Remembering atrocities with purposeTimes of relative peace for God’s people are always eventually broken by the hostility of evil forces and people who, one way or another, would prefer no trace of God’s presence and promises to exist. God’s people, until Jesus came, were more or less identified with the people of Israel. Now that Jesus has come, God’s people are defined in spiritual rather than ethnic terms (Philippians 3:3), yet as Christians we still owe ethnic Israel our respect and gratitude (Romans 3:2) and our love (Romans 11:28). When the wicked forces of barbarism attack, as happened on 7 October 2023, we recognise the ages-old struggle of evil against the word and work of God and we react with horror against the brutality and savagery inflicted on Jewish people simply for being Jews. We denounce the increasing incidence of appalling anti-Semitic attitudes and actual violence, even in the UK, as seen in the recent deadly attack at a Manchester synagogue. Many of the Psalms memorialise previous similar incidents in history and provide a framework for us to bear witness to the atrocity while appealing to God for help, both in the sense of bringing justice and deliverance from evil and also help to become more devoted to God and godliness. In the following updated extract from his commentary on the Psalms, the Covenanter David Dickson (who knew that Christians can also be the subjects of barbaric and unreasoned persecution) takes us through Psalm 74, a psalm of lamentation and appeal arising in the aftermath of enemy attack.There are three parts to Psalm 74. The first is the pitiful lamentation presented to God because of the destruction of Jerusalem and the burning of the temple by the Chaldeans (v.1–11). Next is the strengthening of the faith and hope of God’s people, that God would send a deliverance (v.12–18). In the third, there are various petitions for the relief of His people, the restitution of His own work, and the suppression of His enemies (v.19–23).
Lamenting towards GodThe psalm opens in v.1–2 with lamentation and prayer for relief in general. In all judgements, inflicted by whatsoever instruments, the Lord’s people must look first to God. Even when wrath, and fear of utter wrath, stare them in the face, they must make their appeal to God, however angry He seems to be.
The Lord does not want His people to yield to oppressive thoughts of being “cast off”. Instead, He allows us to question everything that might hint at this, and to debate that point with him, and not to endure it. We are permitted to say, “Why hast thou cast us off for ever?”
Although by our sins we have provoked the Lord to fall upon us, as if we were His enemies, yet we must not quit the least connection we have with Him, not even the external covenant. Instead we must make use of it for supporting of our faith in Him. Here, they call themselves “the sheep of thy pasture,” reminding Him that He has taken on the care of them, as a shepherd over his flock. Whatever the Lord does to His people, they must pray to Him, and make use of all the ties that bind Him and them. “Remember thy congregation,” they pray, “which thou hast purchased” by price and conquest, and “of old,” from a long time ago. He has measured them out, and they are His inheritance, not to dispose of or put away (“the rod of thine inheritance”). They remind Him that He has granted them deliverances out of terrible trouble before (“which thou hast redeemed”), and that He had taken up residence among them in His public ordinances (“this Mount Sion, wherein thou hast dwelt”).
Testifying against the enemyAmong all the calamities of Gods people, nothing afflicts them so much as the insolent profanation of the worship and name of God among them. In the first petition of their prayer (v.3), they lament how the enemies have spoiled the temple, and dwell most insistently on this, “Even all that the enemies have done wickedly in the sanctuary.”
When the wicked are let loose on God’s people, they are most insolent, cruel and savage in how they treat them. “Thy enemies roar in the midst of thy congregations” (v.4). It is not enough for these enemies to insult God’s people, but they will insult their way of religion, and the God whom they worship. “They set up their ensigns” (v.4), displaying their banners on the ruins of God’s temple, as signs of their victory over that religion which is professed there, and over God’s worship there.
When the Lord is provoked by His people’s evil behaviour towards Him, it is only justice if He permits them to be maltreated by enemies. Yet the Lord’s purpose is only to correct His people, by letting them see the sinfulness of how they have provoked Him. The enemies whom He uses as instruments in their correction, however, have in mind their utter destruction. They want them rooted out of the world. “They said in their hearts, Let us destroy them” (v.8).
Praying for justice to be doneOur patience is much shorter than God’s long-suffering and forbearance. The suffering people here ask, “O God, how long shall the adversary reproach?” (v.10), when with God it is not yet time to act against them.
Yet the Lord’s long-suffering patience greatly hardens the adversaries in their insolent mocking of God’s people.
The godly can endure their own troubles better than they can bear the open dishonouring and blaspheming of God which arises out of their trouble. “Shall the enemy blaspheme thy name for ever?”
Worldly wisdom may imagine that God is idle when He permits His enemies to trample on His people and on His glorious name. Yet faith will not admit of such a thought, but goes and appeals to God by prayer to let His strength and power be displayed, so that the world will not think that He is keeping His hands in His pockets. “Why withdrawest thou thy hand, even thy right hand? Pluck it out of thy bosom.”
Fortifying faith and hope in GodRelations between God and His people (especially the fact that He has made Himself their “king,” v.12), are pledges that God defends His kingdom and His injured subjects, and punishes His enemies. And the more time has passed since God avowed Himself king of His church (“God is my king of old”), the more confident later generations may be to find new evidences of His royal actions for them and against their enemies.
New troubles must not make us forget old mercies. Instead, we should call them to memory, to make use of them afresh as pledges that what He has done before, He will do again. The deliverance of Israel out of Egypt, and the destruction of the Egyptians, is a pledge to God’s people in every subsequent age that God will destroy their enemies, however strong and terrible they may be, and will deliver His church (v.13–15).
Faith is so thrifty that it will not even let the works of creation and common providence pass by, without making use of them (day and night, light and darkness, summer and winter, v.16–17).
Redoubling prayer for deliveranceAlthough sins, and especially the persecution of God’s people and blasphemy against God, are not punished immediately, yet they shall not be forgiven. “Remember this, that the enemy hath reproached, O Lord” (v.18). All sins, and especially blasphemy against God’s name, are aggravated by the folly of the sinner, and the excellency of God (“Remember that the foolish people have blasphemed thy name,” v.18).
In comparison with her many and strong enemies, the church of God is like a solitary, weak, desolate turtle-dove, harmless, meek, lowly, patient in desolation, easing her grief by sighing, and exposed to a multitude of ravenous birds. “O deliver not the soul of thy turtle-dove unto the multitude of the wicked!” (v.19).
Yet however weak the church is, and however many and strong the enemies are, they all cannot all devour the church, unless the Lord were to deliver them over into their hands. Against which the church may confidently pray, “O deliver not the soul of thy turtle-dove unto the multitude of the wicked!” for He has given His people wings, and a hiding place too, to use.
Although the Lord’s people deserve to be excluded many times over from the covenant of grace, yet the Lord will never debar them from their right to it, when in their need they draw near to Him and plead for the benefit of it, “Have respect to the covenant” (v.20).
Places which lack the light of the Lord’s presence in His ordinances are dark and uncomfortable places, where it is no less dangerous for the people of God to remain than for sheep to be in the midst of the dens of cruel lions and ravenous beasts. When God casts His people into such places, there is much need to make use of God’s covenant for preservation.
When supplicants come to God, especially when over-loaded with troubles, they shall find comfort, and shall not be disappointed (v.21). The sense of need and emptiness is the best disposition for prayer, and the best preparation for praises also. Those who are poor in their prayers shall be rich in their praises. “Let the poor and needy praise thy name” (v.21).
Remembering who will win in the endThe church’s cause is the Lord’s cause. The wicked do not malign the godly for their sins, but for their righteousness, and so the quarrel is the Lord’s. He will and must maintain her, even if He seems to sit still a while. “Arise, O Lord, plead thine owne cause” (v.22).
The Lord’s enemies are all foolish people; for they beat out their brains on the church’s bulwark. Because the Lord holds off from responding for a time, they go on to blaspheme Him daily to His face, but they shall find at length that God has all their reproaches on record. “Remember how the foolish man reproacheth thee daily” (v.22).
Every sin is fearful, and especially enmity against God and His church. But openly glorying in it is worse, and God will take knowledge of this, and punish it. “Forget not the voice of thine enemies” (v.23).
Sin, and especially persecution gloried in, grows daily more and more. Yet the growing of sin, and especially of persecution, only hastens the deliverance of the godly, and the destruction of the enemies. “The tumult of those that arise against thee increaseth continually” (v.23).
← Why we need Christians as well as Christian valuesFURTHER READINGRead more articles from the blogAUTHOR MENU* Samuel Rutherford * George Gillespie * James Durham * Alexander Henderson * David Dickson * Alexander Nisbet * Donald Cargill * Andrew Gray * George Hutcheson * Hugh Binning * Westminster Assembly * The Covenanters * James Fergusson * James Fraser of Brea * James Guthrie * William Guthrie * James Renwick * John Brown of Wamphray * John Livingstone * Richard Cameron READ MORELIKE THISSubscribe to our weekly newsletter and receive an updated article every week.
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