One of the major advantages of the Psalms lies in the fact that they give us windows through which we are able to peep and see something of what true biblical spirituality is all about. Now, we would all wish that it was all about mountaintop experiences. knowing something of the refreshing walk with God as Savior, as Deliverer, and all that has to do with Him leading us to heaven in a positive way. But often we all know that they are the valley experiences, those moments of deep regret when we are depressed, when we are miserable, either because of difficult circumstances around us or because of what we have done wrong before God. Some of the Psalms that are particularly relevant there are the penitential Psalms. And the one that we are looking at this afternoon is one such where David regretted deeply what he had done. The introduction to this psalm in fact spells it out for us. We are told there that it was a psalm of David when Nathan the prophet went to him after he had gone in to Bathsheba. We know the story. David was supposed to have been out in the battlefield, but instead he remained behind. And in a moment of indiscretion, He admired a beautiful lady from the rooftop of his palace, called her in, and the inevitable happened. Instead of confessing his sin, when the lady told him that she was pregnant, he instead went into conspiracy to hide his sin. He tried to get the husband, Uriah, to go and sleep with his wife. When that failed, he put the man's death warrant in his hands and sent him to the battlefield. And before long, the man was dead. As far as David was concerned, it was mission accomplished. So he thought. But clearly, God does not give up on his children. He is a spiritual, moral being and would have us walk with him in uprightness. And consequently, the end of that story in 2 Samuel chapter 11, has the words, but what David did displeased the Lord." The beginning of the next chapter, Nathan shows up and clearly shows David that God was aware of what had happened, was displeased about what had happened, and in fact was demanding repentance from him. David immediately sought forgiveness. And what we have in this psalm is what he went on to write afterwards. One of the reasons why this psalm therefore must be precious to us is that it teaches us the nature of true repentance. The evil one knows how to work with counterfeits. He knows that if he can make you go through life thinking you are a child of God, thinking all is well between you and God, and only to discover the truth afterwards, you are doomed to hell forever. And consequently, what God does for us in a number of passages in the scriptures is to show us a repentance that he has accepted. David's was one of them. For immediately after he said, I have sinned, Nathan said to him, your sin is pardoned. And therefore it's important for us to go to passages such as this and ask the question, what am I seeing here? And can I say that my own experience matches in some way to what I am seeing in this passage? That is a safe way for us to deal with our own souls. Well, let's quickly look at what he does here. My interest is in the fourth verse, and I'll show you why I'm skipping the first three in a moment. In the first two verses, David is essentially bringing out his cry before God. It was a cry for mercy. It was a cry for God to blot out his transgressions. It was a cry to be washed thoroughly from all sin. My interest is in the why. Why was David crying to God this way? Well, the first, which I preached on last night elsewhere, was that he was under deep conviction of sin. He says that in verse three, for I know my transgressions and my sin is ever before me. He was deeply conscious of what he had done before God and this consciousness was not going away. In other words, it must be clear that by the time Nathan showed up and said to David, this is what you've done and God is displeased with you, David must have said about time too. Because I've been carrying this Lord for such a long time, it was destroying me. And there's something to be said for that from Psalm 32, isn't it? There David speaks about God's hand having been heavy upon him. But as I said, my interest is in verse four. And there we have a second reason why David cried for mercy from God, why he was crying for a thorough washing. And it is this, that he was conscious of God. He was conscious of the God with whom he had to do. And that's one way in which you can see whether your repentance is that which God the Holy Spirit is producing or your repentance is purely at a natural level. A repentance that does not save a soul. David says here, against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment. When God, the Holy Spirit, comes to bring conviction in a person, either for the first time in bringing him to conversion or to a child of God in bringing him back from a backslidden state, what particularly comes to bear upon the mind and conscience of that person is God. God, my maker. God, the governor of history. God, the savior of his people. And God, the coming judge. I have done wrong in his sight. That's what we're seeing here. When David says against you, you only have I sinned, he is not suggesting that he did not sin against human beings. Of course he did. By committing adultery with Bathsheba, he sinned against Uriah. By getting into this conspiracy to bring about the death of one of his primary soldiers, he sinned against the wife, Bathsheba. By doing what he did, he also sinned against the whole nation. because he had been entrusted with power, political power, in order to secure, safeguard the people of God, but he uses it to his own end to destroy one of the citizens in his country. So clearly, David had sinned against Bathsheba, against Uriah, against the entire nation of Israel. Very well then, what would he have meant when he said that against you, you only have I sinned? It is the fact that ultimately his sin was breaking the law of God. So all that which he was doing against other human beings was ultimately being done against the God who has created the world, the God who has put in these moral requirements and principles into our interpersonal relationships. It's primarily about God. We have two examples of that in the Bible. One is in the Old Testament in the life of Joseph. A number of you will recall when he was working in the home of Potiphar. And Potiphar's wife admired this young, handsome man and tried to entice him to bed with her. Joseph's response is instructive. He said to her that, look, my master has not kept anything away from me except you. And then he goes on to say, how then can I do this evil and sin against, you'd think he would say, my master Potiphar. But no, he says, and sin against God. In other words, what occupied the mind and heart of Joseph at that point was not primarily that I will betray my earthly master, it was that I will betray my heavenly master. I will betray God and I cannot do that. Now that is true religion. Clearly, he would have sinned against his master, but that was not what weighed heavily on his conscience. It was the reality of God. Another example that we have is the story of the prodigal son given by the Lord Jesus Christ. You remember when the prodigal son came to the end of his ways, sitting in the far country, admiring the food of pigs. The Bible says he came to his senses. And he said to himself, let me arise. Let me go back to my father and say to him, father, I've sinned against you. heaven and against you. He was conscious of the fact that this that I have done, yes, it's against my father, I ought not to have demanded my share from him as an inheritance before he died, but it was much bigger than this. What I did was against God himself. He is the one who had kept my father alive up to this point. When I was demanding my inheritance, I was a person who was rebelling against his divine government, his providence. I've sinned against him and against you. I want to repeat. When God is working in your life, bringing you to repentance, you are deeply conscious that what you have done is against Him primarily. And consequently, you will want to reconcile with Him much more than with anybody else. Well, David goes on to show us further that where there is genuine repentance, you're not only conscious that your sin is against God, but the Holy Spirit also gives you a sense of the ugliness of your sin. The ugliness of your sin, as God says it. He says there, against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight. Oh, and done this evil in your sight. You see, the way in which the devil works when he is enticing us to sin is he blinds us to the reality of the nature of sin before our maker. He instead draws our attention to the momentary pleasure that you will get out of it. But when the Holy Spirit comes to make you realize what you have done, he reverses that altogether. You lose sight of the momentary pleasure, and you are deeply conscious of the fact that this is terrible. It's obnoxious. It's ugly. It is evil. I ought not to have done it. And that's how David felt here. Previously, he was self-seeking. wanting the thrill of the moment. Now he was conscious that this was something disgusting. Ultimately to God, but because he had a renewed soul, he says something of that ugliness himself. Again, we need to appreciate that where the Holy Spirit is at work, you can't miss this reality. The people of the world will try to justify sin. They will give it all kinds of labels in order to reduce the fact that it is evil. But where the Holy Spirit is working, You cannot repent that place. The reason is simple. He is the Holy Spirit. Not just a spirit giving us emotional experiences. He is the Holy Spirit. Holiness is of the very essence of God. It is the very fabric of his being. And consequently, sin is disgusting to him. He detests it. You cannot be a friend of God, walking with him, and at the same time, entertaining sin in your life. You can't. If God has come to take residence within you, he gives you something of a sight of the moral nature of sin. I don't know about you, but as a human being, which is what I am, every so often when I call in the plumber because there's a problem with the sewer pipes, when he arrives, I don't want to be there. I show him where the work is and I disappear. I'd like to just come and hear from him that the job is done. It's because there's just something about the sewer that makes you go, let me escape. I think they do it for money and praise the Lord for them. That there are some people who can handle that whole process. But the natural thing for all of us is to say, I can't be in such a place. Well, sin is like that to God. It's evil. It's ugly. Disgusting. It's obnoxious. He is of two pure eyes than to behold evil. He must of necessity punish sin. He must cast it out of his presence. It is his very nature. And if God has wrought true repentance in you, you will be conscious of it. Other people may laugh at you, may wonder why you're making such a big issue of this reversal taking place in your life. But you know, you're dealing with a holy God. Therefore, you must part ways with sin. So it is when you are conscious of these two things. First of all, that what you have done is against God. And secondly, that what you have done is disgusting, morally disgusting to him, to his moral nature. that you then get to the point of appreciating that if he sends me to hell, I deserve it. Which is what David goes on to tell us here. Against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment. It's very clear that because David realized these two things, he would not have argued If God was to call one of his angels to tie him hand and foot and throw him into the depth of hell, he wasn't going to try and argue his case out. He knew he deserved the worst from God because of what he had done. A friend of mine back home in Zambia a number of years ago, bought a vehicle before he had a driving license and started driving it around. And his wife used to warn him. He was a Christian. His wife was also a Christian. So she would tell him, look, my husband is not right. Pack that thing until you have a driving license. He wouldn't listen. He was enjoying driving his new car. Well, one day, He went right past red traffic lights and hit into the car of the Inspector General of Police. The highest policeman in the land. That's where he hit. He obviously knew what God was saying to him. He should have listened to his wife, especially when he was now being asked for a license and he didn't even have one. He wasn't going to argue. He knew he deserved what was coming. And there's something of that in what David is saying here. He's saying, look, what I have done is primarily against God himself. And what I have done is something he hates with his entire being. I deserve the worst from his hands. He knew there was no way of escape. He deserved what was going to come his way. I want to repeat that that's the nature of true repentance. It is coming to that stage in your life where you are no longer arguing with God. You're not there seeking to say to the Lord God, well, you've made me this way, so why should you blame me? You're not going to God saying to him, well look God, everybody is doing it. This is the nature of human beings. Don't make a big issue of it. You're not going to God with any kind of excuse. You know that if he was to send you to hell, You would say to everybody, he is right. He is right. I want to say, David here describes the chemistry that takes place in a soul in whom the Holy Spirit is one. And as we study repentance, it's important for us to go to such passages as I said at the very beginning. To ask the question, is this me? When I have sinned against the Lord, Is this what brings me to God, to seek clemency, to seek forgiveness? Is this what happens? Because that's what David is telling us here. The reason why when he came to God, the first cry on his heart was, have mercy on me. was because he recognized that he had lost any right whatsoever to a place in God's presence. He couldn't argue out his case. All he could do is to fall at the foot of the throne of heaven and simply say, mercy, mercy, oh Lord, have mercy. That's all I can ask for. Thankfully, there is hope because the God of heaven is a God of mercy. That's what it says there. According to your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy. I'm not bringing any arguments. I'm simply asking for mercy. Sadly, too many people who think they are repentant, in actual fact, are only sorry for what they have done because they are conscious that other people know about it. It's not so much God and what I've done in his presence and the way he views what I have done, it is the shame. They found out. And that's what is called repentance. I'm saying to you, it is not. At least not repentance that takes your soul to heaven. That is not it. We know the story of Judas, don't we? He also said, I have sinned. He also shed tears. But let me tell you what he did after that. He went and committed suicide. He went and did evil in God's sight after saying, I have sinned. That is not repentance. You don't go from saying I've done wrong and then you go ahead and do wrong again in the sight of God. Go on to do that which is evil before Him. And yet so often that's what passes by the name of repentance in our own day and age. Let's get back to the Bible. Let us make sure That we're not simply following the philosophies of men, but we are instead following what God himself teaches in the scriptures. And it is that where God has come to bring about repentance, there is a God consciousness. We want to be reconciled to the true God of heaven. And thankfully, as I said, he's a God of mercy. Instead of playing around with sin, he instead gave his own son so that righteousness and love may meet in that position. He ensured that his own son would take upon himself our sin and consequently pay the price for it. And in that way, his own moral being, his justice is fully satisfied. Nobody will see you or me in heaven and say God has overlooked sin. They will look at his right hand and see him who looks like a lamb that was slain and say they is the proof that God hates sin. He's punished it. in the person of another, in the person of his own son. And therefore, when we come to him for mercy, we come to him convinced he is merciful because we've heard the good news that his soul gave his son for a fallen world. that whoever believes in him should not perish but instead have everlasting life. So you and I, once our souls are gripped with this reality of God and the sin that is so much hurts can fly back to him. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, pleading that through his son, our sins may be washed away. Through him, we can say, as David said here, wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. Two questions therefore. Number one, Have you become conscious of God above everything else? When it comes to issues of sin and righteousness, are you conscious of Him? Not so much other human beings, but God with whom you Are you conscious of Him? I want to say again, that is true religion. In the second place, has this consciousness of God caused you to have a well-beaten path to the cross? For mercy, for mercy. for mercy. For we are all sinners. We sin in action, in words, in thought. We sin through sins of commission, sins of omission. Are you conscious of God? Are you conscious that He is merciful? Does that cause you to go to Him, through Christ, again and again, saying, have mercy on me, oh God. My prayer is that as you listen to that, your own heart is saying, that's me, that's me. If it is, praise the Lord for that. But on the other hand, if you're a complete stranger to what I've just talked about, throw away what you call your repentance. It's the false thing. It's a lie. And instead, come to God afresh. pleading with him that you may know to the very depth of your being the kind of repentance you see in the scriptures, that your soul may be truly saved for heaven. You can negotiate a lot of things. You can go to Best Buy and get the wrong stuff. At least you can go back afterwards and probably get it exchanged. But if you lose your soul because you arrive on the judgment day with a lie in your hands, you pay for it forever. Don't. Deal with your soul honestly. And may God have mercy on you. Amen. Go ahead and offer a prayer. Let us pray. Eternal and gracious God, we thank you for your word that you've been pleased to ensure remains with us to this very day, that we may not grope around in darkness, but that we may have a sure lamp to lead us to heaven. Thank you that through men and women who have gone on before us, we can see ourselves as in a mirror. Lord, help us. Even as we have briefly thought concerning the subject of repentance, we pray that you might help us by the work of your Holy Spirit to search ourselves and see that ours is the genuine article. Grant this, O Lord, that you might be glorified in us in this life and more so in the life to come. For Jesus' sake, amen.