An Introduction to Imprecatory Psalms #1

In imprecation is a prayer which invokes a curse from God upon inanimate. These Psalms are are seeking the judgment of God on someone else and they're asking God to overthrow the wicked you seen a movie in which a haggard old woman good finger at someone and pronounces a curse upon Snow White comes to mind. For example, usually an act of hateful, selfish, unholy vengeance hello and welcome to the truthful good with John Green, founding pastor of truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. I'm Bill Wright and today Don begins a series called a cry for justice will show us that we also see many people in the Bible pronouncing a curse, or more accurately, calling down the power of God for reckoning. What's the difference with these folks usually had a righteous reason behind the request rather than evil intentions and done a lot of people don't realize that there's an enormous difference between say, which is curse and a Christians call for a righteous God to vanquish their enemies, King David, for example, my friend, as I think about the series. It is just ahead. I want to frame it for you in this way, we live in an age of false tolerance and of moral equivalence people are unwilling to call evil, evil, and to uphold good is good and in the midst of that society, and even within the evangelical church. I'm sad to say, we have lost sight of God's justice and God's hatred of sin, and yet these things are fundamental to his Holiness, the Bible says it is a God who who has indignation every day with centers that has implications for you and I as we think about the world in which we live. We think about the remnants of sin in our own lives. We need a holy zeal and a righteous indignation against everything that offends the holiness of God. And that's what were going to consider in this series titled a cry for justice. Join us as we see these things from a biblical perspective right here on the truthful. Thanks Don and friend right now. Let's find out more from our teacher. As we join in for part one of the message called an introduction to imprecatory Psalms here on the truthful or study brings us to Psalm 69.

In the Old Testament book of the Psalms, and I would invite you to turn there with me. Psalm 69 is a fairly lengthy song and presents us with content that is somewhat difficult to to deal with and we want to approach it carefully is what I'm planning is to do some preliminary messages before we consider Psalm 69 as a whole. I want to look at some specific aspects that the Psalm raises because of the profound questions that it brings to our mind and Psalm 69.

As is often the case. David is dealing with enemies. If you look at verses one through four with me just to kind of start things here.

He says save me. Oh God, for the waters, have threatened my life I have sunk in deep Meyer and there is no foothold. I have come into deep waters in a flood overflows me.

I am weary with my crying. My throat is parched. My eyes fail while I wait for my God, and then he introduces part of the problem that is facing.

He's facing enemies in verse four he says those who hate me without a cause are more than the hairs of my head, those who would destroy me are powerful being wrongfully my enemies what I did not steal.

I then have to restore so there is a framing reference to enemies early in this Psalm that helps condition us to his situation as he is writing this prayer to his God. Now skipping over much of the Psalm for now remembering that were going to address the Psalm in full down the road in part what he does in this Psalm is he asks God to bring severe judgment on his enemies. Look at verse 22 through 28. He says made their table before them become a snare and when they are in peace. May it become a trap. May their eyes grow dim so that they cannot see and make their loin shake continually. Pour out your indignation on them and may your burning anger overtakes them made, there can't be desolate, may not dwell in their tents for they have persecuted him whom you yourself have smitten and they tell of the pain of those whom you have wounded add iniquity to their iniquity, and may they not come into your righteousness may they be blotted out of the book of life, and may they not be recorded with the righteous.

These are pretty severe words aren't say and at first blush, for those of us that are steeped in the New Testament and used to thinking in New Testament categories in New Testament texts. This is a hard passage in a hard type of prayer to reconcile with the New Testament call to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us not to pray against them. Look over Matthew chapter 5 just to kind of frame the issue here.

Matthew chapter 5 in verses 43 through 45. Jesus says you have heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the righteous. Well that doesn't sound much like what David was doing and Psalm 69 does it, and the truth of the matter is, as you read the Psalms with this matter of these prayers against enemies raised to you start to see that this is quite the problem because the Psalms frequently speak in such language. The psalmist is frequently praying against his enemies, let me just show you three eggs. Other examples to kind of frame the issue go back to Psalm five and I deleted many text for my notes simply for the sake of time. At this point.

Psalm five verse 10, Psalm five, verse 10 says hold them guilty of God by their own devices, let them fall in the multitude of their transgressions thrust them out for they are rebellious against you. One of the more famous Psalms in this genre is Psalm 109 if you would turn there with me. Psalm 109 and all were doing right now at this moment is just introducing the the problem were just framing the issue so that we can see what we need to deal with to come to grips with the biblical text. Psalm 109 verse six. Speaking of accusers against him.

David says appoint a wicked man over him, and let an accuser stand at his right hand when he is judge let him come forth guilty, and let his prayer become sin.

Let his days be few. Let another take his office. Let his children be fatherless and his wife a widow let his children wander about and beg and let them seek sustenance far from their ruined homes with the creditor sees all that he has, and let strangers plunder the product of his labor. Let there be none to extend lovingkindness to him, nor any to be gracious to his fatherless children let his posterity be cut off in the following generation.

Let their name be blotted out. This is pretty pretty severe. Isn't it the most severe of all of them is the well-known passage in Psalm 137 if you would turn there again were just illustrating with texts, the nature of the problem. Psalm 137 is Psalm written during the course of the Babylonian captivity in the Old Testament says in verse seven. Remember, O Lord, against the sons of Edom, the day of Jerusalem who said raise it raise it to its very foundation, O daughter of Babylon.

You devastated one.

How blessed will be the one who repays you with the recompense with which you have repaid us. How blessed will be the one who seizes and dashes your little ones against the rock now, you read that for the first time that does not sound very kind toward the enemies. These texts and others like them, bring us to a genre of the Psalms known as the imprecatory Psalms and imprecation is a prayer which invokes a curse from God upon an enemy.

These these Psalms are are seeking the judgment of God on someone else and they're asking God to overthrow the wicked, and as we see as we compare these Psalms superficially, superficially, I say with the New Testament passages like the one I read from Matthew five they raise difficult ethical questions for us. 1/19 century writer said this and I quote he says it is undeniable that these expressions in the Psalms have been a source of grief and perplexity to the Christian while they have furnished occasion for scoffing to the skeptical. What he saying is tenderhearted believers look at this and compare Scripture with Scripture and are not sure what to do with it.

Not sure what to do with the seeming vindictive nature of the Psalms, and along with that. On the other side of the spectrum you have. You have those who do not believe the Bible who do not believe in Christ and they use these things to scoff at Scripture and to scoff at at those who would uphold a high view of God and say, is this the ethic that you're trying to teach that were trying to bring judgment on your enemies you know and and that's the kind of skeptical nature that that he's referring to one of those skeptics is CS Lewis, a man whose influence is far greater than his reliability. He says about the Psalms and goes on for pages and pages about it in his book reflections on the Psalms. He says at the Psalms are full of malice, pettiness, vulgarity and vindictive hatred. He goes on to say that ferocious self-pity and barbaric men wrote these devilish curse things. The psalmist reaction to injury, though profoundly natural is profoundly wrong." That's no less a man than CS Lewis.

Again I say whose influence is greater than his reliability well is that the right way for us to think about these Psalms should we look at them and say that they were written by a ferocious barbaric man who was profoundly wrong and what he said do these Psalms and others like them violate biblical ethics and godliness and are they merely an example of a man whose hatred has taken over his heart. Well, the truth of the matter is beloved that this is not an easy topic. This is somewhat elusive and it requires us to think with close consideration, lest we go astray in this is a topic I would say that that brings us back to an entire way of thinking in an entire way to approach thought in the way that you think about issues.

The problem that the critics run into is that they too quickly want to solve this apparent tension and the easy way to solve the tension is to dismiss the Old Testament writer and an elevated so-called New Testament principles in their place but it's not that simple. And it's in the what we need to do is we need to step back and remember general principles that can never be violated and let those general principles inform the way that we think about a difficult issue.

You don't start immediately with the difficult, the most difficult issue that you can find and try to sort it out on its own terms. You have to think and step back and say what are the broader general principles that inform my thinking about everything.

Therefore, my approach about all of Scripture and then you let those general principles gradually bring you into a conclusion that is satisfactory. And that's what were going to start to do basically what I have for you are three basic points. I just want to get started with this and then expand on it more. The beloved. Here's the thing that we should start with I guess is to remember point number one that the Psalms are God's word. The Psalms are God's word.

Everything in the 66 books of the Bible comes from God and that has a serious implication for us as students of the Bible.

That means that we should not quickly dismiss it. We should not quickly criticize it.

We should not rush to condemn anything that we say stated and affirmed in Scripture. Remember Romans chapter 15 verse four. If you want to turn there you can Romans chapter 15 verse four, the apostle Paul says that whatever was written in earlier times was written for our instruction, so that through perseverance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. Whatever was written in former times in the Scripture was written to profit us to instruct us to give us direction and so we start with the premise of the Psalms are somehow profitable somehow are useful somehow are good for us. Even if watch this watch this. Even if it is not immediately apparent to us how that could be the case, and so we start with that premise that somehow these Scriptures are good for us that they that they instruct us well because all Scripture is God's word. You remember second Timothy three verse 16 all Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work and so we have we have the New Testament looking back and stating with a blanket of blanket affirmation of the Old Testament. There is profitable instruction to be found there and one of the reasons that this is so important to us this point about the Psalms being God's word is that it causes us to slow down. It causes us to humble our hearts.

It causes us to to put a muzzle on our tongue, which is sometimes so quick to speak foolishly and we say but but wait a second. I may not immediately see the profiteer I may not immediately know the resolution to the problem here, but I know from a broader consideration of Scripture that I am supposed to come to Scripture with an attitude of deference I'm to come as a disciple I am to come as one who is here to learn and you and I should approach Scripture should approach the psalmist should approach the, the prophets, who often spoken these in these ways.

With this fundamental principle in our minds. We are not morally superior to the biblical writers who are writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Scripture sits in judgment of us.

We do not sit in judgment of Scripture, and that changes the way that you think about these imprecatory Psalms rather than coming on a moral, a self-appointed moral throne and saying I find this to be objectionable and and not profitable for human consideration. I consider these writers is CS Lewis said to be devilish know we step down from that position of pride and arrogance and, as one who needs to sit at the foot of Scripture and say what is it that this would teach me what is it that I would learn from here when I was teaching Greek back in that other place that I came from. I often told the students that when you come to a difficult text. When you come to difficult grammatical structures and as you're studying the Greek New Testament. I would tell them you need to adopt an attitude of patients and sit down, as it were, and I would literally sit down on the floor in the classroom that always always got their attention that you need to sit down in front of the text and rather than thinking.

The text is the problem rather than thinking that somehow Scripture is is the cause of this difficulty here is to recognize the cause of difficulty is always within yourself is from a lack of understanding, perhaps an as sinful attitude. Perhaps a lack of perspective but Scripture is perfect Scripture is high and lofty and exalted because it is the very word of God and therefore our first presupposition should be when we come to something that causes a difficulty in our mind. Like the imprecatory Psalms to his essay.

Wait a second Psalms are God's word.

The problem must somehow be with me because it couldn't possibly be with the Scriptures, and if you adopt that perspective, it will help you deal rightly with the imprecatory Psalms in my opinion, and it will also more broadly. That attitude will shape you in a way that will make you a fitting disciple of your Lord Jesus.

This is what his word is worthy of this is the devotion and trust, of which Christ is worthy of never to raise our hand against Scripture never to raise our voice against it but to seek to learn from it and to seek what it would have to teach us the Psalms are God's word and that frames the way that we think now. Secondly, we could say this. The Old Testament warns against a vengeful spirit. The Old Testament warns against a vengeful spirit as we said, the psalmist wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and all of Scripture all of Scripture is inspired by God in that manner.

The spirit of God work through the human writers in a way to produce a product that was entirely the word of God and expresses exactly what God wanted to express even though the songs were written 3000 years ago.

From our time. Time reference. We do not view them simply as a human product written by men from a barbaric age. We understand that Scripture bears the imprint of God that these writers were recording exactly what God wanted, said that means that we take an attitude of deference to it. It also mean something else because all Scripture, all 66 books of the Bible are ultimately a reflection of the one mind of God. It means that there is going to be an internal consistency between the between every passage of Scripture. It may not always be apparent to us and beloved it may not always be easy. It may require a lot of work and difficult thought and difficult questions before these problems began to unfold before us, but there should be. This underlying understanding in our mind that there is any internal consistency was Scripture. They are not in competition or in contradiction to one another again. That thought is far bigger for your philosophy of life. Your philosophy of Scripture.

Your you the way in which you walk with God is much bigger than just the imprecatory Psalms. It's it reflects the attitude that says not only is this true, it is internally consistent in one manner or another and if I don't see that immediately. The problem is not with the Bible. The problem is with me there some lack in me that's not seeing it, and so how does that point help us here. Well, the accusation against the Psalms. These imprecatory Psalms is is that there vengeful and vindictive. Blah blah blah. But when we look at other tax in the Old Testament we see that there is an atmosphere that pervades the Old Testament that should inform the way that we consider these imprecatory Psalms go back to the book of Leviticus. If you will. Leviticus chapter 19 Leviticus chapter 19 and what were doing in large part is just kinda like just getting all of the tools out and laying them out so that you're ready to do the work. Later were just getting the tools out and getting them ready so that we can think rightly so. Leviticus chapter 19 in verse 17 says this and this is in the foundational book of Moses book of Moses being the first five books of the Bible in Leviticus 19, verse 17, the law of Moses, which David would have been steeped in is the king of Israel. He knew what this text said he says in verse 17 you shall not hate your fellow countrymen in your heart you may surely reprove your neighbor, but shall not incur sin because of him, you shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord that was written prior to David by some 400 years go to the Proverbs in Proverbs chapter 24 for something written after the time of David.

Proverbs 24 in verses 17 and 18 Proverbs 24 verses 17 and 18 says do not rejoice when your enemy falls and do not let your heart be glad when he stumbles. This is Proverbs 24 verse 17 verse 18, or the Lord will see it and be displeased and turn his anger away from him and here's the thing that I want you to see as we look at those passages, beloved is that both before and after the time of David functioning like bookends. The Old Testament warns God's people against vengeance and a bitter spirit.

Now if all of Scripture is God's word and it is, then it cannot contradict itself and somehow therefore these imprecatory Psalms are informed by these warnings against a vengeful spirit. Somehow these imprecatory Psalms fit with the overall spirit of the Old Testament that's doing green with the first half of the message called an introduction to imprecatory Psalms around the truth.

Pulpit will hear the second half of this lesson.

Next time, and friend. We pray that today's teaching has blessed you and we hope you can join us again here on the truth pulpit.

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