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From: fortmann@superbowl.und.ac.za (Paul Fortmann - PG)
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Subject: Praying for Justice
Message-ID: <May.13.02.29.51.1993.1514@geneva.rutgers.edu>
Date: 13 May 93 06:29:52 GMT
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I recently came across this article which I found interesting. I have 
posted it to hear what other people feel about the issue.

I realise it is rather long (12 pages in Wordperfect) by may well be worth 
the read.

Except for the first page (which I typed) the rest was scanned inusing 
Omnipage. Some of the f's have come out as t's and visa-versa. I have tried 
to correct as much as possible.


ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Peter Hammond is the founder of Frontline Fellowship, a
missionary organisation witnessing to the communist countries in
Southern Africa. He has also made several visits to many East
European countries.

FRONTLINE FELLOWSHIP NEWS                          ISSN 1018-144X

PRAYING FOR JUSTICE
(by Peter Hammond)

To those involved in ministering to Christians suffering
persecution the imprecatory Psalms are a tremendous source of
comfort. And those of us who are fighting for the right to life
of the preborn, or battling social evils such as pornography or
crime, are beginning to appreciate what an important weapon God
has entrusted to us in the imprecatory Psalms.


THE IMPRECATORY PSALMS

Early in my Christian walk I encountered the prayers for
judgement in the Psalms and was quite at loss to know how to
respond to them. Prayers such as:
"Break the arm of the wicked and evil men; call him to account for
his wickedness ..." Psalm 10:15 did not seem consistent with the
gospel of love which I had accepted. Yet Psalm 10:15 was clearly
motivated by love for God ("The Lord is King for ever and ever;
the nation will perish from His land" 10:16, and "Why does the
wicked man revile God? 10:13), and by love for the innocent who
suffer ("You hear, O Lord, the desire of the afflicted; You
encourage them, and You listen to their cry, defending the
fatherless and oppressed, in order that man, who is of the earth,
may terrify no more." 10:17-18)

Nevertheless, I grew increasingly uncomfortable reading such
graphic prayers for God to judge the wicked as: "Pour out your
wrath on them; let Your fierce anger overtake them" 64:24; "O
Lord, the God avenges, O God who avenges, shine forth. Rise up, O
Judge of the earth, pay back to the proud what they deserve."
95:1-2; "Break the teeth in their mouths, O God; ...let them
vanish like water .. let their arrows be blunted ... The
righteous will be glad when they are avenged, when they bathe
their feet in the blood of the wicked. Then men will way, "Surely
the righteous still are rewarded; surely there is a God who
judges the earth.'" 58:6-11

Certainly I wanted God to be honoured and yes I was deeply
destressed by the prevalence of evil -  but could I actually pray
for God to "pour out His wrath" on the wicked?

The scripture make it clear that these prayers are not to be
prayed for own selfish motives, nor against our personal enemies.
Rather they are to be prayed in Christ, for His glory and against
His enemies. The psalmist describes the targets of these
imprecation as: those who devise injustice in their heart and
whose hands mete out violence (58:2) those who "boast of evil"
and "are a disgrace in the eyes of God. Your tongue plots
destruction, it is like a sharpened razor, and you who practise
deceit. You love evil rather than good, falsehood rather than
speaking the truth." 52:1-3; "They crush your people ... They
slay the widow and the alien; they murder the fatherless." 94:5-
6; "With cunning they conspire against Your people; they plot
against those You cherish." 83:3; "You hate all who do wrong. You
destroy those who tell lies; bloodthirsty and deceitful men the
Lord abhors." 5:5-6.

To those unrepentant enemies of God the psalmist declares:
"Surely God will bring you down to everlasting ruin" 52:5;
"Surely God will crush the heads of His enemies ... of those who
go on in their sins" 68:21.

And the purpose of these prayers for justice is declared: "Then
it will be known to the ends of the earth that God rules ..."
59:13; "to proclaim the powers of God" 68:34; "All kings will bow
down to Him and all nations will serve Him " 72:11; "Who knows
the power of Your anger? For Your wrath is as great as the fear
that is due You. " 90:11

Yet despite the fact that 90 of the 150 Psalms include
imprecations (prayers invoking God's righteous judgement upon the
wicked) such prayers are rare in the average Western church.
However, amongst the persecuted churches these prayers are much
more common.


PRAYING AGAINST THE PERSECUTORS

Amidst the burnt out churches and devastation of Marxist Angola I
found the survivors of communist persecution including the
crippled and maimed, and widows and orphans praying for God to
strike down the wicked and remove the persecutors of the Church.
I was shocked - yet it was Biblical (Even the martyrs in heaven
pray "How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge
the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?" Revelation
6:10).

The initiator of the communist persecution in Angola was Agestino
Neto. Described as a "drunken, psychotic, marxist poet", Neto had
been installed by Cuban troops as the first dictator of Angola.
He boasted that: "Within 20 years there won't be a Bible or a
church left in Angola. I will have eradicated Christianity." Yet
despite the vicious wave of church burning and massacres it is
not Christianity that was eradicated in Angola but Agestino Neto.
Neto died in mysterious circumstances on an operating table in
Moscow.

In Romania I learnt of a series of remarkable incidents recorded
of God judging the persecutors of the Church in answer to prayer:
  *  A communist official ordered a certain pastor to be
     arrested. the next day the official died of a heart attack.
  *  Another communist party official ordered that all the Bibles
     in his district were to be collected and pulped, to be
     turned into toilet paper. This blasphemous project was in
     fact carried out. But the next day when the official was
     medically examined, he was informed that he had terminal
     cancer. He died shortly afterwards.
  *  On another occasion, a communist official who had ordered a
     Baptist church to be demolished by bulldozers died in a car
     crash the very next day.
  *  When an order was given to dismantle a place of worship on
     the mountainside in a forest, the workmen flatly refused to
     carry out the order. At gunpoint a group of conscripted
     gypsies also refused to touch the church. In desperation,
     the communist police forced prisoners at bayonet-point to
     dismantle the structure. Yet the officer in charge pleaded
     with the local Christians to pray for him, that God would
     not judge him. He emphasised that he had nothing against
     Christians and was only obeying strict orders. The building
     was in fact reconstructed later, and again used for worship.
     "They were all seized with Sear and the Name of the Lord
     Jesus was held in high honour... in this way the Word of the
     Lord spread widely and grew in power. " Acts 19:17,20

Nicolae Ceaucescu the dictator who ordered much of the
persecution in Romania was overthrown by his own army and
executed on Christmas day, 1989, to joyous shouts of "the
antiChrist is dead" in the streets. Many testified that this was
in answer to the fervent prayers of the long suffering people of
Romania.

Another persecutor of the Church who challenged God was Samora
Machel, the first dictator of Marxist Mozambique. Samora Machel
was a cannibal who ate human flesh in witchcraft ceremonies in
the 1960's. He pledged his soul to Satan and vowed that he would
destroy the Church and turn Mozambique into the first truly
Marxist-Leninist state in Africa. Thousands of churches in
Mozambique were closed confiscated, "nationalised" chained and
padlocked, burnt down or boarded up. Missionaries were expelled,
some being imprisoned first. Evangelism was forbidden. Bibles
were ceremonially burnt and tens of thousands of Christians,
including many pastors and elders, were shipped off to
concentration camps - most were never seen again.

A month before his sudden death Samora Machel cursed God publicly
and challenged Him to prove His existence by striking him
(Machel) dead. On 19 October 1986, while several churches were
specifically praying for God to stop the persecution in
Mozambique, Machel's Soviet Tupelov aircraft crashed in a violent
thunderstorm. The plane crashed 200 metres within South Africa's
boundary with Mozambique. Amidst the wreckage the marxist plans
for overthrowing the government of Malawi were discovered and
published. Not only had God judged a blasphemer and a persecutor,
but He had also saved a country from persecution.

In the months leading up to the first multi-party elections in
Zambia many churches fasted and prayed tor God to remove the 27
year socialist dictatorship of Kenneth Kaunda. This was done on
31st October 1991 when Fredrick Chiluba (a man converted to
Christ whilst imprisoned for opposing Kaunda) was elected
president of Zambia and covenanted to make Zambia a Christian
country.

It is recorded in history that the wicked Mary, Queen of Scots,
declared trembling and in tears: "I am more afraid of John Knox's
prayers than of an army of ten thousand".

On 3 April 1993 the Secretary General of the South African
Communist Party Chris Hani was shot dead. From the unprecedented
international wave of condolences and adulation reported one
could be forgiven for assuming that this man was a saint and a
martyr. Certainly it was not the death and resurrection of Christ
Jesus which dominated the thoughts and headlines of South Africa
this Easter, but the assassination of Chris Hani.

The stunning hypocrisy of the situation is that 20 135 people
were murdered in South Africa in 1992, yet more collective
concern and anguish were reported over the death of the head of
the SA Communist Party than for all the thousands of other
victims. Indeed the SA government, the international community
and the mass media have apparently had greater sorrow reported
over this one death than for all the 50 000 South Africans
murdered since 2nd February 1990 when the ANC, SACP and PAC were
unbanned!

Yet as a member of the ANC Revolutionary Council since 1973,
Deputy Commander of Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) the ANC's "military
wing" - from 1982, and Chief of Staff of MK from 1987, Chris Hani
had approved and ordered bombings and assassinations of many
unarmed civilians. As Jesus warned: "all who live by the sword
will die by the sword " Matt 26:52.

After personally confronting Hani about his terrorist activities
at a press conference in Washington DC (where he publicly
declared his support for Fidel Castro, Col. Gaddafi, Yasser
Arafat and Saddam Hussein and defended the placing of car bombs
and limpet mines in public places during "the struggle") I told
him that I was a Christian and, while I didn't hate him, I did
hate communism and I was praying for him - that God would either
bring him to repentance and salvation in Christ, or that God
would remove him. He responded by swearing and declaring that he
was an atheist.

Several other people also prayed that God would either bring Hani
to repentance or remove him. Similarly several churches in
America have begun to pray the imprecatory Psalms against
unrepentant abortionists. In one town 8 abortionists were struck
down, with heart attacks, strokes, car accidents and cancer,
within months of these public prayers for God to stop these
killers of preborn babies.

Some praised God for His righteous acts of judgement and quoted:
"When justice is done, it brings joy to the righteous and terror
to evildoers " Proverbs 21:15. Others were shocked that any
Christian could express satisfaction at the misfortune of any -
even of the blatantly wicked. Yet the Apostles prayed imprecatory
prayers (Acts 13:8-12; Galatians 1:8-9; 2 Tim 4:14-15) and so did
our Lord (Matt 11:20-24).

What then should our attitude towards the imprecatory Psalms be?
Should we be praying the Psalms? To tackle these thorny issues I
would like to present a short summary of an excellent book, "War
Psalms of the Prince of Peace - Lessons From The Imprecatory
Psalms" by James E Adams, (published by the Presbyterian and
Reformed Publishing Company):

Our Lord Jesus Christ & His apostles used the Psalms constantly
in teaching men to know God. The New Testament (NT) quotes the
Old Testament (OT) over 283 times. 41% of all OT quotes in the NT
are from the Psalms. Christ Himself alluded to the Psalms over 50
times. The Psalms are the Prayer Book of the Bible.


1. Are the imprecatory Psalms the oracles of God?

Some Christian commentators & theologians reject these Psalms as
"devilish", "diabolical ", "unsuited to the church", and "Not God
's pronouncements of His wrath on the wicked; but the prayers of
a man for vengeance on his enemies, just the opposite of Jesus'
teaching that we should love our enemies. "

Yet 2 Tim 3:16-17 declares:
"All Scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching,
rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the
man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. "
(see also 2 Peter 3:15-16).

The fact that something in the Word of God is beyond our
comprehension is not grounds to denying or even questioning its
inspiration. To make ourselves the judge of what is good or evil
is to impudently take the place of God.

Do we imagine ourselves to be holier than God? Wrong ideas of God
have led many to become "evangelic plastic surgeons who have made
it their job to "clean up" God's Word according to their own
ideas of what is proper. They have forgotten that it is God alone
who must determine what Christianity is and what is suitable for
His Church. The essence of what many have done is to question the
authority of God's Word (like Eve's original sin of listening to
Satan's question "Yes, hath God said... ?").

The Psalms are part of God's revelation of Himself and His
attributes, and they are reaffirmed by the NT as the
authoritative Word of God. Those imprecatory Psalms which these
evangelical plastic surgeons reject as "unsuited" and "unworthy"
for the Church are the very Psalms Christ used to testify about
Himself (eg: Mark 12:36; Matt 22:43-44) and which the Apostles
used as authoritative Scripture (eg: Acts 1:16-20; Acts 4:25; Heb
4:7). See also: 2 Samuel 23:1-2.

CH Spurgeon said concerning the imprecatory Psalms, (especially
Ps 109):
"Truly this is one of the hard places of Scripture, a passage
which the soul trembles to read, yet it is not ours to sit in
judgement upon it, but to bow our ear to what the Lord would
speak to us therein. "

The rejection of any part of God's Word is a rejection of the
giver of that Word, God Himself.


2. Who is praying these Psalms?

Christ quoted the Psalms not merely as prophesy; He actually
spoke the Psalms as His own words. The Psalms occupied an
enormous place in the life of our Lord. He used it as His prayer
book and song book - from the Synagogue to the festivals and at
the Last Supper.

On the cross Christ quoted from the Psalms - not as some ancient
authority that He adapted for His own use, but as His very own
words - the words of the Lord's Anointed - which as David's Son
He truly was.
"Father, into your hands I commit my Spirit" Ps 31:5
"My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?" Ps 22:1

In His ministry Christ foretells what He will say as the Judge on
the day of judgement, and He quotes the Psalms in doing so!
Matt 7:23 "Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Away
from me, you evildoers'. " Ps 6:8

In Heb 10:5 the apostle attributes Ps 40:6-8 directly to Christ
although nowhere in the Gospels is Christ recorded as having said
these words. Similarly Hebrews 2 : 12 attributes Ps 22:22
directly to Christ despite there being no record of His having
spoken these words while on earth. Clearly the apostles believed
Christ is speaking in the Psalms.

Christ came to establish His kingdom and to extend His mercy in
all the earth. But let us never forget that Jesus will come again
to execute Judgement on the wicked.
David as the anointed king of the chosen people of God was a
prototype of Jesus Christ. Acts 2:30:
"being therefore a prophet, ... he foresaw and spoke of the
resurrection of Christ. "
David was a witness to Christ in his office, in his lite, and in
his words. The same words which David spoke, the future Messiah
spoke through him. The prayers of David were prayed also by
Christ. Or better Christ Himself prayed these Psalms through His
forerunner David.

The imprecatory Psalms are expressions of the infinite justice of
God, of His indignation against wrong doing, and His compassion
for the wronged.


3. But what about the Psalms of repentance?

Christ is also the Lamb of God, the substitutionary sacrifice for
our sins. Christ in the day of His crucifixion was charged with
the sin of His people. He appropriated to Himself those debts for
which He had made Himself responsible. Our Lord was the
substitution for the sinner. He took the sinners place (Isaiah
53).

"God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we
might become the righteousness of God. " 2 Cor 5:21

In history the Psalms, especially the imprecatory Psalms, have
been understood to have been the prayers of Christ by: St
Augustine, Jerome, Ambrose, Tertullian, Luther and many others.
All the Psalms are the voice of Christ. Christ is praying the
imprecatory Psalms! All the Psalms are messianic. It is the Lord
Jesus Christ who is praying these prayers of vengeance. It is
only right for the righteous King of Peace to ask God to destroy
His enemies.

These prayers signal an alarm to all who are still enemies of
King Jesus. His prayers will be answered! God's Word is revealed
upon all who oppose Christ. Anyone who rejects God's way of
forgiveness in the cross of Christ will bear the dreadful curses
of God.

He who prays Psalm 69:23-28 will one day make this prayer a
reality when He declares to those on His left:
"Depart from me you who are cursed into the eternal fire prepared
for the devil and his angels. " Matt 25:41

All the enemies of the Lord need to hear these Psalms. *God's
Kingdom is at War.* The powers of evil will tall and God alone
will reign forever!
"With justice He judges and makes war...out of His mouth comes a
sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. He will rule
them with an iron sceptre; He treads the winepress of the fury of
the wrath of God Almighty...King of Kings and Lord of Lords. "
Rev 19 : 15


4. Are Jesus' prayers contradictory?

What about Jesus' command to love our enemies and to bless those
who curse us (Matt 5:44)?

Christ is of course the loving and merciful Saviour who forgives
sin; but He is also the awesome Judge who is coming in Judgement
on those who disobey His Gospel.

"God is just. He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you
and give relief to you who are troubled...This will happen when
the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with His
powerful angels. He will punish those who do not obey the Gospel
of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting
destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from
the majesty of His power on the day He comes to be glorified in
His holy people and to be marvelled at among au those who have
believed. " 2 Thess 1:6-10

Jesus has power on earth to forgive sins, and He has power on
earth to execute judgement upon His enemies. In the Psalms we see
both the vengeance and the love ot God.

Even in the N.T. & in the Gospels we see imprecations.
"Woe to you,...hypocrites...blind guides...blind fools...full of
greed and self indulgence...whitewashed tombs...you snakes! You
brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to Hell ? "
Matt 23

In Matt 26:23-24 Christ quotes from Ps 69 and 109 to refer to His
betrayal by Judas.

We also need to acknowledge that Christ's prayers of blessing are
not for all. In John 17:6-9 it is clear that Christ is only
praying to the elect of God - those who have:
"obeyed your Word"... "accepted" God's Word ... and have
"believed ". (see Luke 10:8-16 - Those who reject the
message of God's kingdom will be judged.)


5. May we pray the imprecatory Psalms?

Martin Luther pointed out that when one prays: "Hallowed be Thy
Name, Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done " then "he must put all
the opposition to this in one pile and say: 'Curses, maledictions
and disgrace upon every other name and every other kingdom. May
they be ruined and torn apart and may all their schemes and
wisdom and plans run aground' . "

To pray tor the extension of God's kingdom is to solicit the
destruction of all other kingdoms, eg: Dan 2:44: "The God of
heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed ... it
will crush all those kingdoms and bring them to an end, but it
will itself endure forever. "

* Advance and victory for the Church means defeat and retreat for
the kingdom of darkness. *

There is a life & death struggle between two kingdoms. The Church
cannot exclude hatred tor satan's kingdom from its love for God's
kingdom. God's kingdom cannot come without satan's kingdom being
destroyed. God's will cannot be done on earth without the
destruction of evil. The glory of God demands the destruction of
evil. Instead of being influenced by a sickly sentimentalism
which insists upon the assumed, but really non-existent, rights
of man - we should focus instead upon the rights of God.

Note Psalm 83 where the Psalmist prays against those who "plot
together" against God and His people:
"Cover their faces with shame so that men will seek your Name O
Lord... Do to them as You did to Midian, as you did to Sisera and
Jabin at the river Kishon, who perished at Endor and became like
refuse on the ground. "

The story of Sisera in the book of Judges (Chapter 4 and 5)
provides a vivid example of God's judgement on the wicked. Sisera
"cruelly oppressed the Israelites for twenty years" and they
"cried to the Lord for help" Judges 4:3. In response to those
prayers: "The Lord routed Sisera and all his chariots and army by
the sword, and Sisera abandoned his chariot and fled on foot...
All the troops of Sisera fell by the sword; not a man was left. "
Judges 4:15-16

The account then goes on to describe how Sisera escaped to the
tent of Jael where she lulled him into a false sense of safety
and then drove a tent peg through his temple with a hammer. The
song of victory by Deborah and Barak celebrated the crushing of
the head of Sisera in graphic detail (Judges 5:25-27). And it is
this that Psalm 83 implores God to again do to His enemies.. "As
you did to Sisera ..."


6. The blessings of obedience and the curse of disobedience

The imprecatory Psalms are fully consistent with the Law of God:
     "If you do not carefully follow all the words of this Law,
     which are written in this book, and do not revere this
     glorious and awesome Name - the Lord your God - the Lord
     will send fearful plagues on you and your descendants. He
     will bring upon you all the diseases of Egypt that you
     dreaded, and they will cling to you. The Lord will also
     bring on you every kind of sickness and disaster not
     recorded in this Book of the Law until you are
     destroyed...because you did not obey the Lord your God ...
     so it will please Him to ruin and destroy you. You will be
     uprooted from the land you are entering to possess. "
     Deuteronomy 28:58-63

The covenant God made with His people included curses for
disobedience as well as blessings for obedience. Deuteronomy 27
records the formal giving and receiving of the covenant terms in
an awesome account:
"The Levites shall recite to all the people of Israel in a loud
voice:
"Cursed is the man who carves an image or casts an idol - a thing
detestable to the Lord, the work of the craftsman's hands - and
sets it up in secret. "
Then all the people shall say, "Amen!" "
"Cursed is the man who dishonours his father or his mother...
"Cursed is the man who moves his neighbour's boundary stone...
"Cursed is the man who leads the blind astray on the roads...
"Cursed is the man who withholds justice from the alien, the
fatherless or the widow...
"Cursed is the man who kills his neighbour secretly...
"Cursed is the man who accepts a bribe to kill an innocent
person.
"Cursed is the man who does not uphold the words of the Law by
carrying them out.
Then all the people shall say, "Amen!" " Deut 27:14-26

The New Testament confirms that the inevitable consequence of
rejecting Christ is the curse. "If anyone does not love the
Lord - a curse be on him. " 1 Corinthians 16:22

(See also: Romans 12:19-21; Hebrews 1:1-3; 3:7-12; 3:1519; 10:26-
31; 12:14-29.)


7. How can we preach these prayers?

The Church of Jesus Christ is an army under orders.
Scripture constitutes the official dispatch from the Commander-
in-Chief. But we have a problem: those who are called to pass on
those orders to others are refusing to do so. How then can we
expect to be a united, effective army? Is it any wonder that the
troops have lost sight of their commission to demolish the
strongholds of the kingdom of darkness? If the Church does not
hear the battle cries of her Captain, how will she follow Him
onto the battlefield?

Pastors are commissioned to pass on the orders of the Church's
Commander, never withholding or changing His words. One whose job
is to carry dispatches to troops in wartime would face certain
and severe punishment if he dared to amend the general's orders.
The pastor's charge is of greater importance than that of a
courier in any earthly army. There's no place tor the dispatcher
to decide he doesn't agree with his Commander's strategy.

When Jesus Christ sent seventy-two disciples on a preaching
mission, He told them to proclaim the coming of God's Kingdom (Lk
10:9) - that is, to announce that people must submit to God's
rule in their lives. Jesus instructed them to pray for peace on
any house they approach, assuring them that if anyone rejected
it, the peace would return on the disciples (verse 5). But we
must consider what He said they should do if their message were
rejected - that is, if the hearers persisted in rebellion against
God's rule - "But when you enter a town and are not welcomed, go
into its 'streets and say, 'Even the dust of your town that
sticks to our feet we wipe off against you. Yet be sure of this:
The kingdom of God is near"' Luke 10:11.

What would be the result of that denunciation? I tell you, it
will be more bearable on that day for Sodom [on which God sent
fire from Heaven in judgement for its wickedness] than for that
town (verse 12). Immediately Jesus added curses on Korazin,
Bethsaida, and Capernaum tor their rejection of His message
(verses 13-15). He then explained to the disciples the great
authority He had given them: "He who listens to you listens to
Me; he who rejects you rejects Me; but he who rejects Me rejects
him who sent Me " (verse 16). This is the fundamental basis tor
calling down God's curses on anyone: his persistent rebellion
against God's authority expressed in His Law and the ministry of
His servants.

We need to clearly and forcefully proclaim the war cries of the
Prince of Peace. Only then will the Church awake from its
lethargy and once again enter the battle. If we tail to pass on
the battle cry then a lack of urgency and confusion in the ranks
will be inevitable.

Like Psalm 1 our preaching needs to clearly show the blessings of
obedience and the curse of disobedience. The eternal truth is
that God cannot be mocked. Whatever a man sows - that shall he
reap (Galatians 6:7). The curses pronounced on disobedience in
Deut 28:47-53 were fulfilled in detail in Samaria (2 Kings
6:2&29) and in Judea (AD 70). The wrath of God upon covenant
breakers is real.

The "I" of the Psalms is Jesus Christ. The "we" of the Psalms
includes those of us in the Lord Jesus. The enemies are not our
own, individually, but those of the Lord and of His Church. The
Psalms are ot Christ as Prophet, Priest, and King. They record
Christ's march in victory against the kingdom of darkness. As
Christ is the author of the Psalms, so, too, is He the final
fulfilment of the covenant on which they are based. God will
answer the psalmist's prayers completely in Jesus Christ on the
final day of judgment. While on earth Jesus foretold the day when
He will say: "But those enemies of Mine who did not want Me to be
King over them - bring them here and kill them in front of Me"
Luke 19:27.

A fatal end awaits everyone who refuses to acknowledge and to
obey Jesus as King and Lord. Hearing expositions of these war
psalms of the Prince of Peace will remind His people that God's
kingdom is at war! The kingdom of darkness is being overcome by
the kingdom of Jesus Christ, a war in which each local
congregation of believers plays a vital part. You must rally your
battalion to put on the whole armour of God, including "the sword
of the Spirit, which is the Word of God " Eph 6:17. That battle-
readiness also involves "pray(ing) in the Spirit on all occasions
with all kinds of prayers and requests n Eph 6:18.

Christ teaches His army to pray for the utter destruction of the
enemies of God as the psalmist did: "Pour out Your wrath on the
nations that do not acknowledge You, on the kingdoms that do not
call on Your Name" Ps 79:6.

To deal with the very real hurts and injustices in this world it
is necessary for us to pray for God's justice. Those who are
persecuted need the comfort of these prayers.

"Let the saints rejoice in His honour and sing for joy...May the
praise of God be in their mouths and a double-edged sword in
their hands, to inflict vengeance on the nations and punishment
on the peoples, to bind their kings with fetters, their nobles
with shackles of iron, to carry out the sentences written against
them. This is the glory of all His saints. Praise the Lord. " Ps
149:5-9

Prayer is, in fact, spiritual warfare. One weapon is prayer for
conversion of spiritual enemies; another is prayer for judgement
on those who finally refuse to be converted. We handicap the army
of God when we refuse to use both of these great weapons that He
has given us. It is at all times a part of the task of the people
nf God to destroy evil.

If you have been guilty of dulling your sword, by neglecting or
undermining these psalms, repent of that sin, sharpen your sword
anew, and go forth to do battle in the Name and for the Glory of
Jesus - until "the knowledge of the Lord will cover the earth as
the waters cover the sea" Hab 2:14.

The full book "War Psalms of the Prince of Peace " is available,
at R25, from Frontline Fellowship, PO Box 74 Newlands, 7725 RSA.


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