David asks God for a "do-over"

Have you ever needed a "do-over"?

I have recently started using a BIble Reading plan on my phone and today the passage was Psalm 51:1-19. In this passage, David had just made some really bad choices with Bathsheba and then had her husband killed. The devotional thought mentioned that we see what repentance(or asking God for a do-over) should look like. David first recognizes what he did wrong, then asks for forgiveness and for God to renew him.

How often should we have the following attitude and ask God for a do-over in our interactions with our spouse, kids, co-workers? I love how vulnerable David is with God, I think that is where the healing of broken things starts.

I love how David asks for a do-over in these verses from the Message version:

1Generous in love-God, give me grace! Huge in mercy-wipe out my bad record. 2 Scrub away my guilt, soak out my sins in your laundry. 3 I know how bad I’ve been; my sins are staring me down.

4 You’re the one I’ve violated, and you’ve seen it all, seen the full extent of my evil. You have all the facts before you; whatever you decide about me is fair. 5 I’ve been out of step with you for a long time, in the wrong since before I was born. 6 What you’re after is truth from the inside out. Enter me, then; conceive a new, true life.

7 Soak me in your laundry and I’ll come out clean, scrub me and I’ll have a snow white life. 8 Tune me in to foot-tapping songs, set these once-broken bones to dancing. 9 Don’t look too close for blemishes, give me a clean bill of health. 10 God make a fresh start in me, shape a Genesis week from the chaos in my life. 11 Don’t throw me out with the trash, or fail to breathe holiness in me. 12 Bring me back from a gray exile, put a fresh wind in my sails! 13 Give me a job teaching rebels your ways so the lost can find their way home. 14 Commute my death sentence, God, my salvation God and I’ll sing anthems to your life-giving ways. 15 Unbutton my lips, dear God; I’ll let loose with your praise.

16 Going through the motions doesn’t please you, a flawless performance is nothing to you. 17 I learned God worship when my heart was shattered. Heart-shattered lives ready for love don’t for a moment escape God’s notice.

wow.