Turn your face away from my sins and blot out all my guilt.  God, create a clean heart for me and renew a steadfast spirit within me.  Do not banish me from your presence or take Your Holy Spirit from me.  Restore the joy of your salvation to me, and give me a willing spirit.  Then I will teach the rebellious your ways, and sinners will return to You.  Save me from the guilt of bloodshed, God the God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.  Psalm 51:9-14 HCSB

This Psalm was written by David.  Even if you haven’t spent a lot of time in the Bible, then you probably heard the story of David and Goliath.  David was the little shepherd boy that slayed the giant, Goliath, with just a slingshot and a stone.  This was when an entire army was afraid and confounded and didn’t know how to defeat this giant.  Great story, right?  Well, it gets better.  David is a very faithful man of God.  He obeys God even down to not killing the very man that tries over and over to kill him.  He has the perfect opportunity to sneak up on the guy in a cave and kill him, but David did not feel that this is what God wanted him to do, so he didn’t.  God blessed David for his faithful obedience and made him a mighty warrior and made him king.  But, David messed up and he messed up in a big way.  You see that same David ended up committing adultery, getting the woman pregnant and killing her husband in an attempt to cover his sin.  Now’s that some pretty big sins, right, adultery and murder.  But we must remember that there are no little sins and big sins, there is just sin.  It all carries the same weight.  Our gossiping and little white lies nailed Jesus to the cross just as David’s adultery and murder did.  David wrote this Psalm after having repented for his sin.

Romans 3:23 tells us that All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.  None of us are righteous in our own right.  But praise God even when we fail, we can be redeemed.  We can be restored.  Our sins can be washed clean by the blood of Jesus.  God can create a clean heart and renew a steadfast spirit in us.  Roman 5:1 tells us what we are justified by our faith.  Our pastor defines justified as “just as if I’d never sinned”.  We can be redeemed.

Now as you are reading this today, I don’t know what your situation is.  Maybe you have been a mighty warrior for Christ for many years and strive to do your best everyday.  Maybe you have been a mighty warrior for many years but struggle with unrepentant sin in your life.  Maybe you are holding on to sin and you just can’t let go.  Maybe you have been drowning in sin for years and feel weak and helpless to change.  Whatever your current situation, know that God is there for you.  Know that even if you have failed, he can pick you up and wash you white as snow.  Know that He loves you and wants you to turn to Him.

I don’t know about you, but I know that I try my best to do what God wants me to do.  There are times when I fail.  There are times when the devil gets the best of me.

We must remember that there was only one man to ever walk the face of this earth and live a perfect, sin free life.  This was Jesus Christ.  He died a horrible, humiliating, agonizingly painful death so we not-so-perfect people could have eternal life through Him.  He paid the price for our sins.  He paid a debt that we could not afford to pay.

He does not force this salvation on us, we have a choice.  We can accept it or we can reject it.  The choice is ours.  The term “miserable failure” has applied to me more times than I care to recount.  But praise God, He has washed me white as snow.  Praise God, I have been given a chance to try again.  And praise God, I know that with His help I can succeed.

If you want to be successful at this thing called life, then turn to God.  He has a wonderful instruction manual complete with illustrations of those who have done it right and those who have messed up horribly.  Some came to Him, repented, and made things right and some did not.  I pray that you will get it right today.  None of us know how long we have on planet earth. We are not guaranteed to live to a certain age.  Please, turn to God today.  Let Him create a new heart in you and renew your steadfast spirit.  Pray this Psalm today and allow God to redeem you.

Have a great day!