“Attacks without, and within”

By Rev. Michael Stonhouse

Meditation – Saturday, May 14, 2022

Psalm 55 (Forward, p. 16) CEV p. 587

Recently, I watched a movie, “Blow”, about American drug dealer, George Jung, who along with Columbian drug lord Pablo Escobar, established the US cocaine market in the 1970s. What struck me so forcibly from the movie was his utter and total vulnerability. In the cut-throat world of the drug trade, he never knew whom he could trust. And with the authorities always ‘on his case’, ever vigilant about trying to arrest him, he could not even rely upon his own family and household to keep him safe. I imagine that this is the same for undercover police agents and spies. You never know, for sure, who is ‘on your side’, and who isn’t.

In some ways today’s psalmist feels like that. On the one hand, there are his enemies, who seemed to have sprouted up luxuriously, like so many weeds. He mentions them repeatedly (verses 3, 9-11, 12, 19). There are a number of things that he mentions as characterizing them:

-they are loud and boisterous, shouting in the midst of their attacks;

-they treat him terribly and hold on to angry grudges against him;

-they are cruel and violent and insistently plotting his downfall;

-they hate him and are always on the prowl for opportunities to attack him;

-they are corrupt, liars, full of trouble and freely able to roam about;

-they are controlled by the power of evil

But then our psalmist admits to something else, namely that the attacks are not just ‘out there’, but close to home as well:

“My enemies are not the ones who sneer and make fun. I could put up with that or even hide from them. But it was my closest friend, the one I trusted most. We enjoyed being together, and we went with others to your house, our God” (verses 12-14);

“My friend turned against me and broke his promise. His words were smoother than butter, and softer than olive oil. But hatred filled his heart, and he was ready to attack with a sword” (verses 20-21).

Our psalmist, King David, certainly knew these feelings all too well, and from personal experience. Even his own son, Absalom, rose up against him and among his colleagues and associates he had no idea of just who he could trust and who he could not. And this isn’t the only time that David mentions this experience: it comes up again in Psalm 41:9, where he mentions having enjoyable, intimate meals together.

But he was not alone in this: even Jesus went through this, in His betrayal at the hands of Judas Iscariot. Judas must have been close to Jesus, as Jesus actually trusted him with the common purse for the band of disciples. And so, how very disappointing, how very hurtful, this act of betrayal must have been. To think, the very person He shared meals with would turn against Him in this way. This fact is mentioned in every one of the four gospels (Matthew 26:23; Mark 14:18; Luke 22:21 and John 13:18). How it must have wounded His heart and cut Him deep inside.

And so our Lord, our Saviour Jesus Christ, knows what it is like to be ‘let down’, to be betrayed, by those that we love the most, by those that we have entrusted our very lives to. And so, we can certainly go to Him for comfort and succor at such times.

But there is more: numerous Biblical scholars point out that the psalmist are our hymnbook, our resource when our emotions overwhelm us and our own words fail us. They suggest that we can turn to the psalms, use them to express our thoughts and emotions, and make them our prayer to God. Yes, in those times when we feel attacked, either from without or from within, we can use them to express just how we feel. In this, they are part of God’s gifts to us. Amen.

Forward notes: “I would flee to a far-off place and make my lodging in the wilderness” (verse 8).

“I was the right-hand man for a resort developer, and then it all came tumbling down. Some say they were crooks; some say they were so smart, they ended up being stupid, and some say it was a ‘black swan event,’ something unpredictable and rare. Maybe it was a little bit of all three. All I know is that I spent days testifying in legal proceedings and learning that things get nasty when there is not enough to go around.

“I ended up unemployed, so my brothers-in-law let me build a fence for them. It rained a lot that summer, and much of the fence was on the wrong end of a trail. A quarter-inch of rain turned a steep stretch from a road into a slide. I spent much of the summer fixing fences on horseback with no one around, just deer and elk. I flew away to the Lord’s high place, and it took a summer immersed in solitude to be reborn. By then, the world I knew had passed away.”

Moving Forward: “Consider taking a silent retreat in the next month. Spend the time listening to God.”