Psalms · psalm 51 of 150
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Psalm 51 is David's prayer after the prophet Nathan confronted him about his sin with Bathsheba. He asks for mercy according to God's steadfast love, acknowledges that he has sinned against God, asks to be cleansed and asks God to create in him a clean heart. He declares that God does not want sacrifices but a broken spirit, and promises to teach others God's ways.
The title says it is a psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came to him after he had gone in to Bathsheba, as told in 2 Samuel 11 and 12. It is the best known of the penitential psalms and one of the deepest prayers of repentance in the Bible. It is read in many services and retreats and teaches how to approach God when we have failed gravely.
David begins by appealing not to his merits but to God's character: have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. He asks to be washed from his iniquity and cleansed from his sin. He acknowledges his sin: I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that God is justified in his words and blameless in his judgment. He admits that he was brought forth in iniquity and that in sin his mother conceived him, expressing that his problem is deeper than an isolated act.
Then he asks for cleansing and renewal: purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. Let me hear joy and gladness, hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence and do not take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit.
After that he promises to serve: I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will return to you. Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness; open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise. He acknowledges that God does not delight in sacrifice or burnt offering: the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart God will not despise. The psalm ends with a prayer for Zion: do good to Zion in your good pleasure; build up the walls of Jerusalem; then you will delight in right sacrifices.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
David does not ask forgiveness for what he deserves but according to God's steadfast love and compassion. He asks him to blot out his rebellion, wash him from his iniquity and cleanse him from his sin.
Against you only have I sinned, says David, though his sin harmed Bathsheba, Uriah and the nation. He recognizes that all sin is above all an offense against God, and that God is just in judging.
David asks God to create in him a clean heart and renew a right spirit within him. He knows he cannot cleanse himself: transformation is God's work.
The sacrifices God accepts are a broken spirit and a broken and contrite heart, which he does not despise. Sincere repentance is worth more than any ritual.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: On God's steadfast love and abundant mercy, not on his own merits. — Psalm 51:1
Answer: Against God, against him only. — Psalm 51:4
Answer: A clean heart and a renewed right spirit. — Psalm 51:10
Answer: God's presence and his Holy Spirit. — Psalm 51:11
Answer: Teach transgressors God's ways so that sinners return to him. — Psalm 51:13
Answer: A broken spirit and a broken and contrite heart. — Psalm 51:17
Psalm 51 is a model for confessing sin. David does not minimize what he did, does not blame others and offers no excuses. His prayer begins with God's mercy and ends with a renewed life that serves others. In a small group it can be read slowly, verse by verse, with a time of silence to confess to God what weighs on the conscience.
The psalm also shows that forgiveness is not permission to stay the same but the beginning of a new heart. Paul speaks of that new creation in 2 Corinthians 5:17. Someone who has been forgiven can teach others with humility, not from superiority but as one who knows grace.
Psalm 51 shows a king who falls and rises again by God's mercy. Psalm 52 turns back to David's enemies, in particular one who uses his tongue to do harm, and contrasts him with the one who trusts in God's steadfast love.
In verse 5 David says that from conception he belongs to a sinful humanity. He does not say that the act of conceiving is sin but that his inclination to evil precedes his acts. It is a confession of the depth of the problem, which Paul later develops in Romans 5:12.
It is a small plant used in purification rites to sprinkle blood or water, as in Exodus 12:22 and Leviticus 14:4-7. David asks God to purify him as the rites would, but with a true cleansing of the heart.
No, he asks the very opposite: that God not take it from him. In the Old Testament the Spirit came upon some for specific tasks, and David fears losing that presence because of his sin. Christians are grateful that in Christ the Spirit dwells in all believers.