Psalm 32

⁰⁵          I acknowledged my sin to You,

I did not hide my iniquity;

            I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,”

                        You forgave the iniquity of my sin.

Selah

⁰⁶          Therefore let everyone who is godly

offer prayer to You while You may be found;

            Surely in the rush of great waters,

                        they shall not reach him.

⁰⁷          You are a hiding place for me’

You preserve me from trouble’

You surround me with songs of deliverance.

Selah

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Confession

For the Lord’s Day:  the 20^th of November 2005

 

Introduction:  Our text today is slightly convoluted and somewhat strange in its translation.  Much advice in this regard is given in my Translator’s Handbook.  However, the general sense of the three verses is clear – and as we all have difficulty in swallowing our pride and admitting our sins and errors – we may safely overlook the minimal problems and visit the important points concerning the brief outline concerning confession, which is before us.

 

In general, my Translator’s Handbook tells us that “the turning point in the psalmist’s experience was his decision to confess his sins.”  We may also note that the same vocabulary, “sin, iniquity and transgression” is used again from the first portion of this psalm.

 

Development:

So, it is to these three words in verse five, that we first turn our attention as we explore the weight that is ever and always lifted from our souls when we are willing to confess our misdeeds, short comings and deliberate sins.  Our Confession defines sin as:  “Sin is any want of conformity unto, or transgression of, the law of God.”

 

The world may well stand in amazement at both aspects of sin so described.  The immoral frailty of not doing what should be done has long been out of favor and understanding.  And in our post modern world, it would appear that guilt has been assuaged through the simple redefinition of every deviant sin as merely a variant lifestyle option.  We have only to consider the official and unofficial organs of the minority politicos to realize that truth is respected as carefully and energetically as it once was by the Soviet editors of Pravda, which in the Russian language is their word for truth!  For more than a few decades, Soviet libraries had to cut pages out of the official State Encyclopedia and past others in, all to keep up with the social and cultural lies that were being mandated.

 

The big lie is just as terribly important in our time as the secular-humanist media attempt to foist their on-going story telling as factual truth in order to discredit their enemies.  The popular theory is if a lie is told often enough, it becomes a viable alternative for any real truths.

 

Our second word, “iniquity” or “guilt” in the context here is what the sinner experiences after the sin is accomplished or left undone.  “Should I have” or “I wish I had” done something – is just as much a guilty experience as that sorrow of having done something spiteful or purposeful.  In addition, we may also include random acts of stupidity here as well.

 

The third word:  “transgression” includes the obvious breaking of God’s perfectly ordained and revealed law.  In this regard – we have to remember that even the least of our sins must separate us from the loving presence of the Creator.  After all, our God is awesomely righteous and holy, and He must abhor even the least of sins.  And as we have seen in the first portion of this psalm, the psalmist was in dire anguish apart from the active presence of his Father in heaven. How different is his calling than that of those who barely realize the passive presence of God behind the scenes, but not directly acknowledged in their lives?

 

In verse six, the psalmist encourages the faithful to seek the Father of lights while He may yet be found.  After all, He is only available for a season and He pursues not every man, woman and child.  The “godly” here are of course, all of those who have heard the voice of God.  Now, this is a subtle thing to be sure.  Years ago I was asked by a PCA elder in Florida to examine his niece in our area.  While he spoke of a possible exorcism – this was not the case.  She only had an extraordinary acute sense of hearing.  So, that explained the voices she could hear in neighboring trailers.  Had she lived in more suspicious times, she might have become a Joan of Arc figure?  At least in the young ladies case, she had put no special meaning to the miscellanies of words she had heard.

 

Again, at Lucknow, during the Sepoy Rebellion in India, the fortified residents hoped and prayed for a relief force to march to their rescue.  Late in the siege, Scottish lass screeched loudly that help was “o’er the river and far away.”  She had heard the bagpipes of a regiment of Scots.  The firing stopped and the whole residency listened carefully for the sound of their salvation.  “Kin ye no hear em,” she protested?  Not until the distance was shortened did the English hear the fold tunes to which her ears had been tuned from her very youth.  At the general hearing, the whole company kneeled in a prayer of Thanksgiving for the relief that was drawing nigh!

 

The Psalmist here is the messenger of grace received, and he admonishes the body of believers to give prayers of confession and thanksgiving to the God of all grace.  If they will, he promises that just as in the case of Noah’s family, the rush of flood waters will not reach them!

 

Now, there is some confusion in our understanding of the phrase I have used to designate the seasonal nature of God’s calling people to repentance.  Some translators suppose that personal “distress” should be highlighted here, rather than the periodic working of the Holy Spirit making the Father known.  Now, you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to see that our preferences in translation may well be related to our Calvinist or Arminian theology!  Either way – God may still be God: overcoming our futile resistance and breaking down our pride in order to bring us to our knees before His loving throne of mercy.

 

Application:  As we turn to our last verse for this morning, we can certainly understand in the context of Israel’s exodus experience, that all of our religious singing is about the Deliverer or His deliverance in one sense or another.

 

Now, the last line of verse seven is difficult.  The Hebrew reads “[with] shouts of deliverance You surround me.”  Is this a kind of holy white noise meant to drown out the world at large?  Or is it like a portable device that allows a person to turn off televisions in a public place that is objectionable? Years ago, I discovered that if I didn’t want to listen to garbage music at work during the grave yard shift, I could simply tune another radio, with the volume off: to the same station being played over the intercom.  As long as my hidden radio was within fifty feet of the other, for some reason it would interfere with the reception of the offending radio.  It only took a couple weeks to convince the rockers that their tuning of noise was futile.  Once they gave up, my headaches went away!

 

However, we understand the generalities of the Hebrew text here today, let us be certain that within the shadow of His wings, as another Psalm celebrates – there is indeed a hiding place of safety for God’s children.  And in Him, we may have a hiding place from the perversities of the world at large and even go on to enjoy the spiritual hedge placed around us to protect us from trouble.  May we, like the psalmist here find forgiveness and sanctuary in His service – now and always.  All it takes is enough humility to admit that we have sinned.  Amen.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

PREACHING RESOURCES

 

Calvin, John:  Commentary on Book of Psalms.

Delitzsch, F:  Commentary on the Old Testament – Psalms.

Spurgeon, C.H:  Treasury of David.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Permission granted to redistribute unedited versions with this notice.

http://www.tulip.org/selah/sel032b.htm

To Subscribe or Unsubscribe go to:  http://www.four.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/ccrlist/