3While I kept silence about my sin my body wasted away
through my groaning all day long.
4For day and night your hand was heavy upon me;
my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer.
Psalm 32:3-4
It was already 91 degrees at 5:30 this morning when Rita and I set off on our walk. By the time we trudged back home the sun felt merciless, bearing down hard. “How different our walk felt this morning,” I said. How different it felt from just a week or so ago when we were reveling in the unusually cool days! The mornings were so wonderful and life was good!
Then the summer hit! And on this morning’s walk we didn’t feel like stopping to watch the birds as we used to enjoy. We didn’t pause to talk to the dogs along the way. Nor did we park ourselves on a bench and say of the morning, “Isn’t this all so grand!”
No, there was a zip missing in my step. My get-up-and-go felt like it had got up and went.
Then, after coming back home I read a few psalms hoping to raise my spirits. And as I read I came across this text where David struggles with his own kind of summer heat. There is something happening in David’s life that he compares to the scorching summers of the Judean Desert. His juices are dried up. Something heavy presses hard on him day and night. His “strength,” he says, is “dried up as by the heat of summer.”
But David knows that his problems are not remedied by running off to the beach or mountains. David says his problem is that he has “kept silence” about his sin.
To keep silent, and not run to the heavenly Father with sin, will always weigh heavy on his children. We will feel it for sure. Even our body language shows it as we lumber along under a heavy weight. Our joy and strength dries up.
But good news comes in the next verse as David shows by example how to beat the heat:
5Then I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not hide my iniquity;I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the Lord’, and you forgave the guilt of my sin.
No sin is too big. And no sin is too small. For all who go to Father will experience ready forgiveness and strength renewed.
Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Psalm 32:1
Tim Smith
Weekly Bible Classes with Tim Smith
Every Wednesday through the summer
At the Franciscan Renewal Center
(Garces Room of Piper Hall)
Wednesday Noon – 1:00 P.M.
Songs for Life’s Journey: The Psalms of Ascent
Wednesday Evening 7:00 P.M. – 8:00 P.M.
Profiles of Spiritual Maturity: The Letter of James