The Wicked Wicked. Series

Intro:

1.The word “wicked” is used 5 times in Psalm 10, it means “Morally wrong, bad, wicked, guilty, oppressor, apostate. It is an objective fact rather than a subjective phenomenon, point to the attitudes and intentions of people. Raw-shaw connotes turbulence, restlessness, what is disjointed and poorly regulated. People with this characteristic are guilty of violating the social rights of others through oppression, greed, exploitation, murder, dishonesty in business, and twisting justice. It refers to an entire category of people who have done wrong, who are still living in sin, and who intend to continue with it. Even though the inner lives of the sinners are haughty, treacherous, vile, unstable, and polluted, they sometimes come out on top temporarily. However, God will judge them severely.” [Zodhiates]

2. We live in a very wicked world which will soon be united under the Wicked One, who will foolishly oppose God and thus meet his doom, along with all who follow him.

3.The Wicked Wicked.

Trans: Psa. 10

I…FIRST, WE HAVE THE PROTEST. 1

Why do You stand afar off, O LORD? Why do You hide in times of trouble? – sometimes it seems as if God doesn’t care that the wicked are having their way! But God cares!

We have all felt like C S Lewis, who wrote, after his wife was taken by cancer:

“Meanwhile where is God? This is one of the most disquieting symptoms. When you are happy, so happy that you have no sense of needing Him…you will be – or so it feels – welcomed with open arms. But go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain, and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolding and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence. You may as well turn away. The longer you wait, the more emphatic the silence will become.”

This is why we must learn to walk by sheer faith not by shaky feelings. We need to live by what God has said to us in His Word not by what circumstances are screaming in our ears.

Why? It is a question we all have to deal with, but the truth is God rarely explains the why – He simple directs us to Who is working it all out based on His wisdom, love, and power.

“God Rarely Explains: a long quote.

Usually when we are being trained by someone in a skill, such as in athletics or music, our teacher or coach will explain to us the purpose of the particular drills he is putting us through.129 Though these drills may at times be tedious and even painful, we can endure them because we know their purpose and the intended end result. But God never explains to us what He is doing, or why. There is no indication that God ever explained to Job the reasons for all of his terrible sufferings. As readers, we are taken behind the scenes to observe the spiritual warfare between God and Satan, but as far as we can tell from Scripture, God never told Job about that. The fact is, God has not really told us, even in Scripture, why He allowed Satan to so afflict Job as he did. On the basis of the truth of Romans 8:28 (which was just as valid for Job as it is for us), we must conclude that God had a much higher purpose in allowing Satan's onslaughts against Job than merely using Job as a pawn in a "wager" between Himself and Satan. Satan's part in the drama seems to slip into oblivion. He is never again mentioned after his two challenges of God in Job 1-2. The story does not conclude with a conversation between God and Satan in which God claims "victory" over Satan.

Rather, the story concludes with a conversation between God and Job in which Job acknowledges that through his trials he has come into a new and deeper relationship with God. He said, "My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you" (Job 42:5). We may conclude that this deeper relationship was one (but probably not all) of the results God had in mind all along.

Sometimes afterward we can see some of the beneficial results of adversity in our lives, but we seldom can see it during the time of the adversity. Joseph could surely see after he had become prime minister of Egypt some of the results of the affliction God had allowed in his life, but he certainly could not see it while going through it. To him the whole painful process must have seemed devoid of any meaning and very contrary to his130 expectations of the future, as given to him through his dreams.