Meaningful Life

Date: Nov. 18, 2024

Psalm 51

1 Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. 2 Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.

3 For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. 4 Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight; so you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge. 5 Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. 6 Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb; you taught me wisdom in that secret place.

7 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. 8 Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice. 9 Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.

10 Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. 11 Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. 12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways, so that sinners will turn back to you. 14 Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, you who are God my Savior, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness. 15 Open my lips, Lord, and my mouth will declare your praise. 16 You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. 17 My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise.

18 May it please you to prosper Zion, to build up the walls of Jerusalem. 19 Then you will delight in the sacrifices of the righteous, in burnt offerings offered whole; then bulls will be offered on your altar.

Meaningful Week
Bible Text:  Psalm 51
Sermon Topic: A Cry for Mercy
Take Home Point: True Repentance Comes from Genuine Confession

In a fortnight, we will be celebrating the annual thanksgiving event in the United States of America and Canada.  But before taking our thanksgiving offerings to the Lord, God’s word demands that we search our hearts and make genuine confessions for all our wrongdoings to him for our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving to be accepted.  The Holy scriptures tell us that no one is perfect.  This morning, I want to encourage everyone of us who might be feeling so dejected and thinking that our wrongdoings or sin against God is too much to be forgiven.  Some of us are too ashamed of some of the things we have done in the past that it becomes so difficult or impossible for us to pray.

I want to encourage all of us who might just be feeling that way to pray the scriptures, I mean praying directly from the Word of God.  This morning, we will pray from the scriptures as we walk through Psalm 51. It is a Psalm of repentance.  Each time we feel so overwhelmed with the guilt of wrongdoing or sin, please go to the Lord in prayer as you pray to him through Psalm 51.

Psalm 51 brings out the very deep sorrow and genuine repentance of King David over his moral failures after his adulterous affair with Bathsheba and the subsequent murder of her husband, Uriah. You Can read up the story in 2 Samuel chapters 11 and12.

While seeking for God’s mercy and forgiveness, David Acknowledged his Sin Psalm 51:3, he was Convicted of his Sin (wrongdoing) Psalm 51:3, David went to the Lord and Confessed his wrongdoings to God (1-4) and finally, David Pleaded for total Forgiveness and Cleansing of our Sins as he asked God for a clean heart and a renewed spirit (vs 10).

True repentance and brokenness set us free from worries, guilt, anger, hatred, unforgiveness, shame, it guarantees peace before God and man.  Go to the Lord this morning and through this week as you pray through Psalm 51.

I wish you a meaningful week.

Pastor David Kachi Jite