Lead Righteously; Repent Righteously

Psalm 51:18-19

Today we conclude our series in Psalms 51. I hope you have enjoyed the journey and have learned or have been reminded of the importance of genuine repentance as I have. We have seen the vital importance of trusting in and relying on the mercy and grace of God. We have seen how a severed relationship with God hurts us more then we realize and about the great joy we can experience when we are restored.

In the last two verses of this psalm we no longer see David speaking of himself. David’s focus turns to his people, the people he rules as king.  Let’s look at these two verses and see what we can glean from them.

Psalm 51:18 says, “Do good in your good pleasure to Zion; build the walls of Jerusalem.” David was the king who God had chosen to rule and reign in Israel at this time. However, he had been living in sin for approximately a year. He had not been the godly leader he had been in the past. Because of that, the people suffered. They may not have suffered physically, but spiritually they surely would have.

This is a great challenge for us. In whatever leadership role we are in, our walk with God affects them. If you manage a team at work or are a school teacher, how you react to different situations and how you talk about other people will affect your light for Christ. To paraphrase the children’s song, will you let your light shine or hide it under a bushel?

If you are a husband and/or a father, you have an extremely pivotal role in how your wife and children grow. How you control your emotions, how you make decisions, how often you spend time alone with Jesus in bible reading and prayer, and if you grow or not will affect your family for the rest of their lives. Husbands are even called to imitate Christ’s love for the church. Are you doing that? Am I doing that?

David was aware of how his great sin and his failure to repent for a year affected his people. That is why he asked God to help His people, to bring them back to Him. He was aware he had failed as a leader, and He was asking God to be gracious to his people and, ultimately, to His own people. He knew how it affected their view of God.

In the final verse of the psalm, David writes, “Then You shall be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness, with burnt offering and whole burnt offering, then they shall offer bulls on Your altar.” God put these rituals in place, but, as we saw in verses sixteen and seventeen, what God truly desires is our heart. He does not want people to go through the motions of repentance. He wants genuine, repentant people. He is a faithful God who accepted the sacrifices of the unblemished, but what He truly desired was their hearts.

I have said this many times already, so I won’t belabor this point, but God does not want us to bring our confessions before Him if our hearts are not truly repentant. He will forgive us because He is a faithful God, but what He wants is our hearts. He wants us to be broken over our sin. He wanted the Jews to bring their sacrifices with broken, repentant hearts. These are the sacrifices of righteousness He is pleased with.

This concludes our study through psalm 51! I hope it was as beneficial to you as it was to me. God’s Word is so full of wisdom and digging deeper and deeper into it will only strengthen our wisdom, joy, and awe of Him. It will also cause us to see our sinfulness more, and thus psalm 51 is a great chapter to turn back to. It is where we see a man broken over his own sin, humble himself, admit his only hope is His mercy and grace, and ask for restoration. We serve a God overflowing with holiness Who cannot ignore our sin, but we also see a God full of mercy and grace that wants us to come to Him with a broken heart so that He can restore us.

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