Authentic Repentance:
When we sin and walk out of God's will, we are to respond to His loving discipline with
a repentant and broken heart.
Here's Gene:
What is true authentic repentance?
Well it begins with a broken heart.
It is grounded in humility.
And here in this this particular psalm, which is really another psalm of David, it grows
out of a very, very dark period in this man's life.
He'd committed adultery.
I mean this is a man after God's heart that had sinned against God--a violation of one
of God's commandments.
But he also orchestrated her husband's death.
Now this is something that is sometimes a little bit hard to grasp.
And yet David was a man after God's heart who really failed God in a desperate way.
Now the fact is that even after he failed God, which shows the depth of rationalization
that can set into our lives, because he was justifying himself.
And God sent Nathan the prophet.
And Nathan confronted David with his sins.
And he told a parable. It involved a rich man who was very wealthy and he had a lot
of sheep. He had a lot of goats. It involved a very poor man who had only
one little ewe lamb.
And he really loved that little lamb, nurtured that lamb, took care of that lamb.
I mean it's a very, very significant parable, isn't it?
When you look at that parable and the meaning of that parable.
And then someone came to town--a stranger came--and the rich man, you know, was going
to take care of this guy and provide for him.
But rather than going to his multitude of sheep and goats, he goes and steals this one
little lamb in order to take care of this other individual.
And here's the irony--David heard that parable and he was mad.
He was livid.
How could a man do that?
What a shame!
Let me get at him--he deserves to be punished!
And Nathan looked right straight at him and said: David, you're the man.
You're the man.
And what happened was that Nathan unmasked his rationalization--his self-deception.
And all of a sudden he saw that he was the man that had taken another man's wife--in view
of everything he had--to take Bathsheba.
And what we see here is really authentic repentance.
In fact we're going to see that in this psalm--against this backdrop--because it's against this backdrop
that David really wrote these words.
But notice in 2 Samuel where we have the story, the parable. Notice how he responded:
"David responded to Nathan, 'I have sinned against the LORD.'"
Now when you read this it can seem rather cognitive or just a response but you're going
to see in this psalm it was more than just a statement.
It was a reflection of a broken heart.
Because he had sinned against both God and man.
"'I have sinned against the LORD.'
[And] then Nathan replied to David, 'The LORD has taken away your sin; you will not die.'"
Though he should have died--because there was no provision in the law to forgive that
kind of sin.
He deserved to die--that was the law in Israel that came from God.
And he had committed two heinous sins: adultery and murder.
But God in His grace forgave him.
And we'll see that unfold here in this psalm.
So when you go to Psalm 51, verses 1 and 2, you have an elaboration on what happened right
there in those rather crisp statements in 2 Samuel. So we read:
"Be gracious to me, God, according to Your
faithful love; according to Your abundant
compassion, blot out my rebellion.
Wash away my guilt, [and] cleanse me from my sin."
Here was a very significant, sincere prayer.
And I don't think it just happened in a moment.
I think he spent sleepless nights over his sin with a broken heart.
In Psalm 51, verses 1 and 2 we continue:
"Be gracious to me, God, according to Your
faithful love; according to Your abundant
compassion, blot out my rebellion.
Wash away my guilt, and cleanse me from my sin."
And notice the interesting contrast that you have here.
The contrasts relate to God's faithful love, God's abundant compassion compared with what?
His rebellion.
My rebellion. My guilt. My sin.
And you see in these statements a reflection of a man's heart that is broken.
And God sees that--a broken heart-- which is really the true manifestation of repentance.
The sincere prayer continues:
"Purify me with hyssop, and I will be clean;
wash me, and I will be whiter than snow..."
Underscore that phrase in your mind-- "whiter than snow."
"...and I will be whiter than snow....
God, create a clean heart for me and renew a steadfast spirit within me."
Now what's in David's mind as he goes through this process?
Well it certainly relates back to what happened in Egypt when the plagues came, in order to
convince Pharaoh to let His people go. Let God's people go.
And in that final plague God was going to come into Egypt and take the life of all the
firstborn including the animals.
But notice what God said.
Here we have Exodus 12:13:
"The blood on the houses where you are
staying will be a distinguishing
mark for you..."
In other words they were to take a lamb.
They were to slaughter that lamb. And they were
to take the blood and they were to put it on the doorposts of the house.
But notice what God said:
"...when I see the blood, I will pass over you.
No plague will be among you to destroy you
when I strike the land of Egypt."
And of course when God did, He honored the shedding of that blood from those lambs that
were put on the doorposts of the house. And we know of course that that was really a prophecy
or a projection of what Jesus Christ, the perfect lamb of God, was going to do for us when He
shed His blood on the cross.
And that blood symbol back there in Egypt, and in the continuing sacrifices that God
instituted in Israel, was sufficient because of David's broken heart.
And because of God's grace to forgive him.
Now he's going to pay some horrible consequences because of his sin, and that's another story.
Because there was sin that never departed from his house in relationship to his children
who committed horrible, horrible sins which related back to his sin.
There was a consequence, but the fact of the matter is God forgave him.
And the essence of his repentance and the essence of any repentance today is
the sacrificial pleasing to God. Notice:
"The sacrifice pleasing to God is..." What?
"...a broken spirit."
And that's exactly what happened to David.
He had a broken spirit.
"God, You will not despise a broken and humbled heart."
And that's why I said earlier that the basis of authentic repentance and a broken heart
is a humble heart.
And you see both of these in David's life.
God heard his plea.
God honored his repentance.
And the perfect lamb of God, which takes away the sins of the world,
was effective in David's life before Jesus Christ ever came to this earth and died.
Because those sacrifices in Israel were a projection of what was going to happen to
the Savior who would take away all of our sin.
1 John 1: 7 to 9 speaks of this in the New Testament:
"But if we walk in the light as He Himself
is in the light, we have fellowship with one another,
and the blood of Jesus His Son
cleanses us from all sin."
When Jesus Christ died on that cross, He paid the penalty for our sins: past, all the way
back to David, present, and future.
And John goes on to say:
"If we say, 'We have no sin,' we are deceiving ourselves,
[and] the truth is not in us. ..."
We've all sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Rm 3:23).
But "...If we confess our sins,
He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."
And I think the wonderful thing is, this is an ongoing process in our lives as Christians
as we walk in fellowship with God.
It's one thing to be forgiven. It's another thing to walk in a close, loving relationship
with Jesus Christ.
And that's what Romans 12:1 and 2 again is all about:
when we are not being conformed
to this world, but being transformed by the renewing of our mind and walking in the good,
acceptable and perfect will of God.
You know it's interesting if you go to the internet and just search out one phrase:
"I will pass over you."
And look at the number of songs that have been written related to that concept--spiritual songs.
For example Andrae Crouch's song-- I love it:
[Lyrics]: "The blood that Jesus shed for me Way back on Calvary
The blood that gives me strength From day to day
It will never lose its power."
Boy, that's a great song.
John Foote wrote another song:
[Lyrics]:"Christ our Redeemer died on the cross,
Died for the sinner,
Paid all his due.
All who receive Him need never fear, Yes, He will pass over you."
Where does that come from?
It goes all the way back there to that Exodus scene.
When I see the Blood, I will pass over you (Ex 12:13).
Another song I love--we don't sing it enough, I don't think today:
[Lyrics]: "Jesus paid it all.
All to him I owe, Sin had left a crimson stain,
He [what?] washed it white as snow."
And where does that come from?
Right from the words of David in his repentance.
That's why I told you earlier underscore that phrase to be washed as "white as snow."
And that's what the blood of Christ does for us.
Now the reflection response question:
Why do so many Christians seemingly express regret
for their sins, not because they're truly repentant, but because they've been caught?
I thought a lot about that and I've seen it.
I've seen it in people's lives.
And I've seen them even express weeping and I've seen them fall on their knees, as it were.
But in the long haul it was just an outward sign they were sad and broken because they
were caught, not because they broke the heart of God.
And when David sinned and he was caught, his heart was broken.
That was, you see, authentic, true repentance.
And the fact of the matter is that, I think, that if we don't engage in true repentance
when we break the heart of God, we probably don't have an intimate relationship with God,
or even those we've wronged.
It's a sign of selfishness. It's a sign of being narcissistic.
And not enabling us--or causing us, or allowing us, or encouraging us--
to really engage in authentic repentance.
So here's the principle to live by:
When we sin and walk out of God's will, we are to respond to His loving discipline with
a repentant and broken heart.