The world “weighted” down on me last Wednesday. My city council didn’t see the need for people to wear masks in crowded public places. The mayor fixed this within hours, but I was still angry with our city council. I read in the paper, “The virus continues to disproportionately affect African-Americans in [the state.] Blacks make up about 28% of the state population but account for 41% of reported cases and almost 46% of deaths.”
Then, it hit me. This isn’t about public health at all, it’s about race. For some Pollyanna reason, that realization shocked me. It shouldn’t have. Why should I expect the city’s leadership to behave any differently from the way they have behaved throughout the city’s history?
I became angry and wanted to lash out – so I did. I annihilated a Styrofoam coffee cup spilling its contents on my hand. I’m not sure who won that battle. In truth, I smashed the cup alright, but in the process, the coffee inside the cup burned my hand. The minor pain in my hand will go away, but the more significant pain in my heart will not – at least, not for the foreseeable future.
I called a friend and ventilated. His words helped a little, but they did not “cure” me. As we were hanging up, I said, “I’m going to read the Bible and pray. I’m going to tell God just how ‘teed off’ I am” – except that I didn’t say, “teed off.” He responded, “Good idea, but I think He already knows.” So, I did, and so He did.
In the daily devotional, the author invited me to read Psalm 28. In verse 4, King David prays the following prayer.
Do not drag me away with the wicked, with those who do evil,
who speak cordially with their neighbors but harbor malice in their hearts.Repay them for their deeds and for their evil work;
repay them for what their hands have done and bring back on them what they deserve.
Because they have no regard for the deeds of the Lord and what his hands have done, he will tear them down and never build them up again.
As the angel, Clarence, from “It’s a Wonderful Life” says, “Wait a minute. Wait a minute.” Did King David just call down curses on his foes? Is it OK to pray that way? I didn’t know you could do that. So troubled and confused was I, that I started reading commentaries.
Matthew Henry, the great 18th Century Welsh Non-Conformist minister and Bible scholar wrote of Psalm 28:4, “This is not the language of passion or revenge. It is a prophecy that there will certainly come a day when God will punish every man who persists in his evil deed.” Henry’s writing echoed that of the Antiochian scholar and Church Father, Theodoret of Cyprus from the 5th Century. A modern commentator writes
David wants God to punish the wicked. We can learn something about how to respond to living in a nation where the sin of its citizens calls for God’s judgment. David called for the punishment of the sin of the wicked fellow-citizens. Even though we desire to see the salvation of these . . . we can still call on God to punish the unrepentant sinners of our nation. But at the same time, we also do well to beg God to not allow those [faithful ones, presumably including ourselves] to be swept away in the punishment. David achieves a balance in his prayer. . . that we can, and should, emulate.”
Thus, I considered the point settled. I concluded that if I truly were prophesying against an “evil-doer,” it was an acceptable prayer. In a follow-up, I posted that conclusion in a Facebook Group which I started named “Our C5 Prayer Group,” to which I invite you to join.
However, when my wrath cooled, I read Life Together, by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. I received the strong impression that I was presuming on the “prophesy” point. Bonhoeffer stresses the contrary point that we actually are all in this life together, and we should pray for one another.
It’s completely proper to agree with God on the deepest secrets of my heart, to tell Him what I wish about a subject, and to express strong emotion. Nevertheless, perhaps I am presuming on God to prophesy on His behalf. I’m “neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet.”
Perhaps, as my friend, Adam Jones points out, a better model to follow would be Jesus in Gethsemane and upon the cross. If ever anyone had reason to call down “hell-fire” on someone, it was Jesus. Yet, in Gethsemane, He prayed instead, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” Luke 33:42. From the very cross, itself, He prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” Luke 23:34.
I can and should point out evil where it exists, but in prayer . . . I’ll just stick to praying for people, not against them.
In prayerfully mulling over the Covid-19 virus itself, the cause of the “masked fit,” God led me to a Psalm to which I clung when facing surgery some years ago, Psalm 91:3-6.
Surely, he will save you from the fowler’s snare and from the deadly pestilence.
He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday.
As I was praying on these Psalms and on what Godly men had written, God whispered to me,
Don’t worry so much about those in your city and nation whom you brand as ‘sinners’ or ‘evil-doers,’ you can’t change them. Neither should you worry about yourself in these times, bad times will change to good times in My time. Rather, you concern yourself with changing your spiritual city. As C.S. Spurgeon wrote in A Treasury of David, “Seek not to dwell your spirit in the world according to its system, seek instead to dwell in the secret place of the Most High.”
So let it be written, so let it be done.
johnthebaptist15 