May 10

Psalm 129
The amount of persecution against the cause of Christ in this world is truly staggering. This morning I noted that the president has come out clearly in favor of promoting and supporting same sex marriage. To me, the timing would appear to be a reaction to North Carolina passing the marriage amendment. The current president has repeatedly made comments and supported actions that repudiate his alleged profession of being a Christian. Consider this paragraph from the Manahattan Declaration of Oct. 2009:
We see this, for example, in the effort to weaken or eliminate conscience clauses, and therefore to compel pro-life institutions (including religiously affiliated hospitals and clinics), and pro-life physicians, surgeons, nurses, and other health care professionals, to refer for abortions and, in certain cases, even to perform or participate in abortions. We see it in the use of anti- discrimination statutes to force religious institutions, businesses, and service providers of various sorts to comply with activities they judge to be deeply immoral or go out of business. After the judicial imposition of "same-sex marriage" in Massachusetts, for example, Catholic Charities chose with great reluctance to end its century-long work of helping to place orphaned children in good homes rather than comply with a legal mandate that it place children in same-sex households in violation of Catholic moral teaching. In New Jersey, after the establishment of a quasi-marital "civil unions" scheme, a Methodist institution was stripped of its tax exempt status when it declined, as a matter of religious conscience, to permit a facility it owned and operated to be used for ceremonies blessing homosexual unions. In Canada and some European nations, Christian clergy have been prosecuted for preaching Biblical norms against the practice of homosexuality. New hate-crime laws in America raise the specter of the same practice here
It would appear that the president has added one more link in the chain that will eventually, if left unchecked, lead to further curtailment of religious liberty and eventual persecution of believers in the USA. Perhaps a good dose of persecution is what the Laodicean Church of the USA needs in order to cure it of its carnality.
“Let Israel now say, . . .” This is a corporate song referring to the corporate experience of God’s people. We really do not know when it was written. Quite probably it was around the time of the return from Babylon. The Babylonians cruelly treated Israel in her destruction by them. In cruel circumstances many are prone to respond by asking, “How could a righteous, loving God allow this to happen to me/us?” Clearly the implication of the question is that God is either not righteous or not loving. But in contrast Israel is called to declare that the Lord is righteous, because He does bring deliverance by cutting the chords of their captors. Israel then asks for equity upon their non-repentant persecutors.
What a contrast with the attitude of Jesus upon the cross and Stephen while being stoned, when they asked God to forgive the ones killing them! Or is it? When Jesus and Stephen uttered those words, they were in the process of dying. Jesus and Stephen died in shame as criminals. Israel was kicked out of the land in shame as criminals. If this Psalm was written upon their return to the land, then their persecutors are long since dead. Their persecutors no longer have a chance to repent. Within the watching crowd of Jesus’ and Stephen’s death were persecutors who would one day repent. Notably, Saul was among the Stephen crowd. Their prayers were literally answered. Many in the crowd later repented and found forgiveness.
But one day, Jesus will return. He will not return in shame as a criminal. When He returns, He will bring with Him Stephen, those who were persecuted and all those who have believed. At that point there will be no more opportunity for repentance and forgiveness. There will be no more opportunity for blessing from the Lord. Only righteousness and justice will be dispensed. Fortunately for me and hopefully you, I have already claimed the righteousness of Jesus, which He has so freely given me. Consequently for me, the justice of the Father and Son will have already been carried out upon the cross. But those who refused the forgiveness of the cross will be condemned. They will receive the curse laid out at the end of this Psalm, and rightly so for they rejected the offered sacrifice and forgiveness of the King. He would be unrighteous not to condemn them. Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john