In the thirty-second Psalm is a picture that corresponds with what the Lord has been speaking to the church for some time, about the human spirit.
Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, Whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom Jehovah imputeth not iniquity, And in whose spirit there is no guile. Verses 1, 2.
Passages in the Psalms sometimes seem to shift suddenly, and the reader gets the feeling that the psalmist has completely changed the subject. As you go deeper into this walk with God, however, you realize that he is giving you some answers. Notice the next passage.
When I kept silence, my bones wasted away Through my groaning all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: My moisture was changed as with the drought of summer. I acknowledged my sin unto thee, And mine iniquity did I not hide: I said, I will confess my transgressions unto Jehovah: And thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. For this let every one that is godly pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found: Surely when the great waters overflow they shall not reach unto him. Verses 3–6.
He is saying, in effect, how he obtained that spirit in which there is no guile—it was when he came to the place when there was nothing within him but groaning all the day long, the bones wasting away. Then we are reminded of the beatitude, Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. Matthew 5:4.
For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: My moisture was changed as with the drought of summer. Psalms 32:4. In other words, “God was really making me sweat as in the heat of summer.” Have you ever been in such a position? That is the way you come to the place, Blessed is the man unto whom Jehovah imputeth not iniquity, And in whose spirit there is no guile.
One of the greatest compliments the Lord ever paid to anyone was the one He paid to Nathanael. When Nathanael was coming up the road, Jesus said, “Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile.” Nathanael said, “How did You know me?” Jesus said, “I saw you when you were sitting under the fig tree.” (John 1:48). That impressed him no end. No guile. The Lord had probably read the thoughts of Nathanael while he was sitting under that fig tree and it was a revelation of his honesty of heart.
Honesty of heart is a rare thing. If we’re not trying to deceive someone else, usually we’re trying to deceive ourselves. If we are arrogant enough, we try to think we might deceive God. There is a guile, a duplicity in the human heart. You don’t have to be an out-and-out hypocrite, all you have to do is favor the good side and completely ignore the other, and come up with a very acceptable image of yourself, one full of guile. Blessed is the man, though, whose sin is forgiven, to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity.
If the communion is anything at all, it is the place of honesty. It isn’t that you come to condemn yourself, but it is as though God will forgive the sins that you will expose to Him. Sometimes you don’t even know what the acts are, or the lack of action, whether they are sins of commission or sins of omission. You don’t even know what you have done except that you are aware of something in your spirit. You don’t even know if there are sins that you would have a tendency to commit because the propensity is already within your spirit. Still, there is an honesty of heart that goes beyond the depth of your own self-analysis, and you sense your need and you come before the Lord with an honest heart. But you do more than that: you look to the Lord with such faith and confidence that He is the one who is the author and the finisher of your faith (Hebrews 12:2), and what He has begun, He is able to perform unto the day of the Lord (Philippians 1:6).
In all of your heart searching, don’t make an unbeliever out of yourself every time you approach God. “Well, I’ve failed; I’ve done this or that.” People who do this go almost as far as to rub themselves out of the Lamb’s book of life and put themselves out of the pale of grace. It is not good to waste so much time going through that process.
Recognize the fact that salvation is an experience, and it also is a process. It is an experience that is capable of infinite expansion. You begin with a real, definite experience that you are the Lord’s, you belong to Him; and from that moment on, He begins to invade every area of your life. So it grows, it grows and it grows. Every day, you are saved a little more. It doesn’t eliminate the fact that you had a definite, positive experience of salvation, but there is a depth of completion yet to come in every one of our lives.
So, we yield to the Lord in a moment of honesty of heart, and we say, “Thank You, Lord, that I belong to You. Now I’m not what I should be, but I know that I’m not what I used to be, and I know that You’re going to make me what I ought to be,” so you start seeking His face honestly, relentlessly; yearning (as the psalmist said, “groaning all the day long”) until this thing be completed in you. Romans 8 talks about the groaning within us, the yearning for the redemption of our bodies. And even if we reach sanctification and perfection today, the groaning would not cease, because we know that groaning is of God until we’re swallowed up in the fullness of redemption and all creation will be loosed from its bondage. It is a great day we’re living in—a day of God’s opening up grace to us.
You can be so frustrated; you can be so full of needs and problems yet still be a believer; but the only way you will be in trouble is if you don’t open up your heart honestly to God and partake of the Communion in a worthy manner, discerning the Lord’s body, sensing your need, exposing yourself to Him, drawing it by faith, believing for more and more change. Believe God to do the work in you. Don’t draw back from it.
Let’s reckon ourselves dead. Maybe we will keep on wiggling ’til the sun goes down, but we will reckon ourselves dead in Christ. We lay ourselves before the Lord with honest hearts. We’re redeemed and are yet in the process to be completed—fine, we will expose ourselves to it and see the job finished. We will rebuke every wiggle we find in the old nature, because we’re His, and we will reckon that.
Father, bless us. You have said we have been crucified with Christ, so bless those who are dead but don’t know it yet—for there are still the tremors of that old nature; there is sill that, Lord, which refuses to stop its effort. For we know who we are: we are God’s children, and we come for the body; and the blood of the Lord Jesus, that there might be a fresh cleansing in our heart, a fresh release from everything of the old nature. We reach into Thee with an eagerness, knowing who we are, knowing what has happened to us in Christ, embracing it, appropriating it in its full measure, in the name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.