God is a pastor and one of the elders at Providence Chapel in Denton, Texas, a school that I went to when I was in college. And so while I was there in college, I was able to attend, be a part of that body, and to be blessed by this gift to the church, a brother who has faithfully been pouring into my soul for many years. And so it's such a blessing to have him here, and I trust he'll be a blessing to you and faithful to God's word. So Brother Lee, good, come forward. What a pleasure to be among you. If you have your Bible, please open to the 51st Psalm, Psalm 51. I want to greet you from Providence Chapel in Denton, Texas. My home church and place of ministry for nearly 14 years now, when I first came to the church is when I would have met Randy. We were both younger then, and we were just fast friends. We would share meals together, we would talk about Scripture together, pray together, and we've maintained that friendship and kinship to this day. for which I'm exceedingly grateful. So Providence Chapel is a big fan of Randy Johnson, and it's just a privilege now to be here among you this morning. God be praised. I'm going to read just two verses from Psalm 51. My apologies for not exegeting 19 verses this morning. I figured you'd probably get hungry eventually. So two verses this morning, verses 16 and 17, will be our text. Let me read the word. And my brothers and sisters, you receive the word as though it was God's word, for that is what it is. I'll then pray. For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it. You will not be pleased with a burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. Pray with me. Father, we commit this word to you. You're good and loving, greatly to be praised. We are sheep. We need our good shepherd this morning to come to minister the word to us, to correct, to redirect, to reorient, to help. Lord, in short, we could, every one of us say, we need your mercy today. So pour it out upon us, Lord. Let it be Your voice that these saints hear speaking. If any are unconverted here this morning, save them, add them to the church, we pray. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, as I've said, I want to speak to you from these two verses in Psalm 51, and I want to speak to you on the theme of brokenness. Hopefully, that is a familiar word to most, if not all of you. It's a good word, a necessary word, I think, in a Christian's vocabulary, yet one that may need some fleshing out this morning so that we can rightly understand what God is saying in His Word. Most likely that nearly every one of you know something of the context of the Psalm that we have read from this morning. You know the occasion even of sin that gave birth to this 51st Psalm. But by way of brief reminder, I will say that it was on the heels of King David's grievous sin, dreadful sin, His wickedness involving idolatry, murder, and then a kingly cover-up that Psalm 51 comes to us. By all appearances, some months likely had passed. King David seemingly unaffected, maybe even hardened in his sin. And it's just the facts. This man, after God's own heart, had really made a mess of things. It was as if he had suffered a severe case of spiritual amnesia, or something of its like, in order to sin in such a way as he had sinned. But we mustn't read Psalm 51 thinking to ourselves, how could David do that? How could he? Because there's not a single day that you and I get out of bed in the morning that we cannot totally blow it ourselves. I mean shipwreck everything. Destroy our life, destroy our Christian testimony, destroy even our family, our household. It's just how weak you and I are. So to read this psalm then with an atom of arrogance, Thinking, how could he? Simply means that you just don't know how weak you are. And I hope you could see something of that this morning. The reality is that apart from the grace of Jesus Christ, we can do nothing. I cite the Savior in John's gospel. But I go further to say apart from the grace of Jesus Christ, we may do the very thing we never thought we could do. O to know ourselves and be broken before God. That's the theme today as we consider brokenness as it's unpacked in these two verses. And yet I understand it's not a very popular theme. Y'all might have wanted some cheerleader of sorts to stand in the pulpit this morning and really lift you up high. Because I think much of the church today isn't all that interested in talk about brokenness or sorrow over sin. People say and think things like this, you know, Brother Lee, that just sounds a little depressing. I was kind of hoping for something more upbeat, you know, because I've got a lot I'm dealing with already. My plate's pretty full. I don't know if I need this brokenness talk. Or they might think to themselves, where's the hope and encouragement in that? Brokenness? I want to be whole. Well, I'm here to tell you that the way to wholeness in Christ is the path of brokenness. That may not be what you want to hear, but Randy invited me to deal with him. You know, there are likely those here this morning, all jokes aside, that just aren't all that comfortable with discomfort. And this is a topic involving some discomfort, I think. Maybe you struggle to know what to do with conviction of sin. Maybe you struggle against the notion of God's displeasure with the Christian, and you struggle to reconcile that with the gospel and His ultimate pleasure in the Christian in Christ. Maybe you struggle with God's fatherly chastisements and how to respond to them in a subjective relationship with your heavenly Father. I think the church at large has a tendency in our day to be imbalanced here. The church at large often wants to be coddled and affirmed and sheltered. So, many might think, you know, all that talk of the dark night of the soul. Let's leave that to the spiritual giants of bygone ages. This is the 21st century after all. I think Christians are far too easily satisfied with their little love to Christ. After all, they dabble in the spiritual disciplines here and there. I'm pretty faithful in reading my Bible. Sometimes I'll pray with my wife before bedtime. I mean, look, this is a building full of generally good people. What do we need to talk about brokenness for? I believe this kind of casual, half-hearted, Limpy kind of Christianity is something of a curse in our day. I think a rebuke even to the modern Western church of the 21st century. Maybe even God's judgment upon some of the unbelieving pieces of the church. or the church that has grown sloppy and sleepy and self-indulgent. So my prayer in the weeks leading up to our time together, my prayer this morning in that wonderful flat drive from Denton to Belton was that the Spirit of God would take the Word of God and penetrate hardened, sleepy, apathetic hearts. I understand this, brothers and sisters. I need this as much as you need this, maybe more. So my aim will be to unpack these two verses and try to explain and impart to you the biblical ideal of a broken and contrite heart. For according to the text, God delights in such a heart. Saints, And I want to know more about what God delights in. Okay, look again at the text and may our Redeemer give you ears to hear this morning. Picking up again in verse 16, for you will not delight in sacrifice or I would give it. You will not be pleased with a burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. Here, David, King David, he's bearing his heart to the world, pen and ink. And I believe these pages must have certainly been soaked in tears of repentance. I believe that among the penitential Psalms, of which in the Psalter there are seven of them, I believe this is the supreme penitential Psalm in the Psalter. I appreciate how men have analyzed and read and meditated upon and then communicated in commentary form thoughts on this psalm. Spurgeon may be being chief among them. And I want to read something of Spurgeon's experience in coming to Psalm 51 in his treasury of David and trying and trying again and again to comment on this psalm. Here's what Spurgeon said of his experience. He said, Psalm 51 is a bush burning with fire. yet not consumed. And out of it a voice seemed to cry to me, draw not any closer, put off your shoes from your feet. This psalm is very human, its cries and sobs are of the one born of a woman, but it is saturated with an inspiration all divine, as if the great father were putting words into his child's mouth. Such a psalm may be wept over, absorbed into the soul, and exhaled again in devotion, but commented on? Ah, where is he who, having attempted it, can do other than blush at his defeat?" It was actually weeks of approaching Psalm 51 before Spurgeon was ever to write a single word on Psalm 51. This is simply a deep well, saints, from which the Christian can and should prayerfully be drinking from his whole life. It's not just for the young Christian, for the immature, for the one that stumbles maybe more often or in greater ways than the older mature Christian. No, it's for us all. Going back to my early Christianity, God saved me as a 17-year-old. I believe this was the third chapter of Scripture I ever memorized as a new believer. William Carey, the great Baptist missionary, asked that this psalm be preached at his funeral. Lady Jane Grey, the nine-day Queen of England, as she ascended the scaffold upon which she was to be martyred, she quoted Psalm 51 in its entirety before laying her head on the chopping block. You see, this psalm speaks to the deepest parts of a believer's soul. Even if given a dozen lifetimes, one could simply never plumb the depths of this glorious and experiential psalm. So consider then what David pins here in the midst of his deep repentance because I think he realizes something exceedingly significant. The standard fare in Israel, the economy of Moses in David's day, the standard fare of sin offerings and sacrifices isn't going to cut it. Doubly, he emphasizes this in Psalm 51, for you will not delight in sacrifice. And then he goes on almost repetitively to say, you will not be pleased with a burnt offering. Now there's something immediately significant here, and then there's something more broadly significant here. But before I touch on that detail, I want you to know that this was a part of Israel's experience, not just David's, but more broadly Israel's experience at times. As a matter of fact, this text reminds me of another text we find in the opening chapter of Isaiah. You remember Isaiah chapter one, God's confrontation with the people of Judah. He says to them, and I want you to listen and see the similarities. God, through his prophet to Judah, hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom. Oh wait, I thought he was addressing Judah. He is, and he called them rulers of Sodom. Give ear to the teaching of our God, you people of Gomorrah. What makes you think I want all your sacrifices? Says the Lord. I am sick of your burnt offerings of rams and fattened cattle. I get no pleasure from the blood of bulls and lambs and goats. Bring no more vain offerings. Incense is an abomination to me. When you spread out your hands, I hide my eyes from you. Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are full of blood." That's pretty severe, isn't it? It's because their sin was pretty severe. God never overreacts, nor does God ever underreact. He reacts always with precision. So many similarities between the language that is utilized and David being the biblical man he was when struck to the heart. I think some of these notions were awakened in him, thus he could write, for you will not delight in sacrifice, you will not be pleased with a burnt offering. In addition to this, let's get to the particular now, from a legal perspective in the Mosaic economy, there was no prescribed offering for adultery and murder. That means that David's in a pickle. In Israel, it was simply the death penalty to the adulterer and the murderer. And David is guilty of both. So, in light of death being the inevitable penalty of his sin being disclosed, David knows here as he pens this psalm that there is no allowance under heaven, no offering, no sacrifice. that could atone for this sin. Not in the mosaic economy. You see, David, in his brokenness, is seeing things like he's never seen them before. And this is why you and I need to be well acquainted with brokenness. Here, in genuine and heartfelt repentance, his whole perspective has changed. He's not stiff-necked. He's not hard-hearted any longer. I wouldn't be surprised if in these intervening months before Nathan the prophet pays David the visit, while David is actively covering and hiding his sin, you remember the proverb, he who covers his sin will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes it will obtain mercy. Well, God sends a prophet to King David. What a job assignment that would have been. And now David, having the finger pointed in his face, he's awakened to some things that he has kept quiet in his soul for some time. And maybe in the intervening months, David had been going through the ordinary rituals and sacrifices. Maybe he had offered up dozens of sacrifices to God, none of which pleased God. Kind of going through the motions, as it were, something you and I are guilty of at times. But now his cover-up is fully exposed and the proud man has been deeply humbled. More than the technicalities of the law and there being no sacrifice for this kind of heinous sin, more than all of that, God, in sending the prophet, in convicting him of his sin, God had dealt with David's heart. And a person's heart is truly the heart of the matter. You remember what? We read in 1 Samuel 16, for the Lord sees not his man. Man looks on the outward appearance, but what the Lord looks on, the heart. And David in his repentance has come to the place now of a willingness to give up, to sacrifice, not the blood of bulls and goats, but to give up anything for God. To do anything to appease his God. Look at what he says, for you will not delight in sacrifice or what? Or I would give it. God, if there was some prescription by which this sin could be atoned for, by which this sin could be covered and forgiven, I would do it. I would go to whatever length prescribed. You see, his heart posture now is anything you ask, Lord, I will do it. Anything you ask. Do you remember King Saul's pitiful effort to destroy David even before David married Saul's daughter? You remember when Saul promised to give David his daughter for a certain price? And it wasn't monetary, it was 100 foreskins of the Philistines. Yeah, that's something. Do you recall what David did? You see, he wanted to marry this woman. He was willing to do whatever it took. And so he and his men went out and killed 200 Philistines and delivered double the price. It's this kind of zeal that David feels once again. But this time it's not about marrying a beautiful king's daughter. It's zeal for reconciliation with God. It's zeal to again know the nearness of God. And David, he realizes now that this totally involves his heart. He sees that this only can happen when the heart is crushed and broken to pieces over sin. And I think verse 17 really makes this clear. Look at the text. The sacrifices of God. What does that even mean? It means the kind of sacrifice that pleases God. The kind of sacrifice that pleases God are what? Two things, a broken spirit or heart, broken meaning broken in pieces, or the Hebrew means shattered like glass on the ground, and are a contrite heart. Contrite meaning in the Hebrew crushed as with a mortar and pestle. Y'all know the mortar and pestle. It's those often stony-shaped bowls and then the stone mortar that is crushing the grain and refining and making it fine. The language is vivid then, a broken spirit or heart, a contrite It's strong in its emphasis. It's the picture of the sinful heart being pulverized in the mortar by the rough grinding motion of the pestle. The hardened heart has now been shattered to pieces, and like a shattered cup that can hold no water, the contrite heart sees that it truly is good for nothing. You see, David now knows there is nothing that he can do. He recognizes he can't merit an ounce of divine favor. He's simply cast upon the mercy of God, helpless and hopeless apart from reconciling grace. The warm blood collected from the slit goat's neck into the bowl held by the priest on the day of atonement, it won't appease this holy God. Something more must take place. And so it is that David understands something else. He now sees clearly that only repentance and brokenness over sin, only repentance and brokenness over sin is a sacrifice God can never despise. A sacrifice from the herd isn't going to cut it. God will only delight in a sacrifice of the heart. Positively, we could say it like this, God is well pleased with a broken heart. And David gets it now. He's become like one unclean and even his righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. There is only one way this king can be reconciled to God and it is through God's propitiating mercy. Thus, the psalm opens with, have mercy upon me, O God. According to your loving kindness, the King James says, the ESV steadfast love. According to your abundant mercy, bought out my transgressions. This is what David now understands, what he's learned, what he expresses with pen and ink under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, of course. That's some preliminary analysis of the text. I now have three things that I want to tell you in short order. So let's go. Number one, the essence of brokenness. Number two, the excellence of brokenness. And number three, the experience of brokenness. Essence, excellence, and experience. And we need to begin with the essence of brokenness. What even does that word mean? Well, consider it with me. There's a century old story of a London newspaper, The Times of London, that publicly posed the question in its editorial columns to the reader. And the question was simply this, what is wrong with the world? They invited readers of The Times to submit their answers. maybe they would post worthwhile, worthy answers. Well, a quite famous author read the editorial column that day. This author's name was G.K. Chesterton. Some of you may know of him, even appreciate him to some degree. He replied to the newspaper, and that reply came in with a flood of others. What is wrong with the world? Everybody wants to give their two cents. However, his reply won the day. It was as stunning as it was succinct, and the paper then printed his answer. And here was G.K. Chesterton's short reply. Dear sirs, comma, I am yours sincerely, G.K. Chesterton. What is wrong with the world? You and me. This statement grasps something of what it means to be broken and contrite. It's not the heart that wants to point the finger at anybody else. It's the heart that points the finger smack dab in the middle of one's own heart. John Bunyan in his spiritual autobiography, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners, The title alone represents a broken and contrite heart. Grace abounding to the chief of sinners. He describes his own experience of brokenness like this quite succinctly, I might add. Scripture did so tear and rend my soul. He said that the word of God simply broke him into pieces. Which only reminds me of what God spoke through the prophet Jeremiah. Is not my word like fire, declares the Lord, and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces. Jeremiah 23. You see, saints, the very heart that God breaks is the heart that God delights in. And that is why this theme is so worthwhile. The heart broken over sin is the heart from whence all self-importance has fled. A heart that feels like John Newton, the hymn writer, felt when he often reminded himself, I am a great sinner, but Jesus Christ is a great Savior. That's the heart of contrition. It was Peter's heart when in Luke 5, after the great catch of fish, Peter falls down at the knees of the Lord Jesus, and he says, depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord. There's a broken heart. These are all expressions of brokenness. over one's own sinfulness. But how do we further understand brokenness? First, I think it would be helpful to have a few descriptions as to what it is not, and then we can speak positively to what it is. What it is not can often be as clarifying or more clarifying even than what it is. So let me begin there. It isn't the theological trend amongst some Calvinists in our day as viewing ourselves as worms or maggots. I may be stepping on a landmine, so if you're offended, you'll have to go to God with that. I'm going home this afternoon. And we get this language from one place in Scripture that I know of, and that's Job 25. And if you're familiar with Job 25, it's not even Job speaking here, it's his buddy Bildad. And Bildad's theology wasn't always on par with biblical theology, at least is the way he was discerning the situation. But this idea that I am a worm or a maggot is simply imbalanced and doesn't stand the test of the entirety of Scripture. When you take that little piece, a single verse of Bildad's theology, again Job 25, 6, and then you stretch it out over the course of all the pages of the Bible, I've actually seen to where it can be used to excuse or justify sin. Because, you know, worms just do what worms do. Instead, we need to let all of Scripture speak here. Do you behave like a worm or a maggot at times? I do. But that doesn't mark who I am in Christ Jesus. I read that the Christian lives the life of the Sermon on the Mount. I read that in Galatians 5 we walk according to the Spirit, not according to the flesh. So just be biblical, brothers and sisters. Don't be always acquainting yourself to a worm. Certainly don't be making excuses, feeling like a worm. Rather, be who you are. in Christ Jesus, one possessed and indwelt by the Holy Spirit, one united to the glorious Son, one liberated by a loving Father in heaven. Also, brokenness isn't as much vertical, excuse me, horizontal as it is vertical. Let me explain what I mean. I know you all know horizontal and vertical. But what do I mean? The broken heart is Godward. It seeks no affirmation or recognition from men. The humility of a crushed and contrite heart seeks an audience of one. And that is God in heaven. That the tears and the prayers and the longings of the heart, they are directed to God and God alone. They're not seeking to impress anyone. They're not seeking to win spiritual brownie points in the life of the church. No, they're to God and to God alone. And David says as much in Psalm 51, against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight. That is true brokenness. And again, one more thing that brokenness is not, it isn't self-hatred or belittling yourself. You probably know Christians like this. Maybe there are some here today and it's always self-deprecation. Always. That is not biblical brokenness. David did not criticize himself into this state. David was not even responsible for bringing himself low. God did it through His Word. He did it through the mouth of a prophet. And this is how brokenness happens. God breaks the heart so that He may then mend the heart. Well, that's what brokenness is not, so then positively, what is it? Well, to be broken means your self-reliance has been shattered. It means to be contrite that your pride has been pulverized. Again, the imagery of the mortar and pestle. It's a heart that has been emptied out like a jar of water broken in pieces on a concrete floor. It's the posture of knowing that you have no one else in the horizontal plane to turn to, but you must look up to God running to your dear Savior. It's to be brought low. To use Jesus' language from the Sermon on the Mount and the Beatitudes, it's to be poor in spirit. It's a deep awareness of your unworthiness. It involves real sorrow over sin. Not that you're sad because you got caught, but you're sad because you offended a holy God. The broken heart sees its insufficiency. Matthew Henry, the whole Bible commentator from the Puritan era, he said, it's a heart breaking off from its sin. It's a heart moldable to the Word of God, patient under the rod of God, a heart subdued and brought into obedience. It's a heart that is tender, like Josiah's, a heart that trembles at God's Word. The brokenhearted say things like this, I deserve God's rebuke. I deserve this distance that I feel from my Heavenly Father. I deserve even to be damned. God would be just to cast me off forever, and yet, in the same breath, the contrite heart cries out, as David does in Psalm 51, cast me not away from your presence. Take not your Holy Spirit from me. You know you deserve it, and yet you delight in the same moment that God won't do that with you. But even as He said, He's with you to the end. This is what broken-hearted Christians feel toward God. when it comes to their sin. This is what brokenness is according to Scripture. Second, the excellence of brokenness. We've covered the essence, now the excellence. And yes, I mean what I say, the excellence of brokenness. I'll quote Spurgeon again who said, a heart crushed is a fragrant heart. Men despise those who are contemptible in their own eyes, but the Lord sees not as man sees. He despises what men esteem and values what men despise. Never yet has God spurned, cast off a lowly, weeping penitent, and never will He, while God is love and while Jesus is the man who receives sinners. Bulls and rams He desires not, but contrite hearts He seeks after. Understand this then. God delights more in brokenness than in strength. More in humility than ability. God delights in this. Here's what God is looking for in the earth today. Brokenness. How do I know? Psalm 51 is a good start, but what about Isaiah 66 too? All these things, God says, my hand has made. And so all these things came to be, declares the Lord. But, but this is the one to whom I will look. He who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word. What does this mean? He to whom I will look. Not that he needs our counsel or advice, like, oh, I'm going to go to that Christian there in the front row, he's pretty smart. No, he to whom I will look. It's an expression of God's delight. It's what his eyes fixate on. What kind of believer causes God to delight? The humble, the contrite in spirit, the one who trembles at his word. God is saying, I made everything that is made. It's a glorious and remarkable creation. But let me tell you what I'm looking for day by day. I'm looking for the broken and contrite. Joel 2.12, Yet even now declares the Lord, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning. You want to know how to return to the Lord? You want to know how to experience this subjective reconciliation between you and your God? Return to Him with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, with mourning. You see, the Lord of the universe actually desires you and me to have brokenness. to have a contrite heart, but it gets even better. The excellence is what we're talking about. The Lord has promises for the brokenhearted. Think of this, Psalm 147, verse 3, he heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. Wow, our gracious God will take what he himself has crushed and restore it to a heart that is more like the heart of Jesus. He'll bind it up. He'll heal it. What God breaks and then binds is worth every ounce of pain and every tear shed. But there's more. Psalm 34 18, I think you're familiar with this one. The Lord is near to the what? Broken hearted and saves the what? Crushed in spirit. God breaks and binds the brokenhearted, but the Lord also draws near to such a one. Isn't that something? You're probably thinking, when you sin the way that you sin, that God is suddenly a thousand miles from you. But when the Christian is broken over his sin, God is immediately there. He's not far, He's near. Don't you want the nearness of God, saints? Don't you want the nearness of God, saints? Then prepare to be broken. Be ready to be brought low. If the nearness of God is my good, Psalm 119. How could brokenness ever be an undesirable thing? Do you see the logic? Now listen to this, Isaiah 57, 15, for thus says the one who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is holy. I dwell in the high and holy place. And also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly and to revive the heart of the contrite. God is way up there. And you all know what I mean when I say that. He is majestic and holy and eternal and high, and yet He says, I will dwell with the broken in the contrite. It's amazing. I don't understand it, but I believe it according to His Word. I don't think you and I see how much God values brokenness. To God, the brokenhearted, those broken over their sin, they're like precious jewels. And with all of His glorious creation before Him, His eyes are drawn to those jewels. Yes, God delights in and is pleased with the broken heart. Lastly, the experience of brokenness. I told you I'd try to go quickly. It really is an emptying and breaking process. sometimes by repeated blows and over a span of time, but often sudden and rather abrupt as it was when the prophet Nathan visited King David. This is the way of God with us as Lord of our sanctification. He has promised, according to Romans 8, to conform us into the image of Christ. This is the great end of the gospel, that we would be with Christ and be more like Christ, and God will do whatever it takes to get us there. Some of you that are more stubborn like me, you ought to know what I'm talking about by experience. In His love for us, the Lord will work to empty us. He will make us to feel our nothingness. And then we just have to sit with it, we have to deal with it, we have to have eyes to see it. And then, so often, does He begin to bless us in our service to Him. Then He makes our lives to be truly fragrant. And so it is that for the most part, brokenness precedes true usefulness in the kingdom. It precedes the longed-for intimacy with God. This was evident in Moses when at the call of God, he was so acutely aware of his insufficiency for the task. This was the case with Isaiah in the sixth chapter. When he sees in this vision the Lord seated high and lifted up upon his throne, what does he say? Woe is me. I am lost. I'm a man of unclean lips. I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. For my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. He was broken. And then God, like never before, put that brother to work. And brokenness, it's not a one-time thing, but rather to be a continual experience in the Christian life. Brokenness over sin is continually appropriate because even the holiest Christian continually falls into sin. As much as we're to be always repenting, we're to be always broken in that sense. Again, it involves real sorrow over sin. But let me clarify something. Brokenness doesn't mean we're unhappy. It doesn't mean we lack joy. That is such a shallow, demon-spawned notion. Yes, you heard me right. Satan would make brokenness appear to be unattractive so that we then despise it like he does. But we must never despise what delights the heart of God. God doesn't call you and me to a joyless, unhappy life. No, according to the Apostle Paul, we're to be sorrowful, yes. Yet what? Always rejoicing. Second Corinthians 6.10. Another thing is that the brokenhearted also experience a higher sensitivity to sin. We aren't just at war in the Christian life with the big sins. Yeah, I don't want to fall into the trap that David did with adultery and murder." But then you ignore pride and jealousy and bitterness. No, we make war with even the little sins, the respectable sins, as Jerry Bridges, now beholding the face of Christ, once called them. Our hearts are more tender. The Lord's conviction hits us a little harder. We become ever so quick to confess sin and turn away from it. These are the fruits of brokenness in our lives. But how do we get there? I sometimes wonder at sermons that are preached like this, and they carry you all the way to the edge of the cliff, and then you're like, but how do I get across this chasm? So how do we get there? If you can't break yourself, Brother Lee, what am I to do? Two things we ought to do, neither one of which is be passive. Number one, we need to face our sinfulness. I'm choosing my language carefully. We need to face our sinfulness. I'm not promoting this morning a constant introspection that causes us only to focus on our sins and not look up to our Savior. I despise that. I pastor men and women. I deal with that. It's horrendous. And yet, what did David say in this psalm? For I know my transgressions and my sin is ever before me. For so many, the default position, and this is what we're fighting against in our day, the default position is to get rid of the sting of sin as quickly as possible. We want to forget all about it. We want to move on. God is gracious after all, so we don't really grieve much over it. Instead, we try to put away the sorrow as quickly as we can. But I'm here to tell you the memories of sin, even past sin, significant sin, is good and useful at times. I don't want God to take away certain memories from my life. Without those memories, as painful as they may be, I'd forget about God's grace in delivering me from a wasted and evil life. If those memories were taken away, I'd not recollect those terrible moments, but moments when God came, when He washed me, when He changed me. Without those memories, I'd not feel so deeply the evil of sin and then be kept from returning to it. I can't tell you the number of times over the past 28 years of my Christian life that I have recollected certain occasions of my sinful past and been broken all over again. Why? Because God was so good to me. He took me like a brand from the burning. I was on the brink of destroying things. And God came and rescued me. When I think of God's radical grace in plucking me out of a family history involving suicide and all manner of sin, I remember the evil man that I once was and how significant then God's grace was to me in saving a wretch like me. It's huge. So we need to learn to face our sinfulness. Second, you look to God and at God. You face God. What do I mean? You look to God to do what only God can do. And in this case, that is to grant you this brokenness and sorrow over sin. I'm not saying you go home and hour after hour, you just try to work up this sorrow over sin in you. You need to face your sinfulness. And then you really need to face God. I mean, stare Him in the face. What? We do this chiefly in meditation upon the Word. We do this chiefly, meditating upon the Word of God and then in prayer. So I'm commending to you to fix your gaze. on a moment of the life of Christ in the Gospels, and you just stay there, and you read it, and you look into the heart of your compassionate High Priest, and you read His words again and again, and you see His power in liberating sinners, the demon-possessed, healing the afflicted, or you look at a prophetic portrayal of this holy God, Revelation chapter 1, Revelation 19, and you just stay there, you camp out there, you consider every feature and facet of God as He's revealed in the text, and you let it roll over again and again in the contours of your heart and mind, and you just drink it down slowly, sip by sip, and you let the taste then linger in your mouth before swallowing, I'm saying, You, brothers and sisters, need to face the Lord. You need to look at Him. You need to linger there in His presence. Because His Word is like a hammer. And we need to be willing to be broken by that hammer. In this posture, I trust you will increasingly know what it means to be a broken-hearted believer. Let me close with an exhortation from Charles Spurgeon again. He says to you and to me, though dead, he still speaks, learn this lesson, not to trust Christ because you repent, but to trust Christ to make you repent. Not to come to Christ because you have a broken heart, but to come to Him that He may give you a broken heart. Not to come to Him because you are fit to come, but to come to Him because you are unfit to come. Your fitness is your unfitness. Your qualification is your lack of qualification. I'm appealing to you, my brothers and sisters, linger in the presence of the Lord. And before long, you'll know what this brokenness is all about. Amen.