Context No. 3111 of 4322 · Psalms

Psalms 109:1-16: in context

1God of my praise, don’t remain silent, 2for they have opened the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of deceit against me. They have spoken to me with a lying tongue. 3They have also surrounded me with words of hatred, and fought against me without a cause. 4In return for my love, they are my adversaries; but I am in prayer. 5They have rewarded me evil for good, and hatred for my love. 6Set a wicked man over him. Let an adversary stand at his right hand. 7When he is judged, let him come out guilty. Let his prayer be turned into sin. 8Let his days be few. Let another take his office. 9Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow. 10Let his children be wandering beggars. Let them be sought from their ruins. 11Let the creditor seize all that he has. Let strangers plunder the fruit of his labor. 12Let there be no one to extend kindness to him, neither let there be anyone to have pity on his fatherless children. 13Let his posterity be cut off. In the generation following let their name be blotted out. 14Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered by the LORD. Don’t let the sin of his mother be blotted out. 15Let them be before the LORD continually, that he may cut off their memory from the earth; 16because he didn’t remember to show kindness, but persecuted the poor and needy man, the broken in heart, to kill them.

This is the psalm of a man falsely accused. They repay me evil for good, he says, and hatred for my love; in return for my love they accuse me, but I give myself to prayer. And then comes a long, fierce string of curses against his accuser, that his days be few, his memory cut off, because he showed no kindness but hunted down the poor and brokenhearted.

This is a hard psalm, full of curses against an enemy, and we do not simply take them on our own lips. But watch what the psalmist does with his rage: I give myself to prayer. Wronged, hated, repaid evil for good, he does not take revenge; he pours out his fury before God and leaves the judgment in God's hands. The very ferocity of the curses is handed over, not acted upon. And the New Testament sees this psalm reaching toward Christ and the betrayer, the righteous sufferer entrusting himself to God. When we are wronged, the honest place for our anger is God's presence, not our own retaliation.

When I am wronged and hated for my love, do I give myself to prayer and hand my anger to God, rather than taking revenge into my own hands?

Sources

Psalm 109:4: "In return for my love, they are my adversaries; but I am in prayer."
Psalm 109:8: "Let his days be few. Let another take his office."
Romans 12:19: "Don't seek revenge yourselves, beloved, but give place to God's wrath."