Our meditation today comes from Psalm
51:12a
Create in me a clean heart, O God.
Sometimes when we look back over
the past with the sensitivities and conscience of the present, we realize that
we had done something perhaps years ago that now fills us with guilt and
contrition. “If only I knew then what I know now!” we might cry. Times like
that are times to turn to Psalm 51, which is David’s Psalm of repentance after
the prophet Nathan had opened his eyes to see what sins he had committed:
fornication, adultery and murder. (You can read the entire story in II Samuel,
chapters 11 and 12.) And David’s psalm of repentance and contrition is asking
not only for forgiveness of sin, but also a healing of the emotional, physical
and social consequences of his sin. (And of our sins as well.)
Create in me a clean heart: This is asking for a lot. It’s not only
a question of forgiveness or cleansing; it is begging for something completely
new by an act of God’s creative power. We might pray, “Create in me a new
clean heart.”
And God promises to do this.
Ezekiel 36: 25-27: I will sprinkle clean water upon you to cleanse you from all your
impurities, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. I will give you a new
heart and place a new spirit within you, taking from your bodies your stony
hearts and giving you natural hearts.
One last thing: We pray this
psalm frequently, and in the monastery usually on Fridays, the day of Christ’s
passion. Again and again and again we need to beg for God’s creative action in
our lives, because again and again and again we fall into sin. And God never
tires of giving us what we ask for.
But sometimes we tire of asking.
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