Sermon of the Week

WHITER THAN SNOW Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow (Psalm 51:7). The mere teaching of Bible doctrine and extensive Bible studies divorced from their application to one’s life is not truth in the biblical sense. It is hard to understand the distinction between the letter of the Word and the spirit of the Word. We can learn the letter of the Word with intellectual knowledge. However, the Word is spirit, and we need to understand the spirit of the Word. We learn to understand the words of Psalm 51 and what is in the heart of a true child of God who has learned to understand what we spoke of this morning when Job said: “Behold, I am vile.” It was such an exclamation of surprise. As I pointed out, all these men of God were truly God-fearing men, but when the Light shined in their hearts, they saw the vileness of their hearts by nature. Then all of a sudden they were in a state of shock. They saw something they had not realized. Psalm 51 is a psalm of David after Nathan the prophet had come to him with the message we find in 2 Samuel 12:7-9: “And Nathan said to David, Thou art the man. Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, I anointed thee king over Israel, and I delivered thee out of the hand of Saul; And I gave thee thy master’s house, and thy master’s wives into thy bosom, and gave thee the house of Israel and of Judah; and if that had been too little, I would moreover have given unto thee such and such things. Wherefore hast thou despised the commandment of the LORD, to do evil in his sight? thou hast killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword, and hast taken his wife to be thy wife, and hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon.” This was such a shock to David because he had done it so secretly, and he thought no one knew. It was strictly between him and Joab, who knew that Uriah had been put in the forefront of the battle and killed. David did not realize that his sin was naked and open before God. All of a sudden that light was flicked on, and there he stood, with every thought and every desire and every lust and every crime of his heart now naked before the Lord. It was not until God sent Nathan with the message, “Thou art the man,” that David cried out as Job, “Behold, I am vile.” Keep this in mind as we go through Psalm 51:1-7. Verse 1 says: “Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.” Now his sins stood before his eyes. Until then he could write condemnation on his subordinate who had sinned much less than he had. Continuing in verse 2 he said: “Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.” Now he saw his sin and how vile he was in the eyes of a Holy God. It is not until this takes place in your life and mine that we really understand what it is to plead for cleansing in the blood of Christ. David now saw how he needed cleansing for his own soul. It is so easy to come under the preaching of the Word, and to hear for someone else. We can hear a sermon and wish that someone else could hear and understand it, but the message needs to come home to us. We read in verse 3: “For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before me.” Before Nathan spoke to David, he knew his sin and he knew that God knew it, but now the Holy Spirit brought it home to his heart, and he acknowledged it. He now knew the consequences of that sin and how grievous it was to the Lord. David continued in verse 4: “Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest.” What does he mean, “Against thee, thee only, have I sinned”? He sinned against Uriah. He sinned against Bathsheba. He had sinned against his kingdom. He had sinned against the congregation of Israel. David saw the horrible, grievous nature of his sin in the sight of God. You and I have to learn to understand that when we sin, we sin against God. When Nathan came to David, he had no place to hide. If God had told David he was going to die for this, it would have been a just judgment, but now he confesses his sinfulness. All of a sudden, he realized the grievous nature of his sin. He says in verse 5: “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.” He realized that he was born in sin. He realized that he was conceived in sin. Continuing in verse 6 he says: “Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts: and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom.” This confession of David was the fruit of having the Holy Spirit enlighten his understanding to realize the sinfulness of his sin and that his sin was naked and open before God. Now we come to the words of our text: “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.” Until this happens to us, we will never understand what it is to plead for the purging of our sins, that is, to be cleansed from our sin, to be delivered from the power of our sin. He is saying he wants to be clean from his sin. It is one thing to be clean or be delivered from the penalty of sin. It is another thing to be cleansed from sin itself so that not only the guilt, but the sin itself has been purged away and it no longer has a hold on you. It no longer has power and dominion over you. It no longer reigns over you. That is what he was asking: that he would be delivered from the power and the reign of sin. David wanted to be purged from his sin as well as delivered from the penalty of sin. Notice that throughout this psalm, hell and damnation were not his greatest concerns. He was concerned about the offense he had caused against God and how he had brought reproach against God. He says in verse 16: “Thou desirest not sacrifice or else would I give it thee. Thou delightest not in burnt offerings.” That deals with the penalty of the sin. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit and a contrite heart. He understood that the Lord wanted his heart, but his heart had strayed from the Lord. He realized that it was a heart sin that the Lord was displeased with. Now before the words, “Thou art the man,” were applied to David’s heart, he could still order the execution of his subordinate for a much lesser crime. You can see this in the preceding verses in 2 Samuel 12: 5-6: “And David’s anger was greatly kindled against the man; and he said to Nathan, As the LORD liveth, the man that hath done this thing shall surely die: And he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity.” David passed judgment, but Nathan’s message was that the Lord had said, “Thou shalt not die.” The Lord forgave him. David was not concerned primarily with the consequences of his sin. As we go through Psalm 51, I want you to understand he was not concerned about hell. He was not concerned about the punishment of his sin. He was concerned about being delivered from its pollution, to be cleansed from his sin. The Bible is much more than a book of revealed facts and truth. It is not only a history book. We read in Hebrews 4:12-13: “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” You see the word of God is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. That is what we see in Psalm 51. We see David pouring his heart out before the Lord under the pollution of sin, having to now be cleansed from sin itself. We read in verse 13: “Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.” Bible truths may be correctly explained without raising any opposition until it is applied to our daily lives. Bible studies are everywhere. Pulpits are everywhere, and the preachers may properly explain the word of God. They may read it verbatim and never encounter any opposition until we are required to apply it to our personal lives. That is when you hit a hornets’ nest. That is when you see opposition. That is when people become defensive. Religion becomes a source or form of entertainment that is unprofitable to the soul. A religion of entertainment is unprofitable to the soul. You see this in Ezekiel 33:31-32: “And they come unto thee as the people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them: for with their mouth they shew much love, but their heart goeth after their covetousness. And, lo, thou art unto them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice, and can play well on an instrument: for they hear thy words, but they do them not.” The people were coming to be entertained by what Ezekiel was saying, but their hearts were still covetous. When we apply the word of God to our daily lives, it convicts us. That is when the rubber meets the road. That is when religion becomes offensive. You can get yourself into a heap of trouble. People will tolerate a lot of preaching of God’s word as long as it does not have to be applied to their personal lives. The Holy Spirit applies the words “Thou art the man” to the soul, opening our eyes to see that the word of God “is a discerner of the thoughts and the intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do” (Hebrews 4:12-13). When we have that applied to our hearts, when it becomes personal, when our own sins are pointed out by the finger of God, then we begin to understand the words of our text: “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.” Then we start to understand the desire for cleansing, to be delivered from that sin. Then the sin itself becomes personal. We do not apply it to another person. We desire to be cleansed. When the Holy Spirit opens our spiritual eyes and ears to see and hear spiritually, “Thou art the man,” we begin to truly hunger and thirst for righteousness. We start to understand the work of regeneration, when the desire of the heart is altered. The sin we used to cherish becomes our greatest enemy, and the things of God, which used to be our greatest enemy, become our chief delight. This word purge, as we find in our text, expresses David’s desire to be washed and cleansed from the pollution of his sin by the sprinkling of Christ’s blood. Our text says, “Purge me with hyssop,” because hyssop was to be used for the sprinkling of the blood. In Exodus 12:22 it says: “And ye shall take a bunch of hyssop, and dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and strike the lintel and the two side posts with the blood that is in the basin.” What does he mean by “purge me with hyssop”? He is saying, Lord, bring me under the sprinkling of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, if I can be washed in the blood of the Lamb, I will be whiter than snow. He is saying: Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean. Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow. That speaks of his walk of life: if the Lord will give him the blood that had been dipped with hyssop to sprinkle the lintel and the side posts of the door, which is his walk of life. This sprinkling with the blood was used also for the cleansing of leprosy. They also used hyssop. When a leper came to be cleansed, he was sprinkled with the blood with hyssop, which was to typify the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus, which is the cleansing of sin. The leper had already been cured. We are not talking about justification here. We are talking about sanctification. He had already been delivered from leprosy, but he had to be cleansed from the power of it, from the pollution of it. In Leviticus 14:6-7 it says: “As for the living bird, he shall take it, and the cedar wood, and the scarlet, and the hyssop, and shall dip them and the living bird in the blood of the bird that was killed over the running water. And he shall sprinkle upon him that is to be cleansed from the leprosy seven times, and shall pronounce him clean, and shall let the living bird loose into the open field.” This is a type of the sacrifice of Christ. He says “cleanse me with hyssop,” which is the sprinkling of the blood, to cleanse him from sin. We become whiter than snow when all of our sins are washed away by the cleansing power of the blood of Christ. Before the Holy Spirit spoke, “Thou art the man,” into David’s soul, he could still pass condemnation onto his fellowman, but afterward he saw his spiritual leprosy and his need for cleansing as we see in verses 1 and 2: “Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.” David is talking about that cleansing with hyssop, that cleansing power of the blood. Until the Lord speaks to our soul, “Thou art the man,” our soul has no rest until we have been cleansed. A mere formal religion and intellectual religion does not bring a heart’s desire to be cleansed from the power of sin. That does not bring a hatred for sin. That does not make sin become exceedingly sinful. Conscientiousness of our defilement is not automatically accompanied with a desire for cleansing. You can come under the proclamation of the word and actually come to a full realization of your defilement, but that in itself does not cause a desire for cleansing. The desire for cleansing is the work of the Holy Spirit. It is that work of regeneration. It is that new man of the heart. Jesus said in John 3:19-20: “And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.” They realized they were defiled, but they fled from the light that revealed their defilement, like David did until Nathan spoke to him, and the Lord applied it to his soul. Until the Holy Spirit comes in the heart we see condemnation, and we will flee the light. Sure we can see that we are defiled. We can realize that what we are doing is wrong. We can realize that what we are doing is sin. This though does not put it in the light that David saw in Psalm 51. David knew that when he took Bathsheba he was wrong. David knew that when he told Joab to have Uriah slain that he was wrong, but he was hiding it. He was not coming to the light. Those who flee from the light cannot pray the prayer of our text: “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.” David could not pray the prayer of our text before Nathan spoke to him, “Thou art the man,” because he was hiding his sin. He was not coming to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. He was keeping it secret. The rejoicing of the wicked is in their iniquity, not in hearing the words of God. Those who know their own defilement and those who shun the light rejoice in their iniquity. They do not rejoice as we read in Psalm 51:8: “Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice.” David prayed in verses 9 and 10: “Hide thy face from my sins, and blot out all mine iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” Now David saw the corruption of his soul. He saw the corruption of his human nature. He saw the corruption of his sin. He saw the sinfulness of his sin. He knew his sin before this, but he had never been brought to where he cried out for the cleansing of sin. Continuing in verses 11 to 13 he prayed: “Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit. Then will I teach transgressors thy ways; and sinners shall be converted unto thee.” What a blessing it is my friends, if someone who has been brought under the power of sin, and the Holy Spirit convicts them to see the sinfulness of sin, if that person finds someone he can speak to who can relate to what he is talking about. Now when someone would come to David and say, I have been taken in such a fault, he could reply: I know the power of sin, and I know the sinfulness of sin, and he could teach that person the Lord’s ways. He could teach him that he needs to flee to that hyssop and have his sins sprinkled with the blood of Christ. David prayed in verse 14: “Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation: and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness.” He understood that he was guilty of the blood of Uriah. It went beyond the blood of Uriah though to the blood of the church because he had been guilty of sinning against the second table of the law of love. He had committed adultery, and that is also having blood on his hands. He justly deserved to be put to death. We read in verse 15: “O Lord, open thou my lips; and my mouth shall shew forth thy praise.” There is never a time that a person can sing forth the praises of God like he can when he understands that Christ came to redeem us from all iniquity. David’s reference to hyssop teaches another valuable lesson, that is, his willingness to submit to being cleansed in God’s ordained way. If we rightly understand Psalm 51, we are going to learn a lesson that is powerfully important, and I am going to show you what it is. The preaching of the gospel today is centered on justification and the sacrifice of Christ, but I want to show you what David teaches us in this psalm. David said in verses 16 and 17: “For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.” This is the lesson that Job did not understand. He was a formal religionist. I want to show you the difference between what Job did and what David is teaching us here. Turn with me to Job 1:4-5: “And his sons went and feasted in their houses, every one his day; and sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with them. And it was so, when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all: for Job said, It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts. Thus did Job continually.” David, though, said that God does not desire sacrifice. What Job was missing was the heart. He never trained his children that their hearts should be right before God. He tried to take care of it all with sacrifices. No repentance was taught. Job did not understand the vileness of his own heart, but David said that the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit and a contrite heart. Watch the following verses. This is a tremendous lesson for us to learn. We read in Psalm 51:18-19: “Do good in thy good pleasure unto Zion: build thou the walls of Jerusalem. Then shalt thou be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness, with burnt offering and whole burnt offering: then shall they offer bullocks upon thine altar.” I want you to see that the sacrifice of righteousness goes ahead of the burnt offerings. The sacrifice of righteousness is the sacrifice of a broken heart and a contrite spirit. That has to come before our pleading the blood of Christ. We cannot come and plead the blood of Christ as Job was doing. His sons were feasting and making merry, and then he would offer a burnt offering for it. The Lord has no delight in it. This was the same thing Saul was doing. He disobeyed the Lord by using the best of the sheep and cattle for a sacrifice to Him. We cannot plead justification under the sacrifice of Jesus Christ until we understand what it is to be cleansed in the heart. We need that hyssop. We need that blood on the two door posts and on the lintel of the door so the destroying angel will pass over because he sees our walk of life. Now we can start pleading the burnt offerings. Satan loves overreaction. On one hand, he wants us to slight the authority of God’s word as Jesus warned against in Matthew 5:19: “Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” On the other side of this principle, Satan would load us with legalistic commandments that God has no pleasure in as we see in Isaiah 1:12: “When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your hand, to tread my courts?” Who has asked you to even come within the walls of my house? Continuing in verses 13 to 15 we read: “Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary to bear them. And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.” These verses confirm that the Lord has absolutely no pleasure in sacrifices when the heart is not right. When the heart is not right these sacrifices are an abomination to Him. That their hands were full of blood showed that they had not repented of their sins. Continuing in verses 16 to 18 we read: “Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil; Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow. Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” What was missing? In all this ritual, the people came and offered sacrifices and attended solemn assemblies, but this wearied the Lord. Their hands were full of blood. There was no repentance. David understood what was missing. He realized his hands were full of blood as we see in Psalm 51:16: “For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering.” David is saying, I understand the filthiness and pollution of my sin, and I do not need to bring a burnt offering. I know it would not be pleasing in your sight. I need to come before you with a humble and contrite heart. That is the sacrifice the Lord will be pleased with. He says in Psalm 51:19: “Then shalt thou be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness, with burnt offering and whole burnt offering: then shall they offer bullocks upon thine altar.” After the heart is broken and contrite, then there is a place for the sacrifice. Then we can start talking about pardon. See how abominable it is to only preach the blood of Christ and sacrifices without repentance. Then we come under what the Lord says in Isaiah 1: Away with it. It is an abomination to me. See what we read in Psalm 51:14: “Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation: and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness.” David understood that he had blood on his hands and that he needed to repent and be cleansed by the perfect sacrifice before a sacrifice would be acceptable. He said in verse 15: “O Lord, open thou my lips; and my mouth shall shew forth thy praise.” He saw that he needed the Lord to open his mouth before Him, that he would be able to come before the throne to seek for mercy. Continuing in verses 16 and 17 he said: “For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.” As long as David knew he had blood on his hands, he knew that he could not bring a burnt offering and please the Lord. His heart had to be cleansed, and that cleansing had to start with the hyssop, not with the burnt offering. That is why our text says, “Purge me with hyssop.” He did not say, Purge me with a burnt offering. This repenting spirit, this desire to be cleansed from all sin, this desire to be whiter than snow is what was missing in Isaiah 1:12-15, which talks about all of the sacrifices in which the Lord was not pleased. See what the Lord said in 1:16-18: “Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil; Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow. Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” This is what David was praying for. He was praying for a new heart. He said in Psalm 51:10: “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” He was not praying for pardon. He wanted to be cleansed with hyssop. He wanted to be washed from his sin. He wanted to be washed from the pollution of his sin. He wanted that blood washed off of his hands, so he could now bring his sacrifice as we see in verse 19: “Then shalt thou be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness, with burnt offering and whole burnt offering: then shall they offer bullocks upon thine altar.” We have to be cleansed before we can seek a pardon. We cannot preach pardon to those who are walking in sin. The Lord Jesus Christ did not come to save His church in their sins. He came to save them from their sins. You will seldom find a darker shade of guilt than David was convicted of. I want you to stop and think of the tremendous lesson we learn in this history of David. God had placed David in the highest position of public trust, yet he had yielded to the worst passions. Do you know what a fiduciary is? He is one in whom there is no tolerance for injustice, because he has been entrusted with others’ money. Think of the position David was placed in. David was the king of Israel, but he had committed murder and adultery. He had killed a man and stolen his wife. What two passions could be worse for a man to yield to—adultery and murder. This Psalm pours out the breathings of a wounded spirit touched with the richest sensibilities of spiritual feelings. Look how he grieved as he pled before the Lord. Both sides of our twofold being are revealed here. It reveals something in us so near to hell, yet it also reveals something so strangely near to God, that humble and contrite spirit. This is such a paradox. David had come so close to hell, yet he was plucked as a brand from the burning. He was pardoned and was now not primarily concerned with being slain for his sins, but he was concerned about the pollution of his sins. The knowledge of his sin humbled David so grievously before the Lord. Beloved, does not this Psalm give a blessed revelation of the spiritual warfare within the regenerate heart, as we see what it is to struggle against the power of sin? In this occasion of David’s fall, we see the germs of the most heinous crimes in the most stately saint. When we examine our own hearts, we see the seeds of sin. As the Lord reveals to us the thoughts and intents of our hearts, we see our human nature that had fallen in paradise. We see the perfect preciousness in Christ as He took on our human nature, without sin, to be our substitute. We read in 1 Kings 15:5: “Because David did that which was right in the eyes of the LORD, and turned not aside from any thing that he commanded him all the days of his life, save only in the matter of Uriah the Hittite.” Think of the grief this brought in his life. When you and I examine our own hearts, can we say: except in only one case did our hearts really stray from the Lord? Solomon’s heart was not right before the Lord. With his heart, he served other gods. David’s heart though turned not aside except in the matter of Uriah the Hittite. The Lord forgave him. The greatest lesson we can learn from God allowing His servant David to fall into Satan’s snares is how pleased God is in our unconditional surrender to His will. We read in Psalm 51:16-17: “For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.” This is a heart that is in total, unconditional surrender to the will of God. Even in the sacrifice of Christ, it was not the pain, the blood, the death with which the Father was so pleased. These satisfied the penalty against sin, but it was Christ’s obedience unto death, even the death of the cross, which was His highest evidence of His complete and unconditional surrender to the will of His Father. Therein was the Father so glorified. You and I must learn to understand what it is to be conformed to the image of Christ. As the Holy Spirit works grace in our hearts, and as we mature in grace, we become unconditionally surrendered to His will. It is our conformity to this image of Christ that is so pleasing to the Father. We see this in Psalm 34:15-16: “The eyes of the LORD are upon the righteous, and his ears are open unto their cry. The face of the LORD is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth.” In these two verses we have such a profound proclamation of the gospel. The righteous are those whose hearts are surrendered to the will of God. Continuing in verses 17 and 18 we read: “The righteous cry, and the LORD heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles. The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.” Are we talking about salvation? Are we talking about the elements of salvation? Are we talking about the evidence of salvation? Where is our evidence of salvation? Do we truly understand what it is to fear the Lord? Do we understand what it is to have a heart in total surrender to the will of God? Do we understand what it says in Proverbs 8:13: “The fear of the LORD is to hate evil: pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I hate”? The Lord says He is against those who do evil. Those who do evil do so in pride, arrogance and self-promotion. Who are the righteous? We read about them in Philippians 2:1-7. They are those who have the mind of Christ, those who prefer others ahead of themselves, those who have consolation in Christ.