Psalm 37: Do Not Fret?

Judging by the many people on social networks who say what they really think regarding all of the evil that is growing throughout the world, it is very difficult for many to put hand over mouth in order to keep from saying what we think.

Why should we avoid anger toward them? Verse 2 answers the question. No matter how evil people become, they will “soon” be cut down like the grass and wither as the green herb. Here today and gone tomorrow. The word “soon” of course is from God’s perspective, not ours. God, who exists in eternity and not governed as we are by time, will deal with evil one day “soon” and when people even try to look for it, it won’t be there.

So the big question for the authentic Christian is this: how do we keep ourselves from being angry at everything we see evil doers and workers of iniquity do? How do we not become angry at these things when we know that they are taking advantage of and deliberately destroying lives and livelihoods?

The Psalmist tells us in the remaining verses 3 – 5. First, we are to “trust the Lord.” This is done in the way we think, speak and live. We are to “do good.” In other words, we are to continue doing what our Lord would do in the face of constant evil, resting in the fact that evil will be dealt with and God Himself will sustain us. Because of that, we can focus on spreading the Gospel and doing the things God wants us to do. If we are sidetracked by hateful thoughts borne of anger because of evil people and their iniquity, we will not be doing good, but sowing our own evil.

Okay, raise your hand if this is easy for you. Seriously, we know it’s not easy. There is nothing easy about this! The clue is that we must actively and constantly decide to turn away from evil thoughts and to refocus our thoughts and attention on delighting in the Lord (v 4). It is impossible to do both simultaneously, but depending upon your personality, it may be very difficult to give up our wants for His. We either focus on evil people and their works or on delighting in the Lord. When we do the latter, we are actively renewing our minds (Romans 12:2). This takes effort, doesn’t it? It may take a great deal of effort. We have to be deliberate about it so that we live in obedience. To obey is better than (the act of the) sacrifice (1 Samuel 15:22). The act of giving is usually much easier than being obedient from the heart.

What I’m going to say may sound morbid, but it’s not meant that way. It actually helps with perspective. When I think about my death that will take me from this life to the next, it is amazing how so many things will just drop away. What will I be doing after my death? In His Presence, I will spend eternity worshiping and delighting in Him automatically because of the lack of my sin nature. It won’t be effort then. It will be a natural outflow of the new nature I will have without a hint of sin.

The reality that I will die one day causes many of the things I now tend to worry about to become nothing to worry about. Thinking about my death helps put things into perspective because I know what happens after I die just as I know I will die. This is not morbid or morose. This is biblical fact that helps me understand what is and what is not important.

Understanding my death is in front of me makes it easier to refocus on the Lord,  to commit my ways to Him and trust also in Him. The more I do this, the more my will is conformed to His. The more my will is conformed to His, the more my desires are transformed into His and He will then give me the desires of my heart because they are now God’s desires in me.

I so wish I could say trusting the Lord is easy, but at least for me, there seems no easy way. It takes work as it seems a constant battle to purposefully change my focus, to work things out (as Paul says in Philippians 2:12), and force myself to do what I’m supposed to do. That means that I use my God-enabled effort to focus on Him, not the situations surrounding me in this life.

So what is your focus? Is it focus on evil people and the evil they create or is it instead to focus on God, His love, His, justice, His promises and His sovereignty? That is our choice and what we do with that choice determines whether we live in freedom and praise or overwhelming fear, anger, and defeat in this life.

Theology and Politics from a Conservative, Biblical Perspective