Psalm Meditation 880
Third Sunday of Easter
April 30, 2017

Psalm 18 (selected verses)
1 I love you, O LORD, my strength.
2 The LORD is my rock, my fortress, and my deliverer, my God, my rock in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.
3 I call upon the LORD, who is worthy to be praised, so I shall be saved from my enemies.
4 The cords of death encompassed me; the torrents of perdition assailed me;
5 the cords of Sheol entangled me; the snares of death confronted me.
6 In my distress I called upon the LORD; to my God I cried for help. From his temple he heard my voice, and my cry to him reached his ears.
7 Then the earth reeled and rocked; the foundations also of the mountains trembled and quaked, because he was angry.
8 Smoke went up from his nostrils, and devouring fire from his mouth; glowing coals flamed forth from him.
9 He bowed the heavens, and came down; thick darkness was under his feet.
10 He rode on a cherub, and flew; he came swiftly upon the wings of the wind.
11 He made darkness his covering around him, his canopy thick clouds dark with water.
12 Out of the brightness before him there broke through his clouds hailstones and coals of fire.
13 The LORD also thundered in the heavens, and the Most High uttered his voice.
17 He delivered me from my strong enemy, and from those who hated me;
for they were too mighty for me.
37 I pursued my enemies and overtook them; and did not turn back until they were consumed.
38 I struck them down, so that they were not able to rise; they fell under my feet.
39 For you girded me with strength for the battle; you made my assailants sink under me.
40 You made my enemies turn their backs to me, and those who hated me I destroyed.
41 They cried for help, but there was no one to save them; they cried to the LORD, but he did not answer them.
42 I beat them fine, like dust before the wind; I cast them out like the mire of the streets.
43 You delivered me from strife with the peoples; you made me head of the nations; people whom I had not known served me.
44 As soon as they heard of me they obeyed me; foreigners came cringing to me.
45 Foreigners lost heart, and came trembling out of their strongholds.
46 The LORD lives! Blessed be my rock, and exalted be the God of my salvation,
47 the God who gave me vengeance and subdued peoples under me;
48 who delivered me from my enemies; indeed, you exalted me above my adversaries; you delivered me from the violent.
49 For this I will extol you, O LORD, among the nations, and sing praises to your name.
50 Great triumphs he gives to his king, and shows steadfast love to his anointed, to David and his descendants forever.
(NRSV)

Most of us have enemies of some sort. Some have mortal enemies made of flesh and bone. Each meeting will be a confrontation involving blows or bullets and blood. Some have enemies, also made of flesh and bone. These meetings are confrontations of words and ideas, with no hope of agreement. Some have enemies of emotional/spiritual makeup. These would be the habits, afflictions, and addictions that draw energy from us, with or without our permission. Each type of enemy, each individual enemy drains our time and energy in a variety of exhausting ways. One is not more damaging than another even though the wounds may be more visible.

The psalmist encapsulates the psalm with verse 17, “[God] delivered me from my strong enemy, and from those who hated me; for they were too mighty for me.” By calling on and depending on God for deliverance, the psalmist is freed to serve God in righteousness. The psalmist points out, in some of the verses edited out for space, that the rewards God offers are a mirror image of the attributes we bring to the presence of God. “With the loyal you show yourself loyal; with the blameless you show yourself blameless; with the pure you show yourself pure; and with the crooked you show yourself perverse.” (25-26) Because God is so far beyond our comprehension we are able to see in God what we contribute to the relationship. God defeats our enemies, or becomes our enemy, using the characteristics we possess within ourselves in a way that leaves our common enemies powerless.

While many psalms call for the destruction of enemies through death, dismemberment, and disease that is not usually how God works among us. Some enemies are destroyed by robbing them of their power over us, some by coming to a peaceful accord between us, and some through recognition that we were never enemies to begin with. God has power over our enemies as God has power over us. When we turn to God we are better able to see the power of God at work in the lives of our enemies, ourselves, and all of creation.

April 24, 2017
LCM