*Reader’s note: The next few posts will be a few short reflections from Lent readings.
I’m sure you’ve read Psalm 51 before. (Most likely after sinning or doing something dumb). It’s up there along with Psalm 23 and 139, as one of Psalter’s greatest hits. It is a skillfully crafted, raw and poignant prayer. The psalmist holds no punches before God. He’s been found out.
Psalm 51 is rooted in the larger story of the life of David (see 2 Samuel 11). He’s well established on his throne - loved and chosen. But in his later years, we witness a withdrawal from life. Once dancing and leading at the front of his army, now he paces back and forth naval gazing on his roof while his men are at war. (Idle hands became the devils playground I guess.)
Then he objectifies and uses his power to call for Bathsheba. Then has her husband murdered. Then, he makes it seem that he is a noble king as he takes Bathsheba as his. Yet in God’s kindness, he is challenged and found out by the Prophet Nathan.
Instead of hiding David throws himself at the grace of this God, his plea is penned as Psalm 51.
God create a clean heart in me (V10).
Or as the Message version reads:
“God shape a Genesis week out of the chaos of my life.” (V10)
Peterson picks up on this and connects the chaos of David’s sin to the creation account. David knew this God that that brings beauty from pain, one who shapes order from chaos. David knew this God as one of mercy, and he knew himself to be a sinner.
If we’re honest we recoil at that word - sinner. It offends our sense of self (“at least I never had anyone killed”). But “sinner” is adequate for David and for you and me.
A sinner is a person “in trouble, a person who needs help, a human being who needs God.”1 When we pray from our addictions, our pain, our brokenness, our sin we are more not less. Eugene Peterson puts it this way:
“In and through this prayer [Ps 51] we find ourselves in a place spacious with freedom and resonant with love. We find ourselves before God - honestly, adoringly, believeingly before God - we find our true humanity.”2
In the light of Christ Psalm 51 takes a new shape. Confession is not so much acquisition but gospel. Being honest and open before God is our path to clean hearts. In a world of perfermance and secerecy “truth-telling before God is an indispensable condition for joyous existence. Such emancipation makes for exuberant singing and glad generosity.”3
So Psalm 51 is our guide in naming and recognizing our sins and it is our guide back into the free, wild, extravagant grace of God.
Because of Christ we need not be afraid of the darkness in our stories or our world. We need not shy away from the depths of our sin but focus on Christ. The one who brings order to chaos. After all “we have a finite number of ways to sin; God has an infinite number of ways to forgive.”4
Eugene Peterson, Leap Over A Wall: Earthy Spirituality for Everyday Christians, 185.
Peterson, Leap Over A Wall, 189.
Walter Brueggemann, From Whom No Secrets are Hid, Louisville, KY: John Knox Press 2014.
Peterson, Leap Over A Wall, 190.