“Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.”
~ Psalm 51:10
Hi James and Ellen,
What happens when you do something that you are not to do? If your dad when he was your age did something that he was not to do, do you know what happened to your dad? Your grandpaa will let you ask your dad what your grandpaa did to him when your dad did something that he was not to do. When a guy, gal or kid does something that the Bible teaches him or her not to do, the guy, gal or kid is disobeying God’s perfect will. What do you think God will do to a guy, gal or kid when the guy, gal or kid does something that he or she knows that he or she is not to do? God the Spirit may influence the guy, gal or kid to feel convicted. God the Spirit may influence the guy, gal or kid to genuinely regret what he or she did. God the Spirit may influence the guy, gal or kid to ask Him for His forgiveness. Every guy, gal and kid will at times go against God’s perfect will. Your grandpaa knows that God has undeservedly blessed him. Your grandpaa knows that God before He created planet Earth especially elected your grandpaa to be adopted into God’s Christ-follower family. Your grandpaa knows that God blessed him with a dad and ma who daily prayed and read the Bible. Because your grandpaa saw his dad and ma daily praying and reading the Bible, your grandpaa when he attended Dordt College would pray and read the Bible every night. After your grandpaa had read some verses one night from the Bible, your grandpaa got on his knees and told God that he absolutely believed what the Bible says. As your grandpaa was talking with God, your grandpaa promised God that he would do whatever God asked him to do. Your grandpaa believes that God heard what your grandpaa promised Him that he would do. Your grandpaa believes that as he was talking with God that night that God led your grandpaa to tell Him what your grandpaa promised that he would do. After your grandpaa told God that he would do whatever God would want him to do, your grandpaa did not think any more about what he had promised God until years later after your grandpaa was in Bolivia. God also blessed your grandpaa by giving him your grandmaa to be his wife. Your grandmaa’s dad and ma taught their kids to please and bless God. God has blessed the families of both your grandmaa and grandpaa. Your grandmaa’s ma and dad joined their Heavenly Father years ago in heaven. There are ten kids in all between your grandmaa’s and grandpaa’s family. Your grandmaa and grandpaa are serving God today as missionaries. Your dad’s Uncle Blake was a pastor and is still very actively involved with the Orthodox Presbyterian Church while your dad’s Uncle Henk has been a pastor for years in Christian Reformed Churches. Every uncle and aunt on your dad’s side of the family has been or is still active in the church that each uncle and aunt calls his or her church home.
Your grandpaa is blessed to having been able to start off his life knowing God. Your grandpaa knows that he will go crazy sometimes and sin. It is sometimes easy to think that doing something against what God has clearly instructed in the Bible not to do is not something terribly bad to do as every other guy, gal and kid is doing things that God has clearly instructed in the Bible that they are not to do. It is easy for a guy, gal or kid to think that sinning is okay if it makes him or her happy. Because God’s specially chosen guys, gals and kids were unable to keep the Mosaic Law that God gave to them through Moses, God sent His only Son – Jesus Christ, to die for the sins of the guys, gals and kids who He had specially elected for Himself before He created planet Earth. Your grandpaa wrote about David yesterday. David was Jesse’s youngest son. Jesse was a son of Boaz and Ruth. David was specially chosen by God to be the best king that Israel would ever have. God chose David to write beautiful songs which are called psalms. David knew that he was uniquely special in God’s eyes. Do you think that God kept David from ever going crazy and sinning? God allowed David to find out what it was like to go crazy and sin. Instead of being with his army fighting, David was hanging out on his palace’s roof one day when he spied a gal on top of her house taking a bath. The gal who David noticed really captivated him. David already had a number of wives but . . . and the gal who David spotted was already married. The gal’s husband was a very respected soldier in David’s army. When Bathsheba told David that she was going to have a baby and that David was the dad of the baby, David did a another crazy – and sinned again. David sent word to Bathsheba’s husband’s captain to have him put Bathsheba’s husband as the lead fighter. David wanted Bathsheba’s husband killed by the enemy who they were fighting. David did not want Bathsheba’s husband to discover the contemptible thing that he did with his wife.
God witnessed what David did with Bathsheba. God would not let David go undisciplined for his offenses. Even though David was very special to God, God did not hesitate to afflict David for the wrongs that he did with Bathsheba. Do you know how God chastised David? God had the baby who was born to David and Bathsheba die. David felt miserable that God had his baby die because of his moral and ethical lapses. David would write a psalm song about how contrite that he felt. The psalm song that David wrote at this time is Psalm 51. David knew that he had done something really dissolute. David uses this psalm song to ask God to have mercy on him through forgiving him for the very bad thing that he had done with Bathsheba and what he had done to Bathsheba’s husband. David wanted to start his life all over again. Verse 10 has David asking God to “Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.” If there is one verse in the Bible that would really be good for you to memorize, this is the verse. Your grandpaa knows that you are going to do bad things that you will really lament that you did.
Psalm 51 (121)