But the Lord sits enthroned forever;
he has established his throne for justice,
and he judges the world with righteousness;
he judges the peoples with uprightness. Ps. 9:7-8 ESV
By: Dave Sims
Psalm 9, like many Psalms, is filled with praises to God for his judicious rule. When I was a kid, I appreciated the idea that a God who is all-powerful would choose to be just. (Of course, God acts justly because he is just.) My youthful prayers reflected my admiration and thankfulness for his just nature, likely because I’d seen so much abuse of power by humans.
Psalm 9 also includes numerous praises for God’s compassion toward those who experience injustice, like God intervening and causing the failure of those who would do injustice to his people (vv.3-6, 15-18) or God’s righteous judgment (vv. 4, 8, 16) in response to his enemies’ wickedness (vv. 5, 16-17).
Placed almost near the middle of the Psalm is a plea for help, “Lord, see how my enemies persecute me! Have mercy and lift me up from the gates of death…” (v. 13).
This verse causes me to wonder. In a psalm filled with praise to God for his righteous judgment and faithful deliverance (17 out of 20 verses), if David’s intent was to seek God’s intervention why so many effusive praises compared to so few interceding words (3 verses)?
For someone who doesn’t know David’s life, one might think his numerous praises are an attempt to “butter” God up so he could get God to act. I don’t, however. Here’s why.
Samuel tells a story about David during the time he was running for his life from Saul. David and his men arrived at their encampment weary from travel to discover their families had been kidnapped and their settlement burned to the ground (1 Sam 30:1-6). Their first response was to “raise their voices and weep until they had no more strength to weep”(v. 4). David’s men then considered stoning him (v 6a). What happened next is unusual and interesting. David didn’t defend himself. He didn’t fly off the handle with retaliating anger. Nor did he rush off in a panicked pursuit of his family. Samuel says, “David strengthened himself in the Lord” (v. 6b). That sounds like a mature thing to do, but what does it mean? My guess is that it means David spoke affirming words of truth to himself regarding God’s covenant promises. Psalm 9 might be an example of this skill.
The battle we experience between faith and doubt is no more intense than when we experience injustice. During those times, we often ask ourselves, where was God? Is he going to avenge me? Why would God have allowed this? David may have experienced these same questions, but my sense is that he had learned that, to allow himself to dwell only on these kind of thoughts, would lead to a downward spiral of distress and despair, insulating him from the source of his strength and hope.
David’s strengthening himself in the Lord led to his ability to a reorient himself from the emotional flooding that likely accompanied his initial awareness. As the emotions began to settle he was able to regain access to his wisdom. His wisdom then led him to seek discernment from God for what to do next (vv.7-10). God gave him the “go ahead” to pursue his enemy. God then led them to the camp of the abductors at a time and place when they were vulnerable and that allowed David the advantage to overcome them (vv.16-20).
There are numerous places in Scripture where David’s words might qualify as “strengthening himself in the Lord”. Here are three quotations that I believe bear witness to that reality:
"I love you, O Lord, my strength. The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my
deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of
my salvation, my stronghold." Psalm 18:1-2
"One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house
of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to
seek him in his temple." Psalm 27:4
"O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh
faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have
looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because
your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you
as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands." Psalm 63:1-4
If we could talk to David today, I think he would affirm the critical role justice plays in every community and the deep commitment we should have to uphold justice and resist wickedness. However, I think he would also tell us that the experience of injustice is not the death of meaning. I think he would tell us that even though injustice can take precious possessions, experiences and people from us, it does not have the power to rob us of what most anchors our lives: the one who is our security, strength, hope and love.
African-American Methodist minister Charles Albert Tindley (1851-1933), no stranger to injustice, wrote a hymn entitled “Some Day”. He was likely a man who knew how to strengthen himself in the Lord, evidenced by this stanza:
Harder yet may be the fight,
Right may often yield to might,
Wickedness awhile may reign,
Satan’s cause may seem to gain;
There is a God that rules above,
With hand of pow’r and heart of love,
If I am right, he’ll fight my battle,
I shall have peace some day.
By: Dave Sims
A new command I give you. Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. John 13. 34 NIV
Jesus gave his disciples this new command during the Last Supper. Reading it makes me curious as to how they might have understood it. Their minds might have been drawn to the Shema, “Love the Lord your God…and your neighbor as yourself” (Deut. 6:4-5). They might have also remembered Jesus’s words from the Sermon on the Mount, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (Matt 5.43-44). Regardless of how the disciples understood the new command, we know how Jesus demonstrated it. The following day by he laid down his life for his enemies.
The disciples likely did not connect the dots from Jesus’s new command to the crucifixion. After the resurrection, knowing how confused and disoriented they were, he spent 40 days teaching them the Old Testament prophecies concerning his suffering, death and resurrection. Even though this time with Jesus enabled them to understand that his death was part of God’s plan, they were still expecting him to assume his throne in Jerusalem.
Therefore, they asked Jesus, “…when are you going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6) Not knowing that the crucifixion was Jesus’s inauguration as King, Jesus answered them by saying, “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority.” (v.7). Knowing that he was not going to assume a political reign at this time and that he was going to rule a different way, he said, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (v. 8). Then he ascended back to his Father.
As Jesus rose into the sky with numerous questions swirling through the disciples’ minds, it’s likely that the only thing that gave them any reassurance was the fact that Jesus spoke with such confidence about the coming Holy Spirit. So the disciples did as he told them. They waited, but not entirely sure for what.
They found out a few days later. The Spirit descended and the disciples’ experience was life-changing (Acts. 2). We see this life-change expressed immediately with Peter and John healing a lame man in the Temple. The man asked for alms but they told him that silver or gold were not in their possession, but Jesus’s authority was and, in his name, they told the lame man to rise up and walk. And he did get up and walk.
A big crowd gathered as a result, and Peter extemporaneously preached his first sermon boldly proclaiming Jesus as the resurrected Messiah and accusing the crowd of complicity in Jesus’s execution. The disciples had taken up the ambassadorial call Jesus had predicted (Acts 1:8). They saw that Jesus’s kingdom was invisible, yet real. They exhibited its power and presence, and they began inviting others to join them as its citizens.
The disciples could see God’s plan being unveiled through them. Jesus was establishing his kingdom, but In a way they had not anticipated—through the Apostles and the church that was birthed by the Spirit that day. No one could have predicted this plan, not even the angels. God’s glory was now contained in humans and he would advance his kingdom through them. Instead of placing Jesus on an earthly throne to coerce humans to bow to his will, God had placed him in the bodies of his people, the church, to love their enemies, extend them benevolence, offer them a place in God’s family, and exhibit divine wisdom as they lived out companionship with his Spirit.
The disciples gave witness to this incredible story everywhere they went. God was rescuing humans (even Gentiles) from the penalty of sin and their sinful selves, while restoring them to his promised Shalom (flourishing, wholeness and delight) by forgiving their sins and placing his presence within them. The rescue had taken place as a result of a vulnerable act of self-sacrificial love in which our all-powerful God allowed himself to be killed on a cross. The cross eventually became the symbol of the disciples’ faith, a faith best characterized by imitating Jesus in laying down their lives for others.
Jesus’s command to love “as I have loved you” would become the means by which his followers would demonstrate their love for him and advance his kingdom. They gladly lived out this new command, seeing their lives as an extension of Jesus’s life and, as they laid down their lives, a fruitfulness resulted that would bless God, those around them and even themselves.
What a story! What a God!
By: Dave Sims
Watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod. (Mark 8:15 NIV)
After Jesus had fed the 4000, he and his men crossed over the Sea of Galilee. In route, someone noticed they had forgotten to bring bread. As he often did, Jesus turned the conversation into an object lesson and as usual, he started it with a cryptic statement. This time it was, “Watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod."
Failing to pick up on Jesus’s meaning, the disciples thought Jesus was chiding them for having forgotten to bring bread. Without explaining, Jesus quizzed them about the number of leftover baskets of food collected from both events in which he fed the multitudes. Apparently, the amount of left-over food was supposed to provide them clues for something the Pharisees and Herod were failing to see. Matthew and Luke give some extra details that lend us added perspective. Matthew explicitly names the teaching of the Pharisees as the yeast, and he includes the Sadducees (16:12) among those affected. Luke, in a different story but one in which he includes the same warning, described the yeast as hypocrisy (12.1), the incongruity between what a person outwardly portrays and the inner motives of their hearts.
It’s pretty easy to pick out the Pharisees’ hypocrisy. Jesus exposed it in numerous stories and conversations. However, the Sadducees and Herod didn’t receive as much ink in the gospels. In this story (Matthew and Mark), Jesus explicitly includes them as affected by the same yeast. The Sadducees were Jewish officials who had authority over the Temple. They were notorious for gouging Jewish pilgrims with Temple taxes and fees that made them rich. Instead of mediating God to worshippers, they used the Jewish worship laws for profit.
The Herod of Jesus’s day was given Roman authority to keep the peace in order to insure the economy would continue producing a source for Roman taxes. Herod lived and reigned as a Jew but his loyalty was not to his people. Everyone knew that he ruled as a puppet king for personal gain. Although the Pharisees, Sadducees and Herod were different in numerous ways, each possessed power, wealth and status, and each used them as a means of self-advancement. Therefore, we might paraphrase Jesus’s warning as, “Beware of the yeast of power, wealth, and status to swell your souls with a passion for self like yeast swells dough. It can consume you and, in doing so, destroy you and those in your path.”
Jesus knew that power, wealth and status are captivating to humans because in the world’s culture they promise security, hope, meaning and identity. He also knew that if we live in an effort to secure our lives through one or any combination of the three, we will use people for our purposes. Jesus could also sadly see that even those who don’t possess these much-coveted conditions are often obsessed with their acquisition.
Jesus’s warning to his men was to beware of the alternative to the life he was offering, one in which he freely gives everything we need in abundance (Jn 10:10) and also one in which he provides for our deepest longing (Ps. 42.1). When Jesus quizzed the disciples about the abundance of food left over from the miracle-meals he was inviting them to see him as their life source, one beyond what they could ever ask or imagine (Eph. 3.20).
Finding Jesus to be sustaining and fulfilling begins with recognizing the idolatrous ways we’ve substituted power, wealth or status for Jesus. This idolatry is exposed when we view any measure of power, wealth or status as our source of security, hope, meaning and/or identity. In the same way that power, wealth and status are not life, the absence of them is not death. Death is disconnection from the source of life—Jesus. Even though power, wealth and status are not evil in and of themselves, they do not lead to life.
Finding Jesus to be our source of security, hope, meaning and identity, is not something we can do on our own. It is something we lay hold of by faith because it’s already ours. We do this as we let go of our idolatry, which means repenting of our attempts to quench our thirst from sources that leave us thirsty. In other words, when we see that Jesus is the living water from which drinking will never let us thirst again (Jn 4:13-14), we’ll stop drinking from “broken cisterns” (Jer. 2.13). As we taste of Jesus and see that he is good (Ps 34:8), then power, wealth and status become tools for living instead of our source of life. His life fills our empty places in ways that anchor us in the world with a confidence that what we need most can never be taken from us.
“O Sovereign Lord,…Herod Antipas, Pontius Pilate the governor, the Gentiles, and the people of Israel were all united against Jesus, your holy servant, whom you anointed. But everything they did was determined beforehand according to your will. And now, O Lord, hear their threats, and give us, your servants, great boldness in preaching your word. Stretch out your hand with healing power; may miraculous signs and wonders be done through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” Acts 4:24-30 NLT
This prayer recently grabbed my attention, mainly because I don’t often find myself praying like this. My prayers usually consist of requests for God’s deliverance from hardship and general unpleasantries, both for myself and those closest to me.
Of course, God invites us to ask for whatever we want (Mt. 7:7-12), in part because His heart is to bless us. When He answers our prayers, we experience a growing awareness of His presence and care, something I believe He very much wants us to know. However, something else I think God wants us to know is how to trust Him when we don’t understand why He is saying “no”.
Paul described a time when Jesus said “no” to him. I’m referring to the mysterious “thorn in the flesh” experience he described in 2 Cor. 12. Paul asked God three times to remove it (vv. 8-10), but Jesus responded by saying, “My grace is sufficient”. Paul understood Jesus’s reply to mean that he would not endure the experience alone and, in addition, His strength would supply him with the grace necessary to live with the “thorn”. Paul understood God’s intent for leaving the “thorn” to be a preventive from his boasting–something that could have resulted from the amazing sights God showed Paul when He took him into the third heaven (v. 4). The “thorn” became a daily reminder to Paul to rely on God for His strength rather than his own. This new paradigm led him to boast in his weaknesses saying, “…when I am weak, then I am strong”. We could conclude from this story that when God’s answer is “no”, His intent is to deliver us through our trial, not from it.
The context for the prayer in Acts 4 is Peter and John’s arrest after having healed a lame beggar in the temple courts. As you might suspect, the healing stirred much enthusiasm among the Jewish crowds, but it also elicited the unfavorable attention of the Jewish religious leaders. When brought before the religious high council, Peter gave an eloquent and bold speech accusing the religious leaders of conspiring to crucify the Messiah. Infuriated, the religious leaders made intimidating threats intended to dissuade the disciples from further similar action. In response, Peter courageously told them that he and the other disciples could not stop talking about what they had experienced. Fearing a revolt by the crowds, the religious leaders reiterated their threats then released Peter and John without harming them. They immediately reported back to the other Jesus followers and, together, they prayed this prayer.
Their prayer reveals how the disciples were learning to see and live life like Jesus. They had seen the all- powerful Messiah allow Himself to be falsely accused and executed as a criminal, after He had asked for “this cup to pass from Him”. Knowing this, I think His disciples had begun to recognize prayer as being less about them getting what they wanted and more about asking God to bring His kingdom to bear in their current circumstances, while fortifying them as His agents.
The counter-intuitive words of Jesus, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23 NIV), were likely making more sense to His disciples at this point, too. They knew answering this call would involve pain, hardship, and possibly even the loss of their lives. Between Acts 1, when they were still asking Jesus when the kingdom would be restored to Israel, and Acts 4 when they were praying this prayer for courage and boldness in the face of adversity and persecution, they had grown significantly in their understanding of how Jesus was inviting them to live out their faith in the world. It appears that they had stopped looking for an immediate overthrow of Rome and had begun living as heaven’s exiles who were awaiting restoration to their homeland. After the disciples prayed, God responded in a demonstrative way. Their meeting place shook—a tangible expression of God’s presence and power, bolstering the disciples’ confidence that God’s favor and strength was upon them.
Father, I want to live out my faith in the world like Jesus did. I pray that in the places you lead me I will have the boldness and confidence Peter and John demonstrated. I don’t find myself rejoicing, like Paul, over the opportunity to fill up the remaining sufferings of Christ (Col. 1.24), therefore I recognize a need for a deeper of work of your grace if I’m going to imitate Jesus in this way.