PSALM 82 - Godless Gods

Summer Psalms 2024 • Sermon • Submitted 2 months ago • Presented 2 months ago • 43:33

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Christians are never dismayed by godless authorities, since they know that God is righteous and will certainly judge all things rightly someday

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Introduction

This Thursday, we will celebrate the two-hundred forty-eighth year of the independence of the United States of America. Now, I don’t know what traditional celebrations you and your family might be looking forward to—hopefully they will involve a lot of grilling, maybe a parade (and a few explosions loud enough to make tyrants nervous, accompanied by shouts of “Down with the House of Hanover!” thrown in for good measure!)

But let me suggest, if you haven’t done so, to find about ten minutes (or less) to read through the founding document of our nation—the Declaration of Independence. It doesn’t take long to read, and there’s a really great version on YouTube by Max MacLean if you like (or you can all sit together as a family and take turns reading sections).

The Declaration includes some of the most famous statements in all of the English language—it stirs the hearts of everyone who hears them all around the world (Americans most of all):

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed… https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declaration-transcript

The rights that you and I enjoy today are given not by governments, but by God—and His design for this world is to place governments over us not to give us our rights, but to protect the rights He has bestowed on us.

But as we ourselves are all-too aware, governments are not very good at protecting rights, are they? Eventually even the best of them will stop seeing themselves as protectors of the rights of men and begin acting as though they are the ones who bestow those rights. And when that happens, it invariably results (as Jefferson wrote in the Declaration):

"...a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism...” (ibid.)

It is an unavoidable fact that the government established by our Founding Fathers to replace the “absolute Despotism” that they struggled against has itself become just as tyrannical in its own way—our governing authorities have made it a matter of policy to convince mothers to slaughter their own babies in the womb, and mutilate thousands more with bizarre surgeries to destroy their ability to reproduce before they are old enough to understand, to use the weakest and most helpless members of our population as political pawns or electoral bargaining chips in order for them to gain or consolidate their lust for power. These are the authorities who threaten to close down churches for gathering for worship while at the same time enticing mobs of protesters to burn down their own neighborhoods, who foster a culture where a cake baker or florist is sued for not celebrating anal sex, a legal structure where a homeschooling family can be threatened with removal of their children if they do not enroll them in the government’s schools.

As Isaiah cried out in his lament over Israel:

Isaiah 5:20 (LSB)

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness, Who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!

So here at the threshold of another Independence Day celebration, Christian, we need to ask: What does a 4th of July celebration look like when the nation we are celebrating is governed by unrighteous judges and wicked rulers? What hope do we have when those who have been given authority by God for our good turn away from Him?

Our text this morning gives us the answer—our hope is in our God! The message of Psalm 82 is that we can have great confidence and courage as we rest in the righteous sovereign judgment of our God! This text before us this morning is a song that celebrates the truth that we sang earlier in our worship— “That though the wrong seems oft’ so strong, God is the Ruler yet!”

This is the message of Psalm 82—this is what I pray that God will make real to you this morning in such a way that it governs not only your Independence Day celebration this week, but also fills your spirit, heart, mind and soul with fresh courage and confident assurance in this wicked and godless hour:

Don't be DISMAYED by godless AUTHORITIES destined for God's JUDGMENT

We can see in this short psalm at least four reasons why we need not be dismayed at the wickedness that flows from our halls of power, the perversions enshrined in law, the injustice done with high-handed disregard for God and His commands. Christian, you need not be dismayed, for

I. He SEES what they are DOING (Psalm 82:1-2)

Look with me at verse 1:

Psalm 82:1 (LSB)

God takes His stand in the congregation of God; He judges in the midst of gods.

The wording of verse 1 is a bit cryptic—the word “Elohim” is used for God’s name (God takes His stand…) And then again with “in the congregation of El (singular). And then it goes on to say that Elohim (God) judges in the midst of elohim (gods). The Hebrew word el at its root simply designates a creature that does not have a physical body; a spirit. So in that sense, God is an el—He is a Spirit and does not have a body like men. But He alone is the eternal and all-creator El, referred to in the plural to reflect His majesty. So if we read this with the Hebrew text in mind, it reads: “Elohim takes His stand in the congregation of El; He judges in the midst of elohim...”

So we read here that God (Big “E” Elohim) has convened a council of all of the (small “e” elohim); all angels, principalities, powers, gods and goddesses of all creation are summoned into His presence as He holds courtroom proceedings against the “gods” (again, “elohim”) that have ruled unrighteously (v. 2). Think of these “elohim”—these spirit beings—in terms of Paul’s description of our struggle against heavenly rulers in Ephesians 6--

Ephesians 6:12 (LSB)

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.

And as God conducts His prosecution against these wicked spirit rulers in the spiritual realm, His judgments flow downward from Heaven to earth to earthly rulers as well. What is being said to the wicked heavenly rulers in judgment also applies to the wicked earthly rulers here.

Remember, we are moving through the third book of the Psalms—what one commentator called a “five movement cantata” of God’s covenant faithfulness. The psalms in this third book are characterized as songs of lament over what seems to be the failure of God’s covenant to His people. Psalm 81 was a call to God’s people to turn back to Him; Psalm 82 is a call to the rulers God has established to turn back to Him—the heavenly rulers, and by extension, the earthly rulers. So this psalm was included in Book III as a lament over the wickedness of Israel’s rulers and an expression of hope in God’s perfect justice.

Psalm 82 is a song of God’s judgment on both supernatural rulers in heavenly places as well as mortal rulers on earth. You do not need to be dismayed of either spiritual forces of wickedness in heavenly places or mortal forces of wickedness in City Hall. Because either way, we see here in verse 2 of our text that

They are summoned to ANSWER for their ACTIONS

God’s question in verse 2 makes it plain that He has known all along what they have been up to:

Psalm 82:2 (LSB)

How long will you judge unrighteously And show partiality to the wicked? Selah.

Consider for a moment how often the psalmists cry out with this same question about the wicked enemies that torment them:

Psalm 4:2 (LSB)

O sons of men, how long will my glory become a reproach? How long will you love what is worthless and seek falsehood?

Or how often the psalmist cries out to God asking how long He will delay in rescuing:

Psalm 35:17 (LSB)

Lord, how long will You look on? Bring back my soul from their ravages, My only life from the lions.

Think on this and you will see the encouragement in it: Christian, when you cry out to God asking how long until He delivers you, take comfort in knowing that He has seen every last injustice and act of wickedness they have committed, and He demands of them “How long will you keep this up? I have seen all of it, I remember all of it, and you are going to answer for it all.”

Mark it well, beloved—God sees and remembers every act of the wicked “gods” who inhabit the halls of power—He is watching when

They prop up CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR

That is the sense behind “showing partiality to the wicked” in verse 2—the word “partiality” has the idea of “lifting up the head”—propping up wickedness, stacking the deck in favor of immorality and sin. To those who will have eyes to see it, this is manifestly true in our present hour, and it’s really something that—frankly speaking—a lot of Christians need to quit being surprised and exasperated over. Of course they are going to rig the game; that’s what godless authorities do! Christian, you are never going to get the ref to call pass interference on the other team when the ref is the one that shoved the receiver! The playing field is not level—quit expecting the same authorities who allowed casinos to stay open during the pandemic while shutting down churches to listen to you about anything. Your hope is in the justice of God Who sees and judges, not in the so-called “justice” dispensed by authorities who disregard and ignore Him.

Don’t be dismayed by godless authorities—they are destined for God’s judgment. he sees what they are doing, and in verses 3-4 of our text

II. He COMMANDS them to REPENT (vv. 3-4)

Psalm 82:3–4 (LSB)

Give justice to the poor and the orphan; Justify the afflicted and destitute. Protect the poor and needy; Deliver them out of the hand of the wicked.

The word “poor” that we see in these verses may immediately bring to mind the image of financial poverty—but the word underlying the English translation doesn’t primarily mean a person who has no money—it literally means a weak person; someone who lacks strength or authority, someone who is ineffectual or helpless. And so the sense of the command God is giving to these godless authorities can be expressed as:

Stop EXPLOITING the HELPLESS

The most helpless members of our society are the most exploited—children used as bargaining chips between covenant-breaking parents in a divorce settlement, babies adopted by gay or lesbian parents who permanently deprive them of God-ordained family structure of a mother and a father in order to satisfy their own twisted desires for a “modern family”. Or refugees whose homes were so ravaged and devastated by war, corruption, poverty and loss that they walked hundreds of miles in the desperate hope they could find a life in America, only to be exploited by politicians on both sides of the aisle—Democrats who ignore immigration law and lie to them to get them to come here illegally so they can exploit them for votes to keep them in power, and Republicans who exploit them by turning them into objects of fear and hatred and suspicion to incite their constituencies to vote out all the Democrats. But neither side really cares about them. It is wicked when Democrats exploit them, and wicked when Republicans do the same. (And right now, at this moment, all of the “Yeah buts” and “Whatabouts” are filling your mind to argue over why your political party is actually right about the way the helpless are treated only shows how much of the Kool-Aid you’ve already drunk).

God commands godless authorities to repent of their exploitation of the helpless, and He commands them to

Stop HARASSING the FAITHFUL (cp. Isa. 3:14)

Psalm 82:3 (LSB)

Give justice to the poor and the orphan; Justify the afflicted and destitute.

The word translated “afflicted” is used in other places in the Old Testament to describe the suffering of the righteous ones who were being abused and taken advantage of at the hands of the wicked:

Isaiah 3:14 (LSB)

Yahweh enters into judgment with the elders of His people and His princes, “It is you who have consumed the vineyard; The plunder robbed of the afflicted is in your houses.

God sees the way that the godless “gods” have taken advantage of the godly, the way they have harassed and deprived the faithful of justice, and He commands them instead to protect them from the attacks of the wicked:

Psalm 82:4 (LSB)

Protect the poor and needy; Deliver them out of the hand of the wicked.

God has convened His assembly in order to call the godless authorities of heaven and earth to account for their unrighteousness—do not be dismayed at their schemes, beloved, because He sees what they are doing, He commands them to repent—and see further in verses 5-7

III. He PRONOUNCES their JUDGMENT (Psalm 82:5-7)

Notice how their judgment comes upon them in verse 5:

Psalm 82:5 (LSB)

They do not know and do not understand; They walk about in darkness; All the foundations of the earth are shaken.

As God calls these godless authorities to account, Psalm 82 shows us,

Their IGNORANCE will be REVEALED (cp. Rom. 1:21-22)

Once again we see one of the great themes of the book of Psalms surfacing here again in Psalm 82—these wicked rulers who “walk about in darkness” are the opposite of the blessed man,

Psalm 1:1 (LSB)

...who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, Nor stand in the way of sinners, Nor sit in the seat of scoffers!

Unlike the blessed man, these wicked authorities do not know or understand God’s Law—they have never walked in His way, so they don’t understand or care what He has directed. They are instead full of their own wisdom and are thoroughly impressed with their own intellectual accomplishments. They will not glorify God though the Scriptures are clear that they do know He exists:

Romans 1:21–22 (LSB)

For even though they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools,

The day will come when all of the prideful vanity of their supposed intellectual superiority (by which they scold you for your bigotry, ignorance and “not believing The Science”) will be revealed for the hollow charade it has always been. They are too proud to walk in the light of God’s Law, and so, God says, they day is coming when

Their GLORY will PERISH (cp. Proverbs 24:19-20)

Psalm 82:6–7 (LSB)

I said, “You are gods, And all of you are sons of the Most High. “Nevertheless you will die like men And you will fall like any one of the princes.”

Here we come to the verse that Our Lord Jesus quoted to the religious leaders in John 10:34—they were objecting to Him “making Himself out to be God”, so Jesus quotes this verse to say that if human leaders can be called “gods”, then surely the Messiah can be called God!

So again, what I would suggest here is that we are seeing a kind of overlap between the heavenly authorities and the earthly authorities God is condemning. On the one side, these verses describe how the glory and honor of those rebellious angelic beings will be stripped from them (as, for instance, the “angels who did not keep their own estate” in Jude 6 who have been thrown down into the lowest pit of darkness waiting for their judgment).

And consider for a moment the warning that is written here for the godless authorities of our present hour—consider how much they love their prominence! How proud they are to be honored and saluted and received with pomp and circumstance! How puffed up they are in their insolent pride, that they are the leaders of men, that they have the power of life and death over anyone who opposes them! They can use the courts and the legislatures and the banks and the movie studios and the marketplace to impose their will on anyone, and their names will go down in history for their great and mighty deeds!

Only, God says, they will go down into the dust and be forgotten! No fame, no honor, no great historical legacy or monumental remembrance—fifty years from now schoolchildren won’t even be required to know their names on their history tests! They all believe they will have renown that will outlive them, but no one will care. As the old preacher once said, “Six feet of dirt make all men equal”—no one will miss them!

See, Christian, how God’s Word exhorts you not to be dismayed by the godless authorities destined for God’s judgment:

Proverbs 24:19–20 (LSB)

Do not fret because of evildoers Do not be jealous of the wicked; For there will be no future for the evil one; The lamp of the wicked will go out.

Christian, lift up your eyes to your God standing in the midst of the great Assembly, where He calls the godless “gods” to account for their unrighteous judgment—He sees what they are doing, He commands them to repent, He pronounces their judgment—and in the closing verse of this psalm see His promise that

IV. He will RESTORE what they have RAVAGED (Psalm 82:8)

Psalm 82:8 (LSB)

Arise, O God, judge the earth! For it is You who will inherit all the nations.

This is your hope, Christian—in the darkness of our present moment, governed at best by cultural Christians who think that their own personal religious convictions have no place in the public square and at worst by wicked princes who know God’s Law and hate it—your hope is that there is a God in Heaven Who will set everything right! The psalmist cries out here, “Arise, O God—judge the earth!”

Christian—you do not need to be dismayed by the godless authorities who lord it over you, because the God that you serve can (and often does) stop them in their tracks—He is the God who can (and does!) thwart their wicked schemes against His people

By His acts of PROVIDENCE (cf. Ps. 57:6; Esther 7:7-10)

One of God’s most glorious ways of restoring what wicked rulers have ravaged is by causing them to fall into their own trap—as David sang in the cave when the unrighteous king Saul was seeking to destroy him unjustly:

Psalm 57:6 (LSB)

They have set a net for my steps; My soul is bowed down; They dug a pit before me; They themselves have fallen into the midst of it.

Or as Mordecai discovered in Esther 7, when the wicked prince Haman had prepared a gallows to hang him from because he hated Mordecai’s devotion to YHWH—it was Haman who did the Devil’s Dance at the end of that rope instead!

Esther 7:10 (LSB)

So they hanged Haman on the gallows which he had set up for Mordecai, and the king’s wrath subsided.

Christian, the God that you serve delights to bring down the pride of the wicked rulers by their own hand—don’t be intimidated by the traps you see them setting for you, the threats to your liberties and warnings about what they are going to take away from you. Instead, get into the habit of looking over their shoulder to see your Heavenly Father standing behind them, laughing them to scorn for the way they will fall into their own trap!

Psalm 2:4–5 (LSB)

He who sits in the heavens laughs, The Lord mocks them. Then He speaks to them in His anger And terrifies them in His fury...

Your Father’s providential work is more than a match for the relentless schemes and devices of the godless gods who seek to ensnare you, Christian. But even more than that, He has sworn to deliver justice on the earth

By His act of RESURRECTION (cp. Acts 17:31; Ps. 2:8-9)

Justice is coming for you, Christian—justice is coming for this whole world. Not the twisted “social justice” of the arrogant scoffers, not the weak, fallible justice of black-robed legal scholars on high benches, not the vigilante justice of angry mobs burning down cities, but the pure, holy, unalterable and unassailable justice of God Almighty Himself mediated through His Resurrected Son, the Lord Jesus Christ! This is the justice that the Apostle Paul heralded there on Mars Hill in Athens in Acts 17--

Acts 17:31 (LSB)

…[God] has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He determined, having furnished proof to all by raising Him from the dead.”

Consider what this verse is saying: God has proven that He will judge the world in righteousness by raising Jesus from the dead! The resurrection of Christ is proof that God will judge the world someday! Can you begin to see why our secular overlords want to thoroughly dismiss and debunk the fact of the Resurrection of Christ? Because if Christ was not raised from the dead, then they will never have to answer for their deeds! But because Christ has been raised, it means that their Judgment Day is coming.

Don’t be dismayed, Christian, at the ravages of injustice against you and insolence against God that you see with such distressing regularity in this hour—Christ is coming with justice in His Hand! Do not be dismayed when you are accused of injustice by the godless gods of this age; do not succumb to the temptation to abandon God’s righteous character revealed in His Word as your only standard of justice. It is heart-rending to see how many Christian pastors and churches have lined up to conform their notions of “justice” with whatever the voices in power say it should be—the spectacle of preachers and Christian leaders flooding social media to “repent of their whiteness” and beg for forgiveness from those who have twisted the word “justice” out of any resemblance to what God has revealed in His Word. Never seek to apologize for what God’s Word clearly teaches—do not whisper where His word shouts, do not mumble where His word roars.

Christian—make it your aim that, as much as it lies with you, that you will be a demonstration of God’s justice in the lives of those around you. That you will not show partiality to the wicked out of fear of what they will do for you, but will stand firm on God’s Word. that you will love the weak and helpless in your midst, not using them for your own gain or disregarding them because of their lowly status. The next time you hear Spanish being spoken in the checkout line behind you, for instance, instead of immediately worrying that they are some of those MS-13 gang member illegal aliens Glenn Beck has been warning you about, consider how you can show mercy and grace toward them—maybe, just maybe, God has providentially brought them to Jefferson County so someone would share the Gospel with them? They’re not going to hear about salvation offered through Christ from AOC, no matter how many tearful photo-ops she does at the border. They’re not going to hear about justification by grace through faith alone from Greg Abbott—who probably bussed them up to Philly from Texas as political pawns to cause a headache for Josh Shapiro (and Shapiro doesn’t care about them either…) If not you, Christian—then who?

Maybe it’s time for churches in Jefferson and Clearfield Counties to brush up on their Spanish...

Because, you see, you are a Christian—and for you justice must always be mingled with grace and mercy because that is the way you received it from Christ. Had God poured out His justice on you directly, then there is nothing in you that would have caused you to bear up under it:

Psalm 130:3–4 (LSB)

If You should keep iniquities, O Yah, O Lord, who could stand? But with You there is forgiveness, That You may be feared.

Christian—the justice of God is life and hope and confidence for you only because it has first passed through the nail-scarred hands of your Savior! You can rejoice at the thought of Christ bringing justice on the earth as He inherits the nations only because your life is hid in Him through faith! Do not be dismayed at the wicked injustice of godless authorities, for the Day is coming when they will all bow the knee to the Risen Christ and name His Name above every other.

That Day is coming, closer now than it was when we walked into this room. Friend, make every effort to know that that Day will be a day of rejoicing for you when the Resurrected Christ comes to take possession of the nations—do not rely on your own notions of “being a good person”, do not count on how good you are at reading your Bible or coming to worship every Sunday—the only way that you will stand on that Day is by trusting in Jesus’ death in your place on the Cross as payment for your sin against the perfect righteousness of God. Do not try to face the justice of that day on your own merits; He invites you to come on the basis of His works—He freely offers to forgive you, cleanse you and make you fit for that Day. So leave behind all of your injustices, all your unrighteousness, all your partiality and darkness and ignorance and wickedness and come—and welcome!—to Jesus Christ!

BENEDICTION:

1 Thessalonians 5:23, 28 (LSB)

Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely, and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ… The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen.