Sermons for the Times

by Charles Kingsley

But more; if we look at two psalms which he wrote about that time, we shall find that his conscience had not been dead in him, but had been tormenting him bitterly; and that he had been trying to escape from it, and afterwards to repent—only in a wrong way.

If we look at the Thirty-second Psalm, we shall see there he had begun, by trying to deceive himself, to excuse himself before God. But that had only made him the more miserable. ‘When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my daily complaining. For Thy hand was heavy on me night and day: my moisture was turned to the drought of summer.’ Then he had tried sacrifices. He had fancied, I suppose, that he could make God pleased with him again by showing great devoutness, by offering bullocks and goats without number, as sin-offerings and peace-offerings; but that made him no happier. At last he found out that God required no sacrifice but a broken heart. That was what God wanted—a broken and a contrite heart; for David to be utterly ashamed of himself, utterly broken down and silenced, so that he had nothing left to plead—neither past good deeds, nor present devoutness, nor sacrifices: nothing but, ‘O God, I deserve all Thou canst lay on me, and more. Have mercy on me—mercy is all I ask.’

There was nothing for him, you see, but to make a clean breast of it; to face his sin, and all its shame and abomination, and confess it all, and throw himself on God’s mercy. And when he did that, there, then, and at once, as Nathan told him, God put away his sin. As David says himself, ‘I said, I will confess my sins unto the Lord, and so Thou forgavest the wickedness of my sin.’

As it is written, ‘If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.’

And now, my friends, what lesson may we learn from this? It is easy to say, We have not sinned as deeply as David, and therefore his story has nothing to do with us. My friends, whether we have sinned as deeply as David or not, his story has to do with you, and me, and every soul in this church, and every soul in the whole world, or it would not be in the Bible. For no prophecy of Scripture is of private interpretation; that is, it does not only point at one man here and another there: but those who wrote it were moved by the Holy Ghost, who lays down the eternal universal laws of holiness, of right and good, which are right and good for you, and me, and all mankind; and therefore David’s story has to do with you and me every time we do wrong, and know that we have done wrong.

Now, my friends, when you have done a wrong thing, you know your conscience torments you with it; you are uneasy, and discontented with yourselves, perhaps cross with those about you; you hardly know why: or rather, though you do know why, you do not like to tell yourself why.

The bad thing which you have done, or the bad tempers which you have given way to, or the person whom you have quarrelled with, hang in your mind, and darken all your thoughts: and you try not to remember them: but conscience makes you remember them, and will not let the dark thought fly away; till you can enjoy nothing, because your heart is not clean and clear; there is something in the background which makes you sad whenever you try to be happy. Then a man tries first to deceive himself. He says to himself, ‘No, that sin is not what makes me unhappy—not that;’ and he tries to find out any and every reason for his uncomfortable feelings, except the very thing which he knows all the while in the bottom of his heart is the real reason. He says, ‘Well, perhaps I am unhappy because I have done something wrong: what wrong can I have done?’ And so he sets to work to find out every sin except the sin which is the cause of all, because that one he does not like to face: it is too real, and ugly, and humbling to his proud spirit; and perhaps he is afraid of having to give it up. So I have known a man confess himself a sinner, a miserable sinner, freely enough, and then break out into a rage with you, if you dare to speak a word of the one sin which you know that he has actually committed. ‘No, sir,’ he will say, ‘whatever I may be wrong in, I am right there. I have committed sins too many, I know: but you cannot charge me with that, at least;’—and all the more because he knows that everybody round is charging him with it, and that the thing is as notorious as the sun in heaven. But that makes him, in his pride, all the more determined not to confess himself in the wrong on that one point; and he will go and confess to God, and perhaps to man, all manner of secret sins, nay, even invent sins for himself out of things which are no sins, and confess himself humbly in the wrong where perhaps he is all right, just to drug his conscience, and be able to say, ‘I have repented,’—repented, that is, of everything but what he and all the world know that he ought to repent of.

But still his conscience is not easy: he has no peace of mind: he is like David: ‘While I held my peace, my bones waxed old through my daily complaining.’ God’s hand is heavy on him day and night, and his moisture is like the drought in summer: his heart feels hard and dry; he cannot enjoy himself; he is moody; he lies awake and frets at night, and goes listlessly and heavily about his business in the morning; his heart is not right with God, and he knows it; God and he are not at peace, and he knows it.

Then he tries to repent: but it is a false, useless sort of repentance. He says to Himself, as David did, ‘Well, then, I will make my peace with God: I will please Him. I have done one wrong thing. I will do two right ones to make up for it.’ If he is a rich man, he perhaps tries David’s plan of burnt-offerings and sacrifices. He says, ‘I will give away a great deal in charity; I will build a church; I will take a great deal of trouble about societies, and speak at religious meetings, and show God how much I really do care for Him after all, and what great sacrifices I can make for Him.’

Or, if he is a poor man, he will say, ‘Well, then, I will try and be more religious; I will think more about my soul, and come to church as often as I can, and say my prayers regularly, and read good books; and perhaps that will make my peace with God. At all events, God shall see that I am not as bad as I look; not altogether bad; that I do care for Him, and for doing right.’