How Blessed is the One Forgiven

[0:00] and take your time to equip us for the work of the ministry. So thank you. We appreciate it. Thank you. My pleasure. Thank you. Good morning. I want to offer you greetings from Canyon Bible Church of Prescott.

[0:13] The elders and our folks know that I'm here, so they wanted us to extend their greetings to you as well. So we're so thankful. I've known Jim probably about seven years or so now, and I'm just grateful for the opportunity to finally get to meet you and be able to be a part of this morning's worship time as we worship and honor and we learn from God's Word and we grow and we're stretched and sanctified and all the good things that God is going to be doing as we worship and praise Him this morning.

[0:43] So I want to thank you for that this morning. Let's get started with our sermon. All right. And we've got a great passage of Scripture, Psalm 32.

[0:56] We'll be there in just a moment, but let me just pray for us real quick and we'll get started. Father, we recognize that scurrying about to be here this morning and all the distractions that can be in our minds even as we sit here.

[1:09] We ask that you would keep them at bay, that you would protect our hearts and minds in Christ, that we'd be able to focus in on your Word and hear what you have for us. And we trust you for these things and we are grateful.

[1:21] In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Well, brothers and sisters, it is interesting the times we live in, is it not? These days, you don't always know who's watching you, who's listening to you, or who's recording you, right?

[1:37] It's just one of those times when we never know what's going on, but we're okay. There's a little story I want to share with you real briefly. A couple is sitting in their living room in the evening on the weekend.

[1:51] They're enjoying one another. They're enjoying their time together. And they're just talking about the week and how things are progressing and the different things that couples talk about when the kids are already in bed and they can start talking things out, working things out.

[2:05] And they've been talking a little while and all of a sudden they get a phone call. Actually, the woman gets a phone call from a co-worker and says, Hey, I have heard everything. I want you to know that I just got an email from Amazon that has recorded your conversation.

[2:21] They had one of those little Alexa, do this, do that, that kind of a thing. And apparently had recorded their conversation to that point. He reached out to his co-worker and said, Hey, I just received an email.

[2:32] She's like, No way. There is no way that you know what we're talking about. He goes, Well, you talked about this. You talked about this. Thankfully, she didn't talk about him, right? But there was a list of things that she and her husband had talked about and he was able to articulate those accurately right back to her.

[2:49] So immediately, Alexa went out the window. And no, but it's just funny how we live in a time where we never know who's listening, who's recording, who might be watching us either on a video or from afar or whatnot.

[3:04] Privacy, I think we've come to understand, is pretty much a thing of the past. Would you guys agree? At some level, privacy is a thing of the past.

[3:15] A very distant past, though. And what do I mean by that? Well, you see, more than 3,000 years ago, the psalmist declared that God knows all. Right?

[3:25] We're reminded of that. In Psalm 139, verse 2, David states, You know when I sit and when I rise up. But you discern my thoughts from afar off.

[3:37] This fact is extremely problematic. We might think, well, it would be bad enough for a co-worker to hear certain things we say. But the Lord knows when we rise up, when we sit down.

[3:47] He knows our thoughts before we even get there. He discerns our thoughts and really what our motivations are for doing and saying and all these other things. So the problem is that every one of us, and by God's grace, Psalm 32 is going to, for each of us, I hope, open our eyes and give us wisdom to maybe areas that we are finding ourselves trapped in or we don't really know that we're trapped in in a particular area of sin.

[4:15] And it can be, you know, the dirty dozen or the nasty nine or whatever your list is. But Scripture has plenty of those to reveal to us. Now, Psalm 32 this morning is a mass scale of David.

[4:26] And in wisdom literature, for example, like the Psalms, the word mass scale means to instruct and make one wise. Are we open for that this morning?

[4:37] I'm looking forward to being further instructed and we need more wisdom. The Lord tells us if we need wisdom, if we would ask for wisdom, He would freely give us wisdom.

[4:48] And that's my prayer for us. Now, scholars have said that Psalm 32 should be read alongside of Psalm 51. Why is that? Well, Psalm 51 is David's great psalm of repentance after his affair with Bathsheba.

[5:05] And the story about that whole storyline about Bathsheba and Uriah and David and all of that and Nathan can be found in 2 Samuel 11 and 12 if you want some afternoon reading, 2 Samuel 11 and 12.

[5:20] Now, the point is this, that while David's armies are off, you know the story, David's armies are out fighting war. King David stays behind in Jerusalem and he commits adultery with Bathsheba.

[5:31] And during that time, she becomes pregnant. That whole time, her husband, who's an officer, a committed man, committed to David, committed to Israel, he is out fighting. So there's no way he could be mistaken as the father in this.

[5:43] So David invites him back and he still doesn't go to be with his wife because his men are at battle. You know the story. And so David has him put out in the front lines when he gets back and he has the men retreat back and Uriah's left up front alone and he is murdered, in a sense, by David, right?

[6:00] By his plan and his plot. You see, and David thought that his sin was hidden. And many of us in the past, or maybe even now, have hidden sins. We have things that we don't talk about, we haven't talked to anyone about, and specifically, we haven't talked to the Lord about.

[6:16] And so David believed that his sin was hidden from everyone, but one day, to his surprise, because God loves him and his grace is upon him, that the prophet Nathan confronted him.

[6:28] And after being confronted, David repents. And that's what we read in Psalm 51. Let me read to you verse 13 from Psalm 51 because many scholars believe that Psalm 32 is in fact because of what David prayed and how he repented in 51.

[6:47] 51.13 tells us that he promised God, I will teach transgressors your ways and sinners will return to you. I love that.

[6:59] It is believed that Psalm 32 is that fulfillment, as I stated. As David has written this thousands of years ago, but we can be encouraged, blessed, directed, corrected, and instructed even today.

[7:12] You might ask, well, why is David's instruction about God and his ways in this regard so vital to each and every one of us in this room? And that would be to those who are unredeemed and those who are redeemed.

[7:25] Those who are right with God and those who are not right with God in that sense of being redeemed by God. And so why is David's instruction about God and his ways vital for each of us?

[7:35] Simply because knowing we are sinners means that we understand a need to turn to God and repent of our sin and receive the forgiveness and restoration we so desperately need from and with our God.

[7:52] The title of this morning's sermon for Psalm 32 is this, How Blessed is the One Forgiven? It's not a question mark, it's an exclamation point. How blessed is the one forgiven?

[8:05] We'll note three key areas this morning. Number one, we'll see the double blessing of forgiveness. The double blessing of forgiveness in verses one and two. We're gonna see those blessings that God has bestowed upon David after he repents.

[8:21] We'll see the powerful process of forgiveness. How God does not let us get along very far. Though we might seem like we've been getting away with things, he doesn't let us as his people get away very long, right?

[8:35] So the powerful process of forgiveness, we'll see what David went through and how quickly he turned and repented. That'll be in verses three through seven. And then finally, we'll see that glorious, the blessed outcome of forgiveness in verses eight through 11.

[8:51] Now let me make some things clear. David, we know, was a man after God's own heart, right? Yet he committed such sins, right? That we spoke about already. And so David is a follower of God and he has gotten off the rail.

[9:06] So in one way, this message is for any of us who are redeemed, who have sin in our lives that we need to repent of, or we're in the midst of sin. And it's also for those who are not right with God, who are not redeemed, right?

[9:19] Who have not put their trust in Christ, recognizing that God is holy and righteous and just, and that we are sinners as men and women. We are sinners. We are flawed. We are broken.

[9:30] And we cannot redeem ourselves, but God, who is rich in mercy, sent his son, Jesus Christ, to redeem a people to himself, right? And we're praying that if that's you this morning, that you need to be redeemed, God would do just that.

[9:43] If you would just simply repent of your sins and put your trust in Christ alone and not also in your good works. And we'll talk about getting on the performance, pony merry-go-round. We'll avoid that, but we'll talk about that a little bit in a moment.

[9:56] Here's the main idea. If you're looking for the main idea in a somewhat concise sentence, it's this. Confession and repentance of sin leads to God's forgiveness and restoration and our ultimate joy.

[10:10] Let me read that to you again. The main idea, the big idea, is confession and repentance of sin leads to God's forgiveness and restoration and our ultimate joy. So friends, I'm going to read for you Psalm 32.

[10:23] Now, do you guys usually stand when you read the word or do you remain seated? Whatever you normally do is fine with me. It looks like you stay seated. Okay. Yeah, okay.

[10:34] Well, this is the word of God. And so let us try to prepare our hearts right now and hear what God has to tell us. We know that it's inerrant, it's inspired, it's infallible. What does God have for us this morning?

[10:48] Psalm 32, a mascal of David. Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity and in whose spirit there is no deceit.

[11:03] For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away. They wasted away through my groaning all day long.

[11:14] For day and night, your hand was heavy upon me. My strength was dried up as by the heat of the summer. Selah.

[11:27] Verse five, I acknowledge my sin to you and I did not cover my iniquity. I said, I will confess my transgression to the Lord and you forgave the iniquity of my sin.

[11:39] Selah. Therefore, let everyone who is godly offer prayer to you at a time when you may be found. Surely in the rush of great waters, they shall not reach him.

[11:50] You are a hiding place for me. You preserve me from trouble. You surround me with shouts of deliverance. Selah. I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go.

[12:04] I will counsel you with my eye upon you. Be not like a horse or a mule without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, or it will not stay near you.

[12:17] Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord. Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart.

[12:35] This is the word of the Lord, indeed. Amen. What a wonderful passage.

[12:46] Starting out with the blessings of forgiveness. David's heart broken, dry, dying in himself because of his sin, and immediately repents when he's forgiven. And God talks about how he can be trusted and how he will teach him and guide him.

[13:01] And then later in Psalm 51, David also talks about how he can do that for his people, God's people. So how blessed is the one forgiven?

[13:11] The double blessing of forgiveness, verses one and two. Since verses one and two are the heart of this, we're gonna focus on the blessings of being forgiven. We're gonna spend a little bit more time on that first point.

[13:24] There's gonna be several great things in here for us to grasp and understand and refocus. A lot of times we think on our poor performance or that we're better than someone else. God's just gonna show us we're blessed, not because we're better than anyone and sad because we're worse than anyone, but we're blessed because of what he's done for us, right?

[13:44] That's the goal. So verse one, blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Let's pause for a moment there.

[13:56] The one blessed, that word blessed can mean happy. It can be happiness, but not in a warm and fuzzy way, but in the ultimate joy of wow, I am forgiven.

[14:06] We quickly have that spiritual amnesia and we get caught up in the world's system and the world's ways of doing things and they cause stress and drama and all kinds of things in our hearts and minds, but blessed, happiness, who we are in Christ is what God wants us to hear this morning.

[14:24] The one blessed or happy is anyone who receives the Lord's forgiveness. Instant happiness, instant joy of knowing that burden is off of you and has been placed on the savior of the world, God himself.

[14:39] Now this word blessed is also the first word that comes up in Psalm one, right? We know that from reading the Psalms. The first time we see the word blessed in the Psalms is in Psalm one and it's the first word in the Psalm.

[14:53] But the context of Psalm one is quite different than what we're looking at this morning in that sense because it declares the blessings bestowed. Psalm one is declaring the blessings being bestowed upon the ideal man, the perfect one, the one who is perfect, who never sinned and always walked in God's ways, right?

[15:15] Jesus is the example prophetically there. Jesus is the man, the blessed one of Psalm one. And as sinners, we desperately need his perfection, the perfection described in Psalm one.

[15:29] We need his perfection bestowed upon us and we need to be remembering that's who we are as Christians. Jesus is that blessed one.

[15:40] Then Psalm two, which is also, Psalm one and two are the introductions to all 150 Psalms, right? Psalm two ends with this verse, blessed are those who take refuge in him.

[15:53] He's the perfect one, Psalm one. And Psalm two ends with, blessed are those who take refuge in him. Blessed indeed. That blessing of refuge is what Psalm 32 this morning is about.

[16:08] I pray that we find great refuge in our forgiveness in Christ or that God would forgive us as we repent of our sins and draw near to him, right? Psalm 32 declares the ultimate blessing of our great God is available to sinners, every sinner, you, me, every sinner in that sense.

[16:29] And that is his blessing is reserved for all those who have not, not walked perfectly in God's ways, but have indeed repented and know the joy of God's forgiveness.

[16:41] To further emphasize God's forgiveness and cancellation of one's debt for sin, verse two declares another blessing, our second blessing, this two-fold blessing.

[16:53] Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity. No iniquity. Some of us might be going, well, can you explain a little bit more about iniquity?

[17:03] And the answer is, yes, I can and I will. Can you think of a better way though to encourage you and me to confess our sins than the promises that we see in one and two?

[17:15] So often our sin keeps us from wanting to turn to God about things, doesn't it? It keeps us ashamed and kind of hidden. Even as believers, we can get caught in that. We forget who we really are and more importantly, who Christ is.

[17:28] Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity. Everyone wants to be blessed, don't they? Does anyone not want to be blessed?

[17:39] Of course. Everyone wants happiness and joy and blessing. How happy and blessed are the forgiven. To appreciate the value of forgiveness, we want to look in our text at three words.

[17:53] There's six words in the Bible that are used for sin. We'll see three of them next in this text. And it's important for us to understand, to appreciate the blessing of forgiveness is to better understand your depravity and sin.

[18:08] Right? The more you realize you've been forgiven for, the greater our great God is. And so I want to spend a few moments there. So let's take a look at these first three words for, or these three words for sin.

[18:19] In verse one, the first word we see is the word transgression. Right? That word literally means rebellion. You have transgressed. You have rebelled.

[18:30] We have rebelled against God. This means we have rebelled against God and His authority. Right? And we do it all day long. We just get used to doing that. Right? It's just so easy to rebel against God and not esteem others better than ourselves.

[18:45] Right? All those kinds of things. You see, God created us in His image to live on earth for what purpose? For our own glory? No.

[18:55] Not to compete with His glory. We're to live out our lives representing Him. That's the clarion call. So He directs us, in order to do that well, to do it rightly, to follow Him and care for His, our fellow image bearers, or His fellow image bearers and His creation.

[19:15] But, you guys know the story. Rather than obey God, we have become traitors in many ways, destroying our lives, ruining other lives, living as rebels against God.

[19:27] And again, remember that David was right with God at the time. So we can fall into these categories. And it'll help us realize how great forgiveness really is when we examine those things.

[19:39] And what makes our transgressions so vile is not just that they are against God's image bearers, but, at their very root, our sin is directly against God.

[19:54] Every single one of them. But you don't understand, John, my mother-in-law, my son-in-law, my aunt, my uncle, my kids, my wife. You see, right, I do understand. I'm a sinner like you.

[20:05] I get it. We're going to find a reason to accept our own, the way we respond, right? We're going to find really good excuses why. When someone comes in for biblical guidance for their marriage or for their relationship or whatever, I don't need to hear slanderous gossip about your spouse.

[20:24] I just want to know about you. What's your problem? Oh, no, but I'm like this because of her. Or because of him. No, you're like that because you're a sinner who needs Christ to sanctify him further, right?

[20:36] And that's why we get stuck. So our first word is transgression. King David said it best when he confessed to God in Psalm 51, for against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight.

[20:53] did David sin against Bathsheba, Uriah, Israel, and on and on and on. He did. Absolutely he did in those acts of sin.

[21:04] But he recognizes that the number one person whom he truly sinned against is God. That's the one who will hold him accountable, right? Alexander McLaren, a 19th century Scottish pastor, captures the force of this word transgression in his commentary on the Psalms when he writes this, You do not understand the gravity of the most trivial wrong act when you think of it as sin against the order of nature or against the law written on your heart or as the breach of the constitution of your nature or as a crime against your fellows.

[21:47] You have not got to the bottom of the blackness. Wow. You have not gotten to the bottom of the blackness until you see that it is a flat-out rebellion against God himself.

[22:04] Remember, our goal is to see how great forgiveness is for sinners such as us, right? Psalm 32 is reminding us that we're transgressors and until we realize that it's full-on rebellion against God, we don't appreciate our forgiveness as much.

[22:19] It's kind of like, of course he forgave me. I was whatever. I'm this. I'm that. Let's look at our second word. Our second word that we discover is the actual word sin itself, right?

[22:31] The Bible tells every one of us that we are S-I-N positive, right? Every single person in this room. This has to do with falling short. That's what that word sin means. We're falling short.

[22:42] We're missing the mark. We're a sinner. That means we have failed to reach the goal. In the ancient world, the term sinner, sinner, excuse me, was used in archery to describe the person who shoots at a target but the arrow falls short.

[22:59] No, not just missing the bullseye. The arrow falls short of making it even to the target is the idea. And so they would shout out, somebody be in a competition, shoot the arrow and the moment it dove into the ground or shot off or whatever, totally missing the target, not just the bullseye but the target, the judges would shout out, sinner!

[23:22] He missed the mark. He was a sinner in that regard. This is a great illustration of sin, isn't it? You see, we try to hit the mark of obedience, right?

[23:33] Here you are sitting in church today. You go, you know, I feel good about myself. I went to church and I feel good about myself. And that is right. It shouldn't just be about yourself. You should be feeling so good about your God that it makes you love others more, love Him more, right?

[23:46] That's the goal. But it's great to know that, you know, we're doing our best to obey God by being in worship and fellowship and accountability with one another. We try the best to be obedient to Christ, don't we?

[24:01] But the Bible says we don't even hit the target on our best day. The best 10 seconds of our best day. We don't even hit the target.

[24:12] We fall so short. And so we can't get on that self-righteous performance pony that we were talking about on the merry-go-round of moralism, right? Because one moment you're on that pony and you're way up at the top.

[24:26] And you go, wow, I've done really well this week. I've read my Bible twice. I've gone to, I let somebody cut in line of me at Walmart. I'm just a nice guy this week.

[24:36] Well, next week you're cantankerous and miserable and you're down here as the pony goes to the lower end and you go, everybody's better than me and I'm terrible. And there we go, up and down and up and down.

[24:46] And so we become critical of others in order to feel like I'm going to go further up on this performance pony and feel better about myself, right? And then I'll put myself down because I'm just such a loser.

[24:57] And we go up and down. That is moralism. That is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. Would you guys agree with that? Yeah. We want to stay off of that merry-go-round. But it's so easy as humans to get on that.

[25:10] So we want to be careful. This illustration lets us know as sinners we miss the target altogether. It doesn't matter. Well, I was 50 feet closer than you.

[25:20] Yeah, you're still a billion miles short. Right? It's just, you get the idea. Let's look at our third word. The third word we see is iniquity in our text, right?

[25:30] We see those in our verses. Remember our verses here are telling us these things. Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin, right, missing the mark, is covered. And blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity.

[25:46] And so we're going to look at that word iniquity real quick. It can mean waywardness. I'm kind of getting off path. I don't feel real close to God right now. I'm kind of getting off path. I'm looking at stuff I shouldn't.

[25:58] I'm thinking about things that I shouldn't. I'm kind of getting off track. It also means crookedness. Crookedness. And it starts to reveal to us the crookedness of us going the wrong way.

[26:11] And finally, it also means perversion. Okay? Now these sins, iniquity, are considered intentional sins. Premeditated type sins. Okay?

[26:22] They're different than the transgressions and falling short. They're all included in that sense, but God is wanting us to understand that He sees all of these things and it's the intention of our heart that gets us.

[26:34] And that's what He meant, I believe, by when He says He can see our thoughts afar off. He knows what we're really intending to do when we're making these moves to be Mr. or Mrs. Wonderful or Junior Mr.

[26:48] or Junior Miss Wonderful. Right? We're trying to get in our place as adults or children. These premeditated sins which we are all guilty of make it very clear that indeed we are all guilty.

[27:01] We're a mess. and you're starting to see that the forgiveness is much better than you thought as these things come across our minds. Though this is just a hint of how complex sin is, the facts are in.

[27:14] We're all jacked up. We are a hot mess. We are a dumpster fire of sin and mess. But wait! There's hope, huh? Gotta have hope in Christ.

[27:25] We know that. You see, the most important truth to grasp today in one and two, because we're all naturally wired legalists, we want to go, yes, I'm a transgressor. I'm a sinner. You know, I'm filled with iniquity.

[27:37] That's not what we want you to focus on. God wants us to focus on something else. It's good to grasp these things about sin so we know who we are. But every one of these sins and all the secret sins of our hearts can be and or have been forgiven.

[27:56] By God's grace, the three words for sin are matched with a second set of three words in verses one and two that describe what God does with sin for those who repent of their sin.

[28:09] We'll see that God forgives it, our sin, He covers our sin, and He refuses to count it against us, the sinful person, by instantly pardoning us.

[28:21] Verse one, blessed is the one whose transgression is what? Forgiven. Literally means to be carried away, gone. It's not hidden in a mail bag in some post office from 1940 that will be found one day and go, oh, look at all these letters.

[28:37] It's gone as far as the east is from the west. God forgives us. I don't know about you, but I can tell you from my life that unconfessed sin begins to crush me over time.

[28:54] And it is a burden to carry. But once repentance takes place, God lifts it just as He promises and carries it away.

[29:05] As I stated, as far as the east is from the west, the Bible tells us He remembers it no more. No more. In other words, it's just as if you've always obeyed.

[29:19] Not just as if I've never sinned. It's like you've always obeyed with Christ. Perfect record. Do you see how freeing that is? To see that you've been forgiven of such vile that we have been forgiven of such great transgression that He would see us as having always obeyed.

[29:37] What a gift. Before sin is, it's a crushing burden before it's confessed. You know the song, It is well with my soul. Do you not, most of you?

[29:48] I love that hymn. It was written in 1873. And one of the stanzas goes like this. My sin, O the bliss of this glorious thought, my sin, not in part, but the whole, is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more.

[30:12] Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord, O my soul. Do you see the importance of learning to stay off the performance pony or putting others on it?

[30:23] Do you see the importance of our need to remember our transgressions, though they are great, greater than we can imagine against a perfect holy God, as dark as dark can be, but by God's grace, He sent His Son to redeem people to Himself for His glory and their good, our good.

[30:44] And they have been carried away. it causes our sin to want to rejoice. And you know the state of your being during the day and during the week and how much your heart remembers those things.

[30:55] It's good to be preaching these things to your heart rather than talking to yourself. Well, I think I am better than her. I mean, she hasn't been doing what I've asked for years. Not you, Lorna.

[31:06] And, you know, and all these different things, right, and we go back and forth and we get on the, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Preach to yourself. I am a twisted, twisted sinner. By God's grace, He redeemed me.

[31:18] I'm not going to put you on a performance pony. It makes my relationship with you better and it makes your relationship with me better, right? Reconcile, make it right, and move forward. Yeah, but He knows I don't like that.

[31:29] Why does she? Uh-huh. So repent again. So make it right again. Remember who you are. Don't get spiritual amnesia. Don't forget you've been bought with a high price and your sin was just as bad as the person perpetrating on you.

[31:44] Yet, our sin is greater against God than if you all sinned against me in your heart right now or came up and sinned against me physically or whatever. No matter how bad it is, it is never going to be as bad as my sin against a holy God.

[32:00] So I can forgive you. It may take time. It may take my heart's desire to put myself before the Lord and remember my own sin, but you understand I can forgive you quickly when I remember how much I've been forgiven.

[32:13] If we think we're only forgiven a little, we're only going to forgive a little. If we know how great the forgiveness we have received, how great we will be about forgiving others quickly.

[32:26] The second word has to do with atonement. Blessed is the one whose sin is covered. The blood of a sacrifice covered the sin of the people which turned God's wrath aside and restored the relationship with Him.

[32:40] We see that throughout the Old Testament as leaning up to Jesus Christ, the one who forgave once and for all. We're not going to the temple to sacrifice regularly. Christ is that once for all sacrifice.

[32:54] Right? Our third word for sin, excuse me, for blessing, describes what God does not do. So we've seen the things that God does. He's forgiven. He's covered.

[33:04] But He's not going to do something. Look at this. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity. This is a bookkeeping term.

[33:15] Right? It's an accountant type term. It means to charge something to a particular account. At a church, you might say, well, there's accounts for books that are purchased.

[33:25] Right? Whether it's a bookstore or for the pastor or for leaders, their needs. So you put those things in their right account and they're accounted for and there's a charge to that department or under that heading.

[33:37] But when God forgives you, He no longer charges your sin to your account as we've talked about. Jesus paid it all past tense.

[33:49] You were in over your head, dead in trespasses and sin, drowning in the debt that your sin was causing. But your balance has been erased by Jesus Christ if you have repented of your sin and put your trust in Him.

[34:05] No penalties, no late fees, you're forgiven. This is the same accounting word that Moses uses in Genesis 15, 6 to describe the righteousness Abraham had by faith.

[34:19] Abraham believed the Lord and he counted, meaning God, counted to him, counted it to him as righteousness for simply believing, for simply putting his trust in God.

[34:31] God's accounting, he erases sin and he adds Christ's righteousness to our account completely and fully. That's how he blesses us in forgiveness.

[34:44] It is essential for us to understand saving faith. In the book of Romans, please take a note of this, Romans 4, 2 to 8. I would encourage you to read that later, maybe as a family or as a couple or call a loved one and read that and recognize that Paul is connecting Genesis 15, 6 about Abraham's righteousness and Psalm 32 about David's sin and forgiveness to teach that salvation is by faith alone and not by works at all.

[35:17] That's Romans 4, 2 to 8. You see, by not counting sin against us, God declares us to be righteous. This is God's blessing. Blessed is the one who is forgiven and we could add and counted righteous as righteous as our great God.

[35:34] Who receives this blessing? This heart of the gospel blessing? The end of verse 2 tells us the kind of person God forgives.

[35:45] Blessed is the man in whom spirit there is what? No deceit. Do you see that at the end of verse 2? There is no deceit. The idea of deceit is not about lying to others but about lying to yourself and lying to God.

[36:01] Right? That's the idea of this word deceit. The apostle John tells us if we say we have no sin we what? We deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. How do we lie to ourselves?

[36:14] Oh, let me count the ways. You guys ready for a couple? All right. We lie to ourselves when pride causes us to blame others for our behavior. Like when there is tension or conflict in a relationship it's always the other person's fault.

[36:30] Babysit some children or your grandchildren or watch your kids. How long does it take before somebody's pointing the finger at the other kid? Yeah, but they did but because I did but uh-huh, okay.

[36:41] Well then we forgive you for that. You know, for punching her. Okay, it's okay because she deserved it. No, it's not okay. Sometimes we can lie to ourselves by thinking God does not know about our secret sins whether of long ago or far away, right?

[36:57] We've been somewhere where nobody knew that I did this or I did that or it was so long ago that I've actually forgot the depth of my depravity about it. I'm sure the Lord's let it go.

[37:08] Not necessarily, right? We could be paying the tax in different ways in our lives though that we're forgiven. We can deceive ourselves by comparing ourselves to others. I've stated that. We can deceive ourselves by focusing on the external what we let others see or when we compare our morality to others somehow we're always better and we always show everybody our best.

[37:30] We can deceive ourselves by thinking that this psalm is for somebody else. It's for us. But remember the joy and blessing of forgiveness is for those who do not lie to themselves.

[37:44] They're not deceiving themselves. We can be so self-deceived that we try to deceive God even though He knows more than Alexa, right?

[37:55] More than Siri, more than the NSA or someone else's cell phone or camera picking us up. We can ignore our sin. We can pretend it didn't happen and try to hide it from our Creator but deep down we know that He sees it and if God loves us He will let us know what He sees and that's important for us.

[38:17] He was not letting His heavy hand off of David because He loved him. He was His own and He wouldn't let him go until He repented. So this is where David turns from the double blessing now of forgiveness to the powerful process of forgiveness and these last two points are much quicker.

[38:36] The powerful process of forgiveness. In verses 3-7 David explains how God would not let him ignore his sin.

[38:47] How his own inner turmoil led to his confession, repentance, and forgiveness. We're going to look at three quick areas regarding that. David's stubborn silence, that he confessed his sins, and that he was given forgiveness.

[39:04] The process began with David's stubborn silence and of course that can be our own heart at times. David would not confess his sin but kept on sinning but God would not let him get away with it because He loved him.

[39:18] For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away, verse 3, through my groaning all day long. He was having physical illness because of an unrepentant heart.

[39:31] Verse 4, for day and night your hand was heavy upon me. My strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. A friend of mine, Jim Johnston, who has, with Crossway, he has put together commentaries for the Psalms and they're fantastic and he writes this in this case.

[39:52] This is a perfect description of the misery of living with a guilty conscience. If you are a Christian, this describes the way you have felt when you would not confess your sin to God. Physically, David's bones were being felt and were literally wasting away, verse 3.

[40:09] He was drained and he was weak. He was exposed to the heat. It felt like the heat of summer, like laying out on foil in Phoenix, right, or Death Valley, right?

[40:20] I mean, it was just zapping him of everything. Sin can have a very, very powerful effect on our health and our vitality, can it not?

[40:31] Indeed, sin and its guilt can cause these things. Mentally, David also felt the heavy weight of God's hand. He felt the burden of his guilt all day and when he laid down, he could not rest.

[40:46] Again, by God's grace, he cannot and will not let it go. He doesn't ignore it. He loves you. He cares for you. He desires his best for you.

[40:56] Not just your best, his best for you. And so, we need to confess, acknowledge, return to him. And that's what we see next in this next part, confessing his sins.

[41:09] David says in verse 5, it's just amazing to me, he's talking about the blessing and then in two verses he's talking about how beat up and trashed he is and then in an instant, things have turned. Verse 5, I acknowledge my sin to you and I did not cover my iniquity.

[41:23] I said I will confess my transgressions to the Lord and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. I love the instant forgiveness from our great God. What an example it is for us to care for one another.

[41:36] If God's hand is heavy on your conscience this morning, friend, you need to know that he loves you and is making you miserable for your own good. You know, it's just a fact and it's okay.

[41:46] I went through a season about 20 something years ago where I understood that the Lord wanted me to do a thing and be patient with someone and I wasn't patient with that person and my buddy said, I'll take care of it for you.

[41:59] Somebody I was working with in ministry. I go, great, do it. I knew when I said it it was the wrong thing to say but I was okay with it because I was frustrated.

[42:10] It had been enough. I felt like I waited long enough to get the answers I needed. Well, it turned into more drama, more nonsense and the truth be known, there's nothing that that could have brought on if it would have been left alone but I started to get thinking about it so much that it started making me sick to my stomach.

[42:29] Acid was building up. I was a wreck. I started to get depressed, like literally, absolutely depressed and it would not and I just could not come out of it on my own and finally, I got to the point where I started repenting and I called a pastor friend of mine and I was afraid I wouldn't get the help I needed.

[42:47] I think, I'm going crazy. Am I really going to get help? What if nobody can help me? You know, all the fear of keeping it in, kind of like, you know, we're hearing here. Pastor says, hey, what helps you?

[42:58] I said, when I minister to people, he goes, then get out of bed and start ministering again. It was a slow process but over time, by focusing on others and caring for others, I took my own noggin, self-absorbed self, right, out of the picture and God began to heal me and the great thing about that is it's such a scary place to be.

[43:19] I never want to go back again so it's been like the rumble strips and the cement median when you're going down the highway. I start hearing those rumble strips. I'm like, whoa, I'm back over where I need to be, Lord. Okay, we're good. I don't want to go there.

[43:31] I don't want to learn the hard way though he knows that John means stubborn in Greek, means ignorant, means slow learner, it means, you know, all those things. I'm kidding, it doesn't. So he confesses his sin and he, God, take a look later on at Hebrews 12.

[43:50] Just mark that down, Hebrews 12, 5 through 7 to see how much God loves us and disciplines us because he does. When the Lord is not stepping in, that's the time to start worrying.

[44:06] Am I his own? Am I his? Do I not feel guilty about this? Why am I not, you know, letting go of this? When it begins to come out and you're not worried about God stepping in and seeing your sin, that's the time to worry.

[44:21] Man, am I a Christian? Am I in that deep a rebellion? Am I going to be in, how far am I going to let this go? Because God will love me all the way up to it. Beloved, the guilt of our sin is forgiven through Christ.

[44:36] For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. God. That has been taken care of at the cross for you and I if we're believers, right?

[44:50] But we also know that we're still in these tent, these fleshly bodies that are learning and growing and God promises to make us more like Christ and one day bring us home and give us that ultimate fulfillment.

[45:03] These are our promises. This is who we are. These are our identities. Yes, I am a mess. I am sinful and flawed, but I am welcomed and loved. And my great God is changing me and molding me and shaping me.

[45:16] He wants me to care for others and help them along the way. You know, having a loving faith family like you guys, caring for one another and ministering and doing all those things.

[45:27] Let us not be like David who was afraid to correct his own children even after being forgiven and we saw how his kids turned out. He said, well, how could I talk to that person? They already know my sin.

[45:37] I'm a disaster from 20 years ago or two minutes ago or whatever. How can I help them? Because in the spirit, it's right to go forward and care for one another. Right? Christ paid those charges for you and me and we can be encouraged.

[45:54] Not let the guilt hang on anymore and move forward. David's own experience of God's offer of forgiveness was so powerful that he encourages God's people by stating this in verses 6 and 7.

[46:06] Therefore, let everyone, everyone who is godly offer prayer to you at a time when you may be found. Surely, in the rush of great waters, they shall not reach him.

[46:19] Today is the day to turn these things back around, right, if you have those or if you know somebody and you're in their area of influence to love them through that. Verse 7, you are a hiding place.

[46:32] David is speaking of God. You are a hiding place for me. You preserve me from trouble. You surround me with the shouts of deliverance. David's thinking of godly people here.

[46:44] People like him who gave into temptation and have fallen into sin. People like us at different times in our lives. David knew firsthand that when he was...

[46:58] David knew firsthand what we know. That when we are ashamed and angry with ourselves because of sin, the temptation is to keep quiet and not want it out, not want it exposed. Freedom comes when it's exposed.

[47:13] If you're not sure how twisted I am, read your Bible. It will tell you more about me than I will ever admit. Okay? We're that jacked up. So I can forgive you quickly. You can forgive me because this is the truth.

[47:25] This is how bad it is. Okay? That's freeing. Some of you almost got here out early. I almost turned two pages. Sorry. The problem is we don't want to face him and that we don't want to admit that what we've done, we're acting like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, aren't we?

[47:45] We can. We run off. We hide. We hear God coming, walking in the cool of the day and we shudder. We don't... I don't want to talk to God about it. It's not like he doesn't know. Friends, let's listen.

[47:58] Please. If that's you right now, in your heart, I would just suggest that you call out to God and say, Lord, I am scared to death to talk to you about this or whoever I've sinned against or whatever.

[48:10] I'm afraid it's okay. It's okay to be afraid. It's because it's shameful, it's guilty, but we're all in the same boat. And no matter how it's received, we know the Lord will receive it rightly.

[48:24] You know, and sometimes the repercussions of those things take time with the loved one that we have sinned against or the co-worker or whoever. But you know, it's what God tells us to do. And it frees us to move forward.

[48:38] Please listen. The other side of that is if we don't confess and repent of those sins, like David said, in the rushing waters, you may not be able to eventually repent of that and you'll live with the repercussions of that.

[48:56] Sin is so deceitful and if we don't deal with it, it will harden your heart. Are there any areas that you have hardened your heart over the years and you go, you know, I can't forgive them.

[49:08] I can't confess it. Man, fall on your knees, fall on your face and cry out to God and beg Him to soften your heart.

[49:20] If you can hear that and you're moved in that in any way, I would encourage you to do that. I'm not saying that Jim filled me in on everybody's sinful mess here. I'm saying, I know you enough. I read my Bible.

[49:31] Right? I love you guys. I know I don't know you, but I love God's people. I love people. I just want to help you in any way I can. And this helps me every time I remind myself of this kind of stuff.

[49:42] Right? So the question is, what will you do with your sin if you have sin? Will you try to hide it or would you confess it? Right?

[49:53] If we hide it and we refuse to confess it, we get to the point where we may not be able to confess it and we might be callous and stuck in the repercussions of that the rest of our lives. And you might even prove that you have an unbelieving heart in the end.

[50:08] Years ago, I was with David Helm. He's an author. He's really great at teaching guys how to study the Word of God and preaching the Word of God. And I was joking with a bunch of pastors in the room and I said, well, brother, you know, we were always wondering about you anyway.

[50:21] And he said, whoa, John, like, don't joke about that. I'm like, what do you mean? I'm like, dude, I know him. He's okay with God. He's right with God, right? He goes, yeah, but we're called to live out our salvation with fear and trembling.

[50:33] We're called to, you know, live to the end and we all know people who we thought were more godly than us who are no longer walking with the Lord. I was like, whoa, sobering moment.

[50:44] Just a sobering reminder the fear of the Lord, the right fear of the Lord is the fear to listen and follow. Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart leading you to fall away from the living God.

[50:57] Hebrews 3.12. Wow. David has shown us how God has not let him ignore his sin and I believe the Lord might be showing us that. How his own inner turmoil led to his confession to God, his repentance and ultimate forgiveness.

[51:16] That is the powerful process of forgiveness. Now we see the blessings that follow when you and I confess and repent of our sin and we'll be closing with this. Blessed, the blessed outcome of our forgiveness verses 8 through 11.

[51:30] We'll see the guidance of God, we'll see the enduring love and we'll see the ultimate joy. Verses 8 and 9. God promises his guidance to David and to you and me.

[51:41] I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go. I will counsel you with my eye upon you. Be not like a horse or a mule without understanding which must be curbed with bit and bridle or it will not stay near you.

[51:57] In context, this guidance concerns godly living. Living for Christ. Godly living. From the counsel of God's word, the Holy Spirit teaches us to obey and walk in righteousness.

[52:10] And in Psalm 32, what we've been seeing is that God used pressure to move David from unrepentance to confession and forgiveness. that's the love of God, that pressure, that wonderful pressure of God.

[52:24] God uses this kind of pressure in our lives as well because he wants you and me to understand his ways and walk in them. Walk in his will and not our own, right?

[52:36] Next, God promises his enduring love for those who confess and repent of their sins. Not only promises guidance, but his enduring love. He's patient, he's kind, he's gentle.

[52:48] Verse 10. Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord.

[52:59] These are the things we want to focus in on and remember when we leave, right? Is that the alarm that I should be done? Okay, I'm wrapping it up.

[53:12] Enduring love. Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord. This is God's covenant love. Doesn't change when he loves us.

[53:23] His covenant love, his commitment to you and to me. This refuge, of course, is provided in Christ, our Lord, the man, God himself, the God-man who bore our transgression, our sin, our iniquity, our deceit so that we can be freely forgiven.

[53:42] God's love. God's love. God's love. Like a parent, God waits for that prodigal child to return, always ready to welcome him home. Some of us have prodigal children and we know that ache in our heart that we're hoping, we're praying, right?

[53:58] God has an even greater ache in his heart in that sense, waiting for us. And friend, if this is hitting home for you in any level, in any way, God loves you and he is moving in your heart and he wants you to repent of these things.

[54:13] Put your trust in him and he's going to forgive you when you repent and confess. His love surrounds you. You may not feel it. You may feel distant from his love but that's you feeling that, not him. Draw near to him.

[54:25] All this leads to the third result of forgiveness, joy. Can you use a little joy? Yes, we can. Verse 11, Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart.

[54:39] The expressions here, be glad and rejoice, both describe spontaneous shouts of joy, excitement in who we are. When we worship God, we can walk in and go, we're looking at the order of service like adoring God and confession of sin, right?

[54:54] And we're watching this order like that, man, is my heart in that order? Am I adoring God? Am I confessing my sin, right? Am I thankful for the forgiveness, right? That kind of thing.

[55:06] When we fail and God forgives us, it makes us want to stand up and shout for joy. Not in here, of course. Not in here. Okay. Church, loved ones, the more we understand we are a mess.

[55:22] We are a sinful and flawed mess. The more joy fills us when we remember the gift of forgiveness and what our Lord went through to provide it for us. It causes us to be centered on Christ and his beauty.

[55:34] And you know when you're not because you begin to start thinking of yourself and failures or others' failures, refocus on Christ. Focus in on him. Remember, you are always welcomed in love as Christ paid for your sin as a Christian, right?

[55:50] If you're not a Christian, I want to say this. It's important for you if you recognize that God is holy and righteous and that you are sinful and flawed like everyone else in this room, right?

[56:01] Including me. That you can understand that if you would repent of your sin, that is, confess your sin to God and say, I'm turning away from it. No more do I want to go after it. He will forgive you and you are a new creation in Christ.

[56:15] Old things have passed away. You are a new creation in Christ who is now more able with the Holy Spirit in you to follow him and walk with him. But we need each other. He kept us weak in a sense that we would draw near to one another, that we would trust one another, we'd be encouraged by one another.

[56:33] And friends, remember, when we're forgiven by God, it's as if we've never sinned. It's as if we've always obeyed 100%. What a record.

[56:43] That's Christ's record. Wow. Jesus' perfection becomes our perfection. If you know God, again, let me just end with this.

[56:56] If you know God has forgiven you, it keeps you greatly encouraged. Forget how, if you're not encouraged right now, and I'm not saying you don't go through tough times, but remember, hey, this is a short stint. Life goes quick.

[57:08] We'll be with our Lord soon, and so let's remember we're forgiven and be usable in the times while we're still here for his glory. God is so good to us. He knows far more about us than Alexa, like I said, than the NSA, than Siri, than our spouses, yet he will forgive.

[57:27] And his complete knowledge of you, think about it, if he says, I will forgive, and he has complete knowledge of you, you know that you're completely forgiven when he's forgiven you.

[57:37] Do you see that? Oh, you're not surprising him. He chose to redeem you before the foundation of the world. He saw your life and go, Filkey is a disaster, but I'm going to bestow my love upon him and redeem him.

[57:51] Wow. Completely. That is freeing. That is freeing to live for God. So beautiful. And we can enjoy him and praise his name more and more today and in the days ahead.

[58:04] Friends, how blessed is the one forgiven? We noted the double blessing of forgiveness, the powerful process really of God's love to forgive us and get us where we need to be, the blessed outcome of forgiveness, the joy and reunion with Christ and the beauty of it.

[58:22] We learned that confession and repentance of sin leads to God's forgiveness and our restoration and our ultimate joy. I'm going to ask you right now to just, let's close our eyes, let's think about this, let's take a few minutes to examine our own hearts.

[58:36] Okay? Let's take a few minutes to reflect on what God's word said and any directives that he has. Let's not try to talk ourselves out of what God has for us and let's not forget who we are in him and enjoy the forgiveness of our Lord this morning.

[58:50] Alright? Let's just take a few moments and bow our heads and think about these things. Let's take a few moments.