The sacrifices of God, etc.
We may call this psalm "the penitents prayer-book.' The spectacle of a good man falling into open sin is a sight to make angels weep, especially a man so distinguished as David falling into sins so gross and flagrant. We are ready to ask why a veil of silence was not allowed to hide this shameful example. This psalm supplies a twofold answer: the record of David's profound humiliation and bitter repentance is a warning to those who "think they stand;" his humble but assured faith in God's pardoning mercy is an encouragement to those who know they have fallen. We could none of us afford to lose this page out of the Bible. No part of Old Testament Scripture enters more deeply into the spiritual life. These words set before us—
I. WHAT THE SINNER CANNOT OFFER TO GOD. He can make no atonement for his sin, fulfil no duty that can be accepted as a counterpoise to his transgression. He has no hope but in the simple undeserved mercy of God (Psalms 51:16). The word here for "sacrifice" is general, including sin offerings, Passover lambs, thank offerings—any sacrifice in which the victim was slain (so 1 Samuel 3:14; Exodus 12:27; this is overlooked by some good writers). The sin offerings appointed by the Law provided for sins of ignorance, infirmity, and error, not for wilful transgressions of known law (" with a high hand") (Le Psalms 4:2; Numbers 15:27, Numbers 15:30). They were not designed to interfere with the course of civil justice; otherwise religion and law would have been in open conflict (Hebrews 10:28). Therefore crimes like David's—adultery and murder, for either of which the Law sentenced him to death—could not be purged by sacrifice. He deserved to die, and he knew it. He casts himself on the sovereign mercy of God: "Deliver me from bloodguiltlness!" (Psalms 51:14).
II. WHAT THE SINNER CAN OFFER TO GOD, AND GOD WILL ACCEPT. "A broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart" Why is this called a "sacrifice"—a consecrated gift to God?
1. Because we glorify God by frank, full acknowledgment that his Law is holy, his authority supreme, and that he may justly condemn and punish (see Psalms 51:4). David had deeply sinned against men; but he seems to lose sight of this in the awful overwhelming view of his guilt against God (cf. Joshua 7:19).
2. Because this "broken and contrite heart" implies the full giving up of ourselves to God, not only that he may forgive our sin, set us free from the burden of guilt, but that he may "renew a right spirit within" us (Psalms 51:9-12), that he may make us wholly his own (cf. Romans 12:1). Note that this word "sacrifice" does not of itself mean atonement. That meaning was given to sacrifice by express Divine teaching (Le Psalms 17:11).
III. THE DEEPEST PENITENCE—the truest sense of guilt and shame and grief for sin—IS CONSISTENT WITH BOUNDLESS FAITH IN GOD'S FORGIVING MERCY. If ever there was the utterance of a broken, contrite heart, it is this psalm. No hypocrite, no ungodly man, could possibly have written it. No, nor yet a sincere godly penitent, without a mighty inspiration of God's Spirit. And the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, breathes into the broken heart the healing balm of hope, trust, joy, and thankfulness. David, who dares not offer a sacrifice until he knows that he is forgiven, looks forward to the time when he shall offer sacrifices of thanksgiving, peace offerings, and whole burnt offerings; when God will bless him in his work of building the holy city, and will himself bless and guard Jerusalem (Psalms 51:18, Psalms 51:19), without which verses the psalm would be maimed and incomplete.
IV. THE WARRANT OF THIS ASSURED FAITH is found, not in the sinner's repentance, hut in God's mercy and promise (Psalms 51:1). Nathan had been commissioned to assure David of pardon as well as to charge him with his sin (2 Samuel 12:13). If David had asked how it could be right and just for God thus to pardon crimes which, as king, David himself would have been bound to punish in another man, we know not what answer he could have found, except to say, "God is Sovereign!" The gospel alone reveals how God is "just, and the Justifier of him who believeth in Jesus" (Romans 3:23-26). It was a wonderful new doctrine which the apostles proclaimed, that sins for which the Law of Moses provided no sin offerings are atoned for by him (Acts 13:38, Acts 13:39). "All sin" (1 John 1:7). God has himself provided the Sacrifice which all the sacrifices of the Law faintly foreshadowed (John 1:29). Therefore the sacrifice of one contrite heart and of one joyful tongue, blemished, blind, lame, though it too often is, is acceptable to God, because our High Priest ever lives to intercede.