Justice for the Poor

God's Prophets Demand Justice
God' Prophets Demand Justice

Advocates of Justice for All


A Choice to Be Just

Psalm 140:6-13  The Message

^6-8 I prayed, “God, you’re my God!
    Listen, God! Mercy!
God, my Lord, Strong Savior,
    protect me when the fighting breaks out!
Don’t let the wicked have their way, God,
    don’t give them an inch!”

^9-11 These troublemakers all around me—
    let them drown in their own verbal poison.
Let God pile hellfire on them,
    let him bury them alive in crevasses!
These loudmouths—
    don’t let them be taken seriously;
These savages—
    let the Devil hunt them down!

^12-13 I know that you, God, are on the side of victims,
    that you care for the rights of the poor.
And I know that the righteous personally thank you,
    that good people are secure in your presence.

For Reflection 

The Old Testament is filled pleas for divine retribution.  Vengeance and vindictiveness was pervasive in the culture of those times.  But notice, the decision to enact retributive justice is assumed to be the domain of God.  All humans can do is entreat God to satisfy the human lust for revenge.  It is, perhaps, a way of venting human frustration with human injustice.

In the last two verses, however, the plea for vengeance  turns to praise for God's compassion and God's patronage of the oppressed.  The prayer becomes one of thanksgiving and a confession of the writer's confidence in God  to deliver the wronged from their suffering and to provide justice in an unjust world.

Pray

pray for the oppressed of the world.  Pray that they will find comfort and justice in a world which seems to overpower them.  Pray the they will find hope in circumstances where they can predict little satisfaction.  Pray that they will find in God the will to escape the prison of economic, political and spiritual poverty.