Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness.
Having confessed his guilt and begged for mercy, David now names the stain he has not yet named — blood. Here a man guilty of a death calls God his Saviour, and promises to sing of God's righteousness rather than His kindness.
David's sin with Bathsheba involved two evils. Only one of them surfaces in this prayer.
It was not until God sent Nathan to David to expose his guilt that David finally broke down and confessed. His confession involved both his guilt in adultery and his guilt in bloodshed, since he knew he was responsible for the death of Bathsheba's husband. But he mentions only bloodshed in this chapter (v. 14). It stands for Israel's guilt in the murder of the Lord Jesus, and that is by far the most serious sin of their history.
His plea goes straight to God, not to the altar. That was not carelessness. The law had no sacrifice that covered his case.
About himself he could say nothing. He could only admit his guilt and the corruption he inherited from Adam (2-5). But he could throw himself on God's mercy, the unfailing resource for all who honestly turn to it. He could offer nothing to meet his case. The law provided no sacrifice for someone who had sinned deliberately, as he had. Death was its only sentence (Num. 15:30-31). In that situation the only sacrifice God could accept from David was a broken spirit.
The name David gives God answers his own problem.
David appeals directly to God, because, as he states in this section, he can find no relief in sacrifices (v. 14). Only God can deliver him from the guilt of bloodshed — the God of his salvation.
We might expect a guilty man to sing of God's kindness. Instead David names the attribute that should condemn him.
"Your righteousness!" How wonderfully that comes in here! Not "Your grace," but "Your righteousness." Grace, true grace, reigns through righteousness. Through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ, God can be, and is, righteous in forgiving. He is righteous in justifying and receiving all who come to Him through that blessed One. "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins." He loves to restore the soul, but He restores it on this one ground alone. He is faithful and just to Jesus, and therefore faithful and just to us.
Some say this language is too advanced for a man living under the law. Another writer answers that objection.
This sounds too much like the gospel, if we take it in Paul's sense of God's righteousness revealed in the gospel... But it would be folly to measure the depth of an inspired statement by the intelligence (real or supposed) of the writer. Such folly leaves God out of His Word... At the beginning of the psalm he pleaded for mercy according to God's known compassion. That is, he asked God to act in keeping with His own character. That is already the "righteousness" he will sing about once delivered... The cross is the full explanation of this.
One writer sees more here than David's own guilt. He sees a confession a whole nation will one day make.
This is Israel's future confession of their sin, and above all of the bloodguiltiness that rests on that nation... David had bloodguiltiness on him. And when the Jews handed the Holy One over to the Gentiles they cried, "His blood be on us and on our children." They will confess this bloodguiltiness when the Lord comes. They will look on Him whom they pierced and mourn for Him (Zech. 12:10)... They will sing aloud of His righteousness, when the Lord has taken away their sins.
The verse ends with a promise. It sets the pattern for everyone God forgives.
Out of the fullness of his heart his mouth will speak. His theme will be, not himself, but the God of his salvation. He will sing, and show forth, and teach. He will not fear God's righteousness, but will make it the subject of his song. The man who at first hoped only for His mercy will exult in His righteousness!... Shall we be less ready to speak than David was? Shall our lips be silent?
- Guilt named. David names the worst thing he did — bloodshed — and asks God to deal with that.
- Guilt uncovered. The law had no sacrifice for a sin like his. Death was its only sentence, so he had nothing to offer but a broken spirit.
- Guilt taken by God alone. He calls on "the God of my salvation," because God alone can deliver him.
- Guilt answered by righteousness. God forgives on righteous ground. So the pardoned man sings of the very thing that once condemned him.
- Guilt turned to song. The prayer ends in a promise. Lips once shut by shame become a voice that teaches others and praises God — David's, and one day a whole nation's.
Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall declare thy praise.
Psalm 51 is the prayer of a man caught in his sin. By this line he is asking God for something he cannot do himself: the use of his own mouth. Sin had silenced him, and praise, like pardon, has to come as a gift.
Sin shuts a mouth before God opens it. One writer pictures David after his sin, unable to join Israel's songs while others sang freely:
Moses and the people of Israel may sing, "the Lord has triumphed gloriously." Deborah and Barak in their turn may sing, "so let all your enemies perish, O Lord." Songs belong to a glad heart, to those whose own conscience speaks for them. But there could be no music in David's heart now. That heart was no house of praise now. How could David enter the gates at that time and praise the Lord? Those gates open only to the righteous nation that keeps the truth. God had appointed salvation for walls and defences, and praise for gates; but David must be silent there, because he had sinned against the Lord.
David asks God, not a ritual, to reopen his mouth:
David appeals straight to God, for as he says in this section, he can find no relief in sacrifices (v. 14). Only God can deliver him from the guilt of bloodshed — the God of his salvation. That deliverance will set David singing aloud of God's righteousness, in contrast to his guilt. The Lord could open his lips to declare His praise (v. 15).
The psalm moves from cleansing, to deliverance, to song. One writer names what that song is about:
Having sought cleansing from his own sins, the psalmist seeks deliverance from the blood-guiltiness of the nation, guilty of the blood of their own Messiah (Matt. 27:25). Then indeed he would sing of the "righteousness" of God, expressed as we know in the death of Christ. The declaration of the righteousness of God will lead to the praise of the Lord.
Commentators differ over how much David himself grasped. Another writer traces the word back to David's opening plea for mercy:
From the beginning of the psalm he has been pleading for mercy according to the known compassion of God, that is, in keeping with His own character. This is already the "righteousness" he will sing about once he is delivered. The cross is the full explanation of this.
Notice what fills the mouth God opens. Not the sin, and not the sinner:
His mouth will speak out of a full heart. His theme will not be himself, but the God of his salvation. He will sing, and tell it out, and teach. He will not fear God's righteousness. He will make it the subject of his song. At the start he hoped only for God's mercy; now he will rejoice in His righteousness! … Shall our lips be silent? … Are sinners converted to God when we open our lips to speak? They will not be if we grieve and quench the Spirit within us, or if we have lost the joy of our salvation.
The psalm also looks past David. One writer sees a whole nation here, silent until God opens their lips:
He then speaks again of the witness that restored Israel will give to His praise, when their silent lips are opened.
That confession waits for one event — the day they look on the One they pierced:
This is Israel's future confession of their sin, and above all of the blood-guilt that rests on that nation. … When the Jews handed the Holy One over to the Gentiles they cried, "His blood be upon us and upon our children." They will confess this blood-guilt when the Lord comes, when they look on Him whom they pierced and mourn for Him (Zech. 12:10). … Then they will become the teachers of the Gentiles.
Praise here is not a mood. It is something said:
Sometimes people think praise is the feeling in our own hearts. But that feeling is the result of praise, not praise itself. Praise is "the fruit of our lips confessing His name." God values your joy, the happiness that fills your hearts and overflows. But there is one thing He values infinitely more than all our feelings: Christ Himself confessed to God.
- Silence — Sin shuts the mouth. David could not sing with Israel, because his own conscience did not speak for him. The gates of praise stayed shut.
- Prayer — No sacrifice met his case. So he asks God for the one thing he cannot do himself: opened lips.
- Ground — The song that follows is about God's righteousness. Commentators tie that righteousness to the death of Christ, not just to escape from trouble.
- Content — The opened mouth speaks of the God of his salvation, not of itself. Praise is Christ confessed to God, not a warm feeling.
- Reach — The prayer reaches past David to a whole nation. Their silent lips will open when they look on the One they pierced, and then they will teach others.
For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it thou hast no pleasure in burnt-offering.
The prophet Nathan has just confronted David over his adultery with Bathsheba and the killing of her husband. Now David faces a closed altar. God Himself commanded the sacrifices. If He takes no pleasure in them, what can a guilty person bring?
David knew exactly what he was doing. That put his sin out of reach of the offerings.
But in the fifty-first psalm you find the sin of presumption. There is no question that David knew how awful the sin was that he was committing. His conscience and heart had grown hard for the time, and he went on in that terrible course which in effect ended in murder. Then he came to feel that sin, after God had touched his conscience through the prophet Nathan. He could not plead ignorance, so he does not presume to bring an offering. The law provided trespass offerings and sin offerings, and offerings for the sin of a ruler too — but he could not bring that. He says, "You will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it." How could he bring a sacrifice for the very sin for which God declared there was no sacrifice?
David has only one place left to turn: God Himself.
And so the voice of divine mercy is not delayed: "The LORD also has put away your sin; you shall not die." For sin such as his, the law had no offering or sacrifice. Death was the righteous penalty. Only God Himself, on the throne above the king's throne, could set it aside. And this is what he means in his psalm of repentance.
The verse is not a sweeping rejection of sacrifice. And the broken spirit is not a payment put in its place.
In fact, none could be prescribed for sin like this, which greatly limits how absolute this denial is. Here the "sacrifices of God" could only be "a broken spirit"... A broken spirit cannot be the ground that justifies God's grace in salvation. It may describe the moral condition a sinner must meet to be accepted. And this is the only possible thought here. It would not be a broken spirit if it could regard itself as having atoning value in the sight of God. It is the very confession of sin and worthlessness that makes it possible for Him to come in with mercy.
Many people want to hand God something in exchange for forgiveness. This verse cuts that off.
There was no sacrifice available under law for the sin of adultery or of murder. Can we dare to think of giving something up to deserve the salvation of God? Mere pride may think so, but such a thing is repulsive to a God of truth and of grace... This is just the opposite of the pride of trying to appease God by giving Him some material offering. God would absolutely despise the latter, but will not despise a contrite heart.
David was not the first to learn this. Others in Israel had already put obedience above ritual.
Several passages in the Old Testament show that God did not delight in sacrifices offered with a wrong attitude of mind... "Has the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams" (1 Sam. 15:22).
Even then, the sacrifices themselves were never the real answer.
In many cases the soul had to look outside the sacrificial forms and say, like David, "You will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; You will not be pleased with a burnt offering"... Faith took hold, for salvation, of what these offerings pictured but could not do themselves.
David could only reach forward in faith. Now the work is done.
I would search the whole world for sacrifices, but I cannot speak of them to You. Your steadfast love sweeps them all away... But now One Sacrifice has been offered and accepted too. The blessed Lord was delivered for our offences and raised again for our justification. So God has swept everything away, that we may have to do with Him, directly with Himself, each one.
- Closed altar. The law gave no offering for deliberate sin, so David had nothing to bring.
- Open throne. With the altar closed, mercy alone remained — and it answered at once: "You shall not die."
- No bargain. Offering God something to deserve forgiveness is pride, and He refuses to be bought.
- No merit. Even the broken spirit is not payment; it is the confession of worthlessness that lets mercy come in.
- One Sacrifice. God has now given what the offerings only pictured, so the guilty can come straight to Him.
The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.
David wrote this after his adultery and the murder of Uriah. The law had no sacrifice to cover a sin like that, so the verse names what he could bring instead — and what God accepts from a guilty person.
David's sin fell outside what the law's sacrifices could cover. One writer traces where that left him:
For himself he could say nothing but admit his guilt and the corruption he had inherited from Adam. Yet he could throw himself on God's mercy, the resource that never fails anyone who turns to it with a truthful heart. He could do nothing but this. He could offer nothing to meet his case. The law made no provision for someone who had sinned deliberately, as he had. Death was its only sentence. In such circumstances the only sacrifice God could accept was a broken spirit. But a broken and contrite heart God does not, and will not, despise.
The psalm speaks of broken bones, a broken spirit, and a broken heart. One writer explains what each one stands for in us:
Jacob needed a whole lifetime to learn what the three things in Psalm 51 mean. There are broken bones — the bones being the seat of our natural strength. There is a broken spirit — the seat of our natural good sense and wisdom. And there is a broken heart — the seat of our natural tendency to idolatry.
Another writer ties a broken spirit to the will:
With a broken spirit, self-will cannot be active. Before he had a broken spirit, David had followed his own will, and it led him into adultery and to Uriah's murder. A broken spirit gives up its own will so that it can depend on God.
Why does God value this state? One writer points to where God chooses to live:
The highest place in heaven is honoured by the presence of the One who still stoops to make the lowly heart His throne. "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise." The God whom the highest heavens cannot contain is the God we may host. But we can only do that by getting down ourselves into the lowest and humblest place. So if we have never met Him, the reason is simple: we have never come down as low as that level of self-judgment where He is found in grace. But when He makes His home in the humble and the contrite, He comes in the sweetness of His love and the tenderness of His mercy, to revive the spirit of His humble ones and the heart of His contrite ones. How blessed to be lowly enough for the lofty One to dwell with us, and contrite — rubbed down — enough for the Holy One to revive us!
A broken heart pays for nothing. One writer shows what it does instead:
The law was completely unable to give comfort or peace to David's soul. Yet he takes hold of God. What we hear is confidence, the confidence of a restored soul. But it does not rest on legal sacrifice. He says, the only sacrifice I can bring is a broken and crushed heart. "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit." God will not despise that. It is the condition of heart that lays hold of the truth of Christ and His precious work.
David's case looks beyond himself. One writer finds both a picture and a pattern in it:
What breaks David's heart is to find himself faced with "bloodguiltiness" (v. 14) and to realise that he had shed the blood of righteous Uriah. This is a prophetic picture of the blood of Christ shed by Israel... But let us remember that God disciplines us to lead us step by step from a true and cleansed heart to a broken heart. That is the only condition that suits us in the presence of the cross. It is the only sacrifice God accepts along with the sacrifice of praise. And it is the only state of heart that does not leave us exposed to fresh falls.
What God refuses to despise, others count as nothing:
This attitude is one the world despises... But the Psalmist could say that such a "broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise." And is not His approval what we should really value?
- Empty-handed. David's sin had no sacrifice under the law; he could offer nothing and had to cast himself on God's mercy alone.
- Broken. A broken spirit gives up self-will and natural wisdom. A broken heart gives up the idols we cling to.
- Accepted. This is the one sacrifice God receives, and the state of heart that takes hold of Christ and His work.
- Indwelt. The God whom heaven cannot contain makes the lowly heart His home, so we meet Him at the level of self-judgment — and He comes to revive us.
- Guarded. God's discipline leads us to this brokenness. It is the only state that fits us at the cross, and it keeps us from falling again.
Do good in thy good pleasure unto Zion; build the walls of Jerusalem.
The psalm that began with a man begging for mercy over adultery and murder ends with a prayer for a city. That turn raises the two questions commentators press hardest. Why does a private confession end with Zion? And whose voice speaks these last lines?
The prayer for Jerusalem is not a change of subject. It grows out of what God has just shown Himself to be — One who will not turn away a broken heart. One writer traces the thought straight through:
He had nothing to offer that would meet his case. The law gave no sacrifice for a man who had sinned deliberately, as he had. Death was the only sentence it gave (Num. 15:30-31). In that position, the only sacrifice God could accept from David was a broken spirit. But a broken and contrite heart God does not, and will not, despise. Further, if He can act in grace toward one sinner among His people, He will not forget Jerusalem. The hopes of His people are tied to that city and to its restoration.
Zion is not named at random. The prayer leans on what God has tied to that one place, and on grace He gives freely.
In the last section the psalm openly pleads Zion's cause. Zion is the place where sovereign grace will act toward Israel, and therefore the place of God's eternal rest.
One commentator reads the prayer for walls as more than a building project. He ties it to a day still ahead:
God will do good to Zion, His centre of blessing for the whole world in the millennial day. The walls of true separation to God will be rebuilt around Jerusalem for the pleasure of the Lord (v. 18). Only at that time will literal sacrifices of animals be pleasing to God. Before that time, God did not despise the sacrifices themselves. What He despised was the pride in the motives behind their offerings.
One writer sees the last verses reaching far past the events in the psalm's title. The guilt they confess is heavier than the death of one soldier:
This psalm, which is prophetic as all the psalms are, goes far beyond the circumstances of David's life. So the words "Do good to Zion in your good pleasure; build up the walls of Jerusalem" (v. 18) are about future events. "Bloodguiltiness" refers not only to the murder of Uriah but also to the killing of the Messiah.
Owning the guilt comes first. The walls go up after it.
David, once convicted of his sin, could not excuse himself by saying that he had not killed Uriah. In the same way, when the people come to feel their sin, they will not dare to say that they did not crucify Christ... They will see that they themselves are guilty of the blood of the blessed Son of God. They will confess it, as David owned his sin. And as a result, the walls of Zion will rise, and the blessing will come in.
Commentators differ over whether David himself wrote this line. One writer used the difficulty to reject the psalm's heading altogether:
The subject matter of this psalm can have no link with the Hebrew title placed before it. David, stained with adultery and murder, could not say that he had sinned against God alone. And a prayer for the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem would not have suited the days of David.
The writer who quotes him accepts the prophetic reading, but rejects that conclusion:
We may safely accept this prophetic view. It agrees with the whole character and scope of the book, and it fits the place where we find the psalm. But the other half of his claim — the rejection of the Hebrew title — is far from clear. It is dangerous to adopt a rule that turns a difficulty like this into a reason for correcting the text of Scripture.
- Broken first. A man with no sacrifice left to bring still has one offering. God accepts a broken and contrite heart, and will not despise it.
- Then bold. God acts in grace toward one guilty man. So the psalmist dares to ask the same grace for a whole city.
- Zion is the reason. The plea rests on Zion, where sovereign grace acts toward Israel. It rests on God's own resting place, not on what the one praying deserves.
- Walls mean separation. The walls stand for true separation to God, rebuilt around Jerusalem for His pleasure.
- Confession opens the gate. Israel owns the guilt instead of excusing it. Then the walls of Zion go up and the blessing comes in.
Then shalt thou have sacrifices of righteousness, burnt-offering, and whole burnt-offering; then shall they offer up bullocks upon thine altar.
Psalm 51 moves from one man's guilt to a whole nation's hope. It ends with God taking pleasure in offerings again. Yet two verses earlier He takes no delight in sacrifice. So what changes, and when?
The word "then" carries the verse. Repentance does not replace sacrifice. It opens the way for sacrifice to mean anything.
The psalm looks ahead to the repentance of the remnant of the Jews. That repentance prepares the way for the restoration of Zion, according to God's good pleasure. Then, indeed, God will take pleasure in the sacrifices offered. They will not carry the legal thought of obtaining blessing. They will witness to the ground on which God blesses the nation (compare Ezekiel 43:18, 27; Ezekiel 45:15-25).
The ESV says "right sacrifices"; older translations read "sacrifices of righteousness." Either way, the words describe the offerer, not the animal.
So these sacrifices will now be "sacrifices of righteousness." The offerer brings them with a true heart and with hands "washed in innocence," as David has expressed it elsewhere (Ps. 26:6). The whole tone of these closing verses confirms the prophetic character of the psalm. It is the national confession that must come before national blessing. This also makes clear the link with the previous psalm. That psalm is a divine challenge to the nation, and to the idea that sacrifices without righteousness could be acceptable to God.
God Himself commanded the offerings, so the fault was never in the offering. It was in the hand that brought it.
Only at that time will literal animal sacrifices be pleasing to God. Before this time, God did not despise the sacrifices themselves. He despised the pride in the motives behind them. He had prescribed these sacrifices Himself, and in themselves there was only good in them. But Israel had taken pride in offering them as though they were making God their debtor! The sacrifices were meant to be symbols of the one sacrifice of Christ. They were a public observance to focus attention on that one sacrifice, in its many sides of glory to God and blessing to man.
This is not earning God's favour with animals. It is a nation standing at last where every justified person has stood.
God will then bring the nation of Israel onto the same ground in approaching Him. He will make them recognise the death of Christ as the foundation of righteousness for sinners before God. This confirms what other passages teach: sacrifice is always the ground of righteousness, whether in God's past, present, or future dealings. So Scripture also speaks of the justification of Abel. He is the first of our fallen race that Scripture calls justified, and it rested on the value of the sacrifice he brought as a picture of Christ.
Commentators take these burnt offerings and bulls as literal animals, offered again in the age to come. They will look back, not forward.
The ending of animal sacrifices is not implied in what has gone before; and according to Ezekiel they will be offered even in millennial days (Ezekiel 43:18-28; 45:15-25). If this does not match our thoughts, we must always be ready to correct our thoughts by Scripture… Keeping these sacrifices, and reviving them, is no doubt God's witness to the world. It shows His way of acceptance and blessing at all times, a way unbelief has so often mocked… It will be good in the Lord's sight to have this reminder of the way by which the joy of His favour can be reached.
Israel's long hardness must break before the altar is welcome again.
An unbroken heart, a brow of brass, and a neck of iron have so far been the marks of unrepentant Israel. But a time of weeping and sorrow for sin will come… Then the Lord will do good to Zion. He will build again the walls of Jerusalem. From the place of His name the welcome offering will come up, and He will accept it, as in former days.
David does not end with his own relief. He ends with God's pleasure — and that is the point of any restoration.
Others may see and admire the outward results of restoration, but the Lord finds in the restored soul something that delights Him. David, confessing his sin, says, "Restore to me the joy of your salvation." Then he says, "I will teach transgressors your ways." And as he closes his psalm of repentance he adds, "Then will you delight." Restored David becomes a blessing to others, but a pleasure to the Lord.
- Then — the verse hangs on one word. Contrition comes first; the accepted altar follows it, never replaces it.
- Righteous — "right sacrifices" describe the offerer, not the animal. God looks for a true heart and clean hands.
- Pride — God never despised the offerings He Himself commanded. He refused the pride that treated them as a way to make Him a debtor.
- Ground — when the altar is welcome again, Israel stands where Abel stood. Both are accepted on the ground of a sacrifice that points to the death of Christ.
- Pleasure — the psalm ends with God's delight, not just the sinner's comfort. The restored soul becomes a blessing to others and a pleasure to the Lord.