Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD!
O Lord, hear my voice!
Let your ears be attentive
to the voice of my pleas for mercy!
If you, O LORD, should mark iniquities,
O Lord, who could stand?
But with you there is forgiveness,
that you may be feared.
I wait for the LORD, my soul waits,
and in his word I hope;
my soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning.
O Israel, hope in the LORD!
For with the LORD there is steadfast love,
and with him is plentiful redemption.
And he will redeem Israel
from all his iniquities. – Psalm 130 (ESV)
James L. Mays writes:
[Psalm 130] is based on a fundamental theology. The theology is stated by contrasting an erroneous hypothesis about God and its consequences for the human situation (v. 3) with the truth about the LORD and its consequences for the community of faith (v. 4). The error is to understand the LROD as a god whose principal way with human beings is to watch for iniquities. If that were the case, there would be no hope for anyone. … None could survive if such were God’s way. The “depths” would be the only possibility. The truth that the song knows and teaches is that “the forgiveness is with the LORD” (forgiveness has the definite article in Hebrew as does steadfast love in v. 7). The sentence means that the authority to forgive and the disposition to forgive belong to the LORD. Sin is essentially a matter of relation to the LORD who alone in his sovereign deity has the right to forgive, choosing to deal with sinners by grace. That much of the truth is inherent in the nature of iniquity and the sovereignty of God. Dependence on the LORD’s disposition to forgive was learned from God’s way with Israel. … The consequence of this truth for those who believe it is that they “fear the LORD.” They can live as “God-fearers,” that is, as people who take the authority and disposition of the LOD as the greatest reality of all and base their living on God without reservation.
MEMORY WORK – Shorter Catechism Q/A 14
Q. 14. What is sin?
A. Sin is any want of conformity unto, or transgression of, the law of God.