Psalm 51:10
Scripture Explained · Pairs with New Beginnings
“Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a right spirit within me.”
Psalm 51:10 · World English Bible
What it meant then
This psalm has a date attached to it, more or less. It comes right after the prophet Nathan confronted David over his affair with Bathsheba and the death of her husband Uriah (2 Samuel 11-12), so the confession is not abstract. A specific man had done specific, documented harm to specific people, and everyone around him already knew it.
The word behind “create” is the Hebrew bara, the same verb Genesis 1:1 uses for God making the universe out of nothing at all. David reaches for that exact word on purpose. He wants God to start over from nothing, because he has run out of confidence in his own effort to produce anything clean.
What Leonard Ravenhill wrote
Pairs with
This verse is one of the cards in the New Beginnings Scripture Card set, and pairs with the New Beginnings journal.
Ravenhill preached bluntly about what must come before revival can begin in a life: “The first essential for the coming of the Holy Ghost into a heart today is that the heart should be cleansed from sin, for the Holy Spirit does not fill an unclean heart.”
“Nobody else can give you a clean heart but God.”
Leonard Ravenhill