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God, the universe and all that: Part 3 (12 comments)
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God, the universe and all that: Part 2 (1 comment)
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Temptation and the garden by Jean Williams (2 comments). All our temptations are garden temptations. I don't usually talk much about gardening when I lead Bible studies, but … more
God, the universe and all that: Part 5 by Lionel Windsor (0 comments). In this fifth and final instalment of his five-part series, Lionel Windsor reveals what the solution to … more
Experiencing God by Karen Beilharz (0 comments). If you've just joined us, in these Saturday posts we've been looking at classics from The Briefing archive … more
God, the universe and all that: Part 4 by Lionel Windsor (0 comments). In the fourth instalment of a five-part series, Lionel Windsor uncovers the answer to the riddle. (Read … more
A Vine confabulation by Ian Carmichael (4 comments). We at Matthias Media have recently made available a free and downloadable discussion guide for Col Marshall and Tony Payne's … more
God, the universe and all that: Part 3 by Lionel Windsor (12 comments). In the third instalment of a five-part series, Lionel Windsor discovers we humans are significant in the … more
Kids@church/Click: Some great material for your children’s Sunday School by Jean Williams (2 comments). I teach Sunday School for children regularly, but I don't always have the time and energy to write my … more
Experiencing confusion by Karen Beilharz (0 comments). I mentioned in my last Saturday post that for the next little while, we would be looking at … more
God, the universe and all that: Part 2 by Lionel Windsor (1 comment). In the second instalment of a five-part series, Lionel Windsor contemplates the extent of our significance in … more
Stark treatment of the Crusades by Peter Bolt (2 comments). Revisionist history is probably as common as it is unethical. There are lessons to learn from the past, but … more
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Paul is one of the Staff Editors at Matthias Media. He is married to Cathy and has three fantastic kids. He loves student ministry, reading, writing music and playing the saxophone, and is looking forward to meeting Jesus face to face.
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Ah, the imprecatory psalms. Here’s three good resources:
John Piper on Psalm 139, Don’t I hate those who hate you, O Lord?
http://tinyurl.com/6zukwg
Please Zap them, Lord from David Reid
http://www.growingchristians.org/dfgc/zap.htm
Ardel Caneday, The Propriety of Christians Invoking God’s Curse and Wrath on Evildoers
http://tinyurl.com/5bx7nc
I also wonder about people quickly saying that things we read in Psalms are not applicable today, such as David asking God in Psalm 51 “Do not take your Holy Spirit from me” Is this completely unapplicable today, or does it have an application to Christians in the 21st century of our Lord, as well as Jews in 100 BC?
the one that for me takes every prize is ps 109.
from verse 7 ...let his prayer be counted as sin,
let his days be few, let someone take his property
let his children be fatherless, his wife a widow
let his children be beggers…
and so on.
Why is the author so malicious? We know from Ezekiel that the sins of one will NOT be visited upon his or her children.
I am attempting to take up Gordon’s challenge, but I’ve only done the first 25 Psalms. I’ve found 17 of the first 25 Psalms to be invoking SOMETHING upon ones enemies from “let them be disappointed” or “don’t let them beat me” to… more violent requests.
How to take it? I’ve always been told that it shows God can handle our anger, and saying “God, please beat up these baddies” is a lot better than beating them up yourself.
Perhaps some of our road rage is a result of pent up anger towards others that society says we can’t express and doesn’t give us a healthy way to express. We only pray nice prayers in church “Please heal Aunt Mildred, please bless the Queen, bring about world peace…”, we don’t say “Kill the idiot (would like to type something more violent but wont for fear of it not being printed) who drove while drunk and killed three children, may he rot behind bars and die a painful death”.
Just my $0.02
Thank you to David (commenter) for his links. They were helpful in drawing my attention to their cry for justice and avenging crimes directly against God.
At what point, however, do we declare someone “wicked” and beyond salvation - at the point where we should no longer pray for their salvation and pray for their damnation instead? Is a jihadist terrorist suicide bomber-to-be beyond salvation the day before he commits his suicide bombing? A week? Five years?
I don’t have an answer, just many, many questions.
Liz
Having just walked out of the second of “Annual Moore College Lectures” tonight I thought it might be good to mention that two of the attributes that Mike Ovey has described the ‘Unrepentant’ as having is Unforgiving and Begrudging of Mercy to others. He show this particularly in the Pharisee On tuesday night (Lecture 1)
I’m not really sure how that connects to this discussion yet but I feel that it should possibly because of the discomfort raised in Liz’s questions about the appropriateness of us begging curse on wrong doers.
Anyway I’ll continue to reflect as the series goes on, but I have no hesitation in recommending the series so far (which will be availble to purchase from MTC…
About Psalm 3, David’s cry for God to fight for him reminded me of the theme of God fighting on behalf of his people that runs throughout Joshua and Judges.
The wicked generally in Psalms: Is it fair to say that apart from Jesus, all of us are “the wicked” in these Psalms?
Jesus, the only righteous one, has undertaken to transfer us from the status of wicked, ungodly, sinful, enemies to being reconcilied and justified, dearly loved and adopted (Romans 5:1-12 etc).
Perhaps if we looked at the Psalms this way, some of the tensions are at least shifted, if not made redundant.
It’s taken me a while to get back to this one… But I think that I have a better grip on the uncomfortablity I had with Liz’s question…
As I mentioned in my last post Mark Ovey had discribed the unrepentant as Unforgiving and begrudging mercy to others.
I think I was connecting it to Romans 12:9-21 - Now I am clear that the particular issue on view is persecution…
However I think the Christian way of dealing with evil can be applied fairly broadly and that is not to repay evil with evil - to leave evil for God’s judgment(rom 21:17,19). If we left it here you may be able to justify a calling down of God’s wrath Psalms style, but verse 21 says not just to leave vengeance to God, but to repay evil with good.
I think too, if we remember the context of this Letter to the Romans, that our filth before God and the undeserved mercy shown to us should be in the forefront of our minds.
What better good that to pray that our Father would also have mercy on this drunk driver, (etc.)
We are assured thoughout Romans that God’s wrath will come to all unrighteous, and can take heart that he will ‘kick a few teeth’ to say the least on that day - but let’s not ungraciously forget that for the justification that Christ has given us we would be those very same unrighteous.
I think that the answer to our own rage is to remember our own offence against God, and trust that he will judge justly, I think the answer to us determining a person’s ‘wickedness’ - and “beyond salvationess” is to realise that it is never our part.
We are all ‘wicked’ and without God’s intervention beyond salvation.
So plead he does.
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