All right, if you have your Bibles, please take them and
turn to Psalm chapter 137. This will be around 40% through
your Bible, depending on how many notes and the likes you
have in the back of your Bible. So Psalm is 40% into your Bible,
150 chapters. So go towards the end, Psalm
137. And if you're watching online,
we're so grateful that you're here with us, whether it's 11/18
on Sunday morning watching live or in the moments or days to
come. And we want to officially invite
you to come and be with us at North Life Church.
Our services are 9 and 10:30 on Monday morning or Monday,
Sunday, Sunday mornings, Sunday mornings, it's always Sunday
morning. I don't know where that came
from. So Sunday mornings 9 and 103115
E Main Street, I'm going to read to you from Psalm 137.
I'm going to read the entire Psalm.
It's 9 versus long. This is a challenging 1, and I
can't wait to explain it to you. But allow me to read to you.
It's in your notes, by the way. And if we run out of notes, are
there still notes on the back table back their way?
There still are some back there. Good.
OK, this is Psalm 137. Let me read it to you.
By the waters of Babylon. There we sat down and wept.
When we remember Zion, and on the willows there we hung up our
liars. A liar is an instrument like a
harp. If you can imagine, they're
hanging their instruments on the Willow trees.
For there are captors required of a songs.
And our tormentors mirth, saying, Sing us one of those
songs of Zion. How shall we sing the Lord's
song in a foreign land? If I forget you, O Jerusalem,
let my right hand forget its skill and let my tongue stick to
the roof of my mouth. If I do not remember you, if I
do not set Jerusalem above my highest joy, Remember Me, O
Lord, against the Edomites the day of Jerusalem.
How they said, Lay it bare, Lay it bare down to its foundations.
O daughter of Babylon, doomed to be destroyed.
Blessed shall be he who repays you with what you've done to us.
Blessed shall be he who takes your little ones and dashes them
against the rocks. Wow.
This is a challenging passage, a challenging song.
So this morning I want to talk to you about a song
misunderstood. A song misunderstood.
Let me pray for us, God, as we dive into this beautiful Psalm.
But this challenging Psalm, they're part, they're verses in
it where we go. What?
What does that mean? Is that what Christianity looks
like? Is this a model prayer for us?
Is it one we should just skip over?
Or is it one that we can glean greatly from?
I believe it's one God that you can greatly grow us.
We pray that you will so open our minds and our hearts.
We we just put our seat belt on. We're like we're ready to go and
we race in So speak to us, we pray and Jesus name and everyone
together said Amen and Amen. Now we have been doing a series
this fall based on the book of Psalms, and I'm calling this the
OG playlist. And by ogi mean, it's like the
original playlist many of you created play like for those of
us who are old enough like me, we remember cassette tapes,
right? You'd sit there and you'd wait
for the radio to play the right song.
And you felt so rich when you'd get a whole cassette tape, Side
A and side B Remember that side A inside BI drive, a 2001 Volvo
wagon. It still has a cassette player
in it, right? I love it.
So I've got side A and side B. And back then you would try to
create like a mix tape and then it went to CDs.
You could burn ACD of your favorite songs and nowadays we
have playlists and they could have 200 songs of your favorite
songs. It's easy to do with Spotify and
Apple Music and other platforms, but watch this.
God the Holy Spirit inspires the Old Testament writers to take
150 songs, or we call them Psalms, and to combine them into
one collection. 1 playlist. And the songs are written over a
1500 year span of history in the Old Testament era, and 150 of
them from a variety of different songwriters end up in this
playlist. And this is God's playlist, the
OG playlist. So we've been walking through
the Psalms and we're not going through them like Psalm 12345.
I've kind of been grouping them or taking one or two here and
there bit I might have to sneeze here in a minute if I've never
sneezed in a message that I can remember.
If I sneeze, man, get ready. My wife's going, oh, it's going
to be bad. I sneeze like, get ready, Kevin.
If I sneeze, try to mute me because I sneeze like four or
five times. But maybe I'll get through it.
We'll see. Pray, pray.
OK, so the song God inspires the Holy Spirit to compile these 150
songs. And we've looked at songs of
like repentance and songs that told like, this is like who God
is. They explain who and what God
is. So there are those psalms.
There are psalms of Thanksgiving and joy and sorrow and lament.
Last week we looked at songs that dealt with grief and they
gave voice to grief that is painful enough where even the
body hurts. And to have those psalms, it's
wonderful. But this week we're going to
tackle this Psalm, Psalm 137, and it says some jarring things.
God bless is the one who takes my enemies babies and dashes
them against the rocks. How could that be rights?
What does the psalmist mean? Is it right to bless the one who
takes our little ones and dashes them against the rocks?
You could build a terrible doctrine or theology around that
if you didn't pause and go, OK, wait a minute, what's going on
here and strive to understand because wrong doctrines can be
built on missing historical context or context of near
verses and general understanding of what I'm going to call the
tapestry of Scripture. When you look at the Bible, I
want you to understand that it is a tapestry.
And Mike has a picture that going to put up here of a of a
really ornate tapestry, right. So tapestry is weaving.
My wife does some crocheting. It's called, Is it crocheting or
what is it called again? It's called nitty.
She knits. All right, she knits and it's
different. It's different than God
crocheting. It's knitting, right?
So she's knitting, she's knit blankets, you know, for our
grandkids and for friends and and it's, you know, sweet to see
her knitting. OK, but these tapestries, they
actually are weaving colors and ending in shapes.
I mean, look how elaborate this is.
That big rug has been, has been weaved.
It's a tapestry and the furniture is tapestry.
And I want you to see that Scripture, the Bible is tapestry
as a metaphor and a tapestry is something composed of many
different, often complex and interwoven parts suggesting a
rich and detailed whole. And it's beautiful.
This is beautiful behind me. And also Scripture is this way.
And when you get to the point where you're understanding, wow,
the Bible has, wow, this shows up here and this shows up there.
When this is connected to that, Oh, that's, oh, that's
connected. Oh, I see how that's connected.
It excites me and I want to grow within you and excitement for
Scripture when you go, oh wow, I didn't know that was connected
here. And wow, there's a theme that's
showing up. It's tapestry.
So if you'll stick with me and allow me to unpack this for you,
then hopefully when we're done in three or four hours, you'll
get it. Yeah, I just kidding.
Good. You're paying attention now
about another 20 or so minutes. OK, now, Psalm 139 is worthy of
leaning into when understood in the tapestry and profoundness of
the Bible. So let me just kind of scan
through Psalm 137. I'm just going to point out a
couple things, and then I'm going to connect it to other
places in Scripture. But let me explain what's going
on here. The writer of the song says by
the waters of Babylon. And if you're new to the Bible,
I don't want to overwhelm you, but I just want you to know that
the Bible is is the it's set up. The Old Testament is the early
part in the New Testament is the latter part of your Bible.
And the Old Testament is not one long chronological story, but
instead it's kind of the story of the Bible, the history of the
Bible. And then after that you get
books of poetry and it's a whole nother section of the Bible.
And then from there you get then like minor prophet or major
prophets and minor prophets and their group were the bigger
prophets who have longer writings there.
There's are towards the end, towards the end of the Old
Testament. But there's a lot of story in
history. God tells his story of his
people. And in the story early on, you
have creation and you have like Abraham and Isaac and Jacob,
Abraham, but they're like many of you know who Abraham was and
you know Joseph who had the coat of many colors.
These are all characters. And then you'll know about David
who killed the giant. They're all in this, you know,
order of story. And then eventually God's people
are very evil and they disobey God for a long time.
And because of that, they're going to be sent into what we
call exile. They're attacked and taken over
by the Assyrians and then the Babylonians.
And this is later in the Bible. And this is the era of like
Daniel in the lion's den. Even if you don't know a lot
about the Bible, maybe you've heard there's a story of Daniel
who gets thrown into a lion's den because he won't stop
praying. And maybe, you know, the story
of these young men named Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego,
they won't bow to this big idle. And so they get thrown into a
fiery furnace and they live. And there's a fourth man in the
fire with them. So I tell you all that just kind
of some pinpoint some moments in the Old Testament.
So watch, this song is being written by the waters of
Babylon. It's in the era of like
Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in Babylon.
It's modern day Iraq. OK, so that's the era.
And why are they in Babylon? Because the people, the nation
of Israel or the Jews from Judah, Judea, they had been
disobedient for a long time to God, and God's judgement comes
upon them because of their disobedience and because of
their evil. And now they find themselves in
exile, taken away into Babylon. So the writer of the song says
by the waters of Babylon. And he says, we sat down and we
wept. They're full of sorrow because
of the consequences that they're experiencing because of their
sin for a long time. And they say we remembered Zion.
And when they're Speaking of Zion, they mean Jerusalem.
They remember where they came from.
They remember their homeland that they've been ruthlessly and
just violently taken away from. And so they are experiencing
great sorrow because of, again, not the sin of an individual,
but the sin of their nation for a long time.
And he says that they hung up their liars on the Willow tree.
And again, a liar is like a harp.
It's an instrument. So as a guitar player, you know,
I appreciate like stringed instruments.
So I can appreciate like the idea of like, they, they, they,
they, they put up their, their liars, their instruments and the
Willow tree. It's like they gave them up.
I'm going to tell you like I, we have a guitar in our bedroom.
I have one downstairs. I have guitars here.
Like even this week we were away for a couple days and I didn't
bring a guitar and I missed it. I want to play my guitar every
day. I just love.
I've been playing guitar since I was 12 years old.
And I just genuinely, and I love that I get to do it for part of
my job, right? But I just love playing guitar.
So they're saying, listen, we hung it up out of our star.
We just gave it up. We put our instruments away.
That's how sad they are. I can't imagine that.
Then they said our captors required songs of us.
It's like their captors, the Babylonians.
Like, come on. It was like mocking them.
Come on, Sing is one of those songs she used to sing in Zion,
those happy songs. Come on, sing it for us.
And of course they didn't want to sing the happy songs.
They're full of sorrow, weeping by the waters of Babylon.
And they say if I forget you, they're talking about the idea.
It's like they had forgotten God as a people group and now
they're in this plight. And once he says, Scott, if I
forget you, he says, let my right hand forget its skill.
Now let me unpack this for you. It's like as a guitar player, I
get this because my right hand is what I use to play guitar
right in my left hand too, but my right hand dominant.
And and it's funny if you're if my wife is always embarrassed at
this, it's like if you're up close to me, you might find that
I have this one long nail here. I keep 1 nail here really long
and I put Polish on it and it's you know, you might think, what
is he doing coke or something? What's up with Kurt?
You know, and that long nails, what's up with that?
I'm not doing coke. OK, I will tell you that I need
that now because I use it as a pick and my right hand is
developed a skill where I strike the the strings right with my
and I keep Polish on these nails too.
So they get hard. And I've developed a skill with
my right hand and my my left hand.
I have I have calluses I've had since I was like 12 years old.
I've got calluses all the way to like my second knuckle, you
know, just from all these years is playing right.
And so the song right here is saying, God, if I forget you,
let my right hand. If I forget you, God, then let
my right hand forget its skill that I developed to play my
instrument. It's kind of a beautiful
picture. And he says, then let my tongue
stick to the roof of my mouth and others, God, if I forget
you, let it be that I only I can't even sing anymore.
If my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth.
I won't be able to sing if I forget you.
God. And then he, he, he mentions the
Edomites. OK, who are the Edomites?
Well, the Edomites are the descendants of of Esau.
If you remember your Old Testament story when you're in
Sunday school, remember Abraham has a son named Isaac, and he
has twins, and they're Jacob and Esau.
And Jacob's the one. If you're new to the Bible,
there's a stairway that goes to heaven and he, you thought Led
Zeppelin came up with it, but they didn't.
It was Jacob and Genesis, right? So Jacob has a brother.
Just connecting the dots for you.
So Jacob has a brother and they're twins, and his name is
Esau. And his descendants become very
evil. And the Edomites, they mock
God's people when they're being taken into exile in Babylon.
And there's a man, Obadiah, he writes a book in the very old
test, very latter part of the Old Testament.
It's only like, it's a very short one book.
There's not even 1 chapter. It's not multiple chapters.
So if you want to be able to brag about reading the whole
book of the Bible, check out Obadiah, man, it's quick.
It's like a 10 minute reading. Like I read Obadiah, check me
out, read the whole book. It's not like reading Psalms,
but it's a quick one and watch what happens.
Obadiah is going to prophecy the destruction of the Edomites
because of their brutality towards God's people and watch
Obadiah verse 10, not a chapter number, just the 1 chapter verse
10. It says because of the violence
done to your brother Jacob, meaning the descendants of Jacob
who are God's people here in Psalms.
Because of the violence done to your brother Jacob, shame shall
cover you and you shall be cut off forever.
So when the psalmist says God, remember the Edomites and how
evil they were, how they were like they mocked us and said,
lay it bare. Lay it bare.
Tear the city of Jerusalem down. God's going to bring judgement
and it's prophesied and it happens.
So watch this. You can kind of determine that
this Psalm is written before the destruction of the Edomites in
Obadiah, but after their time of exile.
So somewhere in the 500 BC area, it's written.
So back to Psalm 137. So that's the context that
Edomites had mocked God's people when the Babylonians came and
violently took them into exile. Now watch this.
So going back to Psalm 137, verse 8, it says, O daughter of
Babylon, doomed to be destroyed, the daughter of Babylon.
So Babylon. And when he's his daughter and
he's like the children, the descendants, the descendants of
Babylon, you are doomed to be destroyed.
It's prophecy. And then it goes into verse 8.
And here's the confusing part that I want to make sense of for
you. The songwriter says, blessed
shall be he who takes your little ones and dashes them
against the rock. Will you forget me forever?
He says. Now, is this verse calling down
a call for some man to bring vengeance against an enemy by
killing its little ones? You might read and think it's
that that's what's happening here.
You can. It's potential for really
terrible doctrine. You're like, if you read this
and go, wow, look at the Bible. The Bible has encouraged me to
pray like, yeah, that my enemies, man, that someone will
rise up and just dash their babies against the rock.
Yep. The Bible says it.
You can build some pretty horrible doctrine, but when the
psalmist is blessed is he? The question is, who is he?
The answer to the question is that he, in this context, is
God. The songwriter is saying God,
they are doomed. You've prophesied their
destruction, you prophesied it. They're evil.
Justice will come and you will destroy them.
And he's saying, blessed is God who will do to them what they
did to us. And this is part of the tapestry
of Scripture, right? So you have to understand why.
What permits the psalmist to say, God, do to them what they
did to us? They dashed our babies against
the rock. God, you do it the same.
You must understand that it had been prophesied by Isaiah and
Jeremiah and other Old Testament writers that Jerusalem would be
destroyed and God's people would be brought into exile.
Why? Because they were disobedient as
a nation, not as an individual. But this is national watch.
This is national judgment upon a nation that is evil and ungodly.
God allows His judgment to come and Isaiah prophesied it.
Look at Isaiah chapter 1 verses one and two.
It's Isaiah opens his book by saying the vision of Isaiah the
son of Amos, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem
in the days of Uzziah and Jotham and Ahaz Hezekiah, kings of
Judah. So Isaiah is like, OK, here's
what I'm seeing. And he says hear O heavens and
give ear O earth for the Lord has spoken Children have I
reared and brought up, but they have rebelled against me.
Now though Isaiah comes after the Psalms in your Bible.
This passage lands chronologically before Psalm
137. Okay, so watch this again.
You just know that Isaiah man, he's over here his books like
over here in this area. But Psalms again, it's not all
in chronological order. So Isaiah prophesying the
destruction and the psalmist is writing a song about it in song
137. OK so though Isaiah comes later,
this is prophecy. Then he what is he going to
prophecy in chapter 1 verse 4? Ah, sinful nation.
A people laden with iniquity, offsprings of evil doers,
children who deal corruptly. They have forsaken the Lord,
they've despised the Holy One of Israel, and they are utterly
estranged. Who is Isaiah talking about?
He's talking about those in Jerusalem and those in Judah.
These are God's people, but as a nation they have become terribly
evil and ungodly. They're in rebellion.
So Isaiah prophesied that Babylon will come.
Watch what he says. This is Isaiah 39, six through
7. Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah,
who is the king, Hear the word of the Lord of hosts.
Behold, the days are coming when all that is in your house, and
that which your father's have stored up to this day shall be
carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left, says the
Lord. And some of your own sons who
will come from you, whom will, whom you will father, shall be
taken away, and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the
king of Babylon. It had been prophesied as a
warning. And if they would have repented,
if they would have turned away from their sin, then the wrath
of God, the judgment of God would not have come.
But it does. And Jeremiah 6, Jeremiah
prophesied the same thing. And he says in verse 11 of
chapter 6. Therefore, I am full of wrath of
the Lord. I am weary of holding it in.
God's saying I'm weary of holding my wrath in because it
has to come. My judgment has to come
eventually. Pour it out upon the children in
the street. And upon the gatherings of young
men also both husband and wife shall be taken, the elderly and
the very aged. Their houses shall be turned
over to others, their fields and wives together.
For I will watch this. This is God speaking, and this
might shock you, but this is in the Bible.
Their houses shall be turned over to others, their fields and
wives together. For I will stretch out my hand
against the inhabitants of the land, declares the Lord.
God's wrath appears in cycle in the Old Testament.
Why? Because his people become evil
as ungodly as the Pagan nations around them.
And when they become evil, God's wrath.
He'll permits it, and he allows it.
And often God's judgement will come at the hand of other evil
doers. God allows the evil Babylonians
to give consequence to the evil Jews.
It's a curious thing, but it's right there in the Bible, and
this is the tapestry, the weaving.
Watch the cycles that God's people will be obedient, but
then they get rebellious. They're in rebellion, and then
prophecy will come, warnings will come, and then they don't
adhere. So there's destruction.
And then they pray out to God. And God always over and over
again restores them, gives them mercy and grace.
He brings His justice. And Psalm 137 is giving voice to
those who are in exile. And it's a picture of someone in
the midst of national punishment for the sins of its people
saying God, we trust. When we say God blessed is he,
we're speaking about God. God blessed are you who will do
to them what they've done to us. Now I want to unpack this for
you. But in general, what they're
saying is God, blessed are you who will bring justice and
judgement. They're celebrating it.
And it seems harsh, the voice of this one in exile.
Now, I want to speak to this in light of the elections that we
just had. And I want to tell you that it's
important for a church to rise up to fight against the sins of
the nation in order to keep us away from destruction.
And you know, in years past, I've I've talked about when
elections are rolling around, I'll talk about, you know, these
are the issues, these are the platforms, these are the issues.
And I must say over and over again, I say it, this is not a
right wing, left wing, this is not a Democrat, Republican,
libertarian, independent. That is not the issue.
The issue is about the Kingdom of God and principles that are
righteous and holy. Evil is out there and we want to
address it and watch when it doesn't get addressed in this
nation, eventually God's wrath and judgment is poured out on
them. And so we as a church, not just
our church, but the church at large, should speak out against
the evils in our nation. And if we don't, then we risk
being subject to the judgment and wrath of God.
And I'm not saying it to be like a doomsday type.
I'm telling you it's just a cycle of things.
So the church has often the church has fallen for the slide
that all the church in the state are to be separated.
It's a myth, it's a lie, it's not true.
We have freedom of speech. I can talk from the platform
about anything that Scripture says.
And if it's in defiance of our government, so be it.
If it's in defiance of evil in our land, I can speak about I
have freedom of speech and the government cannot control that.
And again, it's not about Democrat or Republican, it's
about righteousness, right? And so watch this, this last
week, again, I didn't talk about because locally in our election,
we didn't have a lot of things going on.
But I'm telling you, you need to be concerned about what's
happening in Dearborn. You need to be concerned about
what's happening in New York. We live in Michigan.
What's happening in Dearborn with the takeover of Islamist
radicals, it needs to be addressed.
And mutilation of our children who are confused about their
gender identity, this needs to be addressed.
And if the church stays silent, shame on us, right?
So watch this. So the psalmist is saying,
listen, they're saying like God's destruction and wrath
came. Why did it come?
Because the nation had gotten so evil.
They experienced the judgment of God that comes as a result of
disobedience and rebellion against the things and rules and
will and laws of God. So he's in the midst of
experiencing this national national wrath and judgment of
God. Now in the past, like 3 years
ago when proposal three, maybe you remember that three years
ago right about now, Michigan after Roe V Wade was turned
over, there was a proposal before Michigan to say about
abortion to make it easier and easier and easier to have the
right to kill our children. I spoke out about it.
I spoke about it from the platform and I will tell you
that a lot of churches didn't in our area.
Even I was convicted because our Catholic brothers and sisters
who love Jesus, some also I was driving by the Catholic Church
and sign after sign after sign, I'm like, why am I being so
quiet about this? So we put it on our sign and I
preached about it. We put it on Facebook.
Vote no for proposal 3. And I stood right here and I
said church, this is not a right wing, left wing Democrat,
Republican issue. This is an issue of
righteousness. Vote no on this proposal.
I said it from this platform, and some might have been
offended, I don't know. Maybe they left and I didn't
know it. But I just want you to know then
when Charlie Kirk was martyred, like a couple months ago, I
talked about it, how to deal with evil.
And there are going to be issues that come upon us.
And if Scripture talks about it and addresses it, I want you to
know as your pastor that I will address evil and unrighteousness
in our land. And you need to be good with
that. Are you very good?
All right. Now going back to Psalm 137,
watch here. He says, blessed shall be he who
takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock.
Who is he? He is God.
Now, why is why is it OK? And what is the psalmist trying
to portray here? Well, let me make sense of this
for you because I want you to get your head around this.
But the psalmist is is taking a law from Exodus, and he's
putting it into play. And what is the law?
The law is found in Exodus chapter 21 and also in
Leviticus. But this is Moses setting a
precedent or law that is really revolutionary in the ancient
world. What is it?
Maybe you're familiar with the saying verse 23.
But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life, Eye for
eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for
burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
This is the law. Now what is this talking about?
Moses is offering a revolutionary advancement in the
ancient world. He's saying if someone pokes
your eye out, then justice is you poke their eye out.
Now that sounds barbaric in our world, but let me explain what
happened in the ancient world. Let's say if I'm a powerful
person and I have a lot of power and you step on my toe and I get
offended and I get hurt that I and the Angel rule could go, I'm
going to I'm going to wipe out your entire family.
I'm going to wipe out your entire nation.
You stepped on my toe. I'm going to kill everybody in
your family. Moses comes along and says, no
eye for an eye. What's fair?
An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
And again, now we've even culture has even advanced more
and God's lead is into greater depths.
But that was like a step forward in the ancient world.
That law was revolutionary. And so when the psalmist says
God, blessed are you God, who does to them what they did to
us, eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth.
The Babylonians had taken their children and murdered them
ruthlessly. And the psalmist to get your
head around it. The psalmist is saying, God, an
eye for an eye. I'm, I'm, I'm adhering to your
law. God, blessed are you, God, when
you bring your wrath upon them and they experience what we
experience, you do to them what they did to us.
But watch what the psalmist is saying.
He's not saying God strengthen me so I can go out and take
revenge. He's not saying God strengthened
my brothers or though my those in, you know, those who are
connected with me, God strengthened them, empower them
so they can go and bring justice and revenge.
No, he's saying God, blessed are you when you do to them an eye
for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
But let me take it further. What I want you to see is that
Psalm 137 is an expression of trust in the midst of exile,
trusting God to bring justice. And that is the big principle
here, the big principle more than saying, God, take my
enemies, God, blessed are you. God, you could pray, God, do to
them what they did to me. But the greater and more
righteous prayer, even, it's like, God, I am not going to
take revenge into my own hands. I'm not going to encourage those
around me to take violence and take revenge instead.
God, I'm trusting you. God, you will bring vengeance.
You will bring your judgement, You will bring justice.
God, I entrust justice to you. That's what the psalmist is
saying. God, blessed are you when you do
to them what they did to us, whatever that's going to look
like. That is the greater principle.
Now, some people are confused about this because some people
think that Jesus demands just pacifism, that we are not to
celebrate justice, right? And I must tell you that like
you were made with the sense innate for justice and judgement
that is righteous. God wired it in you.
Maybe you don't know that, but it is.
It's there. And for me, it shows up
sometimes in quirky ways, right? Have you ever seen these videos
on YouTube about these sovereign citizens?
Anyone's seen these sovereign citizen citizen videos there?
There's this movement, right? Cruz has, there's this movement
where these, these these people, I had said they're stupid, but
they're really stupid. Not that I have an opinion, but
but they're really stupid. And so they drive around and
they don't think they need a driver's license or insurance
and they think they don't need a license plate.
They don't think and they'll say I'm a sovereign citizen.
I'm sovereign, I'm free of the rules of the slam.
And they drive our roads. And so there's like thousands of
these videos you can watch on YouTube.
And that somehow because I've started watching now my
algorithm, they show up often and I find a lot of joy in these
videos. And I'm not sure what that says
about me. But what happens is people get
pulled over and the officer will say, hi, I need your driver's
license, proof of insurance and registration.
And they'll say, I'm, I'm sovereign, I don't have a
driver's license. But they him hauling around,
they, they have, they're like, I'm, I'm not trying, I'm not
driving, I'm traveling. That's one of their lines.
I'm not driving, I'm traveling because of some maritime law
from the 1800s or something. So they think they don't need a
driver's license. And the police officers over and
over and over again, they'll say you need a driver's license,
roll down your window. I need a driver's license.
I don't need, I'm not driving, I'm traveling.
You know, So eventually the punch line of the videos is
often what happens if they don't get out of the car, then the
police will break their window and they'll drag them out of the
car. Now, I'm not promoting police
brutality. That's not what I'm saying.
But I am saying that I have the sense of justice and I find
great delight and watching justice be poured out.
When they drag these people out of their cars and they put them
in an ankles and they go to jail.
I'm like, yeah, justice, right? I don't know, man, maybe I'm
twisted, but the point is that we are wired for justice.
We're wired to go, this is right, and when right prevails,
we're for it innately. And that is kind of a moment
where it fleshes itself out in me right now.
Some though, they get confused and they think, well, maybe
Jesus demands us to not yearn for justice or to be pacifists.
What is a pacifist or pacifism is the belief that any violence,
including war, is unjustifiable under any circumstance and that
all disputes should be settled only by peaceful means.
OK, so pacifist like, you know, I want to be Christ like.
So some people think Jesus promotes pacifism, and where do
they get that from? From Matthew chapter 5.
Let me unpack this for you. And Matthew 5 verse 38.
Maybe you're familiar with the saying.
Even if you're new to Christianity and you don't know
much about the Bible, you probably have heard this.
This Jesus is speaking. He says you have heard that it
was, it was said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
Wow. Jesus is quoting the Old
Testament. He's quoting the principle that
Psalm 137 has God do to them what they did to us.
We're waiting on you, God, you do justice.
And Jesus says you've heard this.
But he says, but I say to you, do not resist the one who is
evil. OK, he says, but if anyone slaps
you on your right cheek, turn him the other.
Also, this passage is widely, widely misunderstood and I want
to bring it to clarity for you because often people think that
this is Jesus promoting that the Christians should just welcome
and take abuse and not retaliate or stand up or protect or fight
for righteousness. Is that what Jesus is saying
here when we say turn the other cheek, this is not what Jesus is
saying. Let me explain to you what he's
saying. In the in this ancient world
where Jesus was walking, the Romans had taken over that part
of the world, the Roman Empire. And so Jesus is existing in
exile with the Romans ruling. And the Romans, they, they
couldn't, you know, if you were a criminal, they could crucify
you. They paint Jesus as a criminal
and they crucify. But the Roman soldiers and
officials only had so many rights, so they couldn't really
abuse you. And this was all over the Roman
Empire, but they could shame you.
So when Jesus says if someone strikes you on your, your right
cheek, if they slap you on your right cheek, here's my right
cheek. But if I'm going to slap someone
on their right cheek, then how? But in the ancient world,
everybody tried to use the right hand, left hand in this was
considered evil, right? So you have your right hand.
So if I'm going to strike someone on their right cheek,
which is over here, how am I going to do that?
I'm going to backhand them. If I punch them, I'm punching
them in the face. If I strike them on their left
side, which is over here, I mean, I have more power.
I can hit them with this part or I can hit them with my fist.
But if I'm going to strike somebody on their right cheek,
I'm going to use my right arm and I'm going to backhand them.
And in this occasion, Jesus is saying, listen, he point, he's
saying it very specifically. He doesn't say if someone
strikes you in the face, you can, you don't strike them back,
just put you up your face again and say hit me again.
Jesus is not saying that. He's saying if someone slaps
you, it's not necessarily violent or death threatening.
It's not, it's just a slap. Jesus is saying, watch this.
If someone slaps you on your right cheek, just give them the
other one. And this occasion, what Jesus is
saying, he's encouraging them like to be courageous and, and
in the midst of public humiliation, to stand up and be
strong and like, be courageous, like, OK, you slap me.
Here it is. Slap me over here again.
He's not saying if you punch me, punch me again.
He's not saying that this is not an issue of physical abuse.
It's a it's an, it's about public shame and Jesus goes on,
you can go read it. He says if they ask you to carry
your pack for a mile, it was a rule along the Roman Empire that
a Roman soldier could say, hey, carry my pack for a mile.
It's shame. Jesus says, if they say that,
I'll do it a second mile. If they take your cloak, your
coat, just give it to them. It was Jesus wasn't talking
about physical abuse necessarily or or potential for being
killed. He's saying don't protect
yourself. He's saying if someone shames
you just off from your other cheek, and in doing so you'll be
the bigger person, that Roman soldier thinks they're so
powerful, but when you go, here's the other cheek, then now
you're in a position of power and courage.
But some people misunderstand this.
So they take this to mean that we should not stand up and fight
for righteousness and we shouldn't defend.
We should never go to war. This is not what Jesus is
saying. That is not the context of what
he's saying. He's saying that when you're in
the midst of public shame, this is how you should respond.
So what I want to show you is that we are to stand for
righteousness. We are to protect our own.
We are to protect ourselves. Jesus is not saying that, and we
should watch this. Maybe you were wrong and you
thought, oh, that's ungodly. I want to show you that it's
godly to hope and pray and celebrate the justice of God.
Now, how do I know it's true? Is it a New Testament thing?
Yeah, it's a New Testament thing.
Not only is it a New Testament thing, it's a Revelation thing.
Now watch this. In Revelation, you're going to
see that God is going to use the imagery of Babylon in
Revelation. So you have Babylon in the Old
Testament, which was a real empire.
The Babylonian empire was real. But then in the New Testament,
the evil empire that's going to rise, it's going to be called
Babylon in Revelation and it's going to be called the daughter
of Babylon. And Psalm 137 references, it's
using some of the same language. Watch what happens in Revelation
18. One and two, are we to celebrate
God's judgement that comes upon Babylon?
Let me tell you what's what it says verse one, after this, this
is John the Revelator. He says, after this I saw
another Angel coming down from heaven having great authority,
and the earth was made bright with his glory, and he called
out with a mighty voice, falling, falling is Babylon the
Great, a haunt for every unclean spirit, a haunt for every
unclean bird, a haunt for every unclean and detestable beast who
has come down, who has fallen? Babylon the evil empire at the
end of the age that Jesus will defeat is painted as Babylon,
and an ancient comes out of heaven mocking and celebrating
the victory of God over the evil empire.
Babylon Revelation utilizes Babylon as the archetype, the
evil of the end times in the story of Revelation weaves that
tapestry that we looked at. It weaves God's judgment and
justice in to the tapestry of Scripture.
Now watch this. This is really big.
Revelation is not about human revenge, but it is about the
ultimate justice of God and the Angel coming out of heaven is
celebrating it. Now similar language is used
again in chapter 18. Watch this.
The language is similar to Psalm 137, the tapestry.
It's connected. Verse 4 John says, then I heard
another voice from heaven saying, come out of her my
people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her
plagues, for her sins are he pie as heaven and God has remembered
her iniquities. And then watch what John says,
pay her back as she herself has paid back others and repay her
double for her deeds. Mix a double portion for her and
the cups she mixed. Now watch what's happening here.
God is saying to his people, come out of Babylon.
Come out of the evil in your culture where they're evil.
Get out of there because if you don't, you're at risk of
experiencing the judgement and wrath that's coming.
Get out of Babylon and in the world that we exist in now the
culture where we are in our nation, in our state around us,
there is evil. There is the spirit of Babylon
and John is saying through the Angel come out, but watch what
else they're like. Pay her back God, pay back evil
in Babylon. We're praying for God to judge
the evil around us. Now watch John, the Angel is not
saying go out and be violent. Go out and fight the evil around
you. Go out.
No, it's saying that they're praying God, you, you bring
justice, pay her back. It's really strong language.
It's similar to the language that is found in Psalm 137.
And then in verse 19, Watch this, it says.
And they threw dust on their heads as they wept and mourned,
crying out, alas, alas, the great city where all who had
ships at sea grew rich by her. Well, for in a single hour she
has been laid waste. Who is laid waste?
The queen of Babylon. Babylon, God brought his
judgement. It's happening at the end times.
It's in Revelation, it's there and watch what are we to do when
God brings judgement over the evil of Babylon, verse 20,
Rejoice over her, Oh heaven and you St. and apostles and
prophets, for God has given judgement for you against her.
Now you might have thought because you didn't know Psalm
137, and maybe you grew up in a tradition of Christianity where
it was about pacifists, and you might think, oh, it would never
be right to pray for God's judgement on evil.
You might thought, oh, we're to turn the other cheek.
We never fight back against evil.
We just take punishment. We take abuse as Christians.
No, according to Revelation, we celebrate when God's judgement
shows up for evil. We don't take revenge in our own
hands, but we do pray for God's righteousness and justice to
come. God's justice is to be rejoiced
over. Now Romans 12/18 let me bring
some balance that you misunderstand what I'm saying.
Romans 12 verse 18, Paul writes to the church in Roman.
He says, if possible, so far as it depends on you, live
peaceably with all, beloved, never avenge yourselves, but
leave it to the wrath of God. For it is written, vengeance is
mine. I will repay, says the Lord.
To the contrary, what are we to do?
We're waiting on God's judgement.
Vengeance is his. And what does Paul say to the
Church of Rome? And he's saying to us to the
contrary, If your enemy is hungry, feed him.
If he is thirsty, give him something to drink, for by doing
so you will heap burning coals on his head.
Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
That truth and the truth of revelation are to be blended
together in the tapestry of our faith, because if you only get
one and you miss the other, you'll miss it.
We rejoice and celebrate and pray for the judgment of God on
evil, but we don't take it into our own hands and think that we
are going to be the instrument of the vengeance of God.
Instead, those who are enemies, we feed them, and the ones that
are thirsty, we give them something to drink.
Do you see the contrast here? It's vengeance is mine, says the
Lord. And you and I are instructed to
those who are enemies to be gracious and loving and giving
to. So back to Psalm 137.
For many of you, you've never read Psalm 137.
Or maybe you read it and you got there.
And when it said, blessed is he who dashes my enemies babies
against the rock. Maybe you missed it.
Like, wow, that's crazy. Is that a valid prayer?
And maybe you can just dismiss it and go, well, it's the
ancient world. They were crazy back then.
You know, I mean, that's bad theology.
And sometimes you do read the Psalms and go, is that is that
the model for our theology? And well, it's, it's it's a
model for our theology. When you look at the bigger
picture and you say, OK, God, like the writer of Psalm 137,
we're trusting God in your justice.
We're praying for it. We're going to rejoice in it.
And in the meantime, to our enemies, we're going to feed
them and give them something to drink.
We're going to clothe them. We're going to do everything we
can to be gracious because we're commanded to do so.
But in the end, we're trusting and trusting God for him to
bring judgment in the right time is a big discipline.
To sit back and say, God, I'm not going to take this into my
own hands. I won't just take abuse and I'm
not, I'll turn the other cheek for honor, but God, I'll stand
for righteousness and I'll pray for your wrath and judgment to
come, but I won't take it into my own hands.
This is not a call for us to rise up and do atrocities, but
instead a blessing, blessing God, a worship of God who we are
to entrust justice to. This is a big principle, right?
You might have to go back and listen to this message again
this week. So let me give you the
application. Is there a person or a people
group that you need to trust to God's justice?
And again, that doesn't mean that you're passive and that
you're not involved in fighting for our state or our country.
Yes, we're going to fight for righteousness, right?
But we're going to do it in a godly way.
We're not going to take wrath into our own hands, but we are
going to pray and hope for and celebrate when God's judgement
does come upon evil. We're going to be gracious and
loving and kind as we possibly can be.
But maybe there's a people group or an individual that you have
been wanting to take revenge against and you dream of it and
it fuels you. And it's like, man, I can't wait
for that moment when I can get back at them.
And you're just waiting. And it's like, and maybe you
just need to say this morning, it's like, God, I see, that's
ungodly. And so God, I'm going to give
that up. I'm going to lay that down and
I'm going to entrust you with those who've wronged us and done
injustice to you as an individual or someone in your
life. And then can you bless God?
Can you worship God in the midst of pending justice?
Maybe your worship of God has been blocked.
I mean, think about that's the big one of the big takeaways of
Psalm 137 is in the midst of this great exile and sorrow,
they've hung up their instruments, they've given up.
But he says, God, I'm worshiping you, God, blessed are you who
will eventually bring judgment. So maybe you've not even been
able to worship in the midst of your bitterness and in the midst
of your hurt. And so my invitation, you say,
blessed is God. God, I worship you hoping for
you to bring justice. And then I would say, where do
you need to stand for right and not be passive?
Maybe maybe you've thought, well, it's not for me to get
involved in that. Maybe the evil that we see
around us, or whether it's getting involved in the school
board locally or getting involved in some effort to bring
righteousness and rightness to our state, our city, our
country. Where have you just been a
pacifist? Like whatever will be will be.
Maybe you need to say, God, show me where I can be a part of an
organization that is fighting for righteousness or a church or
some type of effort where you can promote good over evil.
This is a challenging message. I really wrestled with this all
week long. I got really excited about
bringing it to you because I do want to challenge you and I do
want you to get the tapestry of Scripture, how Revelation is
connected to Psalm 137, which is connected to Exodus and it's
connected to Jesus saying turn the other cheek.
All of it's at the tapestry. It's all woven together.
And when you look at it, all the big picture of it, then it's
like, ah, OK, this makes more sense.
But if you only see Psalm 137, you might miss it.
Praying that God will bring people to dash your enemies,
babies against the rocks. It's way more than that.
Let me pray for us, God. What a challenge.
I'm tired, God, after preaching this twice, just I'm so
grateful. Even earlier this week when I
was just digging deeper and saying, God, I still don't get
it yet. God keeps speaking to me and in
the moments that I had here and there and here and there in
between, a busy week, you showed up and I create.
I'm just grateful for that, God. I really felt inspired about
this message. And so I pray that as a church,
you would challenge us to look and entrust you to bring your
judgment and righteousness. When we want to revenge, when we
want to be vengeful, God want us chase after vengeance in our own
hands. But let us entrust you and let
us bless our enemies and those who persecute us and be gracious
and grow us in our understanding of what this big enormous
principle looks like and how it plays out in our lives and grow
us. God is a church as individuals
where we can radiate your love and stand for righteousness in
the midst of Babylon evil around us give us wisdom and
discernment. We pray in Jesus name and
everyone said, Amen. I do want to just quickly just
say if you're here this morning, I went along this morning, but
if you're here and you've been wrestling with the decision to
become a Christian, I want to give you a moment to do that.
Maybe you've never just said, Jesus become the Lord of my
life. I turn away from my sin and I
want you to forgive me. I'm going to pray and maybe
you've been wrestling with that decision and you can echo your
prayer with me and it would look like this.
You could say, heavenly Father, I come to you in Jesus name and
I say, come be the Lord of my life.
I turn from my sin, I turn for my evil and I say come and reign
in me. Forgive me of my sin as I chase
and follow after you. Jesus, I believe you are God.
I confess with my mouth, I believe it in my heart.
Come and reign and rule in me and grow me in your ways.
I say yes to you. Cleanse me.
Thank you that you're putting eternal life into me now that
will last forever. I walk it in Jesus name and
everyone said Amen. If you made the decision to
become a follower Jesus, I encourage you tell someone, tell
me, tell a friend, someone that you know and let them celebrate
with you your decision to follow Christ.
Let's all stand together. Thank you for being here.
And I do encourage you to grab notes or go back and listen to
this message again. Share this message with someone
that you might think it would be an enlightening too.
And before you go, please allow me to say a blessing over you.
And now may the Lord bless you and keep you, and may he make
his face shine upon you. And may the joy of the Lord that
is unspeakable and full of glory, may it abound to you.
And may the peace of God that passes all understanding, may it
surprise you in the midst of all of the challenges that life
brings. And may the mercies of the Lord,
in other words, the forgiveness of God, that's new every
morning. May it surprise you in the midst
of all of the challenges that life brings, and then at the
mercies of the Lord, in other words, the forgiveness of God
knew every morning. May it be new to you and each
morning to come and now may the Lord Jesus Christ guard your
heart and your mind, your salt and your light.
Go, go now and be salt and light unto the world.
You are blessed. We'll see you again soon.