Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ,
Last time we considered this request of the Lord’s Prayer, we gave special attention to the “as we forgive those who sin against us” half of the request. And just a few weeks ago, when we considered the invocation of the Lord’s Prayer, “Our Father in heaven,” we also spent time thinking about the importance of having a forgiving spirit towards others. So today we will focus just on the first part of the request, “Forgive us our sins.”
To sin is to break God’s commandments or not to keep God’s commandments as we should.
One common definition of sin is to ‘to fall short.’ If you think of shooting arrows at a target, the whole target would represent perfect obedience. So any arrow that does not even make it to the target is a picture of sin. And the fact is that every arrow, by which I mean all our attempts at perfect obedience, fall short.
And there is a verse in the Bible that describes this in very plain language: Romans 3:23 says, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”
And Romans 6:23 tells us that “the wages of sin is death.” Sinners deserve to die. And if you are thinking to yourself, well everyone dies, what is meant there includes physical death but also the agony and darkness and loneliness and torment of hell, for all eternity.
But having said that “the wages of sin is death,” Romans 6:23 continues, “but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” It is possible to avoid hell and instead to enjoy eternal life in heaven. And this is possible only by way of the forgiveness of our sins. Our sins have to be punished. So God sent His beloved Son, Jesus, to earth. And Jesus took our sins upon Himself and was punished by God on the cross, so that by believing that He did that for us, we might be forgiven. God says, I will forgive your sins if you believe that my Son, Jesus, died on the cross for you.
And there are three words that Jesus spoke on the cross, which help us see this. Do you know what they are? “IT IS FINISHED.” With those three words Jesus revealed that all the sins of believers, past, present, and future, were forgiven.
So if you are believer, God has declared you forgiven or righteous or innocent, because of the obedience and the sacrifice of Jesus, which He has imputed or given to you. You are forever connected with or united to or hidden in the Lord Jesus. You are a forgiven sinner!
So, why then must we keep praying this request of the Lord’s Prayer? If all our sins were forgiven by Jesus’ work on the cross; if Jesus said, “It is finished,” why must you and me pray, each day, “Forgive us our sins”?
Well, we seek an answer to that question today from the words of Psalm 51:17, where A FORGIVEN SINNER PAINTS A PICTURE OF REPENTANCE AS A WAY OF LIFE.
And THE SITUATION OF PSALM 51 is this.
King David committed adultery with a woman named Bathsheba. Afterwards, he then betrayed and murdered her husband, Uriah the Hittite. And because he had to involve others in these wicked acts, it does not take long to end up with a whole pile of sins committed by David. Well, some time later, the prophet Nathan came to David and confronted him with his sin. And this Psalm, as you can see from the title, is David’s confession of sin.
And as you can see as you read through the Psalm, it begins with confession of sin. But what soon becomes obvious is that its VIEW OF SIN is much wider than the particular sins related to Bathsheba. David includes all the Hebrews words for sin, which comes through in English with the words ‘sin,’ ‘iniquity,’ ‘transgression,’ and ‘evil.’ And while a quick read of v5 might seem to suggest that giving birth is somehow sinful, that is not what is meant. Those words are a recognition that sin is present with us from the very first moments of life. Despite the fact that we sometimes speak of infants as innocent, the fact is that we are never ‘sin free.’ Sin is a problem that has to do with the very core of who we are as human beings.
And this is seen also in that David’s basic request in this Psalm is THAT GOD WOULD ‘UN-SIN’ HIM, if you like. David acknowledges that sin clings so closely to him that he cannot solve his problem; God must do it. So he piles up requests for God to “have mercy” and to “blot out” and “wash” and “cleanse” and to “purge” and to “create a clean heart.” It is our responsibility to choose to believe in Jesus for the forgiveness of our sins. But what we learn in the Bible is that salvation is God’s work. We saw this earlier on when we quoted Romans 6:23, “but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” It is an act of grace. He gives us what we do not deserve. God un-sins us.
Well, as we come to Psalm 51:13, we come to DAVID’S RESPONSE TO FORGIVENESS. He explains what he is going to do in response to God restoring him to the joy of salvation. He explains how he will demonstrate his thankfulness for what God has done. And it is in this section that we find our text, which says, “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.”
o And very quickly, we should not understand this verse together with v16 as David rejecting the whole sacrificial system of Leviticus (you know, all the sin offerings and burnt offerings, etc). To begin with, according to the Law of the OT, what was supposed to be done with adulterers or murderers? Do you remember, boys and girls? They were to be stoned to death. There were no sacrifices that could atone for sins like these. And David knew this because as king he was required to read the law. But what David is saying here also is that even with the sin offerings and burnt offerings that God did require, if they were just an outward act; if there was not a true, inward sorrow for sin, they were useless. What pleases God is the inward attitude or way of life that is described in this verse.
So what is a “broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart”? What is repentance as a way of life? It is this that we want to think about with the remainder of our time.
It might be that yesterday, as your parents explained that they wanted you home by 10pm, that you, because your wants are all-important, said some pretty unkind things or gave them a look that could kill… Or maybe last night as you tidied the kitchen while your husband watched the rugby, again, you were thinking some thoughts about him that could strip wallpaper… Or Husband, maybe after watching the rugby you received the ‘not tonight because I have a headache’ response and have been angry ever since even though the Sun has gone down and risen again… Or maybe this morning, as you were getting ready for church, the children were goofing around or whining, and because you slept in a little and were late for Sunday school, you just lost it and let rip…
JAMES 3:2 is right when it says, “For we all stumble in many ways.” And just in case anyone thinks that he or she does not, James goes on to speak about the tongue that we use to gossip, and to lie, and to belittle, and to tell dirty jokes… “For we all stumble (we all SIN) in many ways.”
And the sins I have included in this sample list are not what we think of as extreme sins like the act of murder or adultery, but, dare we call them this, the more ‘ORDINARY’ or ‘everyday’ sins. Earlier we read from ROMANS 7. And I think it is sins like these that Paul had chiefly in mind when he spoke about not doing what he should do and doing what he should not do, as the believer’s experience.
So how does our text connect with the reality of daily sin? How does our text lead us to pray, Forgive us our sins? And what does the life of a Christian who prays this request look like?
I. Well, I hope you have done this already in your own mind, which is to ask first of all how this text GETS US TO JESUS! You see, this text certainly requires you and me to do something. But we will never be able to do all that this text requires because of the sin that so readily clings to us. So before we get to our doing, let’s think about what Jesus has DONE.
A. And with the twice repeated word “BROKEN” in the text and this table of broken bread in front of us, it should be pretty plain how we get to Jesus! THE sacrifice that pleased God; THE sacrifice that God did not despise was the broken spirit; the broken and contrite heart of His Son, Jesus.
1. Isaiah 53:5 speaks of Jesus when it says, “He was wounded for our transgressions; He was bruised for our iniquities.” And that word “bruised” translates the same Hebrew word translated as “contrite” here in our text. In fact, other English Bible versions have “bruised” instead of “contrite.”
2. We could say that Psalm 51 is the prayer that the Lord Jesus prays for us as He hangs on the cross. He knows our sin because He has taken all of it on Himself. And having taken our sin on Himself, He cries out to God for washing and cleansing and restoration. He prays that God might not cast us away from His presence and that instead we might be restored to the joy of His salvation. And He prays with confidence because He knows that He is the spotless, sinless Lamb of God who can atone for sin and that He can offer to God the broken spirit and broken and contrite heart that God will not despise.
B. And the APOSTLE PAUL knew this. That is why after lamenting his daily sin in Romans 7 and crying out, “Who will deliver me from this body of death?” He did not say, I will by just trying harder not to sin. No. he said, “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” He said, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
C. And that brothers and sisters, young people and boys and girls, is what we mean when we say that eternal life is the free gift of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Your salvation is entirely about who Jesus is and what He has done! And that is what we will celebrate as we gather around the table in remembrance of Him.
II. But we cannot end there. We cannot pretend that this text and Romans 7 and 8 do not require anything of us. For we must have a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, as we read here.
A. Did you notice how Paul described his battle with sin in Romans 7? He said, “I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.” He said, “For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.” Paul really wanted to do good and Paul really hated his sin. The one who truly believes in Jesus will want to obey Him and will hate sin. Having celebrated the great truth that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus in Romans 8:1, Paul went on to say, “If you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” The one who is truly thankful for the forgiveness of sins in Jesus Christ will be busy, by the Spirit, putting to death the deeds of the body.
B. So God has indeed dealt with all our sin in the eternal sphere but He is still very displeased with our sin in the here and now. And we should be too.
C. Let me illustrate it for you this way: I want you to imagine that you have a son who asks if he can deliver the newspaper to earn some money. And you explain that if he does this he will have to do it every day, even if its raining and even if he can’t play with his friends. You tell him that this will be his responsibility, not yours. And he agrees so he gets a paper run. And it goes fine for a while. But then one day, after missing out on rugby with his friends again and again, he misses it so much that he stays behind after school and plays with them, ignoring his responsibility. Well, this was in the days before cell-phones so you can’t text him or call him and order him home. So you pack the newspapers in your car and you go and deliver them and you get back home and you wait for him to walk through the door. I think it would be fair to say that there is tension in the air. Now consider two scenarios. In the first, your son arrives home and goes to the fridge and pours a glass of milk and walks into the living room where you are and only when you bring up the fact that you had to deliver the papers does he mumble an oh whoops! and flick on the TV as he slurps up the milk. In the second scenario, he walks in and makes a bee-line for you with tears streaming down his face, and between sobs he apologizes, saying, “I messed up, Dad. I am so sorry. I know I promised not to let this happen and I broke my promise. I am so sorry. I wont let it happen again. Dad, please forgive me.” Which of these represents a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart?
Well, God knows that you cannot give Him perfect obedience and that you cannot pay for your sins. So He chose to accept the perfect obedience and agonized suffering of His beloved Son, in your place. He chose to give you the forgiveness of your sins as a gift that you do not deserve.
So don’t be like the son who mumbles an oh whoops! and isn’t really troubled by his sins.
Be instead like the son who was deeply troubled and repentant.
Be like King David and the Apostle Paul who trusted in the Lord Jesus for their salvation and lived a life of daily repentance and confession of sin. Go to God quickly and often when you realize that you have sinned.
For that is what it means to have broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart. Amen.