Psalm Meditation 973
Fifth Sunday After Epiphany
February 10, 2019

Psalm 53
1 Fools say in their hearts, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they commit abominable acts; there is no one who does good.
2 God looks down from heaven on humankind to see if there are any who are wise, who seek after God.
3 They have all fallen away, they are all alike perverse; there is no one who does good, no, not one.
4 Have they no knowledge, those evildoers, who eat up my people as they eat bread, and do not call upon God?
5 There they shall be in great terror, in terror such as has not been. For God will scatter the bones of the ungodly; they will be put to shame, for God has rejected them.
6 O that deliverance for Israel would come from Zion! When God restores the fortunes of his people, Jacob will rejoice; Israel will be glad.
(NRSV)

When things are not going well for us it is tempting to believe that the whole world stands against us. It is more than this particular situation, this particular set of adversaries out to get us; everyone and everything is out to get us. If we have been part of a group who has held a majority of power for a long time, we feel threatened when that majority position shows the first signs of shifting away from us. We go from being able to lord it over others to feeling attacked and victimized by all who question our position and authority. We feel justified in being comforted by this psalm.

It is important to consider the possibility that we have been the ones doing the victimizing, that we are the ones who will be in great terror as we bump into the judgment of God. It isn’t, as the psalmist claims, that we have said there is no God, it is that we have concentrated on a definition of God that does damage to the people God values. The people God values are the downtrodden, the oppressed, and the forgotten. God rarely stands with the powerful and influential. God stands with those who cry out for and work for God’s justice.

The psalmist is among those who are oppressed, downtrodden, and forgotten by the rest of the world and voices a legitimate and heartfelt cry for help from God. The difficulty comes when we assume the status of the underdog because someone has questioned our voice of authority. Though we can justify the righteousness of our position, and the feeling of oppression, there is no guarantee that we are correct in our assessment of the situation. God is in our lives leading us to wisdom, righteousness, and justice.

February 4, 2019
LCM