How Can I Find Forgiveness? | Dr. David Jeremiah | Psalm 32

David recognized that at the root of all of his sin from the pettiest offense to murder and adultery all of it was an insult to the God who created him and had sustained him every moment of his life before the sin claims any victims it’s already been an injury to the person of God if you sin against me for instance I can forgive you personally but I can’t give you that deeper level of forgiveness with God I can’t remove the offense against the Lord only he can do that the world would pressure us to

dismiss the category of sin altogether but there’s no way to be made well unless we first acknowledge the reality of what we’ve done and apart from this our situation is hopeless if you keep posturing if you keep manipulating what you did to make it look better than it really is before God you will never sense the reality of his forgiveness for over one year after his sin with bath Sheba and his murder of her husband Uriah David had refused to acknowledge his sin in Psalm 51 we find out how he finally confessed his sin and

the initial prayer to God for forgiveness but here in the 32nd Psalm David looks back on that whole experience and he encourages all of us to seek forgiveness as we go through the psalm we need to keep in the back of our mind that this is written by a tormented man who has waited 12 months to get right with God and it begins with the priority of forgiveness in verses 3 and 4 David writes when I kept silent my bones grew old through my groaning all the day for day and night your hand was Heavy upon me and my Vitality was turned

into the drought of Summer now Gulf of Silence stretched between God and David and the man after God’s Own Heart found himself exiled because he chose not to confess his sin David describes his pain if you look at the text notice three things about his situation he was wasting away my bones grew old through my groaning all the day long the verb for grow old means to waste away David’s energy in strength were diminished he became weak as he carried the burden of his Unforgiven sin the weight of his soul began to wear out

the strength of his body and he felt like an old worn out man he goes on to say that Not only was he wasting away he was weighed down day and night your hand was Heavy upon me it’s interesting to note that God was the one who was weighing David down God’s hand was not heavy on David to Simply remind him of his guilt God’s hand was heavy on David to draw him back and cause him to recognize his need of forgiveness he was wasting away and he was weighed down and he was wearing out he says my Vitality was turned into the

drought of Summer David says that the Vitality of his soul was being drained away the priority of forgiveness and then in verses 1 and two we see the power of forgiveness blessed is he whose transgression is Forgiven whose sin is covered blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity and in whose Spirit there is no deceit when we are experiencing the trauma of an Unforgiven life we can doubt whether forgiveness is even possible we might begin to think that our particular sin is beyond the pale of

God’s ability to forgive it but David begins his Psalm with the word of hope he recounts his own experience of being forgiven and he assures us that that experience can be true for us as well he uses four words for sin in his little Soliloquy he says first of all it is transgression and transgression is a defiant Disobedience against God then he uses the word sin in the same text and this word is a picture of an Archer who shoots an arrow at a Target and he misses it for all have sinned and come short of the glory of

God and then he uses the word iniquity iniquity is a more U gross term if you will it’s perversion Distortion of that which is right means to be corrupt or twisted and the word deceit is from a Hebrew word which means to be self deceived Disobedience against God missing the mark Distortion or perversion and deceiving yourself about all of it as David tracks the downward progression of his sin he does so to remind us that every kind of sin can be forgiven every kind one author has written the psalmist declares that

forgiveness of sin of whatever kind whether against God or human beings whether great or small whether conscientious or inadvertent or whether by omission or commission all of that can be forgiven and forgiveness is found in God the nature of sin is not the issue the nature of God is the issue he is a forgiving God he is The God Who forgives transgression and sin and iniquity and deceit whatever kind of sin you might have conjured up in your spirit I am here to tell you that almighty God is able to forgive that sin

when God forgives us what does he do with our transgression our sin our iniquity and our deceit the definition of forgiveness is interesting because it’s wrapped up in the word itself in the Old Testament there are a number of words for the word forgive but if you look at all of them they all have the same concept it’s the idea of conveying something away remitting something making it go away Isaiah 55:7 says let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts let him return to the Lord and He will have

mercy on him and to our God for he will abundantly pardon he will make it go away in his book unpacking forgiveness Chris bronze lists five things about the Forgiveness of God that helped to define the term first of all he tells us that God’s forgiveness is costly while it is free to us and there’s nothing we can do to get it except to ask for it in order for God to forgive us he had to give us his son up as a sacrifice Colossians 213 and 14 says having forgiven you all trespasses having wiped out the

handwriting and requirements that would against you having nailed it to the Cross we can be forgiven because everything we have done wrong that deserves to be punished with death almighty God nailed it to the cross of his son and offers us the result forgiveness for our sin bronze goes on to say that that God’s forgiveness is committed when God forgives us he makes a commitment that we are pardoned from our sin and that it is no longer counted against us Isaiah 43:25 is a good verse to write down if you’d struggle with your

forgiveness I even I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake and I will not remember your sins God’s for forgiveness is committed and it is also conditional now hear me carefully the only condition for forgiveness is that you confess your sin that’s it that’s the only one 1 John 1:9 says if we confess our sins he well if God knows my sins already why doesn’t he just forgive me because he wants to be sure you know about your sin too and he wants you to bring your sin and bring it

to him and confess it and acknowledge and the word confess means to say the same thing about sin that God says so don’t go up there and posture don’t stand before God and try to downplay your sin don’t tell God I think I made a mistake no you sinned tell God what you did unvarnished and confess it and the Bible says if you confess your sin he is faithful and just to forgive you all your sin that’s it just confess it you mean I don’t have to do Penance no you to conf confess your sin and God will

forgive it and then the Bible tells us that when you confess your sin things begin to change when you’re walking as David did for 12 months with unconfessed sin everything’s messed up but when David confessed his sin God brought back to him the joy of his salvation David prayed L God give me back the joy of my salvation let me ask you all to be honest with your pastor today how many of you even for a short time have ever lost the Joy of your salvation can I get a witness here we all have and you know

the quickest way to lose the joy of your salvation is to fall into sin and then not confess it David said oh God you have restored to me the joy of my salvation and then finally God’s forgiveness is connected when you get right with God you start to find out you’re getting right with everybody else we have fellowship with God and then we have Fellowship one with another two violins that are tuned to the same piano will be in tune with each other and when we’re out of tune with God we are going to be out of tune with

God’s people if you’re a husband you’re out of tune with God and your wife is Walking with the Lord in a spiritual way you’re out of tune with her you confess your sin and get right with God and not only Tunes you up to God it connects you with the people who know God as well now in the Bible this is really kind of the core of what I want you to take away today God wants us to get this point so much that he gave us five metaphors for forgiveness five pictures of what it means to be forgiven by God and I’m just

going to take you through this and I want you to write these verses down because one of these days the enemy is going to come and he’s going to tempt you to not think you’re forgiven and you need to take him to the word of God just like Jesus did in the desert and say devil here’s what my Bible says about forgiveness are you ready for these here’s the first one God’s forgiveness is like putting your sin as far away as the East is from the West Psalm 103: 11 and 12 for as the heavens are high above

the Earth so great is his Mercy toward those who fear Him as far as the East is from the West so far has he removed our transgressions from us here’s the second one God’s forgiveness is like burying something in the deepest sea Micah 7:19 says you will cast all of our sins into the depths of the sea go to the deepest sea on planet Earth and realize that almighty God took all your sin and he buried it at the lowest part of the deepest part of the deepest sea never to be retrieved number three God’s forgiveness

is like casting something behind your back Isaiah 38:17 says you have cast all my sins behind your back what is that meant to convey that you can’t see them they’re back here God doesn’t see your sin he’s cast all your sin away from his ability to see it that’s a humanism from the New Testament but it’s meant to convey that God takes your sin away and he takes it all away and then God’s forgiveness number four is like erasing something from existence Isaiah 4422 says I have blotted out like a thick