Lenten Midweek 2 2020

Psalm 6

March 18, 2020

Zion Lutheran Church + Nampa, ID

God’s wrath is real.  We don’t like to think about it much, and often times it is thought of as an ambiguous mystery that might or not be something to be nervous about. In tonight’s reading from St. Paul, however, we see it plain and clear.  Three times in Romans 1 Paul writes of God giving up the hard-hearted.

This is what the wrath of God is revealed against: “all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth" (Romans 1:18).  Because of this ungodliness and suppression of the truth God gave them up to the lusts of their hearts, to impurity, and dishonoring their bodies, to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. Those things led them to unnatural relations and shameless acts. Sound familiar? These are the very same moral evils that our society no longer call evil but thinks them to be the stuff of holy marriage. Sodom and Gomorrah have nothing on us. The wrath of God is revealed in God giving us up to these things until such time as He delivers us and separates the sheep from the goats.

Repent. Repent of turning a blind eye of such things among your family and society. Repent of thinking it is ok if someone else sins as long as it doesn’t really affect you.  It does affect you, as it affects them. Repent for treating the wrath of God lightly or as not that big of a deal, for it is real, it is revealed in history, in the Word of God, in Christ upon the cross. 

Psalm 6 is a perfect Psalm to consider. It is the first and shortest of the seven penitential Psalms we are considering this Lenten season. Penitential here doesn’t mean wallowing in self-pity and terror, but it means to make a plea for and a confession of Messianic forgiveness and mercy.  These seven psalms all have this in common: they all explicitly ask God for forgiveness of sins.

So here in Psalm 6 David begins with the reality of God’s wrath. This isn’t directed toward others, but David is afraid for himself because of what he has done. He has deserved God’s wrath and he knows it. This is the prayer of a man who feels the weight of his sin, the guilt and shame, the burden. It laments the great suffering of the conscience when one’s faith and hope are tormented by the law and anger of God and driven to despair or misbelief. God’s love is hidden from him.  God’s wrath seems to be all there is, all he knows and experiences. So he prays to be delivered from it: “O Lord, rebuke me not in Your anger, neither discipline me in Your wrath.”

“Divine wrath is not some sort of irritation; God does not become peeved or annoyed.”[i]  He is not sulking because we hurt His feelings. His wrath is “a deliberate resolve in response to a specific state of the human soul” particularly toward those who are hard of heart, unrepentant, or who have turned their backs on God and refused His grace. That is what David is up against. He knew better but he turned his back on God’s grace. That is why He begs God not to rebuke him in His anger.

We must also pray in this way – not just in Lent but always. We must ask to be delivered from God’s wrath – not as those who didn’t know what they were doing, but as those who have hardened their hearts and planned to repent later.  A love of sin remains within us all. Every deliberate sin hardens our hearts. Sin, especially deliberate sin, leaves us in “a very weakened state. It is felt in our inner frame, our very bones, as it were.” Thus David: “Be gracious to me, O Lord; for I am languishing; heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled. My soul is also greatly troubled: but You, O Lord – how long? Turn, O Lord, deliver my life; save me for the sake of Your steadfast love. For in death there is no remembrance of you; in Sheol who will give you praise?” (Psalm 6:2–5).

David certainly is not unique in this. In fact, his sin makes perfect sense: lust and greed and pride are well-known by us all. That is why we need to keep on repenting, confessing, and praying, and that is why God in His mercy keeps on speaking in the Scriptures, absolving us through the pastors, and feeding us in the Sacrament of the Altar.

David needs mercy now because death is too late. No one gives thanks in the grave. That, by the way, is how the hard-hearted behave now: “For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him.” The hard-hearted don’t ask God for forgiveness. They also don’t give thanks.  Death is the culmination of sin, the place without thanksgiving, “in the grace who shall give the thanks?” We have suffered a foretaste of that in our own lives. We have been discontent, envious, and hardened our hearts so that our bones ache within us. Like David, we want no more of that. So like David, we pray: “Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am weak.”

Sin and death form the context of this Psalm. They give cause for the lament and plea. We need rescue, deliverance. We are in danger because of the sins of our society and family and church, and because of our own sins. But David also shows us how to pray in hope, how to cling to a promise. He knows the Holy Trinity hears and answers him: “The Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. The Lord has heard my plea; the Lord accepts my prayer” (Psalm 6:8b-9).

And what has the Lord heard? He has heard those who trust in Him, who have come confession and sorrow over sin, whose tears have stained pillows, whose bones ache with sorrow for their children, for their past, for their failures.  The Lord has heard faith. And the Lord answers.

The Lord is merciful. He pours out His wrath over your sin upon His only begotten Son and He casts the dregs upon Satan’s crushed skull. “The taking away of sin required the shedding of Christ’s blood on the Cross. This fact itself tells us how serious” sin is even as it tells us what we are worth to the Father. The Lord, risen from the dead, comes in peace to you, not to rebuke you, but to wash away the ashes of repentance, to prepare you for Jesus’ resurrection and your own, to restore you from death and the grave of Sheol. 

[i] The quotations in this sermon, other than quotations of the Psalm, have been taken directly from Patrick Henry Reardon’s remarks on Psalm 6 in Christ in the Psalms. Even where there aren’t quotes, the argument and ideas are also mainly his from the same section. Patrick Henry Reardon, Christ in the Psalms (Chesterton, IN: Ancient Faith Publishing, 2000), 11–12. https://cyberstones.org/sermon/thursday-after-ash-wednesday-psalm-6-2016/