Coming Back To God

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Coming Back to God

ACL-19 DAV-13 DSS-40

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COMING BACK TO GOD

JAMES 1:13-16
DAVID ON PSALM 51

Transcript

Let’s open to the songbook of the Bible, the Book of Psalms, and we’re going to look and pick right up with David, who as we saw him sliding away from the Lord, we’re going to pick up with him as he is far from God. And as the horrible reality of that takes place, David loses his song. And I want to explain what I mean to you from this book.

This is the songbook, the psalms, or songs are a book of worship songs that primarily David and others, Korah and Asaph and others, inspired by God wrote. But I want you to see the horrible result of sin in David’s life because David, who was known as the man who was so attuned with God, he was really a heart after God. He was a man after God’s very own heart who sang the sweet songs of God. It starts drying up and before you know it, the light of the worship of God had just gone out in his life and David had lost his song, but we don’t want to stay there. We’re going to look at what it means to come back to God. And what coming back to God means. And it is not just if you’ve murdered someone like David did, or if you’ve committed adultery like David did, or if you’ve lied to God, if you’ve broken every law in the book. It’s just when the song goes out, we need to come back to God. And I want to show you that this morning.

But listen for a moment and then we’ll jump into the Psalms. The ornate halls of Jerusalem’s Royal Palace seem so strangely silent these days. It was almost as if David had lost his voice In the days past, there were sweet songs of God’s power that were often heard coming from the throne room of this victorious warrior, the shepherd boy become king, had carried his stringed instrument, his harp or liar into the very daily life of God’s people as he led them. This man who was a living and talking expression of God’s heart was always refreshing. Those he touched with his praises to the Lord.

It became refreshingly a daily treat for the myriads of aides and clerks, the military attachés who came in their business and heard the king rapturously sing the great hymns of worship.

Why down the halls flowed rivers of praise to the Lord, they would pass by the trophy cases of conquered treasures taken from fallen kingdoms that David, God’s warrior, had toppled for the glory of God. Those songs rolled past the storehouses that were just overflowing with consecrated gold and silver heaped in piles for the future Temple of God. These songs poured out of David’s mouth. They were from a heart that was filled with the goodness of God. And each song or psalm sent from God to David were such a treasure from Heaven.

We have them and you hold them this morning. They’ve been preserved for over 3000 years. Pillaging armies have swept across the Middle East like hordes of locusts, fires have burned for weeks behind them in the rubble of ruined cities, blood of the Israelites has flown like rivers and then the natural disasters, earthquakes have leveled cities and towns, floods, and storms without number have raced down the hillsides of Palestine. But God never let us lose His songs, not one of them has been lost. And we hold, this morning, and the Bible you have in your hand is a copy of these songs called the Psalms.

But their author fell silent. No more did David sing. David had lost his song. No more did the daily business of the Kingdom of Israel flow to the songs of Heaven. No more did the good shepherd’s peace and joy touch each worker, aid, and courier. The palace was slowly becoming a wasteland. David was quiet, pensive, and moody. His face became dark, no longer a glow with the joy of the Lord. His words that used to seem like honey were now more like his sword that dangled from his belt sharp, cutting, bringing death to those around him. Gone was God from his daily work. Extinct were the life-giving expressions of joyful delight that nourished the government of God’s people. What a blessing those songs had been.

Let’s look at a few of them. Look at Psalm 8, and I just want to remind you of what was going up and down the halls of Jerusalem’s royal palace for so long that now was extinct from David’s life. Psalm 8, oh Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Your name in all the Earth. You who have set Your glory above the heavens. Those words once rolled down from the throne room of David, Psalm 9, I will praise the O Lord with my whole heart. I’ll show forth all of your marvelous works, David said, but he wasn’t.

Now look at Psalm 18, as David returned at the head of his armies after he destroyed, and in the superscription if you have it, the first verse in the Hebrew manuscript is always the little superscription or attribute. And it says, for the choir director, a Psalm of David, the serving of the Lord who spoke to the Lord the words of this song in the day that the Lord delivered him from the hands of all his enemies and from the hands of Saul.

And he said, that’s the first verse in Hebrew manuscript. And this is what he said. Psalm 18, I will love Thee, oh Lord, my strength. The Lord is my rock, my fortress, my deliverer, my God, my rock in whom I take refuge. Only he didn’t just say that as a leader of God’s people, he sang that, and with a heart of abandon, a heart utterly welling up, a heart unashamed of coming into God’s presence, a heart that led all who were around him into God’s presence. He just overflowed and people were so blessed just to see him, just to hear him, just to feel the warmth and the glow.

Continuing on Psalm 21, he gives his testimony in the song again, as the ruler of God’s people. It says, the king shall joy in thy strength. Oh Lord, in Thy salvation, how greatly shall he rejoice? And so, he did. And for year after year after year, the invincible armies of Israel extended the borders of God’s kingdom to the very limits. But things changed. No more was Psalm 25 heard in the palace. Psalm 25 that says unto the, oh Lord, I lift up my soul. Oh my God, I trust in Thee. Psalm 27, the Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom shall I fear? David no longer was in the light. No longer was he enjoying the joy of his salvation. No longer was he knowing the fearlessness that the righteous have. The righteous are bold as a lion, but wicked people run even when nobody’s chasing them. And God says, David, you’ve lost your song.

Finally. Look at Psalm 48, and we could look at so many Psalms. But Psalm 48, a psalm that David’s helpers, especially Kora and others that led in temple worship, had put together and truly was the theme song of Jerusalem, great as the Lord and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness.

But what went wrong? How can it be, did God just shut off that river of blessing? Did the city no longer have the blessing of God’s presence? The Scriptures say that when we turn away from Him, when we go our own way, that He withholds His blessing. Do you remember last week, the sequence wonderfully by God’s power, a humble teenage David had slain God’s enemy, Goliath. But later in life, a proud David ignoring all that God had said, allowed the giant of lust to come into his house and to slay him.

And David, the giant killer, killed by the giant of lust steps downward into this abysmal dark time in his life. He started by an incomplete obedience to God and His mind, and that desensitized his mind and his conscience, and he no longer was sensitive to obedience to God, and as his mind relaxed its grip on God’s holiness. He, also in his life, relaxed his grip on personal purity.

Then, we saw that he began, without all of the protection God offered him, he began to fixate his heart on his physical desires. He began to rationalize about the wrong decisions he was making. He finally just shut out those who were telling him he was wrong. He plunged in and he descended his life into lustful sin. And, he destroyed his testimony. In that sin of a moment, in that momentary stolen pleasure, in came all of lusts entourage. Death, deceit, murder, immorality, spiritual oppression, spiritual poverty, a famine of his soul, all of those things for just an instant of stolen sensual sexual immorality. David learned what a horrible thing sin is. It deceived with all the glittering promises and destroys precisely.

Turn over to Psalm 51 and we’re going to just walk through this wonderful framework that God gives. It’s a framework of how we get back to God. How we find the course back to God. And when we’ve been defeated by the giant of lust or the giant of despair or the giant of selfishness or the giant of anything, God says you can come back to Me if you’ve lost your song. If you no longer are welling up and overflowing with praise to God, you can come back. God says, I want you to know I’m going to give you a map to come back to God.

Number one, in the first four verses, to come back to God we have to follow David. Let’s see what he did. The first thing David did was he began to focus on God’s character. And remember this, God is exalted whether or not we sin because God is infinite and eternal and he is not like the stock market bouncing around by whatever’s coming in from anywhere. God is the same. His changeless-ness we’re going to see in a few weeks in the book of James, God is never eclipsed. He doesn’t come up and down. He doesn’t wane. Even our sun, our solar powerhouse out there that warms our planet, it goes through phases. It has a cycle. It gets brighter and dimmer. It gets hotter and it gets cooler. It affects the Earth more and less. God isn’t like that. There’s no variation with Him. And God, David saw, is exalted even when we sin because God’s character must be focused on. That it is holy, infinitely pure. Let’s see him do that.

First of all, verse 1. This is what David writes. And by the way… again, the superscription, if you have it in your Bible, it’s a valuable part of our Bible study and some of the modern Bibles just leave it right out. But every manuscript of the Hebrew Bible has as the first verse of the psalm these little supers descriptions, these little… what we call the stuff we don’t understand, these Hebrew words. But it says in Psalm 51:1, a c to one, For the Choir Director, a Psalm of David. When Nathan, the Prophet came to him after he had gone into Bathsheba. So, this is dead, this is right on, this is right in David’s life when God’s convicting prophet pokes his bony finger right into David’s nose. And of course, smitten, his song gone out, utterly wasted. We’ll see next week in Psalm 32, what he went through. He went through total physical, internal, just wasteland as he fought with God, as he hid his sin, as he acted like everything was okay, as he tried to go through the motions, the mechanics, as he tried to sing God’s song and it just fell flat. How did he get back to God?

Verse 1. Be gracious to me oh God, I’m appealing to You on the basis of Your character according to Your loving kindness. According to the greatness of thy compassion. You God, blot out my transgressions.

Number one, he says this, he says, God, You and You alone can renew our relationship. I sinned against You and I come to You, and I appeal to Your character. I appeal to You, my God. Your loving kindness, Your greatness, Your compassion. And You, and You alone can blot out my transgression. David says, Lord, renew our relationship. I’ve gone away from You. Only You can renew it.

Look at verse 2. He says, wash me thoroughly from my iniquity. Cleanse me from my sin. You notice all the different words he uses in the Greek language? There are five different words for sin in the Hebrew language, there’s a myriad of pictures, but basically, he says, I have transgressed. He says, I’ve gone over the line. You had a fence up and I climbed right over it. That’s the first word he uses. He says blot out my transgression. Verse 2. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity. My iniquity is my wicked internal filth. He says, I’m iniquitous on the inside. Continuing, he says, cleanse me from my sin. And sin means missing the mark. He says, I have missed the mark. It’s like I’ve fallen short of Your standard. In the Hebrew world, when they would shoot their arrows, if the arrow didn’t quite make it to the target, it was called missing the mark. And what God says is, we all fall short of His glory. God is here and no matter how hard we try, we just can’t get up to Him because we fall short of Him. And David says, I have crossed the line. You said don’t go over that. Now, I went over that. I am dirty inside and I can’t make it to You. I’ve missed the mark. So, I ask You to cleanse me. And David says this, only You Lord can wash us clean.

I like what William Cowper once wrote. It was his testimony. He was a sinner, as all of us were born into this world, sinners by nature, our very nature is sinful. Our choices are sinful, and God has decreed that we’re sinners. God says we are all, even the sweet little babies that come into this world are sinners by nature. And as soon as they can make their own choices, they’ll choose to sin. And God has already decreed all of us lost in sin because of Adam’s transgression. And as soon as we realize that and come to him, William Cowper wrote these words; There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel’s veins and sinners who plunge beneath that flood, lose all their guilty stain. And as if there was any doubting, he says, lose all their guilty stains. Lose all their guilty stains.

It reminds me, when I was little, and the record player used to have a scratch and it would just keep going back in that groove… shows how old I am… record player. The young dudes don’t even know what that is. It’s in museums now, but it was really neat. The same line would just go over and over. And it sounds like the needle has gotten in the groove. Lose all their guilty stains, and sinners who plunge beneath that flood, lose all their guilty stains. David said, Lord, verse 1. You can renew our relationship. You can take the barrier away. You can remove the blocking cloud of sin and you can wash me clean.

Look at verse 3, for I know my transgressions and my sin is always before me. What he’s saying is, it’s a beautiful word. And remember, Hebrews is an oriental language. It’s an Eastern language. It’s much, much more like Chinese and all the eastern related languages than it is like English. Because it’s not very exact precise Greek words, it’s pictures. And each Hebrew word is like an entire graphic. And what he’s saying is, that my sin, look at verse 3. My transgressions and my sins are always in front of me. They’re always blocking me. And what he is talking about is, he said I’m trying to go over here and it’s in the way. And so, I decide I’m going to come to God this way and it’s right there again. And I just, I can’t get to you, God. He says, it’s blocking me. And what he says in verse 3 is, the Lord can remove the roadblock, the Lord can take away that which robs me of His presence and a fellowship with Him.

And look at verse 4, he said, against Thee and Thee only have I sinned and done what is evil in Thy sight so You’re justified when You speak and You’re blameless when You judge me. He said this, God only You can utterly forgive me because I’ve sinned against You. It wasn’t merely against Uriah. It wasn’t merely against the child. It wasn’t merely against Bathsheba. It wasn’t merely against my household servants that saw what I did. It wasn’t merely against the prophet Nathan who was so grieved. It wasn’t merely against all the people that no longer hear my songs. That doesn’t really cut it. It was against You, God. You were there all the time and I sinned against You. So, he began to focus on God’s character and he says, God, verse 1, You can renew our relationship. Verse 2, You can wash me clean. Verse 3, You can take away the roadblocks that just seem to just make it so I can’t get through to You. You can utterly forgive.

I sometimes have to just borrow the words of the poets. And one put it this way, Horatio Spafford said, my sin not in part but the whole, is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul. David said, You God can utterly forgive. And he focused on God’s character. And God is exalted even in our sin. In spite of our sin, God remains exalted. But when we focus on his character, he renews the relationship. He washes us clean. He takes away the roadblocks and he utterly forgives us.

But look at verse 5, because the second stop on this little map that David leaves of how to come back to God is in verse 5. And he says in verse 5, for behold, I was brought forth in iniquity. And in sin my mother conceived me. Now in the Middle Ages, the monastic types spent a lot of time on this, and that’s where they got this idea of celibacy was holier than monogamous marriage. Because why? Look. It’s sinful to conceive children. That’s not what he’s saying. God would not declare sinful something that He declared beautiful and wonderful and uses as a picture of Christ and the Church. What He’s saying is, that even at the instant of conception, which is a great verse that explains God’s perspective. You know what’s so interesting? The courts and the politicians and all the special interest groups are all saying my opinion is this, but God says that the instant of conception, a child. Look what it says in verse 5. In sin my mother conceived me. David said, when I was conceived in the womb of my mother, I was a person and I was the sinner. That instant wasn’t a week later. It wasn’t two days later. It wasn’t a month later. It wasn’t when I first started making sucking motions and put my thumb, from inside my mother’s womb in my mouth when I was three months old. He said at the very instant the conception occurred I was a person and I was a sinner too. I inherited the sin of my father, Adam, that has infected all the race except for one. The only one who didn’t have a human father, the only one that was supernaturally conceived, Jesus Christ. Everyone else [is] infected with sin.

And so he says, we need to focus on our character. Number one, we are sinful, we show our nature. When we sin, we show our choice. When we sin, we confirm God’s declaration, we are sinful. Now, that doesn’t make a lot of friends, that doesn’t influence people. A whole ministry is built on the fact that they will never mention sin. Jesus never called anybody a sinner, and I won’t either, one prominent television evangelist says. I’ll tell you what, people in Jesus’ presence didn’t need to be told, they knew it. That’s why they wanted to kill him. But we do, and we need to be reminded we’re sinful, we’re sinners. We were from the instant of conception. Sinners.

But verse 6 says that sin destroys our inner truthfulness. Behold, Thou just desires truth in our innermost parts. In the hidden part, Thou will make me to know wisdom. He says, this sin has made me, so as Jeremiah says, I’m deceitfully wicked. We can’t even tell the truth to ourselves. We rationalize. And David says, I did. He says, I need Your truth on the inside because I’m not telling the truth on the inside. He says, God, when I look at Your character, I see You’re exalted. But when I look at my character, I see I’m sinful.

Verse 7, David underlines the fact we’re defiled internally. He says, purify me with hyssop. Scrub me clean. Wash me and I’ll be whiter than snow. He says, I’m so aware of my utter filthiness on the inside compared with God’s holiness. Remember, in the light of other people’s sin mine doesn’t look so bad, and if you want to really feel good, just look at somebody else. Just say, oh man, I’m not like them. Oh, I’m not like that. Oh, ha ha, I’m not like that. But if you want to really feel awful, look up. Compare yourself with God. Compare myself with God, and we see what we really are. And that’s what he does. And he says, purify me. I see myself. I see my character.

Verse 8. He continues. And as sinners, we lose our joy. And he says, make me to hear joy and gladness, I’ve lost it. Let the bones, which You have broken, rejoice. He says, I’ve lost my song. I don’t hear Your joyful song anymore.

And verse 9, he concludes this section. He says I just lost my fellowship with God. Hide Thy face from my sins. Blot out all my iniquities. He says, God I just, the roadblocks there. I’m a sinner. And in this little section, it’s interesting, we start by focusing on God as he does in verses 1 through 4, but we continue by focusing on our character and seeing that we’re sinful. That verse 5 says, we’re sinful by our own nature, our own choice, and by God’s declaration. Verse 6, that sin destroys our inner truthfulness. Verse 7, it defiles us internally. Verse 8, we lose our joy. Verse 9, we’ve lost the fellowship with God. It’s gone.

But now look at verse 10. David says, I’m going to focus on God’s work. I’m going to focus on what God does. I’ve seen God’s character and I’ve seen mine. I’m sorry about mine and I rejoice in His. But I’m going to look at God’s work. In verse 10, he says this, God is washing our hearts. Create in me a clean heart, Oh God. Renew a steadfast spirit within me. Not one that says one day, okay I’ll obey You God, the next day I won’t obey You God. He said, I want a steadfast spirit. I want one that doesn’t turn. He says, I want one that is stuck to the Lord. God is washing our hearts.

Couple of my favorite verses. Hebrews 9:14. How much more shall the blood of Christ through the Eternal Spirit purge your conscience? The inner being of our conscience that records what we do, He will purge our conscience from the works that lead to death that we might serve God. Hebrews 10:22 says, we can draw near to God, unashamed with no fear. Having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience. Our bodies washed with pure water. God is washing our hearts. Secondly in verse 11, God is restoring our walk in the Spirit. It says, don’t cast me away from Thy presence. Don’t take your Holy Spirit from me. He was so aware that the sweet influence of the Holy Spirit that came upon him, that filled his heart with joy, with songs, with peace that made him a blessing, had been pulled back. So David says, I want You to renew my heart by washing it. Verse 10.

I want you to restore my walk by giving me Your Spirit back in verse 11. Verse 12, he says, I want you to bring back the fruit of the Spirit in my life. He says, restore to me the joy of my salvation. Sustain me with a willing spirit. Remember, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy. Fruit of the Spirit. Joy. It’s not something that we get by moving. It’s not something we get by buying something. It’s not something we get by accomplishing something. It’s an internal fruit born by the Spirit of God that grows inside of us. He says, bring back the fruitfulness of your Spirit and my. I’m going to focus on Your work. I want You to wash my heart. I want You to restore my walking in the power of Your Spirit. I want You to renew His fruit growing in me.

Verse 13, he concludes this section focusing on God’s work. And he says, I want You, oh God, to help me have further ministry. Sometimes when we hit the bottom, when we’re into sin, we just think it’s all over nothing. I can’t do anything. I’m useless. Look what he says in verse 13. When I let You, God do all this, when I let You wash my heart, when I let You restore my walk in the Spirit, when I let You renew His bringing forth fruit in my life, You prepare me for further ministry. Then verse 13 says, I’ll teach transgressors Thou’s ways and sinners will be converted to Thee. Wow. David said, I’m going to come back. I’m going to serve You. Now, he didn’t go back while he was still in sin. There was quite a long period of time. God had worked through the process and had utterly cleansed him, filled him back with joy.

Finally, first of all, the first four verses we focus on God’s character. Then from verses 5 through 9, we focus on our character. And then from verses 10 through 13, we focus on God’s work. But then starting in verse 14, we have to look at what God expects from us, our work. What are we supposed to do? Remember how the Apostle Paul says, work out your salvation. Boy, people get all nervous about that. They say, oh, I thought there’s no works. No, there’s a response. You can call it response. But focus on our work, or our response. We must repent. Now, there’s a lost word. I’ll say it again. It’s so absent nowadays. Must, repent. Now look at verse 14. Very beautiful. Verse 14. First of all, we have to call sin what it is. It’s sin. And a lot of people, they’re willing to say, I made a mistake. They’re willing to say, I didn’t do that as well as I should have. They’re willing to say, I don’t… I’m sorry I wasn’t unkind, or whatever. Instead of saying I sinned. People don’t like that. Why? Because to say I sinned, you have to agree with God. And all that’s within us, our flesh, our pride, rebels against that. We don’t want to say that we sinned. We want to say we made mistakes, that we’re weak, but not that we sin.

He calls sin what it is. Look at verse 14. Deliver me from blood guiltiness. Wait a minute, did he kill Uriah? No, I thought an ammonite did. He killed him. He sent him there, he deceived, he negotiated, he deceptively brought him to the forefront and had him killed. And so, look what… he finally does it. He repents by calling sin what it is, deliver me from blood guiltiness. I killed Uriah. Oh God, Thou God of my salvation, my tongue will joyfully sing of your righteousness then. He says, I’ll call sin what it is. In my life that was sin. God, forgive me of that. Cleanse me of that. Renew me. Number one, as we focus on our work, we must repent by calling sin what it is.

Number two, verse 15 says, not only do we have to call sin what it is, we have to start talking to God. Look what happens. Oh Lord, open my lips that my mouth may declare Thy praise. When we’re down in sin, we’re strangely silent to God. That’s what Psalm 32 is all about. We’ll see it next week. He just closed his mouth. He wasn’t talking to God. In fact, he wasn’t talking to anybody. He was just, he’d lost his song. He wasn’t interested in talking to God. And our work, when we call sin what it is, when we repent, we have to start talking to God. We have to just open our lips and say, God, open my mouth back up. Don’t let me hang around down here in the lowlands. Let my mouth declare your praise. And sometimes when we’re down, if all we’ll do is just start praising God for who He is and what He’s done and what He means to us, God will just restore our joy.

Next, verses 16 and 17, we have to experience true contrition and not mere externalism. Look what he says. You don’t delight, verse 16, in sacrifice. Otherwise, I would give it. You’re not pleased with burn offerings. Verse 17. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart. Oh God, You will not despise. You see, it would’ve been easy to just taken a lamb and taken it to the tabernacle and had him kill it in his place. It would’ve been easy to have brought a guilt offering. It would’ve been easy to have brought a sin offering. God says, I don’t want you to merely externally do something. I want you on the inside to have a broken spirit. What does James say? Be afflicted and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning, your joy to heaviness. What did Paul say? Godly sorrow works repentance not to be repented of. But the sorrow of the world, works death. Let me explain the difference.

Godly sorrow is, God, I have sinned against You. I have broken Your righteous standard. I have, and you name the sin. You know what the sorrow of the world is? Oh no, I’ve lost my health. Oh no, I have lost my job. Oh no, I have a sexually transmitted disease. Oh no, I am pregnant or whatever. We just, we sorrow over what happens to us. That’s not godly sorrow. That’s not sorrow that brings repentance. Reminds me of what Howie Hendricks says. He says, when the man goes into the quick stop place and sees the pornographic material and stands there and looks at it and begins the fires burning within him. When he comes out, he goes, God, I’m sorry I looked at the magazine. That’s not confession. Confession is saying, I wanted to and I did and I began a fire as the writer of Proverbs says, within my bosom, that will burn me up. And God, I ask You to cleanse that and take away that wicked desire. That’s confession. Admission doesn’t count. And he says here, I’m not going to admit, I’m going to confess. I’m going to experience true contrition. Not me, externalism. I’m not just going to offer some little lamb. I’m going to be broken hearted inside.

Finally, verses 18 and 19, we’re looking at what he had to do. He had to call sin what it was. Verse 14, he had to talk to God. Verse 15. He had to experience true contrition and not mere externalism in 16 and 17. And then, wonderfully verses 18 and 19, he had to begin zealous worship and fresh and new seeking of God. Look at 18. Buy Thy favor, do good for Zion. Build the walls of Jerusalem. Then thou will delight in righteous sacrifices and burn offerings and whole burn offerings. And the young bulls will be offered on Thy altar. What he’s saying is, he says, God, now that I’m back with You. He says, I’m going to zealously follow your program. I’m going to zealously praise You in Zion. I’m going to zealously bring my offerings to You. But not as a token. But now from a true heart.

What’s the road back to God? Number one. When you get away from Him and lose your song focus on His character. He’s exalted even when we sin and only He can renew the relationship. In verse 1, only He can wash us clean. In verse 2, only He can take away the roadblocks that keep us from His presence. In verse 3, only He can utterly forgive us. No one else can. And then after we focus on Him, we need to look at ourself and focus on our character and see that we’re sinful. That we’re sinful, in verse 5, from birth and even from conception. In verse 6. That sin has destroyed our ability to tell the truth even to ourselves. Verse 7. We’re defiled internally and only God can cleanse it. Verse 8. When we’re in sin, we have no joy. Verse 9. We have no fellowship with God.

Thirdly, we have to focus on what God wants to do. Starting in verse 10, He wants to renew us by washing our hearts. Verse 11. By restoring the ability, we have to walk in the Spirit every day. Verse 12. By renewing the growth of fruit in our life that was killed by the frost of sin. He brings it back and gives us new life. And finally, he prepares us for further ministry. And then he concludes his psalm with the fourth and one of the most critical steps. We have to focus on what our responsibility is and our responsibility, starting in verse 14, is to repent. We need to call sin when it is, in our life. We need to begin to talk to God about it. We need to begin to experience true contrition on the inside. In verses 16 and 17. And then get back started into zealous worship anew and afresh, looking at God.

Someone wrote a hymn about this and I love the words of this hymn. I think this captures what David said. And I think we all need to think about have we lost our song? Is God evaporating from our life? Was there a time when you were seeking the Lord like David. And everything you did you were excited about, now you’re like a dog growling if anybody gets near you? If so, verse one of 341. I’ve wandered far away from God, but now I’m coming home. The paths of sin too long have tried. Lord, I’m coming home. Coming home, coming home, never more to roam. Open now your arms of love. Lord, I’m coming home.

We need to regularly experience coming back to God and saying God, I’m not going to roam anymore. I don’t want to lose my song. I want to lose Your joy. Let’s bow before Him.

Oh, Father, I pray that this song will be a confession in some hearts this morning. I don’t think we have anybody that’s killed someone this morning, that’s killed the husband of some woman they were seeking like David did, but just as grievous in your sight is someone who’s killing their relationship with their husband or wife with bitterness, with anger. Someone who’s killing their relationship with loved ones through impatience and rudeness, someone who’s destroying their relationship with You by neglect and cold heartedness toward You, oh God. Someone who’s destroying the future of having a godly marriage by immorality and by playing with sin and by living for momentary pleasure. And I pray whatever has drawn us away from You this morning, that [we] will turn from that, and that this song will be a song of confession that, Lord, we’re coming home to You and will accept Your forgiveness and Your cleansing. And that you’ll renew the fruitfulness in our life. Give us back our song and let us testify for You. I pray that this will be a time of moving by Your Spirit in our midst, for Christ’s sake, amen.

Notes

Where have all the songs gone? The ornate halls of Jerusalem’s royal palace were strangely silent these days. It seemed as if David had lost his voice. In days past sweet songs of God’s power were often heard coming from the throne room of this victorious warrior. The shepherd boy become king had carried his stringed instrument, a harp or lyre, into the daily life of leading God’s people. This man who was a living and talking expression of God’s heart was always refreshing those he touched with his praises to the Lord.

It became refreshingly a daily treat for the myriads of aides and clerks and military attaches to hear their king rapturously sing great hymns of worship. Down the halls flowed rivers of praise to the Lord passing the conquered treasures taken from fallen kingdoms, past the storehouses overflowing with the consecrated gold and silver heaped for the future temple to God. These songs poured out of David’s mouth from a heart filled with the goodness of God. Each song or Psalm sent from God to David was such a treasure from heaven.

They have been preserved for three thousand years. Pillaging armies have swept across the Middle East like hordes of locust, fires have burned for weeks behind them, blood has flowed like rivers, earthquakes have leveled cities and towns, floods and storms without number have raced down the hillsides. But God kept His songs. Not one has been lost. Most of us hold a copy of these songs in our Bibles they are called Psalms.

But no more. David fell silent. He had lost his song. No more did the daily business of the Kingdom of Israel flow to the songs of heaven. No more did the good shepherd’s peace and joy touch each worker, aide and courier. It was slowly becoming a wasteland. David was quiet, pensive and moody. His face was dark, no longer aglow with joy. His words that used to seem like honey were now more like his sword at his belt – sharp, cutting and bringing death.
Gone was God from daily work. Extinct were the life giving expressions of joyful delight that nourished the government of God’s people. What a blessing those songs had been. Songs like:

Psalm 8: “O LORD our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth! Who hast set thy glory above the heavens.”
Psalm 9: “ I will praise thee, O LORD, with my whole heart; I will shew forth all thy marvellous works.”
Psalm 18: “I will love thee, O LORD, my strength.”
Psalm 21: “The king shall joy in thy strength, O LORD; and in thy salvation how greatly shall he rejoice!”
Psalm 25: “Unto Thee oh Lord do I lift up my soul; O my God I trust in Thee.”
Psalm 27: “The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear”
Psalm 48: “Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness.”

But what went wrong? How can it be? Does God just shut off the rivers of blessing? Yes when we turn away from Him and go our own way. Remember the sequence? Wonderfully by God’s power humble teen aged David slew God’s enemy Goliath. But later in life a proud David:

ignored God’s word and
allowed another giant to come right into God’s city Jerusalem, and
welcomed God’s enemy into the presence of this man after God’s own heart, and
David was slain by the giant of LUST!

David the giant killer, killed by the giant of lust. We noted six dreadful steps down in II Samuel. Join me in II Samuel 5:

David Desensitized his conscience by incomplete obedience II Sam 5:13
David Relaxed his grip on personal purity II Sam 11:1
David Fixated his heart on physical desires v. 2
David Rationalized his mind about wrong decisions v. 3
David Decended his life into lustful sin v. 4
David Destroyed his testimony by the sin of a moment of stolen pleasure. Death, deceit, murder, immorality and spiritual oppression, poverty and famine of the soul are only a few offspring of this act of momentary pleasure.

What a horrible thing sin is. It deceives with all those glittering promises. It destroys with the precision of a surgeon. How do we get back on the track? I think the key is of course in the Word. Let’s close in Psalm 51. When you have been defeated by the giant of lust David is inspired of God to tell us four steps we can take to come back to God.

WE MUST – FOCUS ON GOD‘S CHARACTER: HE IS EXALTED EVEN IN OUR SIN (51:1-4)

The Lord can RENEW OUR RELATIONSHIP v. 1
The Lord can WASH US CLEAN v. 2
- William Cowper once wrote:
  There is a fountain filled with blood
  Drawn from Immanuel’s veins;
  And sinners plunged beneath that flood
  Lose all their guilty stains;
  Lose all their guilty stains;
  Lose all their guilty stains;
  And sinners plunged beneath that flood
  Lose all their guilty stains.
The Lord can REMOVE THE ROADBLOCK v. 3
The Lord can UTTERLY FORGIVE v. 4
- Horatio G. Spafford once penned these blessed words:
  My sin, not in part, but the whole,
  Is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more,
  Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!

WE MUST – FOCUS ON OUR CHARACTER: WE ARE SINFUL (51:5-9)

As Sinners we show our nature, our choice and confirm God’s declaration. v. 5
As Sinners we destroy inner truthfulness v. 6
As sinners we are defiled internally v. 7
As sinners we lose our joy v. 8
As sinners we lose fellowship with our God v. 9

WE MUST – FOCUS ON GOD‘S WORK: HE IS RENEWING (51:10-13)

God is washing our hearts v. 10 [Heb 9.14; 10.22]
God is restoring our walk in the Spirit v. 11
God is renewing the fruit of the Spirit v. 12
God is preparing us for further ministry v. 13

WE MUST – FOCUS ON OUR WORK: WE MUST REPENT (51:14-19)

Call sin what it is v. 14 (David murdered Uriah)
Talk to God v. 15 (Psalm 32 David had dried up spiritually)
Experience true contrition not mere externalism v. 16-17
Begin zealous worship anew and afresh v. 18-19

If we neglect fleeing lust and rooting out What can we do right now to get us started back to God’s path or keep us on that path? Let me give you three choice we need to make:

1. MAKE YOURSELF LOOK AT THE FINAL RESULT or ultimate form (mature plant) of the momentary choices of (or seeds you are planting) today.

If your parents knew what you have been hiding from them, would it crush them and grieve their hearts?

If your husband or wife knew about the area you have surrendered to lust, would it rob your relationship of joy and trust?

If you keep on in this path what will it do to your body, your family, your reputation and your heavenly reward?

Is it really worth as much as it will eventually cost you?

FLEE YOUTHFUL LUSTS. Because soon they will –
1. HABITUATE your lusts
2. CRIPPLE your conscience
3. SOIL your mind
4. DESENSITIZE your warning system
5. MISUSE your body, mind and eyes
6. SPOIL your ability to give
7. LESSEN your desires for a godly husband or wife

2. CHOOSE TO CULTIVATE NEW AND GODLY CHOICES that will become habits of holiness for old and ungodly patterns. Cut cable or online service for a few months and join an accountability group or Bible study; take a fast from TV watching (even sports) and start a Scripture memory plan like our “108 verses”.

3. REMEMBER IT WILL ONLY BE HARDER TO STOP TOMORROW. Every wrong choice we make sets in motion a wave of consequence and
growing bondage throughout our mind and body. Every obedient choice we make set in motion a wave of liberating blessing and spiritual strength.

Numbers 33:50-56 Now the Lord spoke to Moses in the plains of Moab by the Jordan, across from Jericho, saying,51 “Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: ‘When you have crossed the Jordan into the land of Canaan,52 ‘then you shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, destroy all their engraved stones, destroy all their molded images, and demolish all their high places;53 ‘you shall dispossess the inhabitants of the land and dwell in it, for I have given you the land to possess.54 ‘And you shall divide the land by lot as an inheritance among your families; to the larger you shall give a larger
inheritance, and to the smaller you shall give a smaller inheritance; there everyone’s inheritance shall be whatever falls to him by lot. You shall inherit according to the tribes of your fathers.55 ‘But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall be that those whom you let remain shall be irritants in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall harass you in the land where you dwell.56 ‘Moreover it shall be that I will do to you as I thought to do to them.’ ”

Slides

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