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[0:00] So it is Christmas season, right? I still haven't done Thanksgiving yet, but apparently it is because I think we finally set a date for that Christmas Eve service, didn't we?

[0:12] We figured out when we could do that. And it's coming soon, just a few days. Well, again, we always ask this at Christmas.

[0:24] We don't want to just go through a season and not think about its meaning. What are we celebrating as we celebrate Christmas?

[0:37] Obviously, we're celebrating Christ. And why did Christ come? We call this the Advent season because it is the coming of Christ, the advent of Christ when He arrived.

[0:50] And with the candles, we see the different gospel stories that reveal four different meanings or pictures of the coming of Christ, right?

[1:02] He comes as the Holy Child. He comes as the Savior, Redeemer. He comes with good news and He comes to be worshiped. And so we're celebrating Christ.

[1:15] So what are we doing in Psalm 32? Shouldn't we be in Matthew 1 or Matthew 2 or Luke 1 or Luke 2? Well, this is Christmas of the Old Testament, Psalm 32.

[1:29] Christ came to fulfill Psalm 32. He came to make Psalm 32 a promise to us.

[1:40] Joseph was told, remember, you shall call His name Jesus, Yehoshua, Joshua, Savior, because He will be a Savior.

[1:54] He will save His people from their sins. So David writes this. It says it's a masculine of David, contemplative Psalm of David.

[2:06] This is based on David's experience. So he's talking about what he did. He talks about his forgiveness. He talks about his silence. He talks about his confession.

[2:18] He talks about his forgiveness. It's based on his experience. Now, who's David? We could recount a lot of things, I imagine, about David. We could talk about how he was a man after God's own heart.

[2:32] He was the runt of the litter, remember, of all the brothers. He was the last one out in the field. You don't even want to look at this guy, do you? Yes, he's the one that is a man after God's own heart.

[2:44] Yeah, I want him. I don't care what size he is. He was a man of great faith and courage as he stood up against Goliath, that no one else would do that.

[2:57] He was bold in his faith. He became the great, great king of Israel, the one by which every other king of Israel would be measured. Here's what this king was like, but not to the level of righteousness of David.

[3:14] Not like David. David was the measure. David was the great king. David was the one who handed the kingdom to his son Solomon when he had already established peace all the way around.

[3:29] He had firmly established the kingdom. He is the prototype of the king to come because the Lord said, David, in you I shall raise up an offspring who will be a king of an eternal kingdom.

[3:45] So David is a godly man, a great king. We have half of the Psalms are written by this man.

[3:56] He was a man of worship. He was a man of intimate relationship with the Lord. He was also a sinner. And he was not a half sinner.

[4:10] He was a full-blown sinner. When he sinned, yeah, big time. He fell into a great sin.

[4:23] 2 Samuel 11 describes the process that when he was supposed to be out at war, when kings were at war, David stayed home. And he's relaxing.

[4:35] He's laying on his couch. In the afternoon, he gets up finally from his couch, goes to his roof, and what does he see? He sees a woman bathing.

[4:46] He covets her. He takes her. Even after finding out who she was. Oh, she's Bathsheba, wife of Uriah.

[4:59] Who's Uriah? Uriah was one of his 30 mighty men. Uriah was a Delta Force warrior. Top elite soldier.

[5:13] Oh, Uriah, the one who's so faithful to me. Okay, I'll take his wife. So he steals his wife, has an affair with her. So David has committed coveting.

[5:29] He's committed stealing. He's committed now adultery. Bathsheba tells him after a bit, David, I'm pregnant.

[5:42] Ah, got to cover this sin up. Uriah, come home. I want you to sleep with your wife. Uriah won't do it. No, David, I'm at war right now.

[5:52] I cannot. It's just kind of deepening the who he sinned against here. No, I won't. Okay, David, I'll send Uriah back to the front.

[6:07] Commander, I want you to put Uriah in the very front of the battle, and then I want you to withdraw your men so that Uriah is killed. So now he's committed murder.

[6:19] So we've got coveting, stealing, adultery, murder. How many more of the Ten Commandments will he break?

[6:31] This is a man after God's own heart. This is a mighty king. This is a godly man. So David. And you know what I appreciate about Scripture?

[6:44] Scripture doesn't hide any of this. I mean, Scripture gives every embarrassing detail. Here's David, one of our models, and every wart and shameful thing is revealed about David.

[6:59] Why? Because it's not about David. It's not a story about David. David's not the hero. He's heroic.

[7:11] He's also a great failure. But he's not the hero of the story. The Lord is the hero of the story. So what will David do? Under the covenant in which he is, under the covenant of law, there is no sacrifice that he can give when he has broken the commands, when he has rebelled and crossed the line and intentionally sinned.

[7:38] You see, the sacrifices are only for unintentional sins. You know, those oops, didn't mean that, slipped up, oh, we do that all the time, right?

[7:48] Those, we fall short, we sin, we don't mean, it's not rebellious. So there are sacrifices for those, but not for outright coveting and stealing and adultery and murder.

[8:05] No, those are intentional. Those are rebellious. So what will David do? Well, he does nothing for a long time. So sin deepens.

[8:17] It starts with coveting, goes to stealing, goes to adultery, then cover up, then murder, more lies, and then silence.

[8:31] What was that time like for David? Well, he tells us here in Psalm 32 what that time was like when he was silent. And so finally, it's not David who seeks the Lord, it's the Lord who seeks David, sends him a prophet who tells him a story about a little lamb that was stolen.

[8:51] And as a shepherd, David cares about little lambs. And his righteous anger erupts and he hears the story of the man who stole the little lamb from the poor man.

[9:04] that man needs to pay. And what does Nathan the prophet say? David, you're the man. Broken.

[9:17] Broken. Then Psalm 51, he prays. He cries out to God. He says, no sacrifice can I bring.

[9:29] So I appeal to your mercy. I appeal to your compassion. I appeal to your love because I cannot appeal to any righteous thing. I can't make up for this. I can't cover this.

[9:41] Blot out my sin. Wash me. Cleanse me. All of this crying out. You've broke the bones. Let the bones which you've broken revive and rejoice.

[9:52] He can't even worship. He's so broken and miserable in his guilt. So Psalm 51 is David's repentance.

[10:04] Psalm 32, I believe, is the answer to Psalm 51. Psalm 51, he cries out for forgiveness. Psalm 32, he got it.

[10:15] He got it. Here's what I want you to see. I want you to see a couple of things right off the bat here in the first two verses of Psalm 32. What is emphasized here?

[10:27] What's repeated? What is forgiven? Well, notice in verse 1 and 2, there are three terms to describe David's condition.

[10:37] He says, Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven. So he talks about transgression, about whose sin is covered. So sin. And then he talks about the Lord does not count iniquity against him.

[10:52] So three different terms for sin. So transgression is that intentional to transgress, to trespass, right, to cross the line. It is a rebel.

[11:04] It is a rejecting of authority kind of sin. I trespass. I cross the line that I know is there. I do it intentionally. And then there's the word sin.

[11:14] He says sin is covered. That's the one we talk about in the New Testament where it also means to fall short, to miss the mark. I'm trying to do it, but, you know, being who I am, I can't perfectly do it.

[11:26] I fall short. I mean to love the Lord with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my strength, but I am weak and I cannot do that with all, all the time.

[11:39] So I'm a sinner. I fall short. That's our sin every day. We fall short. It's not necessarily intentional. It's just simply we're weak.

[11:50] We're human. And then notice he talks about iniquity. Blesses the man against, verse 2, whom the Lord counts no iniquity. So we have sin falling short.

[12:00] We have transgression, which is intentional, crossing the line. And then we have iniquity. You know, iniquity kind of takes it to another level. It means the twisted stuff. Iniquity literally means crooked, twisted, distorted, perverted.

[12:17] So we have levels of sin. We have sin where we fall short. We have sins that we intentionally cross the line. Then we have those sins that go further.

[12:29] Twist it. Not just rebel, but twist it. Justify ourselves or pervert truth in some way. So David says he's all of that.

[12:43] He's all of that. And then notice how he's forgiven. There's three different terms that relate to his pardon. He's, verse 1, his transgressions are forgiven, which means they're removed.

[12:55] They're lifted away. His sin is covered. Covered means to be concealed. It's hidden. And then his iniquity is not counted against him.

[13:07] So not only is the sin removed and covered, but it's not even reckoned to him. So his iniquity is not put into his account. So it's an accounting word. It's the same idea that Paul talks about.

[13:20] In fact, Paul quotes from this Psalm 32 when he's talking about justification by faith alone. Talking about that the sin is not imputed, but rather the righteousness is imputed.

[13:30] So it's not put on our account book. So it's removed from our account book and put into Christ's account book. So that's forgiveness. Forgiveness is not only removing and covering, but it's also, man, the account book is clear.

[13:45] So I want you to notice those things. That's what he's talking about. So how does forgiveness come? How can we experience this? Can I be the blessed one? So here David gives his own experience here in verses 1 through 11.

[14:00] illustrating forgiveness in his own life. And there's two parts to this. The first half of the Psalm, verses 1 through 5, is his experience of forgiveness from God.

[14:13] How he attains forgiveness from God. Climaxing in verse 5 where that's the remedy. And then beginning in verse 6, he comes to a second part.

[14:26] It's not just forgiveness that he wants. He wants more. He wants then fellowship with God. So forgiveness brings him into fellowship with God. And then he wants to maintain fellowship with God. So in verses 6 through 11, he talks about the marks of walking with God, of fellowship with God.

[14:42] What things are involved in my relationship with God? I don't just treat him as a machine where I can get what I want and only come for forgiveness when I feel really guilty.

[14:54] But I want to maintain a relationship with this mighty God. So two parts here. So first of all, forgiveness in verses 1 through 5. Forgiveness, how does it come?

[15:06] Forgiveness from the Lord comes by honest confession. Honest confession. No deceit kind of confession. Threefold confession.

[15:19] Acknowledging, not covering, and confessing. So first of all, in verses 1-2, as I said, he describes this relationship with God that he now has before his trouble.

[15:33] He's reconciled. He's blessed. In fact, he uses that word blessed twice. Blessed verse 1, blessed verse 2. So reemphasizing this blessedness. And let's be clear, just like in the New Testament, the words rejoice and joy are not about emotion necessarily.

[15:51] They're a state of mind. They can involve the emotions, but they're not excluded to emotion. Same thing with blessed. A lot of translators translate blessed as happy.

[16:02] And I think that's widely, widely misrepresentative of what the scriptures mean. The Hebrew word for blessed means literally to go straight. To go straight.

[16:13] To be on a road. Jesus talked about a narrow road that leads to rough. Jesus used roadway language. In Psalm 1 talks about blessed is the man, what?

[16:23] Who's on the right road. He's not walking over there. He's not sitting over there. He's not standing over. He's over here in the way of God the law. Same thing with Psalm 119.

[16:34] Blessed is the man, right? Who what? Is in the way, on the right road. So blessed, a state of being blessed is about being right with God, being in God's way.

[16:48] So regardless of what's happening. That's why Bunyan wrote Pilgrim's Progress. He's writing with this idea in mind. It's a road we're on, right? It's a progress on the road and it gets narrow sometimes and I can get off track of the road and so it's that picture that Bunyan picks up from the scriptures here.

[17:09] Blessedness is about being on the right road, being right with God and particularly being forgiven by God. And then notice he says at the end of verse 2, blessed is the man against whom the Lord accounts no iniquity and in whose spirit there is no deceit.

[17:28] The blessed man is the one who doesn't hide stuff, doesn't cover it up, doesn't conceal. He's honest with God. So that's why I say honest confession.

[17:41] He's confessing all of it. He's not hiding anything. He's not blaming. Remember Adam, right? Adam, did you eat from the tree? I told you not to eat from.

[17:53] It was the woman, right? Right? Blame it. Eve, did you? It was the snake. That's our first response. That's what we do naturally. We blame, we justify, we give an excuse.

[18:06] No deceit, no hiding, no blaming, no excuses, just honesty. God already knows. You're not going to surprise him with who you are. He knows. That's the blessedness of confession.

[18:20] I can be absolutely honest with him. He already knows. What is it about us? It's hard to say it. We don't want to say it. So that's the condition of verses one and two, but then verses three and four, he brings up a problem.

[18:40] See, it didn't all start that way. It's not always blessed. He says, he gives some reasons for why it's so great to be blessed and forgiven because the counter side in verses three and four is when I kept silent, when I kept silent, when I hid from God, when I would not admit it, there were several effects.

[19:09] When I kept silent, what happened? Well, my bones wasted away. I felt it, I actually felt it physically, my bones. Not just talking about arthritis or bursitis or whatever itis I have in my shoulders.

[19:29] Talking about, man, deep down, you feel wrong. through my groaning all day long.

[19:39] So there's a physical response. There's an emotion of my groaning all day long. I remember being in depression and I was always sighing. everything was hard.

[19:54] Everything was exhausting. Well, it's like that too when you're hiding from God, when you're not being honest with God, it can become that kind of groaning.

[20:09] And then verse four, there's a spiritual effect. For day and night, your hand was heavy upon me. your hand. I'm walking away from you.

[20:20] You're still seeking me. See, God loves sinners. He comes after the sinner. Your hand is heavy. What is that?

[20:33] Your hand was heavy on me. Not under me. It's on me. That's conviction. That's conscience being stirred up.

[20:46] It's okay. Yeah, I know. I know. I know. Can I just put it off for another day? Can I just, when I feel like repenting, I don't feel like it, right?

[20:56] I don't know, whatever our excuses are. Your hand was heavy. You wouldn't let me go. You're hounding me. It starts gently, doesn't it?

[21:09] And then as we persist in being stubborn, it gets a little heavier. Hello? Hey, I still love you.

[21:21] I want that relationship back. You're blocking it. Your hand was heavy.

[21:32] What happened? So the universe for my strength is dried up. That's by the heat of summer that I dry up. I'm spiritually dry. I'm empty.

[21:44] There's nothing. I squeezed the sponge. There's nothing left. The moisture is all gone. Why? Because I'm not rooted in where the moisture comes from. I've been avoiding God.

[21:56] I've been hiding. That's what Adam did, right? Adam and Eve, the first sin, they hide, right? They try to cover and they hide and God comes seeking.

[22:11] Hello, where are you? They heard him walking. Did you, by the way, how gentle he is, did you, by the way, do what I told you not to do?

[22:25] Yeah. There's going to be consequences to that. So then notice at the end of verse four, he adds this word, silah.

[22:37] Silah. What's that? Pause. Now, there's different views. Not everybody knows. It's not very clear.

[22:48] Hebrew, especially Hebrews, you know, it's more pictures. It's not defined as much like Greek is. So Hebrew is more of a picture language.

[23:00] But according to Walt Kaiser, one of the great scholars of the Old Testament, he says, silah means to pause and to think. So he's made a point and he wants you don't read on yet.

[23:14] I want you to stop and think about what I just said. So he pauses about this when I kept silent. So pause and think about that. Have you done that? Have you experienced that?

[23:25] You've been silent with God? Have you experienced that wasting away of your bones and the groaning of your spirit? Have you felt that?

[23:37] Do you know what that's like? So pause there before you rush and get to the solution of verse 5. Then he comes to his, what does he do?

[23:50] Well, he doesn't put in the part here where Nathan came and woke him up, right? But he does say, yeah, I did finally confess. Verse 5, I acknowledge my sin.

[24:01] Notice again, there's three things here. There's lots of threes going on. We've got three ways of forgiveness, three kinds of sin. We have three kinds of confession here.

[24:14] He acknowledged his sin, he did not cover his iniquity, and then he confessed. So three different words describing this honest confession to the Lord. The word acknowledge just means to admit it, to say it out loud, to make it known, to not cover it as kind of the not deceive, not hide it, not conceal it.

[24:36] You know, okay, Lord, here's the dark corner. I'm opening that closet too. You need to know that. Oh, you already knew that? Okay, you knew that. I need to tell you about it because I don't want anything hiding from you.

[24:51] I don't conceal all of that. And then I confess, I cast my iniquity before the Lord. Wow.

[25:05] I cast my transgressions to the Lord. And then notice the result at the end of verse five. And you forgave what?

[25:18] The iniquity of my sin. He takes the two words of the twistedness of my failure. Because my failure usually ends up in twistedness somewhere if I don't come to you.

[25:37] So we'll all say, yeah, we're sinners, we fall short, we fail. Yeah, I gotta admit that. Of course, I'm not perfect. But who wants to say they're iniquiter? Iniquitiers? Can I make a word there?

[25:52] They're twisted? They're perverted? who wants to say that? Well, when I'm before the Lord, I don't have to say it to you, but when I'm before the Lord, I'm gonna say it.

[26:06] Because he already knows. He knows who I am. And for me to get right, for me to get healing, I need to say that to him. I need to say it out loud. Notice, there's a difference.

[26:17] He says in verse three, when I kept silent. And then in verse five, it's I said. I spoke. I verbalized. I admit it.

[26:28] There's something about that, about verbalizing it. It's not a silent prayer. It's a spoken prayer. I said it out loud, Lord.

[26:40] Something about that. I said. I didn't just think it. I said it. Something about saying it makes it more real. Huh?

[26:50] Kind of gets it out. Now, I'm going to do that over in my little prayer room, my gazebo, or whatever. I'm going to do that where I'm alone with him, where Jesus talks about I go in and I shut the door.

[27:04] I'm going to go do that just with the Father. But I'm going to speak it out loud. I might even share it with some close believers because it's appropriate to confess our sins to one another in an appropriate way.

[27:24] But I certainly want to say it to the Lord. And again, Selah. You forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah.

[27:35] Think about that. Before you move on, make sure you ponder that. Don't miss that.

[27:48] He forgives. we're talking about an Old Testament text. The Old Covenant was based on law. There's nothing in the law that says he will forgive transgression or iniquity.

[28:06] There are sacrifices for unintentional sins. The oops. The normal failures.

[28:17] Didn't mean to touch that dead body. I was caught up in the moment. Right? No. You break the law.

[28:28] You break the command of God. You have broken the covenant. You are now under a curse. Remember, the law is black and white.

[28:40] If you keep the laws, you will be blessed. You'll be healthy. You'll be wealthy. You'll be all this. You'll be, you know, your fields will always be producing fruit. But if you break my covenant, you will be cursed and your fields will go barren.

[28:57] It's one or the other. Under the law. So how does David get forgiveness? Mercy. But how can a holy God forgive him?

[29:13] God describe himself? Remember Ezekiel 34 when Moses says, I want to see you. I want to see you. So God says, okay, you're going to see me just the backside.

[29:26] You still want to hide over here in the rock. And as he goes before Moses, God speaks about who he is. He says, I am the Lord who forgives iniquity, who loves abound with abounding love.

[29:41] I am merciful and kind, but I will not allow the guilty to go unpunished.

[29:54] How can he be both? If he doesn't allow the guilty to go, how can he forgive? There's a tension in the whole who God is thing.

[30:05] He's holy and righteous and just and loving and kind and forgiving. How does he do that? How can he still be holy and just and forgive?

[30:20] Oh, he just, you know, he kind of lets this stuff go. No, no, no. Then he's no longer God. He's no longer holy and just. How does he do it? How is this possible?

[30:33] Isaiah 53, 700 years before Jesus came, he is predicted to come and solve that tension. He was pierced for our transgressions, pierced for our transgressions, our rebellions.

[30:56] He was crushed for our iniquities, our twistedness. Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace.

[31:09] And with his wounds we are healed. Us? We? All we like sheep have gone astray. None of us are on the right way. There's that roadway language again. All of us like sheep have gone astray.

[31:21] We've turned everyone to his own way. And the Lord, what did the Lord do? The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

[31:34] Why? Why? Why would he be so kind? Again, Isaiah 53, 11, out of the anguish of his soul, now speaking of Jesus who would fulfill this, out of the anguish of his soul, he shall see and be satisfied.

[31:49] In other words, he will raise from the dead. By his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, Jesus, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities.

[32:02] Therefore, because he dies for them, I will divide the portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong. In other words, he has victory, he overcomes this bearing their sin, because he poured out his soul to death, he died, and was numbered with the transgressors, hanging on the cross among sinners, yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.

[32:30] how can a holy God forgive? By means of a righteous substitute, someone who pays the price for us, who bears our sin, who's pierced for our rebellion, the Lamb of God, who was not like the other lambs of the sacrifice, the lambs, remember, had to be perfect, perfect, had no spots, well, Jesus wasn't outside physically perfect, he was marred, right, he's scarred, he's nothing clean, not necessarily clean, but nothing perfect on the outside, no majesty, but inside, he was the perfect Lamb, he was the righteous, spotless, clean, so he could take our sin for us, could bear our sin, this is forgiveness of the Old Testament, looking forward to the

[33:32] Lamb of God who will come and bear our sins, and notice that in Isaiah 53 he talks about, yeah, he bears our sin, he takes away, he's pierced, he substitutes for us and pays the debt, he doesn't just remove our sin, but he also gives us righteousness, he shall make the many accounted righteous, there's that counting term again, he will put us over here on the good side of the ledger, so not just, let's just wipe our slate clean and then it's up to us to stay clean, no, it's he wipes the slate clean and then he gives us a permanent clean record, as far as God seeing, because we're wearing the cloak of Jesus that God looks upon, so 1 John 1 9 can say, if we confess our sins, he is what?

[34:26] He is faithful and what? Just he's just to forgive us, how can he be just to forgive us?

[34:39] because he's forgiving us based on prices already paid. I can justly, in a holy way, forgive you, because your debt is clean.

[34:51] And not only forgive us, but to cleanse us, cleanse us, oh, confession's so good for us, and not only forgives, but it cleanses, cleanses, it's a wash.

[35:01] well, there's more that David has, he's, so he has forgiveness from the Lord, now he's going to talk about fellowship with the Lord.

[35:13] Therefore, there's a difference now, verse 6, therefore, fellowship with God is experienced by active faith. just like forgiveness from God comes by honest confession, so now ongoing fellowship with God is experienced by active faith.

[35:32] I'm placing the emphasis on active faith, right, not just passive faith, oh yeah, I believe, I'm okay. No, active faith, relying on God.

[35:43] I want you to notice here in these final verses, 6 through 11, there's three marks of this fellowship with God, this relationship with God. Verse 6 talks about prayer, we talk to God.

[35:55] Verse 8 through 10 talk about listening to God, to hear his instruction and counsel and to trust it, not like the horse or the mule, but to trust it, to listen and do it, to trust the word, right?

[36:10] So the end of verse 10, the steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord. So he's summarizing who this person is, he's a truster. And then finally, verse 11, there's joy.

[36:22] Fellowship with God is prayer, trusting in his word, and joy. Joy. We just talked about that for a few months. Joy, joy, joy in all things, in the Lord.

[36:35] No matter what happens outside, I'm in the Lord and that brings me joy. joy. So prayer, first he's invited to pray in verse 6, he says, therefore let everyone who is godly, okay, that's not me, let everyone who is godly, just the godly people pray, right?

[36:57] No, because in this context, the godly person is the one who is a forgiven sinner. The godly person is the one who goes to God for forgiveness. That's the godly.

[37:08] Godly isn't about a duty done. It's not about marking up. Godliness means I'm oriented to him. I have a relationship, but I'm godly, not godly.

[37:22] It's not a stature. The one who desires real relationship. A godly person is not the perfect person by any means. Here's David. No, the godly, the one who looks to God, let him offer prayer to you, Lord, at the time when you may be found, which implies maybe there's a time when you won't be found if I wait too long.

[37:48] Let the one who is godly offer prayer to you at a time when you may be found, which means that's today. When the conscience is working, that's today. When he's tapping, that's today.

[38:02] Go to him when he can be found. Surely in a rush of great waters, they shall not reach him. In other words, when you go to the Lord, then you're safe. When the rush of floods come, you'll be safe.

[38:18] And then the prayer, verse 7. Look at the intimacy of the prayer. You, Lord, are my hiding place. You preserve me from trouble.

[38:30] See, those great waters won't reach me. You surround me with shouts or songs of deliverance. Here comes another Selah. Don't skip the intimacy.

[38:46] See, the Lord is where I go to hide. The Lord is who I look to for protection. The Lord is who I depend on for deliverance. And then he turns to verse 8 and 9 and 10 and instruction where I think this could be David speaking or it could be the Lord speaking.

[39:13] If it's David speaking, it's David speaking as the Lord's spokesman now who has been forgiven. I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go.

[39:23] I will counsel you with my eye upon you. Notice there are lots of threes in here. Did you notice that? There's three descriptions of sin. There's three descriptions of forgiveness. There's three descriptions of confession.

[39:34] There's three descriptions, verse 7, of God there. You're my hiding place. You preserve me. You surround me. Verse 8, now there's three different ways God helps us. He instructs. He teaches. He counsels.

[39:46] So it's kind of the three is kind of rounding it out. It's comprehensive. So my sin is comprehensive. My forgiveness is comprehensive. My confession is comprehensive. God's relationship with me is comprehensive.

[39:59] God's leading and directing me is comprehensive. Instruction, teaching, and counsel. And notice it's in the way. You should go. That's the blessed part again. Being in the way.

[40:12] Teach you the way to walk. What's his counsel? His counsel is verse 9. Hey, don't be like the mule. It's kind of, why bring, it's a beautiful psalm.

[40:26] Why bring a mule into this? Maybe because I can relate to a mule. Maybe because I'm like a mule. That's why I was silent for so long, because I was like a mule.

[40:42] Now I'm doing it my way. Now I don't need to go. We used to, when I was a kid, I used to help my dad bring the donkeys to the Christmas play.

[40:55] You know, we did an illustrated message on Christmas and we brought live animals and donkeys and so we brought cha-cha and pinot. And I know what a donkey's like.

[41:09] He does not want to participate. Not going in that trailer. No siree. So they take out a little help juice. Calm you down, cha-cha.

[41:24] Stubborn, stubborn, stubborn. You're going to have to carry me in there. That's about what they did. What's a mule?

[41:37] A mule's stubborn. A horse can be stubborn. Unless you're a horse whisperer, I guess. But a wild horse can be stubborn. It's not going your way.

[41:50] Until we get a bit and a bridle on them, right, to control them. They're way too powerful for me to control by some other means, but I get a bridle on them, and suddenly I can sort of control this very strong animal, this very strong will.

[42:06] and the Lord is saying, don't be like that horse, stubborn, and resistant, and rebellious. Be teachable.

[42:20] And how does he summarize what this person is like? Many of the sorrows of the wicked, the person who's like the horse and the mule, the independent, rebellious person.

[42:34] The wicked is simply the person who is not willing to confess their sin. They're not, they don't commit worse sins than righteous people. Righteous people are only righteous because they've been forgiven.

[42:45] forgiven. They're not better people. They're just forgiven. They're just honest. The wicked person is the one that, no, I'm going my own way. They do the natural thing.

[42:56] That's natural. That's who we all are until we come. Right? So what happens to the wicked? Well, many are the sorrows because they stay silent all the time.

[43:11] They never confess. So they're going to experience that separation. They're going to experience that wasting away, that dryness. They're going to try to cover that and fix that by finding remedies in whatever, drink or drug or business or things or even nice things like family and children.

[43:37] They can become my idols too. so sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who what?

[43:54] Does all the deeds of the law? No, it's not what it says. Steadfast love surrounds the one who gets everything right, comes to church every week, prays every, you know, whatever the list is.

[44:07] Nope. Steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord. Trusts in the Lord. Who's the truster?

[44:18] Well, in this psalm, it's the one who is an honest confessor, who is not stubborn and listens to the Lord. Lord, it's not heavy with duty here, isn't it?

[44:30] It's just, okay, being honest, talking to God. The truster is the one relying on the Lord to do the forgiving and the protecting and the loving.

[44:46] He loves the sinner. I just hear that over and over again in this psalm. So he trusts. He's actively trusting. Notice there's an S on that trust.

[44:58] He's not just a, has trusted at one point, prayed the prayer at one point, and now I do whatever I want. No, he trusts, and he keeps trusting, and he trusts every day.

[45:08] He's relying on God. He's looking to God. He's abiding in God. He's depending on God. He's confessing. He's keeping that relationship honest and open.

[45:23] See, in Christ, God clears up the path for us to come to him, right? And God doesn't put obstructions in that relationship.

[45:34] I put obstructions in that relationship. That's why Jesus says in your daily prayer, pray, forgive us our debts this day. Jesus is using a different word than sin and transgression and iniquity.

[45:51] He just says debt. What's my debt? Well, I owe him everything. So I always have a debt. So forgive me my debt as I owe Oh, yeah.

[46:04] That's the hard part. Can I just say the first part? No, because if I'm a genuine repenter, and I know that I've sinned against the Lord, how in the world can I withhold that from somebody else?

[46:21] So that prayer helps me get right again, humbles me, humbles me, makes me a genuine confessor again. Because if he can forgive what I owe him, what others owe me, even though it feels bad a lot of times, and sometimes it's very bad.

[46:43] It doesn't measure up to what I've done before the Lord. So then what do I do? Verse 11, I joy, joy, joy. Notice three again. Be glad, rejoice, shout for joy.

[46:58] Be glad and rejoice. Why? Because you're forgiven. You're reconciled. God is protecting you. God is loving you. This is good news of great joy. And notice he says, be glad in the Lord and rejoice, O righteous.

[47:14] Okay, there it is again. Okay, so I'm not the righteous one, so I can't be glad and rejoice, right? Shout for joy, all you upright. Oh, I'm not upright, I'm a sinner. So according to Psalm 32, who's the righteous and upright person?

[47:28] A person who confesses their sin. He's the forgiven sinner. That's the righteous person. Righteousness doesn't have to do with, I measured up. Righteousness has to do with trusting in the Lord.

[47:41] Do you know that in Romans 4, Paul quotes from Psalm 32 to describe justification by faith alone? That we are forgiven based on faith alone.

[47:55] This is one of the places Paul gets that great truth. It's not something he made up. It's something that was already there in the Old Testament. In fact, he got it from Genesis 15 too.

[48:09] Abraham believed God and was reckoned righteous. He became righteous by faith. Same thing here. David, as a sinner, is made righteous because he trusts.

[48:20] And his trust is shown in his honesty with God, his confession, his listening, learning to listen, and his joy. He's an honest confinant.

[48:35] He admits all his sinfulness. So what does trust look like? What is trust? It's a synonym of faith and belief.

[48:50] So we talk about we're saved by faith or we're saved when we believe God sent his son into the world. He loved the world so much that he sent his son into the world so that whoever believes, right, in him will not perish but have eternal life.

[49:06] So belief, trust, it's all the same kind of thing. It's just different aspects of the same thing. So what does trust look like? How does it affect our life? Well, Jeremiah gives a picture.

[49:17] It's a wonderful picture. Jeremiah 17. He says, blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord.

[49:28] Interesting. Two different ways of looking at it. Then he gives a picture. He, the trusting one, is like a tree planted by water. Okay? Picture.

[49:38] Tree by water. That sends out its roots by the stream. Okay? The roots are going down by the stream where it can get moisture, get sustenance, get nourishment.

[49:53] And because of that, does not fear when heat comes. Why? Got water coming. I can sustain the heat. For its leaves remain green because I got nurture and is not anxious in the year of drought.

[50:10] drought. Because I still have my roots down sunk deep in the water. In the sustaining of life.

[50:21] And does not cease to bear fruit. And then in the very next verse in Jeremiah 17.9.

[50:33] He's a truster in the Lord. But there's a problem. He's not always a truster in the Lord. And Jeremiah brings up a very shocking statement in the midst of describing faith.

[50:52] Watch this. He says, after he says he does not cease to bear fruit, he says, the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick.

[51:05] Thank you very much. Who can understand it? I, the Lord, search the heart and test the mind to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.

[51:22] What is that about? This was in this beautiful picture of what trust looks like. It's like the tree that's getting the moisture that can go through the trials. So trust is being planted in the Lord, drawing water from the Lord's word, right?

[51:39] The roots sink deep. Remember Jesus said, drink from my fountain, right? Drink from my fountain. Get your roots deep into my word.

[51:53] And you will bear fruit. You don't produce fruit. You will bear fruit because you're abiding. You're trusting in him. You're drawing from him. You're getting the strength and the nurturing from him to bear fruit.

[52:07] You're just the branch of the tree, right? Yet, to trust in the Lord is also to not trust in yourself. I cannot trust my heart.

[52:20] Oh, but he's got a good heart. Yeah, I get that. I understand that. He means well many times. But there's also times he doesn't mean well.

[52:34] And there's times when even in his meaning well, there's mixed motives. If I look carefully at myself and my motives of doing things, oh, I want to really help that person.

[52:46] I also want to be patted on the back. Oops, I shouldn't want that, right? Heart's deceitful. Yeah.

[52:56] Pastor, I have a question. I'm hearing that it's important for us to make confession to the Lord. But is it also twofold?

[53:07] Because in James 5, 16, it also states we... Confess to one another. Yeah. So do we have to do both?

[53:18] Or are we actually forgiven if we just... You do not have to confess your sins to the congregation or to a priest, to any human individual to get forgiveness from the Lord.

[53:32] Confession to the Lord alone. There are times, like I said earlier, it's appropriate to confess to one another. To one another. So James 5 is describing a situation where somebody's sick or weak.

[53:45] Maybe is under this Psalm 32. I'm wasting away. It may not be a physical thing, but it might be a spiritual or emotional sickness. And I don't know.

[53:56] So I go to the elders for some help to pray for this because it might be that there are sins I haven't divulged. And so in a special situation, not a regular situation, a special situation, I might confess in that small group.

[54:11] Elders and me. So I've actually heard a person myself... It's just a, you know, you're going to the elders to pray for healing. I don't want healing, whether it's a physical or emotional or spiritual thing.

[54:25] And sin could be a part. We don't know. It's not a check the box and guarantee thing. It's just simply, hey, we're coming before the Lord. We need to be honest.

[54:37] Anybody got something? You're hiding? Because we're going to come to the Lord now. So it's just kind of that. It's not, okay, I got my list.

[54:48] Okay, you want to hear... Rick, you want to hear what I've done the last month? No, it's not that. It's not that. It's simply, okay, I'm going to be honest. You know, I haven't been praying.

[54:59] You know, whatever. I don't know what it is. I kind of know the one-on-one thing. Yeah, well, it's elders plural. So there's always... It's never just a single elder. There's always...

[55:09] In the Bible, it's always plurality of elders. Because one... We don't have any Moseses anymore. Right? Okay.

[55:22] So notice he does say, trust is having my roots in the Lord's word.

[55:33] And then secondly, because my heart is deceitful, I cannot trust myself. I see that all the time in the scriptures, especially in the Psalms. I have to learn to not trust myself.

[55:46] I cannot trust my heart because my heart will deceive me. my heart will seek to justify itself. My heart will seek to... I always look at the best side of myself.

[55:58] Right? I, you know... Hey, I meant mostly, well, somewhat meant good.

[56:09] Okay, a little bit meant well. You know, I don't... We want to give ourselves the benefit of the doubt. That's just natural. Our heart's deceitful. Our hearts are where, you know, the New Testament describes the heart as the place of our intentions and our thoughts.

[56:29] You know, the Lord talks about He can divide between the thoughts and intentions of our heart. So our heart is a source of our thoughts and intentions, our will. So in scripture, heart isn't the emotional part.

[56:43] That's our soul. In scripture, the heart is the... kind of flip-floppy and where my will is. So that can fluctuate.

[56:56] So I can't trust that. But the one who trusts in the Lord asks the Lord to search his heart, to test his mind. See, the Lord can do that. I can't.

[57:07] It's like Psalm 139. Lord, search me, try me, see if there be any blind spot. Right? See if there be any hurtful way in me that I'm not seeing because I want to be more right with you.

[57:21] And it's up to him to reveal what he reveals. He'll surprise you sometimes what he reveals. Whoa. Sorry I asked.

[57:34] You know. But of course, that's the heart. I want that relationship with the Lord. I don't want anything to block or prevent. Because his gates are wide open.

[57:48] I'm the one that puts the barrier there. And so that's why Jesus says every day, I pray for my daily bread. I pray for my daily forgiveness. Because there's something.

[58:01] There's something. And then to ask for protection. I need that every day too, don't I? Okay. So, blessed, blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

[58:22] Blessed on the right road is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity, iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit.

[58:35] Let us pray. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for David and his willingness to expose himself, his honesty before you and before us.

[58:47] We thank you for your scriptures that don't hide any of those things so that we can see that even our heroes are greatly marred, tremendously sinful.

[59:04] And now we can feel like, okay, whew, I am too. I am too. We thank you, oh Lord, that you hear our confession, that you want our relationship, that you then forgive us of all of that stuff.

[59:22] Thank you how amazing that is. cause this to sink deep into our hearts this week as we approach Christmas, as we think about why Jesus came, he came to make this true.

[59:36]  We thank you for that in Christ's name. Amen.