Message
Psalm 38:1-22
Forgiving Yourself
You can hear the full message here:-
http://www.nec.org.au/listen-to-a-sermon-series/forgiveness/
Today we’re starting a new sermon series looking at forgiveness in action under three general titles of forgiving ourselves, forgiving others and then also forgiving God; which seems like a strange thing to say but we'll talk about what that means a when we get there. The focus today is on forgiving ourselves or understanding the forgiveness of the Lord.
On the 19th of April 2005, which was quite a while ago now, the Catholic Church elected a new Pope. That Pope's real name was Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger but everyone knows him as Pope Benedict the 16th.
He’s that Pope that resigned and now Pope Francis is in his place.
Now you probably know these names Pope Benedict, Pope Francis
A name that you probably don't know is Rogers Cadenhead.
He was a very smart guy, he was computer guy, and six months before Pope Benedict was installed and voted on he registered this website www.benedict16th.com.
He guessed what the next Pope was going to be called and so, because he registered this website the Vatican wanted to buy the website from him and they were offering him $20,000 to do that.
So he wrote to the Pope and he said, “I will give you this website in exchange for the Domain but please, can I have these things”.
I want a hat like the pope wears.
I want a free stay at the Vatican hotel.
And I want complete absolution no questions asked for the 3rd week of March 1987.
Signed Rogers Caterham.
It makes you wonder what he did on the 3rd week of March 1987.
Now this situation raises a significant question.
As a Catholic person, a person who grows up in the Catholic faith, if you receive absolution from the Pope, it is as if that event has not occurred.
You are no longer guilty, you don't have to feel ashamed, you can remove that aspect from your memory, you can go on as if it never happened. Now I'm not going to talk now about the theology of the Catholic church but that's just what they believed. But my point for raising this example is this:
Is it true that most of us have our own third week of March 1987 experience?
The thing that we've done, or the things that we do, which we are ashamed about. Which we wished it was as if it never happened.
Maybe it was something in a short space of time:
… a one night stand.
… a few scathing words that broke a relationship.
… an act that you've hidden from everyone.
… a secret you don't want to have revealed.
… unethical decisions.
… a moment you took something that wasn't yours
… the list could go on.
Or maybe it's a lifestyle thing: drugs, alcohol, infidelity, deception, hate, lies, abusiveness and again it's list could go on.
If there was a set of Diaries documenting every second of your life what would you do with those Diaries? Are there pages from some of the diaries that you would rip out?
Would you perhaps take away whole weeks?
Would you want to get rid of the whole diary.
We don't want to feel guilty, we don't want to be in a place where we feel ashamed. We want to remove the event from our memory. We want to go as go on as if it never happened. and it's weighing us down.
That's where Psalm 38 comes to the forefront. Psalm 38 is an incredible Psalm because it's telling us or talking to us about a person who feels weighed down. It's important to read these Psalms because it helps us to recognize the feelings that we go through are feelings that the scriptures understand.
Lord, do not rebuke me in your anger
or discipline me in your wrath.
Your arrows have pierced me,
and your hand has come down on me.
Because of your wrath there is no health in my body;
there is no soundness in my bones because of my sin.
My guilt has overwhelmed me
like a burden too heavy to bear.
My wounds fester and are loathsome
because of my sinful folly.
I am bowed down and brought very low;
all day long I go about mourning.
My back is filled with searing pain;
there is no health in my body.
I am feeble and utterly crushed;
I groan in anguish of heart.
All my longings lie open before you, Lord;
my sighing is not hidden from you.
My heart pounds, my strength fails me;
even the light has gone from my eyes.
My friends and companions avoid me because of my wounds;
my neighbors stay far away.
Those who want to kill me set their traps,
those who would harm me talk of my ruin;
all day long they scheme and lie.
I am like the deaf, who cannot hear,
like the mute, who cannot speak;
I have become like one who does not hear,
whose mouth can offer no reply.
Lord, I wait for you;
you will answer, Lord my God.
For I said, “Do not let them gloat
or exalt themselves over me when my feet slip.”
For I am about to fall,
and my pain is ever with me.
I confess my iniquity;
I am troubled by my sin.
Many have become my enemies without cause;
those who hate me without reason are numerous.
Those who repay my good with evil
lodge accusations against me,
though I seek only to do what is good.
Lord, do not forsake me;
do not be far from me, my God.
Come quickly to help me,
my Lord and my Savior
When you read that, you get this sense that the Psalmist doesn't even have any real hope. Everything seems to be going bad, everything's going against him and he knows it's because of the weight of his sin.
My guilt has overwhelmed me, like a burden too heavy to bear.
That's what sin does doesn't it.
Physically we know that there is a limit to the amount of weight that any person can carry. Some more than others but at some point even the strongest person cannot carry it anymore. It's the same with the weight of sin. It pulls us down, it makes us feel unworthy, it holds us back. And it's this weight that comes to a point where at some point it's too much to bear.
I am bowed down and brought very low; all day long I go about mourning. My back is filled with searing pain; there is no health in my body. I am feeble and utterly crushed; I groan in anguish of heart.
This is growing strength of guilt. We feel this in the times of un-spiritual decisions that we make. We think they don't matter in the long term, but they do.
As we keep on making these decisions,
… as we keep on cutting corners
… as we keep on compromising standards
… as we keep on hiding a moral failures
as we keep doing this – and stay true to who we are as those who are believers in Christ - it will start to haunt us.
The weight will start to affect us. Indeed there is definitely evidence that physical pain comes about because of sin.
Not all the time and not all pain …
But physical pain can come.
I am like the deaf, who cannot hear, like the mute, who cannot speak;
I have become like one who does not hear, whose mouth can offer no reply.
When we were kids our mum said, “Stay home I have to go out for a minute.”
So the moment that she left we ran across to the shop and then we brought some lollies and then we came back.
Now Mum always knew; we always got caught.
I don't know why we tried to do anything wrong because she just she just knew.
So when she came home we had the question, “Did you go to the shop?”
No we didn't go to the shop.
Well poke out your tongue.
What do you say? There's nothing else you can say.
It's like that with God isn't it. We try and think of reasons, we try and rationalize, we’ve hurt others.
What do we say when we have hurt others? When we know we are the cause of the breakdown?
What do we say when we've hurt God? What can you say that's going to fix it?
Nothing's going to fix it.
That's how it works doesn't it. We want to no longer feel guilty, we not to no longer feel shame we want to no longer be in that place where it's affecting our memory. We want to go on as if it never happened. But we like the Psalmist we feel that we can't.
God are you listening? God are you there? Do not forsake me Lord.
You see this is what sin does, this is what these events do.
These sins we hold onto - whether the recent past or the long past – they effects our relationship with God.
We can become sure, and some of us become so sure, that we're too bad for God.
Why would God accept me when I think this, when I act this way, when this is part of my history?
Why would God want me?
What could He do with me?
How can I dare to come into his presence when I've done these things.
It affects our relationship with others;
… I've hurt too many people.
… I've hidden too many things.
… If they knew the real me, they wouldn't accept me.
And it hurts and it impacts our relationships with ourselves; where we feel unworthy, where we feel hopeless, where we feel helpless, where we feel ashamed and where we feel trapped.
But the question is: Are we trapped?
Does the rest of our life have to be defined by an action that we have done, in the present or in the past.
Do we have to keep on holding onto it?
Do we have to keep on reliving the consequences?
Do we have to keep on living in fear because of the effect of sin.
These are the questions that people are asking themselves.
And the answer to all these questions is NO.
You are not defined by your past.
We need to understand this so clearly. We are not defined by our past.
“Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God. Do not be deceived neither the sexually immoral, not idolaters, nor adulterers, nor male prostitutes no homosexual offenders, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunk, nor slanderers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.”
All of you fit into that list somewhere don't you?
But keep reading because Paul says
“But that is what some of you were.”
You're not defined by your past.
The Corinthian church was not defined by the past.
You were washed, you were sanctified. you were justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of God.
You are not defined by your past you … and you are defined by the present.
We can say “Jesus here I am and I need your grace, and I need your love, and I need your forgiveness”.
You are not defined by your present and you don't have to keep on reliving the consequences of that.
As high as the Heavens are above the Earth so great is the Lord’s love for those who fear him. As far as the east is from the west so far has he removed our transgressions from us.
We're completely different. There's been a complete change in who we are. We don't have to keep on reliving the consequences, we can move on as if it never happened. It’s a transformation that takes place.
When you think about butterflies. When you look at butterflies.
Do we call them caterpillars with wings?
We don’t do we.
We never call butterflies caterpillars with wings we call them butterflies, because they're completely different to what they were before.
That's what Jesus offers us. That's what we've been offered. This is been removed. So far from us that there's been a transformation that is completely different.
There’s a great theological word, we try not to use to big theological words, but there's a great the theological word that describes this transformation.
The word is “justification” or “being justified.”
What justification is, is this: my conscience accuses me. I've sinned against all of God's Commandments, I am still inclined toward evil but without my deserving it at all, out of sheer grace, God grants and credits to me the righteousness and holiness of Christ as if I had never sinned, nor being a sinner.
That's what justification is. Just as if I had never sinned.
As if I had been as obedient as Christ.
Christ’s obedience is now my obedience.
That's justification.
And that's why forgiveness is so powerful. That's why we don't have to live the consequences and also that's why we don't have to fear the effects of sin.
God is love; whoever lives in love lives in God and God in him. In this way love is my complete among us so that we have confidence on the day of judgment because in this world we are like him.
Not in the future, not in heaven, in this world - we are like him.
There is no fear in love but perfect love drives out for you because fear has to do with punishment.
You don't have to be afraid of the effects of your sin because it's been dealt with. Instead you can be a person who is at peace.
A dad and his son we're driving down the road. The son had a bee allergy and as they were driving in a bee flew in the window. His dad reached out and grabbed the bee and held onto it. And after a little while he left the bee go.
The child was all afraid.
Why did you let the bee go?
The Dad showed the child his hand and said here's the stinger. The bee's not effective anymore.
Scripture talks about Jesus taking the sting of death. Taking the sting of death, the sting of the guilt, the sting of the shame, the sting of the consequences, the sting of the hurt, the sting of everything that comes with standing under in our lives in a way that allows sin to continue to affect it.
It's all gone. Which makes a whole lot of difference doesn't it?
You see like Rogers Cadenhead we've all got those things.
Everyone’s got that thing that you've done
… the decision that you've made.
… the words that you said.
… the actions that you did.
… the lifestyle that you have.
… that thing.
And you want absolution; you want it to be as if it never was, as never happened, you don't want to be guilty.
You don't want to feel ashamed.
You don't want to have that event continually revived in your memory.
You want to go on as if it never happened.
Well the reality is it's true. It can be like that. You don't have to write to the pope to do that. All you need to do is to come before Jesus Christ. All we need to do is to look at Jesus, look at the nail scarred hands and recognise he is doing this because he wants it in our life to be just as if we had never sinned.
That we wake up every day, to the new day, to the new week, to the new month, to the new year, to the new decade. And know that all things are new and know the truth that the promise of forgiveness is a promise which says you don't have to feel guilty.
You don't have to feel ashamed.
That memory can be removed.
You can go on from this moment as if it never happened.
The grace of Jesus Christ is new every morning. Great is his faithfulness.
Prayer
