Psalms 10 and 11
Matthew 6:12
Lord’s Days 52 and 1 of the Heidelberg Catechism
September 16, 200`
"Terror and Trust"
Dear Congregation of our Lord, Jesus Christ,
Psalms 10 and 11 seem to go together. Both were apparently written in times of tremendous fear, perhaps war. Some of you remember such times from WW II. The enemy "sits in ambush....in hiding places he murders the innocent." Does that sound familiar? The terrorist attack has been compared to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Pearl Harbor was a sneak attack. This too was a sneak attack, only one step sneakier. The terrorist, the pundits say, is a new kind of enemy. He doesn’t accept responsibility, and declare himself as an enemy. He likes to hide.
He sits in ambush, in hiding places, and murders the innocent.
The result is a real insecurity. If they have their way, the result is, in fact, terror. How do we respond to terrorism? I’m sure you’ve heard this before...in times of danger, there are two instinctive responses. Fight or Flight.
That is the instinctive response. But what’s the right response? That is an important question for us, because Psalm 11 says that the Lord examines us, and his soul hates violence, but he loves justice. So what’s right? Fight or Flight? Both.
But first, we need a paradigm shift. A new perspective. A different way of looking at things! We need to flee and fight. But first, we need a paradigm shift, that is, a different way of looking at things. The world leaders and media are telling us, in effect, that we need to have a paradigm shift with respect to terrorists...we are told that we have to think of opposing them in terms of a war, like the war on drugs. We have been asked to join in a war on terrorism, and to see terrorists as war criminals. That is a paradigm shift. But it is not radical enough. That is, it does not get to the root of the matter.
I couldn’t help notice how, in the midst of terror, all of a sudden, people have a paradigm shift. What was the most common expression of people on the videotapes of the attacks on the world trade centre? It was "Oh My God!"
You have the same kind of abrupt change in Psalm 11. Notice the abrupt change from Psalm 11:3 to 11:4. In verse 3 you have the question "When the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do?" The Psalmist appears not to answer. Instead he suddenly changes the subject. "The Lord is in His Holy temple, the Lord is on his heavenly throne." What does this abrupt change of topics accomplish? It jars us into a paradigm shift, into a completely different way of looking at things...from God’s point of view. It brings us from terror to "Oh My God" ...only reverently, not as an empty blasphemy.
Note well....God’s view is from the pinnacle of holiness. High towers like the former World Trade towers, and the CN tower, from their lofty elevations, offer a different perspective on all below. But it is not high enough for what the Psalmist has in mind. And viewing terrorists as "the enemy that can be anywhere and everywhere" is not radical enough.
The Psalmist is saying "Don’t think you can escape trouble by blindly taking flight." "How can you say, flee like a bird to your mountain? The wicked...shoot from the shadows." You can run, but you can’t hide. The best security measures offer no guarantees!
If you want security, you need a radical paradigm shift. First you need to understand the enemy. Osama bin Laden is not the enemy. Oh, he is an enemy. But he is not "The Enemy." Terrorist organizations make war on us. But they are not "The Enemy." The Bible is clear about this. "We are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness..." (Eph. 6:12) The enemy is Satan and his army.
Have you noticed that once people start acknowledging God in the midst of terror, another word tends to creep into their vocabulary? The word is "evil." The catechism reminds us in Lord’s Day 52 that Jesus taught us to pray "deliver us from evil." The catechism goes on to say that "our sworn enemies, the devil, the world, and our own flesh...never stop attacking us. And so Lord, uphold us and make us strong with the strength of your Holy Spirit so that we may not go down to defeat in this spiritual struggle."
One of the firemen on the scene in New York said, "The world is an evil place." And national leaders keep saying things like "We will overcome this evil."
But I heard a philosopher on the radio take exception to the use of the term evil. No, he did not believe we should call these attacks evil. After all, he said, that immediately Christianizes the discussion...."evil" is a particularly Christian type of expression which he did not accept.
Well, that reminded me of another expression we hear a lot lately too....they say that the success of the sneak attack was an intelligence failure. The gatherers of intelligence failed to detect this sneaky enemy. Well, folks, intelligence will always fail to detect "The Enemy." The Bible tells us not to lean on our own understanding, but to look to the Lord and His word. Evil is real. To deny it is a failure of intelligence.
Terrorism is a manifestation of an evil spirit, the devil. He is the soul of terror, if you will. He is the enemy that lurks in the soul of every wicked person. Listen to Ps. 10:7-11: "His mouth is filled with cursing and deceit and oppression; under his tongue are mischief and iniquity...he lurks in secret like a lion in his covert." Sounds like old slew foot, doesn’t it, who prowls about like a lion seeking whom he will devour?
Now that you know the enemy, you may hide. Now you may flee! Because now you know where to hide. Now you know where the enemy is not to be found.
Where do we flee? Ps. 11:1 says, "In the Lord I take refuge." We are safe in him, because he is holy, and holiness is the opposite of evil.
And notice that the opposite of terror is trust. You flee from the devil. You flee to the Lord, who is our refuge. He is that safe place where evil cannot come.
Now that too is a paradigm shift all of us need to make. Our human nature wants to rely on what we can see and hear and touch and understand for our security. We understand the security of airport X-ray inspections. We understand the security of buildings. It was boasted that the towers of the World Trade Centre were indestructible...like the Titanic. We understand the security of weapons. We understand the security of money. What we so often forget is just how fragile these securities really are. The events of September 11 reminded us.
"If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?" As I said, earlier, the Psalmist seems not to answer this question. But in fact he has already answered it. If the foundations of our security are destroyed, what can the righteous do? Why, of course, he/she can take refuge in the Lord.
Human nature does not easily grasp eternal security. It requires the paradigm shift of faith, of trust in the Lord. "The wicked boasts of the desires of his heart, and man greedy for gain curses and renounces God." (RSV) "In his pride the wicked does not seek him. In all his thoughts there is no room for God." Over against this, the Psalmist says, "The fool says in his heart, ’There is no God.’ The LORD looks down from heaven on the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God." (Ps. 14:1-2) The failure to find security in God is a massive, massive intelligence failure.
Proverbs 3:4 says "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding." When we take refuge in God, whom we trust, we have an unshakable security. "He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. He will say of the LORD, "He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust." (Ps. 91:1,2,5) Our scripture says, "The Lord is King forever....so that man who is of the earth may strike terror no more." Nor do we fear the Prince of Darkness, the evil one. As Luther put it, "The prince of darkness grim, we tremble not for him. His rage we can endure, for lo, his doom is sure."
And now we can fight. Now we have a secure place to fight from. But remember, things look different when you see things from the perspective of God’s holy throne in heaven. The real enemy is the evil one. And the real target is evil. The devil is the ultimate terrorist. He is anywhere and everywhere, except near to the heart of God. At any time he can launch a sneak attack, and we will find no security unless we abide in God.
According to the Bible and the Catechism, we too must fight the world. Not like terrorists, though. We understand "the world" differently. We must fight wordly ways.
We must fight cheap grace. We might fight against the wordly mindset that says, "God has forgotten, he covers his face and never sees. . . He won’t call me to account." We need to fight for a paradigm shift that reminds us people are accountable for their wrongdoing. "The Lord is righteous, he loves justice." (NIV) God loves justice. And so should we. It is the task of government to do justice and to restrain evil. Indeed, we should pray that terrorists be brought to justice. And that wrongdoers of any kind be called to account.
We must fight unbelief. We must fight the wordly idea that God will not hold us accountable for our beliefs. We must fight the idea that God will not hold us accountable for how we have responded to the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ. Not all beliefs are equally good. If you have the belief system of an Osama bin Laden, the result is terror. We must fight for a paradigm shift. The weapons of choice in this war are truth and the gospel of peace through our Lord Jesus Christ. Let us seek not for weapons of mass destruction, but for weapons of mass conversion.
And let us seek weapons of mass repentance. We must fight hate, lest we become the evil we deplore. First, it is not our job, and not even the job of the state, to get even. It is God’s business to exact vengeance. "On the wicked he will rain fiery coals and burning sulphur; a scorching wind will be their lot." Vengeance is mine, says the Lord. I will repay. Payback time is in God’s hands.
We need to temper justice with mercy, so that we do not sow to the winds of hatred and reap the whirlwind of violence. One of our hymns prays, "Lead on O King eternal, the day of march has come." But "not with swords loud clashing, or roll of stirring drums. With deeds of love and mercy the heavenly kingdom comes."
And we must fight sin in ourselves. To pray "deliver us from evil," says the catechism and scripture, is to fight against our own flesh too. We must put our old natures, our own sinful habits to death.
Terrorists attack and destroy countless lives. And if you ask them, they would tell you that given a chance, they would do it again. They are convinced that they are right. They think they were right to attack the U.S. and the world community represented by the World Trade Center. But how innocent are we, really, in our so-called "civilized world." How many thousands and thousands of defenseless babies have we civilized people aborted? Our nations also have murdered in secret places. And if you ask them, most aborters would tell you that they would do it again! They are convinced they are right.
Let’s not just point fingers abroad. And let’s not just point fingers at others. How many things, I wonder, have you or I done that we are absolutely convinced were right? But for all our self-righteousness, how many of the things we do are nevertheless, in God’s eyes, just plain wrong, perhaps even evil?
And this is where things get tricky. Because there is "None righteous, no not one." To say that we are to fight evil is to say that we must also declare war with the sin and doubt in our own hearts. Let us implode ourselves, and humble ourselves in the ashes of repentance.
The attack on the Pentagon is especially demoralizing when we lose God’s perspective, because it strikes at a symbol of a security the mind can grasp....the security of power. The destruction of the twin towers of the World Trade Center is demoralizing because it strikes at a symbol of security we can put our hands on...money. We even refer to "securities" and "financial security." The attack on the architectural feats called the twin towers is demoralizing because it strikes at a symbol of a security we have built for ourselves. We in the Western world are builders. And we should understand well that these are not just symbols of the aspirations of the U.S. They are our aspirations here in Canada too. The buildings were the WORLD trade center. One TV commentator observed that they were the cathedrals of capitalism. He observed that just as the churches dominated the skylines of medieval cities, monuments to human industry dominate the skylines of modern cities.
Dare I raise the question? Were the towers were also reminiscent of the tower of Babel? What if the Twin Towers are also symbols of our greed? Then we ourselves are the wicked spoken of in Psalms. "The man greedy for gain curses and renounces the Lord......He thinks in his heart, ’I shall not be moved; throughout all generations I shall not meet adversity." (Psalm 10:3,6)
If that kind of sin is also found in our own hearts, who then can stand before the face of the Lord? We need a paradigm shift from feats of accomplishment to understanding that we are accepted by God only because he graciously forgives us for our sins. This is the most important paradigm shift of all. It is the great paradigm shift at the heart of reformation. We abandon the idea that we are somehow more deserving of God’s blessings than others, and embrace the truth that we receive God’s blessing only because we have been forgiven much. That is what the cross of Jesus is all about. He came, not to pat us on the head and say, "You are such wonderful people God can’t wait to have you join him in paradise." He came to die on the cross for our sins. We have the hope of eternal life, not because we have earned our place in the hall of holy fame, but because we have received grace, amazing grace, as a gift of God. We need to fight the idea of self-reliance, and instead lean on the everlasting arms of Jesus.
And then, we must prepare to flee. We must get ready to evacuate. We need to make a paradigm shift from time to eternity. We must seek, not temporary security, but eternal security. When we put our trust in Jesus, we can survive even terrorist attacks that vaporize our bodies. Security? You want security? You won’t find it on this planet! The first question of the catechism is, "What is your only comfort, (your only security) in life and in death?" It is that "We are not our own, but belong, body and soul, in life and in death, to our faithful saviour, Jesus Christ." There is no other security system that will keep you eternally! The whole creation, the Bible says, is going up in fire and smoke. "The day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare. Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives, as you look forward to the day of the Lord, and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. But in keeping with his promises, we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth...." (II Peter 3:10-13) And on that great and terrible day, Jesus will come like a mighty fireman, and he will carry all who believe to eternal safety. And we will be raised in glory, and there will be a new heaven and a new earth. All things will be made new, also our hearts, so that "man, who is of the earth, may terrify no more."
Amen! Pastor Joe Veltman
