J. Albrecht…Trinity 19…Oct. 11^th, 2026…Psalm 32:1-7…Blessed is He Whose Sins are Forgiven!

¹ Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, Whose sin is covered. ² Blessed is the man to whom the LORD does not impute iniquity, And in whose spirit there is no deceit. ³ When I kept silent, my bones grew old Through my groaning all the day long. ⁴ For day and night Your hand was heavy upon me; My vitality was turned into the drought of summer. Selah ⁵ I acknowledged my sin to You, And my iniquity I have not hidden. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,” And You forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah ⁶ For this cause everyone who is godly shall pray to You In a time when You may be found; Surely in a flood of great waters They shall not come near him. ⁷ You are my hiding place; You shall preserve me from trouble; You shall surround me with songs of deliverance. Selah

To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings and priests to God and His Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever, Amen.

In the name of our Savior Jesus, who died that we might live, who lives that we may never die, my friends in Christ, fellow sinners, forgiven by God.

Martin Luther famously said, “When I look at myself, I don’t see how I can be saved; When I look at Christ, I don’t see how I can be lost.” It is a strong confession that should grace the lips of every Christian, for it highlights a very dichotomy with which we live our lives. When we look only to our moral efforts, our strength, our righteousness, all we can see is the ugly, sin-blackened heart that finalizes our condemnation. As Paul said, “I know that in me, that is in my flesh, nothing good dwells.” But, when we look to Christ, the tables are turned. We have grace – God’s undeserved forgiveness, not for our sake, but for Him who offered His body on the cross as the satisfactory payment for our sin. Then, through Christ, we are holy and the most secure for eternal life.

Psalm 32 is a maskil – meaning it is a Psalm written to teach doctrine. It was written right out of the inmost heart of a man who had tasted all the bitterness of repentance and all the sweetness of pardon. Thus it is the perfect Psalm to teach us the importance of the confession of our sins and the joys of resting in God’s forgiveness. David learned the hard way to confesses the same as Luther: While his focus was inward, he saw not his sin, he bore its burden, and it crushed him. But when his focus was on Christ, then he was truly blessed, for he eagerly confessed his sin knowing it was pardoned by God, and peace followed.

This morning let us explore the greatest gift of the godly life: The Forgiveness of Our Sins. Blessed is He whose sins are forgiven! Let us pray: Sanctify us by Your truth, O Lord, Your Word is truth, Amen.

¹ Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, Whose sin is covered. ² Blessed is the man to whom the LORD does not impute iniquity, And in whose spirit there is no deceit.

David uses three different words to describe sin, painting a fuller picture. The first is transgression. In Hebrew, it is ‎פֶּ֗שַׁע . Pesha originally meant “rebellion, to revolt against a government.” When you use that original meaning in our text, it says, Blessed is he whose rebellion is forgiven, You begin to catch the sense of the deadly guilt that comes with it. Traitors against a nation are not spared – very often put to death. Rebellion against God is a thousand time worse than rebellion against the best government on earth. But so our hearts are by nature. Our sinful flesh rebels against God, wanting to remove Him from our hearts, even as our first parents did in the Garden of Eden.

The second word is ‎חֲטָאָֽה . Chata means to “miss the mark, to fail.” The mark is set by God in His will and Law, and “to sin” is to disregard that mark and set up one of our own. Sin is complete lawlessness and it centers in the will. Where Pesha is to rebel against God Himself, Chata is rebellion against the laws He made. Imagine trying to cover up missing God’s mark. We confessed earlier in the service that we have sinned against God in thought, word, and deed. Is there a part of God’s Law that He overlooks? Is there a time when God cannot see past the righteous shell that we put on to hide our wretched behavior? What a foolish thought.

The third word is ‎עָוֹ֑ן. Avon comes from a verb which means “to turn aside” a deliberate leaving of the right path. The right path is despised and hated. The flesh wants nothing to do with it, seeking out any other possible path that it can take, except the one that God wants us to be on. But since there is only one right path, it can only be one right path. Whatever path that our flesh chooses to follow is not God’s. It’s the wrong path. And they all end in death. There are many different roads that we can take. But they all have the same character. They’re all iniquitous, the opposite of right. When we choose to take God as part of His Word, but ignore the part that condemns the pleasure my flesh has found, that is iniquity. I am guilty. And not just of that one sin, but of breaking all of God’s law. That is my iniquity.

In these three words, David imparts how serious sin is, how deep its consequences, how easy it is to fall into. His heart gave way to lust; lust to adultery; adultery to murder; and murder to lying. But what really put the nail in David’s coffin was that he lived ignorantly in his sin. He pretended it didn’t exist. He claimed to be righteous. Had he confessed his sin to God immediately, he would have still suffered consequence for his sin, but his soul and spirit would have been lifted up rather than crushed by the burden of guilt. Luther wrote, “unblessed is he who does not impute sins to himself, is well pleased with himself, thinks himself pious, has no qualms of conscience, considers himself innocent, and takes this for his comfort and hope.”

If you suppose, as David did, to be free from such sin, you are not and neither am I. Rather, your spirit is full of deceit. David supposed himself to be pious. His heart muffled his sin in hopes that it would not cry out to God for vengeance, all the while the dirty filth lay beneath the surface, metastasizing, the devil building his case against him, and David was unaware of the danger that he was in. God says through Jeremiah the prophet, “The heart is deceitful above all things, And desperately wicked; Who can know it?” How good is your heart in hiding sin? Does it come up with excuses like, “I can’t help it, it just happens!”, “My friends do it,” “Who is it going to hurt?” What other excuses do you know in your heart? “O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?” That comes from the Apostle Paul.

David writes these words because he lived them. He ignored his sin, rationalized his rebellion against God away. But what did that bring him? ³ When I kept silent, my bones grew old Through my groaning all the day long. ⁴ For day and night Your hand was heavy upon me; My vitality was turned into the drought of summer. Selah

David was not happy, but look, he found no peace. He always knew that he had sinned, the dog and pony show of ignoring his sin was to avoid confessing it. Yet he could not escape his conscience. He found no rest, no peace, only envisioning God’s wrath standing over him as with a club. He knew the weight of his sin and holding it in, not confessing it, he bore that weigh himself as it slowly crushed him. This is the end of hiding our sin and not confessing it. Not only does it eat away at life, draining its peace and joy, but it fools the heart into thinking that I don’t need forgiveness.

What changed for David? It was God. God who sent the prophet Nathan to lead him to confess his sins so that God could forgive him. ⁵ I acknowledged my sin to You, And my iniquity I have not hidden. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,” And You forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah

David learned to rebuke his self and let God speak for him. When he finally opened the flood gates, confessing his sin to the Lord, it laid his heart open and exposed. And though that sounds frightening to our flesh, but what it did for David, and what it does for you, is to allow the Lord to touch each sin with His grace and His forgiveness. In confessing my sins, I will rebuke myself; then God will praise me. I will degrade myself; then God will honor me. I will accuse myself; then God will acquit me/ I will speak against myself; then God will speak for me. I will speak of my guilt; then He will speak about my merit – Jesus my Savior.

The grace of forgiveness that God offers through our Savior Jesus Christ is more complete than David’s description of sin. And it begins at one place, the cross. Upon the cross, Jesus shed His innocent blood as the propitiation for our sin, the satisfactory payment to God for every rebellion, wayward path, despising of His law, false sense of righteousness. And see what Jesus’ atonement does to your sin.

Transgression is forgiven. The word for forgiven is נָשָׂא which means “to life, or carry away.” That is exactly what Christ does with your sin. He lifts it off of your conscience. He takes it so far away that no one can find it. As far as the east is from the west, so far has God removed your sin from you.

 

As deep as the depths of the sea, so the Lord has buried your sin. Sin is covered. כָּסָה “to conceal, cover.” Jesus bore God’s judgment on the cross. The blood that He shed so covers your sin as a blanket that not even God can see them. The best part is, both of these words for God’s forgiveness are passive, meaning you and I are the recipient of them, but God is the actor. There is no merit, no works of righteousness – only that we confess our sins to Him and receive His undiluted grace and forgiveness. God was, in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them. How blessed we are! No sin remains to the one who trusts in Christ Jesus. Eternal Death is replaced with eternal life.

⁶ For this cause everyone who is godly shall pray to You In a time when You may be found; Surely in a flood of great waters They shall not come near him. ⁷ You are my hiding place; You shall preserve me from trouble; You shall surround me with songs of deliverance. Selah

David offers these words for anyone who has need of them. He appeals to the godly – that is grace-filled ones. What God’s pardoning grace did for David, it will do for you and for anyone who confesses their sins to Him. The time is today. God’s grace is not like a child’s toy for us to use now, toss into a corner later today, and pick it up when we need it again. No, rather, when sin has broken down your door, entered your heart, hear God’s call of grace. Come to the throne of your Father. Confess your sins. Be refreshed by your Savior. Stand on His grace as your rock. So that when the floodwaters of sin, guilt, or tribulation come, your soul may be lifted up far above their destruction and be saved.

As Paul says in Romans 5, Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, ² through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

God watches over you. He is ever-present with this forgiveness. Run to Him. Flee from sin. Confess to your Savior, for He will fully pardon. Bring peace and joy to your heart. And what a joy indeed! And we join with David, with jubilation in our hearts for God’s deliverance from our sin and guilt. Selah! Yes, forte! Loud and long may we sing our Savior’s praises for His grace, for His forgiveness, which truly makes us His blessed people. Amen.