“According to the multitude of Your tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me” (Ps 51:1-3).
For some perverse reason, the fallen human condition makes us much more adept at seeing others’ sins than our own. In David’s well-known penitential prayer, he takes full responsibility: “my transgressions…my iniquity…my sin…my transgressions…my sin.” And yet this is the path to cleansing, forgiveness, and restoration, because, as David knew, awaiting his honesty were God’s “tender mercies.”
When the Supreme Court was to make a speech at Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee in 1887, some justices strenuously disagreed with including the phrase, “conscious as we are of our own shortcoming.” Lord Justice Bowen gently suggested a change to resolve the impasse. It read, “conscious as we are of one another’s shortcomings.” Ah, yes!