In the following sermon, Damian Phillips preaches on God's forgiveness of
sins and His mercy and love. It is an uplifting and encouraging sermon.
May God bless,
Carl
my website -- http://www.nettally.com/saints/
my blog -- http://www.anniemayhem.com/cgi-bin/wordpress/
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From Death To Life
by Damian Phillips
This morning we are going to talk about how we can have peace of mind
about
our eternal destination. If you have ever been worried about whether or
not
you will go to heaven, or how you can gain God's favor, then this passage
is
for you. Concerning our passage this morning, the Bible commentator
Matthew
Henry says it is, "A psalm of David giving instruction, and there is
nothing
in which we have more need of instruction than in the nature of true
blessedness . . . [or] what we must do to be happy . . . We are here
taught
that our happiness consists in the favor of God . . ."
This morning we are going to see that David gives us a prescription for
happiness. Peace and happiness in life lies in having favor with God, and
the favor of God will grant us entrance into his kingdom when we leave
this
world. Let's dig into the Scripture and see what we can learn from David.
The need for forgiveness (vv. 1-2)
David says, "Blessed is he . . . whose sin is covered." Why do we need to
have our sins covered or forgiven? One logical reason is because we are
all
sinners. Romans 3:10 says, "As it is written: There is none righteous, no,
not one." Romans 3:23 says, "For all have sinned and fall short of the
glory
of God" All of us have not only sinned, but we have sinned against God.
Psalm 51:4 tells us, "Against You, You only, have I sinned, and done this
evil in Your sight - That You may be found just when You speak, and
blameless when You judge." You see, we are all sinners from birth. Our own
death warrants are written into our birth certificates.
In verses 1-2 David provides a threefold description of sin. He speaks of
"transgression," "sin," and "iniquity." 1.) "Transgression" depicts a
spirit
of defiant disobedience against God. 2.) "Sin" denotes a missing of the
mark, a deficiency with respect to one's intent or purpose. The Greek word
for sin in the New Testament is hamartia, which was an archery term.
Someone
would shoot an arrow at a bull's eye, and if the person missed then
someone
would shout out "hamartia!" meaning, "you missed the mark!" 3.) "Iniquity"
represents a perversion, and a distortion of that which is straight.
Iniquity is a voluntary sin.
Every person in this world has committed transgressions, sins, and
iniquities. In verse 2 David says, "Blessed is the man to whom the LORD
does
not impute iniquity." Why is a person blessed whom God does not hold
accountable for his or her sin? Because Romans 6:23 tells us that "The
wages
of sin is death." Without the forgiveness of sin we are destined to die.
We
know that we will all die a physical death, but Scripture tells us that we
will also die a spiritual death if our sin is not forgiven.
In verses 1-2 we see a threefold counterpart to sin. This counterpart or
blessing is associated with forgiveness. The main word here is "forgiven."
The other two phrases are "being covered," and "not imputing." 1.)
"Forgiven" means "to lift up" (as a burden), "to take away," and "to
bear."
2.) "Covered" means "to conceal or hide," as from the eye, and 3.) "not
impute" pictures the canceling of a debt. Our sins can be forgiven and
hidden from God's eyes if we want them to be. Jesus, God's Son, wishes to
forgive us of our sins and take on our burden, that's why he says in
Matthew
11:28, "Come unto to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will
give you rest."
You may have heard the expression "forgive and forget." If we accept Jesus
into our hearts, God will remember our sins no more.
A man who was telling his friend about an argument he had with his wife
commented, "Oh, how I hate it, every time we have an argument - she gets
historical." The friend replied, "You mean hysterical." "No," he insisted.
"I mean historical. Every time we argue she drags up everything from the
past and holds it against me!"
The Lord is not going to be historical with us if we have accepted his
Son,
Jesus, as our personal Lord and Savior.
All of us have sinned and are in need of forgiveness. In verse 2 David
says,
"Blessed is the man . . . in whose spirit there is no deceit." We see in
verse 2 that David affirms the fact that forgiveness is obtained only when
there is absolute sincerity and honesty on person's part in acknowledging
his sins before God. Forgiveness is granted to the person in whom there is
no deceit, and who truly desires to be forgiven.
Without forgiveness there is death (vv. 3-4)
David was referring to those times that we try to hide our sin. We know
that
we have sinned but rather than confess it, we try not to think about it
and
try to fill our minds with something else. These verses illustrate the
biblical principle that one's physical health is vitally related to his
spiritual well being. Matthew Henry said, "The wounds of sin, not opened,
wilt fester, and grow intolerably painful. If the conscience is seared,
the
sin is even more dangerous." As long as David did not acknowledge his sin,
he suffered great pain, both bodily and mentally. In Job 33:19 Elihu told
Job that people who run from God will be chastened with pain upon their
bed,
and with strong pain in many of their bones.
One of the most painful times I can recall is when I was convicted of the
fact that I was a sinner and lost without Jesus in my life. When I was
made
aware of my sin, and that I was destined to hell without Jesus, I was very
troubled. As Elihu told Job that the person in sin would lie in his or her
bed in pain, I lay in my bed with the pain of thinking about where my soul
would be if I had died without Jesus in my heart. Maybe some of you can
identify with what I am saying. That pain won't go away until you make
your
life right with the Lord through his Son, Jesus Christ.
In verse 4 David said, "Your hand was heavy upon me." This is the weight
of
sin he felt.
A youth once asked a preacher, "You say that unsaved people carry a weight
of sin. I feel nothing.
How heavy is sin? Is it ten pounds? Eighty pounds?" The preacher replied
by
asking the youth, "If you laid a four-hundred pound weight on a corpse,
would it feel the load?" The youth replied, "It would feel nothing,
because
it is dead." The preacher concluded, "That spirit, too, is indeed dead
which
feels no load of sin or is indifferent to its burden and unaware of its
presence." The youth was then silent.
Thankfully David felt the load and the pain of sin. Only when we are aware
of sin's presence can we do something about it. And what we should do
about
sin is repent of it, and ask God's forgiveness.
In verse 4 we read, "My vitality is turned into the drought of summer."
David here suffered spiritually but he also suffered physically. He became
like an old man. God's hand of conviction was heavy upon him both day and
night. He dried up like a brook in the drought of summer. Have you ever
felt
that you were walking through a spiritual desert, or were in a spiritual
dry
spell? That is what unconfessed sin will do. Sin causes a distance between
the Lord and ourselves. The farther apart we grow from the Lord, the less
we
will feel his presence in our lives.
Proverbs 28:13 says, "He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever
confesses and forsakes them will have mercy." Don't expect God to cover
what
you are not willing to uncover. In order to for a Christian to feel God's
presence again, and in order for a non-Christian to have eternal life, he
or
she must ask forgiveness through Jesus Christ.
Forgiveness leads to eternal life (v. 5)
Once David realized his sin, he acknowledged it to God and didn't try to
hide it from him. That is called repentance. Millard Erickson defines
repentance as, "Godly sorrow for one's sin together with a resolution to
turn from it." We have to feel truly sorry for having displeased God, and
then we must turn from what we have done wrong in order for it to be true
repentance.
Erickson says, "If we have sinned and the consequences are unpleasant, we
may well regret what we have done. But that is not true repentance. That
is
penitence. Real repentance is sorrow for one's sin because of the wrong
done
to God and the hurt inflicted upon him. This sorrow is accompanied by a
genuine desire to abandon that sin." We read earlier in verse 2, "Blessed
is
the man . . . in whose spirit there is no deceit," meaning basically,
"Blessed is the man who is truly and sincerely sorry for his sin and
desires
to repent."
We must feel sorrow in our heart and confess our sin to the Lord in order
to
be forgiven. Romans 10:10 tells us, "For with the heart one believes unto
righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." We
must not only confess our sin, but we must also acknowledge the One who is
able to pay the penalty for our sins, Jesus Christ.
In Matthew 10:32-33 Jesus says, "Whoever confesses me before men, him will
I
also confess before my Father who is in heaven," meaning that we will be
forgiven of our sin and have eternal life. Jesus continues to add,
"Whoever
denies me before men, him I will also deny before my Father who is in
heaven," meaning that if we fail to repent and accept Jesus as our Savior
we
will experience spiritual death.
Time of Reflection
What we have seen today is that whether we are a Christian or a
non-Christian, if we choose to hide our sin and not acknowledge it to God
and repent, then our lives will be miserable without any peace of mind.
For
the Christian, he or she will have to live with the pain, guilt, and
sorrow
for sinning against God. For the non-Christian he or she will live with
the
fear of eternal death and eternity in hell. The only way to have peace is
to
confess our sins before the Lord and sincerely ask for his forgiveness. If
we do this he will heal us and make us spiritually whole.
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