WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.240 Well, we're taking a break tonight from the life of David, just to consider for a few 00:00:06.240 --> 00:00:13.240 minutes Psalm 82, and really even bigger than that to consider the fact that God gives us 00:00:13.240 --> 00:00:19.640 a category in the Bible, a specific type of prayer called lament. 00:00:19.640 --> 00:00:24.879 And there's lots we can't say about it in 15 minutes or so, but as tonight we're thinking 00:00:24.879 --> 00:00:32.079 about we're praying about the immense hurt in Ukraine and God gives us a category for 00:00:32.079 --> 00:00:36.479 how to deal with the problem of pain in our lives. 00:00:36.479 --> 00:00:42.759 And that at least is the prayer of lament that we see all across the Bible. 00:00:42.759 --> 00:00:49.000 And as you know, we I was just praying there's there's immense hurt and pain in so many people's 00:00:49.000 --> 00:00:51.640 lives because of something like a war. 00:00:51.640 --> 00:00:55.240 And we know that at every single moment in all of human history since Adam, there has 00:00:55.240 --> 00:01:00.120 been immense hurt and pain across every people group across every land. 00:01:00.120 --> 00:01:05.159 And there is tonight there is across our city, and there probably is immense hurt, perhaps 00:01:05.159 --> 00:01:09.960 even in this place, that people are coming tonight from all sorts of different places. 00:01:09.960 --> 00:01:14.560 And we all know the experience of painful personal events. 00:01:14.560 --> 00:01:16.240 What do you do with your pain? 00:01:16.240 --> 00:01:18.000 The problem of pain? 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:23.200 Problem of suffering deep in the bowels as the Old Testament puts it. 00:01:23.200 --> 00:01:29.040 And at least we can say that God says lament, lament about it. 00:01:29.040 --> 00:01:32.879 So how two things first is the call to lament. 00:01:32.879 --> 00:01:37.560 Now just to talk about this, I just want to step back from Psalm 82 briefly. 00:01:37.560 --> 00:01:46.280 The title of the Psalms, the whole book in Hebrew is actually the word teleheem, which 00:01:46.280 --> 00:01:49.040 means the book of praises. 00:01:49.040 --> 00:01:54.079 And we take the title Psalms from the Greek translation of the Old Testament, which was 00:01:54.079 --> 00:01:55.079 Psalms. 00:01:55.079 --> 00:01:58.240 But the original title is the book of praises. 00:01:58.240 --> 00:02:04.079 And that means that every single Psalm in the book is a praise, is a type of praise. 00:02:04.079 --> 00:02:09.120 And so you can go through, as many of you will know, and you can categorize all the ways 00:02:09.120 --> 00:02:10.400 you can praise God. 00:02:10.400 --> 00:02:12.639 There are all sorts of different categories. 00:02:12.639 --> 00:02:17.000 And that's wisdom praises and royal praises and historical praises and thanksgiving praises 00:02:17.000 --> 00:02:19.879 and the songs of a sin and Zion. 00:02:19.879 --> 00:02:28.439 And one of those is lament and actually lament either as an entire Psalm or verses of lament 00:02:28.439 --> 00:02:34.819 before God are about right at 40% of the entire book of Psalms. 00:02:34.819 --> 00:02:38.879 And they are by far the most text in the book of Psalms. 00:02:38.879 --> 00:02:43.000 And it's not closed by double our laments. 00:02:43.000 --> 00:02:49.439 And I think probably, nevertheless, in the modern church, they're the least used. 00:02:49.439 --> 00:02:54.240 We use the least that which God has given the most across the book of Psalms. 00:02:54.240 --> 00:02:59.120 Now, part of that, I think, is because we haven't thought perhaps carefully what a lament 00:02:59.120 --> 00:03:01.159 really is. 00:03:01.159 --> 00:03:04.680 And a lament is not just an expression of sorrow. 00:03:04.680 --> 00:03:05.680 It is that. 00:03:05.680 --> 00:03:10.599 It's an expression of deep grief and sorrow, but it also comes with more than that if you 00:03:10.599 --> 00:03:13.599 look at the lament Psalms carefully. 00:03:13.599 --> 00:03:20.840 And that's that laments always include not only the expression of grief, but also complaint, 00:03:20.840 --> 00:03:25.280 protest, and appeal, as the scholars will put it. 00:03:25.280 --> 00:03:32.200 That there's a complaint to God about a circumstance, a protest, why, Lord? 00:03:32.200 --> 00:03:34.200 And then an appeal. 00:03:34.199 --> 00:03:40.159 And if you have any of those elements at all, you have a lament. 00:03:40.159 --> 00:03:45.280 And that's why here, people don't normally categorize Psalm 82 as a lament. 00:03:45.280 --> 00:03:50.919 But if you look down at verse eight, the very end when the people's voice rises up, it is 00:03:50.919 --> 00:03:56.280 a rise, O God, rise up, O God, and judge the earth. 00:03:56.280 --> 00:03:58.560 And that is an appeal. 00:03:58.560 --> 00:04:00.679 It's saying, this is not working. 00:04:00.680 --> 00:04:04.280 Please, Lord, get up and judge the world. 00:04:04.280 --> 00:04:06.360 We only, you can do it correctly. 00:04:06.360 --> 00:04:09.120 And so come on, rise up and judge. 00:04:09.120 --> 00:04:16.680 And that means Psalm 82 is also lament is sorrowing toward God with complaint toward 00:04:16.680 --> 00:04:22.639 God, protest toward God, appeal toward God for change. 00:04:22.639 --> 00:04:28.720 Now Glenn, I read a book this week about laments and a guy named Glenn Pemberton, and it was 00:04:28.720 --> 00:04:30.760 called Herding with God. 00:04:30.760 --> 00:04:36.640 And he argues in that book that we today don't know what, we don't use them as often because 00:04:36.640 --> 00:04:39.960 we don't know what to do with them. 00:04:39.960 --> 00:04:43.200 And one of the great examples of this comes from C.S. 00:04:43.200 --> 00:04:51.800 Lewis, who as you'll know, I find to be unusually right most of the time, but on this he is unusually 00:04:51.800 --> 00:04:52.800 wrong. 00:04:52.800 --> 00:04:53.800 Okay. 00:04:53.800 --> 00:04:59.360 In his book, Christian Reflections, he reflects on Psalm 109. 00:04:59.360 --> 00:05:01.639 Let me just give you a snippet of Psalm 109. 00:05:01.639 --> 00:05:07.360 It says things like this, a prayer of David against a man who's done something unjustly 00:05:07.360 --> 00:05:08.439 against David. 00:05:08.439 --> 00:05:14.060 He says, a point a wicked man against that man, let an accuser stand at his right hand. 00:05:14.060 --> 00:05:16.680 When he is tried, let him come forth guilty. 00:05:16.680 --> 00:05:19.259 Let his prayer be counted as sin. 00:05:19.259 --> 00:05:20.920 May his days be few. 00:05:20.920 --> 00:05:23.040 May another take his office. 00:05:23.040 --> 00:05:27.120 May his children be fatherless and his wife a widow. 00:05:27.120 --> 00:05:31.000 And no doubt that that is a hard saying, a hard prayer. 00:05:31.000 --> 00:05:33.040 But this is what Lewis says about it. 00:05:33.040 --> 00:05:36.960 He says, the writer here gives hatred free reign. 00:05:36.960 --> 00:05:39.439 He encourages it and spurs it on. 00:05:39.439 --> 00:05:46.120 He was undoubtedly a hot-blooded barbarian, more like a modern child than a modern man. 00:05:46.120 --> 00:05:49.020 What good can we find from such stuff? 00:05:49.020 --> 00:05:50.640 God does not hear such prayers. 00:05:50.639 --> 00:05:53.240 They're wicked, he condemns them. 00:05:53.240 --> 00:05:58.719 Now perhaps that's Lewis that is worse because I think Lewis falls prey to his own critique 00:05:58.719 --> 00:06:03.240 there of what he later calls chronological snobbery. 00:06:03.240 --> 00:06:07.839 Because he says, we know better now than to get so angry that we would pray a prayer 00:06:07.839 --> 00:06:09.240 of justice like that. 00:06:09.240 --> 00:06:10.719 We're civilized. 00:06:10.719 --> 00:06:12.959 That's barbaric type language. 00:06:12.959 --> 00:06:18.199 And Walter Bruggeman, who may be one of the best, if not the best Old Testament scholar 00:06:18.199 --> 00:06:22.879 of the 20th century, he gives a completely different reading. 00:06:22.879 --> 00:06:24.000 And this is what he says about it. 00:06:24.000 --> 00:06:29.879 He says, we may read Psalms like Psalm 109 that cry for justice and say, this Psalm doesn't 00:06:29.879 --> 00:06:33.879 concern me because I've never been that angry. 00:06:33.879 --> 00:06:36.800 I don't want to be that angry. 00:06:36.800 --> 00:06:41.680 As if Bruggeman says, as if that were a virtue. 00:06:41.680 --> 00:06:46.439 But I suggest that this reflects someone who is only half living. 00:06:46.439 --> 00:06:52.800 It is a good idea instead to ask of a Psalm like this, who is it that needs to pray this 00:06:52.800 --> 00:06:55.839 prayer today? 00:06:55.839 --> 00:06:57.719 And he's writing during the time of apartheid. 00:06:57.719 --> 00:07:02.639 He says, this could it be a voice of a black man in South Africa who has yet again been 00:07:02.639 --> 00:07:07.480 brutalized by the system or a woman whose life has been forever changed as a victim 00:07:07.480 --> 00:07:09.079 of the sex crime? 00:07:09.079 --> 00:07:15.519 This is God's, in other words, he says, lament cries for justice as lamentation are God's 00:07:15.519 --> 00:07:20.759 gift to deal with the problem of pain in a world of injustice, especially when you can't 00:07:20.759 --> 00:07:23.439 do anything about it. 00:07:23.439 --> 00:07:29.399 And that means lament is also God's gift in another way, because lament gives you away, 00:07:29.399 --> 00:07:37.879 gives me a way of obeying the command of Ephesians 426, where God tells us through Paul, be angry 00:07:37.879 --> 00:07:40.439 and do not sin. 00:07:40.439 --> 00:07:42.599 And how can you possibly have a cat? 00:07:42.600 --> 00:07:46.600 Maybe as sinful humans don't have a category for anger that's not sinful at the same time, 00:07:46.600 --> 00:07:49.480 and yet this text says, be angry and do not sin. 00:07:49.480 --> 00:07:50.480 And how? 00:07:50.480 --> 00:07:51.480 Lament. 00:07:51.480 --> 00:07:52.480 Lament. 00:07:52.480 --> 00:07:53.480 What is a lament? 00:07:53.480 --> 00:07:57.200 Lament is the expression of just anger, of just anger. 00:07:57.200 --> 00:07:58.400 How? 00:07:58.400 --> 00:08:06.920 Because first, in lament, you cry God word with a complaint, a protest, a longing about the 00:08:06.920 --> 00:08:07.920 way of the world. 00:08:07.920 --> 00:08:10.160 Lament is not venting at God. 00:08:10.160 --> 00:08:12.160 It's not raging. 00:08:12.160 --> 00:08:19.920 It's structured, reasonable protest before God about the injustices of the world. 00:08:19.920 --> 00:08:24.880 And the reason it's just, it's righteous is because in a lament, you carry a posture of 00:08:24.880 --> 00:08:28.520 absolute dependence on God throughout the entirety of it. 00:08:28.520 --> 00:08:30.560 You say, God, I want you to change this. 00:08:30.560 --> 00:08:31.800 I'm saying, why? 00:08:31.800 --> 00:08:32.800 Why has this happened? 00:08:32.800 --> 00:08:33.800 Why have you done this? 00:08:33.800 --> 00:08:39.040 And at the same time, you say, but I know that you're good, and I'm not. 00:08:39.040 --> 00:08:40.800 And I know that I don't know. 00:08:40.799 --> 00:08:43.319 And I know that you're working all things together for the good. 00:08:43.319 --> 00:08:44.679 And so whatever you do is good. 00:08:44.679 --> 00:08:47.399 And yet, how long ago, Lord, when will you act? 00:08:47.399 --> 00:08:48.399 When will you change? 00:08:48.399 --> 00:08:51.199 When will you rise up and do something? 00:08:51.199 --> 00:09:02.839 Now that means that prayer, prayer as lament especially, does not require us to present 00:09:02.840 --> 00:09:11.879 ourselves in our Sunday best before the Lord and to get the terminology correct. 00:09:11.879 --> 00:09:16.080 Lament instead gives you a category that God is saying, when you need to pour your soul, 00:09:16.080 --> 00:09:23.040 pour your soul Godward and cry out before God and say, why are you doing this? 00:09:23.040 --> 00:09:24.040 Where is your justice? 00:09:24.040 --> 00:09:29.480 Roll down, rise up and roll down like a mighty river into this situation, into this place. 00:09:29.480 --> 00:09:35.800 But as I close this point and move to the last one, we could come back to Lewis, maybe 00:09:35.800 --> 00:09:42.080 later he reflected on this, and say, did you read Revelation 6.10 before you wrote that 00:09:42.080 --> 00:09:45.039 about the justice Psalms? 00:09:45.039 --> 00:09:51.840 Because in Revelation 6.10, the martyrs, the apostolic martyrs say before the throne room 00:09:51.840 --> 00:10:00.000 of God in heaven, how long, Lord, oh Lord, tell you bring justice for our blood. 00:10:00.000 --> 00:10:05.840 They lament, they cry for justice in the land, they protest, they appeal, they cry out to 00:10:05.840 --> 00:10:14.240 God, but even more, Jesus Christ stood in the Garden of Gethsemane. 00:10:14.240 --> 00:10:19.920 And when he was in Gethsemane, he said, my Father, if there could be another way. 00:10:19.919 --> 00:10:26.559 You know, he appealed, he cried in tears and appealed, it's a lament. 00:10:26.559 --> 00:10:33.079 And he said, if there could be another way, let it come to pass and it's righteous because 00:10:33.079 --> 00:10:36.959 he said, but not my will. 00:10:36.959 --> 00:10:42.199 If there could be another way, then this is my lament before you, but whatever your will 00:10:42.199 --> 00:10:43.279 is what I shall do. 00:10:43.279 --> 00:10:45.959 And so he obeyed. 00:10:45.959 --> 00:10:49.719 And even more than that, the greatest lament of all of human history, the climax of all 00:10:49.720 --> 00:10:54.639 lamentation is when Jesus Christ hung upon the cross and quoted a psalm of lament and 00:10:54.639 --> 00:10:58.920 said, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? 00:10:58.920 --> 00:11:04.320 And so there is righteous lament, there's holy grieving before God. 00:11:04.320 --> 00:11:07.639 And so the question is tonight, what do you do with your pain? 00:11:07.639 --> 00:11:09.720 What do you do with your pain? 00:11:09.720 --> 00:11:14.960 And what do you do when you look at injustice and there's nothing that you can do? 00:11:14.960 --> 00:11:20.000 God says at least step one is you lament before him. 00:11:20.000 --> 00:11:24.480 Bruggeman says that if we're not lamenting, then that might mean that we're half living 00:11:24.480 --> 00:11:31.040 because we're not getting angry enough at the great injustices that are around us. 00:11:31.040 --> 00:11:35.800 The second thing is this is just a few minutes, Psalm 82. 00:11:35.800 --> 00:11:38.639 We have a call here to lament injustice specifically. 00:11:38.639 --> 00:11:45.039 Now, in verse eight is the appeal, rise up, O God. 00:11:45.039 --> 00:11:50.439 And that's actually a different voice speaking in verse eight than the rest of the psalm. 00:11:50.439 --> 00:11:56.720 Verse one and verse eight are a chorus, but verse two to verse seven are a different voice. 00:11:56.720 --> 00:12:00.639 In verse two to verse seven, maybe you noticed are actually the voice of God. 00:12:00.639 --> 00:12:06.840 This is a very unusual psalm because most of it is in God's voice, him speaking. 00:12:06.840 --> 00:12:11.840 And in verses two to seven, what happens is that we have an opportunity from Asaph where 00:12:11.840 --> 00:12:15.759 he's having a vision and the curtain is being pulled back. 00:12:15.759 --> 00:12:20.480 And we're allowed to see God in his counsel in heaven. 00:12:20.480 --> 00:12:26.200 So God stands up and he's the king in the heavenly throne room, which is also at the 00:12:26.200 --> 00:12:27.600 same time a courtroom. 00:12:27.600 --> 00:12:31.960 He is both king and judge at the same time. 00:12:31.960 --> 00:12:33.040 And what does he do? 00:12:33.039 --> 00:12:39.719 He says, he speaks and he says, how long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to 00:12:39.719 --> 00:12:41.159 the wicked? 00:12:41.159 --> 00:12:42.199 And he speaks to who? 00:12:42.199 --> 00:12:44.439 In the midst of the gods. 00:12:44.439 --> 00:12:46.559 Verse one tells us he's holding judgment. 00:12:46.559 --> 00:12:48.799 So it says that the curtain's being pulled back. 00:12:48.799 --> 00:12:51.360 We're seeing God in the throne room of heaven. 00:12:51.360 --> 00:12:59.759 And it says that he speaks to the gods and says, how long will you fail to judge justly? 00:12:59.759 --> 00:13:02.679 Now, who are the gods? 00:13:02.679 --> 00:13:06.759 I have one sentence on this because we don't have time. 00:13:06.759 --> 00:13:08.759 This is not polytheism. 00:13:08.759 --> 00:13:16.199 The gods is a, this is a generic word in Hebrew that would be used all over the place for 00:13:16.199 --> 00:13:23.719 any human or angel or anybody who takes a position of authority in life. 00:13:23.719 --> 00:13:30.799 And so when the gods stand before God here, what we're seeing is the king and the judge 00:13:30.799 --> 00:13:36.359 of all the earth judging the judges of the earth. 00:13:36.359 --> 00:13:44.039 Meaning God has gathered up all the ministers to parliament and presidents and kings and 00:13:44.039 --> 00:13:50.479 magistrates and rulers and princes and judges and anybody that is ever held in office that 00:13:50.479 --> 00:13:52.799 is meant to rule above other people. 00:13:52.799 --> 00:13:55.799 That's who God has gathered in this vision. 00:13:55.799 --> 00:13:57.479 And that's who he's talking to. 00:13:57.479 --> 00:13:59.199 And this is what he says in verses three and four. 00:13:59.200 --> 00:14:05.560 He says, how long will you judge with injustice, injustice? 00:14:05.560 --> 00:14:09.520 And instead, I want you to give justice to the weak and the fatherless, maintain the 00:14:09.520 --> 00:14:13.280 right of the afflicted, rescue the weak and the needy. 00:14:13.280 --> 00:14:20.759 And then it's as if in verse five he turns to speak to his holy angels with the judges 00:14:20.759 --> 00:14:25.120 of the earth, the princes of the earth who have been wicked and not judged with justice 00:14:25.120 --> 00:14:30.480 before him and he says, these judges don't have knowledge nor understanding. 00:14:30.480 --> 00:14:36.519 They walk about in darkness and all the foundations of the earth, society in other words, is 00:14:36.519 --> 00:14:40.039 shaken because they're walking in darkness. 00:14:40.039 --> 00:14:41.039 Society is not working. 00:14:41.039 --> 00:14:43.240 It's broken because of their failures. 00:14:43.240 --> 00:14:48.759 And so then he turns back in verse six and says, but I say to you, you are gods, you 00:14:48.759 --> 00:14:52.600 are judges, you are kings, you are princes, you are rulers, you are magistrates, you are 00:14:52.600 --> 00:14:59.000 employers even, your sons are the most high and nevertheless you're going to die just 00:14:59.000 --> 00:15:05.360 like every other man and fall like any other prince will fall. 00:15:05.360 --> 00:15:07.680 And you see what we learn? 00:15:07.680 --> 00:15:11.399 It's a very simple Psalm actually and what it means. 00:15:11.399 --> 00:15:17.320 And it's this that in the midst of all the kings of the earth and whatever position you 00:15:17.320 --> 00:15:23.680 might want to think about, a judge, a ruler that has ruled in pride and vanity without 00:15:23.680 --> 00:15:32.360 justice who break the backs of the poor, who quench the candle of righteous impartial trial, 00:15:32.360 --> 00:15:38.200 who occupy their office entirely for self gain, who are power hungry, who rule for their 00:15:38.200 --> 00:15:43.680 own glory, who have a conquest mentality, who murder and who pillage and who destroy 00:15:43.680 --> 00:15:45.720 the lives of society. 00:15:45.720 --> 00:15:48.600 God is going to bring justice to the land. 00:15:48.600 --> 00:15:52.800 God is going to judge and only he can do it. 00:15:52.800 --> 00:15:59.240 And the reason for that, the theology underneath it is that God is full of compassion for the 00:15:59.240 --> 00:16:00.960 people. 00:16:00.960 --> 00:16:05.399 He wants the people, the poor, the lowly, the those who are not kings and princes to 00:16:05.399 --> 00:16:11.240 know what it's like to live in a land that's ruled well and that's peaceable and peaceful. 00:16:11.240 --> 00:16:13.960 And he wants to have a loving prince. 00:16:13.960 --> 00:16:20.480 And so he says that God at the, if not before, we see examples all across the Bible of kings 00:16:20.480 --> 00:16:27.120 of Nebuchadnezzar whom God acts into their lives to judge them for their great injustices. 00:16:27.120 --> 00:16:33.320 But if not then, then in the end of history, all unjust judges, rulers, princes will be 00:16:33.320 --> 00:16:34.320 judged. 00:16:34.320 --> 00:16:39.920 That's what Psalm 82 says for their grievous injustices. 00:16:39.920 --> 00:16:41.360 The lament is clear. 00:16:41.360 --> 00:16:48.519 We can look, we can look at history and we can say that just like nature is red in tooth 00:16:48.519 --> 00:16:55.200 and claw, the powers of humanity have been read in tooth and claw. 00:16:55.200 --> 00:16:57.919 And that's been in every century of all of human history. 00:16:57.919 --> 00:17:02.159 Now, in other words, the point, what do you do? 00:17:02.159 --> 00:17:05.960 What do you do with your pain in the midst of injustice? 00:17:05.960 --> 00:17:14.880 And one, you lament and you pray prayers of lament before God and then you know that the 00:17:14.880 --> 00:17:20.920 great king of all the earth will bring justice and that he has great compassion on those 00:17:20.920 --> 00:17:26.640 who have been broken, their backs have been broken by the injustice of evil rulers. 00:17:26.640 --> 00:17:35.240 Now, Lewis to close was onto something just slightly because one of the things he is trying 00:17:35.240 --> 00:17:43.440 to say in his complaint is what do we do with this in the light of Jesus? 00:17:43.440 --> 00:17:49.400 And very helpfully, Jesus Christ helps us know because he quotes Psalm 82. 00:17:49.400 --> 00:17:59.599 In John chapter 10, Jesus quotes Psalm 82 in a really peculiar way, an interesting way. 00:17:59.599 --> 00:18:09.719 This had just said before the scribes and Pharisees, I and the father are one and so they wanted 00:18:09.719 --> 00:18:13.719 to kill him because they knew what he was saying. 00:18:13.719 --> 00:18:18.839 And you look at Psalm 82, you think about the 20th century, you look at Ukraine, you 00:18:18.839 --> 00:18:23.319 look at all sorts of events of history that all of you are well familiar with and you 00:18:23.319 --> 00:18:26.719 look at people's lives all around us. 00:18:26.720 --> 00:18:32.720 And if Psalm 82 is saying anything in verse 8, it's saying, rise up, oh God, because we 00:18:32.720 --> 00:18:38.799 need a judge, a ruler, a king, a prince who will truly rule with great justice. 00:18:38.799 --> 00:18:40.519 We need a king. 00:18:40.519 --> 00:18:43.000 We want a king. 00:18:43.000 --> 00:18:50.319 And in John 10, after Jesus says, I and the father are one, they try to kill him. 00:18:50.319 --> 00:18:57.119 And he says, are you trying to kill me because you heard me say I'm God? 00:18:57.119 --> 00:19:02.639 And he appeals to Psalm 82 and he says, didn't God himself say in the Old Testament that 00:19:02.639 --> 00:19:06.399 a human could also be God? 00:19:06.399 --> 00:19:09.439 He used the language, didn't God use that language in Psalm 82? 00:19:09.439 --> 00:19:13.879 And he said, Jesus was poking them. 00:19:13.880 --> 00:19:22.760 And that's because what he was really saying is that Psalm 82, 8, when the chorus says, 00:19:22.760 --> 00:19:28.760 rise up, oh Lord, and take over, it's ambiguous translation, it's not just you inherit the 00:19:28.760 --> 00:19:33.480 nations but you possess them now, rise up. 00:19:33.480 --> 00:19:38.000 That when Jesus stands before these scribes and Pharisees, he is saying Psalm 82, 8 has 00:19:38.000 --> 00:19:40.920 been fulfilled in your hearing. 00:19:40.920 --> 00:19:46.800 The great judge and the true king has now come and he stands before you. 00:19:46.800 --> 00:19:53.279 He is the source of mercy and justice, meaning that yes, he will judge the kings of the earth 00:19:53.279 --> 00:20:01.480 but also he is the opportunity for mercy for the kings of the earth. 00:20:01.480 --> 00:20:05.360 That we can pray prayers of justice but because of Jesus Christ and we should, because of 00:20:05.360 --> 00:20:06.920 Jesus Christ, how do we start? 00:20:06.920 --> 00:20:14.279 We start by saying, Lord, great evil has fallen upon the land, will you change the heart of 00:20:14.279 --> 00:20:19.640 this evil king and president and prime minister and ruler and whoever it might be? 00:20:19.640 --> 00:20:28.080 Will you move on them by the Holy Spirit and convict them and make them your son or daughter 00:20:28.080 --> 00:20:31.680 and then we could have justice temporarily at least? 00:20:31.680 --> 00:20:38.360 But if not, Lord, we do ask that justice would be had because that is good. 00:20:38.360 --> 00:20:43.279 So in the light of Jesus, that's how we're being called to pray prayers of lament. 00:20:43.279 --> 00:20:50.039 The Bible, the last word here, the Bible doesn't philosophize about what we do with our pain. 00:20:50.039 --> 00:20:54.960 It doesn't say how can a good God allow evil, it doesn't go and ask questions like that 00:20:54.960 --> 00:21:00.600 and instead it says look at the cross of Jesus Christ where the greatest injustice of all 00:21:00.599 --> 00:21:06.039 of history became the greatest glory and mercy and hope of all history. 00:21:06.039 --> 00:21:13.480 And the last thing it does is it leaves us with Hebrews 5.7. 00:21:13.480 --> 00:21:19.919 Hebrews 5.7, Hebrews 5.7, well it's the greatest argument for praying prayers of lament because 00:21:19.919 --> 00:21:22.519 this is what it says. 00:21:22.519 --> 00:21:31.680 In the days of Jesus' flesh when he was on earth, he offered up prayers and supplications 00:21:31.680 --> 00:21:39.279 with loud crying and with tears and he was heard because of his godliness. 00:21:39.279 --> 00:21:45.879 Saying, when Jesus was on earth, he cried out in great prayers of lamentation and God 00:21:45.879 --> 00:21:49.400 listened because of his godliness. 00:21:49.400 --> 00:21:55.640 And in that section, it's all about the cross. 00:21:55.640 --> 00:21:59.560 And you see, you have to look through it just a little bit to see what this is saying. 00:21:59.560 --> 00:22:00.560 What is this saying? 00:22:00.560 --> 00:22:06.120 It's saying that in the time of his greatest cry, his greatest lamentation, my God, my 00:22:06.120 --> 00:22:07.800 God, why have you forsaken me? 00:22:07.800 --> 00:22:14.240 He was heard because of his godliness, meaning when he was dead and dying on the cross and 00:22:14.240 --> 00:22:24.200 he prayed at that moment, God heard his lament and responded because Jesus deserved it. 00:22:24.200 --> 00:22:29.160 Meaning that when God rose Jesus up from the dead, it was because Jesus cried out in lamentation 00:22:29.160 --> 00:22:31.200 and says, why are you forsaking me? 00:22:31.200 --> 00:22:34.120 And God said, you don't deserve to be dead. 00:22:34.120 --> 00:22:39.240 Do you know that Jesus rose up from the dead precisely because death couldn't hold him 00:22:39.240 --> 00:22:41.599 down because he was godly? 00:22:41.599 --> 00:22:42.759 Because he deserved it. 00:22:42.759 --> 00:22:47.680 Because it was a great injustice for the God man who obeyed the law perfectly to be held 00:22:47.680 --> 00:22:49.480 down forever. 00:22:49.480 --> 00:22:54.960 And so God listened to him in his godliness and he raised him up because Jesus Christ 00:22:54.960 --> 00:22:58.119 deserved to be raised. 00:22:58.119 --> 00:22:59.119 You know what that means? 00:22:59.119 --> 00:23:04.319 That means that when you look and say, is there hope for justice in this world, the resurrection 00:23:04.319 --> 00:23:11.960 is the guarantee that justice will be had because God looked at his son and said, you 00:23:11.960 --> 00:23:15.480 are just and therefore death will not keep you down. 00:23:15.480 --> 00:23:18.079 You deserve to be raised. 00:23:18.079 --> 00:23:21.759 The resurrection is the guarantee of all justice. 00:23:21.759 --> 00:23:30.519 And that means that for anybody, an evil king and any of us who come before the king himself 00:23:30.519 --> 00:23:35.880 and say, I need your justice, I don't have my justice, I know that before God I will 00:23:35.880 --> 00:23:40.039 be judged like the rulers who've done wickedly. 00:23:40.039 --> 00:23:45.839 For every single one of us, justice that you deserve can already be had in him. 00:23:45.839 --> 00:23:46.839 In him. 00:23:46.839 --> 00:23:53.599 And so there's hope for every evil king and every single one of us and we know that justice 00:23:53.599 --> 00:23:58.799 will be had in the midst of great oppression. 00:23:58.799 --> 00:24:06.440 And so lament and justice, pray that those who cause it would turn to Jesus and pray 00:24:06.440 --> 00:24:12.400 that God's justice would roll down like a mighty river into the land. 00:24:12.400 --> 00:24:14.720 We pray it for Ukraine. 00:24:14.720 --> 00:24:17.519 We pray it for all sorts of things that are happening in our lives. 00:24:17.519 --> 00:24:18.519 Let's pray. 00:24:18.519 --> 00:24:21.559 Father, we do pray that prayer now. 00:24:21.559 --> 00:24:24.880 We lament, we cry and appeal towards you. 00:24:24.880 --> 00:24:26.600 We ask why. 00:24:26.600 --> 00:24:30.400 And we at the same time say you are good. 00:24:30.400 --> 00:24:34.320 And so we appeal once more that you would stop this war in Ukraine. 00:24:34.319 --> 00:24:39.519 We appeal in each of our hearts for the problems that we face. 00:24:39.519 --> 00:24:43.879 Will you bring healing to our land, to our hearts, to our problems? 00:24:43.879 --> 00:24:48.480 And we give thanks for the category of lament in the midst of that, Lord. 00:24:48.480 --> 00:24:55.200 And we do pray for the hearts of so many of our rulers across the world that you would 00:24:55.200 --> 00:24:59.879 bring them before the feet of King Jesus and that they would learn justice. 00:24:59.879 --> 00:25:00.879 And we pray this in Christ's name. 00:25:00.880 --> 00:25:07.880 Amen.