The Psalms Student Handbook

PSALM FIFTY-ONE Sorry God, sin was so attractive page 15

PSALM SEVENTY-THREE God, am I an idiot?

page 4

page 7

Introduction page

1 2 Contents ...

4 5 6 7 3

PSALM ONE HUNDRED & THREE God, you’re awesome page 54

PSALM ONE HUNDRED & NINETEEN God, do you know best? page 48

PSALM TWENTY-THREE God, you will stick with me page 41

PSALM THIRTEEN God, help me! page 33

PSALM ONE HUNDRED & THIRTY-NINE God, do you even know I exist? page 23

Mistakefree days:

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chapter

two

psalm fifty-one

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SORRY GOD, SIN WAS SO ATTRACTIVE Is God in denial about how good sin can feel at the time? Can’t I just say sorry and it will be all good?

Listen to ‘Undo’ by Rush of Fools and read the lyrics.

what do you think? *

What is the song saying?

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* What do you think of its message?

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* Do you identify with any of it?

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- consider this Feel bad for a bit but hope that it will fade soon enough.

Ignore it and move on hoping no-one will notice.

Tell someone close to you, to get it off your chest.

DISCUSS what best describes your reaction when you do something wrong.

Not even think about it—after all who really cares anyway?!

Say sorry straightaway as you can’t stand secrets!

Feel really guilty until eventually you admit what you’ve done and say sorry.

* Do you think this is a good way to react? * Where do you fit on a scale between the following?

If there is a God, he will forgive me for everything I do. Sin is not that big a deal and forgiving is God’s job. Right?

I am not the kind of person God would ever love. I am beyond his forgiveness.

God wouldn’t want me. Right?

AS WE LOOK AT PSALM 51, THINK ABOUT WHERE GOD’S PERSPECTIVE MIGHT STAND ON THIS SCALE.

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grew up with him and his children. It shared his food, drank from his cup and even slept in his arms. It was like a daughter to him.

‘Now a traveller came to the rich man, but the rich man refrained from taking one of his own sheep or cattle to prepare a meal for the traveller who had come to him.

Instead, he took the ewe lamb that belonged to the poor man and prepared it for the one who had come to him.’

- david’s story One afternoon I was on the roof of my palace, and saw a gorgeous woman bathing at the neighbour’s place.

I asked who she was and sent my servants to bring her to me. After all, I am king and she, Bathsheba, was irresistible. I knew she was married to Uriah, one of my soldiers, but he was away at war so I slept with her. Some months passed and she sent me a message saying she was pregnant. I had to devise a plan, so I requested that Uriah return from the war and report back to me how it was going. That way he could sleep with Bathsheba and he would think it was his baby. But he was so loyal to me and his troops that he slept at the palace steps.

He didn’t feel that he deserved to enjoy his comfortable bed and wife while his men were suffering at war. I tried getting him drunk but he still didn’t go home. I needed a new plan. I sent him back to war with a sealed letter telling my commander to withdraw from Uriah and leave him at the front line so that he would be killed.

It worked. Bathsheba had a grieving period, and then I married her. I didn’t really reflect on what I had done. I guess I was in denial. Instead I just enjoyed my new wife.

However, God sent Nathan, a prophet, to speak to me.

He told me a story: ‘There were two men in a certain town, one rich and the other poor. The rich man had a very large number of sheep and cattle, but the poor man had nothing except one little ewe lamb he had bought. He raised it, and it

I exploded in anger! ‘As surely as the LORD lives’, I said to Nathan, ‘the man who did this must die! He must pay for that lamb four times over, because he did such a thing and had no pity’.

Much to my horror, Nathan cried out ‘You are the man!’

It suddenly hit me. Nathan went on, ‘This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you from the hand of Saul. I gave your master’s house to you, and your master’s wives into your arms. I gave you all Israel and Judah. And if all this had been too little, I would have given you even more. Why did you despise the word of the LORD by doing what is evil in his eyes? You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own.

You killed him with the sword of the Ammonites! Now, therefore, the sword will never depart from your house, because you despised me and took the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your own.’

As I reflected, I was horrified at what I had done when God had been so good to me. I confessed to Nathan, ‘I have sinned against the LORD’. Nathan pronounced, ‘The LORD has taken away your sin. You are not going to die’.

I had to talk to God about this. I put my prayer into a song.1

1- Some text taken from The New International Version 2011.

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FACE TO FACE WITH THE TEXT psalm fifty-one For the director of music. A psalm of David. When the prophet Nathan came to him after David had committed adultery with Bathsheba.

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions.

2 Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.

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For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.

4 Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight; so you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge.

Then I will teach transgressors your ways, so that sinners will turn back to you.

Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, you who are God my Saviour, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.

15 Open my lips, Lord, and my mouth will declare your praise.

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You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.

17 My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise.

18 May it please you to prosper Zion, to build up the walls of Jerusalem.

19 Then you will delight in the sacrifices of the righteous, in burnt offerings offered whole; then bulls will be offered on your altar.

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Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.

6 Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb; you taught me wisdom in that secret place.

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Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.

8 Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.

9 Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.

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questions 1. Nowhere does David promise he will make it up to God. So, why does David feel brave enough to ask such a big thing of God, even when he has sinned so badly? (Hint: The whole psalm starts with this fact.) Add this to the flowchart on page 19.

2. Highlight verses that show how David views himself? Put these details into the flowchart.

3. Highlight (in a different colour) verses that show what David wants from God? Discuss and summarise these and add them to the flowchart. Note: Just writing ‘forgiveness’ is not the answer: there is more to it.

4. David says this will result in change in his life. Have Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

11 Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.

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Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

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a look for what he says and finish off the flowchart with this.

Why can’t David just decide ‘OK, I don’t want to do anything bad anymore so I won’t’?

Please God, have mercy on me

because you are ...

whereas I am ...

so I need you to ...

then I will ...

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so what? reflect does this psalm show about the problem * What with the advice, ‘Just trust your heart’ when you are making a decision? ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ back to where you put yourself on the scale * Look at the start of the lesson. As Psalm 51 shows us, neither statement truly shows God’s view of our sinfulness. What is wrong with these statements?

Describe what you have learned about sin and forgiveness from this lesson. ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________ ___________________________________________

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relate people think God is in denial about how good * Many it can feel to do whatever you want, even if it’s sinful. After reading David’s story and Psalm 51, do you think God really is in denial or does he know how tempting sin can be? Explain your answer.

CONNECTING

with

CHRIST

1 JOHN 1:8–9 ‘If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.’

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God invites, indeed commands, that we confess our sins to him and promises he will forgive and purify us.

ROMANS 6:23 ‘For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.’

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But thanks to the cross ...

You need to take up God’s offer of forgiveness as the consequences are massive.

1 PETER 3:18 ‘For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God.’ One way that we can understand this verse is with this illustration: • We all reject God and do whatever we want—this is sin. Imagine every sinful action or thought of ours was written in a book. We’d fill up books and more books throughout our life. These ‘books’ act as a barrier between God and us.

• We can’t have access to God and his perfect eternity if we are sinful—that wouldn’t be fair and heaven couldn’t be heaven if it was full of sinful people.

• Jesus is the only one who never sinned. He has done nothing deserving God’s punishment. He has no ‘books’ full of sin. On the cross, he took all your books full of sin and was punished for every one so that you can now have access to a relationship with God for eternity.

MURAL

Turn to the centrefold and add to the mural for this lesson, finishing the statement ‘Psalms show us we can …’ with a summary sentence of what you have learned this lesson.

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Take a break!

Crack the code!

See if you can crack the code and decode the sentence.

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PART ONE: Use the Pig Pen cipher above to decode the message below. Write your result on the orange lines.

ijfw lti, n mfaj xnssji. n'r xtwwd, uqjfxj ktwlnaj rj fsi mjqu rj hmfslj.

PART TWO: Use the Caesar Cipher below to decode the message you discovered in Part One. We have given you a few letters to start you off. Can you work out what the other letters are? Write your result in the orange box.

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22 - The Psalms

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FINAL MESSAGE