5 “All day long they distort my words;
All their thoughts are against me for evil.
6 They attack, they lurk,
They watch my steps,
As they have waited to take my life.
7 Because of wickedness, cast them forth,
In anger put down the peoples, O God!
8 You have taken account of my wanderings;
Put my tears in Your bottle.
Are they not in Your book?” (Psalm 56:5-8 NASB1995)
Persecuted for Righteousness’ Sake
This is a section of this Psalm of David on the subject of
being persecuted by his enemies, who fought against him, who oppressed him, and
who trampled upon him. And Jesus Christ, when he lived on this earth, promised
us that if we follow him with our lives, in walks of obedience to his commands,
no longer as slaves to sin, but as servants of the Lord, that we will be hated,
persecuted, mistreated, falsely accused of wrong, cast aside as unwanted,
rejected, have our words distorted, and be personally attacked by others.
And the very sad reality of our present day situation is
that many of our enemies, who are against us, who cast us off as unwanted, who
persecute us, and who do evil against us, are those who are supposed to love,
protect, value, nurture, and do good to us, and not harm. And many of these who
are our enemies, who treat us with disdain, are others who profess faith in the
Lord Jesus, who could be our relatives, neighbors, friends, and pastors and
elders of “church” congregations. And that is heartbreaking!
But Jesus said we would be hated and persecuted as he was. And
his persecutors and his opposition came from his own family members, from his
own people (the Jews), and from the rulers and people of influence and the
teachers of the Scriptures in the temple of God and in the synagogues. So it
should not surprise us if our persecutors are of the same nature, and not
necessarily the people who make no professions of faith in Jesus Christ. And Jesus
promised that family members would turn on us for our faith in him.
Now, where David spoke of his “wanderings,” he was not
speaking in terms of wandering from the Lord in deliberate and habitual sin
against the Lord. He was speaking in terms of being persecuted to the point to
where he was forced to flee, to move from place to place as an exile, a
fugitive, without a permanent place to settle down and to live. And so he
prayed to God that the difficulty of his situations, and the tears that he shed
because of them, might be remembered by the Lord, and that God would comfort
him.
A Present Day Example of This
Let me give you a present day example of this. For the “Christian”
culture that we live in here in the USA is very worldly, and is largely being
led by marketeers and their marketing schemes on how to draw in large crowds of
people from the world into their “church” gatherings. Therefore, many “church”
congregations have been turned into businesses being marketed to the world, and
thus the character of God/Christ, and of his church, and of his gospel, are
being altered to make them more acceptable to human flesh.
So, if you are a follower of Jesus Christ who takes God and
his word seriously, whose life is committed to obeying the Lord and to walking
in his ways, and to doing what he has called you to do, as a follower of
Christ, and so you stand on the truth of God’s word, you are not going to fit
in with today’s market-driven “church” congregations. And so you may find
yourself being opposed and ostracized and invited to leave these gatherings and
to go someplace else where you will be a “better fit.” So, you are in exile.
But you may find that every “church” you have tried in your
community are all following the same marketing schemes and business models on
how to “grow their churches,” and they are all partnered with (incorporated
under) the state (the ungodly, the world), and so they are all busy doing what
they think is going to attract the world to their gatherings. And so they may
be being trained to “watch out for people like you, i.e. people with strong
convictions,” and to make certain that they encourage you to go elsewhere.
Therefore, you are in exile. And you have cried many tears
over the mistreatment that you received at the hands of those who were supposed
to love you and to include you and to believe and to teach what the Scriptures
teach as the truth of the gospel. And so you take your unjust suffering to the
Lord in prayer, and he may show you a place where he can use you. And that is
what he did for me. And the place he sent me was to the internet, where God is
using me to share his word with the people of the world.
So, if you come up against a “brick wall” in your pursuit of
following the Lord in obedience, then just pray and ask the Lord what he has
for you next. Don’t let how others treat you determine who you become or what
you end up doing with your life. And there was a time in my life when I did
that, when I let the persecutions of others undo me. But the Lord was always
there encouraging me to get back in there and to keep pressing forward and to
not give up the fight just because it got much harder. So don’t give up!!
[Matthew 5:10-12;
Matthew 10:16-39; Matthew 24:9-14; Luke 6:22-23; Luke 21:12-17; John 15:18-21;
John 17:14; Rom 5:3-5; Phil 3:7-11; 1 Pet 1:6-7; 1
Pet 4:12-17; 2 Tim 3:12; 1 Thess 3:1-5; Jas 1:2-4; 2 Co 1:3-11; Heb 12:3-12; 1
Jn 3:13; Revelation 6:9-11; Revelation 7:9-17; Revelation 11:1-3; Revelation 12:17; Revelation 13:1-18; Revelation
14:1-13]
An
Original Work / September 11, 2012
Christ’s
Free Servant, Sue J Love
Bombs are bursting. Night is falling.
Jesus Christ is gently calling
You to follow Him in all ways.
Trust Him with your life today.
Make Him your Lord and your Savior.
Turn from your sin. Follow Jesus.
He will forgive you of your sin;
Cleanse your heart, made new within.
Men betraying: Our trust fraying.
On our knees to God we’re praying,
Seeking God to give us answers
That are only found in Him.
God is sovereign over all things.
Nothing from His mind escaping.
He has all things under His command,
And will work all for good.
Jesus Christ is gently calling
You to follow Him in all ways.
Men deceiving: We’re believing
In our Lord, and interceding
For our nation and its people
To obey their God today.
He is our hope for our future.
For our wounds He offers suture.
He is all we need for this life.
Trust Him with your life today.
Don’t Give Up The Fight!
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