Psalm 51:10-12— "Create in me a clean heart, 0 God, and renew a right spirit within me...Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me...Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit."When you use a computer you learn about such things as "defragmenting". What happens, I have learned, is: in normal operations individual files become fragmented or scattered in numerous locations around the disc. Performance slows down. Defragmenting places individual files all together in continuous blocks on the disc and erases blank areas. I found out that you need to defragment your hard drive quite often.
I liken this to my spiritual life. In everyday living I become fragmented, or scattered in numerous directions. Sometimes I have so many things on my mind that I don't know in which direction I am going. I am not going to name all these directions. I know that most people have the same experience. In fact, young people most likely have even more on their schedule, thus more causes for fragmentation. There are household chores, including making sure the children are dressed, fed, have lunches for school, and that they arrive safely at school. Then there are other things that take up a person's day. In this busy age we can become very fragmented. And if we don't go through a process of defragmentation, our performance will be considerably slowed down.
In my spiritual life I must undergo a time of getting things back in place, so that my performance can once again be functional.
David found that out when he took his eyes off his God, and let lust enter into his life. He allowed himself to become fragmented—scattered in the wrong direction. He committed a terrible sin. II Samuel 12. When the prophet, Nathan, came to him to tell him about it, he was so far from God he did not even recognize the man the prophet was talking about.
Nathan told him a parable of two men, a rich man and a poor man. The rich man had many flocks of sheep. The poor man had but one sheep. When company dropped in on the rich man, instead of taking one of his many sheep to kill to make a meal, he took the poor man's one sheep and killed it. David was so angry at the man who would do such a thing, that he said to Nathan, "That man must die!" But Nathan pointed his finger at David and said, "You are that man. You sent Uriah out to the thickest part of the battle so that he would be killed, just so you could have his wife, Bathsheba. Then you took advantage of a grieving widow, and stole her to be your wife."
David’s spiritual eyes were then opened. He realized his sin, accepted the punishment, and cried to the Lord for forgiveness. It was after this that he wrote the soul-cleansing Psalm 51.
Verses 1-2: “Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin”...Verse 10-12: “Create in me a clean heart O God: and renew a right spirit within me...Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me...Restore unto me the joy of my salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit”... Verse 17: “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.”
Do you feel fragmented in your spiritual life? Go through a defragmenting process to put your spiritual system back into place. You will find the defragmenting tools in the Bible. All the directions needed are there. Take time out to become functional again.
Psalm 46:10 – “Be still and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen. I will be exalted in the earth.”
