Psalm 79: God’s Wrath Works Repentance! (a) A Cry of National complaint Psalm 79:1-5

Text: “O remember not against us former iniquities: let Thy tender mercies speedily prevent us: for we are brought very low.  Help us, O God of our Salvation, for the glory of Thy Name: and deliver us, and purge away our sins, for Thy Name’s sake.”

Psalm 79:8-9.

Good morning, progressively repentant Christian!  Both you and I have sometimes sinned, often in gross and blatant manners – in word, thought, and deed – AFTER we have been gloriously redeemed by the precious and sinless Blood of Christ Jesus, the Lamb of God. Fact!

We have sinned because we are natural born sinners, possessing an Adamic nature inherited from fallen Adam/Eve that only wants to sin continually, and is therefore constantly, and incurably prone to sin against the Lord God’s absolute Holiness. Fact!  

Mankind’s state, after the Fall: “And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.  And it repented the Lord that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him at His heart.” (Genesis 6:5-6)

“For to be carnally minded is death; but to be Spiritually minded is life and peace.  Because (a conclusion) the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.” (Romans 8:6-8)

Our Holy Lord God Almighty cannot have SIN in His Holy Presence, He must punish all sin in order to remain a Holy Lord God.  There are no small sins, or big sins with the Lord God – all falling short of the absolute Holiness and righteousness of God the Son, Christ Jesus is, and is deemed to be, SIN.  Every person born of woman after Adam/Eve’s fall from God’s grace in Eden, are born natural sinners – we sin every day, in word, thought, and in deed.  That is why we Christians must repent from our sin, confess our sin to the Lord God, and seek fresh sanctification every day.  This is the Bible doctrine of what we call Progressive Sanctification.

The Lord God chastens us, ‘His people’ when we sin.  That chastisement is designed to bring us back into line with God’s great Holiness in our daily state, as Christ’s Blood has made us Holy in our family standing in Him.  God’s wrath works repentance in us continually.

Psalm 79 is a Psalm listing the complaints of God’s people, as the Lord repeatedly chastens them for their sin to bring them to personal and National repentance.  Personal sin, and National sin must be continually punished by God. Invasion, oppression, and National overthrow are the chastisements of our Holy Lord God.

Verse 1. “O God, the heathen are come into Thine inheritance. It is with the eye of amazement at sacrilegious intrusion; as if the poet were struck with horror. ‘Thy Holy temple have they defiled.’ It is an awful thing when wicked men are found in the church and numbered with her ministry. ‘They have laid Jerusalem on heaps’ It is sad to see the foe in our own house, but worse to meet him in the house of God; they strike hardest who smite at our religion.” (Charles Haddon Spurgeon, The Treasury of David, page 343)

The Jewish nation, and their great city Jerusalem in particular, have suffered God’s rebuke after rebuke down though the war-torn centuries since Christ Jesus was rejected as their true Messiah, and Crucified to death outside that great city’s walls.

“Pilate saith unto them (the Jewish chief priests and the people), What shall I do then with Jesus which is called Christ? They all say unto him, Let Him be crucified…Then answered all the people, and said, His blood be on us, and on our children.”  (Matthew 27:22-26)

God the Father said ‘Amen’ (So be it) to this rejection statement – and ever since, the Jewish nation have suffered the consequences of their rejection of Messiah Jesus and felt God’s angry rebukes.  One day a remnant of National Israel will repent, and be graciously saved.

Verses 2-5. “How long, Lord? Wilt Thou be angry forever? Eighteen centuries of exile and woe have not dulled their heart’s affections or deadened their feelings of devotion. Here we see them assembled from the ends of the earth – poor, despised, down-trodden outcasts – amid the desolations of their fatherland, beside the dishonoured ruins of their ancient sanctuary (the wailing wall) – chanting, now in accents of deep pathos, and now of wild woe, the prophetic words of their own Psalmist: ‘O God, the heathen are come into Thine inheritance; Thy Holy temple have they defiled…We are become a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and derision to them that are round about us. How long, Lord? Wilt Thou be angry forever?’” (J.L. Porter, in The Giant Cities of Bashan, (1776-1850)

Verse 5. “…Shall Thy jealousy burn like fire? “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness (‘holy pictures/paintings') of anything that is in Heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself to them (images/pictures/paintings), nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Me; and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love Me, and keep My commandments.” (Exodus 20:4-6)

Nations like our own British nation, and other once great nations like America, which have been founded and grounded upon the Bible and Biblical laws and principles – have apostatised, gone back into worldliness and gross sin; made idols of fools, fools to be worshipped one day, and mourned the next; due to them having taken lethal over-doses of narcotic drugs, or wrecked cars due to being intoxicated by alcohol.  God is not pleased.  Nor shall He be mocked!  Divine punishments are constantly evidenced in floods, storms, wars, as He rebukes and curses once Christian nations, and heathen nations, for their increased rejection of Christ Jesus.

“As the bird by wandering, as the swallow by flying, so the curse causeless shall not come.” (Proverbs 26:2)

Thought: National and personal repentance from gross sin, a sincere turning to Christ for Salvation: these alone might turn away the righteous rod of God’s Divine anger.