Third in a series of studies on Psalm 51
by Keith Bassham
These past several months, we have been looking at Psalm 51. Some of the things we have already learned are, first, it is one of seven penitential psalms, that is, the words are those of a person who is sorry for moral or covenantal failure — it is a prayer for forgiveness, and that was in fact the title of our last lesson: “We Need Forgiveness.”
Another thing we learned is that the psalm has a back story, and the back story is identified in the inscription: To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came unto him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba. This was, we said earlier, a blemish on David’s record. David had a lifetime of noble service to God, doing the right thing, acting in an honorable fashion even when being pursued and hunted down by his predecessor Saul. But there is an asterisk in 1 Kings 15:5, where the Bible record is, “David did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, and turned not aside from any thing that he commanded him all the days of his life, save only in the matter of Uriah the Hittite.”
And then we looked at the episode in detail, nearly a chapter and a half from 2 Samuel tells us all about what David had done, and how his sin was exposed. And this psalm, according to the inscription, is the result.
In verses 1-6, the psalm begins with a cry for forgiveness, emphasizing the urgency of the situation with a series of cries for God to do several things: have mercy, blot out, wash, and cleanse — mercy and blotting out for the transgressions, washing for iniquity, and cleansing for David’s sin.
One more thing before we get into this lesson. We said that David did not ask for justice. He asked for mercy. Justice, in the case of adultery and murder, would be capital punishment. God in His justice would have been justified (you see the similarity of those words?) to strike David dead. David needed forgiveness, and we need forgiveness.
But, David and we also need renewal. Mercy and forgiveness removes the guilt of sin — renewal replaces the sin with a desire to do right.
Renewal begins with a removal of uncleanness
Verse 6 introduces the section: Sin is forgiven, now it needs to be purged completely from within for a makeover to begin.
6 Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts: and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom.
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Hyssop, the hyssop of the Bible, could be taken in one of two ways, and in fact there has been quite a lot of discussion about what this hyssop actually is. A couple of things we do know. First, it had some uses as a medicine. The biblical hyssop, most think, is a plant related to herbs like thyme and oregano, maybe even licorice. So a purging with hyssop would have been like taking a medicine for a cleansing. Most often, though, in the Bible it is related to metaphorical cleansing, usually with blood. It was used in the Passover to apply blood to doorways to identify those who were safe from the death angel. It was used again to sprinkle blood in the cleansing of lepers, and again mixed with the ashes of a red heifer and water to purify someone who had touched a dead person.
All these images would have come up as the phrase, “purge me with hyssop,” was being sung. Israelites, and perhaps even early Christians, would be familiar with all these uses. It speaks of blood, and death, and uncleanness, and the opposites: life and cleansing. In every case, there is the idea of renewal and life. A leper could go back and be with people and commerce. An unclean person could be declared clean and fit to rejoin the village and family. For David, purging with hyssop will make him as white as snow.
I can’t read this passage without thinking of these words:
“What can wash away my sin?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
O’ precious is the flow,
That makes me white as snow.
No other fount I know,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.”
Renewal continues with an intention to please Him
So now we have a clean house, gutted to the frame. What is next? Do we leave it empty? No, David says,
8 Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice.
9 Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.
David has spent a miserable week or two. In fact, I doubt he has had much peace after what happened to Uriah. Each day, he sees the face of the woman he took by force from her rightful husband. And now, he sees also the face of Nathan his accuser, and in Jerusalem, the city where God meets with man, and in his palace, and even when he attempts to worship, there is no joy and no gladness. He feels God bearing down on him, breaking his bones.
The evangelist from another generation, A. W. Tozer, once wrote: “It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until He has hurt him deeply.” Has God hurt David? I believe in God’s sovereignty. I’m not a what-will-be-will-be fatalist, but I don’t think God is always anxious about what we might and might not do. And I am certain that he sometimes allows us to do stupid things that he knows will bring us hurt. Could God have prevented David from committing these awful acts?
Peter says of Christ in Acts 2:23: “Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain.” Who is responsible for the death of Jesus? Who is responsible for the pain that David has caused and is now suffering as he composes this psalm? Could God not have just made it so David had to leave Jerusalem, so that he would not be walking around on the palace roof at night, so that he did not take Bathsheba, and so on? But I think David needed to be broken.
“Before I was afflicted I went astray: but now have I kept thy word.” Psalm 119:67
“It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes.” Psalm 119:71
“I know, O LORD, that thy judgments are right, and that thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me.” Psalm 119:75
“I am afflicted very much: quicken me, O LORD, according unto thy word.” Psalm 119:107
David did not begin to need renewal after Bathsheba. He had begun to need renewal before that, back in those winter days when he was making the decision not to lead his men, when he was becoming a typical king, and beginning to think that perhaps he was as great as people were saying. No, David needed to be broken. And now it has happened.
But God does not want him to stay broken. He wants him renewed. And renewal happens after the cleansing, and only after David makes it clear to God (and to himself) that he intends to allow God to fill the void. In other words, he must have an intention to allow God to work. Verse 10 – “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.”
How does this happen? Well, if you take something out, you have to put something back in. And if you want God working in there, you have to intend that to happen. You have to plan for it. It won’t just magically happen by itself.
This is the burden of a chapter from a very old book, A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life, by William Law. Chapter two is titled “An Inquiry into the Reason, Why the Generality of Christians Fall So Far Short of the Holiness and Devotion of Christianity.” In that chapter, Mr. Law uses as an example swearing, that is vulgar and profane speech, among Christians. His observation is that people misuse their tongues because they lack intent to please God. It sounds so simple, almost stupidly so, but this is a very important part of spiritual discipline. It is not enough to merely will to stop a sinning activity — we must proactively and intentionally build in new habits and practices. I think of Romans 12:1-2 when I think of this aspect of renewal: “And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind …” Read the section of Mr. Law’s chapter below to see what I mean.
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Excerpt from A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life – by William Law
It may now be reasonably inquired, how it comes to pass, that the lives even of the better sort of people are thus strangely contrary to the principles of Christianity?
But before I give a direct answer to this, I desire it may also be inquired, how it comes to pass that swearing is so common a vice among Christians? It is indeed not yet so common among women, as it is among men. But among men this sin is so common, that perhaps there are more than two in three that are guilty of it through the whole course of their lives…. Now I ask, how comes it, that two in three of the men are guilty of so gross and profane a sin as this is? There is neither ignorance nor human infirmity to plead for it; it is against an express commandment, and the most plain doctrines of our blessed Savior.
Do but now find the reason why the generality of men live in this notorious vice, and then you will have found the reason why the generality even of the better sort of people live so contrary to Christianity.
The reason of common swearing is this; it is because men have not so much as the intention to please God in all their actions. For let a man but have so much piety as to intend to please God in all the actions of his life, as the happiest and best thing in the world, and then he will never swear more. It will be as impossible for him to swear, whilst he feels this intention within himself, as it is impossible for a man that intends to please his Prince, to go up and abuse him to his face.
… It was this general intention (to please God in all things), that made the primitive Christians such eminent instances of piety, and made the goodly fellowship of the saints, and all the glorious army of martyrs and confessors. And if you will here stop, and ask yourselves, why you are not as pious as the primitive Christians were, your own heart will tell you that it is neither through ignorance, nor inability, but purely because you never thoroughly intended it. You observe the same Sunday worship that they did; and you are strict in it, because it is your full intention to be so. …
… You see two persons: one is regular in public and private prayer, the other is not. Now the reason of this difference is not this, that one has strength and power to observe prayer, and the other has not; but the reason is this, that one intends to please God in the duties of devotion, and the other has no intention about it. Now the case is the same, in the right or wrong use of our time and money. You see one person throwing away his time in sleep and idleness, in visiting and diversions, and his money in the most vain and unreasonable expenses. You see another careful of every day, dividing his hours by rules of reason and religion, and spending all his money in works of charity: now the difference is not owing to this, that one has strength and power to do thus, and the other has not; but it is owing to this, that one intends to please God in the right use of all his time, and all his money, and the other has no intention about it….
They are methods by which we obey the command to “put off” the old person and to “put on” the new person who is in the likeness of Christ. (Colossians 3:9-10; Ephesians 4:22-24) They are “exercises unto godliness.” (1 Timothy 4:7-8)
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Renewal is complete when God fills you with His Spirit
11 Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me.
The fact is, again, God would have been justified in walking away and taking away all the presence of God from David, and yet He will not. You could make the case that David was speaking from ignorance, or that there is a difference between the Old and New Covenants where the Holy Spirit is concerned. But I think that David is just being very honest here in his brokenness. And the irony here is that a haughty unsaved man would never say these things — nor would a carnal man who was wanting to bargain with God, or someone who wanted to pin God down on a theological point by saying, “My theology says you won’t leave me, so I feel pretty good about that.” No. These are the words of a broken man who has been redeemed by God, who knows that a theology held only in the head is useless when you are dealing with the God who requires truth in the inward parts. David is giving God what he wants: honesty. And he is honestly saying that regardless of how spiritual we may believe we are (and many nonbelievers think of themselves as spiritual), we are spiritual zeroes without the presence of God’s Spirit within us: “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God” (Romans 8:14).
Just after Thanksgiving, I visited with BBF Founder John Rawlings in his home near Cincinnati. The old gentleman, nearly 100 years old, is nearing heaven in his journey, and he asked me to communicate a message from him to the preachers of our Fellowship. That message is this: take the example of David, fall on your faces before God, plead with him for renewal through the power of His Holy Spirit, and make a covenant with Him for the new year to be holy men and spiritual men that we might be concerned for the souls of men and women, and for the condition of our churches, that we place ourselves totally into God’s hands and be bold for Him with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Mr. Rawlings had some difficulty breathing and speaking, but the fiery energy of the founder’s youth is not yet quenched, and his wish is that the Baptist Bible Fellowship finds renewal as we face the middle of our sixth decade of ministry. And I join him in that wish.