NOTES for Psa 51
Practically every verse of this psalm is used by the Church in worship and included in prayer canons. It is difficult to choose the single most important thing in it, because just as no two days are the same, different words strike us each time. It is the quintessence of everything we try to say to God, to express in words or sighs. If we compare psalms of praise with this cry of grief torn from a person who realises all the consequences of what he has done, we see that praise uses few words. But grief finds a way to make itself heard; repentance and the impossibility of living in sin before the face of God, together with the thirst to see His gaze—all this compels us to find a path to God.