In the back of the Psalter hymnal, we turn again tonight to Lord's Day 1 on page 8. And then in our Bibles, we're going to turn to Psalm 51. Psalm 51, all found on page 562. Before we read the psalm, we're going to read responsively Once again, questions 1 and 2 of Lord's Day 1. Beloved congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ, what is your only comfort in life and in death? That I am not my own, but belong, body and soul, in life and in death, to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ. He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood, and he has set me free from the tyranny of the devil. He also watches over me in such a way that not a hair can fall from my head without the will of my Father in heaven. In fact, all things must work together for my salvation. because I belong to Him. Christ, by His Holy Spirit, assures me of eternal life and makes me wholeheartedly willing and ready from now on to live for Him. What must you know to live and die in the joy of this comfort? three things. First, how great my sin and misery are. Second, how I am set free from all my sin and misery. And third, how I do thank God for such a deliverance. In light of especially the second question that will be our focus tonight, we're going to read this very familiar Psalm of David. for the director of music, a psalm of David, when the prophet Nathan came to him after David had committed adultery with Bathsheba. Have mercy on me, O God. According to your unfailing love, according to your great compassion, blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgressions and my sin is always before me. Against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge. Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. Surely you desire truth in the inner parts. You teach me wisdom in the innermost place. Cleanse me with hyssop and I will be clean. Wash me and I will be whiter than snow. Let me hear joy and gladness. Let the bones you have crushed rejoice. Hide your face from my sins and blot out my iniquity. Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence, or take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me. Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you. Save me from blood kilt, O God, the God who saves me, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness. O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise. You do not delight in sacrifice, for I would bring it. You do not take pleasure in burned offerings. The sacrifice of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. In your good pleasure, make Zion prosper. Build up the walls of Jerusalem. Then there will be righteous sacrifices, holy offerings to delight you. Then bulls will be offered on your altar. this Father reading of God's holy and infallible Word. This first question and answer of the catechism is so incredibly beautiful because it covers the whole range of our life, doesn't it? From the beginning to the end, all through our life, The whole of our being. We are not our own, but we belong, body and soul, in life and death, to our faithful Savior Jesus Christ. An incredible statement that brings so much comfort. It defines our identity. We are not left to ourselves to invent ourselves. We are not left to ourselves to come up with meaning and purpose for our lives. No. We are not our own. We belong. And then, we are reminded of what our Savior did to make us His own. He fully paid with His precious blood for all of our sins and set us free from the tyranny of the devil. We are reminded of the great deliverance we've received from our Savior, dealing with the very problem that we have of our sin, and then the reminder that through our Savior God Himself now is our Father. And because He is the Father in heaven, who rules over heaven and earth, and is in control of all things, the comfort that we have is that everything in our life is the will of our Father being moved, being steered to prosper us, to bless us, to be good for us. Now not even one of our hairs will be lost without the will of our Father deliberately determining that. I don't know how it is in your house, but my wife loses a lot of hairs. And the thought is that not one of them ever leaves her head without God knowing that. Isn't that incredible? I don't know, but It doesn't seem to have great purpose, and yet God determines it all. And the point is, if He cares about hair, don't you think He cares about everything else? Of course He does. But then we are reminded that belonging to Him not only binds us to His Father, but also brings us the power of the Holy Spirit that assures us of our great salvation. The power of the Holy Spirit that brings home the reality that is ours to be. He is already the down payment of heaven that is to come. There is no uncertainty as we heard this morning about our future, and the Holy Spirit and His presence in the believer's life is already the down payment on heaven itself. You know, when you buy a house, you put down some money, down payment, to say, this is ours, we're committed to buying this house. God gives us a down payment of heaven. by giving us His Holy Spirit. He says, it is yours. You don't have to doubt or live in uncertainty. And the glory of the power of the Holy Spirit that takes up residence in the believer's life is that now He changes us so that we become willing, ready, desirous to be like Christ more and more every day, and that our desire is to live for Him. It is incredible, incredible Lord's Day, isn't it? And since it was published in January of 1563, this answer has lived in the hearts of many of God's children to be a source of great comfort for many difficulty. And I'm sure you've experienced the strength of this beautiful answer. Now, the problem with something so glorious is that it overshadows what follows. And especially question 2 is very easy to be overshadowed with this glorious Lord's name. And yet, this question is of Great importance because it's the question of how do I enter into all that I have said before? What do I need to know? What is it that I need to grasp so that the reality of what we have said in Lord's Day 1 would be mine fully? How can I live and die in the joy of this comfort? Now, the answer of the catechism we have made easy for us to understand by saying, well, we need to know our sin, we need to know our salvation, and we need to know how to serve God. Sin, salvation, service. Or, guilt, grace, gratitude. And there are others that summarize these three things that we need to know. And that becomes then, of course, the very structure of the catechism. The catechism which is the instruction in the Christian faith. that sits before us as God's people and especially as a tool to be used to train our children so that they may come to understand what is the basics of the Christian faith. Sin, Lord's Day 2 through Lord's Day 4. Salvation, Lord's Day 5 through 31. And then service, Lord's Day 32 through the end, 52. That becomes then the general pattern that is followed and as we work our way again through the catechism we'll see it unfold. Question one is the theme and question two is the structure that unfolds and helps us to live in the reality. But now the question becomes, how did they come up with this division? How do you come up with this division? It sounds good, sin, salvation, service. It has a nice ring to it, doesn't it? But where does it come from? Is it merely the brainchild of the writers of the catechism? The main writers, Caspar Ulivianus, the preacher in town? And Zacharias Ursinus, the theological professor, are they the ones who came up with this bright division? Well, no. They're merely setting forth what is central in all of life. Now let's think about it for a moment. The very pattern and structure of history follows that pattern of sin, salvation, and service. Creation, fall, redemption, consummation. The big picture of history that we were created by God. And Adam, as he listened to his wife and ignored the command of God and reached out and ate in rebellion against God, all of creation fell under curse. All of creation now is subject, as Paul would say in Romans 8, subjected to futility. It is in bondage to decay. And we see it all around us. How creation itself seems to be out of control. Did you see these tornadoes this week again in some parts in Iowa? Tremendous destruction. We are reminded of the brokenness of the world in which we live. And yet, the glory of the Gospel, the glory of God's salvation is that Christ comes to undo sin in all of its ramification. That creation itself is redeemed by the Lord Jesus Christ. That the deliverance He brings is not merely a deliverance for us as individuals, but is a deliverance of all of the world itself. Paul in Colossians 1 reflects on this glory of who Christ is and what He came to do. of the God it should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth and things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of the cross." All of creation is redeemed by the Lord Jesus Christ, and that's why in the end, when Christ comes again, all of the world will be restored, and God will be served forever. You see, this whole pattern of sin, salvation, service, is the pattern of world history. It is also the pattern of redemptive history. It's the pattern of God's saving of His people, the very pattern which is given us in the Exodus. You remember the story. of the Exodus, boys and girls, how the Israelites found themselves in bondage, in slavery, bound to the Egyptians. And then God sent Moses, a reluctant man, a reluctant Savior. And through Moses, God displays His power, and He sets His people free from Egypt. He leads them out of Egypt, He leads them through the Red Sea, and in the Red Sea, He destroys the armies of the Egyptian. And so God's people are set free, delivered. And finally, He brings them into covenant with Himself on Mount Sinai, and He sets before them what it means now to live in the salvation they've received, how to be thankful to God. And you see, that pattern then becomes again repeated in the New Testament. It is the pattern of the Lord Jesus Christ that reminds us that Christ has come to be our true Savior, now not from the slavery of Egypt, but from the slavery of sin. And when we are saved by the Lord Jesus Christ, He restores us to what we were meant to be, servants of the living God, sons and daughters that are living for the Lord Himself. You see how it is the pattern of world history, the pattern of redemptive history, the pattern of our own lives. That the story of every believer is this story that we are born and conceived in sin, in bondage to sin. We need a Savior. And the glory is that there is a Savior who has come. And He has come to save people. A people for Himself. A people whom He knows by name. And He calls all of them at one point or another during their life. He calls them to Himself. And they believe in Him and know the power that sets them free from sin. And what they used to love, they discover they now despise, and their lives are altered. They don't want to live for themselves anymore. They want to live for their Savior. You see how this pattern is repeated, repeated, repeated? Is it any wonder, therefore, that it is so often the pattern that we find in Scripture? The book of Romans follows this pattern so beautifully. Chapter 1, 2, and 3, after the introductory part, we have Paul's great, one of the most greatest discussions of the depth of sin, and we'll see it in a few weeks time as we delve into our misery. There the Apostle Paul sets forth the greatness of our sin and the fact that all, both Jews and Gentiles, are guilty before God. And then, halfway through chapter 3, Paul begins to set forth the greatness of the salvation that we have in Christ. And through one of the most beautiful, sustained arguments, he shows us what Christ has done. How we are justified in Christ. How we are sanctified in Christ. How this work of Christ is to be the sustaining work that will save all of God's people. And then in chapter 12, Paul comes. And He begins to set before us the implications of that salvation for the believer by setting before us how now can we serve Christ, our reasonable service, being transformed not by the pattern of this world, but having our minds renewed by the Word of God. You see, it's the pattern of Scripture itself. Now, Pastor, that's all interesting and beautiful, but what do we do with this? Because notice the question. What must you know to live and die in the joy of this comfort? You must know this. What I want you to see is that this is not merely the pattern of world history, the pattern of redemptive history, the pattern of the Christian, the pattern that we find so often repeated in Scripture, but this is the constant pattern that we live in. There is a certain organic connection between sin, salvation, and service. What do I mean by organic? Think about a plant. You plant a seed, and you water the seed, and what does it do? It grows. And that's what this knowledge is meant to be in our lives. It's a growing reality. You should not think of it like, you know, these conveyor belts you get at the airport, these long things you just climb up and you ride. And sometimes people think that's how it is. You begin, there's a section of sin, and then you move on to salvation, and then you move on to service. But that's not how this knowledge works. This knowledge is a knowledge in which we always live. We always need to know how great our sin and misery are. We always need to know that. We always need to know how I'm set free from that sin and misery. And we always need to know how I can thank God for this deliverance. What we have in Psalm 51 is a beautiful illustration of how this knowledge works in our hearts and lives. Now you know the situation is sketched before us. This is David's response to his horrendous rebellion against God. where David, as a mature believer, falls into grievous sin, steals a man's wife for himself, and then when he can't cover up that sin, he have him murdered. And David thinks, I have cleaned up my mess. Nobody knows. what has really happened. But God knows. And He sends the prophet Nathan to convict David. And if you haven't read Nathan's beautiful speech to David, go read it. Go read it. It's in 2 Samuel. It gives us this beautiful description that unmasks David as he tells him the parable of the man who loved his one sheep and then the rich man who takes his sheep and slaughters it because he didn't want to take his own. And that unmasks David and so he writes this psalm. Now think about what David reveals to us about his knowledge of sin here. Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your unfailing love, according to Your great compassion. Blot out my transgressions, wash away my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against You, You only, have I sinned and done what is evil in Your sight. so that you prove right when you speak, and justified when you judge." Do you hear what David is saying here? He is acknowledging that first of all, his offense is not against Bathsheba, it's not against the husband Uriah, it is not against the nation of Israel. It is against God Himself. And notice that he says, God, you are right to judge me. He understands that he is guilty. He understands. And he uses the most widely used descriptive words in Hebrew for our sin. And he uses them all. transgressions, iniquity, sin. He covers sin in all of its hue and shades. He understands that he has greatly offended God. And yet, he has the audacity to plead for forgiveness, doesn't he? He doesn't own his sin. For reasons to boast. That's what sometimes happens, isn't it? People take pride in how they have rebelled and sinned. That's not what David does. He takes hold of his sin so that he can see how guilty he stands before the Lord. Now think about what this is for David. He understands greater he has grown in grasping how great his sin truly is before the Lord. Which means, now think about it, here is a mature believer, a man who has walked with God. We don't know exactly when he wrote, but I'm sure that most of his Psalms, many of them were written before this moment. We see his spirit and his devotion to God. And yet here, David discovers something of the depth of his sin that is even greater than what he ever could have thought before. Now, the example is not that we need to sin greatly so that we can understand the enormity of our sin more. That's not the point. I hope that's not the point you get. But the point is this. That there is never a point in a believer's life where we stop understanding and growing in our knowledge of our sin. There is never a point where you can say, you know what? I am done with dealing with my sin. I have plumbed the depths of my rebellion against God. There is never a moment where we reach that point. The reality is that the longer we live our Christian life, we will discover sin, which we never thought we had in our life. We will discover areas which the Lord in his mercy have kept us from seeing. And we'll realize that our sin goes deeper and have affected us far more greatly than we could ever have imagined. Why do you want to grow in your knowledge of your sin and misery? Because then you grow in your knowledge of the greatness of Christ who delivers you from sin and misery. You see, the deeper we go in our grasp of our sin, the deeper we go in our understanding of how glorious Christ is. You remember the parable? As Jesus comes to this Pharisee's house and he eats with him, there comes this woman, this prostitute, this unmentionable And she comes and she dares to wash Jesus' feet. And Simon says, you know what? This man must not be a prophet because if he knew who this woman was, he would not allow her to touch him. But of course, Jesus knows. He knows what Simon is saying in his heart. And you remember what he told Simon? He says, who loves most, the one who has little that he has been forgiven or the one who has been forgiven much? And Jesus drives home that if you have a small understanding of your sin, you love but a little. But as your understanding of your sin grows, your love for your Savior will grow with it. Now notice David's cry, "'Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love, according to your great compassion. Not little compassion. Not just love. Do you know what David is doing here? He is displaying to us that he has seen that because of the greatness of his sin, God's grace must be even greater than that. That God's love cannot be ordinary love. Because ordinary love will not set him free. It must be a love that cannot ever be disappointed. That cannot ever be stopped. And that is truly the love of God. It is unfailing. You know what David is saying? He is saying that no matter how great my sin is, the grace of God is always greater. Do you believe that, my brother and sister? That's the glory of the gospel. And you see, we cannot ever fully grasp how great the love of God is. We cannot because it always is greater than what we can imagine. But you see, as we grow in our understanding of our rebellion against God, we grow in our understanding of the greatness of the love of our Savior that sets us free from that sin. You and I need to grow in our grasp of the depth of our sin that we may grow at our understanding of the depth and the glory of Christ that sets us free. Now, David do not merely want to experience the forgiveness of God for himself. Did you notice how he expresses in the psalm that he longs for God's forgiveness so that he can be a conduit of that forgiveness and that salvation to others? He wants others to be swept up into the greatness of the salvation that God brings. It's not merely about David here, but it is about God, who through David and through the deliverance of David, is able to affect the lives of others and draw them into the same salvation. Notice how he expresses it so powerfully, beginning there in verse 10. Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from Your presence, or take Your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me. I will teach transgressors Your ways, and sinners will turn back to You. Save me from blood guilt, O God, the God who saves me, and my tongue will sing of Your righteousness. O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare Your praise." Do you see what he is saying? He's saying, Lord, forgive me. so that through me your forgiveness may be known by others who have sinned against you as well. Now, let me ask you, how have you been blessed by this Psalm of David in your own life? How often have you turned to this Psalm when you have felt the burden of your own sin? How often have you used the words of David in your own confession before the Lord?" Do you see this psalm is a testimony already? Think of how many people, how the church have been blessed by this psalm, this one psalm of David. God has answered this prayer of David, hasn't He? Multiple times. Because how many of us have not been moved to praise God for delivering us from our sin by using the very words of David so that we may experience the depth of that salvation. You see, this knowledge is a living knowledge in us as believers, and it grows throughout our lives, and it works together, doesn't it? The more we grow in our sin, the more we grow in our love for Christ and our dependence on His deliverance, and the more we grow in our thankfulness for the salvation we have And the more we grow in our thankfulness, the more we realize how sinful we are, and how far we fall short of what we owe God, and the more we need Christ. And the more we grow in our understanding of Christ, the more we grow in our desire to please Him, to thank Him, and the more we understand the greatness of His salvation You see how this question and this answer sets before us the very dynamic of our Christian lives and how beautifully all these things are linked together so that we can live in the joy of this comfort that we have in Christ. My brothers and sisters, rest in the salvation that is ours in Jesus Christ. And let that salvation drive you, drive you to seek to live more for Christ, even as you grow in discovering how far, far you fall short. The glorious reality, as we heard this morning, is that there is a day coming when we no longer will have to wrestle with the reality of sin in our lives, but that that day is not here yet, and so we wait, and so this pattern marks our lives. Amen. Let's pray. Lord, we are grateful for the words of David. Words which enable us to at time express our own need for your forgiveness. And we are reminded that if you forgave Him, you can forgive us. And that because of what Christ has done, we may know that that forgiveness is complete and full and abundant. Enable us, Lord, to know that reality, to live in that reality. And will you use our lives to show others what it is to know Christ? May we ourselves be used by you to show others what it means to be saved from sin and to be set free. And may we live in that reality. May the joy that we have in Christ truly fill our hearts tonight. And may it be evident in the way we live in this coming week. In Jesus' name we pray this. Amen.