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NASB | Psalm 51:17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise. |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Psalm 51:17 My [only] sacrifice [acceptable] to God is a broken spirit; A broken and contrite heart [broken with sorrow for sin, thoroughly penitent], such, O God, You will not despise. |
Bible Question: Why does the Lord delight in a broken heart? |
Bible Answer: Nolan, I believe God delights in a broken and contrite spirit (or heart) for essentially the same reason that, as a young lad, I found favor in a broken-in horse. Now this may sound as though I'm making a joke of a spiritual issue or being flippant, but hear me out if you will....When I was but a boy a nearby neighbor had a horse, a beautiful animal, young and spirited. Now I'd never been on the backside of a horse before and was invited to ride this fine animal. Being both fearless and foolish, as I was soon to discover, I agreed with unbridled (pun intended) alacrity to mount the beast and go for a ride. To say that things didn't go very smoothly is to understate the predicament I soon found myself in. For instead of the horse gliding along smoothly, he started out in a slow trot, increased to a fast trot, and before I knew what was happening, I thought I was on a runaway freight train, not a horse. I was scared out of my wits. I'd never traveled 90 miles an hour before, not on a horse or any other conveyance. But my venture came to an abrupt, embarrassing, and rather painful halt when the horse threw me. I landed, unharmed except for a few superficial bruises to my body and a significant bruising of my pride, in a soft meadow. In the wake of my eventful ride, the neighbor confessed that the steed was indeed a spirited animal, rather proud and haughty, and not yet fully broken-in. Fine time for a confession I thought..... Quite a time later I screwed up enough courage to mount another horse, but this was a gentle animal, calm and obedient, and my ride, if less adventurous, was far more enjoyable...... Gentle, calm, obedient -- those are the words I used to describe the second horse which had been broken. Spirited, proud, haughty were adjectives applied to the first horse..... Does God want his people to be proud, haughty, spirited (in the sense of doing one's own thing) or does He want us to be thoroughly broken-in (disciplined) -- gentle in our relationships with God and man, calm in our absolute trust in Him, obedient to His commands? The young steed that had not been broken was undisciplined and self-willed. The broken horse was disciplied and obedient to his master. Perhaps this tale of two horses serves somewhat to illustrate and illumine why the Lord delights in the contrite human heart. --Hank |
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Questions and/or Subjects for Ps 51:17 | Author | ||
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Makarios | ||
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Hank | ||
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Makarios | ||
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melchizedekau | ||
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DocTrinsograce | ||
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starrijn | ||
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azurelaw |