Our Devotion for today is taken from: Amazing Grace Devotions for Lent by Michael Hoy.
9 Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities. 10 Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.
Psalm 51:9-10NRSV
GRACE OVER SCANDAL
While David enjoyed favor with God, he was also a man with sin and scandal in his life. He had an adulterous affair with Bathsheba and sent her husband, Uriah, to a certain death. Nathan the prophet told a parable about a man who had many flocks of his own but stole for himself the only lamb that belonged to a poor man. Angered by this injustice, David said the rich man deserved to die for his transgression. Nathan then said to David, “You are the man!”
From his own mouth, David had pronounced his own sin. Penitently, he cried to God for mercy to deliver him. Grace empowers us to acknowledge and accept the sins and scandals in our lives. But it also gives us the confidence that God can and will be merciful. Our Lord Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
Friends,
We are all in need of forgiveness, none of us can claim to be without “spot or blemish” (Eph 5:27). Psalm 51 is David’s repentant cry and plea for forgiveness after the Prophet Nathan holds him accountable for his treachery with Uriah and Bathsheba. Yes, we are all in need of forgiveness, but Christ also calls us to be forgiving of those who have wounded us. As we continue through the Lenten Season, let us be ever mindful to be conduits of God’s grace, hope, mercy, and forgiveness.
-Pastor Anthony
Prayer
Father, for the sake of you Son Jesus, do not hold us in the guilt of our sins, but grace us with your ever abundant mercy. Amen.
-Michael Hoy