God Keeps it Real

Psalm 31:15 through Psalm 31:18 (RSV)

 ¹⁵         My times are in thy hand;

          deliver me from the hand of my enemies and persecutors!

¹⁶       Let thy face shine on thy servant;

          save me in thy steadfast love!

¹⁷       Let me not be put to shame, O LORD,

          for I call on thee;

          let the wicked be put to shame,

          let them go dumbfounded to Sheol.

¹⁸       Let the lying lips be dumb,

          which speak insolently against the righteous

          in pride and contempt. 

I see so much Christian piety that is romanticized. We are often sold a G-Rated faith in an R-Rated world. Lots of religious poems I hear read at the start of various meetings are about pussycats and daffodils – rainbows and golden meadows. I appreciate the charm of these lovely things, but I think we ought to forge a faith that is tough enough to take us through those seasons where the enemies are real and our persecutors appear far stronger than our meager resources can withstand. 

I thank God for the faith expressed in the poems and songs of David. I thank God, further, that we have the ministry of Jesus to balance the fear-based pessimism of the Psalmist. Yet, we must admit that Psalm 22 describes, in stark detail, the suffering of our Lord of the Cross – at the hands of His enemies.

One attribute of God we rarely meditate upon is God the vindicator. Paul rests on such a God in Romans 12, where he says of God, “vengeance is mine, I will repay.” In one place Jesus warns that those who hurt these “little ones” that after “my Father” gets through with them, they would wish they had a millstone tied around their necks and been thrown in the sea. 

When we are wronged, unjustly, it is good to say to ourselves “my times are in Thy hand” and “let Thy face shine on Thy servant.” 

Persecution often does in this life what the last great day will do completely—separate the wheat from the tares.

James Milner (d. 1721) 

Be of good cheer, our God has overcome the world.