SPEAKER_01: So let's talk about prayer.
SPEAKER_01: You see, all earthly things will fade away.
SPEAKER_01: Prayer grass and eternity.
SPEAKER_01: I'm convinced that God not only hears desperate prayer, God also hears every prayer.
SPEAKER_01: Prayer is a disposition of the city.
SPEAKER_01: Prayer is so much more than a discipline, it is a learned desperation.
SPEAKER_01: As human beings, prayer is one of the greatest privileges that we're good morning, church family.
SPEAKER_02: My name is Garrett McCord.
SPEAKER_02: I'm the youth pastor here at FBC Bernie.
SPEAKER_02: Is it all right if we start a little bit different this morning?
SPEAKER_02: We're in a series on prayer, and so I just want to invite us to start this morning by taking a few seconds.
SPEAKER_02: And would you pray for yourself?
SPEAKER_02: Would you pray for your heart, for your mind, that God would open your eyes and ears to anything that the Holy Spirit might have for you this morning?
SPEAKER_02: Maybe for the first time, maybe for the thousandth time.
SPEAKER_02: But would you go ahead and do that for a few moments here this morning?
SPEAKER_02: And would you pray for me that I would be able to stand behind the Lord's word and preach it faithfully, and that everything I say would be helpful and true.
SPEAKER_02: Father, we thank you for your word this morning.
SPEAKER_02: We thank you for the opportunity to gather here as a family, Lord, and to read and learn your word.
SPEAKER_02: And I pray that we leave here change in the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: And everybody said, Amen.
SPEAKER_02: Well, outside of ministry, my favorite job was one that I held when I was a student at Dallas Baptist University.
SPEAKER_02: Uh from sophomore year to graduation, I worked for apartment maintenance, which I know what you're thinking.
SPEAKER_02: Maintenance is your favorite job outside of ministry?
SPEAKER_02: Look, I got paid$9 an hour to drive around campus on a side-by-side with my redneck friends and fix stuff.
SPEAKER_02: Like, that's honest work, okay?
SPEAKER_02: It was a blast.
SPEAKER_02: I love that job.
SPEAKER_02: And um I remember learning a lot at this job, learning how to work with my hands, learning how to fix things.
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but starting out, I didn't really know a whole lot of any of that.
SPEAKER_02: And so one day we came into work, and my boss, who I loved him, but the best way I can describe it was kind of like working for Michael Scott, was just like, hey man, uh, there's this washer that needs to get fixed down in one of the townhomes.
SPEAKER_02: Like, can you all go do that?
SPEAKER_02: It's like, okay, cool, we'll go and we try to go and fix it, and we get down there, and we get all of our tools set up and everything set out, and we're getting ready to work on this washer, and then we realized there was one small problem.
SPEAKER_02: None of us had any idea what we were doing.
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely none, no clue.
SPEAKER_02: And so for about two hours, we three Bible students probably took this thing apart six different ways, uh, just to put it back together incorrectly and realize it still didn't work.
SPEAKER_02: And so uh we were messing with this thing, and come to find out, the whole issue is there was some underwear that was like stuck in the filter, which had to be super embarrassing for the kids who live there.
SPEAKER_02: Um, but the problem was it wasn't that like the task was super difficult, right?
SPEAKER_02: We had one job, go fix the washer.
SPEAKER_02: Uh and honestly, removing underwear from a filter wasn't that difficult of a thing to do either.
SPEAKER_02: The problem was we knew what we were supposed to do, but we had no idea how we were supposed to do it.
SPEAKER_02: So why in the world am I telling you that story this morning?
SPEAKER_02: Well, these last few weeks, we've been in our series on prayer.
SPEAKER_02: And we've been covering both the theological, the why we pray, and the practical, how do we pray?
SPEAKER_02: And this morning we're gonna be covering a specific type of prayer, and that's a prayer of confession.
SPEAKER_02: Confessing our sins to God.
SPEAKER_02: And that's where this story this morning comes in because a lot of us feel the same way about confessing sin to God as I did about that washer.
SPEAKER_02: I know I'm supposed to do it.
SPEAKER_02: You know, I know generally kind of the idea there, but I really don't know how because I've never been shown.
SPEAKER_02: Like, do I just start like listing off all the bad things I've ever done?
SPEAKER_02: You know, do I say sorry?
SPEAKER_02: Do I say I apologize?
SPEAKER_02: Like that's a little bit more formal.
SPEAKER_02: Like, should I do that?
SPEAKER_02: Like, what's the statute of limitations?
SPEAKER_02: Like, how how long before God and I are cool again?
SPEAKER_02: Like, we don't really know.
SPEAKER_02: And so the reality is it doesn't have to be that complicated.
SPEAKER_02: There isn't a one size fits all, this is the only way to do it approach, but scripture does give us some templates and some frameworks.
SPEAKER_02: And one of those is found in Psalm 51, which is where we're gonna be this morning.
SPEAKER_02: So if you have your Bible, if you don't mind going ahead and flip open to Psalm 51.
SPEAKER_02: If you don't have your Bible, there should be one in the pew back in front of you, and that is yours to keep.
SPEAKER_02: We gift that to you.
SPEAKER_02: We want you to have a copy of God's word, mark it up, keep it.
SPEAKER_02: And so as you flip there, uh, just some background context.
SPEAKER_02: This psalm is David's prayer to God after he committed adultery with Bathsheba and then tried to cover it up by having her husband killed.
SPEAKER_02: So pretty big sin, right?
SPEAKER_02: And he is praying to God and he's asking for forgiveness.
SPEAKER_02: And as we study this text, we're gonna see that true confession is not just admitting that we've messed up, but it's appealing to God's love.
SPEAKER_02: It's honestly owning our sin, it's asking God to renew us, and then it's living out of gratitude for his forgiveness.
SPEAKER_02: And we can put that into a little bit of a loose framework that we can follow.
SPEAKER_02: Appeal to God's character, admit your sin, ask for renewal, and act out of gratitude.
SPEAKER_02: So if you're taking notes, appeal, admit, ask, act.
SPEAKER_02: Those are gonna be our points that we move through this morning.
SPEAKER_02: So, that being said, let's jump into verse one, Psalm 51.
SPEAKER_02: Be gracious to me, O God, according to your loving kindness.
SPEAKER_02: According to the greatness of your compassion, blot out my transgressions.
SPEAKER_02: Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.
SPEAKER_02: And so David begins his prayer by actually talking about God to God.
SPEAKER_02: He says, God, will you be gracious to me according to your loving kindness?
SPEAKER_02: And then in verse two, he asks God, would you blot out my transgressions?
SPEAKER_02: Which is a word for sin.
SPEAKER_02: Would you wash me from my iniquity?
SPEAKER_02: Would you cleanse me from my sin?
SPEAKER_02: But again, he asks God to do so.
SPEAKER_02: Why?
SPEAKER_02: Because of his compassion.
SPEAKER_02: And the reason I'm focusing on that is because what David's doing here, he's actually quoting Exodus 34, verses 6 through 7, which is a really good passage to memorize because Exodus 34, 6 through 7 is the most quoted verse in the Bible by the Bible.
SPEAKER_02: And it's where God reveals his name and character to Moses.
SPEAKER_02: It reads this: Then the Lord passed by in front of him, talking about Moses, and proclaimed, The Lord the Lord God, Yahweh Yahweh, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving kindness and truth, who keeps loving kindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity and transgression and sin.
SPEAKER_02: And so you see it's the same words, compassion and loving kindness.
SPEAKER_02: And it's the same words in Hebrew.
SPEAKER_02: The first one, Rahum, is the one that gets translated compassion.
SPEAKER_02: And it comes from this root word that means female womb, which is really confusing.
SPEAKER_02: Like God, womb, mother, that doesn't make a lot of sense.
SPEAKER_02: So you have to go and look at other places in the text and in the Old Testament specifically where this word gets used.
SPEAKER_02: One is in 1 Kings 3.
SPEAKER_02: Two women come to Solomon and they're fighting over this baby.
SPEAKER_02: Who's the real mother?
SPEAKER_02: And because there's no ancient Israelite version of Maori, he hatches a plan.
SPEAKER_02: He's like, all right, we're gonna cut this thing in two, and we're gonna give one half to you, and one half to you, and everybody be happy, right?
SPEAKER_02: I'm a benevolent king.
SPEAKER_02: You're welcome.
SPEAKER_02: But here's the thing Solomon doesn't actually expect that to be the outcome.
SPEAKER_02: What he's doing is he knows that's gonna flush out who the true mom is, and that's what happens.
SPEAKER_02: Because right away the true mother said, and this is the text, was deeply moved out of love for her son, and said to the king, Please, Lord, give her the living baby, don't kill him.
SPEAKER_02: And the word there used for love is Rahum.
SPEAKER_02: It's this gut level parental love that comes from the deepest part.
SPEAKER_02: And then another place it gets used is in Psalm 103, where the Exodus or the author quotes Exodus 34, 6 through 7.
SPEAKER_02: And then he writes, Just as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him.
SPEAKER_02: And so, no, God is not a mother, he does not have a womb, but that word for compassion, Rahum, is talking about how a parent feels about their children.
SPEAKER_02: It's a feeling word, it's this deep parental love that's almost impossible to explain.
SPEAKER_02: I actually remember kind of an example that I felt recently.
SPEAKER_02: I was scrolling through the photos and videos on my phone, and I came across this gem that I figured I would share with you guys real quick.
SPEAKER_02: I think we have that that we can pull up.
unknown: Maybe.
SPEAKER_02: You want some more what?
SPEAKER_00: Or some more doodles.
SPEAKER_02: Can you ask nicely?
SPEAKER_00: Please.
SPEAKER_02: More more noodles?
SPEAKER_00: Oh more goods, please.
SPEAKER_02: So I don't know about you, uh, but when I watch that video, I melt.
SPEAKER_02: I'm like, hey, Leighton, that's my daughter, by the way.
SPEAKER_02: Uh, do you want my car keys, my wallet, uh, ice cream for dinner for the rest of the year?
SPEAKER_02: Great.
SPEAKER_02: Whatever you want, sweetie.
SPEAKER_02: But in all seriousness, and those of us who have children or have been a parent to someone, like you know that feeling of just that deep love that wells up within you.
SPEAKER_02: And it's this love towards her as my daughter, and it's not earned, it's not conditional, and it's not even really explainable other than I love her because she's my daughter, because she's mine.
SPEAKER_02: And that's how God feels towards his children.
SPEAKER_02: That's the love that David is setting his eyes on in this prayer as he confesses his sin.
SPEAKER_02: But David's not just appealing to how God feels, he's appealing to how God acts.
SPEAKER_02: Because in Hebrew, that other word that gets translated as loving-kindness is the word hased.
SPEAKER_02: And it's this really big word that's really hard to translate into English.
SPEAKER_02: Like there's not one like equivalent.
SPEAKER_02: And so oftentimes you'll see it translated as unfailing love, steadfast love, covenant loyalty.
SPEAKER_02: But again, it helps you to understand it as you look other places in the Old Testament where this word gets used.
SPEAKER_02: In Psalm 136, it gets repeated over and over again.
SPEAKER_02: Give thanks to the Lord for he is good.
SPEAKER_02: His loving kindness, Hesed, is everlasting.
SPEAKER_02: And it gets paired with the word amet a lot, which is the uh is translated faithfulness.
SPEAKER_02: And in Psalm 89, we see uh it says, I will sing of the loving kindness, Hesed, of the Lord forever.
SPEAKER_02: To all the generations I will make known your faithfulness, Amet, for I have said, loving kindness will be built up forever, in the heavens you will establish your faithfulness.
SPEAKER_02: And so to paint a picture here, the meaning of this word, Hesed, is God's unwavering love and faithfulness to both his people and his promises.
SPEAKER_02: Because see, God doesn't just feel all mushy gushy towards us, he backs it up with action.
SPEAKER_02: And Hesed is God's love that he feels in action, how he holds us, how he provides for us, how he comforts us, how he corrects us, how he forgives us, even when we mess up.
SPEAKER_02: And I would say that his hased, his loving kindness is how you know he has compassion for us.
SPEAKER_02: It's almost a stronger indicator of that.
SPEAKER_02: To go back to my kids, that video is an adorable highlight, right?
SPEAKER_02: The kind that you see on social media all the time.
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but that is not the complete reality of parenting, because what you don't see is when Leighton takes a toy from Michael and Michael responds, Michael's my one-year-old son, by yanking her hair.
SPEAKER_02: And now everybody's crying, including me, right?
SPEAKER_02: Like we're trying to figure this thing out.
SPEAKER_02: And so love in that moment is not just a gushy feeling.
SPEAKER_02: Love in that moment is how I respond.
SPEAKER_02: Am I gonna use anger and a loud voice to try and gain control of the situation and impose my will on my children?
SPEAKER_02: Or am I gonna try to calm things down and do the difficult task of trying to have as much of a conversation as you can have with a one and a three-year-old?
SPEAKER_02: Because love in that moment is measured by hard work over time.
SPEAKER_02: That's what parental love is.
SPEAKER_02: It's changing diapers at 3 a.m., it's the grind of dinner and bedtime and trying to wrangle soapy kids that are trying to wrestle in the bath.
SPEAKER_02: It's the answering the same why question over and over and over again.
SPEAKER_02: Like, I don't know why God made frog screen, sweetie.
SPEAKER_02: Like, I really don't.
SPEAKER_02: Like, I you're so cute though.
SPEAKER_02: I love that.
SPEAKER_02: That's the parental hard work, it's correcting bad behavior without losing your cool, showing up tired, but choosing patience.
SPEAKER_02: That's real love.
SPEAKER_02: It's patient, committed, it's constant.
SPEAKER_02: And that's God's Hasid towards us.
SPEAKER_02: But unlike us, his love is perfect.
SPEAKER_02: He doesn't get tired or grumpy or snappy or get short with us when we don't want him, when we ignore him, when we rebel.
SPEAKER_02: And praise the Lord because we do all of those things all the time.
SPEAKER_02: So to put it together, God feels this deep parental love towards his children and he acts on it through a faithful love that doesn't ever fail, even when we do.
SPEAKER_02: So, to bring it back to the point of our sermon this morning, what does any of this have to do with how we confess sin to God?
SPEAKER_02: Well, remember, David starts by asking God to forgive him based on the compassion and the loving kindness.
SPEAKER_02: Do you know what he's not saying?
SPEAKER_02: He's not saying, hey God, will you forgive me because I feel really bad?
SPEAKER_02: Or, hey, God, will you forgive me because I've also done some good things and they kind of outweigh the bad things?
SPEAKER_02: Or, hey, God, will you forgive me because at least I'm not as bad as that guy over there.
SPEAKER_02: Or God, will you forgive me?
SPEAKER_02: Because it's just a one-time thing.
SPEAKER_02: Like it's no big deal, it's not gonna happen again.
SPEAKER_02: And guys, we say those prayers about sin all the time.
SPEAKER_02: And the reality is when we do, whether we realize it or not, we're leaning on our feelings, our works, comparison, all just trying to secure some sense of forgiveness, or if we're honest, to try and just make ourselves feel a little bit less guilty.
SPEAKER_02: And it doesn't work.
SPEAKER_02: In fact, it just leads to more guilt and shame because someone else's sin doesn't make yours any less bad.
SPEAKER_02: So instead, like David, we can call on God's character because at the end of the day, the only grounds for forgiveness are God's compassion and loving kindness.
SPEAKER_02: And so practically, when you're confessing sin to God, begin by meditating on his character.
SPEAKER_02: Just sit there and think about his compassion.
SPEAKER_02: Have you ever done that before?
SPEAKER_02: Like really sat there and thought about the fact that God loves you?
SPEAKER_02: Like he's your heavenly father.
SPEAKER_02: He feels the way towards you as a father would feel towards his kids.
SPEAKER_02: And I'll admit that's really, really difficult for us who don't have a good earthly model of that.
SPEAKER_02: And I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_02: But what a better reason to make a practice of just sitting and meditating on God's love towards you.
SPEAKER_02: But not just how he feels, think about his loving kindness.
SPEAKER_02: Think about how he's shown up time and time and time again.
SPEAKER_02: Even when you didn't think there was any way, even when you didn't want him to show up, he still did.
SPEAKER_02: Think about those moments and just start your prayer of confession by dwelling on the fact that God loves you.
SPEAKER_02: And this is huge because a lot of times we struggle to actively confess sin because we view God as some heavenly tyrant who's just waiting to drop the hammer.
SPEAKER_02: And you're never gonna be able to be open with a God like that, but that's not anywhere near the truth.
SPEAKER_02: And so when you set the stage by reminding your heart that he loves you, that he wants what's best for you, you're gonna have the ultimate freedom to be completely honest before God.
SPEAKER_02: And that's where David goes next in verse three.
SPEAKER_02: Let's pick back up in the text.
SPEAKER_02: For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.
SPEAKER_02: Against you, you only I have sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are justified when you speak and blameless when you judge.
SPEAKER_02: Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me.
SPEAKER_02: Behold, you desire truth in the innermost being, and in the hidden part you will make me know wisdom.
SPEAKER_02: So David begins by appealing to God's character, that's our first point, and then he moves to admitting his own sin.
SPEAKER_02: He admits he's done wrong, there's no hiding from it.
SPEAKER_02: He says, Against you and you only I have sinned, which can be a little bit confusing because it's like, did you, David?
SPEAKER_02: Because I'm pretty sure you committed adultery and killed a dude.
SPEAKER_02: Like I feel like some other people faced the consequences of your actions here.
SPEAKER_02: Like it's really just against God.
SPEAKER_02: But the point that he's making here is that ultimately all sin is first and foremost an offense to God.
SPEAKER_02: And he continues on that train of thought by at the end, he acknowledges that God will be perfectly just to judge him for what he's done, to punish him.
SPEAKER_02: And in verse 5, he says, Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, in sin my mother conceived me.
SPEAKER_02: And this is not him saying that he was the product of an affair or that his mom sinned by having him, rather, he's acknowledging that his decisions to sin are actually a byproduct of an inner, broken, sinful nature.
SPEAKER_02: This thing we call the flesh.
SPEAKER_02: And then in the end, he he ends this section and he says, Behold, you desire truth in the innermost being.
SPEAKER_02: Meaning God acknowledges that, or sorry, that David acknowledges that God wants honesty and vulnerability, that the outside that we put forward would match the inside.
SPEAKER_02: And there's a lot there, but to put it together, David gives us a very clear picture of what it means to confess here.
SPEAKER_02: It's more than just telling God you did something wrong.
SPEAKER_02: If that's all confession was, you know what Psalm 51 would read?
SPEAKER_02: Dear God, I committed adultery and killed someone.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_02: That's all it would read.
SPEAKER_02: But it's not.
SPEAKER_02: Like David actually goes on, and that's all pointless because God already knows, right?
SPEAKER_02: Like God's not sitting up there as David's praying this prayer, like, shocked.
SPEAKER_02: He knows what's happened.
SPEAKER_02: Rather, confession is much closer to what John describes in 1 John 1 9, where he writes, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us of all unrighteousness.
SPEAKER_02: The word in the Greek that gets translated to confess is homo lego, and it means to say the same thing or to speak the same truth.
SPEAKER_02: And so the idea that John's getting at is that confession is not just telling God about your sin, but it's agreeing with God about your sin, about its seriousness, saying the same thing.
SPEAKER_02: It's owning it fully, no excuses, admitting that God would be right and just to punish.
SPEAKER_02: And it's recognizing that sin's not just about bad behavior, but it flows from a broken heart.
SPEAKER_02: And when you do that, you actually open yourself up for transformation from the inside out.
SPEAKER_02: Think about it this way.
SPEAKER_02: Uh, we all know that one person who believes all medical conditions can be solved by drinking more water.
SPEAKER_02: Um, we just know that guy.
SPEAKER_02: Uh, and if you don't know that guy, he's you.
SPEAKER_02: So sorry to break it to you.
SPEAKER_02: Um, but I knew that guy.
SPEAKER_02: My family had a friend growing up, and uh he one day started to have some fatigue and started to have some shortness of breath and like some chest tightness.
SPEAKER_02: And we all made it very clear like, hey man, you should probably go to the doctor, get that checked out.
SPEAKER_02: Doesn't just sound like a rolled ankle, like you might want to run some tests on that.
SPEAKER_02: And he's like, nah, no, I'll be fine, like some water and Vic's Vaporub, I'll be good.
SPEAKER_02: I was like, I don't, I don't think Vic's, like like at least an aspirin brother.
SPEAKER_02: Like Vicks Vaporub has nothing, but whatever, fine.
SPEAKER_02: And so we finally convinced him to go to the doctor.
SPEAKER_02: And of course, the doctor says, hey man, uh, kind of sounds like the start to a heart attack.
SPEAKER_02: Like, let's run some tests and get this thing checked out.
SPEAKER_02: No, no, I'm fine.
SPEAKER_02: And he wasn't buying it.
SPEAKER_02: He wouldn't agree with the diagnosis, and because he wouldn't agree with the diagnosis, he couldn't get the help that he needed.
SPEAKER_02: Do you see it?
SPEAKER_02: And sure enough, he ended up having a heart attack.
SPEAKER_02: Praise the Lord, he was okay.
SPEAKER_02: But we hear this story and we think, oh, this is ridiculous, like it's some no-brainer, like, of course.
SPEAKER_02: Guys, we do this with sin all the time.
SPEAKER_02: We minimize it.
SPEAKER_02: God, I I probably looked at some things that I shouldn't have, but it was it was just a quick glance.
SPEAKER_02: I didn't act on it or anything.
SPEAKER_02: We rename it.
SPEAKER_02: Lord, I know I've been really focused on money lately, but I'm just trying to be wise and ambitious and get ahead, provide for my family.
SPEAKER_02: We justify it.
SPEAKER_02: God, I I know I snapped at my kids, but they're just out of control.
SPEAKER_02: I'm trying to teach them discipline.
SPEAKER_02: All right, they wouldn't have listened to me if I didn't raise my voice.
SPEAKER_02: We'll do anything short of agreeing with God about our sin and its seriousness.
SPEAKER_02: I know I've been there.
SPEAKER_02: True confession is being honest with God about your sin.
SPEAKER_02: Name it in all of its detail.
SPEAKER_02: Say exactly what you did.
SPEAKER_02: He already knows.
SPEAKER_02: Why would you try and hide?
SPEAKER_02: Just tell him.
SPEAKER_02: Speak the same truth about it as God does.
SPEAKER_02: For example, Lord, I confess I sinned against my wife when I let my anger control me.
SPEAKER_02: I spoke to her with harsh and cutting words, and that was selfishness, not pride.
SPEAKER_02: Or maybe for you, Lord, I confess I sinned by looking at that person with lust, and I treated them like an object for my pleasure rather than an image bearer in your child.
SPEAKER_02: Or, Lord, I confess I tore that person down by talking behind their back, and I used my words to tear them down just so I'd feel a little bit better about myself.
SPEAKER_02: Name it.
SPEAKER_02: Be honest, God knows the deepest parts of you.
SPEAKER_02: Why try and hide?
SPEAKER_02: And that's what David gets at when he writes that God desires truth in the innermost being, that the part you put forward to God and by extension to other people would match the inside.
SPEAKER_02: The inner parts of your heart and your soul.
SPEAKER_02: And let's be honest, that's a really scary thing because our hearts can be really dark places.
SPEAKER_02: We all have things we want to hide, secrets, stuff you hope you're gonna take to the grave.
SPEAKER_02: And look, you might be able to, but it's gonna be a slow, painful death on the inside because you were made to be fully known and fully loved.
SPEAKER_02: And here's the trick: the only way you can be fully loved is by being fully known.
SPEAKER_02: And you have to be vulnerable because if you refuse, you're gonna rob yourself of the very thing that God wired you for.
SPEAKER_02: You're dooming yourself to a life of keeping up this false version of you, not only to God, but to others, because you feel like if anybody knew the real me, they'd run.
SPEAKER_02: They wouldn't want anything to do with me.
SPEAKER_02: And so you keep up this sanitized version of yourself that tries to be everything to everyone, but in the end you become nothing real to anybody.
SPEAKER_02: Aren't you tired of it?
SPEAKER_02: I know I was.
SPEAKER_02: This is my struggle for so long, and I'm still prone to just hide behind this wall and this facade of religiosity and shininess.
SPEAKER_02: There's no life in that.
SPEAKER_02: But it doesn't have to be that way.
SPEAKER_02: First John 1.9, the verse we talked about earlier, if we confess our sins, he's faithful and righteous to forgive us, to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
SPEAKER_02: James 5, 16.
SPEAKER_02: Therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed.
SPEAKER_02: God does not say it will be easy, but he does promise healing on the other side.
SPEAKER_02: And that healing is the focus of these next verses as we jump back into the text on verse 7.
SPEAKER_02: Purify me with hyssop and I shall be clean.
SPEAKER_02: Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.
SPEAKER_02: Make me to hear joy and gladness.
SPEAKER_02: Let the bones which you have broken rejoice.
SPEAKER_02: Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquities.
SPEAKER_02: Create me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
SPEAKER_02: Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your Holy Spirit from me.
SPEAKER_02: Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and sustain me with a willing spirit.
SPEAKER_02: And so David begins by appealing to God's character.
SPEAKER_02: He asks God, or he admits his sin, and now he begins to ask God for renewal.
SPEAKER_02: And he starts by talking about hyssop, which is like, what in the world?
SPEAKER_02: Hyssop?
SPEAKER_02: Wait, where is this coming from?
SPEAKER_02: Well, hyssop was a plant, uh, and he was referencing this purification ritual that would have been really well known at the time because this was like a little bushy herb, and you could bundle the leaves together, and in this purification ritual, uh they would dip this plant into either water or blood and then sprinkle it over the person who needed to be clean.
SPEAKER_02: And then sometimes there would also be this additional process called fulling, and it was how you would like clean and whiten wool, and you'd soak it, beat it, stretch it out, leave it in the sun, and it would sit there until it became white, which is why David says whiter than snow.
SPEAKER_02: And so what David's doing here is he's using a well-known ritual as this poetic way of asking God for cleansing on the inside that flows to the outside.
SPEAKER_02: And that's what he continues to ask for more in verse 10.
SPEAKER_02: He says, God, give me a clean heart, renew a steadfast spirit within me.
SPEAKER_02: He's not just being asked to be cleansed in the moment, like, hey God, can you give me my get out of jail free card?
SPEAKER_02: He's saying, fix the things in me that got me here.
SPEAKER_02: Heal those broken parts of me that led me to a place where I can make this decision.
SPEAKER_02: And then in verse 11, he says something that can be confusing.
SPEAKER_02: He says, Don't cast me away from your presence and do not take your Holy Spirit from me.
SPEAKER_02: And I remember reading this as a kid and uh thinking, I didn't know that was an option.
SPEAKER_02: That kind of scares me.
SPEAKER_02: Like losing the Holy Spirit, like what's going on here?
SPEAKER_02: But you have to understand the context this is being written in.
SPEAKER_02: In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit would usually come upon specific people to equip them for roles.
SPEAKER_02: You see it with Moses or Joshua or some of the judges like Gideon and Samson or even the kings, Saul and David, and sometimes prophets, Isaiah and Ezekiel.
SPEAKER_02: And then after Jesus, crucifixion, burial, resurrection, uh, he promises his followers, you will receive the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_02: And then at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit falls and permanently indwells believers.
SPEAKER_02: According to Ephesians 1.13, they were sealed with the Holy Spirit, which is this very permanent language.
SPEAKER_02: And so you're not gonna lose the Holy Spirit on this side of Jesus, but David's writing long before Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: The Spirit wasn't given permanently to every believer yet.
SPEAKER_02: It was usually selective and temporary, and it was tied to a role in God's plan.
SPEAKER_02: And it could be taken.
SPEAKER_02: That happened to Saul.
SPEAKER_02: Saul lost the Spirit.
SPEAKER_02: And so why do you think David's saying this?
SPEAKER_02: He watched it happen.
SPEAKER_02: And so that is the context this is being written in.
SPEAKER_02: Not that we can lose the Holy Spirit, but that in David's context, that actually was a possibility.
SPEAKER_02: But why in the world does that matter to us then?
SPEAKER_02: If we don't have to worry about that, well, there's something in David's posture that I think we can learn from.
SPEAKER_02: And that's that even in his darkness moment, he desires a closeness with God.
SPEAKER_02: And how how often is our response the opposite?
SPEAKER_02: Like, I want to run, I want to hide.
SPEAKER_02: You see Adam and Eve, they they hide in the garden.
SPEAKER_02: Sin pushes away, but David says, no, I'm gonna lean in because he understood that he was made for a relationship with God, and that's his source of life.
SPEAKER_02: And while sin can't remove us from that relationship, it can create distance because sin has residual effects.
SPEAKER_02: If you sin by looking at someone lustfully, that lustful part of your flesh will grow.
SPEAKER_02: And you'll be much more prone to click that link late at night when you're by yourself.
SPEAKER_02: Or if you sin by lying to cover yourself up at work, that deceptive part of your flesh is gonna grow and the next lie and the next lie and the next lie will just become easier and easier and bigger and bigger.
SPEAKER_02: If you sin by scrolling Amazon late at night and buying a bunch of stuff you don't need, that greedy, materialistic part of your flesh will grow.
SPEAKER_02: And the next time you feel stressed or uncomfortable, you'll be so much quicker to go back and try to chase it away by spending.
SPEAKER_02: What you feed grows.
SPEAKER_02: If you water it, it's going to bloom.
SPEAKER_02: And so when you confess sin, this is the practical piece.
SPEAKER_02: Pray specifically that God would burn out whatever part of the whatever part of your flesh you just fed, that he would kill it, that he would remove it.
SPEAKER_02: Ask God, remove those images from my mind.
SPEAKER_02: Remove the anger from my heart from holding on to that bitterness, remove the words from bouncing around in my head.
SPEAKER_02: And this is where fasting can actually be a huge tool.
SPEAKER_02: Fasting is spending time intentionally abstaining from food to devote yourself to prayer.
SPEAKER_02: And so you go without food for a day, two days, or even half a day.
SPEAKER_02: And every time you feel hungry, you redirect your mind and your heart towards prayer and say, God, will you break these strongholds in my life?
SPEAKER_02: God, I am prone to anger.
SPEAKER_02: Will you remove that part of me?
SPEAKER_02: God, I am prone to lust.
SPEAKER_02: Will you remove that part of me?
SPEAKER_02: God, I'm prone to um, I'm prone to comparison, gossip, whatever it is.
SPEAKER_02: God, burn that out.
SPEAKER_02: But here's the thing: you want to hate sin like he does, but it's more than just hating sin.
SPEAKER_02: David writes, restore to me the joy of your salvation.
SPEAKER_02: See, it's not only what he's turning from, but who he's turning towards.
SPEAKER_02: It's praying, God, don't make me just hate sin, make me love following you.
SPEAKER_02: Don't just make me hate lust, make me love a life of purity.
SPEAKER_02: God, don't make me just hate greed.
SPEAKER_02: Help me to love the joy of living generously.
SPEAKER_02: God, don't just make me hate pride.
SPEAKER_02: Give me a deep heart for walking in humility.
SPEAKER_02: Lord, make me see things like you do.
SPEAKER_02: And as God changes your heart, your life will change too.
SPEAKER_02: And you're not going to live the way that you used to.
SPEAKER_02: And as a part of that new life, it becomes more and more visible.
SPEAKER_02: You get to be a picture, a walking picture of God's grace to other people.
SPEAKER_02: You get to share your story.
SPEAKER_02: And that's the hope that carries you through the pain of confessing sin, that there's life and joy on the other side of it.
SPEAKER_02: And that's the hope that David ends with in the Psalm, starting in verse 13.
SPEAKER_02: Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will be converted to you.
SPEAKER_02: Deliver me from blood guiltiness, O God, the God of my salvation.
SPEAKER_02: Then my tongue will joyfully sing of your righteousness.
SPEAKER_02: O Lord, open my lips that my mouth may declare your praise.
SPEAKER_02: For you do not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it.
SPEAKER_02: You are not pleased with burnt offering.
SPEAKER_02: The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
SPEAKER_02: So he appeals to God's character, he admits his sin, he asks God for renewal, and then he commits by committing, or he ends by committing to act out of gratitude.
SPEAKER_02: He says, I will teach sinners your ways, God.
SPEAKER_02: That my lips will joyfully sing of your righteousness, which almost sounds a little bit like he's trying to barter with God.
SPEAKER_02: Like, God, if you forgive me, I'm gonna do so much stuff for you, man.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I have no idea.
SPEAKER_02: That's not actually what's happening here because all throughout Israel's history, confession wasn't just a private prayer between them and God.
SPEAKER_02: It always led to something public.
SPEAKER_02: You see it all over the Psalms and even in the law.
SPEAKER_02: When God forgave Israel, they would respond with songs of praise and public worship.
SPEAKER_02: It was an overflow from what David called earlier the the joy of God's salvation.
SPEAKER_02: It wasn't a way to earn God's favor, rather, it was a response to what God had done.
SPEAKER_02: Because truly understanding that you're forgiven always leads to a joyful heart.
SPEAKER_02: I think back to church camp.
SPEAKER_02: I love camp, and I've had the blessing to get to lead a lot of incredible camps here at FBC.
SPEAKER_02: But my love for camp actually started when I was a student.
SPEAKER_02: We uh were up in Dallas and we would go to Highland Lakes Journey Camp on Lake Travis.
SPEAKER_02: Uh, in the beginning of the week, it would never fail.
SPEAKER_02: Everybody would be cranky, complaining about everything.
SPEAKER_02: It's hot.
SPEAKER_02: It's July in Texas.
SPEAKER_02: Yes, it's hot.
SPEAKER_02: Like we we live here, you know that.
SPEAKER_02: And then, you know, people be trying to sneak off.
SPEAKER_02: Girls would be planning their whole outfit and day around trying to get Chad from skinny jeans, non-Denoms, phone number, like just doing everything they can.
SPEAKER_02: It was just camp, right?
SPEAKER_02: But it never failed.
SPEAKER_02: Like four days later, uh, after a little bit of good old fashioned sleep deprivation, everybody's getting saved, right?
SPEAKER_02: Like the worship hits just right.
SPEAKER_02: The the speaker just brings his gospel fastball.
SPEAKER_02: He gives the invitation, all the hands go up, and then everybody's crying, and then we go back to the church group room, and it's share time, and everybody's making promises, right?
SPEAKER_02: Like I'm gonna wake up at 4 a.m.
SPEAKER_02: every day for the rest of my life and pray for three hours, and I'm gonna tell everybody at my school about Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: Or I am never gonna date another person again unless God personally writes their name in the sky.
SPEAKER_02: And I'm gonna be a missionary to Hawaii.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_02: And the reality is about 95% of those did not make it past a week, right?
SPEAKER_02: But here's the thing: I'm not hating on church camp.
SPEAKER_02: Uh experience is not the substance of our faith, but it is important.
SPEAKER_02: And at camp, a lot of us really did experience incredible forgiveness.
SPEAKER_02: Some for the first time.
SPEAKER_02: And even if our attempts were imperfect and fleeting at best, these commitments were our best effort at trying to respond to that forgiveness with gratitude, like David talks about.
SPEAKER_02: It was genuine, even if we didn't really know what we were doing.
SPEAKER_02: And it's not just a church camp thing, though.
SPEAKER_02: We're called to approach regular confession to God in the exact same way.
SPEAKER_02: When you confess to God, the Bible says you're forgiven.
SPEAKER_02: So you can thank God like you're forgiven.
SPEAKER_02: You can leave that conversation like it's true.
SPEAKER_02: If you're truly repentant, you don't need to sulk around for a few days hoping that it sticks.
SPEAKER_02: You can walk out with joy.
SPEAKER_02: But there is a caveat, there should be joy that leads to a response.
SPEAKER_02: Repentance, truly, that word meta noeo, it means to change direction.
SPEAKER_02: I'm walking this way, I stop, I turn around, and I go in the other direction.
SPEAKER_02: And so there might be some sort of real commitment.
SPEAKER_02: You might need to confess to your community.
SPEAKER_02: You might need to confess to your spouse.
SPEAKER_02: You might need to go ask for forgiveness or to make amends for something that you said or did.
SPEAKER_02: You might need to set up some guardrails.
SPEAKER_02: You might need covenant eyes, you might need screen time, you might need to join a recovery program like regeneration or celebrate recovery.
SPEAKER_02: You might actually need to do some things that are gonna be hard.
SPEAKER_02: But you can do it in joy because it's not trying to secure forgiveness, but it's a response from the forgiveness you've already received.
SPEAKER_02: It's gratitude.
SPEAKER_02: And on the other side of it is the hope that you get to be an example of God's grace to others.
SPEAKER_02: That something that once brought nothing but guilt and shame for you, God will use to bring hope and healing for others.
SPEAKER_02: And there's a beauty in that.
SPEAKER_02: And so to put it all together, through David's prayer in Psalm 51, we get a pretty good framework that we can follow.
SPEAKER_02: And we're not moralizing the method, right?
SPEAKER_02: This is just one way of doing it, but you can confess your sin to God.
SPEAKER_02: You appeal to God's character.
SPEAKER_02: Admit your sin.
SPEAKER_02: Ask for renewal and act out of gratitude.
SPEAKER_02: Appeal, admit, ask, act.
SPEAKER_02: I'll close with this.
SPEAKER_02: We're about to move towards a time of response and whatnot.
SPEAKER_02: I know many of you have probably been listening to me this entire time, and you're skeptical at best.
SPEAKER_02: Like that's nice and all, but you don't know what I've done.
SPEAKER_02: You don't know what I've said, the decisions I've made, the lies I've told, the people I've hurt, the secrets I have.
SPEAKER_02: And this whole talk about just praying and being forgiven seems naive at best, and at worst just cheap.
SPEAKER_02: But brother, let me tell you, ain't nothing about this grace that's cheap.
SPEAKER_02: Because 2,000 years ago, God put on flesh and Jesus stepped onto this earth and he lived a perfect life, did nothing wrong.
SPEAKER_02: All he ever did was walk the earth and bring healing and bring hope, bring the message of the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_02: But at the end of his life, he was nailed to a tree, hung on the side of the road, beaten, naked, and died of suffocation.
SPEAKER_02: And he didn't die that death as an accident.
SPEAKER_02: It wasn't like he said the wrong words, got too involved in the political scene.
SPEAKER_02: No.
SPEAKER_02: The scriptures say that that was the entire reason he came here.
SPEAKER_02: Because on that cross, he became our sin.
SPEAKER_02: That God took the wrath that we had earned and he dumped it onto Jesus so our sin could be paid for, final and finished.
SPEAKER_02: And so when we talk about forgiveness, we're not just talking about God looking the other way, sweeping your sin under the rug, letting you off the hook this time.
SPEAKER_02: He looked in it in all of its vile ugliness and he said, I'm gonna pay for it.
SPEAKER_02: And look, I don't know what you've done.
SPEAKER_02: But the one who knows every hair on your head, every decision you've ever made, everything you hope to take to the grave, he looks at you in all of your mess and says, I want that one.
SPEAKER_02: I want the one who hates the way they look in the mirror.
SPEAKER_02: I want the one who said one last time a million times, I want the one who's made a mess of their family, I want that one.
SPEAKER_02: So, brother, this grace ain't cheap, but it was paid for by someone else.
SPEAKER_02: And salvation is a free gift.
SPEAKER_02: Romans 10, 9 says, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
SPEAKER_02: So have you.
SPEAKER_02: And if you haven't, that invitation is open to you this morning.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe for the first time.
SPEAKER_02: Don't put it off because nothing I said, that framework, none of that matters until you get right with God and accept the free gift of salvation and become his child.
SPEAKER_02: But for those of you who have, we're about to move into a time of response, and I want you to encourage you.
SPEAKER_02: We're gonna have two songs, just as I am in gratitude.
SPEAKER_02: And this is going to be our practice.
SPEAKER_02: This is going to be our first opportunity to pray this type of prayer of confession.
SPEAKER_02: So, this first song, I want you to commit to me.
SPEAKER_02: Don't stand up, don't leave.
SPEAKER_02: I just want you to stay where you are.
SPEAKER_02: Everything will still be there when you leave.
SPEAKER_02: And if not, you can personally blame me.
SPEAKER_02: Email it to J Smith at FBC Bernie.
SPEAKER_02: Let him know.
SPEAKER_02: But in all seriousness, I just want you to stay in this moment and I want you to work through those first three.
SPEAKER_02: Just start by thinking about how God loves you.
SPEAKER_02: Appeal to his character.
SPEAKER_02: That's in his word.
SPEAKER_02: I'm not just making this stuff up.
SPEAKER_02: That's how he decided to describe himself to Moses.
SPEAKER_02: Admit your sin.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe for the first time in your life, you've been following Jesus for 40 years and you've never actually sat down and prayed your sin and all of its detail to God.
SPEAKER_02: Tell it to him, knowing that he loves you, but come clean.
SPEAKER_02: Be honest, be fully known so that you can feel fully loved.
SPEAKER_02: And then ask for renewal.
SPEAKER_02: And look, there's not a single one of us who walked in here this morning without something to confess to God.
SPEAKER_02: And so that first song, Just As I Am, is a great opportunity to do that.
SPEAKER_02: And then I wish I could say that we planned this.
SPEAKER_02: We didn't.
SPEAKER_02: It was just the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_02: That next song we're going to sing is gratitude.
SPEAKER_02: And so that's where we get to practice that last A, to act out in gratitude.
SPEAKER_02: And so I want you to leave that moment of confessing your sin to God.
SPEAKER_02: Stand up, raise your hands, get on your knees, get on your face.
SPEAKER_02: I don't care, but act like somebody who's been forgiven because you have.
SPEAKER_02: And respond in that way.
SPEAKER_02: Would you pray with me?
SPEAKER_02: Lord God, we thank you this morning for your word.
SPEAKER_02: We thank you for the blood of Jesus that makes a way for us to be clean.
SPEAKER_02: That God, we don't have to be crushed by the weight of our sin because you crushed your son for it.
SPEAKER_02: And that by faith we can accept the free gift of salvation.
SPEAKER_02: And so, Lord, for all of us who are here this morning, Lord, I pray that you would give us clear eyes to see our sin and just to lay it at your feet this morning as response.
SPEAKER_02: That we would walk out of here free of the guilt, free of the shame, because we don't have to bear it anymore because you bore it for us.
SPEAKER_02: We don't have to pay for our sin anymore because you paid for it.
SPEAKER_02: And so, Lord, can we all lay it at your feet this morning?
SPEAKER_02: Father, we love you.
SPEAKER_02: We praise you.
SPEAKER_02: We pray these things in the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.