Ready for Battle? | Psalm 7:10–13
10 My shield is with God,
who saves
the upright in heart.
11 God is a righteous judge,
and a God
who feels indignation every day.
12 If a man does not repent, God will whet
his sword;
he has bent
and readied his bow;
13 he has prepared for him his deadly
weapons,
making his
arrows fiery shafts.
What fearsome language!
The Lord of all creation readies Himself for battle. All those who hate the God Most High face a
grave fate. God doesn’t sin (miss the
mark)—His arrows fire true. His sword doesn’t
dull. And as the KJV translates v. 11, “God is angry
with the wicked every day.” How
blissful the ignorant sinner, unaware of the coming nightmare!
The Lord battles His
enemies with a variety of weapons. For
instance, God providentially allows violence to befall these men of violence
(v. 16). When Christ sets up His
kingdom, we read of a more literal application: “From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations,
and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the
fury of the wrath of God the Almighty” (Rv 19:15).
The Lord knows the
hearts of men. David says that God “saves
the upright in heart” (v. 10). God
recognizes true worship. For instance,
consider 2 Chronicles 29:34—“But the priests
were too few and could not flay all the burnt offerings, so until other priests
had consecrated themselves, their brothers the Levites helped them, until the
work was finished—for the Levites were more upright in heart than the priests
in consecrating themselves.” There, we
see that God knows who is genuine of heart and who is not, and He defends and
punishes accordingly.
The Lord shows mercy
to the penitent. Hope remains, for
verse 12 begins the battle language with the condition that the wicked does not repent. Consider that David, innocent of the slander
of this psalm but certainly a sinner, says, “My shield is with God.” The Lord doesn’t take delight in the destruction
of the wicked (Ez 33:11), and He will relent from disaster (Jon 4:2). When Christ came, He came preaching repentance
(Mk 1:15). In light of all of this,
repent of your sin and believe the gospel today.
