I. Here is a remarkable outline of a holy character. Of these three gifts "a right spirit," "Thy Holy Spirit," a "free spirit" the central one alone is in the original spoken of as God's, the "Thy" of the last clause of the English Bible being an unnecessary supplement. The central petition stands in the middle, because the gift which it asks is the essential and fundamental one from which there flow and, as it were, diverge on the right hand and on the left the other two. God's Spirit given to a man makes the human spirit holy, and then makes it right and free. (1) As to that fundamental petition "Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me," one thing to notice is that David regards himself as possessing that Spirit. The Spirit of the Lord had departed from Saul because Saul had refused His counsel and departed from Him; and Saul's successor, trembling as he remembers the fate of the founder of the monarchy and of his vanished dynasty, prays with peculiar emphasis of meaning, "Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me."(2) The primary idea in the holiness which David so earnestly desires is that of separation separation for God and separation from sin. (3) "A right spirit." "A constant or firm spirit," is the Psalmist's meaning. (a) There is no stability and settled persistency of righteous purpose possible for us unless we are made strong because we lay hold on God's strength and stand firm because we are rooted in Him. (b) You can only get and keep purity by resistance. In such a world as this, with such hearts as ours, weakness iswickedness in the long run. "Add to your faith manly vigour." (4) A "free spirit." He who is holy because full of God's Spirit, and constant in his holiness, will likewise be free. That is the same word which is in other places translated "willing;" and the scope of the Psalmist's desire is, "Let my spirit be emancipated from sin by willing obedience."
II. Desires for holiness should become prayers. David does not merely long for certain spiritual excellencies; he goes to God for them. He has found out two things about his sin both of which make him sure that he can only be what he should be by God's help. (1) " Against Thee onlyhave I sinned." (2) He sees in his one deed more than an isolated act: "Behold, I was shapen in iniquity."
III. Observe that prayers for perfect cleansing are permitted to the lips of the greatest sinners. Knowing all his guilt, and broken and contrite in heart (crushed and ground to powder, as the words mean), utterly loathing himself, aware of all the darkness of his deserts, he yet cherishes unconquerable confidence in the pitying love of God, and believes that, in spite of all his sin, he may yet be pure as the angels of heaven ay, even holy as God is holy.
A. Maclaren, Sermons Preached in Manchester,p. 112.
References: Psalms 51:10; Psalms 51:17. E. C. Wickham, Wellington College Sermons,p. 22.Psalms 51:11. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xvi., No. 954; Homiletic Magazine,vol. xii., p. 272.