The Psalm before us today is a beautiful illustration of one who has gone through the process of repentance.

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1 Lent Psalm 32 March 20, 2011 Psalm 32 1Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. 2Happy are those to whom the Lord imputes no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. 3While I kept silence, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long. 4For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. Selah 5Then I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not hide my iniquity; I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord, and you forgave the guilt of my sin. Selah 6Therefore let all who are faithful offer prayer to you; at a time of distress, the rush of mighty waters shall not reach them. 7You are a hiding place for me; you preserve me from trouble; you surround me with glad cries of deliverance. Selah 8I will instruct you and teach you the way you should go; I will counsel you with my eye upon you. 9Do not be like a horse or a mule, without understanding, whose temper must be curbed with bit and bridle, else it will not stay near you. 10Many are the torments of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds those who trust in the Lord. 11Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart. The Psalm today is instructive for us in this season of Lent. It is one of seven Penitential Psalms or Psalms about repentence (or asking for forgiveness). Lent, of course, is season of repentance for the Christian. Lent is the 40 days before Easter Sunday (or Resurrection Day) wherein the Christian is called to prepare their heart and mind for the Passion of Christ, that is the events leading up to Jesus Crucifixion and Resurrection. It is 40 days because the Bible tells us that before Jesus ministry, the Spirit drove Jesus into the desert to spend 40 days and 40 nights, fasting and enduring temptation. It is the Spirit that pushes him into a time of selfexamination and trial. In that time, Jesus faced himself directly, who am I and who is God calling me to be? What is it that is tempting me, causing me to stray? The story goes that in Jesus state of famished vulnerability, the devil or tempter comes with offers of food, miraculous protection, and all worldly power, to which Jesus is unmoved by. He remains in the will of God and continues on in his ministry of reconciliation, love, and power. During Lent, we live out our own version of the story. We enter into our own spiritual deserts, looking at ourselves, recognizing those places where temptation has overcome us, or where sin has taken hold. The places in our lives where we are not fully who God has created us to be. None of us is perfect, so each takes time to reflect, repent, and draw closer to God and to Christ, to the source of our Salvation..

2 The theme of repentance is found throughout the Bible. The story of God s People is a story of folks who constantly venture from God and God s will and then seek reconciliation with God. And its one thing after another. Idolatry, apathy toward neighbor, the poor, the widow, and the orphan, breaking the commandments...god s people have spells of extraordinary faithfulness, but also ones of unfaithfulness...as it turns out, sort of like the once popular bumper sticker said, Sin Happens. We miss the mark we stray from who God made us to be. Instead of being people of love, compassion, forgiveness, and generosity as God intended, we bear spoiled fruits of stinginess, entitlement, greed, and violence. The Psalm before us today is a beautiful illustration of one who has gone through the process of repentance. In verses 1 and 2 we hear a declaration of hope, that one s life is fuller/richer when their sins are covered. 1Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. 2Happy are those to whom the Lord imputes no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. To be happy in this context means to fully be in right relationship with God. To be fully God s. God loves us despite the wrongs we commit, but to be forgiven is to be released from our guilt and shame and to be in right relationship with God. But the Psalmist shares with us in the next verses that he didn t always feel that way. Something happened in his life that drew him away from that happyiness in God. We have no idea what it was in the Psalmist s case, but I m sure we can all relate to that in some way. I ve had that moment of realization of my sin when I ve said something unkind to family or friends. I ve had that moment of conviction when I realized my behaviors and habits effect others in the world negatively. I have that feeling when I realize I ve said, done, or even thought wrong that has hurt myself or others. These cause we to FEEL like I m distant from God. I have a relative in my extended family that feels the weight of this every day. He was unfaithful to his wife resulting in a difficult and ugly divorce. He s lived with that ever since and he s told me How could God ever love me or forgive me--i can t even love or forgive myself. We all have those things in our lives that we regret and have pain about, some more extreme than others, but its not a good feeling to dwell in. The first steps on a road to reconciliation with God and others is to bring sound to the silent places. Sometimes we just sit on our sin, not talk about it, let it fester inside of us in silence. We may even try to hide it. In the story of Adam and Eve, after they eat the apple, what s the first thing they do? 8 They heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. The Psalmist tells us in verses 3 and 4 that silence is not the answer to relieving our guilt and shame. While I kept silence, my body wasted away through my groaning all day

3 long. 4For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. Boy, ain t that the truth. It takes more strength and energy to hold our sin secret and safe, than to let it go. It can destroy you from the inside. And fascinating to me here is that I always thought the weight was the guilt, but the scripture says, For day and night God s hand was heavy upon me...that s different. The Psalmist interprets the heaviness he feels, not as the guilt and shame crushing down on him, but God s hand perhaps pushing him toward repentance and reconciliation... So the Psalmist brought sound to his silence. 5Then I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not hide my iniquity; I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord, and you forgave the guilt of my sin. The Psalm makes a point of contrasting Silence and Speaking...it is not unintentional. Naming the wrong is the start of reconciliation...it makes a difference. There s a reason our Catholic brothers and sisters have Confession...it is a chance to speak out loud our wrongs, to name them before God. God surely is already well-acquainted with our wrongs. I don t think confession (whether with a priest, pastor, or in the privacy of your own home) is a chance to inform God of our sin, instead its a process for us, a start on the road for healing. A wrong not recognized is a wrong that can t be easily reconciled. The Psalmist comes out of his silence to name before God his sin and in so doing, he finds freedom...god forgave the guilt of his sin. The process of repentance and reconciliation is not always an easy one. Its clear from our own experience and the experience of the Psalmist that within it is groaning. There is a heaviness. There is shame and embarrassment. It is indeed hard to say I m sorry sometimes, to make ourselves vulnerable before God and others. We are in the uncomfortable position of looking in the mirror and seeing what we might not want to see and then having to tell God and others about it. A saying was attributed to James A. Garfield who said, The truth will set you free, but first it will make you miserable. As people of Christian faith, we are called to this kind of examination and confession. We are called to peer into our lives, to seek out the muck and turn it over to God, to seek cleansing from our sin. Jesus first words of ministry in Mark were The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news. Jesus urged those who followed him to repent, to turn from their old way of life, to a new one that he leads us in. We must become aware of the ways we are estranged from God and from our neighbor. For Jesus taught that it wasn t enough just to seek God, it was important to make good with our neighbors as well. Matthew 5:23-24 says, 23So when you

4 are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you,24leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift. It is not just reconciliation with God that we seek, but with our brothers and sisters as well. To ask God for forgiveness for our wrongs is noble, but to speak words of regret and apology to others is just as important. Jesus said the Commandments are summed up in just two laws: Love the Lord your God and Love your neighbor as yourself. We must be reconciled with both. So before offering our worship and praise to God this Lenten Season as we prepare for the glory of Easter...what silent places in your life are groaning for sound? What words of repentance need to be spoken to God, to family, to friends, to spouse? Have you grown tired of carrying the weight, has God s hand grown heavy on you urging you to repentance, to reconciliation, to freedom? We even need to reflect as the whole Body of Christ when have we been silent, when should we have words of repentence? In the year 2000, Pope John Paul II apologized on behalf of the church for a number of wrongs in the church s history, including one to Galileo that came 400 years too late, but I guess it was something. Sometimes those silent spaces that have our spirit groaning and heavy, just need some sound, and light, and faith to make a change. A true, heartfelt I m sorry, an apology from the heart not only will make a difference in the one you speak to, but in yours as well. Perhaps then we can know more fully what the Psalmist means when he says, 1Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. We also trust that in those silent and dark places we may feel that God is distant, but praise be to God that God is with us. Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for though art with me. There is no height nor depth nor distance nor darkness, nor silence nor sound that God s love cannot enter into. As I told my relative who believed he could not be loved, that it was quite the contrary. Though there are times when we don t see worth in ourselves and wonder how God might even love us, it is precisely then we trust that the God who made us, who knit us together in our mother s womb, will go to the ends of the earth and back to love us, forgive us, to save us. Praise be to God for that. Hear Psalm 32:6-7 as a blessing to take with you on your journey: 6Therefore let all who are faithful offer prayer for you; at a time of distress, the rush of mighty waters shall not reach you. 7For God is a hiding place for you; God will preserve you from trouble; God will surround you with glad cries of deliverance

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