Psalm Meditation 1240 ¶Palm/Passion Sunday ¶March 24, 2024 ¶Psalm 94 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=psalm+94&version=NRSVUE (NRSVUE) ¶We do like the idea of crushing our enemies, especially, if someone does it for us if we only ask. Whether it be a natural phenomenon, illness and disease, or a person or group we are ready to have God remove this terrible, no good, very bad person or thing out of our lives. We don’t deserve to have the world treat us so badly because we are some of God’s favorite people. Other people probably deserve their suffering, but we are not other people, we are special. ¶Interestingly, every group has at least a few people in it who see themselves as deserving special treatment from some higher power or other. Our God, YHWH, is quick to remind us that being faithful does not make us special in a privileged way, it makes us special as people called to serve others with willing hearts and hands. There are no guarantees that everyone will be grateful and treat us well, only that our service will bring us closer to God in a variety of ways. ¶Like us, the psalmist wants revenge on all those who have picked on friends and family. It is human to want the world to be fair and just almost all the time. The psalm includes a list of all the things that ‘those’ people have done to us along with the prayer that they all be destroyed by God in a frenzy of destruction. God, however, is not one to destroy our enemies by wiping them from the face of the earth. God destroys enemies the same way God calls us to destroy those who stand against us, by working to become friends together. ¶March 18, 2024 ¶LCM