How Do We Apply the Psalms about Killing Enemies?
When we read of the incessant desire of the Psalmist’s adversaries, we should think of our own constant temptation to Sin. We should read these poems of war as our poems of war. We should be encouraged not just to sit through hard times but to fight against the world, the flesh, and the devil with our only weapon—the sword of the Spirit.
John Calvin called the Psalms the heart of the Bible—not only do they occur toward the middle of our Bibles, but they express the heartbeat of Christianity. Pain, grief, joy, and the desire for victory over enemies are Christian emotions infallibly set down in God’s Word. That last emotion, however, is one that many Christians struggle to apply from the book of Psalms. The enemies (oyiev), foes (tsar), and adversaries (shoreir) of Israel litter the Psalms over a hundred times. What are we, as 21st-century (American) Christians, supposed to do with that? I don’t have any enemies who “trample my life to the ground” (Ps 7:6). I can’t say “my deadly enemies … surround me” (Ps 17:9). Do these Psalms only apply to persecuted Israelites but not Christians?
No, they apply to all Christians. Every believer in Christ is in a struggle more significant than mortal life. We are in the battle of eternal life (Eph 6:12). We must fight against “the schemes of the devil” (Eph 6:11) because he “prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Pet 5:8). We have an adversary who is more powerful and who seeks to do more damage than all the nations the Psalmist wrote about. The Amorites, Babylonians, and Egyptians are nothing compared to the schemes of the devil. They can take lives, but the devil wants your soul.
Throughout history, Christians have understood themselves to be in a three-part war. They have seen themselves in a fight against the world, the flesh, and the devil. If we apply the Psalms to that fight, we see that, indeed, they do apply to our battle against worldly powers. That is the context of most of the Psalms. But, we must consider the reason the Israelites were in that earthly fight. It was not for gold or glory or national gain. The fight was always theological. God commanded the Israelites to fight because He knew that if they lost and the nations ruled over them, they would forsake Him. The physical fight was always just the servant to the spiritual battle.
Related Posts:
You Might also like
-
The Curse Under Our Breath
Paul describes the luminary life of trusting saints; a life that shines in a dark and thankless world (Romans 1:21). Blamelessness, innocence, proving ourselves to be children of God—all by a supernatural life of worship instead of bleating.
At first, it seems a little thing,A want unmet, a prayer unwinged.Voiceless, it interrogates the King,When sounded, Lucifer sings.
Grumbling.
If you do not stand at the gate armed with sword and spear, if you keep down the drawbridge and fail to post men on the watchtower, gurgles and grunts will occupy your heart. Self-love and unbelief have a fruitful marriage, multiplying little moans and murmurs as rabbits in the forest or as crabgrass in the front lawn.
What is in a grumble? The sound, unheard in heaven, is the heart shaking its head, rolling its eyes, cursing under its breath. It is the seemingly harmless exhale of several respectable sins—ingratitude, thanklessness, discontent. It’s a controlled rage, an itchy contempt, the muffled echo of Satan’s dismay. A broken tune. It can be voiced in a sigh or strangle a praise. It is the cough of a sick heart.
We overhear these pitiful pleas all over the New Testament. The volume turns up with the crowds and soon-to-be apostate disciples of John 6, and in episodes with the envious scribes and Pharisees. Yet New Testament authors often bend the ear backward to hear the mumblings of an ancient people. None better expose the horror of this muffled mutiny than ancient Israel.
The apostle Paul writes,
We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer. Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come.(1 Corinthians 10:9–11)
God’s Spirit records Israel’s history in the wilderness to teach us about this too-easily-committed and too-easily-overlooked sin of grumbling.
Lessons from the Mumblers
If we had to venture a guess as to who the first grumblers mentioned in Scripture would be, could any man or angel have suspected it to be God’s own people, and that right after their wondrous redemption from Egypt?
Ten plagues have fallen on Pharoah’s defiance. His army and chariots now lie at the bottom of the sea, a calm settles upon the water’s surface—Israel is free. Uproar sounds in the heavens, and praise to God extends to earth. Music sheets are passed around beside the Red Sea, they begin,
I will sing to [Yahweh] for he has triumphed gloriously;the horse and his rider he has thrown into the sea.(Exodus 15:1)
Who could have guessed that these same tongues would rot into a chorus of murmurs by the end of the same chapter? Satan’s song intrudes. Lucifer’s lyrics, once sung, get stuck in their heads. Trial after trial—needing water, then food, then water again—leads to more and more muttering. Consider, then, just a few lessons from the all too familiar sounds of Exodus 15–16.
God deprives us to see what’s inside us.
God led Israel around the Philistines, in front of the Red Sea to bait Pharoah, and through the Red Sea, and now to the wilderness of Shur. Millions marched waterless. One day turned to two turned to three. Finally, in the distance, water. They bend down to drink—yuck. Dying of thirst, they spit out the sour beverage. They named the place “Marah,” meaning bitterness (Exodus 15:22–23). We finally find water and it is undrinkable? Is this where trusting the Lord gets you? For the first time in the Hebrew Bible we read, “And the people grumbled against Moses, saying, ‘What shall we drink?’” (Exodus 15:24).
And then, as he did with the water, so God did with their stomachs: “he tested them” (verse 25). He “let them hunger” and led the people to depend upon him that whole forty years to see what was in their hearts (Deuteronomy 8:2–3). And he found Marah in his people—out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth sighs. When you find yourself kneeling by the bitter waters of God’s providence, what does God hear from you? Cries to your heavenly Father for help and mercy, or grunts against an unreliable god?
Read MoreRelated Posts:
-
Job and the Deadly Spiritual Equation
Jesus dealt Satan a deadly blow. The devil is mortally wounded, though even more deadly in his desperation. But he can do nothing (please hear this!) to disrupt the equation. He can’t press us with fear of punishment; Jesus took that on. He can’t shame us with a poor self-image; we are the image of Christ now. He can’t drive us mad with death-threats; Jesus destroyed the power of death. Satan has a front row seat every time the redemption equation is written on a human heart. And he can’t do a single thing about it.
Job is one of my favorite books of the Bible. That usually catches people by surprise. Why would a book about a holy man falling prey to Satanic torment be something you want to read? Despite the initial fear the book induces, it’s extremely comforting and relevant for our understanding of trauma and suffering. Job shows that the worst still leads to the best. And of the many ways in which the book is still relevant, there’s one that stands out to me because of how prevalent it is in our times. It’s what I call “the deadly spiritual equation.”
The Deadly Spiritual Equation
The deadly spiritual equation won’t sound so deadly, but if you follow through to the end of the article, you’ll see why it is. The equation has two sides, depicted below.Doesn’t look so bad, does it? On one side, of course, Scripture teaches that moral living aligns with God’s commandments and character. And God loves to bless those who follow his commands. On the other side, immoral living never ultimately goes unpunished. God is just. So, on the surface, this deadly spiritual equation seems biblical. What’s the problem?
The problem is twofold: (1) the complexity of God’s providence goes well beyond us and includes our spiritual nemesis, and (2) what happens when suffering comes to the upright? The latter, of course, is what the book of Job is all about. God himself tells Satan and the heavenly hosts that Job is upright. According to the deadly spiritual equation, Job should only receive God’s providential blessing. And yet the whole book is about how Job doesn’t receive that. He receives torment at the hands of Satan; he receives what looks a lot like punishment to the rest of the world, even to his friends.
Job’s friends maintain the deadly spiritual equation with vigor. Job must have sinned. He must be wicked, because that’s how the spiritual equation works. God’s punishment (the horrendous suffering of Job) must be the result of immoral living. As readers of the book, we have an insider’s perspective. We know that Job is not being punished. We know that he’s righteous, by God’s own declaration. What are Job’s friends missing? And why is this spiritual equation “deadly”?
The Missing Elements
There are two things Job’s friends are, the same things missing from the spiritual equation: the presence of Satan and the underlying purpose of suffering in God’s world. Both of these elements are brought to the fore by Jesus Christ.
Isn’t it odd how Satan only appears at the beginning of the book of Job? He destroys Job’s life, drags his head down to the dust, and then he’s gone. This isn’t arbitrary (nothing in Scripture is). Why is Satan absent from the rest of the book? Why is he absent from all of the discussion among Job and his friends? Answer: the deadly spiritual equation. It has no place for Satan, for the personified presence of evil. Satan is not in the equation. And that’s a huge problem, since we know that Satan is the one responsible for all of Job’s torment! The cause of Job’s suffering, plain as day to readers, is not even on Job’s radar. Neither is it on his friends’. For all of them, the deadly spiritual equation is just that: deadly. It’s sucking the life out of them, out of their relationships.
Read More -
Tension in Our Polity: A History of the Assistant Pastor
In all the debates that took place on this topic, it does not appear that any of the polity tensions with BCO 17-2 inherent in the office of Assistant Pastor identified by the Ad Interim Committee were ever resolved. If we are to be a denomination who are Reformed and “always reforming,” perhaps it would be healthy for us to continue to wrestle with this initial question that earlier generations raised: is it truly congruent with our polity for a man to serve as pastor of a congregation in all the above-mentioned ways if that congregation has no opportunity to vote on him? Why should the PCA revisit this question?
Is it possible that the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) has had, since its inception, provisions in its Book of Church Order (BCO) which violate its own Preliminary Principle (#6) regarding the rights of congregations to consent to those who serve as their pastors? I suspect that most members and officers in the PCA do not know that early on in the history of the denomination, a study committee that at one time included such men as R.C. Sproul, Don Clements, J. Ligon Duncan Jr., Kennedy Smartt, Michael Schneider, Morton Smith, and others, recommended that the PCA remove this element from the BCO, and the committee made this same recommendation year after year from 1974 to 1979. That element in question: the position of Assistant Pastor, which the committee insisted could not be squared with the fundamental tenets of Presbyterianism.There is a longstanding principle in Presbyterian polity that says, in essence, that no one may be placed over a church without the consent of a congregation. This principle applies to elders, to deacons, and even to pastors. The 1898 version of the BCO puts it this way:“Since the government of the Church is representative, the right of the election of their officers by God’s people, either immediately by their own suffrages, or mediately through church courts composed of their chosen representatives, is indefeasible. Nor can any man be placed over a church, in any office, without the election, or at least the consent of that church.”F.P. Ramsay, that great commentator on the BCO put it this way at the time:
“The sole authority is Christ, and from this point of view the Church is a monarchy. But he administers the government solely by his Spirit working in all his people, and from this point of view the government is representative; for if the Holy Spirit calls any man to an office, he also calls the people to elect him thereto.”[1]
James Bannerman, in his 1868 book The Church of Christ, points out that a minister’s ordination does not depend upon the consent of the local church, but on his calling by God, and its recognition by the presbytery. However, his becoming pastor of a particular church does require their consent:
That pastoral relation necessarily implies the election, or at least the consent, of the people, in order to make the formation of the tie lawful; and this element therefore enters as an essential one into the title to the pastoral office. In addition to the joint call by Christ and the Church, which is necessary to give a right to the exercise of the ministerial office, there is also the consent or election by the people, which is necessary to constitute, over and above the ministerial, the pastoral character. The pastor cannot properly discharge the duties of the pastoral office without the consent of the people over whom he is appointed.[2]
The modern version of the PCA BCO calls the right of congregations to vote on those placed over them “inalienable,” making the congregation’s vote, in other words, an essential element in the call of Christ to a particular work in a particular church. Presbyterians have fought and died for the right of congregations to only be ruled by those they consent to. And yet there is a curiosity in the polity of the PCA when it comes to the above principle and the office of Assistant Pastor. The office of Assistant Pastor is enumerated in the PCA BCO, chapter 22-3, which says the following (as of 2023):
An assistant pastor is called by the Session, by the permission and approval of Presbytery, under the provisions of BCO 20-1 and 13-2, with Presbytery membership being governed by the same provisions that apply to pastors. He is not a member of the Session, but may be appointed on special occasions to moderate the Session under the provisions of BCO 12-4.
The PCA is in the notable minority when it comes to Reformed Churches on this subject. Just a sampling of Reformed denominations shows this to be the case:The PCUSA ceased allowing anyone to serve as “Assistant Pastor” after 1984.
The URCNA has no office of “Assistant Pastor.”
The OPC has no office of “Assistant Pastor.”
The Presbyterian Reformed Church has no office of “Assistant Pastor.”
The ARP has no office of “Assistant Pastor.”
The RPCNA has no office of “Assistant Pastor.”
The EPCEW has no office of “Assistant Pastor.”
The RCA has an office of “Assistant Minister.” “An ordained minister serving a congregation under contract and providing assistance for its installed minister. The assistant minister may be commissioned by the classis as a minister under contract, but shall not be ipso facto a member of the church or the consistory.” (1.I.2.8; see also generally 1.II.7.9)”
The EPC has an office of “Assistant Pastor” who is called by the session. However, the Assistant Pastor is called for a definite period of time that is renewable. The call may be terminated prior to that time (if the presbytery agrees). (EPC BCO 10-6)
ECO has what it calls “Assistant Pastors.” However, they have a provision that allows the Assistant a vote on session if the congregation votes to allow it (see 2.04c of the ECO BCO).The truth is, many of us in the PCA may today take for granted the office of Assistant Pastor. “Of course,” we think, “there can be a type of pastor in the church that is chosen by sessions but that the congregation doesn’t vote for or consent to.”However, in studying the history of this position in the PCA one cannot help but be provoked to the same question that the early generations within our denomination wrestled with: “Is it really consistent with our polity for a session to place someone as pastor over a church that the congregation has no vote on?”To pose this question, it is worth considering where this section of the BCO and the office of Assistant Pastor originated in the first place. The PCUS (from which the PCA was birthed) had no office of Assistant Pastor in its 1933 BCO. The 1933 version of the BCO formed the template from which the PCA’s own BCO would be formed in 1973. Where, then, did the office of Assistant Pastor even come from?There has always been a need in the church for men to be eased into the work and responsibilities of ministry, of course. The Scottish Presbyterian tradition formerly had a practice of what they called “Probationers.” These were men who assisted the pastor and were given more responsibility than the average congregant. During this time, men are given opportunities to develop their gifts and to demonstrate their giftings in a congregational setting. They were permitted to read Scripture and preach in worship services. They were men who were in training to become ministers, and of course they served with the approval of the session, but not with a call from the congregation.Sometime between 1933 and 1973, the PCUS did introduce a provision for “Assistant Pastors,” making this a present and live reality when the time to form the new denomination had arrived. At this time, internship requirements did not exist as we have in our current BCO (those didn’t come into existence until the PCA’s Joining & Receiving (J&R) with the RPCES, which did have internships, in 1982). Until that time, men served as Assistant Pastors during their probationary period. A bit of a stigma was attached to a man if he served as an Assistant Pastor for longer than a year. Essentially, where the PCA has interns today, Assistant Pastors existed. Kennedy Smartt, in his book I Am Reminded, makes an observation during the 1970s that “more and more the roles of assistant pastor and youth minister were filled by seminary interns.”[3]The obvious advantage of the office of Assistant Pastor is that it allowed sessions of churches to add and remove pastors without the drama and trauma of a congregational vote. However, in the context of the liberalizing PCUS, the Assistant Pastorate sometimes served a more troubling function. In some cases the position of “assistant pastors” was used as a loophole allowing the introduction of female ministers into churches whose congregations might otherwise have opposed them if put to a vote.The first version of the BCO of the National Presbyterian Church (name later changed to PCA) was adopted in 1973. Though it was based on the 1933 PCUS BCO, it contained one reference to the “Assistant Pastor” which is to be “called by the session,” but “is not a member of the session” (13-5, 1973 edition). It appears that some churches coming into the newly formed PCA had Assistant Pastors already, and so the provision which included them had to be added in to account for their existence.In 1974 at the 2nd General Assembly, the barebones first draft of the PCA BCO adopted in 1973 underwent a series of drastic amendments. In the course of these amendments, the Assistant Pastorate in 13-5 was deleted and chapter 22 was created, which included provisions for the office of Assistant Pastor. From that point forward, it was not to be changed fundamentally from this form.Also at the 2nd General Assembly in 1974, an Ad Interim Committee to Study the Number of Officers of the Church was formed. The Ad Interim Committee at that point included TEs Don Clements, A. Michael Schneider II, and Kennedy Smartt. It also included REs William Borden, Murdock Campbell, and Thurston Futch. They were assigned the topic of the number of officers of the church (Are the offices “elder” and “deacon”? Or are they “teaching elder,” “ruling elder,” and “deacon”?). The committee was also “instructed to include the study of the office of assistant minister in its assignment” (2-70). Kennedy Smart offers his own self-effacing commentary on this development:“I was asked to serve as the Chairman and I was happy about that because I could hide my ignorance behind my presiding. Actually, Don Clements did most of the work. Don loves that sort of thing and he was a natural for it. We gathered a lot of material, did a lot of study and musing, and thanks primarily to Don, had our report ready by the next assembly.”[4]At the PCA’s 3rd General Assembly in 1975 Kennedy Smartt presented the report of the Ad Interim Committee. Included in the lengthy report from the Ad Interim Committee was its significant recommendation regarding the question of Associate Pastors.
Read More
Related Posts: