What Does God Want?

Psalm 51:16-19

When I chose Psalm 51 for the scripture for my first Sunday back from vacation, I had no idea that it would be a three-part series. I thought I would cover Psalm 51 in one sermon. .. As it is, we are in our third week on Psalm 51 and the plan is to finish up today. Next Sunday we will celebrate Palm Sunday, and Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, Thursday evening at 7 we will celebrate Communion and look into the lives of Jesus’ Twelve Disciples, and Friday at noon we will gather with the community churches next door at the Presbyterian Church and look at Jesus’ coronation ceremony. Then it will be Easter, time to celebrate the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!

We started in Psalm 51, looking at the human condition, selfish, unholy, and full of sin – we stand in desperate need for God’s intervention. Last week we looked into the celebration that happens when lost people come to Christ – and how we are saved so we can have an impact on their lives, so we can stir all heaven to celebrate when the one lost one comes home.

Today we are coming to the end of Psalm 51, where we are going to tackle the question: What does God really want? Before we get into the text, let’s pray.

Last Sunday afternoon, my boys went over to Harry’s house to play. Harry’s mom reported that the boys were hunting golf balls in the woods and were very serious about it. One boy would be looking through binoculars and shouting directions to the other boys (this way, no, the other way!), while the other boys tried to follow those directions and find the golf balls.

Doesn’t it sometimes feel like that when we’re following God? It can be confusing to know what God wants of us, especially when we have people shouting at us, “This way! No, the other way!”  It is unfortunate that many people have wrong ideas about just what it is that God wants and expects from us.

I hear a lot of “as long as I’m trying my hardest” or “I’m hoping my good deeds outweigh my bad” or “I try to be good to others” – then I’m doing my duty to God. From others, the sentiment is “as long as I show up for church on Sunday (or on Easter and Christmas, depending on how often that person actually attends church).” Or “I need to be busy – so keep me involved in everything going on in the church.” Or “I need to put something in the offering plate” or “my parents/grandparents were pillars of this church.”

But King David recognizes that when things go wrong, he needs something bigger than all of this. He’s already cycled through “I’m God’s chosen King of Israel” and “I defeated Goliath.” And he goes to the next possibility: religious duty.

After all, there were prescribed sacrifices for just about anything – they have to work. That will put him back in right standing with God, right?

In Psalm 51:16, David says, “You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.” Why would David even come to this conclusion? It was God who told His people to offer these sacrifices. But as the author of the Book of Hebrews states: The law [this includes the entire sacrificial system] is only a shadow of the good things that are coming – not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship. If it could, would they not have stopped being offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins. But those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins, because it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. (Hebrews 10:1-4)

If you didn’t get what Hebrews 10 was saying, it’s saying that if the sacrificial system were perfect, it would have made those who participated in it perfect. But what the sacrificial system accomplished was pointing to a reality greater than itself. By the sacrificial system, it is possible to follow the letter of God’s Law without following God’s heart. One could presumably give perfect sacrifices and still have a hard heart. In Matthew 23, Jesus addressed this tendency in the Pharisees. For those who aren’t familiar with the Pharisees, they have gotten a bad rap because Jesus was always critical of them, but they were the Holiness Movement of their time. They saw where God’s Law was being broken and they created a system to keep people from even accidentally breaking God’s Law. On its face, it just sounds like healthy accountability: for example, many of us have been affected by alcoholism, whether we or a loved one is the alcoholic. We recognize that an alcoholic will drink, so we make rules like: don’t go to the bar. I don’t think any of us would have problems with making parameters like that – in fact, many people with drug and alcohol problems would be well served to set up some parameters and accountability.

And the whole aim of the Pharisees was to keep God’s Law. Every bit of it. Yet here is what Jesus says to them in Matthew 23:23-24: “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices – mint, dill, and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law – justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.” They went to every length to give a tenth of the most insignificant spices, but meanwhile, they were neglecting the bigger matters of the heart.

This isn’t what God wants from us.

There are some long-time Christians who are some of the most grumpy, mean people I’ve ever met. If you have ever picketed a funeral, told someone that they are going to Hell because they don’t agree with you, or chased someone out of “your” pew, I just might be talking to you. Some of you have fastidiously carried out every aspect of the Christian life, yet your heart is cold and hard.

The old story is told of a mother, repeatedly telling her little boy to sit down. The boy continued to stand, disobeying his mother. Finally, the mother went to him and forced him down in a chair. The boy said, “I may be sitting down on the outside, but on the inside I'm still standing up!”

If God doesn’t delight in rote obedience, what does God want?

David nails it in Psalm 51:17: My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise.

Friends, it is all about the heart. Someone who obeys but has a hateful heart is just as guilty as someone who disobeys. Jesus seemed to retain his harshest criticism for the Pharisees and others who did exactly this.

Most of the problems in the American church right now aren’t doctrine problems, though we do have problems with doctrine. Most of the problems in the American church right now aren’t discipline problems, though we have them, too. Most of the problems in the American church right now aren’t problems of lack of Bible knowledge, though I would contend that our lack of Bible knowledge is a symptom of the real problem. The real problem is a heart problem.

What do we do about a heart problem? Well, first we have to be willing to have it diagnosed. If you are, ask the Spirit to examine your heart. Pray the prayer of Psalm 139:23-24: Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

Because when we are humble enough to pray this prayer, this is how God responds, from Ezekiel 36:26-27: I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.

Notice the difference here – if we start with following God’s laws, in other words, by doing good deeds, we can continue to do them and miss God’s heart. But when we allow the Holy Spirit to transform us, to give us heart transplants, then God moves in our hearts to move us to follow God’s laws, to do good deeds in God’s name.

The whole goal isn’t the good deeds, however. The top goal is to bring glory to God. We do this partially by doing good deeds in God’s name. But as Christians, everything we strive for should be for God’s glory.

Now, it could be easy for David to pray simply for himself, because his sin was a big deal and he is finally taking that sin seriously – that his deserves the punishment he’s getting, and that punishment is ultimately separation from God. But David’s prayer does not stop there. So David concludes this prayer by praying May it please you to prosper Zion, to build up the walls of Jerusalem.

Did you notice what he did here? He went from praying for himself to praying for the nation. He prays that for Zion – if you ever wonder where that terminology came from, Zion is the hill where the Jebusite fortress was located – the one that David conquered and where David built his palace. Similarly to when we would talk about Russian leadership by referencing “the Kremlin” (which is really the fortress in Moscow), when there is talk about Zion, it is short for all of Israel, especially bringing to mind the strength, prosperity, but not only this. Zion was later to become the dwelling place of God Himself. So praying for Zion and Jerusalem was not merely praying for his land or his rule – it was praying for the people of God.

David recognized that he had sinned, but as the king, he realized he wasn’t alone, and the sin of the people had similarly caused them problems. The sin of the people had separated them from God, and so when he prays for Zion to prosper, he prays for the same kind of mercy for the people that he asks for himself. He doesn’t ask because of their inherent goodness or righteousness or their good deeds; he is fully reliant upon God’s character.

I don’t have a lot of time to go into this, but there has been a lot of misinformation regarding prayer for God’s people to prosper. Many have twisted this prayer into a “health and wealth” gospel which says that if you follow God, you will be healthy, happy, and rich. The unfortunate side-teaching to this is the converse – that if you are sick, unhappy, or poor, that you must be sinning. While David certainly hopes and prays for this kind of prosperity for Israel, it is only a tiny part and is certainly at best a misreading of the text. To see it in its context is to understand that he wants Israel to be in right relationship with God, and that such right relationship leads to their prosperity, whether they have money or not. To have money and not have God is to be impoverished. David also prays for God’s protection over his people, protection that comes when they, again, are in right relationship with God. He is, in essence, praying the same prayer he prayed for himself for the nation: cast them not away from your presence, and do not withdraw your Holy Spirit from them.

And their response will be giving to God in thanksgiving: Then you will delight in the sacrifices of the righteous, in burnt offerings offered whole; then bulls will be offered on your altar.

In a sense, he is restating what he said about himself. The response to someone restored to right relationship with God is giving glory and thanks to God. So as we prayerfully position ourselves back in right relationship with God, do not stop there, but continue to pray for those who aren’t, that they will glorify God and will enjoy God’s prosperity and protection.