This is one of those Psalms that has stood out down through the centuries.
Here we see repentance in action. David, the king, has stolen another man’s
wife, impregnated her and then, in order to cover it up, ultimately has this
woman’s husband killed on the field of battle. How vile can you get? And
then, to make matters worse, he refuses to deal with his sin. Finally, and
fortunately, God breaks through. Nathan, the prophet, speaks the words that
finally pierce David’s cold heart. Then comes repentance. David wrote two
Psalms about this experience of his. Along with Psalm 51, Psalm 32 also
deals with what happened. This morning I am not going to deal with the whole
of this Psalm. I am only going to look at verses11 and 12. Listen again.
‘Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing
spirit.’ Let’s see what the Spirit has to teach us all today.
There is a tone to this section of David’s prayer, a tone that you can
especially hear in verse 11 that I just read. The tone you hear is fear.
David is afraid of something and it shows. You can almost feel it. ‘Cast me
not away from your presence and take not your holy Spirit from me.’ David is
afraid of being removed from the realm of safety and salvation. David is
afraid of being cast away from his God, of having the Spirit taken away from
him. David is afraid of becoming like every other pagan, or to use the
language of Paul, ‘separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of
Israel and a stranger to the covenants of promise, having no hope and
without God in the world.’ [Ephesians 2:12] David is afraid.
Now, there are those who know immediately how to deal with this – or they
think they know. If they were there with David they would be quick to offer
counsel to ease David’s fears. ‘Brother David, there is nothing to fear. You
can’t fall away. Don’t you know, ‘once saved, always saved’? Don’t you
believe the doctrine of election? Once God has chosen you there’s no way you
can lose your salvation. David, you’re worrying for no good reason.’ But
David is wiser than that. He remembers someone else who was chosen by God.
He remembers King Saul. Here was the man chosen by God Himself, anointed
with the holy oil by the prophet Samuel. And yet, what happened to Saul?
What do the Scriptures say? ‘Now the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul …
’ [1 Samuel 16:14] And Saul knew that this had happened. Listen to what he
said. ‘I am in great distress, for the Philistines are warring against me,
and God has turned away from me and answers me no more, either by prophets
or by dreams.’ [1 Samuel 28:15] And this is but a picture of the same theme
that we find in the New Testament. Jesus spoke of cutting off branches that
were in Him if they were unfruitful. Then there are these words from the
Apostle Paul. ‘Do you not know that in a race all the runners compete, but
only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete
exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable
wreath, but we an imperishable. So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as
one beating the air. But I discipline my body and keep it under control,
lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.’ [1
Corinthians 9:24-27]
David is afraid, and he has reason to be afraid. He cries out for mercy lest
God decide on justice. To be sure, the Scriptures teach the doctrine of God’
s election. That is too clear to deny. But that teaching of Scripture is
never to be used as a prop for presumption. And that is the clear result of
the counsel of too many. The lesson here is clear. When the Spirit points
out your sin, deal with it! Never tell yourself that it doesn’t matter what
you do about your sin. Never. And if there should be any here who have been
cavalier about their sin thinking that they don’t need to deal with their
sin because of the doctrine of election, let me urge you to cease your
foolishness. Remember that on the last day there will be many professing
Christians who will find out too late that they will be excluded from the
kingdom. Do not play around with your sin lest you be cast away from the
presence of the holy God. Rather, repent of it quickly.
But there is the flip side to consider. ‘Restore to me the joy of Your
salvation.’ What is it that David desires? What is this joy? I have told you
before that joy is not the same as happiness. The two are very different.
Happiness is an emotion that depends on the circumstances of the moment.
And so, it will come and go. Joy is an optimistic spirit that is based on
the truth of the Gospel. It is not based on what is passing. And so, it
makes sense for the Apostle to command, ‘Rejoice in the Lord always.’ Joy is
not some passing emotion. And yet it should, at least at times, express
itself emotionally precisely because of those Gospel truths. There is a joy
that comes from the Gospel, a joy that affects the emotions. How could it
not? Take a moment and think of just a few of the glorious truths of the
Gospel. ‘God is my Father and I am his son. He loves me so very much, more
than I could ever imagine. I experience more of that love every day. Nothing
happens to me apart from that love.’ Or consider this. ‘Jesus is my elder
brother who has suffered what I will never comprehend so that I will not
have to. Eternity will be spent enjoying His wit and wisdom.’ Or think about
this. ‘The powerful Spirit of God lives within me. It is His desire to mold
me after the example of Jesus Himself. And He will not stop doing His work
in my life until He reaches that goal.’ These are truths of the Gospel,
truths to be believed, truths to be enjoyed. And they are truths that are
ours. How can there not be great joy, even an emotional joy?
Well, there is one thing that will hide such joy. There is no joy in these
things when sin clouds them over. That’s what happened to David. He refused
to deal with his sin. And so, the joy that was his heritage evaporated. His
enjoyment of God and His blessings was gone – and that maybe forever. No
wonder he cried out, ‘Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation.’ And you
know what? That is exactly what God did. We see the fruit of that in other
Psalms that David wrote, Psalms that are filled with a sense of joy –
because of the Gospel.
Do you see what was going on in David’s life? We have before us a great
picture of something that many have a hard time understanding. We have a
great picture of the fear of God. David understood what was going on. He
understood, finally, the danger that existed to his soul because of his sin.
He was afraid and for good reason. Here is an example of the fear of the
LORD. And what a great antidote to foolish presumption. It isn’t for nothing
that the proverb states, ‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.’
The fear of God leads to serious dealings with your sin. And that needs to
begin long before you ever feel the Spirit’s nudge about some specific sin.
Let me encourage you to make this a matter for prayer.
Let me explain what I mean by that. It is my habit to begin my daily prayers
first, in terms of things relating to the Father and then in terms of things
relating to the Son and then in terms of things relating to the Spirit. When
I get to the Spirit it is my habit to pray that there would be nothing that
would stop Him from His work of changing me. In this context I pray that my
heart would always be tender toward God. The Scriptures warn about grieving,
resisting or even quenching the Spirit. So, it is my frequent prayer that
the Father would never allow me to get even close to doing such a thing. It
is my prayer that I might be quick to respond to the Spirit’s nudge when I
have sinned. I do not pray that as some mere form that I supposed to follow.
I have thought about what it would mean to be cast away from God’s presence
and to have the Spirit taken from me. And I know that I still love my own
sin enough that I could act just like David and refuse to deal with my sin,
even to the point of no return. And so, I pray that I would never even get
close to that kind of attitude. Let me encourage you to do the same. Pray
that you would respond quickly when the Spirit points out sin in your life.
And He will. You needn’t dig around in your soul to find some terrible sin
to confess. Just deal with what the Spirit presents to you.
And remember that this will be a life-long process. You will never outgrow
the need for repentance and faith – not in this life, anyway. And bear in
mind that this will make a difference. One fruit of serious dealings with
sin is a growing joy in the Gospel. As more of your sin is dealt with, as
you discover how insidious your sin really is, how it subtle it works, how
disgusting it is, but then as you see Jesus forgive it all and the Spirit
root it out completely, bit by bit, what would you expect but joy? The
Father is displaying His love to you day by day as you are being redeemed
from your filthy sin. You are no longer the person you once were. You are in
the process of becoming the person you will most certainly be, and that
forever. All because of Jesus. How amazing!
The fear of God is not something that is opposed to the joy of the Gospel.
They are linked. So, I will not ask you if you are rejoicing in your
salvation. That’s the wrong place to start. Rather, I will ask whether you
are fearing God. If you are then the joy will follow.
