R.C. Sproul

And if you've ever been through Palestine, you will see the phenomenon of what is called the Wadi, W-A-D-I, which we call in southwestern United States dry gulches or arroyos, where you see in the midst of the desert these pathways that are like creek beds, but no water is flowing in them.

but they are made when the storm does come and you have flash flooding and the runoff from the mountains and so on create these crevices in the hard surface of the desert, and they are the way in which the water is washed away.

However, during drought in the desert time,

The earth becomes parched, and the land becomes cracked, and these riverbeds, these wadis, are dry.

And this is what David is recalling here.

During that time where I was experiencing guilt without relief, and the hand of the Lord was heavy upon me, and I felt oppressed by my burden of guilt.

My soul was dry as a potsherd.

I was like the drought in summer.

And that's the language he uses, which everyone in Palestine was aware of that.

And he says, my vitality was turned into the drought of summer earlier when I kept silent, when I was not confessing my sin before God.

My bones grew old.

Isn't that an interesting metaphor?

that I could hardly stand the weight of the bones in my body as they were getting older and older, and I was becoming calcified.

And I was groaning all the day long, for day and night your hand was heavy upon me.

My vitality was turned into the drought of summer, and I acknowledged my sin to you.

And he said, and my iniquity I have not hidden.

I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord, and you forgave the iniquity of my sin.

This is the prayer of David, prayer of thanksgiving, an expression of gratitude for having received the complete forgiveness and pardon of God.

Beloved, this is the prayer of every Christian.

every Christian who has stood at the foot of the cross and who has confessed their sins and who has experienced the pardon and the remission of those sins from the hand of God.