In Psalm 56, the message centers on faith when you are afraid. Explore Psalm 56 and discover how faith responds to fear, why we can trust God under pressure, and what it means to place confidence in His Word. Rather than treating the passage as abstract theology, the sermon traces what these truths reveal about God, the gospel, and the way followers of Jesus are called to live.
The teaching brings biblical truth into the places where faith becomes deeply personal: fear, uncertainty, suffering, desire, and the questions we carry about what comes next. It invites listeners to let Scripture shape their perspective instead of allowing circumstances, emotions, or cultural assumptions to have the final word. The emphasis is on a durable hope that changes how we think, pray, endure, and respond in the present.
Along the way, the message engages themes including Psalm 56, faith when you are afraid, heart, david. These ideas help place the primary passage within the larger story of Scripture and show how its theology speaks to real spiritual formation. At its heart, the sermon helps answer questions such as: What does Psalm 56 teach about faith when you are afraid? It also considers how should faith when you are afraid shape the way Christians live?
For someone studying this passage, exploring the Christian faith, or looking for practical biblical teaching, this sermon offers a clear path from the text to everyday discipleship. The invitation is to hear what Scripture says, receive it with humility, and take the next faithful step in following Jesus.
What does Psalm 56 teach about faith when you are afraid? | How should faith when you are afraid shape the way Christians live? | How can believers apply Psalm 56 in everyday life?
Psalm 56, faith when you are afraid
-
We are in our final week of Psalms. Uh the first week was Psalm 1 where it's blessed is the person who walks with God at the center of your life and not walk with all the dusty sons out there. Um Psalm 23 uh God is my shepherd. He is with us and his love is chasing us down. It was so good Jay the just the reminder of that in worship today. Last week was Psalm 73 and uh talking about doubt. Doubt is is normal and we handle that doubt in the presence of God. Amen. Today we are in Psalm 51. If you have your Bibles, turn with me to Psalm 51. And we're talking about responding to sin. We're talking about how do we respond when we fail and how do we grieve God? So, right right out the gate, like this is going to feel like a very heavy message, but the reason that it's heavy is because the enemy hates this. The enemy doesn't like us handling the sin in our lives. He'd much rather us walk in sin and keep following Jesus and coming to church. He would much rather us compartmentalize the sin in our lives into one area and let it not touch our faith and our walk. and and so that we can feel good in what we're doing. But let me ask this question. Have any of you ever made a mistake? >> And and I'm not I'm not just talking about like putting salt in your coffee instead of sugar. I mean like you've made a mistake that that you were doing something wrong. It's impacted your life. It's impacted your family's life. It's hurt others, >> right? >> It's just me. I'm the only one with my hands up, guys. Just just saying. As humans, we're prone to m make mistakes, right? We're prone to to sin. but how we respond when we sin and how do we how really ask the question how do we respond to God and to people when we sin because as a as a Christian movement many times we've kind of cheapened forgiveness and maybe maybe that's just me I'm hoping I can show you this today we've we've cheapened grace and we've cheapened repentance and a great example of this is like if you make a mistake or or you sin or you do something wrong many times we just go ah God forgive me. Right? Boom. God forgave me. We're moving on. Right? I'm not the only one who's done that. But what would happen if we actually grieved and processed that? So before we read Psalm 51, I really want to show us the setup for for why this verse was actually written because it's really in a response to this really terrible sin that David walked in in 2 Samuel 11. King David, he stays home during the season of war. meant throughout the throughout the years there were different seasons in life where kings would go out to war. But for whatever reason, David decides to stay home while everyone else is going out into battle. And this is already kind of a setup because David, he's a warrior. He belonged on the battlefield, but he stayed back. And while he's home, he sees a woman bathing naked on a rooftop. And her name is Beth Sheba, and uh she's really hot. Um, she's married to Uriah, which is one of David's most loyal elite soldiers. David is also married, but he abuses his power as King David, and he brings Beth Sheeba to himself and sleeps with her, and she becomes pregnant. So again, this could have been like a one-time thing. And I'm not trying to to downplay the sin, but just kind of put yourself in this scenario. Like this could have been easily a one-time thing, and he could have covered it up as the king. But then because she gets pregnant, now he has to do an even bigger cover up. And so he calls Uriah home. and he's hoping that that this rest period that he'll go spend time with Beth Sheeba and that the pregnancy could end up being explained. But Uriah refuses. He comes home, but he stays in the palace. Like he's such a man of integrity. He's like, "I can't go home and see my wife while all of my brothers are sitting on the battlefield." And then David tries to get him drunk and he still won't go home. So again, it's sin after sin, all these things that David is trying to do to cover up what he's done with Basheba. And finally, David sends him back to battle with orders that guarantee his death, put him in the the center of of of the most action and fighting, put him on the front line, and Uriah is killed. Bathsheba mourns, and then David marries her, and then they have the baby. It's an awful story. And then scripture says at the end of this, the thing that David had done displeased the Lord. The lying, the affair, the premeditated murder, these are all reasons to disqualify or cancel a person or even have them killed with capital punishment and be imprisoned. It's premeditated murder. But the Bible calls David a man after God's own heart. But honestly, who would like to follow a man like this? Like, if you found out that your friend slept with their buddy's wife, got her pregnant, had him killed, you'd probably testify against him in the trial that would inevitably air on Netflix at some point, like Johnny Depp or something. You know, we'd all want to be in that trial, right? It's like, hey, you did this. But, so what is it about David that makes him a man after God's heart? The Lord exposed his sin and how David responds actually reveals his heart. Because how you respond to your sin says more about your devotion to God than what you actually did. >> Right? >> King David, he initially tries to cover all this up, the adultery, the deception, the murder. But then this really annoying pastor shows up to his house. >> Those pesky pastors. >> Nathan. Yeah. Thank you for the Yeah. Don't you love it when the pastor shows up and starts poking around your life, right? Pastor Nathan exposes David and says, "God knows everything that you did >> AND GOD IS SO furious with you, it's going to cost you the death of this child." David, he laments before the Lord. And for seven days, he eats nothing and just begs God on his face laying on the floor, begging God to save this baby. And then he writes this psalm, Psalm 51. And on day seven, the baby dies. As a follower of Jesus, I make mistakes. I sin. I screw up. And there's times where I can get into cover up mode and hope that nobody saw that or I hope my wife didn't see this or I hope my pastor doesn't find out about this. Y'all know what I'm saying? >> But God knows. And the process of this Psalm 51 could change everything for us if we would begin to walk this out. And so, if you're taking notes, I've got five points and I'm going to try to go as quick as possible here. But the first one is humility leads repentance or lead with humility. In Psalm 51, we're going to see David's humility leading the way. But again, in this story with Basheba, David has shown his pride, his ego, his power, his control, which you could easily say this is a normal attitude for a dude, right? But then God gave him the gift of exposure. Y'all, it's a gift. When God calls you out and exposes what we've hidden, it is a gift from God. And we can get really MAD AT GOD. WHY DID YOU let this come out? Cuz he loves you. >> David's first response in all of this in this psalm was to walk in humility. Verse one, it says, "Have mercy on me, oh God, according to your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy." Again, David, he can't undo what he's done. How many you know you can't undo what you've done or take back the things that you said. He can't bring back Uriah. He can't erase the deception. He can't force Bethsheba or anybody to trust him ever again. So, he throws himself completely on God's mercy. And this is humility. Humility admits, "I did this and I can't fix it. I'm not excusing it. I need God. That is humility. And and and the mercy that that God is showing. Mercy is is God choosing not to give you what you deserve because David deserved death. According to scripture, he should have been stoned to death because of committing adultery. And then he goes on and he says, "Blot out my transgressions." Again, David, he tried to delete what happened, but he needs God to blot it out. Blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. Wash me. Cleanse me. We we we've cheapened and sterilized language like this. >> These kinds of prayers, right, that because the prideful posture says, "God, forgive me until I do it again." Or God, you know my heart. It's okay. Or God, this is how I've been wired. This is my tendency. And again, it's our tendency and it's our nature to cover up our stuff, to excuse things away or to compare and say things like, "Oh, at least I didn't do insert worse sin in our mind here, right? I may have stolen from my job, but at least I didn't cheat on my spouse with the secretary. You're right. Keep stealing. You're right. Some of us, God's exposing things even right now. Things that you've been trying to cover up. Secret apps, secret accounts, hidden places, things that nobody else knows about. But guess what? God knows. God knows. And he loves you so much that he sent an annoying pastor like me to give you the gift of exposure. Because I'll be honest, I'd rather expose your stuff than my stuff. >> Hey, cuz I I hate sermons like this. But you know why I hate it? Because my flesh hates it and because the enemy hates it. Because if we can step into this, we can change. If we can start walking through this process of true repentance, we can begin to grow into who Jesus created us to be. Again, no more of this compartmentalization in our faith. One of my mentors says, "You're only as healthy as your secrets." That'll preach all day. You're only as healthy as your secrets. So, will you start with humility or will pride leave you into covering up or making excuses? is telling God that you can't change or saying that I was born this way or or maybe we make the excuse like God if you had the the trauma drama daddy mama problems like me you would act this way too this is who I am or have you ever heard somebody make it an excuse like using their inagram as the excuse of why they did what they did like my inagram it's a seven guys like imagine if God was like oh you're right I'm so sorry I didn't realize I was dealing with a for you know like you're okay bud like you honey boo boo you do you know it's okay God doesn't work that way God cares about you becoming more like Jesus that we would live this axio life that we would live in a manner worthy of the calling that he has for us and if you're living in sin and you won't repent you're not living worthy wants to say you know big sky daddy is mad at you or that he hates you. No, he hates the sin and he's called you to live at a higher standard. So again, first we lead with humility. We humble ourselves. Second, we show real sorrow. And we've we've distorted and we've perverted the idea of God's grace and forgiveness. Like again, God, I stole from my job. It wasn't that much. Please forgive me. Amen. God, my children hate me. I guess I did something wrong. God, forgive me. Help my kids to get over it. Amen. Right. Or God, I looked at that website again that I know I shouldn't have, but I knew you'd forgive me like always, so forgive me. Amen. We do something wrong and then we demand God's forgiveness like children. Like remember growing up, my mom probably remembers this, and you're hitting your sibling in the face in the back of the car. Maybe it was just me. I just Lucas has that face that's just so punchable, you know? And then mom or dad yells, "STOP IT." AND SAY you're sorry. Say you're sorry. And then you roll your eyes and you mumble, "Sorry." And then your brother just smirks at you and says, "Thank you." And neither of you meant it. Right? We made sorry the language of forgiveness, but that has no sorrow. Like I've had people, and maybe you've had this too, where you've had like very Christian people will come to me and say, "I know that I hurt you, but whatever. I'm forgiven." Like, "God forgave me, so let's move on and forget it." Has that ever happened to you? Maybe it's just me, but how is that sorrow? Or like I I've gotten into arguments with my wife, my beautiful wife, who's sitting here on the front row, and I'll tell you what, a disingenuous apology restarts more fights than ends them. Yeah. >> All the married people like, "Yeah, >> I'm sorry, babe." Okay. And then she's like, "Oh, really?" And then the lamp starts flying in my direction, you know? >> Yeah. Listen, she's never thrown at it. She's never thrown anything at me that big before. Um >> Yeah. Yeah. Love you. Listen, that's not sorrow. Sorrow is realizing that I've grieved God. Look at this verse three. For I know my transgressions and my sin is ever before me. Again, I know my struggles, my issues, my vices, my temptations. And then verse four, this is it right here. Against you and you alone have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight. Against you alone. He's talking to God. Can you imagine like Beth Sheba reading this and going, "Are you serious? You didn't sin against me? like what about my husband? This doesn't make like hello and we'll get to the collateral damage later. But David is saying only God have I sinned against. It doesn't mean that Bath Sheba and Uriah don't matter. It means that for the believer, get this, the deepest wound of sin is grieving the heart of God. If it grieves God, it should have no place in our lives. Sin damages people. Yes, but it first breaks our relationship with God. And Paul even in the New Testament says, "Don't grieve the spirit of God." David says, "So that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment." He's saying, "God, you're right to call this wrong." Because God, you're blameless. You're perfect. Verse 5, "Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me." No, just get this for a second. He's not saying, you know, oh, it's my sinful nature, you know, I was born this way as an excuse for the sin. Because he goes on, he says, behold, you delight in truth in the inward being, and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart. God, you grieve with my sin, and you delight in the truth. You delight in the exposure. You delight in this coming into the light, in the inward being. you're teaching me. There's wisdom in the secret place, in the secret heart. This is where God wants to do work. This is where God wants to do business within your life. It's within your heart. Because again, God sees our behavior, but he wants to change our hearts. Sorrow from sin will end up producing wisdom. In Romans 2:4, it's the kindness of God that leads us to repentance. His kindness lets you grieve over your sin and in the process you're transformed by it. Jesus said in Mark 7:21, "For from within, out of the heart of man come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All of these evil things come from within and they defile a person. Out of the overflow of your heart, that's where we're vindictive, bitter, lying, deceitful. That's where the wickedness comes from. Again, we we can try to change all the behaviors, but if we don't address the heart, then it's religious, right? out of your heart leads into your actions and your emotions and your word. And so David, he's in sorrow because of his heart. He's recognizing like, I need a changed heart. And he can't compartmentalize his heart from his actions and live in this dualistic faith like like let me just come into the presence of God and feel good and comforted but if I have to address my sin I ignore that because it's uncomfortable or changing my life will disturb my peace. But this is where we have to grow and why David was called a man after God's own heart. because he chose to respond with, "My heart is in the wrong place and it needs to change." James said this in James 1:14, "But each person is tempted when he's lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death." David is saying, "Change my desires, God." He doesn't accept this is the way that I am. He's saying, "God, I can't do this alone." And that's humility and brokenness before God. Look at this. He says this in verse 7. He says, "Purge me with hissup." Y'all know what hissup is? Hup is like this. It looks like this weed. And they they actually used hip to put blood over the door frames during Passover when the the Israelites were about to leave Egypt. And so hipup was actually used um for for cleansing things like priests would take hissup they dip it in water and they'd smack people that were unclean in the temple mostly like lepers and things like that really to signify that there's purification taking place. So when David is saying this, he's using priestly language. He's saying purge me with the hissip. And and and many of you know the the word purge, it's not this like just an outward thing. Purging is like throwing up. When we purge, we force ourselves to throw up to bring it out of us. And so he's saying, "Would you purge me? Would you bring this out from within me and make me pure?" It's kind of gross language, but it's like it's it's also priestly language in this. He wants to be clean. Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow. Get this out of me. Purge me. Purge and cleanse me. I don't want to cover this up. Number three, restore your joy. Verse 10 and 12. This this is really the like the verse that we need to memorize out of any other verses within this this chapter. Maybe get a tattoo of it. I don't know. Underline it. Do something. But verse 10, it says this. Create in me a clean heart, oh God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence and take not your holy spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit. I love that. Restore me to the joy of my salvation. Like, do y'all remember when you got saved? Maybe some of y'all still need to get saved in this room. That's okay. We'll get there. But when you first get saved, there's like this there's this joy and this excitement like look what God has done in my life. Like Jesus saved me. I got the joy joy joy joy down in my heart where just kid but I'll tell you what there's also been seasons in my life where newly saved people annoy the mess out of me right like someone gives their heart to Jesus and they're just so fired up and I'm like chill like Jesus saved me too like maybe be saved for 5 years and then then you'll understand like just you need to calm down right cuz I'm so holy and sophisticated right? Like you you need to chill out. But really, that's the wrong heart, >> right? >> We we need the joy of this of our salvation. We need to be walking in that joy daily. LIKE, HOW AWESOME IS IT THAT THAT Jesus set me free? He died on the cross for me. >> Like, I can now be in relationship with God because of what Jesus did for me. Like, it should fill us with joy and excitement. But again, when we have this jaded, wrong heart, really, when we've drifted, we've drifted away. When we stop delighting in that joy, >> David had drifted. And drifting always kills joy. He stopped being where God called him to be. And a callous heart became a dangerous heart. The absence of joy created that vacuum that sin decided to fill. But for us, joy is a guard rail against sin. If you're not joyful in your relationship with God, your guard rails are down. Joy makes obedience delightful and not burdensome. Like when you're excited to obey God, that's a good sign. But when obedience is a burden, there's something that needs to change in your heart. But look at this. Look at this language again in this verse. Create in me a clean heart. Renew a right spirit. Cast me not away. Take not your spirit. Restore to me the joy. These are all like restorative and sort of removal words like I've been in your presence. Don't take me away. Like I've I've encountered you. Don't let your spirit leave me. Except for create. Like all of these things are sort of speaking in past tense. But create is present tense. There's a huge shift in that language here. He says, "But first create in me a clean heart." It doesn't say recreate. >> Yeah. >> Get that for a second. It doesn't say recreate. It doesn't He's not saying I had a pure heart. Now recreate me a new one. Look at this. David had walked with God for decades. He had written psalms. He had worshiped in the temple. He battled giants. He knew the presence of God and yet he never had a pure heart because we see the scripture here and he says create create as if it's never been done before. And and here's the thing. Some of you love worship. You love singing songs about Jesus, but you don't love purity. Some of us, we love coming to church, but we don't love having a clean heart. Some of us love preaching and and podcasts and and studying the word of God, but we don't love purity. Like, we can be close to God in the natural, but far from him in our hearts. Right? David says, "Restore, renew, redo. Don't remove me, but create in me a new heart. Do a a new thing that has yet to be done. Because I've done all of the things on the exterior, but I only you, God, can do and create a new thing in my heart. Like, I've been following God for a minute, but I've drifted. I've blown it. I've been exposed. I've done all the church activities. Now God, would you create in me a clean heart? I've tried to do all this by myself, but only you can change my heart. Out of the overflow of your heart is your life. And so, do you have a pure heart? Now, I'm not asking you if you have holy behaviors. Do you have a clean heart? Because that's where God wants to do his greatest work within you. Again, he's way less concerned about your behaviors than he is your heart. Why? Because your heart overflows into your behaviors. >> Let's deal with the heart first, then we can deal with all the other stuff. The other stuff is easy once the heart is right. David has been serving the Lord for close to 40 years. And finally, he says, "Create a purified heart in me." Repentance is a beautiful word. Again, we we we've talked about it before, but the word metaninoeo, Jesus says it and it's literally saying it's a it's a 180°ree turn where you're facing this way and now I'm going and I'm heading in the other direction away from what I was just walking into. That is repentance. It's not just God, I'm sorry. It's Lord, I've grieved your heart. I've I've I've walked into things that and said things and and done things that you don't desire me to do. And I want to turn away from that and begin to walk with a clean heart with you. In John 1:9, it says if we confess, if we would confess our sin, he's faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us. And that's the God we serve. But here's the thing. We we we can enjoy Christianity knowing that God forgives us but live without the excitement of walking in purity and we miss out on seeing God. Like this is my this is my favorite scripture in the whole Bible. It's Matthew 5'8. Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God. What a promise that is. You want to see God? Purify your heart. Allow the Lord to create in you a pure heart. Number one, lead with humility. Number two, show sorrow. Number three, restore your joy. And number four, decide to change. Again, it's a decision. It's not just boohoo, I'm sorry, I cried and we're all good. But now you have to decide to turn away. Many Christians, we want deliverance without discipline. We want an altar moment without daily surrender. We want God to remove temptation from our lives without us removing access to the temptation. Like if you if you want freedom, you may need some guard rails. If you want purity, you may need accountability. If you want restoration, you may need to change your environment. Like sometimes the most spiritual thing that you can do is delete the app. or confess to a mentor. Or maybe you need to move out or break up or quit the job that's leading you into temptation. Again, repentance is not just tears and sorrow. It's deciding to change. It's a decision. Like I can't tell you how many times I've come to the altar or the front of some room that that we're having a worship service in and I begin to pray and cry and feel so bad for what I had done and then I turn around and I go right back to what I was doing before because I didn't actually make a decision. I just felt sorry for what I did. That is not repentance. Repentance is turning away. It's deciding to follow Jesus. I have decided to follow Jesus. No turning back. No turning back. And it doesn't mean that you're being perfect. It means that you're being purified, that you're walking out that purification. And David is determined to change and also help others to change. Look at this verse 13. Then I will teach transgressors your ways and sinners will return to you. Like like being able to show people here is how I repented and how I overcame this sin and temptation in my life and now I can guide other people in the process of getting back to Jesus. >> That's what we're called to do. It's not let's all get in a circle and cry about what we've done. No, let's make changes together. Let me show you what God has led me in in this season to overcome this temptation. Come on. Many of us have temptations in our lives that in one season they tempted us, but now I'm dealing with other temptations. I've I've overcome this one. And how many times have we run into people in our lives that they're dealing with temptations that we've already faced and God is calling you to show them the way? Again, being missionaries to them. Verse 14, deliver me from blood guiltiness. Oh God, oh God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness. Oh Lord, open my lips and my mouth will declare your praise. Like it's really hard to step into ungodliness when you're worshiping God like this in purity, right? And you're telling people what it means to live for God. But let me let me just swing another direction here because many Christians have lifted their hands in the sanctuary only to use those hands later to beat their wife and kids. You're speaking in tongues only to gossip and slander later in English. And Christians with have godly character on Sunday for the three minutes during the the meet and greet time. And then Monday through Saturday, they're unrecognizable in the kingdom of God. Like, don't get me wrong, like there's there's stories of that and we and we've seen that. But here's the thing. As for me, as for us, as for this church, we will live worthy of repentance. Like, don't get it twisted. God is calling us so much higher. And we're no longer going to be in this place as a church, as a people, where we're living one way on Sunday and differently Monday through Saturday. God has called us so much higher. He's called us to be live worthy of the gospel, worthy of repentance, and worthy of the call that he has for us. The pure in heart will see God. And that is our desire. Now, I I had a buddy who was so addicted to his phone. It was just hours hours on end. I don't know. Do you guys have your tracker on your phone? It tells you how many hours you've been on your phone. This one's like, you turned it off. Okay, cool. It's like 10 to 12 hours a day that he's just locked in on social media and and doom scrolling and all the things. And his wife and kids were ready to leave him because he just couldn't break out, couldn't connect. and he came to a a service like this and and the Holy Spirit finally got a hold of him and he said enough is enough. And when the preacher finished his message, he runs up to the front with his phone and he starts smashing it till his hand started bleeding on the stage. Just destroying his phone. Please don't do that this morning. Okay, I'm just All right. But now he uses a dumb phone. Have you all seen those dumb phones? Yeah. >> No internet access, >> right? >> All he has is is texting and Google Maps and that's about it. That's it. >> Because he he knew he had to make a decision in order to overcome this sin in his life. He had to turn away. Again, it's it's easy to feel sorry for what you did, but if you're not going to make decisions to actually change, you're just going to fall right back into that temptation, and it's just going to get stronger and stronger every single time. Like how bad do you want to be delivered? How bad do you want to see God? We need to decide to eliminate the temptations and beg God to create in us a pure heart and praise God with our actions and bring him honor. So we need to decide. And number five, we need to be concerned for others. This is on the on the back half of this scripture. It's it's it's so interesting. Verse 16. For you will not delight in sacrifice or I would give it. You will not be pleased with a burnt offering. Let me just like stop this for a second. He's saying he's speaking again to that that priesthood with sacrifice because in that day and age, if you had done something wrong, you were supposed to bring a sacrifice to the temple. And he's saying, "You will not delight in sacrifice." Again, sometimes when we do something wrong, we think, "Oh, I just need to serve in church a little bit more." Or maybe if I just go to all these different Bible studies, like, you know, I could just cover up the fact that I did this kind of thing. Or if I, you know, if I pray a little bit more or if I, you know, all of the the the religious things that we can do on the outside. And he's saying right here, you will not delight in that sacrifice or I would give it. You will not be pleased with a burnt offering. says, "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit." Come on, somebody. >> A broken and contrite heart. You can do all of this stuff. You can change all the behaviors on the outside, but is your heart broken over what you've done, over what you've said? And if it's not, what do you need to do to get there? Begin to pray. Begin to get on your face and say, "God, forgive me. I'm sorry. Create in me a clean heart." Again, God is more desirous of you being changed in your heart than you trying to buy him off doing good things. And I think one of the hardest truths again with being concerned for others is that sin always affects people around us. We may not see the effects right away, but when we see this tragic story where the annoying pastor Nathan comes and he speaks and talks about God's consequence for what he's done, he said, "The child that you have had with her will not survive." And the baby gets sick and dies. Look, that's that's tough to read, tough to hear. But let me just clarify for anyone who's ever wondered if the pain that you've gone through is a consequence of your sin or it's bad karma or I'm getting what I deserve. Let me just tell you, God did not take away your friend or your family member to punish you. God does not function that way. This is during the old covenant when God had to dole out these punishments because Jesus Christ had not come to take on those consequences. God held King David to a standard and chose to allow that child to die as punishment for what he's done. But I'm telling you that is not the way that God works today because we are in a new covenant. In the old covenant, God would serve out that punishment. But the new covenant, Jesus put the consequences of our sin, which is hell and damnation. He put it onto himself when he died on the cross for you and for me. And so, yes, there are natural consequences that we have to deal with because we're in a fallen world. But there are also relational consequences for our direct actions. There are consequences for the things you say. There's consequences for the things you do with the people around you. Like when a leader falls, it hurts the people that they lead. And some of you here, you have kids who've been impacted by your old life and they're still having to deal with that. Some of you have marriages that are still recovering from past sin. Some of you have friendships that are fractured because of betrayal. Some of you, maybe you got right with God late in life, but the people around you still remember who you used to be. And we have to face that. We have to deal with that. We can't go like, "Oh, God forgave me, so you have to, too." That's not how it works. Many people are still picking up the pieces from the damage that we've done when we were living in sin. But David says this. Here's the answer. Verse 18 says, 'd do good to Zion or Israel, the nation that he oversees as king. Do good to Zion in your good pleasure. Build up the walls of Jerusalem. Then will you delight in righteous sacrifices and burnt offerings and whol
