10. Deliverance From 'the Wicked' Psalm 37:32-36

Text:  “...We are not careful to answer thee in this matter.  If it (threat, whatever it may be) be so, our God is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us out of thine hand O king (Nebuchadnezzar).”

                                                                                                              Daniel 3:16-17.

Good morning, threatened Christian!  As you read this weekly Bible Lesson, do you find yourself living under serious threat?  Do you have a humanly incurable illness; do you have unpaid bills;  are you  being oppressed by the world around you; persecuted, yeah, even unto death by zealots of false religion; are you being tortured by loneliness, grief, heartache, fear, personal weaknesses, or countless other anxieties? 

Well, by the good grace of the Lord God, and belief in His Son Christ Jesus – let me encourage you in your most precious faith, beloved reader: the Lord God Jehovah, God Almighty, is very aware of your plight and His deliverance is on its way right NOW.  Wait patiently on His help.  The Lord Who loves you and has redeemed you, will never ever let you down.

“Wait (trust) on the Lord: be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart:  wait, I say, on the Lord.  (Psalm 27:14)

Those defined in Holy Scriptures as ‘the wicked’, are not merely natural, human enemies of the Christian faith, but also spiritual powers and agents of Satan, the arch-enemy of every genuine, Spiritually regenerate Christian believer.

“Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the Devil.  For (the reason for such action) we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”  (Ephesians 6:11-12)

(For a more exhaustive and thoroughly satisfying exposition of this vital theme, I fully recommend The Christian in Complete Armour, volumes 1, 2, and 3, by the Puritan William Gurnall 1617-1679 – Banner of Truth Trust.)

Such ‘wicked’ agents – human and spiritual – are dedicated entirely to the service of anti-Christian evil, Satan, and sin.  These are the reprobate powers – people, fallen spirits (sometimes referred to as ‘demons’) - all working with one accord, to bring down, vanquish, and spoil the witness and testimonies of true Christian believers.  These agents and powers only exist to cause hurt, harm, and denigration to the glorious Cause of Christ Jesus, the Creator Son of the Living Lord God Jehovah.

Verse 32.  “The wicked watcheth (watch continually) the righteous (made righteous in Christ Jesus), and seeketh to slay him/her. Here the Spirit of God, the Divine Author of all canonical Scripture, states the facts of the case, and the motivation of those deemed ‘the wicked’.  Bible-believing Christians are left in no doubt of this fact.

Were we Christian believers merely left with the above facts, we would have genuine and profound cause to live in abject fear and trembling.  However, God the Spirit immediately puts our puny human minds at ease – His help is always at hand.

Verse 33.  “The Lord will not leave him/her in his (the wicked) hand, nor condemn him when he/she is judged.  If the Lord God were to save us, then leave us to work out our own destiny, we would not last a day in the service of Christ Jesus.  Here, in verse 33, we have God’s promise to us, ‘His people’, He will not leave us in the hands of ‘the wicked’, nor condemn us when we falter, fail, and fall into sin.  Hallelujah!  What a gracious Lord and Saviour we have, in Christ Jesus!

“Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God; I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness.  Behold (look and understand!), all they that were incensed against thee shall be ashamed and confounded: they shall be as nothing; and they that strive against with thee shall perish.”  (Isaiah 41:10-11)

Verse 34. “Wait on the Lord.  He that truly trusts (believeth) in God will stay God’s time, and use God’s means, and walk in God’s way, though it seem round about.”  (David Clarkson 1622-1686)

Verse 34.  “...Keep His way. Avoid crooked paths, take heed of turning to the left hand, lest you be set on the left hand.  Sin doth cross our hopes, it barricades up our way; a man may as well expect to find Heaven in Hell as in a sinful way.”  (Thomas Watson 1690)

Today, in this increasingly apostate, anti-Christian 21^st Century, true, regenerate, Bible-believing and practicing Christians are being sorely threatened by both Spiritual wickedness in high places of State, and all around by ‘the wicked’, servants of Satan and his rebellious kingdom here on planet earth. 

Sodomites are applauded by this ‘wicked’ age, while those who would live lives of Godliness for the Holy Christ are pilloried by social and political ridicule.  Television writers seem to be at the forefront of this threat to Bible-based Christianity – writing the most ‘wicked’ and perverted storylines to be portrayed and acted out continually in so-called Soap Opera television programmes for the mass indoctrination of our children and their parents.  This ‘wicked’ filth seems, in all reality, to be ‘...spreading...like a green bay tree...’  Yet, we see and understand what the end of such ‘wicked’ worldlings shall surely be.

Verse 35.  “...Spreading himself like a green bay tree.  It was the case of Hophni and Phinehas: the Lord gave them enough and suffered them to go on and prosper in their wickedness; but what was the reason?  Because He would destroy them.”  (J. Gore’s Sermon at St. Pauls, cited in Treasury of David, page 181)

Thought: “Some of the humblest of the Godly are immortalized, their names are imperishably fragrant in the church, while of the ablest of infidels...Men who were in everybody’s mouths but yesterday are forgotten tomorrow, for only virtue is immortal.”  (Charles Haddon Spurgeon, 1834-1892)