Would you turn back to the 25th
Psalm? Now, the writer of this Psalm
is King David, the man after God's own heart. And we see something
of his mood In verse 16, when he says in Psalm 25 verse 16,
turn the unto me and have mercy upon me for I am desolate. I'm all alone and afflicted. The troubles of my heart are
enlarged. Oh, bring down me out of my distresses. Look upon mine affliction and
my pain and forgive all my sins. Now that gives us some idea of
his state of heart when he was writing this psalm. The inspiration
for this psalm was verse 11, when David says, for thy name's
sake, oh Lord, pardon mine iniquity for it is great. Now that's not
the way the natural man would deal with a request for pardon. He would say, pardon my iniquity
because I promise I won't do that again. Or because I'm going
to turn over a leaf or because I'm saying I'm sorry. But David
says nothing of this sort. He says, pardon my iniquity,
oh Lord, for it's great. It's great. Now that's the man
after God's own heart speaking. And what I thought about, if
the man after God's own heart says, pardon my iniquity for
it's great, should we see our iniquity in any less light than
that? If David said his iniquity was
great, and I believe I could be pretty safe in saying David
was a better man than you or I. Wouldn't you agree with that?
If He said regarding His iniquity, pardon mine iniquity for it's
great, shouldn't you and I have the same view of our iniquity?
It is great. But let's begin and read this
psalm together. I've entitled this message, God's
Reason for Forgiveness. Now I want my sins forgiven.
I desperately want my sins forgiven. And I've got to know that the
Lord God has a reason to forgive me of my sins. He's got to have
a reason. He doesn't do anything for no
reason. He's got to have a reason as to why he would forgive this
sinner of his great sins. And verse one, David says unto
thee, O Lord, Do I lift up my soul? Oh my God, I trust in Thee. Let me not be ashamed. Let not
mine enemies triumph over me, whether my people, whether people
or sins or whatever form those enemies are. Let not mine enemies
triumph over me. Yea, let none that wait on Thee
be ashamed. Let them be ashamed, which transgress
without cause. Show me thy ways, O Lord. You know, that's the same thing
Moses prayed in Exodus 33, show me now thy ways that I might
know thee. I want to know his ways, don't
you? I don't want to know man's ways. I want to know his ways.
You know, the scripture says he made known his ways to Moses. He made known his acts to the
children of Israel, what he did, but he made known his ways to
Moses. I want to be somebody that he
makes known his ways to, don't you? Show me now, show me thy
ways, O Lord. Teach me thy paths. Lead me. I want him to show me. I want
him to teach me. I want him to lead me. Lead me
in thy truth. And teach me. For thou art the
God of my salvation. If I'm saved, it's because he
saved me. He is the God of salvation. Salvation is of the Lord. On thee do I wait. all the day. Now you'll wait on the Lord when
you don't have any other hope. I mean, there's nothing else
to do, but to wait on him. You wait on him to act for you. Now look what he says in verse
six. I love this. He says, remember, Oh Lord, thy
tender mercies and thy loving kindnesses for they have been
ever of old. Now, He's asking the Lord to
remember his eternal mercies toward him. That mercy, that
love, that grace that came as a result of union with the Lord
Jesus Christ. Ephesians 1, verse 4 says, according
as he has chosen us in him before the foundation of the world.
Now, how did he view you when he viewed you then? One way,
in Christ. He says, view me that way now.
Remember your mercies of old. Behold, I've loved you with an
everlasting love. Therefore, with loving kindness,
if I draw on thee. Oh, what a desire that he might
see me only in Christ. The same way he saw me before
time began. And then there's something he
asks him not to remember. He says in verse seven, remember
not the sins of my youth. nor my transgressions. Don't
remember those, but according to thy mercy, remember thou me. For thy goodness sake, O Lord."
You see, the goodness of God is his capacity to be good to
somebody like me when I'm not good. That's God's goodness. It's his capacity to save. Oh, remember me in your mercy. Good, he says in verse eight,
good and upright is the Lord. The Lord's good, isn't he? I'm
bad and he's good. And I love his goodness. And
he is upright. Therefore will he teach sinners
in the way, the way of Christ. It's his goodness, his merciful
goodness and loving kindness that causes him to teach sinners
like me in the way of Christ. Good and upright is the Lord.
Therefore he'll teach sinners in the way. Verse nine, the meek,
the lowly, the poor, those who have nothing. The meek will he
guide in judgment. He's going to teach them that
their salvation is because of the judgment that took place
on the cross. He'll guide them in judgment.
And the meek, the lowly, will he teach his way, the way of
the cross, the way of the gospel. All the paths, verse 10, of the
Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant and
his testimonies. Now, did you hear that? All the
paths of the Lord are mercy and truth to such as keep his covenant. Now what covenant is he speaking
of? There's two covenants in the scripture. The covenant of
works and the covenant of grace. Remember when he said to Adam,
he put him in the garden, he said, don't eat of this fruit.
There's the covenant of works, salvation dependent upon what
Adam either did or didn't do. The covenant of works is salvation
in some way dependent upon you. I don't care what it is, if it's
in any aspect dependent upon you, it works. The covenant of
grace is salvation dependent upon Christ, what he has done. I love the covenant of grace,
and I don't want to have anything to do with the covenant of works.
Not a thing. I just simply want to be found
in Christ where everything that God requires of me, He looks
to His Son for. And I'm holding on to that. I'm
keeping that covenant. I'm not looking anywhere else.
By the grace of God, I know I won't keep it unless He enables me
to, but that's a covenant I'm holding on to. That's His testimony,
that salvation is in His Son. This is the record that God has
given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. That's the covenant I'm keeping.
I don't want to have anything to do with the covenant of works.
Now, He says, all the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth,
not to everybody, but unto such as keep His covenant and His
testimonies, the testimony of His gospel. And then He makes
this statement, For thy namesake, O Lord, pardon mine iniquity. And he doesn't say pardon it
because it's not all that bad, but pardon it because it's great. Now the greatest argument for
the forgiveness of sins is the greatness of your sin. You can't paint the picture bad
enough. And no matter how bad you paint it, it's actually worse
than you think. Now he says, pardon mine iniquity,
the perversion of my sin. And that's what iniquity is,
it's crookedness, crookedness. Pardon mine iniquity for it is
great. But more back to that in a moment.
He says in verse 12, what man is he that feareth the Lord? Now the fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom. Oh, the fear of the Lord. That
fear that makes you reverence Him. That fear that makes you
afraid of sin. That fear that makes you afraid
to look anywhere but Christ alone. You don't trust yourself at all.
That's what the fear of the Lord is. You look nowhere but Christ. What man is he that feareth the
Lord? Him shall he, the Lord, teach in the way that he shall
choose. You know, I want the Lord to
do my choosing for me, don't you? And that man who fears the
Lord is the man who's been taught by the Lord. And that man who
fears the Lord is the man that the Lord teaches. Verse 13, that
one who fears the Lord, his soul shall dwell at ease and his seed
shall inherit the earth. Now his soul shall dwell at ease.
What's that mean? The only thing I know about ease
is this. Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace
with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. That makes me at ease. Justification. God justifying
me through Christ, where I really am righteous before God. I don't
just have a paper that says I am. I am. As He is, so are we in
this world. That sets my soul at ease. Everything God requires, I already
have. God can't get any more pleased
with me than He is. That sets my soul at ease. His soul shall dwell at ease. And His seed, the seed of the Lord Jesus Christ,
shall inherit the earth. Now verse 14, the secret of the
Lord is with him that fear him. And he will show them his covenant.
Now that word secret is the intimate counsel is what the word means.
The amity of friendship. The secret of the Lord, the secret
of friendship with the Lord where you're his friend. And he's your friend. Now I want
you to get ahold of this by the grace of God, every one of us.
This thing of being a friend of God. Abraham was the friend
of God. Moses spake to the Lord face
to face as a man speaketh with his friend. I want to be somebody
that God would say, he's my friend. And I want to be somebody who
can say regarding the living God, the Lord Jesus Christ, he's
my friend. The intimate counsel. The friendship
of the Lord is with them that fear him. A friendship with mutual
trust. Now it's wonderful to have a
human friend that you can trust. that you can count on, that you
can confide with and you can bare your soul to them and know
that they won't use that in any way for your hurt. That they're
behind you, that they're for you, that they've got your back.
Isn't it a blessing to have a true friend? To have the Lord God
as your friend. Abraham was the friend of God.
God counted him a friend that he could trust and he made himself
known to him. Turn with me for a moment to
Genesis chapter 18. This is when God was going to destroy Sodom. Verse 17, and the Lord said,
Genesis 18 verse 17, And the Lord said, shall I hide from
Abraham that thing which I do? You see, friends, let each other
know what they're going to do, what's in their heart. That's
what they do. He said, shall I hide this thing from Abraham?
And if he hid it, it's because he somehow would not find him
trustworthy. Seeing that Abraham shall surely
become a great and mighty nation and all the nations of the earth
shall be blessed in him for I know him. that he'll command his children
and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of
the Lord to do justice and judgment, that the Lord may bring upon
Abraham that which he hath spoken of him." Now, I remember one
time using that verse of scriptures to try to deal with childbearing.
You know, Abraham knew how to raise his children. Well, you
can use it for that, but that's not what it's talking about.
He's talking about Abraham's spiritual children. He says,
I know him, and I know them. I know the way they'll go. That's
why Abraham was called the friend of God. And all of his spiritual
children will do justice and judgment. The only time you do
that is when you believe the gospel. That the Lord may bring
upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him. Now the intimate
counsel, the friendship of the Lord, is with those who fear
him. The fear of the Lord, which is
the beginning of wisdom, that fear that makes someone afraid
to look anywhere other than Christ only. That person is God's friend
and he makes known to him his ways, his counsel. He confides in that person. That's what friends do. The Lord
said, you are my friends. That's the words of the Lord
Jesus. You are my friends. If you do whatsoever I command
you, if you believe the gospel. Now this is how God looks at
his people. Yes, his children. That's amazing. Yes, the benefits of His salvation,
but He looks at His children as His friends. God looks at
me and says, that's my friend. And He says that for every one
of His children. The friendship of God, the intimate
counsel of the Lord, is with them that fear him. He'll show
them his covenant, that eternal covenant of grace that David
spoke of when he said, although my house be not so with God yet,
hath he made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things,
ensure, and this is all my salvation. Mine too, David. And it's all
my desire. It's all I desire, though He
make it not to grow. Now let's go on reading back
in Psalm 25. Verse 15. Mine eyes are ever toward the
Lord, for He shall pluck my feet out of the net, that net that
I get trapped in and that I can't get out of. He'll pluck my feet
out of the net. Then he says, turn thee unto
me and have mercy upon me for I'm desolate. I'm all alone and
I'm afflicted. The troubles of my heart are
enlarged. Now troubles are bad enough,
but when they're enlarged, and I look this word troubles up.
And I was kind of amused with the definition that strong David
in the Hebrews concordance, he gave five or six different words
that the trouble means. But the first thing he said was
a female rival. I thought, Ooh, that's a female
rival. Now that's trouble. That's trouble.
Um, affliction, tribulation, trouble. He said, the troubles
of my heart are enlarged. Oh, bring thou me out of my distresses. Look upon mine affliction. You
know, if the Lord looks at it, everything's going to be okay.
Look upon my affliction and my pain and forgive all my sins. Oh Lord, bring me out of this.
How many times have you prayed that prayer? I've got myself
in a mess. It's all my fault. Lord, would
you bring me out? Would you pull my feet out of
the net? Well, David's asking that. Lord, do that for me. Verse
19, he says, consider my enemies. They're too strong for me. I'm
so weak before them. There are many. They hate me
with a cruel hatred. Oh, keep my soul. If you don't
keep it, it won't be kept. I'll fall away. Deliver me, save
me. When Steve was praying, he said,
Lord, save us. Yeah, I pray that prayer every
day. Lord, save me. Save me. That's the most applicable
prayer to every situation. Lord, save me. Peter's walking
on the water. He begins to sink. Lord, save
me. Deliver me. Let me not be ashamed. Don't let me be put to shame.
Don't let me be exposed for what I am. Let me be found in Christ.
For I put my trust in thee. Let integrity. and uprightness
preserve me, for I wait on thee. Redeem Israel, O God. You know,
when you pray for yourself, you pray for all Israel, don't you?
You pray for the church. You know, the Lord taught us
to pray, Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
While David's praying for himself, he says, O Lord, redeem Israel
out of all his troubles. That's what I need, redemption. Ain't that a wonderful song?
You know, I read the Psalms two or three times a year, and I
always get excited when I come to Psalm 25. I just love this
Psalm. But I'd like to spend the last
few moments considering what he says in verse 11. For thy
name's sake, O Lord, pardon mine iniquities, for they are great. Now this is how David felt about
his sin. My iniquities are great, great
because of who they're against. You know, until I see that my
sins against God, I might have remorse over my sin, but I don't
have true repentance. I might be sorry for the problems
it brings me and even the problems it brings others. But it's only
when I see my sin is against God that I have this true repentance. That's why my sin is so great
because it's who it's against. Not only that, but because of
the greatness of the amount of my sin and the greatness of the
wickedness of my sin, pardon my iniquity, O Lord, for it's
great. Now, can you imagine a criminal
using this when he's standing before the judge? Lord, pardon,
or judge, could you pardon my iniquity because it's so bad?
He says, it's horrible, it's evil, it's wicked. Hey, only
reason, pardon it because it's so bad. Why? Throw him in prison,
lock the, throw away the key. The guy, no hope for him. That's,
you couldn't use that. Now, if salvation were by merit,
the man who sins the least would be the most likely to be saved,
wouldn't he? If salvation was by merit, but thank God that's
not the case. David says, pardon mine iniquity. The crookedness, the perversity
of my sin. We read in Job, he looketh upon
men and if any say I've sinned and perverted that which is right,
then God will say, I deliver him from going down to the pit.
I found a ransom. David said, I've sinned against
the Lord. I was thinking about this thing
of the confession of sin. Don't confess your sin to men. What could a man do for you?
I don't know how many times people have wanted to tell me things
they've done. Don't tell me. I repeat it, just in case anybody's
tempted to do that. I don't want to know. I really
don't. What good could I do you? I'm sure not going to tell you
anything. You confess your sin to the Lord.
That's the only one you confess your sin to. Now, turn with me
to 1 John 1. Hold your finger there and Psalm
25 will come back to it. Look in 1 John 1. Three times in 1 John 1, we read
of the phrase, if we say. If we say. You know, folks have
a lot to say, don't they? Look in verse 6. If we say that
we have fellowship with Him. You know, a lot of people make
that confession. I fellowship with God. I pray
to him. He hears me. He speaks to me.
I serve him. I walk with him. A lot of people
make that claim. I have fellowship with God. If
we say we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness, the
darkness of human religion, the darkness of works, we lie. That's all you can call it, is
a lie. And we do not practice the truth. We're liars. But if
we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we do have fellowship
one with another. And the blood of Jesus Christ,
his son, cleanses us from all sin. If we say, there it is again,
if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves. We've lost
all credibility. The truth is not in us. I always
have this sinful nature that I always am aware of. Always. Breathing on me. When I would do good, evil is
present with me. Now that, that's the truth. Verse 10. If we say we've not
sinned, there the word is a verb regarding anything we do. If
we say we've not sinned, I didn't sin there, we make him a liar
and his word is not in us. All you have to do it or all
I have to do is do it and it's sin because I did it. That's
all it takes is for me to do it. The sinful man to do it,
there's sin in it. No question about that. But look
at verse nine. If we confess our sins, if we
take sides with God against ourself, If we confess our sins, He is
faithful and just. Not just merciful and gracious,
but faithful and just. Faithful because He promised
He'd do it. He gave us the grace to confess. Just through justification. If we confess our sins, He is
faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness. Now turn back to Psalm 32. Here's
David confessing sin. Psalm 32. David says in verse 3, when I
kept silence, he wasn't confessing. My bones waxed old through my
roaring all the day long, for day and night thy hand was heavy
upon me. My moistures turned into the
drought of summer. Verse 5, I acknowledge my sin
unto thee. And mine iniquity, have I not
hid? I said, I will confess my transgressions
unto the Lord. And thou forgave us the iniquity
of my sin. Now back to Psalm 25, there's
something I want us to notice. David says in verse 11, for thy
namesake, Oh Lord, pardon my iniquity. For it is great. For thy namesake. My iniquity
is such is that the only reason you can find to pardon me is
for your great namesake. Now let me show you what this
means. Turn to Genesis chapter 19. Hold your finger there in
Psalm 25 and turn to Genesis 19. When's the last time you
read about brother Lot? Lot. was a mess. That's about all you can say
about him as far as a man goes. As a matter of fact, if you read
his history without the New Testament, you would conclude that he probably
wasn't saved. Now, God tells us he was. That
righteous man, that's God's testimony of him. He talked about his righteous
soul that was vexed day to day with the unlawful deeds of the
wicked. But if all you read was the Old Testament, as a matter
of fact, most of the Jewish writers wrote of him as a wicked man
when they were commenting on this, that didn't know anything
about the gospel. Now Lot was in Sodom. He shouldn't have been there.
He lingered, should have never been there. Now look in Genesis
chapter 19 verse 29. And it came to pass when God
destroyed the cities of the plain Sodom and Gomorrah that God remembered
Abraham and sent Lot out of the midst
of the overthrow when he overthrew the cities in which Lot dwelt.
God remembered Abraham. And Lot's salvation was his connection
to Abraham, wasn't it? God remembered Christ. That's salvation for his name's
sake. Let me show you another scripture
in Psalm 106. Verse six. The psalmist says we have sinned
with our fathers. We have committed iniquity. We
have done wickedly. Our fathers understood not thy
wonders in Egypt. They remembered not the multitude
of thy mercies, but provoked him at the sea, even at the Red
Sea. Nevertheless, I love that word. Nevertheless, he saved
them for his namesake. that he might make his mighty
power to be known. Now, why does God save sinners?
For the glory of his name. He saves sinners who would most
magnify the freeness of his grace. Now, let me ask you a question.
How much would your personal salvation magnify the freeness
of his grace? I know how much mine would. If
a doctor wanted to be known for his ability as a physician, who
does he want to work on? Somebody with a paper cut or
a headache or somebody who's mangled and diseased and dying?
Who would give him the most glory in his work as a physician? If a man wanted to demonstrate
generosity, What would glorify him the most? Paying off the
debt of a man who owed a hundred dollars or paying off the debt
of a man who owed a million dollars and there's no way he could pay
it. My sin is such that the only
reason for pardon can be found in the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Be ye kind, tenderhearted, forgiving
one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven
you." Now remember, the title of this message is God's Reason
for Forgiveness. I'd like to look at one final
scripture. Would you turn to Isaiah 43? Isaiah 43. Now look
in verse 25. This is God speaking. And he
says, I, even I am he that blotted out thy transgressions for my
own sake. Not because of you, but for my
own sake and will not remember thy sins. Now, who is he speaking
of when he says, I'm going to give this great blessing of blotting
out your transgressions and not even remembering your sins. Well,
look in verse 22. These are the people that he
says this of, but thou has not called upon me. Oh, Jacob, the
one thing they shouldn't do. They hadn't done, but thou has
been weary of me. Oh, Israel. How many times have you thought
something like I could be doing this, or I could be doing that.
If I wasn't a believer, this is cramping my style. That's what they had been doing.
Thou hast been weary of me, O Israel. Thou hast not brought me the
small cattle of thy burnt offerings. God had blessed them so greatly,
but they didn't bring him the first fruits. Neither has thou
honored me with thy sacrifices. You didn't even think of me.
I've not caused thee to serve with an offering, nor wearied
thee with incense that was wearisome to God because it was so insincere.
Thou has bought me no sweet cane with money. Neither has thou
filled me with the fat of thy sacrifices, but thou has made
me to serve with thy sins. That's all I've got out of you.
Thou has wearied me with thine iniquities. I, even I am he that blotteth
out thy transgressions for my own sake. and will not remember
thy sins. The reason is found in me." Now
he's the only one who can do this. You know, he can forgive
you of all your sins and make it to where they're not even
remembered. And I think it seems like the
Lord is I say this reverently, but he seems almost surprised
when he says he's doing this. I even, I'm either doing this
that I could, that I could forgive such rotten people. That's what
he's saying. I even, I am he that blotted
out thy sins, blotted them out for my own sake and will not
remember them. Now this is present. He says, I am He that blotteth out. Not that we'll blot out, but
I blotted them out. Remember this. I love this. This
is one of my favorite things I ever say. Salvation doesn't
end with forgiveness. It begins with God sovereignly
saving your sin is blotted out. It's gone. That's what salvation
is. Forgiveness isn't a reward to
you for something you've done. No, those first few verses would
describe us, I'm afraid, far too often. But he says, I've
done it for my own sake. It's a present forgiveness. And he says, I won't even remember
him. Won't even remember him. Now, there's three things I think
about when I think about him not remembering my sin. First thing,
by justification. The reason he doesn't remember
him is there's nothing there for him to remember. That's how
real the work of Christ on the cross is. He put him away. There's
nothing there for him to remember. Watch him. There's nothing there.
But here's the next thing that I think of when he says, I won't
remember him. When someone sins against us, By God's grace, we forgive. But
man, it's hard to forget, isn't it? You remember. You remember. I would love to
be able to just forget it. Just forget it. Not even thinking
about it. That's the way it ought to be.
But when someone sins against us and does us wrong and abuses
us, we forgive them. But we don't embrace them at
first, just like, oh boy, you know, nothing ever happened.
That's what we ought to do. But I know how hard it is. We've
got this thing called the flesh. But you know when God forgives,
He completely embraces, nothing ever happened. It's forgotten. You're received into a state
of full and complete fellowship. Nothing ever happened. Now that's
the Lord's forgiveness. And this thing of I won't remember
your sins, when it comes to the recompense of the reward, Judgment
day. He's not going to remember sins.
Now, in human terms, what if a wealthy man had a son who was
absolutely no good and squandered and wasted everything his father
did for him? He didn't do anything for his
father. He was a wicked son, a rotten son. He didn't cause
him anything but grief and heartache through his conduct and through
his actions. And he didn't deserve anything
from his dad. I mean, if you did will him something,
you know it'd be wasted, wasted all, the guy was no good. And
then you had another son who was just faithful, a good boy,
someone who worked hard, someone who respected his father and
respected the name of his father and was just a good, faithful,
obedient son. Now, you wouldn't blame that
father when it comes to the last will and testament. Another boy
got, well, he may have given him some maintenance, but he
wasn't going to give him the same as that other son. You understand that. The
Lord doesn't do that. The Lord doesn't do that. Everybody
gets the same thing, Christ. Likeness to Him. He said, I am
thy shield and thy exceeding great reward. Everybody gets
the same thing because he really does not remember our sin. There is God's reason for forgiveness. Behold, I, even I, am he that
blotteth out thy sins for mine own sake. Reason's not found
in you. Reason's found in me. And will
not remember thy sins. But I'll tell you one thing that
comes out of it. I know this. God saving me magnifies the absolute
freeness of his grace. And there's never been a better
master and a more poor servant. Let's pray together.