7. Feeling Guilty or Sorry?

A Meditation of Psalm 32

Feeling sorry and feeling guilty are opposite to each other.  They are as different as day and night. One is positive, but the other is negative. Feeling guilty suffocates us, but feeling sorry relieves us. The author of psalm 32, probably David, knew this very well. He explains clearly the difference between the two.  

Let us think about Adam, the prototype of all human beings. He did something wrong. He broke an agreement with God, his landlord. He was a steward in God’s garden, and he was strictly told not to eat from a certain tree in the garden. However, he ate from that tree. Soon after breaking the agreement, he felt guilty. As David says, for day and night God’s hand was heavy upon him; his strength withered as in dry summer heat. Adam made an attempt to erase the wrong-doing by hiding it. He tried to avoid coming to the presence of God, the landlord. As David says, as long as he kept silent, his bones wasted away; he groaned all the day. But when God questioned him directly if he ate from the forbidden tree, he admitted he did because he couldn’t hide it any more. But he tried another trick. Instead of taking the blame, he placed it on his wife. He said somewhat as follows: It is true that I did what was wrong, but I am not responsible for it. She made me do it.  

It never occurred to Adam that there was another way to deal with the situation. He was not as wise as David. If only he knew what David knew, he would have felt sorry instead of feeling guilty. Driven by blind passion, David, the shepherd of the people of Israel, treacherously murdered a faithful soldier, one of the most heinous crimes someone could do. First he kept silent about it, and as a result, his bones wasted away, and he groaned all the day. However, as soon as his treachery was exposed by Prophet Nathan, he felt sorry for what he did and wept like a child before God. He did not place the blame on anyone else as Adam did. This is what he did in his own words: “Then I declared my sin to you; my guilt I did not hide. I said, ‘I confess my faults to the LORD,’ and you took away the guilt of my sin!” 

Imagine if Adam had had the wisdom of David. As soon as he realized what he had done was wrong, he would have gone in search of God, and would have fallen at His feet. He would have said, “God I did a terrible mistake. I broke the agreement. I ate from that tree. I am willing to take any punishment you give me!” 

From his own experience, David advises us not to be senseless like horses or mules. Adam was as senseless as a horse or mule. That is why he acted as he did.  

It is human to err. God, the all-knowing being, is the only one capable of not doing anything wrong. It is OK for us humans to do wrong deeds. When a child learns to walk, he/she falls several times before he/she is able to walk steadily. No one is born a saint. We all learn the lessons of life by trial and error. But once we do a wrong deed, we have two options: we can either hide it and place the blame on someone else, or we can admit it before God and others and take its blame. It was bad for Adam to have eaten from the tree, but it was much worse for him to hide it and then to place the blame on his wife.  

Adam fell down, and he remained there. David fell down, but he got up again and continued his journey of life. We are treading the same path, the same journey, of life today -- our journey in this world from our birth to death. What do we do when we fall down? Do we follow Adam’s approach or David’s approach?

Back to Contents