I just don’t know how human beings cope with this burden.The sheer crushing weight of unforgiven sin. Even a small argument ending in bad feeling completely ruins my week. It is not possible to live at all freely when we are under a deep conviction of sin – when loaded down under a sense of guilt or of personal deceit.
O yes, we can muster a reserve of defiance, and in a kind of madness, fight to preserve our dignity, covering up wrong-doing, finding excuses, even congratulating ourselves on our ingenuity. But I am aware, at the same time, of being separated, cut-off from God, and from those who trust me. I’m even split within myself – defiantly deadening my own conscience. Unconfessed sin is not only a weight of misery, it is like a cancer in our souls. Why, even cancelled sins can remain a burden when, although God has forgiven us, we cannot forgive ourselves. The burden still presses down.
Thank God for Psalm 32, which calls all of us to confess and rejoice in forgiven-ness – to have our slates wiped clean. Now, in the Old Testament, sins “with a high hand” were excluded from free forgiveness! This corresponds with the New Testament’s sin against the Holy Spirit.The insolent, impenitent, obdurate rejection of God’s offer.After all, you can’t forgive someone who refuses to be forgiven.You can forgive, but if it is rejected the relationship remains severed.

How blessed are they who come to Jesus Messiah, the human soul’s true hiding place, where sins admitted and confessed in penitence are forgiven, where minds and consciences are washed spotlessly clean, where chains fall away, where gratitude replaces guilt and joy replaces judgement, where love’s obligation is a celebration of gratitude.
These are verses from Psalm 32:
“Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord does not count against him and in whose spirit is no deceit.When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long.For day and night your hand was heavy upon me;
Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity.
You are my hiding place;you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.”

Now read, and pray, all of Psalm 32.