R.C. Sproul

So there is this inseparable relationship among these three qualities of guilt, repentance, and forgiveness.

And anyone who has gone through the pain of genuine repentance is

I am sure has also experienced the unspeakable joy of forgiveness.

And that's why I don't want to conclude our series on repentance without looking to the end of repentance or the goal of repentance, which is the restoration of the soul to fellowship with God and to the experience of that unspeakable joy of forgiveness.

In Psalm 32,

The author of Psalm 51, David, gives us his feelings of forgiveness where he says in verse 1, "'Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered, and blessed is the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity, and in whose spirit

There is no deceit."

These powerful words of benediction are quoted in the New Testament as the Apostle Paul, for example, sets forth the gospel in his epistle to the Romans.

He appeals to these words from Psalm 32.

We remember that one of the devices that the prophets used in the Old Testament

to communicate the Word of God to the people was the use of the oracle.

And there were two kinds of oracles.

There were oracles of doom by which the prophet would be God's spokesman to announce the impending judgment that he would bring upon the nation.

And there was also the oracle of weal, w-e-a-l, the good news, and the bad news of judgment was prefaced by the term cursed be.

And the good news that was announced in terms of the divine benediction was prefaced by the word blessed.

That's why in the Beatitudes when Jesus speaks there, he uses this oracular form when he goes through the Beatitudes, blessed are those who do this and blessed are those who do that.

Well, now David...

is pronouncing an oracle of weal that has direct implications for himself.

I've often spoken about how the oracle of the curse or judgment, which is pronounced with the use of the term woe,

is used by Isaiah in chapter 6 where he pronounces the curse upon himself, woe is me, for I am an unclean man.