Monthly Archives: July 2021

Our Enemy

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On every side the wicked prowl, 
as vileness is exalted among the children of man. (Psalm 12:8 ESV)

God does not immediately take those who are His out of the world at the moment they become His. God leaves the citizens of His kingdom in the world for a time for two specific reasons. We are witnesses to the righteousness of God and His love for the world as evidenced by the sacrifice, the death and resurrection of His Son. And God uses the world to make the citizen of His kingdom ready for citizenship, which is eternity with Him. In every country becoming a citizen of that country requires renouncing citizenship from their home country and passing a test, then proclaiming allegiance to the new country. The test of the citizen of the kingdom of heaven is abiding in Christ (John 15). The citizenship oath is a relinquishing of control of self to God. Our lives are lived in God’s strength for Him under His control. We do not live our lives in our own strength and under our own control for Him. No one is strong enough to live for God, without His direct intervention, in a world that hates both God and the citizens of His kingdom.

Scripture is filled with descriptions of the wicked and the position of the righteous between the wicked and God, who created all. Psalm 1 begins with a description of the One Righteous Man and how His being is diametrically opposed to the unrighteous. 

Blessed is the man 
who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, 
nor stands in the way of sinners, 
nor sits in the seat of scoffers. (Psalm 1:1 ESV)

Psalm 2 describes how the wicked train their children and the people under their authority to rebel against God, refusing to submit to His authority. 

Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? 
The kings of the earth set themselves, 
and the rulers take counsel together, 
against the LORD and against his Anointed, 
saying, “Let us burst their bonds apart 
and cast away their cords from us. (Psalm 2:1-3 ESV)

God responds to the vitriol of the wicked rulers and kings by setting His Son over all, demanding obedience from all. 

Now therefore, O kings, be wise; 
be warned, O rulers of the earth. 
Serve the LORD with fear, 
and rejoice with trembling. 
Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, 
and you perish in the way, 
for his wrath is quickly kindled. (Psalm 2:10-12 ESV) 

Though Jesus is the ultimate, eternal authority, having been given “dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet” (Psalm 8:6 ESV), people continue to rebel, hating God and those who represent God.

Every intention of the being of the wicked person is evil only (Genesis 6:5). Those who are wicked dream up and imagine new ways to rebel against God and to hate Him. “Behold, the wicked man conceives evil and is pregnant with mischief and gives birth to lies” (Psalm 7:14 ESV). God leaves the citizen of His kingdom amid the wicked as evidence of His righteousness. God’s promises are sure, guaranteed by the blood of His Son and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Those who take refuge in God, though attacked and made to suffer at the hands of the wicked, will not be removed or taken from God’s presence. God will protect those who are His from the eternal consequences of the rebellion of the world.

On every side the wicked prowl, as vileness is exalted among the children of man.  The wicked are those guilty of sin. It is their method of operation to do anything and everything contrary to God’s will. They are worthless. Yet, they lie in wait for those they deem helpless and worthless, to do violence against them.

He sits in ambush in the villages; 
in hiding places he murders the innocent. 
His eyes stealthily watch for the helpless; 
he lurks in ambush like a lion in his thicket; 
he lurks that he may seize the poor; 
he seizes the poor when he draws him into his net. 
The helpless are crushed, 
sink down, and fall by his might. (Psalm 10:8-10 ESV).

The wicked exalt in vileness and worthless action and thinking. Everywhere the wicked walks they live in a manner that shows their disdain and hatred for God. Every act done by the wicked is evidence God uses in His judgment against the world. Though God calls all to repentance, those who refuse face His wrath and eternal separation from Him.

God Will Keep Them

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You, O LORD, will keep them; 
you will guard us from this generation forever. (Psalm 12:7 ESV)

Who are them and who are us? In this verse the words them and us are assumed but not explicitly stated. YHWH, the Everlasting One will keep, which means to guard and protect, to watch over, them. God will guard, which means to preserve and to faithfully watch over, us. This verse is an answer to the prayer of verse 1, “Save, O LORD, for the godly one is gone, the faithful have vanished from among the children of men” (Psalm 12:1 ESV). Them and us are the faithful that have momentarily vanished or have fled and hidden themselves because of the predicted, yet unexpected, death of Christ.

Jesus always prays for those who are His. Jesus teaches His disciples about their place before God in John 14-17, just before His death and their scattering. “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me” (John 17:20-21 ESV). Jesus, in Psalm 12:7, adds the promise that is only hinted at to this point in other places in the Psalms. God will separate those who hate Him from those who love and obey Him. Those who seek refuge in Him are protected by His eternal and everlasting strength. God’s enemies will perish and the memory of them is forgotten. God’s enemy will face eternal ruin and destruction. 

“You have rebuked the nations; 
you have made the wicked perish; 
you have blotted out their name forever and ever. 
The enemy came to an end in everlasting ruins; 
their cities you rooted out; 
the very memory of them has perished” (Psalm 9:5-6 ESV). 

But here Jesus tells us that God faithfully watches over those who are His for eternity, not allowing anything sinful or rebellious to hurt or attack them forever. God will guard us from this generation forever.

Jesus tells His disciples that He is going into eternity to make a place ready for them when, after a time, God calls them into His presence. His promises and guarantee are that He will return for them after His ascension.

Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. (John 14:1-3 ESV)

Jesus prays that those who are His will be with Him in eternity. “Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world” (John 17:24 ESV). Still, God does not immediately take those who are His out of the world and into eternity with Him. 

The citizens of the kingdom of heaven are left in the world for two reasons. The faithful are a witness to the people of the world of God’s righteousness and reveal the sin and rebellion of those who hate Him. God uses those who are His in the world to convict and call the people of the world to repentance. The testimony of the citizen of the kingdom of heaven is part of the evidence God uses to judge those who rebel against Him. Secondly, God uses the world to prepare the citizens of His kingdom for eternity. “The LORD tests the righteous” (Psalm 11:5 ESV). God tests everyone. Yet, the righteous are specifically tested and trained for witnessing in the world and for living in eternity. “Oh, let the evil of the wicked come to an end, and may you establish the righteous— you who test the minds and hearts, O righteous God!” (Psalm 7:9 ESV).

Those who follow Christ may face suffering for righteousness’ sake (Matthew 5:10-12). The world will hate those who are God’s because the world hates God (Psalm 2:1-2). The hatred of the world is evidence of God’s love for those who are His and their love for Him. God’s promises are true and trustworthy. God will arise and place those who are found in Christ in the safety for which they long (verse 5). Those who have taken refuge in God cannot be harmed. They may suffer temporarily in this world, but for eternity they are in the safety and security of the presences of God.

For you are not a God who delights in wickedness; evil may not dwell with you. The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers. You destroy those who speak lies; the LORD abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man. (Psalm 5:4-6 ESV)

God’s Word

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The words of the LORD are pure words, 
like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, 
purified seven times. (Psalm 12:6)

God speaks. Unlike the wicked described in 12:2, where every word and intention of the heart is to lie and deceive, God words are true and trustworthy. God is the Everlasting One and all of His words are pure, which means clean, without fault or compromise. There is no hint of a lie in God’s words. The wicked use their words, their flattering lips, to gain malevolent control over those whom they believe are weaker. They use their words to convince themselves they are the master of their own lives and God is either unreal or absent. 

“For the wicked boasts of the desires of his soul, 
and the one greedy for gain 
curses and renounces the LORD. 
In the pride of his face 
the wicked does not seek him; 
all his thoughts are, ‘There is no God’” (Psalm 10:3-4 ESV).

Yet, God is real and does speak. He speaks to all through His creation and to those who seek refuge in Him. “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens” (Psalm 8:1 ESV). God reveals in Scripture His eternal attributes and characteristics none could know had He not spoken.

God speaks, answering the prayer of the Psalmist to save Him. We have His words in verse 5. “‘Because the poor are plundered, because the needy groan, I will now arise,’ says the LORD; ‘I will place him in the safety for which he longs’” (Psalm 12:5 ESV). God will do what He has determined and promised to accomplish. His promises are trustworthy because God is trustworthy.

Does God test and refine His words? Is there anything in Him or His words that require cleansing? The world looks for anything that offers an excuse to view God as limited. In Chinese philosophy, yin and yang, there is a suggestion that in every good is a little evil and in every evil is a little good. Opposite and diametrically opposed forces can thus discover complimentary parts and achieve compromise. Such belief suggests God has sin and that He needs to fight wickedness in Himself. This philosophy also suggests God will bring all people, the righteous and the unrighteous, into His presence for eternity, forgiving and overlooking all wickedness. Nothing in the Psalms, or in all of Scripture, lends credence to this suggestion and belief. There is no sin in God, and He will not abide sin in His eternal presence. 

“Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, 
nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; 
for the LORD knows the way of the righteous, 
but the way of the wicked will perish” (Psalm 1:5-6 ESV).

The Psalmist offers a metaphor of the purity of God’s being and speech. God and His words are “like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times.” Precious metals, like silver, are refined until all impurities are removed. Unrefined metal is put in a crucible fixed securely in a place that will not allow other materials to invade and compromise the process. Then the precious metal is heated to melting many times and the dross removed, until what is left is pure, uncompromised, and has nothing other than the desired precious metal. Impurities are purged during the process. God’s words are “like,” having been through this process. His words have not been through the process because they are eternally undefiled.

In the beginning, God spoke creation into being. “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1 ESV). Everything God made He declared “good” (Genesis 1:10, 12, 18, 21, 25). Then God created Man in His image and declared the creation of Man “very good” (Genesis 1:31).  Jesus came as a Man, being both completely God and completely Man the way God decreed Man be (Philippians 2:6-8). Jesus, the Word of God, through whom all creation was created, is God the Creator.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. (John 1:1-5 ESV).

Though God’s words are not subject to refinement, Jesus subjected Himself to the testing of the world, enduring the cross in obedience. “Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him” (Hebrews 5:8-9 ESV). Though, Jesus was completely Man they way God originally intended with Adam, He was sinless. Jesus’ sacrifice was not meant to remove sin, or to pay for His own sin, but to fulfill the just sentence for the sin of the people created in His image, who rebelled against God. His sacrifice was for redemption, not refinement.

God’s Promise

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“Because the poor are plundered, 
because the needy groan, 
I will now arise,” says the LORD; 
“I will place him in the safety for which he longs.”  (Psalm 12:5 ESV)

Who are the poor and needy? God says that He will stand up and show Himself powerful when He arises for the poor and needy. How does God show Himself powerful when He arises?

The poor and needy are those who are so weak and afflicted they must rely upon another for their very life and existence. They cannot take care of themselves and need deliverance from someone stronger than they, someone who is abusing them. Plundered means oppressed and devastated, where those who view themselves as strong act violently against those they view as weak. When this happens those who are oppressed groan, which means to cry out for help from their savior.

David begins this Psalm with the word save. “Save, O LORD, for the godly one is gone; for the faithful have vanished from among the children of man” (Psalm 12:1 ESV). He then describes the oppressors as  those who lie, using their deceptive words to control others. Wicked people are self-righteous and refuse to acknowledge God’s authority. They stand over and tyrannize anyone they consider of no value. God values people the world hates. Those hated are afflicted because of their relationship with Him. God, the Everlasting One, is all-powerful. No created being can change God’s will. From eternity, God determined what He would do. Those who suffer for righteousness’ sake will come into His presence and live without fear for eternity. God will deliver those who are His, bringing them into the safety of His presence where there is no sin.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus describes the essential character of the citizen of the kingdom of heaven, the faithfulof Psalm 12. The first three characteristics are described in Psalm 12:5. First, the citizen of the kingdom of heaven is poor in spirit. “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:3 ESV). Those who are poor in spirit recognize their spiritual poverty before God, that they can do nothing to bring themselves into His presence. They have no righteousness except that given by God through the resurrection of Jesus, His Son. They are completely dependent upon God for eternal life and intimately know they can do nothing to earn God’s pleasure. Yet, they also intimately know that they have God’s grace and pleasure.

Secondly, citizens of God’s kingdom are needy and groan under the realization of the consequences of their sinful condition before God and the reality of living in a fallen world that hates them. They know they deserve separation from God. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted” (Matthew 5:4 ESV). To mourn is to lament, to cry and weep and grieve over the deserved sentence for rebellion against Him who created them in His image. The needy groan because of the attacks of those who hate God against those who love Him. God’s faithful are those who love Him, obey Him, though they know that they deserve separation from Him because of their rebellion against Him, the only source of eternal life.

Finally, God stands in His strength to rescue those who are His from the attacks and hatred of the world. “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth” (Matthew 5:5 ESV). Meekness is strength under control. But the people described are weak and unable to take care of themselves and have no strength to control. Meekness is not weakness. Meekness is God’s strength in the person under God’s control. God will arise in His strength and give the citizen of His kingdom remaining in the world the safety of His presence. Those who suffer for righteousness’ sake inherit eternity with Him.

According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. (1 Peter 1:3-5 ESV)

Those who are God’s take refuge in His Son, who is unshakable. “Blessed are all who take refuge in Him” (Psalm 2:12 ESV). That which happens to God’s Son happens to those who are found in Him. Christians die with Christ and are raised with Him. Those who are citizens of the kingdom of heaven are not citizens of the fallen world and long for their true home. 

Self-Righteousness

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May the LORD cut off all flattering lips, 
the tongue that makes great boasts, 
those who say, “With our tongue we will prevail, 
our lips are with us; 
who is master over us?” (Psalm 12:3-4 ESV)

Jesus faced the anger of the Jewish religious leaders and allowed them to murder Him using the Romans as executioners. God foreknew and predetermined the death of His Son. God’s foreknowledge and predetermination does not remove from the Jewish religious leaders the personal responsibility for their intentions and actions. God holds them accountable. 

Refusing to answer Pilate’s questions after being scourged and humiliated, Jesus declares the results of the sin of those who condemned Him.

So Pilate said to him, “You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?” 

Jesus answered him, “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above. Therefore he who delivered me over to you has the greater sin.” (John 19:10-11 ESV)

God is the judge and the godly one who is gone (Psalm 12:1) prays that God will pass righteous judgment on those who utter lies and speak with a double heart (Psalm 12:2). God, the Everlasting One, will cut off, which means to hew down and kill, those who commit wickedness based on the evidence of the intent of their heart as they talked with each other and those who would finally murder Jesus. The evidence against those who lied to ensure the murder of an innocent man is three-fold.

First, their words were delivered with flattering lips that come from a double heart. Flattering lips is speech that is smooth and slippery, empty and worthless. The Jewish religious leaders, tasked with upholding and teaching the Laws of God, violated those Laws with their lies. Flattering lips are lies. They knew the Law. “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor” (Exodus 20:16 ESV; Deuteronomy 5:20). The lies of the religious leaders were based on a false assumption that they were worth more or were more valuable than the man they condemned. This is the second piece of evidence against them. Once they inflated their value in their own minds and hearts, they made great boasts, which is pride in themselves and their self-righteousness. The religious leaders made themselves large and loud and important.

The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but do not practice. They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger. They do all their deeds to be seen by others. For they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long, and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others. (Matthew 23:2-7 ESV)

As the religious leaders consulted together after Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, they realized the power of Jesus and His challenge to their place and authority before the people. Instead of exulting in His power over death they saw their own position before the people eroding. “What are we to do? For this man performs many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation” (John 11:47-48 ESV). Their plotting to murder Jesus was an attempt to prove how great they were and that the land and people needed them more than they needed God.

Finally, their words revealed the manipulative power they had over others, especially other authorities. As the religious leaders stood before Pilate arguing that Jesus deserved death, they revealed the true intention of their hearts. They cared nothing for God, willing to sacrifice their relationship with Him for what little power they thought they had. They prevailed on Pilate to murder Jesus when they declared they had no king but Caesar and that Jesus was a direct threat to the power and authority of Caesar (John 19:12-15). To prevail means to use their personal strength and power in their own pride. With their intention and their words, they did not need another authority. They viewed themselves as the authority. So, they asked who is master over us? Not even God is their master.

From the unstable foundation of a double heart that lies, to the boast of self over all others, to rebellion against God, the progression of wickedness invades and overcomes all righteous behavior in those who say God is unnecessary. God will cut off from the life that is His those who refuse to abide in His Son. The warning of Psalm 2 comes to mind.

Now therefore, O kings, be wise;  
be warned, O rulers of the earth. 
Serve the LORD with fear, 
and rejoice with trembling. 
Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, 
and you perish in the way, 
for his wrath is quickly kindled.  
Blessed are all who take refuge in him. (Psalm 2:10-12 ESV)