walls, spilling coal dust everywhere. I went home. I showered three times, probably nearly an hour in length. I grabbed my towel, I rubbed my face, and there was a streak of black. And I thought to myself, How do you get rid of cold dust? Have you ever been there? Have you ever looked in the mirror? Have you ever rubbed your heart, your soul, your mind, and seen the stain of your sin and thought, how do I get rid of this? What can make me clean? What can make me whole? Have you ever considered how thoroughly ruined you are? How incredibly evil you've become? And felt the desperate cry, whatever shall I do? My friends, here's a song for you. Here's a song for you to sing. Let me give you two reasons why this is a song for you, the sinner. Notice in the subtitle, first, that it is to the chief musician. It is a psalm of David, it says in the subtitle, but it's a psalm that arises from the life and experience of David, but it belongs to the choir. That is why he dedicates it to the choir master. It belongs to the church throughout every age. This is not simply the private meditation of King David. It's not simply his poem to be archived for memory. It is something that is to be reborn in the voice of the church, generation after generation. In preparation for this sermon, I meditated on the fact that I've actually preached Psalm 51 probably half a dozen times. I don't know that I've ever gotten through it dry-eyed. And I don't know that I've ever heard a preacher preach it dry-eyed. Generation after generation, for thousands of years, the Word of God has been open to this page, and preachers have preached, and congregations have sung, and underneath the chief musician, we have been cut to the quick, pierced to the heart. It belongs to all of us because it's a universal experience. It's something we can all relate to. David says it is a song that was born from the experience of Nathan the prophet going to him after he had gone into Bethsheba. You see, David had sinned, and you, my friends, are sinners. This psalm relates directly to you. But what is more, what is worse, is David doesn't say this is a psalm about my time that I committed adultery with Bathsheba. He doesn't say this is the time I raped an innocent girl in my palace. When I abused my authority to take advantage of the wife of my most trusted soldier, the granddaughter of my most trusted advisor. This is not simply the psalm that responds to the horror of his actions. He says specifically it's when Nathan had confronted him. It's when he was caught red-handed. It's when he was exposed and laid bare by the truth of God, and when he was finally required to look at his face in the mirror. And my friends, if you cannot relate to what I am telling you right now, You will. One day you will. If you have not looked in the mirror with King David and seen the height and the depth and the breadth and the length of your sin, wait patiently. One day you will. As a human being, none of us are excused from either the experience of sin or the consequences of it. We all suffer the sorrows of our own sin. We all face the judgment and the reality of condemned creatures, and this is a psalm for us. It is not simply a psalm for sinners. It is a psalm for sinners whose hearts have been broken, beaten, and pulverized by sin. This is a psalm for sinners who have had someone wag a finger in their face and say, you are that man. And there was nothing but silence, because the waving finger was right. This is a psalm for that moment in life when you discover who you really are, a wretched, vile, sinner. And when you have come to that dark day, open Psalm 51. Sing Psalm 51. Let me give you some reasons why. First, in verses 1 and 2, David, despairing under his weight of depravity, says, have mercy upon me, O God. Have mercy. Why should you sing Psalm 51 when you discover how incredibly sinful you are? Because God is a God of mercy. Specifically, David wants mercy that blots out his transgression, washes him thoroughly from his iniquity, and cleanses him from all his sin. With these three keeped up metaphors, David points us to the laundry room. This word, blot out transgression, refers to that practice that all mothers have long since, you know, mastered, where you spill on your clothes. All right, let's be honest. Where I spill on my clothes and my wife comes running to my aid and she blots the stain. This is what David says. I have stained my soul, blotted out. He says, wash me thoroughly. This is a very soft translation of a very violent verb. David says, scrub me vigorously. Remember, this is the age where you don't wash by hitting buttons that make beautiful sounds made by Samsung. This is the age where you wash clothes by running them over rocks and hard, wavy boards. Twist me, turn me, beat me, wash me thoroughly of my iniquity. This is a desperate man. He is desperate to be rid of his sin. Cleanse me from my sin. But notice, most importantly, where David puts all his hope and expectation that this will be his experience. Verse one, according to your loving kindness, according to the multitude of your tender mercies, what do great sinners need? Greater love. Steadfast love, abundant mercy, tender mercies. There is a fullness of compassion in God, a completeness of pity that he has for sinners. Why do we need Psalm 51 when we finally realize how great our sin is? Because it's only then we can be trained to realize how great his love is. How much more merciful He is. What is the refrain that has been circulating of late? A great line. There is more grace in Christ than sin in you. My friends, you cannot exhaust His steadfast love. You cannot weary his compassion. You cannot spend out his abundant mercies. They are the foundation cornerstone and bedrock of this psalm. These are the opening lines. David the guilty, David the ashamed, David the sinner says, but there is mercy with God. For he loves sinners. So he has an expectation of cleansing. An expectation of hope. Beloved, do you know who God is? He's not like you. He's not like the world around you. Do you know what He does with tear-stained cheeks as sinners cry out, forgive me? He doesn't drive His thumb upon them. He doesn't beat them down. He throws His arms wide and says, come my child, I forgive you. He is a God who forgives. David begins here. First lesson, why should we turn to God because He forgives? Second, because we are helpless otherwise. Notice in verses 3 through 6, David now, as it were, is fortified by the love of God. Strengthened by the hope and expectation of cleansing that can only come from the grace of God, David is now willing to do the hard work of actually examining his sin. Notice the reverse. He doesn't begin with himself. His repentance and sorrow for sin doesn't begin with introspection. It begins by turning to the love and grace of God in Christ, and having rooted himself in the truth of the gospel, he is now willing and able to face his sin. And it begins in verse 3, I acknowledge my transgression. Specifically, David acknowledges several things about his transgression. First, it is always before me. Second, it is against you and you only that I have done this. Third, that I was brought forth and conceived in this iniquity. And fifth, that it's truth and hidden wisdom within me that I have lacked. In this way, David surveys the completeness and universality of his sin. He does not minimize his sin. He does not explain it away. He does not justify it. Caught red-handed, he acknowledges his sin. He confesses it. He admits to it. He says, yes, this is true. This is what's happened to me. It is always before me. That is to say, it is constant. I am constantly sinful. The Puritans were fond of saying, even our tears of repentance need to be washed in the blood of Christ. Even my turning away from sin is marred by sin. It is constantly before me. In verse 4, He says against you, it has been done. This evil is in your sight. That is to say, it is heinous and vile. It is a violation of the highest holiness in the land. Yes, it was a misuse of his authority. Yes, it was an abuse of Bathsheba. Yes, it was a murder of Uriah. He doesn't diminish any of these things. But he admits that the guilt of them does not remain down here. The guilt of it ascends to the very heights of heaven. Not only is his sin everywhere around him, It is so rotten and vile, it has gotten to the very attention of God. It is everywhere here and higher still there. But he also notes that it is as ancient as he is. He was born, he says brought forth, he means born, in iniquity. It says that he was conceived in sin. There was never a day in David's life where he didn't sin. How many mothers can remember those sweet days of pregnancy when the baby wiggled inside and there was this exciting sort of sensation? How many mothers remember the day that the baby kicked you in the kidney and punched you in the ribcage and you went, now that's just selfish. David says that we were conceived in sin. brought forth in iniquity. Our sin has been constantly around us and ever within us. He says in verse six, you desire truth in the inward parts, you will make me know wisdom, meaning that I have lacked it. David says that sin is deep within us and has ever been with us. We were never excused from our sin. This acknowledgement of how sin is everywhere, how sin is evil and rotten and heinous, this sin that is so complete and the corruption so thorough, is rooted in his understanding of the love of God. The courage and the willingness to embrace this vision of sin and of depravity is sponsored by the understanding that David has in verses one and two. You know what? If I have sin always around me, there is a forgiving grace that is greater still. And if I have a sin that I have been born with, if I was, may I borrow the phrase, born this way, that's okay, God's grace can change me. I am born in sin, conceived in sin, and God's love is greater than my nature. God's love is greater than my birth identity. God's love is greater. It can change me as I am. It can remake my inner parts. It can remake wisdom in my inner parts. David is not afraid to face his sin because he knows the love of God is greater still. But let's move on. Number three. How do we know that we should go to Psalm 51? When we are caught in sin red-handed, when the guilt and the shame is too great for us, why do we turn to God for mercy? He's full of love. We are otherwise helpless. Love must be the answer. Number three, because that's what gives us joy. Notice the refrain here in verse 7, purge me with hyssop, wash me. He says in verse 10, created me a clean heart. He is focused on the effects now of this cleansing. What takes sin's place? God's love is so good that he doesn't merely scrub us clean and then say, go merrily along your way. He replaces the filth, the stain, the sin with something else. Notice that it is joy. Verse eight, make me hear joy and gladness, that my broken bones may rejoice. Notice again in verse 12, restore to me the joy of your salvation. Three times in these verses, David notes that the forgiveness of sins leads us to joy, but it is not merely the absence of sin that gives us joy. I mean, how many of you have resisted temptation through the exercise of will and found no joy in it? The mere naked exercise of discipline by which we beat ourselves into obedience to God seldom produces great joy, does it? David envisions a different path. David envisions a different experience in our sanctification. That the cleansing of us, notice in verse seven, by hyssop produces whiter than snow. This is a weird metaphor. This is a strange thing because the hyssop is a green leaf branch that the priest would take and dip in bright red blood and then shake it on you so that you were speckled with bright red blood. At no point do green leaves and bright red blood produce white clothes. Right, moms? And yet, this is exactly what David promises. That when God, as our High Priest, sprinkles us with blood, we end up with brilliant white clothes, which in this culture was reserved for one time. When you were partying. The only time you wore your white robe is when you were going to a party. Because you weren't going to wear it around the dusty, dry Middle Eastern culture and Dermot Brown. White garments were reserved for celebration. David says when you bring out the forgiving love of God in Christ to us, we are then ushered into the heavenly celebration of grace and love. You hide your face from our sins, but in the place we receive a steadfast spirit. presence of God, verse 11, the Holy Spirit himself in verse 11, a generous spirit. Notice again, three times David says, we go from sin to joy. Three times he says that the path is the indwelling spirit of Christ. He is a spirit of joy. This is why the apostle Paul teaches that the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, Joy. What does Christ do to us when he cleanses us of sin? He gives us joy. He turns our sorrow into dancing. He takes off our sackcloth and ashes and dresses us in the white robes of holiness and righteousness, and we hear songs of celebration. As Tom has already stole my thunder, we hear new songs. Not songs that are brand new. That's a very American consumeristic interpretation. Rather ancient songs that sound fresh and new to a soul that finally understands them rightly. It is not the song that is new as much as the singer. It is new to me. Because I at last understand grace. I at last understand love. And so I sing with joy. I sing with enthusiasm as I discover the true meaning of the song. You see, David says, turn to God with your guilt and your shame, turn to God with your sin, for there then you are ushered into the fullness of joy. But out of this joy then comes speech. Out of this joy comes a full expression of the spirit of joy. This is our fourth idea. David says that he will turn to God because he's full of love. He will turn to God because he's helpless to fix his sin. He will turn to God because God will move from sin to joy. And then fourthly and finally, he will turn to God because then he is equipped to both witness and worship. Beginning in verse 13, I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners shall be converted to you. He will witness to others what he has experienced. I have tasted the love of God. I know your ways. Your ways are not like our ways. Our ways are stingy and cruel. Our ways are impatient. His ways are patient and loving and compassionate. I have learned your ways, O God. I will teach it to others. Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, the God of my salvation, and my tongue shall sing aloud of your righteousness. O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall show forth your praise. David says that because God's love has carried him up out of the filth of his sin and set him cleansed into the place of joy, he will there sing and teach. He will sing of the righteousness of God. That is to say that God judges righteously. That's extraordinary for a condemned man. Something good must have really happened in that courtroom. If the one who walked in guilty says, I will be singing about the righteousness of the judge because he has made me righteous. He has pardoned all my sin and He has declared me innocent. I will sing of His righteousness. I will teach His ways. My mouth will show forth Your praise. I will make evident, I love verse 15. This is one of these verses that gets to a preacher. Lord, open my lips. First, I can't do it. I can't manufacture a good sermon. It doesn't matter how many hours you give me each week. He needs to open our lips. Second, my mouth shall show forth your praise. Show. How many times have you heard sermons that show you the glory of God? Sermons that are so full of this vigor, this passion, this clarity, this poetry, that through word you see the grace of God. Let me give you an illustration. How many times have you heard a pastor say, look and see? Our God is willing to speak and to show. He shows and He tells and He brings forth in this persuasive manner. He is loving. He would persuade us. He would persuade the world. Come, hide not in your sin. Fear not the wrath of the Almighty. Come to Him and plead. But of these four, it leaves us wondering, how can this be? And this is the hardest part of the psalm to preach, because it is the sweetest. And if your cheeks and eyes aren't willing to weep, I beg that your hearts at least will. Notice the final portion of the Psalm in which David reconciles and brings together this otherwise impossible reality. How is it that this great sinner should walk into the courtroom of a holy God and be left dancing and singing and celebrating and telling all the world the good and things he has just discovered? Here's how. Verse 16, you do not desire sacrifice. or else I would give it. You do not delight in burnt offering. How does this make any sense? I mean, you guys have read the first five books of Moses, right? Where page after page, God goes into great detail about the right way to kill animals and splatter their blood and burn their carcasses because God delights in sacrifice. What does David mean when he says you won't delight in sacrifice? He means in his historical circumstance. Well, what was the sacrifice for adultery? Did David bring a ram or a goat or a bull or an ox? Is that what he brought to atone for his adultery? What did the law of Moses say David should do to be forgiven of adultery? The law said he should die. There was no sacrifice. What did the law of Moses provide for a murderer? What animal should he bring? What sacrifice would give God pleasure such that God would forgive David for his murder of Uriah? The law said he should die. My friends, This is the reality we must face. You should die for your sin. We are sinners who cannot offer sacrifice. There is no sacrifice we can give that forgives sin. No, the sacrifice that David teaches us to bring is a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart. These you will not despise. David understands in a way that none of his contemporaries could have possibly grasped without this psalm. The animals dying by the thousands did nothing. They had to look to someone else. No, the sacrifice for sin wasn't there at the hands of a Levitical priest. No, He would offer Himself in the days that are to come. You desire the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And so you desire from us a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart. How many times Are we so prone to think, I'll try harder, that will make God happier. I will feel horrible about that sin, and my negative feelings, that will make God happy. I'll preach a great sermon, that will make God happy. You know what God delights in? Broken hearts, contrite hearts. He gives joy to those who weep and to mourn. Those who are downcast and full of sorrow. Those who feel the right weight of depravity. Those are the ones He loves. Notice David compares the futile sacrifices of animals, which cannot forgive his sin, with the sacrifices that do please God in verses 18 and 19. God doing good for His good pleasure builds up the church in Zion and Jerusalem. By this phrase, do good in your good pleasure, David refers us back to the actions of God in Psalm 51. Namely, that He forgives our sins. God does good to us, He forgives our sins. For no other reason than it is His good pleasure. Why are you still breathing? He is pleased with your exhale and inhale. Why are you still living? He is pleased with your living. It is His good pleasure that keeps us here. It is His good pleasure that pardons our sin. He is delighted to forgive sin. Do you now see the difference between our ways and His ways? He loves to forgive sins. He delights Himself in sinners running to Him and crying, Father, have mercy. He loves it. He says, come, come every sinner, come with every sin. He is never tired of our repentance. He is never exhausted in our confession. No, indeed, in verse 19, he is well pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness, the burnt and the whole burnt offerings that are laid on the altar, not in order to be forgiven, but because we are forgiven. In the New Testament, the word sacrifices remain. Did you know that in the New Testament, we still offer sacrifices? We are repeatedly commanded in the New Testament to offer sacrifices. The sacrifice of praise, the fruit of our lips. The sacrifice of our whole self, a spiritual act of worship, Romans 12. These are sacrifices which we make not in order to be forgiven, but because we are forgiven. This is the deep treasure of Psalm 51 and why we need this song in our lives when we know the shame and the guilt of our sin. Because this psalm sticks training wheels on our hearts and says, come with me, let's get out of the guilt, let's get out of the shame, let's get out of the sin, let's get into the love of God in Christ. Beloved, this is what Psalm 51 is telling you. Jesus saves you from yourself. You are the sinner. And like David, we all need Nathans who say to us, you are that man. And all of us, like David, need a Psalm 51 that tells us and Jesus is your Savior. Beloved, Jesus saves you from yourself. Worship Him. Let us worship Him. Please pray with me. Our Father in heaven, we give you thanks for this beautiful day you have made. Our Father in heaven, we give you thanks for the forgiving grace you've given us in Jesus Christ. We give you thanks that though our sin is as red as scarlet, your Jesus makes them whiter than snow. And though our sins go up over our heads and overwhelm us and drown us, you bind them up in a sack and throw them into the heart of the sea. That though our sins are ever before us, you separate us from them as far as east from west is distant. Though we, oh God, struggle and strive under the awful weight of our shame and our guilt, you freely forgive and pardon abundantly. And we thank you that this is true because of Jesus Christ, the real sacrifice for sin, who now sits into the heavens, praying for us, interceding for us, and now serving us, his sufferers. That these things which we today have heard of how desperately sinful we are, yet how completely salvific He is, might not only be heard, but tasted, observed, and believed. We pray, Father, that you would grant us faith in these truths and confidence in this faith. We ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.