there are some people who have this mentality…
true confession will lead to true repentance and the subsequent true restoration will come
have you ever been unsure if your confession is genuine? … the only way for us to know if our confession is genuine is…
something has been robbed away from us…
david seemed to have lost EVERYTHING BECAUSE OF SIN.. that was the lowest point of his life…
perhaps you once had joy
- not exact wording…. but i know it ends with perhaps there is a particular sin you are harbouring in your heart
for the psalmist to ask create in me a clean heart - he was asking for nothing less than a miracle
it would be very foolish to say… i will cause myself to change and be transformed. no man can do that. no amount of human effort can ever accomplish that. only God alone…
david was talking about God’s continual blessing on his life…. we may lose the continued blessing that God had showered upon our lives because of SIN.
john calvin who believed in the eternal security… said that david did not really need to pray such a prayer…
the reason david prayed this is because when the believer falls into sin… he would be so devastated. so troubled. so anxious in his heart that he would spontaneously cry out TAKE NOT thy holy spirit… so david was talking about the inability to LIVE A HOLY LIFE
one pastor gives the illustration of the filly of the holy spirit… glove… until the glove is filled with the hand…
in our humanness in our emotions that is what we feel, even though it is impossible
- the point was answering why David said take not thy spirit from me
… every aspect of our lives are affected. we may pretend that everything is alright. we may put up a happy demeanour. but within our hearts know there is no more joy.. once we confess and repent of our sins, we will be speaking for a renewed spirit
the vast majority of people think that the way to have joy to have a good time is sin. actually the opposite is true… if you continue in your sins, your sins will remove every good thing from you… you may still be participating in… but there will be no more joy in your worship, fellowship, prayer, giving. the joy has been robbed away from you because of sin. you are just going through the motion
if you are a Christian you know the joy… words cannot express it, it is unspeakable… we would not want to exchange anything for it in the world. not money, nothing… to lose this joy is most devastating… we would do everything we can to be restored to this joy…
- pastor goes further at the start. quite descriptive…
when i was a little boy, i did not know how to swim… i fell into the deep end and i almost drowned… i remember very clearly it was not sufficient for me to have my head above the water… i want my entire body to be out of the water… i want my body to be where i was BEFORE i fell into the pool… he would not want to exchange ANYTHING for that restoration. he would never have anything less than that restoration
so it’s strange for a believer to say, “well i’ve confessed my sins, i’ve received forgiveness. that’s good enough”. surely that’s not good enough…
that is the only kind of life we want…
let us search our hearts this morning.. have we lost something more valuable to us? have we lost the joy of our salvation? perhaps you feel most dejected because of some sin, and no one knows, but God knows.
but in ONE SINGLE MOMENT you blew your testimony away because you behaved in such an unchristian way… or maybe you have been given the privilege to serve God in a certain capacity… but you don’t want to face the struggles(?)… you are afraid. you find yourself drifting further and further away from God… you cannot say, it is well with my soul.. because something is missing. no more joy…
take COMFORT and be of good cheer, because God does NOT want us to go on like this. money cannot bring us joy, we cannot command joy… it does NOT WORK LIKE THAT. we can ONLY cry out to him and ask him to restore us… our GOD IF FAITHFUL. he WILL answer our prayers.
you know what God did? he USED DAVID to serve as king for twenty years! even israel was blessed by David….
so if you cry out to Him, he WILL FORGIVE. he will CLEANSE you. “i want to have that same experience, that unspeakable joy when i first came to know you…”
God will restore that joy. do you believe him? you must believe him. he is faithful