Psalms 38:18

(Verse 18.) If you see your servant confessing his own sins and offering himself voluntarily to punishment, will you be moved, forgive him, and doubt the mercy of the Lord? The judge himself, who is not allowed to temper the sword in many cases because he serves the laws, can still grant a profit from punishments. And yet you hesitate about what you should ask from the Lord of the laws and the Author of mercy, to whom the law is a desire and the right to give. If, however, you ask for your sins to be forgiven, do not consider your honors or be ashamed of your friends, so that you do not seem to have deviated from your dignity. Friend of God, prophet of God, king chosen by God himself, and anointed to the kingdom, he willingly offered himself to the whips and was not ashamed: and are you ashamed? This modesty will not help you much when you come to the judgment of God; but you will repent of this shame when you find yourself not only in the presence of men, but also of Angels and all celestial Powers, and you begin to not deny your own sins. How will you excuse yourself when you have committed such great offenses? Do you pretend the weakness of your condition because no one is without sin? It will be answered to you: Therefore you should have repented, I had given a remedy, why did you reject it? Do you cover your shame because you are ashamed of your honors? He will say: If you are ashamed of me before your friends, then I will be ashamed of you before my Father, who is in heaven. Learn that it is true what is written, that shame leads to sin (Sirach 4:25). David placed his sorrow before him, so that he would never forget; David declared his own wickedness; David thought about his sin, not his riches; David did not hesitate to confess his sins, lest he be ashamed in my judgment: and you were ashamed? My servant Job is not at rest today, if he has blushed for his three friends the kings; and David himself, if he were ashamed to confess his own sins. Therefore, because he did not blush to reveal his sins to me, neither will I be ashamed to reveal my secrets to him. And because neither of them was ashamed to lay the price of their actions in my power, to commit themselves to my judgment and will; I will not be ashamed to call such servants friends, who have striven to do my will. Therefore, since they were previously in mourning, now in consolation; you,…

"And my sorrow is continually before me." What "sorrow" is that? Perhaps, a sorrow for my scourge. And, in good truth, my brethren, in good truth, let me say unto you, men do mourn for their scourges, not for the causes on account of which they are scourged. Not such was the person here. Listen, my brethren: If any person suffers any loss, he is more ready to say, "I did not deserve to suffer it," than to consider why he suffered it, mourning the loss of money, not mourning over that of righteousness. If thou hast sinned, mourn for the loss of thy inward treasure. Thou hast nothing in thy house, but perhaps thou art still more empty in heart; but if thine heart is full of its Good, even thy God, why dost thou not say, "The Lord gave, the Lord hath taken away; as it pleased the Lord was it done. Blessed be the Name of the Lord." Whence then was it that He was grieving? Was it for the "scourging" wherewith He was scourged? God forbid. "And my sorrow" (says He) "is continually before me." And as if we were to say, "What sorrow? whence comes that sorrow?" he says: "For I declare mine iniquity; and I will have a care for my sin" (ver. 18). See here the reason for the sorrow! It is not a sorrow occasioned by the scourge; not one for the remedy, not for the wound. For the scourge is a remedy against sins. Hear, brethren; We are Christians, and yet if any one's son dies, he mourns for him but does not mourn for him if he sins. It is then, when he sees him sinning, that he ought to make mourning for him, to lament over him. It is then he should restrain him, and give him a rule to live by; should impose a discipline upon him: or if he has done so, and the other has not taken heed, then was the time when he ought to have been mourned over; then he was more fatally dead whilst living in luxury, than when, by death, he brought his luxury to its close: at that time, when he was doing such things in thine house, he was not only "dead, but he stank also." These things were worthy to be lamented, the others were such as might well be endured; those, I say, were tolerable, these worthy to be mourned over. They were to be mourned over in the same way that you have heard this person mourn over them: "For I declare mine iniquity. I will have a care for my sin." Be not free from anxiety when you have confessed your sin, as if always able to confess thy sin, and to commit it…