“…what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?”
~ Psalm 8:4
Welcome, once again, Sweetwater friends and family, to the final post of my Psalm 19 series! Through these discussions, my love for the Law of God was deeply enriched and I have been made more aware of His indescribable radiance that shines throughout Scripture. I thank the Lord for His mercy on me through this journey and I am grateful for the perseverance He gave me when I was feeling less-than-motivated. My prayer for you has been, and continues to be, that God would use Psalm 19 to encourage your heart and mind and that you, also, would experience a deeper and richer love and understanding of His Word, both written and Incarnate.
Let us now draw back the curtain on the final act.
Scene IV. Act IV.
Recall from my last post the three sections of Psalm 19: God’s revelation through Creation, revelation through Scripture, and the believer’s response. David’s prayer in verses 12-14 is a model for how we also ought to respond in light of the glories and grace of God put forth in verses 1-11.
19:12. Who can discern his errors? Declare me innocent from hidden faults.
The Hebrew word for “errors” in verse 12 is shegı̂y’âh (sheg-ee-aw’), meaning “a moral mistake”, derived from shâgâh (shaw-gaw’) which means “to stray (go astray), transgress; deceive, sin through ignorance”[1]. Note this latter definition. It is important to highlight the word ignorance because the sacrificial system described in the books of Leviticus and Numbers specifically addressed “sin through ignorance” (KJV), or “sins [committed] unintentionally” (ESV), as sins covered by substitutionary atonement (see Lev. 4:2, 13, 22, 27; 5:15, [17]; Num. 15:22-29). In the Levitical law, a sinner[2] who committed an unintentional sin and was later made aware of their transgression, or “the sin…becomes known” (Lev. 4:14), was then commanded to confess and bring an appropriate offering for their atonement sacrifice.
By what means is a sinner’s guilt exposed, even when the sin was unintentional?
The Law of God; for “by the law is the knowledge of sin”[3].
Consider, then, the context of Psalm 19:12. David has just spent five verses acclaiming the “perfect…sure…right…pure…clean…true” Law of God (19:7-9) and expressing the value of it above anything else in Creation (vv. 10-11). His meditation on the Law then brings him face-to-face with his own depravity and, having seen the ugliness and wretchedness of his heart, leads him to cry out for mercy. According to John Calvin:
We ought then to remember, in the first place, that as we are personally destitute of the righteousness which the law requires, we are on that account excluded from the hope of the reward which the law has promised; and, in the next place, that we are guilty before God, not of one fault or of two, but of sins innumerable, so that we ought, with the bitterest sorrow, to bewail our depravity, which not only deprives us of the blessing of God, but also turns to us life into death. This David did.[4]
With his use of the words “errors” and “hidden faults”, David exhibits an awareness that there is a great magnitude, in number and malignity, of conscious and unconscious sins from which he is in need of being “declared innocent”. Matthew Henry explains:
We are guilty of many sins which, through our carelessness and partiality to ourselves, we are not aware of; many we have been guilty of which we have forgotten; so that, when we have been ever so particular in the confession of sin, we must conclude with an et cetera – and such like; for God knows a great deal more evil of us than we do of ourselves.[5]
Even if a conscious sin is never committed, David, along with Calvin and Henry, is here saying there are a plethora of transgressions for which we must make account that are beyond our consciousness. Pastor and expositor Alexander MacLaren likens our secret sins to “vermin lurking beneath the stones” of our hearts or a “fungus that has grown in a wine-cask…[that] sucks up all the generous liquor to feed its own filthiness, and when the staves are broken, there is no wine left, nothing but the foul growth”[6]. MacLaren also paints a sobering picture of the blindness and deceit of the human heart with these words:
It is with our characters as with our faces. Few of us are familiar with our own appearance, and most of us, if we have looked at our portraits, have felt a little shock of surprise, and been ready to say to ourselves, ‘Well! I did not know that I looked like that!’…We have fine names for our own vices, and ugly ones for the very same vices in other people. David will flare up into generous and sincere indignation about the man that stole the poor man’s ewe lamb, but he has not the ghost of a notion that he has been doing the very same thing himself.
Though we, or our peers, do not know of every hidden sin harbored within ourselves, for “who is there that could reveal himself to men? Who is there that could bear the sight of a naked soul?” (MacLaren), they are not hidden from our Maker. Just as “there is nothing hidden from [the sun’s] heat” (Psa. 19:6), so does the eye of the Lord search and know every faculty of our hearts (see 1 Sam. 16:7; 1 Kin. 8:39; Psa. 139:1-6; Prov. 16:2, 5; Luke 12:2-3; John 2:23-25). Therefore, our “hidden faults” are as deserving of death as those committed in willful defiance. Again drawing from Henry, “even secret faults are defiling, and render us unfit for communion with God…”. Calvin likewise teaches:
In summoning himself and others before the judgment-seat of God, [David] warns himself and them, that although their consciences do not condemn them, they are not on that account absolved; for God sees far more clearly than men’s consciences, since even those who look most attentively into themselves, do not perceive a great part of the sins with which they are chargeable.
In light of this, we ought to cry out to David’s question, “Who can discern his errors?” Not I!
Is there any hope, then, of redemption from these vicious and toxic “errors” that are wedged into the deepest crevices of our hearts? What confidence can we have to also say along with David, “declare me innocent” of all the ugliness and filth hiding within my soul?
The good news is yes! there is hope of redemption and promise of pardon found in Jesus Christ. The Levitical sacrifices instituted for unintentional sins were only a temporary atonement, a placeholder until the coming of the truly perfect Lamb of God. Contrary to the Old Testament sacrifices that had to be performed daily, Jesus’ offering of Himself on the cross was a “once for all” sacrifice (Heb. 7:27) through which “the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands” was “canceled” in order that we might be “made alive” in Christ. (Col. 2:13-14). Through His life, death, and resurrection all the requirements of the Law were fulfilled. We no longer rely on the imperfect blood of bulls, goats, and doves, but on the righteous, divine blood of our Savior Jesus, in whom our darkest thoughts, even those hidden from our own consciousness, are cleansed. Only in Christ can we be found innocent in the eyes of a holy God. “And so we may be sure that, though our eye does not go down into the dark depths, God’s eye goes, and that where He looks He looks to pardon, if we come to Him through Jesus Christ our Lord” (MacLaren).
19:13. Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me! Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression.
In the discussion of verse 12 I referenced a contrast between unintentional sins and willful sins. Psalm 19:12-13 also distinguishes “errors”, unintentional sin, from “presumptuous sins”, or willful disobedience. As mentioned at the beginning of verse 12, the Levitical law specifically identifies an atonement sacrifice for unintentional sin but it does not provide a sacrifice for “presumptuous” sin. In fact, Numbers 15:30-31 tells us that whoever “doeth presumptuously[7]…shall be cut off from among his people…his iniquity shall be upon him” (KJV).
This word “presumptuous” is the Hebrew word zêd (zade’), which means “arrogant” or “proud”. Zêd is found 13 times in the Old Testament, 12 of which, in the KJV, are translated as “proud”.
What is pride?
The first definition listed in the Oxford Dictionary[8] is, “a feeling or deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from one’s own achievements”. Applying this definition to the context of sin, pride causes us to blatantly disregard the truths of scripture by convincing us that we are fine on our own – we ‘feel a deep pleasure or satisfaction’ in our own conduct rather than seeing our need for Christ. We believe our works will vindicate us when we stand before God for judgment.
MacLaren puts forth the idea that “presumptuous sins” encompass more than purely sins committed in pride or arrogance, though those are certainly included. Given the context of Psalm 19:12-13, he explains these presumptuous sins are “just the opposite of ‘secret sins’-all sorts of evil which, whatever may be their motives and other qualities have this in common, that the doer, when he does them, knows them to be wrong”. Whether out of pride, or spite, or a rebellious desire, presumptuous sins differ from secret sins in that the sinner willfully rejects the truths of Scripture and continues in his or her sin despite the understanding that it is wrong.
It is also noteworthy to look at David’s word progression in the first sentence of Psalm 19:13. First, he asks the Lord to “keep back your servant…”, a phrase implying to restrain or hold back. What circumstances generally require restraint of a person? When that person is using all their might, straining or struggling, to get to something, go somewhere, or do something that is harmful for them or others around them. According to MacLaren,
The Psalmist is like a man standing on the edge of some precipice, and peeping over the brink to the profound beneath, and feeling his head beginning to swim. He clutches at the strong, steady hand of his guide, knowing that unless he is restrained, over he will go.
Calvin, also, comments on our propensity to sin saying, “even the saints themselves would immediately break forth or rush headlong into it, did not God, by his own guardianship and protection, keep them back.” More than rushing into sin only once, however, presumptuous sin further implies a continual rejection of God’s Law, a lifestyle of choosing self-governance over submission. A willful sin that later brings the sinner to his knees in recognition of his transgression and leads to repentance is not the kind of willful sin here mentioned. MacLaren states:
A man may do a very bad thing once, and get so wholesomely frightened, and so keenly conscious of the disastrous issues, that he will never go near it again. The prodigal would not be in a hurry, you may depend upon it, to try the swine trough and the far country, and the rags, and the fever, and the famine any more.
Conversely, it also happens that, having indulged in fleshly desire, a person, whether sinner or saint, will continue to reject that which they know to be true and right and return time and again to unholy endeavors. It is this continual rejection of truth that constitutes what David and the book of Numbers call “presumptuous sin”. Paul, also, in Romans 1:18-32, addresses this kind of presumptuous rebellion in the ungodly men who “knew God” but “did not honor him as God” (v. 21), desiring, rather, to satisfy the impulses of their flesh. In consequence “God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts” (v. 24) for “though they knew God’s righteous decree” that their practices and attitudes were deserving of death, they chose to continue in their vile and wicked ways (v. 32).
Next, David acknowledges his position as a “servant” of God, “keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins…”. By admitting himself a servant in need of restraint from willful transgression, David shows us that even believers struggle with their sinful nature; only by God’s constant intervention of grace can we overcome worldly temptations. As the last stanza of Robert Robinson’s hymn “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing” expresses,
Oh, to grace how great a debtor
daily I’m constrained to be!
Let thy goodness, like a fetter,
bind my wandering heart to thee:
prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
prone to leave the God I love;
here’s my heart, O take and seal it;
seal it for thy courts above.
Charles Spurgeon states it this way:
This earnest and humble prayer teaches us that saints may fall into the worst of sins unless restrained by grace, and that therefore they must watch and pray lest they enter into temptation. There is a natural proneness to sin in the best of men, and they must be held back as a horse is held back by the bit or they will run into it.
Lastly, the plea to “not let them have dominion over me!” emphasizes the degree to which David knew he longed to give in to temptations of the flesh. Again from Calvin:
By these words he expressly declares, that unless God assist him, he will not only be unable to resist, but will be wholly brought under the dominion of the worst vices. This passage, therefore, teaches us not only that all mankind are naturally enslaved to sin, but that the faithful themselves would become the bond-slaves of sin also, if God did not unceasingly watch over them to guide them in the path of holiness, and to strengthen them for persevering in it.
Consider, now, the last sentence of Psalm 19:13: “then I shall be blameless and innocent of great transgression”. What does David mean by the “great transgression” and why does he so avidly beg God to keep him from it? In the KJV the article “the” is placed in front of “great transgression”, saying “then…I shall be innocent from the great transgression” (italics mine). This is, therefore, not a general sin but a specific form of treachery, namely the conscious rejection of Jesus. This rejection of Truth is the worst of all “presumptuous sins” imaginable. Recall the passage in Numbers that describes the consequence given for a presumptuous sinner: to be “cut off from among his people”. A note in my ESV study Bible explains that to be “cut off” signifies “dying suddenly as a divine punishment, being executed, or being separated from the rest of the community” (note on Num. 9:6-14). In other words, someone who knows what they’re doing is wrong, who willfully and unrepentantly continues in their sin, and is therefore denied access to God’s presence and the Covenant blessings that flow from Him. Sweetwater’s founder, David Pendergrass, explains the terrible reality of being cut off from God in this manner:
It was a horrible fate to be cut off from God’s people. Hell on earth. Literally. It’s tied to Paul’s directive to the Corinthian church to excommunicate the unrepentant sinner (1 Cor 5). Paul even refers to giving the man over to Satan! To be cut off from the Body of Christ is to be outside the protective umbrella of the Covenant of Grace and the means of grace that come to us through the preached Word and the sacraments (i.e., baptism and the Lord’s supper) as well as the blessings of fellowship with other believers, etc. Those who left their pods of fellow sailors adrift in the ocean after their ship sunk were the first to be taken by sharks.
To proudly and willfully deny Christ, then, invites the consequence of being cut off from the presence of God, not only in this life, but for eternity[9]. So, how can we be found “blameless” and “innocent” of such a “great transgression” that would separate us from our Lord forever?
By humbly clinging to the cross of Christ; for it is by His blood we are “cleansed…from all sin” and “all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:7, 9). MacLaren further elucidates:
The Gospel knows nothing of irreclaimable outcasts. To it there is but one unpardonable sin, and that is the sin of refusing the cleansing of Christ’s blood and the sanctifying of Christ’s Spirit. Whoever you are, whatever you are, go to God with this prayer of our text, and realize that it is answered in Jesus Christ, and you will not ask in vain.
19:14. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.
Having been humbled before the Lord through a confrontation with his wretched heart and having asked the Lord for help to overcome his sin, David then finishes his prayer with a request to be found “acceptable” before his Heavenly Father. The faculties of “mouth” and “heart” in the human body are the most vile. Words are often the hardest to control, more so than actions. According to James, chapter 3, the tongue steers the body and, if left untamed, it can “[set] on fire the entire course of life” (v. 6). Yet James also notes that “no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison” (v. 8).
But why does it matter that the words of our mouths be acceptable in the sight of God? Why should we want to tame our tongues?
In Matthew 12, Jesus tells the Pharisees, “I tell you, on the day of judgement people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned” (vv. 36-37). How can that be? Are we not justified by faith? To further understand what Jesus is saying here, let’s look also at Matthew 10:32-33: “So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven, but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.” Our words justify us, not because language itself holds any sort of salvific power, but because words are expressions of our hearts; “for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Matt. 12:34, [15:18]). Therefore, David’s coupling of the “words of [his] mouth and the meditation of [his] heart” fit naturally together; you cannot have acceptable words without an acceptable heart and you cannot have an acceptable heart without acceptable words, for this would be akin to “both fresh and salt water” coming from the same well (Jam. 3:11).
But if it is impossible for us to tame our tongues, as James says in James 3:8, and our hearts are naturally inclined to evil (Gen. 8:20, Ecc. 8:11), how can we hope to be found acceptable in God’s sight? David answers this question in the last phrase of Psalm 19:14: we have hope in our “LORD, [our] rock and [our] redeemer”, once again, pointing to Jesus Christ (“Rock” see 1 Cor. 10:4; redeemer see Gal. 3:13). Spurgeon states:
Words of the mouth are mockery if the heart does not meditate; the shell is nothing without the kernel; but both together are useless unless accepted; and even if accepted by man, it is all vanity if not acceptable in the sight of God. We must in prayer view Jehovah as our strength enabling, and our Redeemer saving…
Thus, the only goal worthy of striving for is to live a life pleasing to the Maker and Sustainer of all things. For what god, but the merciful, gracious One, Creator of Heaven and Earth, would send His only Son to be “pierced for our transgressions” and “crushed for our iniquities” so that in Him all of our “wounds…are healed” (Isa. 53:5); only He is the One by whom I desire to be accepted! To wrap up Psalm 19:14, hear these encouraging words, also from Charles Spurgeon:
Our near Kinsman’s name, our Goel[10] or Redeemer, makes a blessed ending to the Psalm; it began with the heavens, but it ends with him whose glory fills heaven and earth. Blessed Kinsman, give us now to meditate acceptably upon thy most sweet love and tenderness.
And now the end of this journey through Psalm 19 has come. It has been an immense joy to dive into and swim through this incredible chapter of Scripture over the past eight months; I pray that some of these discussions both encouraged and challenged you in your walk with the Lord. As a final thought to this series, I will leave you with a quote from John Owen that beautifully articulates the rightful place Christ deserves in our thoughts and affections:
Some, of more refined minds, rise to a diligent meditation on the works of creation and providence. Hence there are many excellent discourses on that subject, adorned with eloquence, published among us. And this is a work worthy of our nature and suited to our rational capacities; yea, the first end of our natural endowment with them. But in all these things there is no glory in comparison to what is proposed to us in the mysterious constitution of the person of Christ. The sun has no glory, the moon and stars no beauty, the order and influence of the heavenly bodies have no excellency, in comparison to it.[11]
*All scripture references in this post were taken from the ESV translation unless otherwise noted.
[1] Hebrew words and definitions in this post were drawn from Strong’s Concordance, accessed on e-Sword.
[2] This applied to individuals, priests, or whole assemblies/congregations (see Leviticus 4).
[3] Charles Spurgeon, Treasury of David. Published 1869-1885. Accessed on e-Sword. All quotes cited by Spurgeon in this post were pulled from this commentary.
[4] Calvin’s commentary on the Psalms…
[5] Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible. Published 1708-1714. Accessed on e-Sword. All quotes cited from Matthew Henry in this post were taken from this commentary.
[6] Expositions of Holy Scripture. Published 1904-1910. Accessed on e-Sword. All quotes cited from Alexander MacLaren in this post were taken from his exposition of Psalm 19:12-13.
[7] Or “anything done with a high hand” (ESV)
[8] Definition accessed through https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/proud.
[9] This discussion on being “cut off” from God barely scratches the surface of the topic, and I am still working to fully understand all the nuances of the phrase. For further clarity on the concept, however, I recommend Heidelberg Catechism Q. 83-85 regarding the keys to the kingdom of heaven and the authority granted to the Church.
[10] From Merriam-Webster Dictionary: “Redeemer; Reclaimant. especially : a next of kin upon whom according to ancient Hebrew custom devolved certain family rights and duties including the avenging of a murdered kin’s blood and the redemption of the person or property of a relative in debt or helpless circumstances”
[11] The Glory of Christ, Chapter 3.