Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayer for attention to Psalm 51 and verse 10. Create in me a clean heart, O
God, and renew a right spirit within me. Psalm 51 and verse
10. And I want to say, right at the
outset that that which is upon my spirit is the asking, asking
for a clean heart. It is making this matter a matter
of prayer, bringing it to the Lord for the Lord to do so. And I hope Through the word this
morning, we will be encouraged, encouraged in what the Lord had
already done for David here, and that which he prays for,
and the foundation of how it is that God can give such gifts
as this. We read together when Nathan
came to David in 2 Samuel chapter 12, those first 14 verses. In the previous chapter to that,
we read of how David, a man after God's own heart, who loved the
Lord, who served him, how that he fell. It is to be noted in
the Word of God that those characters that are known or renowned for
an attribute or goodness, the Lord is pleased to lay on record
how that they fell. No man by what is in themselves
is good, there's none good, There's none that doeth good and sinneth
not, and none is able to keep his own soul. And in the Lord's
sovereignty, he has allowed those that have been in positions like
David to sin grievously, to fall, and then show how he was restored. We have the case as well of Samson,
a man so strong And yet a weakness similar to David, through women
he lost his hair, he lost his strength, and yet again was recovered
at the last. We think of Peter, though all
men forsake thee, yet will not I. Then the Lord prayed for him,
not that he would not fall, not that he would not deny his Lord,
he did, but also that he would not lose his faith, he would
be restored. And we have the case of Solomon,
the wisest man that ever lived, and yet so many wives, and his
wives, what did they do? Turned away his heart. The very
thing that David here sees as the root of all sin and all the
evil that he'd done, that is the same thing that Solomon,
His heart was turned aside by women who followed other gods
and from other nations. In David's case, he had seen
Bathsheba washing. He hadn't gone himself to the
war like he should have done. He took her, he lay with her,
After then, she told him she was with child. He contrived
a way to bring Uriah back from the battle and so that he was
to think that the child was his. But he would not go down to his
wife. Some of the things he said must
have been, or should have been, very piercing to David because
Uriah said, How can I go down and be with my wife, lay with
my wife, when Israel is dwelling in tents on the battlefield,
when there is David in his own house at ease and lying with
Uriah's wife? David must have been in a very
low, hardened state and condition that allowed him to do this outward
sin. And I believe this is later on
that he realizes that that outward sin had not really begun in an
instant, but the way to it had been paved by his own heart departing
from the Lord and being in a very wrong spirit, a wrong way. So then David contrived that
he would have Uriah, Bathsheba's husband, put by Joab in the hottest
part of the battle and slain with the sword of the children
of Ammon, which came to pass. And after the days of mourning,
then David took to him Bathsheba to be his own wife." And it is
at that point in 2 Samuel chapter 12 that then we read of Nathan
being sent to David. I want to look then with the
Lord's help this morning. Firstly, what God did for David
after he had fallen, and I hope in looking at this we may see
some encouraging things that the Lord has done for us. I pray
that we might not be left to fall in the way that David did,
but We all have sinned, all have sinned and come short of the
glory of God. And wherever we sin, especially
in an open way, we need to be brought to repentance. We need
to have the matter of the heart that was the root cause of us
going away dealt with. Just while we think of this regarding
the heart, We are told that it is deceitful above all things,
and desperately wicked. And we are to know as well that
this will be always the case, this side of the grave. Whatever
and however the words of our text may be answered in giving
a clean heart, it still will not be. a heart that is completely
free from sin and incapable of sinning. We are exhorted in Proverbs
to keep the heart, keep our heart, keep thy heart with all diligence,
for out of it are the issues from life. The Lord, even when
there were those that believed on him, he did not commit himself
unto them, for he knew what was in man. And Solomon, when he
dedicated the temple, he again mentions that God knows the heart
of men, for thou knowest all the hearts of all the children
of men. God knows our heart. He knows
what goes on there. He knows what happens there. And God looketh at the heart. And our Lord Jesus Christ is
very clear as to what proceeds out of the heart, which is those
adulteries, fornications, murders, evil thoughts, lies, deceits,
all these things that come out of the heart of man and they
defile a man. So I want to look firstly what
God did for David after he had fallen. Secondly, why? Why God does this for one sinner
but passes by others. And then thirdly, how God can
forgive sin and do what he did for David and yet be just and
holy. and righteous, and this is to
give us also encouragement. How can the Lord do to us and
give us a clean heart and bless us? The same reason applies. But firstly, what God did for
David after he had fallen, and I mainly want to reference back
to Samuel, to Samuel 12. The first thing that we read
is, and the Lord sent David, or sent Nathan unto David. The Lord instigated all that
was to be done to restore David. The Lord began it. We read in
the previous chapter at the end, but the thing that David had
done displeased the Lord. Did the Lord do nothing about
it? We read in Hebrews that the Lord
chasteneth every son whom he receiveth. All of his people
will not be just left to go on in sin and sinning, he will come
to them, he will deal with them. And that is to be our encouragement. This surely is the first thing
that God did for David. He sent the prophet Nathan to
him. He sent him to him so that David
would see his sin, and he did see his sin. It seems amazing
that beforehand he didn't, even when he was told of the parable
of the poor man's lamb. And God gave this word to Nathan
to paint a picture to draw out from David all the pity The picture
of a little ewe lamb that this poor man had, brought up, nourished
with him, grew up together with him, with his children, did eat
his own meat, drank his own cup, lay in his bush and was unto
him as a daughter. And then there's this rich man
that had exceeding many flocks and herds. And when a traveller
comes to the rich man, he doesn't take of all the multitude that
he had himself. He takes that one poor man's
lamb and slays it. And we read that David's anger
was greatly kindled against the man. And David passes his own
judgment on this man. As the Lord liveth, the man that
hath done this thing shall surely die. He shall restore the lamb
fourfold because he did this thing and because he had no pity. And then after he'd seen the
sin through the parable, passed judgment upon him. Then Nathan
says to David, thou art the man, and explains to him what he had
done, all the things that he'd been given, and now how he had
taken the wife of Uriah to be his wife. It was a blessing. that God devised a way through
this so that David could see his sin. There are countless
millions in this world that cannot see their sin. By nature, we
cannot see our sin. And even when we are called by
grace, we can fall like David, maybe not anywhere near in a
greater outward way, but still fall. and not see our sin. And so it is a blessing where
God opens our eyes and we see it. It's not a nice picture. It's a humbling thing. It's a
thing that could easily lead us to despair, to be discouraged,
to feel that we're not one of the Lords, we're cast away from
the Lord. But I hope we can see from David's
account that the very fact that the Lord has used means to show
and make us see it is a mark for good. The second thing that
was done was that David acknowledged his sin. He says, I have sinned
against the Lord. Verse 13 to Samuel 12. It is a great blessing that we
are brought to confess our sins and to acknowledge them. In 1
John 1 verse 9, if we confess our sins, He is faithful and
just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we are brought to see our
sins, May we be blessed as well as David was in confessing that
sin. There are some sins that need
to be confessed before men, because if they have been done before
men, if men have been injured or men have seen those sins and
known those sins, then they are to be confessed in that way.
There are other sins that are heart sins that are unknown by
men that there would be more harm done in speaking of them
and bringing them out before men than as if they were kept
secret from men but acknowledged and confessed before God. It's not right in a public prayer
meeting to be specific of all of the inward and heart sins
that we have committed. It would not be prudent, it would
not be right to bring them all up. And so if you are tempted
and you think, well, I hear prayer meetings, but I never hear someone
enter into the sins that go on in my heart, in my life, that
will be the reason for it. It's not that they, don't have
those things and don't feel them, but that they are not brought
out in public in that way. It is to be confessed before
God. And we need that discernment
as to when to go to a brother, a sister in faith, or to men,
perhaps the ungodly, and confess our sin. And it is best if we
are tripped up at work in a workplace before the ungodly, we might
say something completely wrong, we might do something and the
ungodly immediately reprove us for it and say how wrong it is.
If we are convicted that what they're saying is right, we are
wrong. We must immediately acknowledge it, immediately say, I have sinned,
that is wrong, I should not have said that, I should not have
done that. If we try to justify ourselves, great harm is done. And there are those times when
a confession must be made before men. The third thing that God did
with David was forgive him his sin. As soon as David had said,
I have sinned against the Lord, We read, the Lord also hath put
away thy sin, thou shalt not die. The Lord pronounced that,
and this is again tied in with what we quoted from 1 John 1. Not only did the Lord forgive
David's sin, but he also chastened him for his sin. Just because
David had acknowledged it, confessed it, didn't mean to say that the
Lord would turn away his chastening hand. I prove this through life. We are to know that sin has consequences
and that it is a bitter and evil thing. And if we think, well,
just by saying sorry and repenting, we can turn away those consequences. We think of cases where there
have been people that have committed terrible acts, they've been put
into prison, then they have purportedly been converted, and because they
repent and they're sorry, they say, well, now we should be let
out of prison. But if they're truly converted,
they would say, no, I am in the right place. I'm rightly suffering
for what I have done. repent or confess with the thought,
well, we're going to turn away all of God's hand from us. David had to know the sword was
not to depart from his house. He had trouble in his own house.
He had Absalom rise against him. He had Absalom lay with his wives
in the sight of the sun. All this, what God said through
Nathan, was brought to pass. David had this and yet that again
in Hebrews 12 is a mark of sonship. Every son whom he received he
chastens. But David then had felt his sin
and the root of it. You know this is not something
that is just an intellectual, he feels it and This Psalm 51
so highlights how much David felt the evil of his sin, the
sin of his heart, the sin of his thoughts, the sins of his
actions, and he really feels it. Dear friends, the feeling
of sin is not nice to us. It's a hurtful thing, but it's
a good thing. It makes us like the publican, beat upon our breast. Often we cannot forget the sins
and aggravations of the sins. The psalmist in Psalm 25, remember
not the sins of my youth. But he remembered it. Joseph's
brothers, they remembered 22 years before what they'd done
to Joseph. And even then, many years later,
another 17 years later, when Jacob died, they still remember
it and they can't hardly think that Joseph will forget or that
we'll forgive them still. So David then feels his sin,
but he feels the root of it. He sees the root of it. It began
with his heart, it began inwardly, secretly, departure from the
Lord. It was this evil and corrupt
heart, that which we said at the beginning, what the Lord
said it would be, in Mark chapter 7, verse 20. And the Lord says, that which
cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out
of the heart of man, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications,
murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness,
an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things
come from within and defile the man." And David is deserving
that. I wonder how much we deserve.
what comes forth from our heart, what is generated, what is grown
as a seed and starts to spring forth. And if it's not dealt
with, then it ends up in actions. No wonder we are exhorted to
keep our hearts with all diligence. So David, again, another blessing. He felt his need of a clean heart. If we are to pray for anything,
if we are to try and seek that we have anything, we are to feel
our need of Him. Countless millions, they don't
feel their need of a Saviour. They don't feel the need of a
clean heart. They don't feel the need of repentance. They don't feel the need of those
things that God's people do. Bless the Lord if He has brought
you to feel your need. of those things that magnify
God, that are provided in the gospel. Our Lord Jesus Christ
is exalted to give repentance and remission of sins unto Israel,
unto his people. But then David had been taught
another thing. I wonder how many of us have
been taught this as well. His inability to do it himself. Now it is right that we should
use the means. We should seek to avoid the places,
the things that stir up our hearts. We read of Job, and he said,
I made a covenant with mine eyes, agreement with mine eyes. Why
then should I think upon a maid? And he's taking care. We can
see things, but it's a different thing seeing it than to looking,
isn't it? If we go past a blasphemous or
an obscene billboard on the side of the road, or someone walking
immodestly, we can just take note that that is there, without
actually impressing it upon our minds. If we turn and look at
it, well, we'd like it if we're in the car to have a car accident,
is a very different thing, just registering that something is
there, and to then dwelling and looking. And then another difference
as well, and our deceitful hearts will do this, they'll seek out
these things deliberately. Our hearts are that deceitful,
and it's right then that we do not sin, that grace might abound. We are diligent to be aware of
what our heart is doing. It is right that we do that.
We are not to live foolishly, carelessly, as if we were drunken. We are to be sober, be mindful. We are in the body, we have a
deceitful heart, we have an alluring world, and so that we are to
walk circumspectly, carefully. But however much we might do
that, if we could, If we could, by our own willpower, cleanse
our heart and bring us so that we did not fall and did not sin,
God would not get the glory. We would take that to ourselves.
The provisions of the gospel would not be done. Some might
say, well, we just ask God to bless all these means. And yes,
it is right that we do so. But it's a very different thing.
to be really convicted that however much we try, we will not succeed. No man can keep alive his own
soul. And with all Peter's assurances
of saying that, though all men forsake thee, yet not will I,
he still did. And to be convicted of this,
We are not able. We need the Lord. We need the
power from heaven. We need miraculous work done
for us. We don't just need the Lord's
name cast into the scale to do our own effort and then say,
well, yeah, the Lord helped me. No, it is to be truly convinced
we need that power of God. And so the next thing, not only
was he taught, his inability, but he was taught to ask for
it. And this is the main point that
is upon my spirit. In this psalm, this is a lot
of asking. We're confining ourselves just
to one verse here, but there's many, many petitions throughout
this psalm. You can look at these later. We haven't really time to look
at the others. But his petition here creates
In me a clean heart, O God. As if you say, there is not one
there. There's no ingredients for it.
It's not like a designer using steel or using wood or using
something's there. It needs to be completely created
from nothing. Make it so. A clean heart, O
God, and renew a right spirit within me. The spirit and the
heart, they go together. In the margin here it says, constant
spirit within. And we can be like that, can't
we? Sometimes we are diligent and watchful, and other times
we're just reckless and careless. And that inconstancy is a real
thing that is together with our heart. But what we want is that
endurance and constant, predictable, heart. And of course when we're
speaking of the heart, we're not speaking of that which pumps
the blood around our body, our literal heart. But the same as,
like with a natural birth and the new birth, there are parallels
between them. When our Lord insists in John
3 of the new birth, and you think Nicodemus thought, how can a
man be born again? He's thinking naturally, but
God is speaking spiritually. But spiritually, the parallels
are very great. The new birth spiritually, old
things passed away, old things become new. We have new ears,
new eyes, new feelings, new senses. All of the things regarding us
naturally, they have a parallel to spiritually. The same with
the heart. What does the heart do? Every
limb, every part of our body is supplied with blood. And it's
the blood that brings the nutrients from the intestines. It brings
the benefit and blessing to every part of our body. It's absolutely
central, and so in a spiritual sense, that heart, what is spoken
of as the heart of man, is what that person is, it's the spring
of all of their actions, it affects how they feel, affects what they
see, seeing the word, seeing the word of God, affects what
they hear, as they hear the word of God, It affects their appetite. It affects everything. The heart
is the seat. And so this is why David and
our Lord has said that these things come out of the heart.
So David is saying, this is what I want dealt with. I'm not going
to deal with symptoms. I'm not going to want the things
outwardly done, but create in me a clean heart, oh God. And so He was taught to us. If we turn to Ezekiel chapter
36, it's a beautiful word there, where the Lord promises and says
in verse 26, so remember this, Ezekiel 36 verse 26, a new heart
also will I give you. and a new spirit. Notice those
two things together again, heart and spirit. Will I put within
you and I'll take away the stony heart out of your flesh and I
will give you a heart of flesh and I will put my spirit within
you and cause you to walk in my statutes and you shall keep
my judgments and do them. Now, in many other things that
he is set before us in that chapter, encouraging things as well, what
the Lord will do for His people. But then He says in verse 37,
Thus saith the Lord God, I will yet for this be inquired of,
or prayed for, of by the house of Israel to do it for them. I will increase them with men
like a flock. And this is my burden. How much do we ask the Lord to
do it for us? How much are we relying upon
means or our own efforts, or how much are we looking to the
miraculous, powerful work of God in our hearts and in our
lives? God does answer prayer, and he
is able and he will do that which is asked in this way. And so
these things are what God had already done for David. And may we be able to look at
this and say, humbly say, that the Lord has also done this for
us. And when we sin again, the Lord
is able, and we're encouraged to think the Lord will. Do it
for us again. Bring us to see our sin, to acknowledge
our sin, and to confess it, to know the chastening hand of the
Lord for sin. Gentle sometimes it may be, but
still to be felt. And sometimes it might be like
a child, there's a mother, It doesn't need to take up a rod,
just one look, and they wilt, they feel that they've grieved.
They feel chastened under the look. Just the Lord's silence
sometimes is chastening enough for the people of God. Be not
silent unto me, lest if thou be silent unto me I become like
them that go down into the pit. Remember many times that David
and others, the Lord did not answer them, And that was a grief,
that was a trial to them. But may the Lord give us to know
the Lord has done this, to see sin and the root of that being
in our hearts, and to feel the need of a clean heart, and our
inability to cleanse it ourselves and to ask of the Lord. So from that encouragement, what
the Lord has done for David, and maybe what the Lord has done
for us as well, We must ask then, in the second place, why God
does this for one sinner but passes by others? Why was David
given this? Ahithophel was not. He went and
hung himself. Judas Iscariot was not. He just hung himself. King Saul, before David, He was
not given to see, yes, he saw, acknowledged superficially his
sin, but never asked for the Lord that forgiveness or a clean
heart like this. Why does the Lord does these
things for one, but not another? And we must answer that that
is because of sovereign grace. Hymn writer says, why me? Why
was I made to hear his voice to enter while his room while
millions make a wretched choice rather starve than come? The Lord has sovereignly chosen
a people from eternity, loved them with an everlasting love
and therefore with loving kindness has drawn them. He has suffered
for them as the land slain from the foundation of the world.
And it is because of that sovereignty, Jacob have I loved, Esau have
I hated, that the Lord does this for one, but not another. And we must bow before that sovereign
hand of God. But where the Lord has begun,
the Lord had begun with David, even as a youth. And we're told
that where the Lord has begun, he will perfectly perform unto
the day of Jesus Christ. And there's great encouragement
in that. Where we have tasted, the Lord
is gracious. Where the Lord has begun, he
will not forsake the work of his own hands. If while we were
sinners, he passed by us and he bid us live, how much more
since we have been following him Knowing Him amongst His people,
how much more then will He keep us and answer our prayers? And so this is why there is no
cause in us. That's why the publican, he was
pleading for mercy. He hadn't got anything to plead. There was nothing. And you and
I, we have nothing to plead. Don't come with promises, Lord.
If you cleanse my heart, I'll be better next time. I won't
fall the same next time. I'll be consistent. Don't come
with those promises at all. Hymn writer says, nor can we
promise future good to bring. It is right that we should be
like Paul, the good that I would. We do have good that we would
do and try to do, and evil that we hate. But we will prove, like
Paul and David, the good that I would, I do not, and the evil
that I would not, that I do, O wretched man that I am. We come on mercy's ground. We
come on the sovereignty of God. We come on the provision that
God has made in the gospel for sinners. It is good news. And
very often, the Lord will do just what he did with David.
He gives so many tokens for good, so many encouragements, that
the Lord will show mercy and will answer prayers like David
is making here. Very often we cannot see, and
I hope through the word this morning, there'll be some of
you that see, even though you still fear your sin, you see
those tokens for good. You see those encouragements
to come to the Lord. and to ask. I want to give you
another encouragement. Point three, how God can forgive
sin and do what he did for David and yet be just and holy and
righteous. And the reason why he can is
because he himself has suffered, bled and died for the sins of
those that he's showing mercy for. God is just. He won't just pass by the transgression
of his people without laying that upon his beloved son. We have in Psalm 80, And verse 17, let thy hand be
upon the man of thy right hand, upon the son of man whom thou
made strong, made as strong for thyself. That is the Lord Jesus
Christ. That is how God can. A substitutionary
offering. Without the shedding of blood,
there is no remission. When God showed mercy to Adam
and Eve, He shed blood of animals, He clothed them with the skins. The vital need of Calvary, the
vital need that there should be sin put away. That is how God can forgive sin. The debt is paid by Himself. The righteousness that we do
not have is provided by himself, his life, his obedience. That is to be our righteousness
before the throne and forever, not our own good works, not our
ways. We are to be ashamed because
of our own works and own ways. All the provision of saving for
the people of God is in Christ and is in the gospel and that's
why it cannot, it must not be achieved with man's strength
and ability. God will make sure that his people
really feel that. They feel that in me that is
in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. They will feel like David
did, so unclean, so wrong at heart, so needing to have the
Lord show mercy upon him. But this is the whole foundation. We are directed to Calvary, we're
directed to that precious bloodshed there, to the Lamb of God, which
taketh away the sin of the world. In one way, David had a little
type of it. We've been very careful here,
we read of what was said there in 2 Samuel 12, that because
of what David had done and the enemies that had caused the blaspheme,
the child would die. The child that Bathsheba had
through David, that first child, it died, and it did die. The
dying of that child did not put away David's sin, but I believe
David Well, in many of the Psalms, he points to our Lord Jesus Christ,
and he would have known that it was through his seed that
the promised Messiah, the Saviour, Redeemer, would come, and that
he would die for him. So, though he's not looking at
that child as his salvation, he would have looked for His
greater Son that would be born, that would die, and would put
away His sin. That is how God can forgive sin. Those Old Testament saints, they
saw Christ dying, they rejoiced at Him, they died in faith of
what would be done there, and really they had the benefits
of Christ's death, just like David did. When the Lord gives
him prayer and answers that prayer, and cleanses his heart, create
in me a clean heart, O God, renew a right spirit within me. So instead of all that evil within,
the Lord giving a calm, a thankful heart, a heart from sin set free,
A heart sprinkled with the blood, so freely shed for me. A heart
that is made like the Lord's heart, to learn of Him and to
walk after His ways. Instead of that den of thieves,
it becomes a calm, delightful house of prayer. And in a lot
of ways we read of Paul in Romans 8, that if ye, through the Spirit,
do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. And here is David
in this psalm, and in this verse especially, he is walking in
the Spirit. He's not, as it were, bowed down
with his sin, But taking his sin to the Lord, the very attitude
of prayer, the very coming before the Lord, is the way that the
Lord uses. Not only that he answers the
prayer, but bringing his people to be spiritually minded. Paul
says in that same Romans 8, to be spiritually minded is life
and peace. To be calmly minded is death. If we walk after the Spirit,
you shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh. And it is walking
after the Spirit to be bringing these hard cases, our sins, our
unclean heart, to be bringing it to the Lord. Not waiting for
the heart to be cleansed first, Maybe having to say to the Lord,
Lord, my heart wants to go here, there, to think of this and meditate
of that. And I'm struggling to contain
it. I can't contain it. I hardly feel I want to pray
against this sin because I love my sin so much. And there's part
of me that wants to go on with it. And we have to just confess
what is going on within and ask the Lord. that he would do this,
creating me a clean heart. Remind the Lord of Calvary and
what he has done in putting away sin and putting away our sin. You say, how does he know? How
do we know he's put away our sin? Well, David could say, because
he made me see my sin and feel my sin and made me feel the need
of those benefits and blessings that come from God alone, and
He shows me in Calvary how He can give me these things. May
we then be encouraged, encouraged to pray, to come to the Lord
and ask, create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right
spirit within me. The Lord bless His word. Amen.