Lament and Repentance

Scripture Passage

Psalm 51:1–17 (NLT)

1 Have mercy on me, O God, because of your unfailing love. Because of your great compassion, blot out the stain of my sins. 2 Wash me clean from my guilt. Purify me from my sin. 3 For I recognize my rebellion; it haunts me day and night. 4 Against you, and you alone, have I sinned; I have done what is evil in your sight. You will be proved right in what you say, and your judgment against me is just. 5 For I was born a sinner— yes, from the moment my mother conceived me. 6 But you desire honesty from the womb, teaching me wisdom even there. 7 Purify me from my sins, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow. 8 Oh, give me back my joy again; you have broken me— now let me rejoice. 9 Don’t keep looking at my sins. Remove the stain of my guilt. 10 Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a loyal spirit within me. 11 Do not banish me from your presence, and don’t take your Holy Spirit from me. 12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and make me willing to obey you. 13 Then I will teach your ways to rebels, and they will return to you. 14 Forgive me for shedding blood, O God who saves; then I will joyfully sing of your forgiveness. 15 Unseal my lips, O Lord, that my mouth may praise you. 16 You do not desire a sacrifice, or I would offer one. You do not want a burnt offering. 17 The sacrifice you desire is a broken spirit. You will not reject a broken and repentant heart, O God.

Focus Statement

Some of our deepest troubles can come from within us.

As we bring them to God,

we can grieve and turn from our sins

with a readiness to receive God’s ever-present grace.

Point of Relation

Truth be told, I have struggled with guilt and repentance in the past.

Not because I feel I am perfect and have nothing to repent…

But because when I came back to Christ, I was sensitive to the sins I had committed in my life up to that point…

I knew I had walked away from God for a number of years…

And I knew that there was nothing I could do to change the things I had done.

All healthy things….except I took it to an unhealthy extreme.

I remember every time I would pray, I would lament my past actions, and I would beat myself up before God…

Praying for forgiveness over and over and over again.

The guilt was rightfully there, the lament was in order; however, I allowed the guilt to consume me and no matter how much I prayed for God’s forgiveness, I could not forgive myself.

Eventually, God reached me in those prayers…and God spoke to me…telling me that my sins were forgiven…

That I just had to trust in God and follow.

When that clicked, I experienced a healing in my soul that which I had never felt before.

Still, it took me a long time to get there…and my relationship with God did not grow until I was able to let go of my own guilt and give that, along with my repentance, to God.

Things to Consider

Ash Wednesday is about mortality

but it is also about recognizing our need for God as limited and flawed human beings.

On Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the Lenten season,

we often talk about repentance, turning away from our sin and towards God.

This year, through Lent, our church will be focusing on ”lament”

(expressing our sorrow, pain, suffering to God in prayer).

Truth be told, there can often be a connection between repentance and lament

though this is not always the case as, for example, when we are lamenting the loss of a loved one .

What Scripture Says

Psalm 51:1-17 shows this connection.

The Psalmist here, laments his own sin.

He is expressing his grief and sorrow to God

about the things he has done that have separate him from God (verses 1-9).

Before I move forward, let me just say that this happens to be the case for this Psalmist…

But not all suffering is a result of sin, or a result of our own personal sin.

With that said, the psalmist recognizes and laments his suffering

but is self aware and truthful in acknowledging that at least parts of it flow from his own actions and transgressions.

In Psalm 5 the Psalmist claims to be”born a sinner”…

But I wonder what he meant by that claim?

I do not believe that the Psalmist believed he was guilty of sinning as a baby…

I wonder if he was reflecting on a sense that there has always been a level of separation from God?

I wonder, if like the rest of us, he was observing the broken world he and we all are born into?

I mean it doesn’t take a genius to know there is something wrong in the world that needs God’s love and forgiveness to fix it.

Still, in lamenting his sin, the Psalmist moves to repentance.

It is one thing to know that something is wrong and to name it.

It is another to recognize our own role in it and take the next step of inviting God to work on/in us.

Verse 17 speaks of ”a broken spirit” as the sacrifice acceptable to God.

This broken spirit comes from being uncomfortable and dissatisfied with what is contrary to God’s will for us

The way this psalm is written is deeply personal

(using ‘I’ language, not we).

Especially in the beginning of the Lenten season,

we must start where we are as individuals with deep self-reflection…

though throughout Lent we do move to more communal self-reflection as well.

What This Means for You

With that said, I want you to notice the presence of God in this passage.

If we yield ourselves, there is a litany of things that God can do in/with/through/for and even in spite of us.

Repentance is a release that allows us to move forward and accept God’s loving work in us.

I want to invite you to reflect on something that needs to change in your lives,

to identify the suffering that has come from it,

and to both lament (express the pain, sorrow they’ve experienced because of it to God in prayer)

and repent (turn away from the sin and towards God).

Conversely, once you’ve expressed that lament, I want you to feel God’s LOVING presence…forgiving you…

Calling you to put your trust in God even more!

What This Means for Us

Friends, as a people of God, we are being called to be honest about who and where we are in our faith.

There’s no hiding it from God and besides

True growth comes through reflection and repentance.

For if we don’t reflect, we will never see ourselves as we are…and we will never recognize any reason to change.

Without change, there can be no growth.

So, friends, let us embrace this practice of reflection, lament, and repentance…

For it is a necessary part of our spiritual, emotional, and even physical development as human beings.

Let us put our trust in God enough to be honest and repent the areas we need to change the direction of our lives in. Amen? Amen.