Qualifications for Refreshment

Today we are going to look at some general qualifications for those people who need refreshment.

I’m going to read off some qualifications and you tell me if you tell me if you can guess what these characteristics qualify you for

No watches, bracelets or wristbands
Earrings and nose studs okay. No other pierced parts.
Tattoo’s but not on your neck or face.
Clean nails but no polish
Natural looking hair. No pink or purple or blue hair

Any guesses? Those are the qualifications to work at Starbucks.

GPA of 3.8 or better
SAT score of 1800 or better
Well rounded high school career including community service, athletics and the arts

Any guesses. Those are the qualifications to get you into a University of California School like Cal Berkley, UC Davis or UCLA, where my son went to school

Here are some more qualifications . Guess what these qualify you for
Wealthy parents
Cool clothes
A Pulse

That’s the qualifications to get into USC

Here are more qualifications.

Creative talent and Artistic ability
Work compliant with state and federal health standards
Completion of license and certification process

That’s the qualifications necessary to become a licensed tattoo artist. The laws deal more with hygiene than artistic ability.

I think I would add, “good with spell check”

8  Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.
10  Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me
11  Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me. Psalm 51:8-12

Let’s break down these verses real quick. How do these phrases sound to you in the place you are at right now.

Let me hear joy and gladness. I love that phrase. I love being in the room when there are happy sounds. When friends are over and everyone is laughing. When you sneak around the corner and your kids are playing nice together. You know parents, that 7 minute period during the week when you kids are playing well together. I remember years ago when our kids were little we walked into the room and 2 and a half year old Riley was sitting on his 6 month old sister. As we walked in he said, “Look Mama, I’m riding her.” What a great moment.

Let the bones you have crushed rejoice. Have you been crushed. Crushed by a relationship. Crushed by feelings of failure. Crushed by the sheer busyness of life. You’re calendar crushed.

Create in me a pure heart. Are you ever pursued by impure thoughts. You can’t get them out of your head. Let me just say this is a tough world for guys to live in. Everything is our culture seems to be sold with sex. With guys it’s visual, with women it’s more emotional connections in books and movies that pull you away. Have your soul washed clean.

Restore to me joy. Bring the joy back to my life.

I love this line. Grant me a willing spirit. Here’s what I get out of that line. God has so many great things for us. So many adventures he wants to take us on. So much purpose to our life. You know the one thing separating you from that adventure God wants to take you on? A willing spirit. God, whatever you have for me. I’m willing. I will go. Like we heard Isaiah say, “Here am I, send me.”

Those verses are refreshing in so many aspects of our life.

The author of these verses is named David and he prayed these words with his whole heart. He was qualified to pray them. There were situations that were going on in his life that made him uniquely qualified to make this prayer his own. I believe they are the qualifications each of us need to be true of us to make this prayer. But don’t worry. I think you’ll be okay. At least for this first qualification.

To qualify for refreshment you need to have done something despicable.

A psalm of David. When the prophet Nathan came to him after David had committed adultery with Bathsheba.

Most bibles have something like that in them. A few of them add another minor detail. In the course of having this affair David had Bathsheba’s husband murdered. This is the backdrop to these verses. They are the reason for this prayer. David has done something despicable.

Our mistakes point out a need for Him.

He wants us to be focused on us, not on everyone around us.

To qualify for refreshment we have to look honestly at our mistakes.

Let’s get back to sin evaluation for a moment. This is why I think we like to think of some mistakes as bigger than other mistakes. Because as long as someone had made bigger mistakes than I don’t have to really worry too much about my little mistakes.

Let me give you one last qualification for this prayer of refreshment

To qualify for refreshment you need to accept God’s forgiveness

Look with me at the beginning of Psalm 51. You can feel David’s grief in these words. There is a line in there that David says that haunts me a little.

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. 2  Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. 3 For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. 4 Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight; so you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge.

Have you ever been at that place mentioned in verse 3. My sin is ever before me.

Years ago I had a friend pull me aside and confessed to me that when he was young he got his girlfriend pregnant and he encouraged her to get an abortion. He told me that I was one of only maybe 5 people that knew this information and that he had been carrying it for over 20 years. And he couldn’t let it go. No amount of forgiveness verses, no amount of God loves you messages, no amount of prayers of penance could keep it out of his mind. My sin is ever before me.

Have you been there. You’ve made a mistake. You said something you shouldn’t. You lashed out in anger. You got yourself in a mess financially. You got mad at your kid. And your sin is ever before you.

We say we forgive but too often we never really forget. Someone hurts us and we log it away. We put it in the ledger. We keep the long list of sin on each other. But God isn’t that way. Later on in the book of Psalms David puts it like this.

For as high as the heavens are above the earth, as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.  As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him Psalm 103:11-13

To really be refreshed we need to understand this truth. Accept God’s forgiveness. Accept that God still loves you. Like a good Dad he loves you. He’s compassionate. He chooses to see the good in us. He chooses to see our potential. He accepts you. Maybe you just need to accept yourself.

Here are our qualifications.
You need to be despicable. Check
You and I need to take a hard look at our mistakes and failures.
You need to accept God’s forgiveness. Not just know He forgives. But accept it. Accept yourself.

Then you can pray this prayer and feel God’s refreshment.

8  Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.
10  Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me
11  Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me. Psalm 51:8-12