Sermon for 3rd Lenten Midweek Service: "Fall and Redemption"

 + Lenten Midweek 3 – March 15^th, 2023 +

Psalm 51

Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church

Milton, WA

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 

There you are one day cleaning out your garage or a closet or some shelves in your basement and before you see it, you smell it. That musty. Dirty. Earthy smell. Then you see it. Black and green residue covering one box, then two, then three. Ugh. It’s everywhere. What happened? Where did this come from? How did things get so bad?

 

Find the source and you’ll find the answer. There’s a cracked pipe, a clogged drain, and moisture has been seeping in. 

 

Quite often, our lives feel like those boxes covered in mold, or those window sills that start to dry rot. Where did I go so wrong? Where did that thought, that word, that sin come from? How did I end up here?

 

In Psalm 51, our Lord gives us the answer. 

 

Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
    and in sin did my mother conceive me.

That’s not something you write on your mother’s day card, but it’s true of all of us. It’s what we call original sin. Or the chief sin. David’s words in Psalm 51 diagnose our underlying spiritual condition. Psalm 51 plumbs the depths of our fallen sinful hearts to reveal the source of the problem: a corruption so deep in our fallen human nature that there is nothing healthy, nothing uncorrupted remains within or without. We are born this way. We sin because we are sinners. Not the other way around. As we confess on Sunday mornings, we are by nature sinful and unclean…and as a result…we have sinned in thought, word, and deed by what we have done and what we have left undone. We have not loved God with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves.

 

For I know my transgressions,
    and my sin is ever before me.
⁴ Against you, you only, have I sinned
    and done what is evil in your sight,

 

Psalm 51 is David’s confession. Not only his lust of Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba. Not only his adultery with Bathsheba. Not only his murder of Uriah. He confesses those sins, but he also confesses the deeper condition. Sin itself. The source. The sin that he conceived in his life was born of the sin that he was conceived in even before he was born. Like a good plumber or doctor, David goes to the source of our problem. We too are heirs of corruption. Sons of Adam and daughters of Eve. Conceived and born in sin. And that sin in which we are conceived, conceives yet more evil. Like David we see the symptoms: our lust, greed, and selfishness. The deeper we go, the darker it gets. 

 

If, in this psalm, is hidden the depth of our Sin, so too, in this psalm, our Lord has hidden the greater depth of his rescue from our sin.

 

For hidden in this psalm is the story of another David. The conception and birth of one who changes everything.

 

Think back to Christmas for a moment. To Luke 1 and Gabriel’s announcement to the Virgin Mary. Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.  And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus.

 

Conceived in Mary’s womb, is the answer to David’s sin and our sin. Conceived in Mary’s womb is a greater David who is like us in every way, except without sin. Jesus’ conception and birth changes everything. 

 

If there’s not a single cell of sanctity within us, not a drop of original purity in us, then our only rescue and our only hope is found outside ourselves and in someone else. In the Son of Adam, the Son of David, the Son of Mary the Son of God. For you, Jesus is conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary.

 

If our conception is sinful, we need one whose conception is pure for us. If our birth is in sin, we need someone whose birth is holy for us. If our lives are a constant display of selfishness, greed, lust, we need one whose life is full of righteousness, who resisted every temptation, who kept every divine Law for us.

 

That’s why Jesus, the Son of God came to us through the womb…passing through every stage of life for us, and he did so perfectly. Through Jesus’ perfect life and death we receive perfection in Him.

 

Christ was not conceived for himself but for you. He was not born for himself, but for you. He did not live and keep the Father’s commandments for himself, but for you. Our Lord Jesus did not die and suffer and rise again for himself, but for you.

 

Psalm 51 is David’s prayer of repentance but it’s so much more. It’s also our prayer of repentance. And even more than that, it’s a promise and proclamation of a new and better David who has come, whose conception conceives in us hope, redemption, and forgiveness of sin and all our sins. 

 

When we confess, Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin! That’s exactly what Jesus does. He washes. Renews. Restores. Redeems. Rescues. Reconciles you.

 

Jesus, the new David, blots out our transgressions. He washes you in holy water. He hides his face from our sin and creates in you a clean heart; his Spirit dwells with you by his word and water and promise. 

 

In Jesus, the new David, you are cleansed. Washed. Whiter than snow. From his conception to his cross, from the full womb to his empty tomb, Jesus is your Savior. 

 

 

In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.