God has had mercy on you,
according to His unfailing love;
according to His great compassion,
He has blotted out your transgressions.
He has washed away your iniquity,
and cleansed you from sin.
More than removing sin, God goes a step further: He not only takes away something bad; He gives something good. God takes away guilt, and gives joy. He declares us innocent.
He has cleansed you, and you are clean.
He has washed you, and you are whiter than snow.
He's caused you to hear joy and gladness.
He's healed your crushed bones, and caused them to rejoice.
He's hidden His face from your sins,
and He's blotted out all your iniquity.
The joy which God gives along with His forgiveness is no mere superficial passing worldly happiness. It is a spiritual eternal joy. It is the reshaping of our character, which can even include moments of pain. Here is a mystery: God shapes the purest joy in us, using a process which sometimes allows us to endure times of suffering.
God has created a pure heart in you,
and renewed a steadfast spirit within you.
He did not cast you away from His presence,
and He did not take His Holy Spirit from you.
He restored to you the joy of His salvation,
and granted you a willing spirit to sustain you.
The grace which God gives is a multitude of gifts, in response to a single plea for mercy. God's generosity is such that He gives more than what was asked.
Jesus points out (in Matthew 5:21-22) that God even forgives each of us of murder!
God has delivered you from the guilt of bloodshed,
He has opened your lips.
God is ever dealing with us on two levels, the individual and the corporate, simultaneously. His absolution to the individual is at the same time a blessing to the community.
God has done good to Zion in His good pleasure.
He's built up the walls of Jerusalem.
As He strengthens His relationship to one person, so He blesses the community of which that person is a part.
We see, then, how active God is! He is ever at work, blessing and forgiving. So we "fix our eyes on Jesus" (Hebrews 12:2), to see what He's doing now.
