Imprecatory Psalms?

 

If there’s one part of the Bible that makes most evangelical
Christians uncomfortable its the imprecatory psalms in the book of
Psalms. To imprecate means to invoke judgment, calamity, or curses on
ones enemy. And sometimes the language can be really stark. An
example of this is Ps. 69:24, “Pour out your wrath on them; let
your fierce anger overtake them.” Wow, that seems pretty harsh for
a God of love!.

This is where we
really need to be careful. A knee-jerk reaction may be to say, “Well,
the God of the Old Testament is just like that, the one we see in the
Gospels is different!” That understanding is Marcionism, which was
a heresy in the early church that has been dealt with. God is the
same, yesterday, today and forever.

So how do we
reconcile or understand this?

One of the issues
that really flattens how we seek to understand Scripture is our
understanding of the spiritual world, and the realities of the
spiritual realm. Most of us don’t know, but many Christians have
imbibed more materialism into our worldviews than we think, even
those in the Charismatic movement. Through Scripture and tradition we
know that there is a lot more going on in the spiritual world than we
give credit for. But when we take that into account, things really
come into focus.

(For an introduction
into the entire area of Biblical studies and theology I highly
recommend Supernatural by
Michael Heiser, and The Lord of Spirits by
Andrew Damick as primers into understanding what goes on in the
spiritual world.)

Once
our spiritual landscape is more fleshed out then we begin to see what
these imprecatory psalms are speaking to. The writer of the Psalms is
not necessarily look to God to strike down his natural enemies (maybe
we can read it that way). They are instead asking for the one true
God to give them victory of the spiritual powers and authorities over
pagan nations that they are facing against.

While
yes God does command the destruction of humans when wickedness is
full (i.e. the flood, the conquest of the Promised Land), there is
always a strong influence of what we can only call demonic activity
that is going on, that has corrupted humanity into doing great evil.
These demonic forces have redirected worship that is due to the true
God, and instead take it for themselves, having the people under them
commit horrid acts.

It
is against these spiritual foes, pagan demonic forces that are coming
against God’s people, seeking to destroy them, or mix them up in
what everyone else is doing.

This
theme continues on through to the New Testament. The Apostle Paul
speaks of our weapons not being natural and physical, but instead
spiritual that can tear down strongholds (2 Cor. 10:4).

So
what does this mean for us today? The people “out there” that we
think are our enemies really aren’t. Those who are not followers of
Christ are not just misguided or lost. They are slaves of demonic
forces that are desiring nothing but the destruction of humanity
because we are image bearers of God. No matter how vile or horrid
they seem, they are ultimately lost and in need of the thing all of
us are in need of. Christ, the savior and King to free them from
death, and their slavery of sin, to become part of His Kingdom and
join the fight in conquering the world with the Gospel.

As
we do that, keeping singing these Psalms, asking Christ to strengthen
you in the fight against the spiritual powers and forces that are
holding those you love captive. And do not fear, love as won! Hell
has been harrowed, and the enemy is in retreat.

Aslan
is on the move.