Your turn to answer

First, let me say that I TRULY appreciate the times that y'all are able to take a moment, consider these questions, and then type out an answer! I know I'm asking for a significant investment of your time, and I really am blessed, too, being able to read your comments. I enjoy hearing your input, and many times there are wonderful things to be learned from our collaborations!

So let's put our heads together again today, shall we?

We discussed so many things in the past two weeks, as we worked our way through Psalm 25. We talked about our sins, poor judgment calls and mistakes, and much more! We discussed trials and deliverance, and carefully (and honestly) examining our hearts. 

Keeping our study of Psalm 25 and the life of David in mind, here's our question for today:

Does God remove some or all of the consequences of our sin when we repent? Why or why not? If you have time, leave an answer in the comments and support your answer from scripture. (You may wish to refer to II Samuel 12, along with other passages of your choosing.)

Thanks in advance for your prayerful discussions and feedback - they mean the world to me!

 

Deliverance

All-knowing.

Almighty. Powerful.

Are these just words that we flippantly toss about? Or are they core beliefs?

Here's the test -- do we truly believe what David says in this psalm? 

Do we truly believe that no matter how difficult our trials are, our Father is able to deliver us from them? Do we know in our hearts that He is able? That He can do this for His glory and our good?

Do we truly believe in the mercy and grace that we sing about? That we read about?

Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble,
    and he delivered them from their distress. (Psalm 107:6, NIV)

“Because he has loved Me, I will save him;
I will set him securely on high, because he has known My name. (Psalm 91:14, NASB)

See? He even promises that He will deliver us. Oh, but wait. I think I remember that John the Baptist was "delivered" by being beheaded. . . . wasn't Stephen delivered by being stoned to death? And even Paul, the apostle whose letters we read and re-read, died at the hands of the Romans after a long stint in their prison system. . . . 

I guess we need to be careful to define "deliverance" in Biblical terms, not in the superficial terms that we humans usually think on. While some have been truly (and miraculously) delivered, others have been killed, or died in what were perceived as accidents, or even died as they were persecuted and murdered. 

The children of Israel were delivered from their troubles many times. Their leaders, David included, were rescued from distress time and again. In Hebrews, we read that Timothy was imprisoned and then released, while Paul remained there for many years.  Others were delivered in ways that seem incomprehensible to us on a human level: Samson died pulling down a banquet hall on his own head and the heads of God's enemies; Zechariah was killed between the temple and the altar; James (one of the sons of Zebedee) was killed by King Agrippa . . . . there are many examples.

It's not always the will of God to miraculously heal us or get us out of all of our troubles. And that bothers us sometimes, doesn't it? We just don't understand God's ways. In 1956, the world was shocked by the seemingly senseless murder of five Christian missionaries in the wilds of Ecuador. All across the globe, the names of Jim Elliott and the others became household words. Elliott's wife, Elisabeth, and her three year old daughter actually moved to the village of the tribesmen who had murdered her husband, and continued the work of telling the Waodani the gospel of Jesus Christ. In the coming years, the word would spread about the murderous villagers who accepted Christ as Savior; the Mission Aviation Fellowship would expand and serve even more countries across the globe; Elisabeth Elliott would be become renowned for her inspirational books . . . . yes, it's true. God's ways are sometimes surprising, even shocking to us. And deliverance can assume many different forms.

In Paul's last days, Christianity had morphed from a small, struggling movement into a religion with multitudes of followers. But it was no longer a religion that existed under the shelter of Judaism. It had become a crime to be a Christian. It was dangerous to be seen with Paul, a well-known Christian, and it was equally dangerous to be known as "one of those Christians." 

Does this sound familiar? We are rapidly heading in the same direction in our world today . . .

Paul, however, is not afraid. He knows that he will die. He knows he has escaped the mouth of the lion before, but that he will soon die. And he says that the Lord Jesus is with him.

But the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it. And I was delivered from the lion’s mouth. The Lord will rescue me from every evil attack and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom. To him be glory for ever and ever. Amen. (II Timothy 4:17-18, NIV)

These are the words of a man who is fully aware of the multiple layers of meaning in the word "deliverance." And Paul's fervent desire was that his life and his death would bring glory to God! Paul felt bound by duty and by love to affirm again and again -- in his letters he repeated that the Lord is always good, loving, and compassionate. Paul said no matter his circumstances, no matter his future, God was going to deliver him from his trials. 
And we can trust in the same. God is fully able to deliver us, even when we are the cause of our trials, either by sin or by foolish mistake. If we will humble ourselves and seek Him, He will instruct us so that we know His wisdom to guide us out of out trials. The difficult circumstances we find ourselves in should drive us to examine our hearts, as we studied last week. We must confess and then forsake our sins, and lastly, cry out to the Lord for His grace and deliverance -- our fervent desire should be for His glory, knowing that it's our ultimate good that He works toward.

Let those who love the Lord hate evil,
    for he guards the lives of his faithful ones
    and delivers them from the hand of the wicked. (Psalm 97:10)

Let's focus on loving Him, hating evil, and waiting on His timing for deliverance. Let's ask that the Lord will be glorified as He leads us.

Seeking God's wisdom in hard times

 

We saw that Step One was to examine our hearts and confess any sins that the Holy Spirit shows to us. Step Two of seeking the Lord during our hard times is to meditate and praise Him for Who He is.

We touched on this yesterday when we looked at the verses in Exodus. In that passage, God talks about Himself. He tells Moses (and us) about Himself.

In Psalm 25, David tells us more. He lays out his prayer in the first seven verses, and then many of the remaining verses are a review of Who the Lord is. I believe that David's primer here is instructing us to seek refreshment and encouragement by thinking about the goodness of God. 

Let's look at all the goodness of God that is revealed in this psalm: David says in verse three that no one who waits on the Lord will be ashamed - just as we mentioned yesterday, God is faithful; we can trust in Him. Verse five calls Him our Savior, and the next verse points out that He is a compassionate and loving God. He is called good and also upright in verse eight, and verse ten points out that He is truth. He is fair (v. 9) and forgiving (v. 11), and comforts the lonely (v. 16). His power is revealed in several verses, and in verse twenty-two David says God will redeem His people from all their troubles.

Wow! I would say that the attributes of God are "awesome," but that is such an overworked and overused word today that I feel I need to say something different! I guess my point here is that as we think about and meditate on God's goodness, and all of His attributes, we will be refreshed and encouraged as we face our hard times. Whether we are looking about us at horrific circumstances, or if we are face-to-face with the realization that we've cause this mess ourselves, thinking about our wondrous Redeemer will encourage us as we seek His wisdom.

Another thing that kinda jumps out at me as we study this psalm is that David also emphasizes asking God to teach us His ways, to instruct us in His paths. This is mentioned in five different verses! I figure that must be important! 

One commentary that I looked into said that the Hebrew word for "paths" refers to a well-worn, or beaten path. That it implied a path or road made by wagon wheels passing over the same ground, over and over again. Made me think of the "ruts" made by animals and wagons pulling loads over the same ground. Today in the western states of the US, one can still see the ruts made by wagons moving westward in the mid-1800's. In some places the iron-rimmed wagon wheels, pulled along usually by plodding oxen (not by horses, as some television shows would have us believe.....horses would not have as much strength nor the endurance needed for the weeks of pulling loaded wagons across the prairie) and some of the ruts can be easily seen today. Settlers were encouraged to follow behind the wagon in front of them, and not to stray from the trail into uncharted (and possibly much rougher) ground. 

David says in verse eight that God instructs sinners in His way -- wonderful! We qualify there! We also see in the psalm that we need to be willing to walk in His ways once He shows us the path. Willing to walk in His way? Well, of course I am! 

Good! Then the proofs of that will be that I am constant in prayer, and that I wait on the Lord, since His timing is not always mine. I must also be teachable - my desire should be to grow in understanding God's truths. The psalm also says I will be humble (v. 9) and that I will obey Him (v. 10).  The next verses say that I should fear Him and look to Him continually, and that I will walk in uprightness.  

Running through this entire psalm, like an undercurrent, is the idea of trust in the Lord.

My God, in You I trust,
Do not let me be ashamed;
Do not let my enemies rejoice over me.(v.2)

But is David that antsy about being ashamed? Is that something that worries him? In my old age, there's not much anymore that will truly embarrass me . . . unless it's appearing to be unreliable, or dishonest, or hypocritical, or delusional, or, or,  . . . hmmmm, even though those things would make me more sad than embarrassed, I guess I see David's point. He's "going public" in affirming his trust in the Lord. He's saying that if the Lord doesn't come through for him, and David's enemies are triumphant, it will be a blow to not just David's honor, but the Lord's honor, too. His enemies will look on, "Here is a man who trusted in the Lord. This is how things turned out."  So, as he prays, David says to the Lord that he's totally trusting in Him. "Don't let me be ashamed, because then Your Name would be dishonored."

Here's the summary for Step Two: meditate and be encouraged by all of the wondrous attributes of our Lord, and then trust in Him to work so that His Name will not be dishonored -- instead His Name will be glorified!

Seeking the Lord in our hard times

 

We're still camped out here at Psalm 25, and we are picking up where we left off last week . . . we said then that in our hard times, whether caused by circumstances or sin, we need to seek the Lord. We need to ask for wisdom.

The absolutely foundational truth for seeking the Lord is that we must confess our sins and ask for His pardon. It's step one. Numero uno. Can't get anywhere until we do this.

As we saw last week, David is being very transparent in this psalm. He is letting us look into his heart - and he is painfully aware of his shortcomings. Not just his sins in the current mud-pie that he finds himself in, but even going back and looking at the sins of his youth. 

Some people have a real problem with this. A big problem. A pride and self-righteousness problem. 

We shouldn't just shrug off our sins by saying something like, "Oh, what do you expect? Come on, I was just (insert age) years old!"

We also can't compare ourselves to our enemies and pat ourselves on the back: "I may have some faults, but look at those peeps! They are downright evil."

David doesn't belittle his sins, either, or try to downplay them . . . "Sure, I was wrong to sleep with Bathsheba, but that's water under the dam. I'm just a hot-blooded guy that saw a beautiful lady."

David doesn't blame God, either; that's something that some people use to try to feel better about past sins. "I made some mistakes, give me a break. I'm human. God made me this way."

Well. 

No, no, and no. David feels the pain of his guilt and it drives him to confess again his sin to God, and to plead for His pardon. Let's look at our psalm:

For the sake of your name, Lord,
    forgive my iniquity, though it is great. (v. 11, NIV)

You might be thinking, shouldn't David be concentrating on himself, and how badly he has failed? Instead he is asking for forgiveness for the sake of the Lord's name . . . David is wholly sincere when he says his iniquity is great. Not "great" like we think. His iniquity is large. It's way bigger than it should be, and he's guilty about it. The phrase "the sake of your name" refers to all of the attributes of God. His characteristics. "What makes Him tick." It hearkens back to all that He has revealed to us, about Himself.

One of the earliest instances that we have in the scripture of God revealing Himself happened after the children of Israel really messed up one time. Yeah, I know, they did that a lot. But then, I do, too, so I'm not gonna poke fingers at them. (Grin) When Moses went up on the mountain and was busy receiving the tablets and commandments, the kids at home got bored. Apparently it didn't occur to Aaron to try anything else to keep them occupied - instead, he asked all of them for their gold bracelets and necklaces and bling of all kinds, and like he told Moses, he put it in the fire and out came the golden calf. I'm not kidding; you can check it out in Exodus 32:24.

Now, I bet you know the rest of the story . . . . Moses was livid, and smashed the precious tablets. Then he ground up the calf and (ugh) made the revelers drink water with that powder in it. He approached God on their behalf and pleaded for their lives, and for God to be with them. To make a long story short, Moses went back up the mountain called Sinai and God met with him. God had explained to Moses that if he saw God in all His glory, he would die. He arranged for Moses to see His back as He went by on the mountain. 

And as He did, He spoke words that reveal so much about our Father God:

Then the Lord came down in the cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the Lord. And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; (Exodus 34:5-7a)

The Lord.

How many times in just one day do we use those words? Are we paying attention? How many times do we stop and think of just what is "in" His name?

He's compassionate and gracious:

We count those blessed who endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord’s dealings, that the Lord is full of compassion and is merciful. (James 5:11, NASB)

He's slow to anger:

And tear your heart and not merely your garments.”
Now return to the Lord your God,
For He is gracious and compassionate,
Slow to anger, abounding in mercy
And relenting of catastrophe. (Joel 2:13)

Abounding in love and faithfulness:

Know therefore that the Lord your God, He is God, the faithful God, who keeps His covenant and His faithfulness to a thousand generations for those who love Him and keep His commandments; (Deuteronomy 7:9)

Forgiving:

 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our wrongdoings, according to the riches of His grace (Ephesians 1:7)

He will punish the guilty:

For whom the Lord loves He disciplines,
Just as a father disciplines the son in whom he delights. (Proverbs 3:12)

David knew that he deserved the punishment part. He was sorrowful over his sins and reminding God of the lovingkindness that He Himself had noted as a part of His character. That part of His character that David had seen at work, over and over again in his life. God is holy; He is the exact antithesis of sin. But He can be both the "just" and the "justifier" because of Jesus' work on the cross. Jesus satisfied the justice portion of the equation when He bore our sins on the cross. So then, God is not only the One Who points out our sins, but He is also the One Who provides grace and forgives those sins. Truly that is something to ponder and then to rejoice over!

Even as we follow David's primer on seeking the Lord in the hard times -- examining our hearts and confessing our sins -- we are blessed to rely on His grace through the blood of our Savior, Jesus Christ.

Friday slowdown

This week we've seen that David, a man of God, fell prey to the traps of circumstances and sin. We learned that Psalm 25 is meant to be a primer on our correct response: to seek God's wisdom, to know how to move forward.

Each day I am so glad to realize again that He leads me!

How to avoid traps - Psalm 25

 

Yesterday we mentioned that sometimes those difficult circumstances we face are from our own sins or mistakes.

That's a theme that runs through this psalm. Our own sins, and our own mistakes, can trap us. The name of the trap? The letters on the tag attached to it? Look closely. 

G-u-i-l-t.

David's guilt is painful. He prays:

Do not remember the sins of my youth
    and my rebellious ways; (v 7a)

In verse eight, he refers to himself as a sinner, and then in verse eleven, he cries out to God:

For the sake of your name, Lord,
    forgive my iniquity, though it is great. (v 11)

And again in verse eighteen:

Look on my affliction and my distress
    and take away all my sins. (v 18)

Is it just me, or have y'all noticed this too? The older I get, and the closer I try to follow my Savior, the more I can relate to that prayer - please, Lord, don't remember the sins of my youth!

Are y'all nodding your heads? 

I hope so.

To me, it seems that the closer we draw near to the Lord, the more hideous the sins we committed when we were younger, appear to be. Some of those sins keep coming back to haunt me, do they you? Sometimes I think, "How could I have done those things? How could I have said those things? What was I thinking?" Well, the answer is that I wasn't thinking . . . I was being foolish and sinful.

“My people are fools;
    they do not know me.
They are senseless children;
    they have no understanding.
They are skilled in doing evil;
    they know not how to do good.” (Jeremiah 4:22, NIV)

Folly is bound up in the heart of a child . . . (Proverbs 22:15a)

A wise person is cautious and turns away from evil,
But a fool is arrogant and careless. (Proverbs 14:16, NASB)

Yup. That was me. The "throw-caution-to-the-wind kid." It was God's grace that kept me from doing some things that could have had serious consequences!

As believers we should try not to dwell or brood on those sins. Quite frankly, thinking about those things can make us shudder and squirm. Ever been there?  What a blessing to realize afresh that they are now under the blood of our Savior, Jesus Christ! When they DO come to mind, they remind us of how corrupt our heart was (and still is, since we are still susceptible to those same sins). And that reminds us of God's great love that sent His Son to bear our penalty for those sins. 

An application to our lives: as we've said before, thinking about God's great love and His awesome gift should remind us of our own enormous need for grace (and mercy) and also of our need to patiently extend God's grace to others.

Another application is this: whenever we are in a difficult situation, we can use the trial to examine our own hearts. Whether it's a financial need, a health need, a relationship conflict, or some other obstacle, we can ask ourselves if we are in this mess because of our own sin?  Whether in part or in whole, is it something we did (or left undone) that caused this mess? And here is where the rubber meets the road, peeps: no matter if it's our fault or not, what is the Lord trying to teach us? Are we being reminded of our mortality? Our stubbornness? Our pride? Let's use our trials to examine our hearts and lives before our Father God.

If we conclude that our trial is directly related to our sin (or our stupidity!) what should we do? 

We could blame it on someone else, right?

We could deny it, right?

We could bluff our way through and cover it up, right?

In a word, no.

Nope.

There is a MUCH better way, and David is telling all who will listen . . . seek the Lord and His wisdom to know what to do.

The Spirit is nudging me to make sure that I say this . . . it's for my own heart's good, as well as for anyone who may read here: one of God's main reasons for allowing such trials in our lives is to get us to seek Him with all our hearts. As we recognize again how dependent on Him we truly are, we will seek Him more fervently. If our trial is due to a sin that was previously a blind spot, we can confess and turn from it. If, instead, our trial is due to a sin that we actually knew better than to commit, we can confess and turn from it, with a renewed desire to avoid that trap the next time!

David was a man wise in the ways of God. He fell into traps of circumstances and of sin.

We, as believers, fall into the same traps of circumstances and sin as David did. If David, who was a man after "God's own heart," cried out to God for wisdom in his trials, how much more should we do the same!

OK, you may say. That's lovely. Sounds so good. But how do we actually seek the Lord and ask for His wisdom in our hard times?

I'm glad you asked! We're going to study that next week! Hope you will join us!

How to stay out of traps - Psalm 25

                                                      

Have you ever read the works of James Fenimore Cooper? From my childhood, I was a history buff, and historical fiction was just my cup of tea . . . Cooper's heroes and heroines were people of intelligence and acumen. He wrote into his novels wily and experienced men who could slip through the forest without disturbing a twig; men who knew well the signs of animals and men, and could determine not just who had stepped in a spot, but how long ago they stepped there!

And this was good, because in the pioneer era that Cooper detailed in his works, the forest could look quite safe but still be dangerous - natives and colonists alike could set snares and traps and hide them so a casual observer might never see them. Whether for food or for an enemy, a well-placed and concealed trap was something to watch out for . . . 

Most of the experience that I have with traps would be those shiny, metallic, boxy contraptions that one can use to trap and relocate squirrels. There's not much way to conceal those, so I don't feel so sorry for the critter when they are trapped - they could see the danger; they just were greedy for that bait! 

All of these were thoughts of mine as I read and re-read Psalm 25. That verse about God releasing our feet from the snare really stuck with me. Especially when David's psalm also speaks of being troubled by his mistakes and his sins . . . often when we find ourselves in "traps" in our lives, it's because of our own mistakes or our own sins. How can we learn to stay out of those traps?

If we jump over to the New Testament, we find a couple of verses that seem to be the perfect summary of our psalm for this week. Indulge me if you will, and turn there sometime this week to refresh your memory:

But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. 6 But he must ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. (James 1:5-6, NASB)

James has just finished talking about the need for wisdom in the midst of trials. Then, he tells us that we must seek God and His wisdom when we experience those trials -- and that is exactly what David is telling us in our psalm. He's telling us it doesn't matter how difficult our trials are. It doesn't matter if we caused them ourselves! We still need to seek wisdom from the Lord - and then trust Him to work in the trials for His glory, and for our good.

Whew! That's a tall order! I feel like we need an instruction manual, don't you? Aah, yes, we have one! First of all, we have our Bibles. In addition to being a book of history, and a book of prophecy, and poetry, and comfort, it's also the best set of instructions EVER. (Grin) And we have some particular passages that are truly helpful. Psalm 25 is one of those.

The scholars tell us that this psalm is an acrostic (I would never have known, but I will take their word for it!). An acrostic is a text where each verse begins with a successive letter of the alphabet. This may have been something that David and other psalmists used in order to make the psalms easier for people to remember. Just as it's good practice for us to memorize portions of God's Word nowadays, the Hebrew people did the same back then. This whole psalm has a theme of learning, and the alphabetical arrangement of the verses would have aided in memorization. 

We could say that in the midst of pouring out his heart, David wrote a primer on how to live so as the please God - in the midst of trials. If he'd been a Southern Baptist preacher, he probably would have tried to divide all of this into three sections, and if he could have titled each section starting with the same letter, it really would have cranked his tractor! (Grin) I'm guessing David's three sections would have been something like this: trials from sin and guilt, seeking the Lord for wisdom, and the Lord's ability to deliver us from the trials.

We've said before that God's children often find themselves in difficult (even frightening) circumstances. We're not absolutely certain about David's circumstances in this psalm. It's not like he titled it "I'm on the run and feeling guilty" or something else along those lines . . . in light of his repeated references to his sins (including the sins "of his youth") we can surmise that he was a little older. It's possible that since his sin with Bathsheba and the murder of her unsuspecting husband led to Absalom's leading a revolt, it may have been written during that time of his life.

Other clues to his circumstances . . . what else had David feeling trapped? In verses 2-3, he mentions enemies who are seeking to gloat over his troubles - even over his death! Verse nineteen says that the foes are many and that they hate David with violence. They seem to have gained advantage over David, because he describes his feet as already caught in their net (verse 15). Our old buddy David feels lonely and bereft, and he feels his troubles are growing worse instead of better (v 16-17). Lastly, David asks repeatedly for God to teach him (verses 4-5, 8-9, 12, and 14). He doesn't sound like someone who feels he has his act together, no? He is admitting that he needs instruction -- that he's confused in the midst of these circumstances. He feels trapped.

Wow. If David, who walked with God from his youth, was facing these trials as he was well, about my age, then none of us are exempt! Not young people, not older people, not even those who are wise in the ways of godliness. Sometimes we believers think, "I've been following the Lord and seeking Him. I've been trying to be obedient. WHY am I experiencing all these trials?" We needn't think that if we obey God, He gives us a "home free" card. No passes that exempt us from trials. Nope, we need to brush up on our Bible reading if we are thinking that way: many of the most godly men and women in the Bible went through difficult trials, so we needn't be surprised.

Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. (I Peter 4:12)

Circumstances can seem to trap us. So can our own sins and mistakes. More on that next time . . .