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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.
Getting Rid of Sin
Series Book of Psalms
| Sermon ID | 11621212362039 |
| Duration | 41:41 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | Ephesians 3:14-21; Psalm 51 |
| Language | English |
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