Later, the NT draws on it to exemplify the work of God in our Life. That NT text makes it clear that God has always had one and only one standard for crediting righteousness. It is apart from human ability and based on this forgiving, covering sins and not imputing those sins against us. David, Paul, and believers throughout time have realized that God s blessing was inseparable from forgiveness. Happiness and freedom in life start when God forgives our sin.
Communion is a celebration of that.
This is why Martin Luther referred to this as a Pauline Psalm to make the point that it teaches forgiveness not based on law-righteousness but divine mercy. Blessedness is not in this case ascribed to the man who has been a diligent lawkeeper, for then it would never come to us, but rather to a lawbreaker, who by grace most rich and free has been forgiven. Self-righteous Pharisees have no portion in this blessedness. Over the returning prodigal, the word of welcome is here pronounced, and the music and dancing begin. A full, instantaneous, irreversible pardon of transgression turns the poor sinner s hell into heaven, and makes the heir of wrath a partaker in blessing.