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Psalm 51:10. "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me." This psalm is so beautiful; David is contrite, remembering all his sins, but asking God to have mercy on him and to place in him a clean heart and a new spirit. This is exactly what God wants to do for every one of us, if only we will turn to Him in this same spirit and let Him.

 

We cannot save ourselves, we are fallen and broken, but our Creator can save us. He wants to repair our brokenness and renew and refresh our hearts and souls - all we have to do for this glorious gift is ask Him in a spirit of true contrition. This renewal will not be pain-free or easy; we have to, after all, face the consequences of our sin, but it will be so worth it!

 

Last Saturday at our weekly Bible discussion group, some were talking about the Warning, or illumination of conscience, and wishing it would come soon. I wondered aloud if maybe it was already happening, at least to some. I have felt like David in this Psalm lately - "my sin is ever before me." (Psalm 51:3). I keep thinking of all the ways over my life I have, without even really thinking, sometimes, hurt God and others with sinful, foolish, and self-centered actions and words, or given into temptation through my passions or emotions. I feel like such a sinful person, and I beg God to wash me more and more from my sin so that I can be clean. I frequently go to confession with a long forgotten sin or even just to lay my brokenness at His feet. Someone in our group said the same thing has been happening to her, and I have heard and read that it is happening to many people right now.

 

This makes me think that, whatever "The Warning" might look like to us each individually, it may already be beginning. There may also come at some point, a time when it happens to the majority of people at once, or some other very obvious sign as Christine Watkins alludes to in her book (and in the video below), but if God can get through to us now, without those things (and He is for some of us), why not take the warning in that softer way, repent, confess, and allow Him to create clean hearts in us now? Maybe He wants a few who have already been through it to help others when "the big one" comes! Or maybe we will each experience a "Warning" in our own way.

 

In any case, anytime we are given the opportunity to see ourselves as God sees us; to see our brokenness and sin, we should count it as a blessing and use it as an opportunity to repent - asking God to renew our hearts and souls, and He most certainly will!

 

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