In the Lord I
take refuge;
How
can you say to my soul, “Flee as a
bird to your mountain;
For,
behold, the wicked bend the bow,
They
make ready their arrow upon the string
To
shoot in darkness at the upright in heart.
If
the foundations are destroyed,
What
can the righteous do?”
The
Lord is in His holy temple; the Lord’s throne is in heaven;
His
eyes behold, His eyelids test the sons of men.
The
Lord tests the righteous and the
wicked,
And
the one who loves violence His soul hates.
Upon
the wicked He will rain snares;
Fire
and brimstone and burning wind will be the portion of their cup.
For
the Lord is righteous, He loves
righteousness;
The
upright will behold His face (Ps.
11, NASB).
Much
has taken place in our country to give Christians great pause as to the future
of our nation. We have seen a surge of sin in the marketplace unprecedented in
our time with little, if any, real outcry as to its appearance, much less to
its growth. Some want to immediately run to an “end of the world” scenario,
preparing for Jesus’ impending Second Coming. Unfortunately, they neglect the
fact that the early Church lived and existed in much worse circumstances than
that which present America is enduring. Jesus did not come to bail out those
first century Christians from their sin-drenched muck and mire. What made their
situation more dire than ours was that, in many parts of the Roman Empire,
Christians were actually dying for their attachment to Christ and His Word, just
as fellow believers in other parts of the world are doing even today. Yet, here
we are in the American church wanting Jesus to return to deliver us from
militant homosexuals, corrupt liberal politicians, and a president intent on
destroying a system of living responsible for blessing many past generations. I
dare say, if we are truly honest with ourselves and the Lord, the comparison
between our situation and that of the early Church (not to mention the
Christians in places like Indonesia and Egypt just to name a couple) would be
unfair at best. If the Father has not sent the Son to return to get His Bride,
the whole Church, not just the American branch, as of yet in almost twenty-one
hundred years since the Lord exited to the right hand of Power, then we must be
patient enough to know that it may yet be a long while before Jesus parts the
eastern sky to wind up time and bring final judgment to mankind.
Now, having stated all of this,
David’s words in Psalm 11 are very apropos to our subject. The gist of his
meaning is this. When overwhelmed by the reality of evil, it is easy to feel
like the best way of response is to escape, to flee, to run away and hide
“until the storm passes by” or deliverance comes. This is to what David refers
in vs.
1b-3. When “the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?”
betrays a question of hopelessness and fear. However, David’s response is
telling—“The LORD”. He is basically reminding the reader that the Lord, Jehovah
God, is sovereign over all and has not left the Throne of the universe. He will
execute justice on evildoers without question. Those who have committed to do
what is right according to God’s Word (i.e. the “righteous”) should focus on
Him and their faith in Him, not on what evildoers are committing in terms of
sin. The wicked are only setting themselves up for impending doom and judgment
which the Lord Himself will dispense. When He does come in wrath against the
wicked, He will act swiftly, precisely and definitively, leaving no question as
to His motives and reasons. Why? Because “His soul hates” sin. Sin defiles His
holy nature. Therefore, if repentance is not forthcoming from the evildoers,
they will suffer His wrath in full—“Fire
and brimstone and burning wind will be the portion of their cup.”
Rather
than looking for a way out as American Christians tend to do (e.g. Jesus’
Second Coming), why don’t we start taking a different approach to the evil
around us. First of all, for those we know that are personally caught up in
known sin, let us start praying for them to be redeemed from whatever has them
bound that they might be freed to live in the light of God’s salvation and
favor. If enough Christians did this on an individual basis for the people they
each knew, the kingdom of heaven would expand exponentially by leaps and
bounds, impacting communities, cities, states, and, ultimately, the nation for
the cause of Christ. Hordes of folks once enslaved to gross sin would be
cleansed and made new in Jesus (I Cor. 6:9-11). Secondly, as difficult as it
may be to do sometimes, pray for our leaders. We are commanded in Scripture to
do so for the benefit and freedom of the Church as a whole (I Tim. 2:1-2). Pray
specifically that all who are in authority in our nation would either come to know
Christ as Lord and Savior, if they haven’t already, or, if they have, uphold
God’s Word in the decisions they make as leaders of our country. Pray also that
if they are in full rebellion against the Lord and refuse His Spirit and His
wisdom that they be removed from office and replaced by those who would best
serve His interests for the benefit of His people and the nation.
Let us not fall prey to “giving up the ship”
by pinning our hopes on an action that lies beyond our grasp of timing and
control. Let us instead be proactive in showing the world that we will not be
overwhelmed by evil, but, rather “overcome evil with good” (Rom. 12:21) and
prayer.
