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A Penitential Psalm

According to the Compact Oxford English Dictionary "penitent" means "feeling sorrow and regret for having done wrong." And that is certainly what Ps.51 is all about. There are seven "penitential psalms" or psalms of confession" in the Bible and of these Ps.51 is probably the most famous.

The heading leaves us in no doubt as to what were the exact circumstances that lie behind this psalm. The sin (or sins) of King David are detailed in 2Sam.11 and then the following chapter tells us how he was confronted by the prophet Nathan who brought home to him the seriousness of just what he had done.

You'll remember that David had stayed behind in Jerusalem while his armies had gone out into the field of battle to fight his enemies. Instead of accompanying his soldiers David was idle at home and as men have known for centuries "The devil finds work (or mischief) for idle hands to do." (Chaucer, 1386)

1 How doth the little busy bee

Improve each shining hour,

And gather honey all the day

From every opening flower!

2 How skilfully she builds her cell!

How neat she spreads the wax!

And labours hard to store it well

With the sweet food she makes.

3 In works of labour or of skill

I would be busy too:

For Satan finds some mischief still

For idle hands to do.

4 In books, or work, or healthful play

Let my first years be past,

That I may give for every day

Some good account at last.                       Isaac Watts.

David looked out, saw Bathsheba and fell for her. The problem was that Bathsheba was already married to another man. Yet how strong the impulses to sin can be and David – the sweet singer of Israel - can only think of one thing – he wants Bathsheba.

He has her brought to the palace, lies with her then lets her return home. He's had his way – all is fine or so he thinks until the message comes back from Bathsheba that she is pregnant!!

The remainder of the chapter shows the great lengths to which David is prepared to go in order to try to cover up his sin. In his efforts he goes from bad to worse and ends up arranging the death of Bathsheba's husband Uriah. All the while he seems totally oblivious of the wrongs that he is committing and all the while he fails to realize that more and more folk are becoming aware of his sin and of his increasingly desperate efforts to cover up.

There is a well known verse hidden away in the little read Book of Numbers that says "be sure your sin will find you out." And this was soon to be the case for David.

Despite clear examples throughout history we still go on in much the same way today desperately trying to bluff our way through difficulties:

Eg. Nixon's denials of any knowledge of a small break-in in an office building. A few months later he resigned over what was known worldwide as "Watergate".

Do you remember Clinton and Monica Lewinsky? Clinton may have survived an impeachment vote but his credibility certainly took a severe knock.

And how often do we try to do similar things, How easy to try to suppress the truth, to lie and fabricate stories anything but come clean!

 In 2Sam.12 brave Nathan faces down the King by means of parable and suddenly David sees – as if for the very first time – just what he has done.

Psalm 51 begins at this point.

After the concealment and subterfuge of the chapters in 2Samuel, Psalm 51 comes to us with a stunning contrast. All attempts at cover-up are abandoned as David has been brought to see his behavior for what it was – sinful.

The Psalm employs all the major words for sin in the OT. David describes his actions in the following ways:

Transgression – iniquity – sin – evil – bloodguiltiness.

 And this is so serious that he goes to God earnestly for a solution. The psalm contains a whole series of imperatives directed towards God that He might act to resolve the problem that David has caused.

             Have mercy – blot out (x2) – wash (x2) – cleanse (x2) – hide your face – purge – deliver.

David has been convicted of his sin and realizing his guilt cries out to God – he doesn't deserve anything now from God and that is the reason he calls out for mercy.

For David his sin has become totally inescapable and he's given up every attempt to hide it. He makes no attempt either to bluff his way pretending that he wasn't responsible, or it wasn't his fault. Rather he has come to see himself in a new light. Far from being something abnormal he now realizes that his sin is merely the fruit of his real nature – he's come to see that he's always been like this.

Confession replaces concealment in these opening verses. No excuses, no trivializing, no attempts at self-justification – David declares himself to be a sinner before God.

And do you know something? We all need to come to such a point and for the reason that David declares in v.6

"Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,"

David has finally realized that while he can maybe pull the wool over the eyes of others he can't do so with God!

And yet to realize this does not crush David into thinking that all is hopeless because he immediately carries on with a further declaration concerning the Lord.

v6b. "and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart."

God had convicted David of his sin through the courageous ministry of Nathan not in order to gloat over the failures of David but to put things right!

Praise God that He convicts us of sin otherwise we would continue our petty little games of pretence and concealment and fail to come to the Lord for Him to deal with our sin. I wonder have you ever come to see your sin as David has done – he loses sight of others all that bothers him is what he has done in offending God and in rebelling against Him.

As the Psalm unfolds David returns to God with his requests for cleansing. Conviction of sin has led on to confession of that sin and now for further pleas.

Why does he need to do that?

Well because sin separates:

·       David has been separated from a sense of personal wholesomeness

o   he sees himself to be defiled and polluted

o   he sees his strength has been affected in that he now feels crushed and broken. See how he cries out in vv.7-9.

·       David has been separated from God by his sin; he no longer has any joy in his spiritual life and longs for it to be different.

He sees his situation as serious indeed and he realizes that he can't solve the problem by himself. What he needs is a fresh start and a new beginning and he prays for just that!

v.10 "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me."

The words used are strong words – the word create is the same used in Gen 1. To describe God's creating the world out of nothing.

David is not so much praying about his guilt now – he has already done that at the very outset of the Psalm but he is concerned about the consequences of this guilt. If God will only act in response to his prayers and do a work of new creation then all his problems will be addressed.

Experiencing a sense of God's withdrawing from him, David is desperate that this not be made permanent but reversed. And he prays with expectation and anticipation!

  When David first began to pray he called upon God to deal with him according to his "steadfast love". This type of love was a feature of the Covenant. David at this time was a member of God's family but a wayward member. He longs to be treated as a full-member and to benefit from the blessings of the covenant.

That is the reason that he can pray with such expectancy here in v.13. We shouldn't regard vv.13-17 as some form of negotiation that David is trying use to wheedle some blessings out of an unsympathetic God. This is no "If you do this then I'll do that" exchange. Rather David is committing himself to a life of joyful response when the Lord acts to deliver him.

David promises:

     To praise and worship

     To teach and testify

     To humbly and joyfully serve.

The Psalm comes to an end with a prayer for the wider community. While David is concerned about his individual salvation he is not so blinkered that he can see only his own interests and he prays on for the whole community for blessings to abound for all the people.

Now is it possible for us to apply this Psalm in any way to our Lord Jesus Christ? It is obviously difficult to do so directly – after all, the psalm is an intensely personal psalm concerning specifically personal and individual sin. Our Lord Jesus Christ had no such sin of His own and so could not pray this psalm in a personal capacity. Cf. Heb.4:15.

But having said that we have not exhausted the possibilities.

One of the major strands of the Bible's teaching about the Lord Jesus s that He functions as the High Priest of His people and as such represents His people to God.

As a priest Christ did not offer sacrifices but offered Himself as a sacrifice to God and this is the basis for our salvation. His intercession – ie. His praying for His people which involves the pleading of His merits on their behalf – is usually considered as part of His continuing work having gained access to God on their behalf. However it is possible and helpful to reflect upon His intercession before His resurrection and ascension, the intercession of His humiliation.

Heb.5:7 refers to this: "In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence."

 In Jn.17 He prays for those who will believe in the future.

And in Lk.22:32 Jesus informs Peter that because Jesus prays for him his faith won't fail even though he will deny Jesus:

"but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers."

Jesus came to save us and that involved Him in taking our sins upon Himself  -  as Paul put it in writing to the Corinthians "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." 2Cor.5:21.

He can thus understand the pollution and the desperately uncleanness of sin as no other! So to pray for cleansing, washing, purging He can do feeling the sin and pollution of His people.

He can understand the crushing burden – as of broken bones" – as He faced crucifixion.

He well knows that there is no escape from sin and understands that His people are sinful from birth -  and knowing such there was no escape from sin for Him on the cross.

He knew that sin ruptured the relationship between God and man – the would experience the joy of relationship being taken from Him and this in order that God might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus (Rom.3:26).

He fully understood the consequences of sin as He faced the cross yet at the same time was able to look beyond the cross with expectancy – "who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God."

No Jesus couldn't pray the Psalm for Himself but praying it on behalf of the people He represented taking their sins upon Himself none was better placed to understand the deepest significance of what David and us after him can only faintly begin to appreciate.

So let us worship our Saviour for so great a salvation.