Psalm 51:10 Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me. 11 Do not cast me away from Your presence And do not take Your Holy Spirit from me. 12 Restore to me the joy of Your salvation And sustain me with a willing spirit. 13 Then I will teach transgressors Your ways, And sinners will be converted to You. 14 Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, the God of my salvation; Then my tongue will joyfully sing of Your righteousness. 15 O Lord, open my lips, That my mouth may declare Your praise. 16 For You do not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it; You are not pleased with burnt offering. 17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise.
In the passage above we see the work of God in the human soul. While David had committed the physical sins of adultery and murder, he saw the real problem of sin. It was a sinful heart. His real problem was his sinful heart which was a heart that sought the things of self and then tried to justify self in the sin. What is it that David really needed? The same thing as any truly broken sinner truly needs. We first need a broken heart that sees how spiritually bankrupt it is. Then we need a clean heart.
Once the LORD has opened our eyes to see our sinful hearts, we see our need of a clean heart. Our sins must be forgiven and we must be restored to a right relation to God and with God. Oh how David realized how grace his situation was. He did not want the presence of God to depart from Him. This shows how David was a man after God’s heart. He longed for the presence of God. It is here we see the great need of a believer. The believer wants to be in the presence of God and fears that the presence of God will depart from him or her as the greatest fear. It is God who is our joy and our greatest good, so the absence of the presence of God is the greatest fear for those who truly love Him. The heart that truly loves God knows that if it is going to glorify Him in any way it must have the presence of His glory in order to do that. Look upon the awakened and broken heart. It loves God and seeks for God Himself as the hunger and thirst of the soul.
Notice the spiritual helplessness of David. He does not promise God that he will teach transgressors His ways and he does not promise to praise God by singing joyfully of His righteousness. Instead, He cries out for God restore to him the joy of his salvation. He cries out to God to sustain him with a willing spirit. He asks of God to open his lips that his mouth can declare His praise. He knows that God does not delight in sacrifice, but instead God wants a broken and a contrite heart.
We must always ask the question, however, as to where those things can possibly come from? Does God give His presence because we deserve it or is it by His grace alone? Does God restore the joy of His salvation (the salvation He works and gives) for any reason in the sinner or because of His grace alone? Does God deliver from blood guiltiness because of what we do or because of His grace alone? How are we to approach this God who does all of these things that we so desperately need whether we recognize it or not that we may have those things?
We should also ask our hearts if we long for a pure and clean heart because we long for God or because we want something from God? Do we really want to praise God from the heart or do we want to say great things about Him in order to obtain something from Him? Do we desire forgiveness because we long for Him and His presence or because we want fire insurance from Him? The Gospel of grace alone teaches us that we must stop working to be saved and rest in grace alone. We are to abandon all hope for salvation and the presence of God if we are to work for it in the slightest way or try to add to what Christ has done in the slightest way.
Oh sinners, we are to look to Christ alone for Him to help us to know God and to love God. It is the lovely and beautiful Jesus who takes sinners and gives them clean hearts and opens their lips that they may praise the God of all glory. It is Christ alone who can cleanse our filthy hearts by His own blood that He shed on the cross and He does not need the slightest help from us. He saves sinners for the glory of His name and for the glory of His grace. David needed grace for all things and so do unbelieving sinners now as well as believing sinners. Our hearts are so prone to wonder into thinking we can do some work or some little thing to add to what Christ has done. On no, sinner, if you want Christ plead with Him to take all your hope in self away. He saves by His grace in Christ alone.
God Loves... Himself 
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