Psalm 51:9 3/14/18 (Create in Me a Clean Heart #9) HIDE YOUR FACE FROM MY SINS
You ever find yourself stuck on YouTube watching cat videos or dog videos? How about the Guilty Dog videos? Typically their owners come home and find that their dog has gotten into the garbage, so they turn on their phone and start asking the dog about it. It looks something like this:
Slide: Guilty Dog video
Now most scientists say that dogs don’t actually feel the emotion of guilt when they act that way and they “look guilty”. They are just responding to your dominance and disapproval with a submissive behavior. “I don’t know what you’re saying, but you’re mad about something, so I’m just going to look meek and let you know that you’re in charge.” But it is interesting, isn’t it, that in those circumstances your dog simply doesn’t want to make eye contact with you. They’d rather hide. It’s interesting because that is exactly the behavior that humans demonstrate as well, isn’t it? Do you remember Adam and Eve? When God called out to them after the garbage they got into, what did they do? The Bible says:
Slide: “Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden.” (Genesis 3:8 NIV)
Well, they tried to hide. You can’t of course, hide from God. And you can’t hide from the consequences of your sin. They couldn’t, and we can’t. As we go deeper now into King David’s Psalm of repentance, we see that he understood that. So instead of trying to cover up his sin or to hide from God himself, he asks God to do it.
Slide: “Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.” (Psalms 51:9 NIV)
I pray O Lord that – somehow – there might be a way where my garbage isn’t constantly staring You in the face. And he’s repeating a little bit here from the start of this great prayer:
Slide: “…according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.” (Psalms 51:1–2 NIV)
And I pointed out then that David uses multiple words for his wrong-doing. He starts with “Transgressions”: that’s similar to the word we use in the Lord’s Prayer: “Trespass”. It means there was a clear line that you knew you shouldn’t cross, but you did it anyway. It wasn’t an accident, it wasn’t a mistake, it was a deliberate rebellion against God’s law and an attempt to write your own laws for your behavior. Doesn’t that sound familiar today? And here he repeats the word: “Iniquity.” That means doing what is not just, not right.
And doesn’t that fit when you think of what David did to Uriah, and Bathsheba, and to his country and to God?
And finally, he also used the more generic word: “Sin”, which brings us back to “guilt” and basically covers all wrongdoing. In other words, David was covering all the bases and making sure that everybody knew that he knew he was without excuse, his garbage was on display for everybody to see, and he was falling completely on the mercy of Almighty God… which is exactly where all of us need to be.
So we get all that and have been praying these things right along with David, but in verse 9 he brings something new into the picture: The face of God. When Moses led the people of Israel out of Egypt and met with God on top of Mt. Sinai, he asked for the presence of God and he was bold to ask to see God himself, face to face. And God answered him: “…you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.” (Exodus 33:20 NIV) That’s the face of God that David was afraid to see, the face of judgment and wrath against sin, the face of holiness that cannot look at sin without seeing justice done against it. See, God does not look at sin like the people who make the guilty dog videos and post them on YouTube. God doesn’t think it’s funny when He sees that we’ve gotten into the garbage of life again.
One of the most powerful scenes in the Passion of Christ for us is when Jesus is being questioned in the courtyard of the high priest, and Peter had snuck into the courtyard and was watching, but he was being questioned himself by some of the servant girls who accused him of being one of the disciples with Jesus. And he was denying it. And finally after he was questioned a third time, the Bible says:
Slide: “Peter replied, “Man, I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Just as he was speaking, the rooster crowed. The Lord turned and looked straight at Peter. Then Peter remembered the word the Lord had spoken to him: “Before the rooster crows today, you will disown me three times.” And he went outside and wept bitterly.” (Luke 22:60–62 NIV)
Wouldn’t you? But can you imagine what was in that look? In Jesus, people could finally look at the face of God and live, right? Jesus was God and man at the same time. But oh how horrible it must have been for Peter to have seen His face in that moment of his utter failure.
Slide: Jesus looking at Peter pic
I’m sure he didn’t hold the look for long, but turned his face away and prayed with King David: “Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.” (Psalms 51:9 NIV) At the same time I’m sure that the straight-on look of Jesus to Peter was a look of complete compassion, forgiveness and love. Because that’s why He was there, to win forgiveness for Peter and for David and for us.
Folks, again, God the Father is not giggling when he looks at our guilty faces. He’s looking at the cross and seeing what it cost Him to forgive our sin. He does not overlook a single wrong thing we have ever done, said or thought. He can’t. Since He is a perfectly just God, it all has to be punished and made right, and it was in Jesus on that cross. That’s exactly what David is praying for. And exactly what he got and what we can get. After David was forgiven and restored, he proclaimed to us all:
Slide: “The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.” (Psalms 103:8–12 NIV)
I hope from the bottom of my heart that you hear those words laying right on top of your brokenness, and healing you and cleansing from every stain. That’s what God wants. That’s why He so loved you that He gave His one and only Son that if you believe in Him you shall not perish, but have eternal life.
And receiving that forgiveness and new life, there is now another aspect of the Face of God for the followers of God. The 16th century Christians, during the days of the Reformation, used the Latin expression “Coram Deo”: “Before the face of God”
Slide: Coram Deo
It meant that they were determined to live their entire life before the forgiving face of God. The Apostle Paul put it this way:
Slide: “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.” (Colossians 3:17 NIV)
Living Coram Deo is to understand that whatever we are doing and wherever and whenever we are doing it, we are doing it before the face of God. So coming here and worshipping once or twice a week does not take care of Coram Deo. This is recognizing that you can’t “get the God thing out of the way so you can get on with your real life.” Living before the face of God IS your real life – all the time. And can you imagine how your life, your families, all your relationships would change if you really did this? If you really lived and believed the truth that God is omnipresent? It could be an absolute miracle. It could change you and everybody around you.
Coram Deo is living before the face of God - not in fear, but in faith, knowing that God’s gaze is not going to strike us down like we deserve, but it’s going to give us peace and a benediction. It’s going to give us exactly what we long for. And it’s all a preview of the next verse in the Psalm, our theme verse for the series: “Create in me a Clean Heart O God.” But for that you have to come back on Sunday. In the meantime, receive that blessing that God wants you to have:
Slide: “The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the LORD turn his face toward you and give you peace.” (Numbers 6:24–26 NIV)
