Sermon Tone Analysis

Psalm 32

 

! Introduction

This is the first Sunday in the season of Lent which is kind of a countdown to Easter.

The focus of Lent for many people is giving something up, but what is the purpose of that and what does it really mean?

Merriam Webster’s Dictionary defines it as “a period of penitence and fasting.”

Wikipedia states that “The traditional purpose of Lent is the preparation of the believer — through prayer, repentance, almsgiving and self-denial — for the annual commemoration during Holy Week of the Death and Resurrection of Jesus...”

Because we are doing the Scripture readings which relate the calendar to the events of Jesus’ life, we will be reading a lot of Scripture which will help us prepare for the celebration of the death of Jesus in the next little while.

During the advent season we prepare for the coming of Jesus into the world.

During lent, we prepare ourselves to consider and celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus.

How can we prepare?

The death of Jesus on the cross will become more meaningful when we know who we are and when we understand our need for His great gift.

My hope is that reflection on the Scriptures related to Lent, over the next 40 days or so will prepare us to celebrate Easter with more depth and meaning.

We will think about why we need salvation and why it was so important that Christ had to come.

We will consider the depth of our lost condition and reflect on the importance of repentance so that when we hear the news of Jesus’ death on April 22 we will be very glad that a way has been provided and when we hear the news on April 24 that Jesus rose from the grave, we will be filled with joy at the wonder of this gift.

That is my hope for the next six weeks.

So we want to start by looking at Psalm 32.

!

I.                   The Guilt of Sin

!! A.                 What is Sin?

We are all tempted.

In fact the Bible tells us that even Jesus was tempted.

However, unlike Jesus we have all yielded to temptation.

The Bible calls this sin.

In Hebrew this Psalm uses three words for sin to help us understand a little bit more of what sin is.

The New American Standard picks up on this when it translates verses 1, 2 using the words – “transgression,”  “sin,” and “iniquity.”

The first word emphasizes that sin is rebellion against God.

It is a deliberate act of not doing the things God wants us to do or doing the things God does not want us to do.

Sin is against God.

Although we affect ourselves and others when we sin and often sin against others, ultimately all sin is against God.

The second word give us a little different shade of meaning in that it emphasizes sin as missing God’s revealed will.

Whereas the first word focuses more on the act of rebellion, the second focuses more on deviating from what is intended and what is good and what is God’s will.

The third word emphasizes the perversity of sin.

It reminds us that sin always is a deviation from what is right and good.

In other words, sin always destroys.

Although we shouldn’t put too much emphasis on the distinctions, they do help to remind us what sin is.

It isn’t just an “oops” or a slip.

All sin is a deliberate act of disobedience against God which deviates from God’s perfect will and so transgresses into acts and attitudes that destroy.

!! B.                 The Consequences of Silence

When we sin, and we all sin, there are always consequences.

As we have said, Sin destroys.

If we choose to gossip, we destroy someone’s reputation.

If we tell a lie, besides whatever damage the lie does, we brand ourselves as untrustworthy.

Ultimately the consequence of sin is final destruction, which we call death.

The Bible says in Romans 6:23 that “the wages of sin is death.”

Another consequence of sin occurs when we hide our sin.

It is tempting to hide sin because we are proud people.

We have this strange notion that we are pretty good and don’t really do that badly and we hate to have people find out what we are really like.

So when we sin we are tempted to cover up our sin.

When we do that, our conscience begins to bother us.

We hate pain but pain is really a wonderful gift of God.

If we did not feel pain, we would be in great danger of injuring ourselves because we wouldn’t know that we need to pull away from a flame or avoid the business end of a sharp knife.

Our conscience is like pain in that it is a warning for us to deal with sin.

Like pain, if we ignore the warning, it is very uncomfortable.

The Psalmist tells us his story of a time when he had sinned and was ignoring his conscience and as a result was terribly uncomfortable.

He uses graphic language to speak of his discomfort.

He compares the pain of a guilty conscience to bones wasting away.

In other words, he felt as if he had no structural strength.

He says his “strength” was sapped.

The word for “strength” is “delight” and is a word used for a sweet treat, a dainty.

When we cover up sin delight is gone.

When we sin and have a guilty conscience, the joy of living is taken away.

He describes it as a summer day when the humidity is high and the temperature is hot.

I don’t know about you, but on those days I have no energy to do all the things I would like to do.

A similar feeling occurs when we live with a guilty conscience.

Many people live with this pain and get around it by numbing their consciences with a lot of noise, by being so busy that they mask their true feelings, or by self medicating with overeating or alcohol or partying.

Hiding our sin has the consequence of discomfort and pain and if we continue to hide our sin, it has the even more serious consequence of numbing us to God’s hand in our life.

In fact if we get to the point where our conscience bothers us less and less, we are in real trouble because then our hearts are becoming hard and insensitive to God.

!

II.

The Path to Freedom

!! A.                 Confession

Hiding our sin leads to a negative consequence, so the only solution is openness.

The Psalmist tells us of his experience.

This is no theoretical discussion, but arises out of a life lived and reveals important fundamental spiritual truths.

As long as we hide our sin, we will find, as the Psalmist did, that it is just too painful.

He recommends, out of his own experience, what God also wants us to do and that is to be open about our sin.

He uses four expressions which help us understand what that means and point us to the path of how to do it.

The first word is “I acknowledged my sin to you.”

To acknowledge is to say “yes” to our sin.

If we say, “it wasn’t so bad,” or, “I didn’t do it,” or, “it wasn’t my fault,” we are in denial and as long as we do that God’s hand of conscience will remain upon us.

When we say “yes, it was my fault,” “I did it,” or “I admit it,” that is the beginning of the path to freedom.

Augustine said, “The beginning of knowledge is to know oneself to be a sinner.”

The second thing which the Psalm says is, I “did not cover up my iniquity.”

It is pride which causes us to cover up what we have done wrong.

The picture that comes to my mind is when mom asks junior, “Did you eat the chocolate bar which I told you not to eat?”

While junior sits on the wrapper and says, “no” he covers up his sin.

Yet at the same time the chocolate stains on his chin reveal a different reality.

We may hide sin from others and we may even hide it from ourselves, but we can never hide it from God.

If we want freedom from the pain of our guilt we need to get off the candy wrapper and stop hiding our sin from ourselves, from God and from the person we have sinned against.

When we get to that point, we get to the point of confession, which is the key place we need to get to in order to deal with sin.

Confession is the act of taking that “yes” in our heart and declaring it to God.

Acknowledging happens in our mind, as an admission of guilt.

Not covering up happens with our deeds as an act of revelation.

Confession happens with our mouth when we say, to God and to the person we have sinned against, “I was wrong and I admit that I did it and I am sorry.”

Apart from such an action of the heart and hand and mouth, we will not find freedom from the guilt of our sin.

Trying to make it right, covering it up, avoiding the issue or doing better next time will not bring us freedom.

Only confession will bring freedom from the guilt of sin that we seek.

And we need to be very careful to be absolutely honest about it.

One of the phrases the writer uses in verse1 to describe the blessedness of sins forgiven is “in whose spirit is no deceit.”

You may have heard about the man who did not pay his taxes.

When his conscience bothered him about this, he wrote a letter to the government with a check.

He wrote, “Here is the money I owe on my taxes.