PSALM 44
Commentary by Brian Huggett
To the chief Musician for the sons of Korah,
Maschil.
It is maschil – maskiyl an instructive
or educational poem. This would
suggest the words were not to be overridden or given second place to the
music. It is therefore to be accepted as
important doctrine to the Jews and to all students of the Bible
In studying this psalm and attempting to
place it in some historical time frame, the following paragraph was found in
Alfred Barnes’ notes. Because of its
clarity and adherence to historical reality his comments have been included
verbatim.
“Perhaps it will be found, on an examination of
the psalm, that all the circumstances accord better with the time of Josiah,
and especially the close of his reign 2Kings 23:26-30; 2Chronicles 35:20-27 and
the commencement of the reign following 2Kings 23:31-37; 2Kings 24:1, than with
any other period of the history of the Hebrew people.
This was the beginning of the calamities that came
upon the nation in the period immediately preceding the Babylonian captivity;
it was a time when the nation was free, as far as the efforts of a pious king
could accomplish it, from prevailing idolatry; and yet it was a time when that
series of disasters commenced which resulted in the entire removal of the
nation to Babylon.
There is not the slightest internal evidence that
the psalm has reference to the times of the Maccabees; there were no historical
facts in the time of David to which it can be easily applied; but all the
circumstances in the psalm would find a fulfilment in the events which just
preceded the Babylonian captivity, and in the series of national disasters
which commenced with the defeat and death of Josiah.”
Psalm 44:1
“We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers have told us, [what] work thou didst in their days, in the times of
old.”
To ‘hear with the ears’ speaks of oral tradition
yet the word translated told – saphar, seems to have as its basic
meaning to score, to mark, to write down, and this would
refer to the Scriptures; those books extant at the time – the writings of Moses
etc. To hear with the ears then is
probably to be taught the Scriptures, as we today are taught the Scriptures by
those God has ordained to do so (Ephesians 4:11).
Through the ministry of the priesthood the people
of Israel were taught the word of God.
In Nehemiah chapter 8 we have an example of it occurring (Nehemiah
8:6-9). Verse 8 of this passage from
Nehemiah is the classic method of sound Bible teaching: “So they (the
teachers) read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense,
and caused [the people] to understand the reading”.
Closer to our own time, there is story of a little
boy being taken to hear the greatest preacher of his day. After the message and as he and his family
were leaving, his father asked him what he thought of Charles Spurgeon’s
message; the little boy said, “Yes it was good but all he did was read from the
Bible and tell us what it meant”.
This method is the only worthwhile method for two
reasons; 1. God’s word is truth, and 2. Truth needs only to be expressed
clearly and coherently. Untruths are
ambiguous and must be manipulated; they can be presented in a hundred different
ways without repetition, whilst truth need only be spoken once.
What the Psalmist had in mind was the work God had
done for the people of Israel in the past.
It was the recorded history of God’s dealings with the children of
Israel. Such a history is conducive to
faith for it is proof of God’s grace and mercy to those who are his, and if he
has been gracious and merciful in the past we can have every confidence he will
be so in the here and now and in the future.
These ‘works of God’ are enumerated in the
following verses.
Psalm 44:2
“[How] thou
didst drive out the heathen with thy hand, and plantedst them; [how] thou didst afflict the people, and cast them
out.”
The ‘writings’ the Psalmist refers to obviously
includes Joshua, for that book covers the conquest of Canaan. Drive out – yarash means to
occupy by driving out previous tenants and possessing in their
place. The words plantedst them,
referring to the Israelites, accentuates the meaning of yarash. God planted the Jewish people onto the land
from which he drove out the Canaanites.
When we read the Biblical account it is clear the
Israelites were instruments in the hand of God and not the instigators of the
invasion, and its success was due only to God’s mighty works.
Afflict the people is a parallelism to drive out the
heathen, and therefore refers to the Canaanites
Drive out - yarash – to seize, to impoverish, is
paralleled by the word afflict – raa to spoil, to make good
for nothing, and therefore, in the spirit of Hebrew poetic parallelism, one
would expect the final phrase, cast out – shalach, to
be a parallelism also; but in what way?
Shalach has the
primary meaning to send away and at face value one could suppose it to
be the Canaanites that are not only being afflicted, but also being cast
out. However shalach can also
mean the sending out of shoots or branches by a tree or vine as in Psalm 80:11;
Jeremiah 17:8; Ezekiel 17:6-7, and in keeping with Hebrew poetic parallelism,
the use here could mean the establishing of Israel throughout the land. Because parallelism is found in this verse
the casting out is almost certainly meant as a spreading out, the
establishment of Israel in the land.
To paraphrase this verse then would be, “They tell
of how you did expel the Canaanites and replace them with your people; how you
spoiled the Canaanites and established our fathers in their stead.”
Psalm 44:3
“For they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did
their own arm save them: but thy right hand, and thine arm, and the light of
thy countenance, because thou hadst a favour unto them.”
In vs.2 the word yarash was used in the
sense of dispossess, here it is used in the sense of occupation. The fathers did not gain occupation of the
land by the power of the sword, which of course is an idiom meaning armed
force.
It does not take a great deal of strength to pull
a trigger of a gun, or push a button or flick a switch of some missile system,
but a sword is only as effective as the strength of the arm which wields it,
and Scripture is telling us here that taking possession of Canaan required more
than human strength.
The tearing down of the
walls of Jericho was evidence of Gods power and precision and is depicted by the
Psalmists use of ‘thine arm’ and ‘right hand’.
This was a physical manifestation of God’s presence with his
people. The ‘light of thy countenance’
speaks of illumination and of God as its source; it refers to spiritual
enlightenment. Because God is true and
merciful and kind, his illumination will be true and worthwhile, and will have
well defined and attainable goals. The
ungodly may have goals but do not have assurance that those goals will be
reached; in their darkness they live in a constant state of wishful thinking
Israel
had many fighting men, yet without courage, without purpose or will to fulfil
that purpose they could never have entered into the Promised Land. It is God who gives such a vision, it is
God’s vision that inspires men to achieve, and it is God working behind the
scenes of history that allow his people to fulfil his vision. The Exodus generation died in the wilderness
because they had no vision; their children entered in because they believed and
trusted God and he went before them, tearing down the defences of Jericho.
If we do not have the light
of God’s countenance shining on us, we are in darkness and will stumble on our
way through life. If we have God’s word
hidden in our hearts we will have the ‘light of his countenance’ giving us a
lamp to our feet and a light to our path (Psalm 119:105), and will also enter
into the Promised Land of his rest (read Hebrews 3:11 to 4:11).
Psalm 44:4-5
“Thou art my King, O God: command deliverances for
Jacob. Through thee will we push down our enemies: through thy name will we
tread them under that rise up against us.”
The literal meaning here is, “Thou art He, my
King, O God” and expresses an awareness of the absolute sovereignty of Elohyim,
the God of the scriptures, i.e. the God of creation (Genesis 1). The Almighty God of creation has so
manifested himself as to bring about unqualified confidence in the Psalmist to
acknowledge him as ‘He, the one who is my King’.
Such confidence cannot be the result of idealism,
and must have the backing of something more than immediate experience; it must
have tried and true historical reality supporting it. The Psalmist had, as do we, a more sure word
of prophecy greater than his own experiences (2 Peter 1:19) for he had in his
mind the historical evidence which he has heard with his ears and which
the fathers had spoken of (vs.1).
Command
deliverances for Jacob would be a request based on
past events with the following statements a reiteration of those events. Push down our enemies is to liken
their efforts to a bull thrusting against an adversary with his horns. Israel’s historic victories against her
enemies had been done only in the power of God and with his direct support, and
this continuing need is acknowledged by the Psalmist in the words ‘through’
or by your power.
Through thy name: this
phrase also has the meaning of by the power of God …the enemies of
Israel will be overcome. Treading underfoot
is not only a defeat, but subjugation; it carries the connotation of humiliation.
Those who ‘rise up’ against God’s people in effect
rise up against God and in this they are without excuse, for God has made his
presence abundantly plain through the testimony of creation. Many deny that we can know God through the
natural world. Jesus said “if you have seen me you have seen the father,
meaning that in his character and his actions you see perfection and therefore
you see God. In the same sense, God’s
eternal power and Godhead, his Divine nature is clearly seen in the things that
are made (Romans 1:20). The incredible
complexity of our universe requires an architect of absolute knowledge and a
builder of absolute power and these absolutes reveal the Divine nature.
It is written that the unbelieving will come and
worship before our feet Revelation 3:9.
In its context this refers to the religious crowd who say they are
Jews/Christians but deny the truth. God
will make this happen as a final subjugation of those who rise (in any way)
against his people. It will be God’s
visible vindication of those who have been obedient to his word, against those
who think they have.
In the case of Israel however, in a day to come
God will place the world under her and she will be the head of the nations
(Deuteronomy 28:1).
Psalm 44:6-7
“For I will not trust in my bow, neither shall my
sword save me. But thou hast saved us
from our enemies, and hast put them to shame that hated us.”
We should never place confidence in our abilities
to accomplish God’s purpose for our lives.
God’s purpose for each of us can be summarised in two great
commandments, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with
all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy
neighbour as thyself” (Luke 10:27).
(All else in life will fall into place if we fulfil these two.)
These commandments are so entwined with
righteousness that it is impossible to fulfil them without true and abiding
morality. To fulfil these commandments
we must have God’s Spirit as a permanent and constant power source within us,
producing those spiritual fruits of love, patience and humility.
Because mankind is subject to the lusts of the
flesh, of the mind, and of pride, our moralities are less than perfect; in fact
our righteousnesses are as filthy rags in God’s sight (Isaiah 64:6),
therefore to fulfil God’s purpose we must be dependant on him alone and accomplish
things in the power of his righteousness.
The bow and the sword speak of worldly methods,
which many use and because they have certain strengths of character and wield
those weapons with great effect they become great men in their particular field
of endeavour, but they always remain slaves to the weaknesses of lust and
pride.
The word save – yasha, means to be liberated,
be saved, be delivered and no amount of self control, of
counselling, no amount of material success can deliver us from those lusts or
produce in us the fruits of inner freedom, the fruits of love, patience and
humility. Psychoanalysis may help to
obscure sin, but it is only God who can forgive us our sins, it is only God who
can deliver us from that burden.
Israel, in her birth as a nation and in her
historical experiences, can be looked upon as a type of the Christian life; she
was redeemed from bondage, baptised in the Red Sea, was given God’s word, was
disciplined for unbelief, and eventually entered into the Promised Land. For the nation, salvation was to be
experienced in the land, freedom was not guaranteed outside of the land;
salvation for Israel in fact, meant national freedom and prosperity. To the Jew, salvation - yasha is
primarily experiential, to be free and safe.
The Psalmist refers to this salvation when he
recalls that God had saved them from their enemies. He sees salvation as national deliverance
from those who are enemies of Israel.
The enemies of Israel are those who hate her. Not only had God delivered Israel from
conquest and suppression, he had turned the tables on Israel’s enemies by
putting them to shame. Shame - bush
means to be put to shame, to be disconcerted, to be taken
aback and has the connotation of humiliation.
There
is a day coming, after that God has purged evil from Israel, that he will yasha
– deliver Israel from her enemies and establish the throne of David over the
whole earth.
Psalm 44:8
“In God we boast all the day long, and praise thy name for ever. Selah.”
The word for boast is halal,
to praise, boast or be boastful and it is the context which dictates whether it
is in a good or bad sense. The good
sense is when we exult in praise of our God: “My soul shall make her boast
in the LORD” (Psalm 34:2). To
praise oneself is to boast, and stems from pride (Psalm 10:3).
The apostle Paul also uses boast in both a good and bad sense, a good
sense in 2Corinthians 7:14 and in the sense of self-righteousness in Ephesians
2:9, Romans 2:17 and Romans 2:23.
This boasting in God is the natural outcome of the previous two
verses. It has not been Israel’s
military might that has given them their freedom but God’s gracious
intervention in their affairs therefore they glory in God and continually
praise his name.
Selah stipulates a suspension or pause in the narrative as the Psalmist now
looks from what has been, to the present.
Psalm 44:9-10
“But thou hast cast off, and put us to shame; and goest not forth with our
armies. Thou makest us to turn back from the enemy: and they which hate us
spoil for themselves.”
The lives of God’s people, whether Jewish or
Christian, are lived in the Devil’s world, and in a body of sin: this
guarantees testing and discipline even to those who have attained a certain
maturity in the knowledge and application of God’s word. God disciplines us for unconfessed sin
and tests us to strengthen our faith.
The Psalmist, in writing for himself and on behalf of the Jewish people
seems to be torn somewhere between the two forms of pressure. He acknowledges the judgements but appears to
be justifying himself and the people.
The words cast off and put to shame are
words of abhorrence. The calamities are
of such magnitude it appears to the Psalmist that God has repudiated his
people, that God has brushed them to one side in utter contempt. It is obvious from the magnitude of these
events that this is national discipline.
If we place this psalm in context with Josiah’s
death and Israel’s subsequent defeat and captivity, it becomes obvious the
nation’s sins have outweighed Josiah’s reforms and once that godly king was
dead the nation went into discipline.
This would show that there had not been national repentance but only an
enforced humility; Josiah had used his kingly office to force reform on the
people.
The nation had not repented and went into battle
in a state of national sin and consequently without God. When we attempt to fight life’s battles in a
state of unconfessed sin, we arrogantly assume we have no sin and believe God
is still on our side. But without
confession we cannot be forgiven nor can we be cleansed (1John 1:9) and we
leave ourselves open to defeat. If it is
prolonged, our lives will end in utter failure.
Although the Psalmist makes much of their
faithfulness, calamities such as defeat in battle do not come upon a guiltless
and repentant people. If we are
experiencing defeat we must take stock, looking at our lives in the light of
God’s word, confessing any known sin and being cleansed from all
unrighteousness which are our unknown sins.
Thou makest us: The
only way it can be said of God that he makes cowards of men, is in relation to
his laws. God’s laws are binding and if
we do not obey them we face inevitable consequences. This applies to moral/spiritual law as well
as natural law and if we choose to neglect good morals we will be prey to
everything immoral, including dishonour, disgrace and humiliation.
By their neglect Israel had become morally weak
and fearful, where men had become afraid for self rather than afraid for their
families and their nation. A morally
strong man who is afraid for his family will fight to the death for their
safety. This generation has become
afraid and has run away from battle and their enemies have plundered the
land.
Psalm 44:11-12
“Thou hast given us like sheep [appointed] for meat; and hast scattered us among the
heathen. Thou sellest thy people for
nought, and dost not increase [thy wealth] by their price.”
Because of their lack of repentance God did not
deliver Israel, therefore the results of their continual sin have fallen upon
them. There are several successive
stages in the discipline of national ungodliness. These are stated in Leviticus chapter 26 and
manifest themselves in ever increasing immorality, decline in social values and
a decrease in national prosperity. If
these warnings are ignored, criminality will run rampant and eventually
internal or external warfare will break out and in the end there will be a
destruction of national sovereignty.
Israel has reached this point and it is an outside
enemy that now conquers them; they are herded like sheep to the slaughter and
driven out of the land as slaves. They
were now a conquered people and although their new owners might think they are
worth something to sell for profit, the Psalmist sees their defeat and
enslavement as though God had given them away; they were not worth
taking to market.
This shows a terrible paucity of faith in Israel
at the time of writing; in fact it would indicate apostasy in Israel,
tantamount to total rejection of godliness (of righteousness and justice). Religion is never acceptable to God, for
religion rejects God’s assessment of mankind (see Romans 1:18-32) and dares to
offer the fruits of its fleshly labour to God as a bribe. God cannot accept human works because they
are imperfect and he would need to lower his standards to accept them; God is
perfect and cannot be anything less than perfect therefore he cannot accept
imperfection from man. Those however who
simply believe and accept God’s salvation, are accepted in the Beloved Saviour
(Ephesians 1:3-7). It is of faith not of
works for there can be no boasting on the part of sinful fallen man.
Psalm 44:13-14
“Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours, a
scorn and a derision to them that are round about us. Thou makest us a byword among the heathen, a
shaking of the head among the people.”
And so it is today. Israel has suffered dispersion from the land
and suffered the scorn and ridicule of the ungodly because she lost her status
as a morally strong, vibrant and free nation - a godly nation. The ultimate expression of this loss was her
rejection of her Messiah, and she has suffered ever since.
In the days of Moses and Joshua as Israel
approached the Promised Land the second time in faith and in the power of God,
and then again in the days of David and Solomon, she might have been hated but
she was not despised. It was only when
she became morally and spiritually bankrupt and lost her strength and her
sovereignty that the world around her scorned her in her claims to being the
people of God.
In Ezekiel 36:17-21 we see this principle being
brought into play. Because of Israel’s
sins (and we Christians are not immune from such blasphemy) they fell from
righteousness into gross sin and the nations round about scoffed at what they
saw as the morality of a lesser god. It
is God who is blasphemed when we openly sin and make our claims to Christianity
a matter of ridicule amongst unbelievers.
It was not for their sakes God had re-gathered
Israel in the past and is in the process of doing so again, but it is because
he has respect for his name and all that his name implies. Sovereignty, Power, Truth and Love are all at
stake, for God has promised Adam a saviour (the seed of the woman), Abraham a
great multitude of descendants, and David an everlasting kingdom. For his names sake God must fulfil those
promises.
These verses should be a fearful warning against
unrepentant sin, apostasy, and blasphemy.
The very thought of God being ridiculed by our actions should cause our
souls to shudder in horror.
Psalm 44:15-16
“My confusion [is] continually before me, and the shame of my face hath covered me, for the
voice of him that reproacheth and blasphemeth; by reason of the enemy and
avenger.”
Israel has suffered national defeat and
dispersion, and the enemy scoffs at her claim to being God’s people. God has made great and wonderful promises to
Israel in regards to the Promised Land and yet here they are being driven from
the land by the enemies of God. It is a
source of boasting and blasphemy on the part of the ungodly and one of
confusion and shame to God’s people; confusion because God has abandoned them
and shame because it is a result of unrepentant national sin.
Up to this point the Psalmist has been speaking on
behalf of the nation but here he refers to his own feelings and the shame he is
suffering because of the national sin and judgement. The Psalmist hears the accusations of the
enemy and knows them to be warranted.
He is a godly man and therefore feels shame for
his people; he shares in it as though it were his own, as in reality it is for
he is one with them, a Jew, one of the children of Israel. Such feelings of reproach and shame in the
individual believer are not however a precursor to national restoration; it
requires faith and righteousness on a larger scale for the preservation of a
nation. If we compare the time of the
Babylonian captivity with God’s destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah where ten
righteous people would have saved the cities (Genesis 18:20-32), it is
indicative of the prevailing unrighteousness that must have saturated Israel at
this time.
(Shame felt by believers who have been caught in
sin is often prompted by the criticism and scorn of the enemy - of antagonistic
unbelievers. When a believer sins and is
treated with disrespect and contempt by those outside the Church it is time to
take stock and to change one’s ways; to repent, to confess and be forgiven and
cleansed.)
This verse is a very powerful description of the
shame that follows sin and the consequent defamation and vilification by those
who reject God and are contemptuous of those who are his. Although there are times when the ungodly
hate without cause, generally they do not hate those who live exemplary
lives. When and if they do hate, it is
well for the believer to be introspective and to examine his/her life.
Unbelievers hold no spiritual authority over
believers, but their voice of condemnation and of disdain must be heeded seeing
that it is to them that our ministry of reconciliation is aimed. Our testimony to the power of God to save is
manifest to the ungodly in his power to cleanse, and if our lives are unclean
we are left with little or no testimony.
Psalm 44:17-19
“All this is come upon us; yet have we not
forgotten thee, neither have we dealt falsely in thy covenant. Our heart is not
turned back, neither have our steps declined from thy way; Though thou hast
sore broken us in the place of dragons, and covered us with the shadow of
death.”
The
claim of faithfulness and constancy in these verses is in stark contrast to the
terrible facts of judgement seen in the vss.9-16 and 19-25. It must be that the Psalmist is either
speaking from a national viewpoint and claiming
righteousness in relation to Josiah’s enforced reforms, or for himself and other god-fearing people - the remnant
If this psalm was written just after Josiah’s
death at the time of the Babylonian assault and written from the perspective of
the people, certain factors must be taken into account. Josiah’s reforms were inherently good and
very necessary for the moral and spiritual wellbeing of the nation, and they
would have been complied with by his subjects but by compulsion and not from
the heart. Because they had been obeying
the King’s reforms the people may have thought they had a legitimate cause for
complaint in that they were now being judged.
But God sees the heart and once Josiah’s influence was removed, judgment
was brought to bear on what, for a long while, had been an ungodly and
hypocritical nation.
It is unlikely the Psalmist would side with the
people against God in such a case; therefore it is more probable that at this
point he is looking at his own situation and the future.
In the doctrine of the REMNANT, we see that there
is always a small group who do not apostatise and do remain faithful to God
even in times of national decline. The
Psalmist would certainly be a part of any remnant, and if he is writing from
this position, his claim to having remained faithful would be true. The remainder of the psalm would also fit in
with such a view.
Verse 19 could be taken as a statement of
faith. ‘We (the remnant) have
remained faithful even though God has sore broken the nation and placed
us all under the shadow (or threat) of death’.
Psalm 44:20-21
“If we have forgotten the name of our God, or
stretched out our hands to a strange god; Shall not God search this out? for he
knoweth the secrets of the heart.”
The Psalmist now gives reason for his
faithfulness; God knows all. This is not
an admission to having fear as his motivation for obedience, although
reverential fear is vital in ones relationship with God, but the psalmist
recognises the futility of hiding things from God, even the secrets – taalummaah hidden things of the heart.
Divine love and grace
excludes terror from the heart of one who knows God, for God knows our frame
that we are but dust (Psalm 103:14) and treats us with lovingkindness (Psalm
40:11, 107:43), with compassion (Psalm 86:15; Matthew 9:36) and understanding
(Psalm 78:38-39), and when this is recognized the believer will respond with
reverential fear for his holiness, and devotion for his all-encompassing love.
The Psalmist is stating
facts: if we forget or have our attention drawn away from God by our desires;
and if we are led away from the things of God to things of this world, to gods
of our own making, “Shall God not search this out?”
It is a fact that if a
man does not accept that he has been made in the image of the Creator God, he
will create a god in his own image. It
is not difficult to see where this will lead, for man is a weak and corruptible
being and a god created in that image must also be weak and corrupted.
On the other hand the
God of creation must be a God of absolutes, an eternally omniscient,
omnipotent, omnipresent Spirit; Spirit because he is above and beyond the
material universe. Mankind may have
knowledge, power and presence in a finite way, but the God of the Bible is
infinite, not a god created in the image of man, but the true God and to be
worshipped by his creation.
The answer to the
Psalmist’s question is obvious: Of
course he will “search
this out” for he knows – yada, he sees the secrets of our
innermost being. There is great comfort
in this for sinners. He knows us better
than we know ourselves yet he still loves and has compassion for us and desires
our salvation (2 Peter 3:9).
Psalm 44:22
“Yea, for thy sake are we killed all the day long; we are counted as sheep
for the slaughter.”
For thy sake: ‘On account of you O God’ we are suffering these
things. In Romans 8:36 the Apostle Paul
quotes this passage and his use should help in understanding the meaning
here. In both cases the focus is on the
suffering of God’s people, and Paul goes on to give the reasons for it.
In the case before us God has brought down
judgement on the nation for its ungodliness, and believers are suffering along
with the nation. Believers who have
loved the world and joined in the general ungodliness will suffer judgement;
this is designed by God to bring about repentance and restoration, both
nationally and individually. Those who
have remained faithful, like the Psalmist, will suffer along with the nation,
but their suffering will be ameliorated by the knowledge that such disaster is
for testing and strengthening.
In Romans 8:28-39, Paul encourages believers to
see God working behind the scenes for their benefit, even in calamitous
situations. God works all things in
concert for the good of those who are his.
He has eternally secured them in the person of the Saviour, but works
all things together in life, to bring about their conformity to the likeness of
his Son, a likeness that is one of peace and stability.
Although we might suffer all the day long, and be
counted as sheep for the slaughter, when we know God’s purpose we are more than
conquerors through him that loved us.
The Psalmist did not have Paul’s insight but does
the next best thing and continues to call upon God for deliverance
Psalm 44:23-24
“Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord? arise, cast [us] not off for ever. Wherefore hidest thou thy face, [and]
forgettest our affliction and our oppression?”
Sleep, hide, forget; the
Psalmist is not ignorant of God’s character therefore these words must be being
used as poetry, used to express the feelings of a heart and mind that sees only
calamity and the destruction of a nation and a way of life. We can sit at our keyboards in the security
of God’s blessings and attempt to place ourselves in such a predicament, trying
to understand the horror of being displaced, but until the physical realities
of such an event were to strike us we can only theorise and hope our faith
would hold firm in such a time.
“Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither
slumber nor sleep” (Psalm 121:4), yet because God
has allowed destruction to come upon them it seems that he does. But God is just and true in all his actions
and it is the responsibility of his people to take stock of their situation and
the part they played in bringing that situation about. We are made in God’s image and that includes
our freedom of choice. We are free to
accept or reject good counsel but will come up against God’s laws (established
for the orderly maintenance of our lives) if we reject his counsel. God does not sleep, but when he applies
pressure to our lives to discipline us we will feel the loss of his presence
until we learn not to knock our heads against his moral and spiritual law.
In
Deuteronomy 32:20 God says he would hide his face from the people because of
their stubborn and faithless ways. This
has become a reality because of a lack of faith and stubborn refusal to look
into the perfect, the sure, the right, and the pure
word of God. The people’s refusal to
heed God’s word has caused the light of the Spirit in their spirit to wane
(compare this with God’s assurances in Psalm 19:7-9; Isaiah 26:2-3; James
1:25), consequently God’s face – paniymI
or presence is no
longer felt.
The word forget - shakach means to be unmindful of, from lack of memory or attention,
but this cannot be applied to God for his knowledge is absolute (complete and
undiminished). Therefore in this
situation God has ignored their plight for his own just and righteous
reasons and it is up to the people to come to terms with the part they have
played in the trials and pressures which have come upon them. The Psalmist, as with every believer, will
have every opportunity to come to grips with his and his nation’s
situation.
Galatians 6:7 can be applied to believers and to
the ungodly for it is an inviolable law; “Be not deceived; God is not mocked:
for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap”. If there are not sufficient numbers of
godly men and women within a nation to act as “salt of the earth” (Matthew
5:13), that nation will decline.
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