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Psalm 51

Prayer for Cleansing and Pardon

To the leader. A Psalm of David, when the prophet Nathan came to him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba.
¹ Have mercy on me, O God,
   according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
   blot out my transgressions.
² Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
   and cleanse me from my sin.

³ For I know my transgressions,
   and my sin is ever before me.
⁴ Against you, you alone, have I sinned,
   and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you are justified in your sentence
   and blameless when you pass judgement.
⁵ Indeed, I was born guilty,
   a sinner when my mother conceived me.

⁶ You desire truth in the inward being;^*
   therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart.
⁷ Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
   wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
⁸ Let me hear joy and gladness;
   let the bones that you have crushed rejoice.
⁹ Hide your face from my sins,
   and blot out all my iniquities.

¹⁰ Create in me a clean heart, O God,
   and put a new and right^* spirit within me.
¹¹ Do not cast me away from your presence,
   and do not take your holy spirit from me.
¹² Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
   and sustain in me a willing^* spirit.

¹³ Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
   and sinners will return to you.
¹⁴ Deliver me from bloodshed, O God,
   O God of my salvation,
   and my tongue will sing aloud of your deliverance.

¹⁵ O Lord, open my lips,
   and my mouth will declare your praise.
¹⁶ For you have no delight in sacrifice;
   if I were to give a burnt-offering, you would not be pleased.
¹⁷ The sacrifice acceptable to God^* is a broken spirit;
   a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

¹⁸ Do good to Zion in your good pleasure;
   rebuild the walls of Jerusalem,
¹⁹ then you will delight in right sacrifices,
   in burnt-offerings and whole burnt-offerings;
   then bulls will be offered on your altar.

¹⁴For the love of Christ urges us on, because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore all have died. ¹⁵And he died for all, so that those who live might live no longer for themselves, but for him who died and was raised for them.

16 From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view;^* even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view,^* we know him no longer in that way. ¹⁷So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! ¹⁸All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; ¹⁹that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself,^* not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. ²⁰So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. ²¹For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

6As we work together with him,^* we urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain. ²For he says,
‘At an acceptable time I have listened to you,
   and on a day of salvation I have helped you.’
See, now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day of salvation!