Rescued from the Depths of Sin

A reward for a thief.

Imagine bringing someone into your home to care for them. You don’t know this person other than that they are in need.

You feed them a warm meal. Provide them with a place to bathe and clean themselves up. You show them to a room where they can sleep in a clean bed.

And in the middle of the night, this man wakes up and steals jewelry and all kinds of expensive things, and leaves.

This is what happens early in the musical Les Misrable. Jean Valjean was an angry prison set free on parole. He could not find a job or food, but a bishop took him in.

He fed him and gave him a warm place to sleep, and in the middle of the night, he stole a bunch of silverware (which was actually made of silver).

This is the depth that sin will take us to. Sin that we are compelled to indulge in and submit to with no escape. It doesn’t matter what we say we will do and how we promise we will change, on our own we will always remain the same sinner we have always been.

And in Psalm 130, we find a man crying out from these depths.

What do I need to know? Regardless of how difficult your life is or has been. There is no financial struggle, health diagnosis, or family strife/drama worse than your sinful condition.

“The deepest pit you will ever find yourself in is the pit of your own sin.” — Tommy Swindol

This morning’s Psalm is about God leading us up out of the depths of sin to a place where we can show others that God can lead them out of their depths as well.

Psalm 130:1–2 “Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord! O Lord, hear my voice! Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for mercy!”

The “depths” is always painting a picture of a vast ocean. You think about the ocean for a moment. We have only mapped about 25% of the ocean floor with high resolution technology. We’ve physically explored far less.

The deepest point is Challenger Deep in the Marianas trench at 6.75 miles.

To help you understand that, you could sink Mt Everest and the top of it would be 1 1/2 miles deep.

The pressure at this depth would be the same as 100 elephants standing on you.

Have you ever felt that kind of despair and overwhelming weight of sin in your life?

Psalm 69:1–3 “Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. I sink in deep mire, where there is no foothold; I have come into deep waters, and the flood sweeps over me. I am weary with my crying out; my throat is parched. My eyes grow dim with waiting for my God.”

Jonah 2:2 “saying, “I called out to the Lord, out of my distress, and he answered me; out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice.”

You will not cry out to God until you realize that your life depends on him.

You have to come to the end of yourself. Some have to reach the most devastating consequences of their sin before they will look up and see the God that has been pursuing them.

What’s terrifying and at the same time mysteriously wonderful is that God will allow you to go to these deep places. God will allow you to suffer in your sin until you finally find yourself in a deep enough place to cry out to Him.

It’s in His mercy that He does this because He knows that particular depth in your life is where you will finally turn to Him.

The problem comes when we consider turning to God in our sin. And the Psalmist feels this.

Psalm 130:3–4 “If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness, that you may be feared.”

“Mark” literally means to take account or keep a record of it. There’s people in your life right now that you struggle to forgive because you are keeping score.

The Psalmist writes that if God were to do this, then no one could stand before Him. No one could bring their petitions to God.

And the Bible tells us that God does keep a record.

Romans 3:19 “Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.”

Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,”

God meets our guilt and sin with forgiveness.

This is the amazing truth of the Gospel.

“We are more sinful and flawed in ourselves than we ever dared believe, yet at the very same time we are more loved and accepted in Jesus Christ than we ever dared hope.” - Timothy Keller

Psalm 103:8–12 “The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He will not always chide, nor will he keep his anger forever. He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.”

You may say, “You don’t know what I’ve done.” And you’re right in saying that. Jesus knew when He went to the cross to die for all the sins of the world. Whatever you are thinking of…all the sin that you are thinking about and saying that God wouldn’t forgive that…that sin…THOSE SINS are precisely the ones that Jesus came to die for.

If God has forgiven you, then follow Him in fear and wonder.

“that you may be feared” is one of those phrases we try to apologize for.

There is an appropriate amount of fear that needs to be given to God. Think about the cross and what Jesus did in order to atone for your sin. See the wrath of God poured out on Jesus Christ. You deserve every bit of it.

And while Jesus came to offer us forgiveness and grace, there should still be a fear with this wonder of what God has done. The fear is that we live in such a way to honor what God has done for us. We’re not living to earn it or pay it back.

“Those who have been forgiven are softened and humbled and overwhelmed by God’s mercy, and they long never again to sin against such a great and fearful goodness. They do sin, but in their deepest hearts they do not want to, and when they do they rush back to God for deliverance.” — James Boice

There is a fear and wonder in what Jesus has done for us. Follow Jesus in light of the great mercy and grace that He has poured out on you.

Psalm 130:5–6 “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope; my soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen for the morning, more than watchmen for the morning.”

When you cry out to God, wait with confident trust that God will do what He has promised to do.

The watchmen is a picture of a confident expectation. The watchmen are always waiting for the sun to rise. And they know that the sun will eventually rise. Did any of you get up this morning expecting the sun to take a day off. Even if it were cloudy today, the sun would still be back there behind the clouds.

So when you see a sunrise, remember the faithfulness of God. He is more faithful than the sunrise.

We don’t doubt it, so don’t doubt God’s promises of grace and forgiveness for sin.

1 John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Psalm 30:5 “For his anger is but for a moment, and his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning.”

Acts 16:31 “And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.””

Jesus will always save those who call out to Him in faith and repentance.

If you have been rescued, tell others who are in need of rescuing.

Psalm 130:7–8 “O Israel, hope in the Lord! For with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is plentiful redemption. And he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities.”

The Psalmist is calling others to hope in the Lord as he has. Salvation is not something we get and keep for ourselves. It is something we share with the world around us.

We do this with anything and everything else. You find a sale on something and you know someone who would like it, you text or call them. You see someone struggling with a health problem similar to yours, you tell them what helped or what doctor you went to. SALVATION IS WAY MORE IMPORTANT! We must share it with the world around us.

Conclusion: Are you waiting on the Lord?

Wait is to trust. Do you expect God to save?

Are you in the depths this morning? Cry out!

Have you been rescued from the depths? Praise God and tell somebody!

God has pulled you up and placed you in this way that He has prepared for you.

Now we are called to prepare the way for others to come and see Jesus Christ.

Let me finish the story of Jean Valjean. He is captured and brought back to the bishop with all the silver that he stole. He told the guards that the bishop gave him those things (not true). When the guards questioned the bishop, he said that he did give those things to him, but in his haste he forgot the candlesticks as well.

The guards are excused and Jean Valjean is left sitting there confused.

“Jean Valjean, my brother, you no longer belong to evil, but to good. It is your soul that I buy from you; I withdraw it from black thoughts and the spirit of perdition, and I give it to God.”

The musical adds this song, “But remember this my brother. See in this some higher plan. You must use this precious silver to become an honest man. By the witness of the martyrs. By the Passion, and the blood, I have raised you out of darkness. I have bought your soul for God.”

Obviously, no man can buy someone else’s soul, but this moment changes Jean Valjean. And it is a picture of grace that we long for.

And the truth is God has done this for you in a way that goes far beyond stealing silver.

God meets our guilt and sin with forgiveness.