"This is Our Story"

Have you ever been watching a movie or reading a book and wonder is anything ever going to go right for the main character?

- It’s like no matter what they try to do or how they try to do it, it never works out, but then all of sudden there’s a pivotal moment that changes the entire outcome of the story

- Isn’t this our story as believers?

- No matter what we did or found ourselves involved in we were never truly satisfied until the pivotal moment of our lives when we met Jesus

- While each of our stories are unique, God is writing the same story of redemption through his grace on every heart that calls on him to be lord.

Psalm 51 is where we’re going to be at today as we look at a guy that we know as a man after God’s on heart

- David finds himself in a pivotal moment after he had realized the devastation that his affair with Bathsheba had caused

- 2 Samuel 11 and 12

- One of the most known failures in the Old Testament

- In this Psalm, David gives us a beautiful picture of God’s story

1. Our sin is serious (vs. 1-5)

- Sin a condition that we inherited that easily consumes our entire life

- “For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.”‭‭Romans‬ ‭5:19‬ ‭ESV‬‬

- Sin is sin, David’s lust and pride were merely symptoms

- This was a pretty evil thing that David did wasn’t it?

- David says his sin is ever before him

- We don’t sin like that do we?

- We have these made up hierarchy’s of sin in our lived and as long as we don’t cross that threshold then we’re good.

- We have to stop living a life of trying to justify living the way we want to

- Sin is our identity before Christ and a holy God can not affiliate himself with sin

- Jesus and John said that if we hate someone or are angry with them we might as well kill them

- “But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire.” ‭‭Matthew‬ ‭5:22‬ ‭ESV‬‬

- “Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.” ‭‭1 John‬ ‭3:15‬ ‭ESV‬‬

- Jesus said that if we lust after someone who isn’t our spouse we might as well have had an affair

- ““You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” ‭‭Matthew‬ ‭5:27-28‬ ‭ESV‬‬

- Pride brings destruction and suffering in our lives

- “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” ‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭16:18‬ ‭ESV‬‬

- For some reason we’ve decided overtime that Jesus really didn’t mean what he said about sin and that’s just a radical way of following him now

- It’s almost a story if we’ve told ourselves we don’t really sin

- Sin can never be justified within ourselves

- There’s this external pressure all around us to be perfect so we’ve had to justify our faults for us to gain confidence and acceptance, but could it be that we’ve started to desire our sin rather than God

- God, bring us to a place where we are so overwhelmed by our disobedience that we aren’t hung up on the mistake of everyone else

- We have to see the severity of our personal sin against God for us to ever appreciate his heart of grace

2. God’s grace is restoring (vs. 6-12)

- Hyssop was a plant that was used in the Old Testament to sprinkle the blood of a sacrifice in act of atonement

- David is asking God that he would unsin him. It’s the same thing that we ask God for when we pray for forgiveness

- Have we ever thought of the implications of that request?

- “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” ‭‭Romans‬ ‭6:23‬ ‭ESV‬‬

- “Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.” ‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭9:22‬ ‭ESV‬‬

- The penalty for sin didn’t just get annulled. It didn’t just go away

- Our forgiveness cost God something

- The payment for my sin wasn’t erased it was paid in full

- We are no longer strangers, aliens, cut off, we are sons of God

- We are saints and our identity has changed

- “since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”” ‭‭1 Peter‬ ‭1:16‬ ‭ESV‬‬

- He recreates our heart

- Our holy God doesn’t see your sin anymore he sees Jesus

3. God’s restoration leads to transformation (vs. 13-19)

- The point of God’s grace isn’t for us to clean for cleansing’s sake. The point of God’s grace in our lives is to point the world to Jesus

- Grace doesn’t draw us to freedom grace draws us to Jesus

- Once saved always saved isn’t deserved

- Our lives are lived hanging on the mercy of Jesus

- This is our story and it’s good news

- Share it

- We were eternally broken but we were eternally healed for the purposes of God

- Do we really believe the gospel of the Bible?

- Crazy faith is just normal faith