Cornerstone Mission Church, Sunday Sermon
Corrie Ten Boom is a Christian woman who survived a Nazi concentration camp during the Holocaust. She said this about forgiveness.
“Forgiveness is to set a prisoner set free, and to realize the prisoner was you.”
Corrie Ten Boom recounted when she faced the former Nazi guard who had become a Christian. Who said to her, “I have become a Christian. I know that God has forgiven me for the cruel things I did, but I would like to hear it from your lips as well… will you forgive me?” She described coming to face to face with one of her captors as when her blood seemed to freeze. She remembered her sister Betsie who had died in that concentration camp. It could not be more than split seconds, but to her felt like hours had passed as this former Nazi guard held his hand out and waited for Corrie Ten Boom’s response.
She stood there with coldness and clutching her heart. But she reasoned with the truth; “forgiveness is an act of the will, and the will can function regardless of the temperature of the heart.” So, she prayed, “Jesus, help me… I can lift my hand. I can do that much. You supply the feeling.” And, she described what happened next; “the current started in my shoulder, raced down my arm, sprang into our joined hands. And then this healing warmth seemed to flood my whole being, bringing tears to my eyes.” And, she cried, “I forgive you, my brother with all my heart.”[1]
So, she the prisoner was set free that moment, truly happy! She was set free from bitterness and hatred that was eating her inside. She was set free from the desire for revenge. She experienced God’s power to forgive and this made her truly happy.
- The vision for happy life
Do you have the vision of truly happy life? Is there such thing as a prerequisite for happy life? Rather we acknowledge it or not, without honestly dealing with our sins and experiencing God’s forgiveness, we cannot experience true happiness. Without experiencing God’s forgiveness, we cannot extend forgiveness to others. Without forgiveness, we cannot be happy.
David spells out the prerequisite for happy life in Psalm 32. Verse 1 and 2, he says that blessed that is one who is truly blessed, truly happy is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered; blessed, truly happy is the man whose sin the LORD does not count against him and in whose spirit is no deceit.” Forgiven life is happy life.
Contrary to what people believe about God, God really wants us to be happy. He doesn’t want us to settle with substandard happiness but go for the vision of truly happy life. The way you are going to realize the vision of truly happy life is experiencing God’s forgiveness.
Psalm 32 lays out for us how we can experience God’s forgiveness. Let me unpack them for you.
- Don’t cover your sins deceitfully. Be honest.
A stumbling block to happiness is temptation to hide and not be honest with ourselves. David calls it deceit in verse 2.
Self-improvement is a form of deceit. It is our act to cover up. It is our attempt to prove ourselves that we are worthy to be forgiven. Do you ever notice after sinning, you have this self-talk going on in your head? “I really messed up. I am sorry God. I am going to try really hard not to mess up again.” So, you feel this surge of self-determination and you begin trying really hard not to mess up. But, soon or later, you run out of steam, you get distracted, and you feel overpowered by temptation, and you are back to where you were.
This doesn’t work because you are not dealing with the core of sin. The truth is that you cannot manage sin; sin must be forgiven. God never forgives your sin because you are good enough. Your good enough will never be good enough to satisfy God’s holiness and his justice. No amount of your self-improvement and self-determination will make you more forgivable. You cannot cover your sins with self-improvement. God has to cover you. God has to forgive your sin.
Matthew Henry in his commentary wrote “the wounds of sin, not opened, will fester, and grow intolerably painful.”[2] Trying to make yourself good enough to draw near to God is like covering up infections with dirty Band-Aid. It only makes things worse.
Ignoring the guilty conscience is another form of cover up, deceit. David said in verse 3 when he tried to keep things silent, his bones wasted away. Deceit is to believe that if you sweep sins under the rug, if you ignore it and don’t think about it, then somehow it will magically disappear. It doesn’t. you cover up the guilty conscience prompted by the Holy Spirit, it only leads to deeper bondage to sin.
David says in verse 6 that we need to offer prayer to God at a time when he may be found. He is talking about when the Holy Spirit nudges our hearts through our guilty conscience. When you feel that nudge to your heart about your actions of rebellion, missing the mark of God’s standard, crooked evil attitude, you got to know that it is God who is nudging you. Don’t ignore when God nudges you. Pray when he is found.
Another form of covering up deceitfully is to when we don’t mean what we say. When we confess our sins with a purpose to sin again, we are cover up our sins in deceit. It sounds bad, but we do that don’t we? Then, there are times we sin with a purpose to repent again.[3] Either way, these are sure ways to insult God’s generosity to forgive us.
- Don’t be vague. Be specific with sin.
When you read verse 1 and 2, do you wonder why David uses different words to describe sin? In fact here in these two verses, David used three Hebrew words to talk about sin. It is easier to see when we read from more literal translation of ESV.
Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the LORD counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit.
Transgression is an act of rebellion and disloyalty against God; sin is an act of missing the mark, God’s expressed will; and iniquity is an crooked act with perverse and evil intention.
Why did David use three different Hebrew words with different nuances to talk about sin? He is trying to guard against the temptation to be vague about sin.
When Roger Barrier left for college, his mom who had always done his laundry gave him a canvas duffel bag and told him, “Put your dirty clothes in this every night… At the end of the week, wash them at the Laundromat.”
A week later, he took the duffel bag full of dirty clothes to the Laundromat. To save time, he stuffed the whole duffel bag in the washer, put some laundry power and with right amount of coins, he turned on the machine. Thump, thump, thump went the machine. A pretty gal approached him with a grin and told him, “I watched you load your washer. I think the clothes would get cleaner if you took them out of the bag.”
Another word, confession should never be trite, “Dear God, forgive me for all my sins for today. Amen.” You need to pay attention to individual sin. Are you acting out of rebellious attitude? Are you missing the mark of the moral standard set by God? Are you acting out of the crooked spite?
- Don’t be stubborn. Be willing.
David warns in verse 9 against being like the horse or a mule without understanding (v. 9). For these creatures, unless they are forced with bit and bridle, they won’t stay near you.
Neighbor’s dog – Ryle, the neighbor’s dog was on the loose. I saw Bobby and his wife Tenniel struggling to control him. Ryle wouldn’t listen to their voice, their commands, even bacon bits weren’t working. Lyn told me that I should go out with Rocky to help them out. I went out with my dog Rocky hoping that Ryle might come for Rocky. Ryle did, but every time I or Bobby tried to grab his dog collar, he would skip away just out of our reach. That went on for five minutes. Before I came out, Bobby had been chasing after Ryle for a while already. The only way Bobby got Ryle was by ambushing the dog between us. Rocky and I stood at one side of the house and Bobby went around the house and approached his dog from the other side. And, he jumped on him. Finally, Ryle was caught. You should have seen Bobby’s face. Oh, he was angry.
Do you ever play God like this ungrateful dog did to its owner?
- Rejoice in God’s forgiveness.
See how David rejoices in God’s forgiveness. Verse 10, “steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the LORD.” So, he calls you and me in v. 11 to rejoice, be glad, sing for God’s forgiveness.
Consider how God forgives your sins. And, rejoice in the truth about God.
He covers your sins (32:1b)… Sins make us loathsome before God in guilt. Sins also make us feel shame, feeling loathsome about ourselves. Sins expose us to nakedness just like Adam and Eve felt. But, God covers our guilt and shame as he covered Adam and Eve’s sin and nakedness with the coats of animal skins. It required skins of animal to cover the shame, the nakedness of Adam and Eve, but for true covering, it requires the death of Jesus.
Revelation 3;18, “I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.”
Covering sins does not mean God forgets our sins as though he experiences amnesia over our sins. Sins are not covered from God’s omniscience because he sees all and knows all. Hebrews 8:12 says, “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.” This doesn’t mean that God would forget our sins. What God does is he covers our sins from his justice with his mercy.
God doesn’t count sin against you. This means he doesn’t hold his relationship with us in hostage (32:2b). He is not going to abandon his relationship with us at whim. No, instead he promises to be our hiding place, to protect us from trouble, to surround us with songs of deliverance. .
God’s ready to forgive you; God is far more willing and quick to forgive than we imagine him to be… We think of God as God who has us jump through the hoop before he lets us off the hook, we think of God as stingy with his forgiveness as an old stingy Ebenezer Scrooge from ‘A Christmas Carol’…
We must see the face of the Father of the prodigal son. See how long it took and what it took for David to come to terms with his sins and yield to God’s forgiveness. And compare it to how quickly God forgave David. Compare how long it took the prodigal son to come to terms with his sins and to that of his Father’s eagerness and quickness to welcome his son back by forgiving his son’s guilt and cover his shame.
God’s vision is to give you blessed life. His promise is to instruct you, teach you in the way you should go, to counsel you and watch over you (32:8).
Would you pursue true happiness by being honest, being specific with your sins, being willing, and by rejoicing in God’s forgiveness?
[1] http://www.crossway.org/product/663575723080
[2] Henry, M. (1996). Matthew Henry's commentary on the whole Bible : Complete and unabridged in one volume (Ps 32:1–6). Peabody: Hendrickson.
[3] Henry, M. (1996). Matthew Henry's commentary on the whole Bible : Complete and unabridged in one volume (Ps 32:1–6). Peabody: Hendrickson.
