“If only you, God, would slay the wicked!
Away from me, you who are bloodthirsty!
They speak of you with evil intent;
your adversaries misuse your name.
Do I not hate those who hate you, Lord,
and abhor those who are in rebellion against you?
I have nothing but hatred for them;
I count them my enemies.
Search me, God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting.“
Psalm 139:19-24
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JULY 18, 2025
Have you ever found yourself in the middle of talking to someone you suspected was not really listening, so you threw in an absurd phrase like “and then the blue striped dinosaurs flew in!” to see if they notice, or if they just keep nodding and smiling?
It feels like the psalmist just did that to us today, doesn’t it? After a whole poem of God’s comforting presence and knowledge from before our first breath to after our last, suddenly we’re singing about how much we hate our enemies, feel nothing but hatred for them, hope they are brutally murdered and soon!
Then we’re asking God to search our hearts and make sure there’s no hidden sin within us.
Well, how about that part where we hope our enemies are violently slain?
We live in a time when the name of Jesus is frequently paired with calls for (and acts of) violence, so it matters that we understand what is happening here. Since this is a devotion and not a 40,000-word book, I’ll limit us to two brief thoughts.
First, we call this sort of language part of the “imprecatory psalms.” It’s about deep pain and injustice and the ways that, in worship, we bring this pain and injustice to God. This songbook was compiled by the people in exile; they had literally been ripped from their families and homes and dragged to an enemy city for the rest of their lives. Talk about trauma, anger, and suffering! They brought this all-too-visceral devastation to God in their worship (and the language in some of the other psalms is much worse than this one).
Secondly—and importantly—Christians are Christ-ians, literally little Christs, followers of Jesus. Jesus came to fulfill God’s law and work, to be the living embodied Word. We interpret the Bible through a Jesus-filter. Jesus taught His followers to love, not hate, our enemies. To overcome evil with goodness not violence. Jesus not only taught this but lived it, submitting to a publicly humiliating “defeat” and death—and in refusing to back down or fight back, He laid down His life for His enemies and defeated evil once and for all.
Few reading this devotional are victims of exile; in fact, many of us are citizens of the empire! But there is still evil and injustice being done, too often in the name of our country and our faith. Let us join our ancient brothers and sisters in standing firmly against all suffering and stand with Jesus in defeating evil and hatred and violence not through wielding hatred and violence ourselves, but through wielding Jesus’ steadfast love.
Questions for reflection and discussion:
- What questions does this psalm raise for you?
- How do you bring suffering to God?
- What does it look like to follow Jesus’ radical evil-overcoming way of love in our time and place, do you think?
Church Reading Plan:
- Today, July 18 : Judges 1; Acts 5
- Saturday, July 19: Judges 1; Acts 5
- Sunday, July 20: Judges 2; Acts 6