“Have mercy on me, O God, because of your UNFAILING LOVE. Because of your great compassion, BLOT OUT the stain of MY SINS.” (Psa. 51:1)
The title of this psalm gives the tragic setting for David’s plea. He had sinned in adultery with Bathsheba, and in the murder of her husband Uriah, then in covering his sin, and in hardness against repentance. It took the bold confrontation of Nathan the Prophet to shake David from this (2 Samuel 12), once shaken, David came in great honesty and brokenness before God. David used several words to speak of the kindness he desired from God. Mercy, implies God’s loving assistance to the pitiful. Unfailing love, (lovingkindness) points to the continuing operation of this mercy. Compassion, (tender mercies) teaches that God has sympathy for our infirmities.
“WASH ME THOROUGHLY from my iniquity. Purify me from my sin. For I recognize my rebellion; it haunts me day and night.” (Psa. 51:2-3) The word of God through Nathan the Prophet worked like a mirror to show David how DIRTY AND STAINED HE WAS. He had lived in that condition for some time (perhaps a year) without an acknowledgement of his iniquity and sin. Now the sense of the stain drove him to beg to be cleansed. “Wash me thoroughly”, Hebrew multiply to wash me; by which phrase he implies the greatness of his guilt, and the insufficiency of all legal washings, and the absolute necessity of some other and better thing to wash him.
“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.” (Psa. 51: 4) In an objective sense this was not true. David had sinned against Bathsheba, Uriah, their families, his family, his kingdom, and in a sense even against his own body (1 Corin. 6:18). Yet all of that faded into the background as he considered the greatness of his sin AGAINST GOD. He rightly felt as if, against You, You only, have I sinned.
Create in me a CLEAN HEART, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me. Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, make me willing TO OBEY YOU… (Psa. 51:10, 12)
-Bill Stockham