When the cares of our hearts are many
Psalm 94
1 O Lord, you God of vengeance, you God of vengeance, shine forth!
2 Rise up, O judge of the earth; give to the proud what they deserve!
3 O Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked exult?
4 They pour out their arrogant words; all the evildoers boast.
5 They crush your people, O Lord, and afflict your heritage.
6 They kill the widow and the stranger, they murder the orphan,
7 and they say, ‘The Lord does not see; the God of Jacob does not perceive.’
8 Understand, O dullest of the people; fools, when will you be wise?
9 He who planted the ear, does he not hear?
He who formed the eye, does he not see?
10 He who disciplines the nations, he who teaches knowledge to humankind,
does he not chastise?
11 The Lord knows our thoughts, that they are but an empty breath.
12 Happy are those whom you discipline, O Lord, and whom you teach out of your law,
13 giving them respite from days of trouble, until a pit is dug for the wicked.
14 For the Lord will not forsake his people; he will not abandon his heritage;
15 for justice will return to the righteous, and all the upright in heart will follow it.
16 Who rises up for me against the wicked? Who stands up for me against evildoers?
17 If the Lord had not been my help,
my soul would soon have lived in the land of silence.
18 When I thought, ‘My foot is slipping’, your steadfast love, O Lord, held me up.
19 When the cares of my heart are many, your consolations cheer my soul.
20 Can wicked rulers be allied with you, those who contrive mischief by statute?
21 They band together against the life of the righteous,
and condemn the innocent to death.
22 But the Lord has become my stronghold, and my God the rock of my refuge.
23 He will repay them for their iniquity and wipe them out for their wickedness;
the Lord our God will wipe them out.
This is a tough psalm for it asks God to act against the wicked, against the doers of evil.
That includes the proud and the arrogant (those who boast) (vs. 2 and 4), and those who persecute the people of God (vs. 5), and those who kill the widow, the stranger (immigrant), and orphan (vs. 6). The list goes from bad to worst – for the entire Bible has a profound concern to protect the widow, the immigrant, and the orphan. This was a way in which the people of God were to be different than the cultures around. (Think, for example, of the orphanages built by churches through the ages.)
Notice, the psalm writer is not deciding how to punish those who do evil. The chastising of wrongdoing (vs. 10) is God’s work. But that does not mean that the writer does not wish for the discipline to happen.
And is where things become challenging – we are to cry out on behalf of those who are crushed and killed by the wicked, by evildoers (vs. 16). We are to plead with God on their behalf, but we are to let God act in chastising, in bringing discipline, in digging a pit for the wicked to fall into (vs. 13).
The psalm writer is able to trust that God will act because God has given the writer hope, God has been the writer’s help catching the writer when they thought they were about to lose their footing in life. (vs. 18) And “when the cares of my heart are many, your consolations cheer my soul.” (vs. 19). God has provided certainty that God is trustworthy, even if the timing seems slow. God can be trusted to exercise justice.
PRAYER:
O Lord, there is much in the world that we cry out against. The ways in which the proud and the arrogant are never humbled, the way in which your people are persecuted around the world, the way in which the poor, the lonely, and the ignored are pushed further down. O Lord, hold us secure in your love when we start to feel evil will win, remind us to trust in your justice which will be revealed in your time. In Jesus’ name. Amen.