"Cleanse Me! Change Me!"
Sermon Presented March 1, 2006
Ash Wednesday
Psalm 51:1-17
The season of Lent begins today - Ash Wednesday. The early Church began observing Lent more than 1500 years ago as a preparation for Easter. The belief was that if we don't walk through the wilderness with Jesus, we won't be prepared to celebrate his resurrection. When we face our sins and seek God's forgiveness, we are ready to celebrate Easter.
Ash Wednesday's emphasis is on confessing our sins with a desire to turn from them and then seeking God's forgiveness. Our text is a prayer offered to God - a psalm by one who admits his guilt and seeks forgiveness. The psalmist approaches God, believing God can heal the internal devastation he feels because of the sins he has committed. In our Bibles, the heading indicates the psalm was written by David after being confronted by the prophet Nathan over David's sins against Bathsheba. However, we don't know who wrote it, and this note wasn't part of the original text. The redactor who put the psalms together added the note because of the belief that this was a prayer prayed by someone who was caught in monumental sins as David's - rape, adultery, and murder. This psalm is a prayer for people of all generations.
Psalm 51:1-17 (Read text.)
The psalmist is filled with guilt and shame. He's having trouble facing himself, let alone facing others and God. He has looked at himself and doesn't like what he sees. He sees SIN looming front and center in his life, blocking his relationship with God. He's confronted with the gravity of his sin and a need to turn away from it toward God.
The psalmist once had a deep relationship with God or he couldn't have prayed as he does. He knows what it's like to be right with God and the fracture of that relationship is most painful. How can he deal with his agony? How can he find healing?
From past experience, he knows what to do! He must accept the blame for his actions! He believes that his sinfulness is an affront to God and that God won't tolerate it. He knows God is the only one who can help him, and he boldly reaches out to God. He trusts God to forgive him and help him make the needed changes. Let's look at the process outlined in his prayer.
He begins by affirming God's positive attributes. "God, I know you're loving and merciful." Then he confesses his sin to God. He labels it what it is: SIN! We often rationalize our actions so as to take the emphasis off sin. It was a mistake, an illness, an impulsive action. The psalmist calls it sin!
In the current lawsuit against the corporate executives of Enron, we never hear the accused speak of sin or of the misuse of power. We hear excuses - standard defense in trials. They don't admit to wrongdoing, but act like children who place the blame on others. "It wasn't my fault, she started it!" We don't want to be held accountable for our sinful actions. When we recognize and admit to God that our sin is sin, we have taken the first step toward forgiveness.
When we sin, we not only hurt the ones we sin against, we also hurt God and ourselves. The effects of our sins are much broader than we realize at first. Sin plays havoc with our relationships with people and with God, and it causes us to lose respect for ourselves. The damage to our relationships - coupled with guilt - robs us of joy.
Next the psalmist seeks forgiveness and cleansing. He feels dirty! He uses words like "blot out", "wash", "cleanse", and "purge." These sound like laundry terms complete with bleach, soap and scrubbing. It's a most picturesque image. He is confident God can do something about his problem - that God can make him clean.
He asks God to give him a new heart so he won't get in the same fix again. He wants to be changed on the inside so he won't repeat the offenses. He wants to be clean and stay clean. He truly wants to change.
Without God's help, most of us fall back into the same sin pattern as before. We have good intentions but we need help to change. We need a close relationship with God and often accountability to another person in order to remain faithful.
Once God forgives us, two problems arise: we can't believe God truly forgave us and we can't forgive ourselves. Let's look at the first.
When my brother Terry was in his thirties, he was diagnosed with colon cancer. Surgery was performed immediately and he was told that if he remained cancer free for 5 years, he could consider himself cured. Initially, tests were conducted every six months - then once a year. At the end of five years, we all celebrated, but we still had a twinge of concern. There was jubilation, but still a hint of doubt and fear. Was he truly healed?
We sometimes have the same doubts about God's forgiveness. We wonder if at a later time our sins will be thrown in our face - that what we accepted as God's forgiveness didn't really happen. Will God remember and hold me accountable? By faith we must accept God's forgiveness and when we are tempted to retrieve our guilt, we can offer a prayer of thanksgiving that forgiveness is a "done deal!"
Sometimes, even after we accept that God has forgiven us, we can't forgive ourselves. We can't get free from the guilt. We feel dirty, even though God has already "cleaned us up!" When we carry around guilt that is no longer ours to carry, we suffer, our loved ones suffer and God grieves. The ability to forgive ourselves takes effort, just as forgiving others takes effort.
The Bible tells us that God is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. When we come to God as the psalmist did and seek God's forgiveness, God forgives us. However, even though God forgives us, we often pay the consequences of our sins through the courts, a loss of trust in our personal relationships, or physical damage to our bodies.
This psalm isn't just about the psalmist; it's about you and me. It's about how sin invades the lives of individuals, families, churches, businesses and governments. It's about God's desire to forgive us. It's about our need to repent, seek forgiveness and turn from our sins. It's about forgiving ourselves.
The 13th verse of our text looks like a precursor to the 12 Step programs. When I am forgiven, when I feel joy again, then I will help others who are caught in the same trap as I.
When I was in Kansas, I was in regular conversation with a young man who was addicted to gambling. I determined to learn more about this addiction and contacted a Gamblers Anonymous group leader in Missouri (her telephone number was given to me by someone on a gambling addiction hot line.) She told me that no one can truly understand the problems of a person addicted to gambling except another addict. She leads two GA groups and is a member of another. She had been free from gambling for three years when I spoke with her. She is so grateful for her ongoing healing that she delights in helping others with their addiction.
The good news of this psalm is that God is loving and merciful. God can and will change lives, but we must want to be changed. We must want to turn from our sins and accept God's forgiveness. We must cooperate in the change process by giving God the opportunity to change us.
Anne Lamott, a recovering alcoholic and drug addict, wrote in her book Traveling Mercies: "I don't know why life isn't constructed to be seamless and safe, why we make such glaring mistakes, things fall so short of our expectations, and our hearts get broken and our kids do scary things, and our parents get old and don't always remember to put pants on before they go out for a stroll. I don't know why it's not more like it is in the movies, why things don't come out neatly and lessons can't be learned when you're in the mood for learning them, why love and grace often come in such motley packaging (p. 143.)" She then goes on to say that our failures - our sins - will turn into grace when we allow God to work. It's these tough lessons in life that stick. When we turn our failures over to God, our relationships with God and with others are enhanced.
Think about the heaviness of guilt that you have felt because of a past sin. I'm not speaking here of false guilt or imagined guilt, I'm speaking of authentic guilt that is a result of sin. Have you asked God to forgive you, but continue to hang onto the pain because you can't forgive yourself? Have you failed to ask God's forgiveness or ask the forgiveness of someone you have sinned against? (It's not always advisable to confess your sin to the one you sinned against. God can give you direction here. It may help to speak first with a trusted person who is removed from the situation.)
We are invited to come to God with the desire to be changed. When we accept God's forgiveness, then we can offer grace to others and help them in non-judgmental ways. We can be transformed and filled with joy. What are you waiting for?
