Psalm 147:6

Psalm 147:6

The righteous, the humble and the wicked.

Now this is a dilemma, and one that we have encountered many times on our journey through the Psalms. It seems that the psalm writers had no compunction in labelling the righteous and the wicked. In this instance the righteous are the humble, those who have learned to depend on the Lord God and who admit that they cannot deliver, maintain or protect themselves, they have to put their trust in the Lord. The dilemma is that such people are few and far between, does this mean that everyone else is wicked? Yes, in the sense that they ignore God and despise the Gospel of His salvation, but would we go so far as to say that our family members, neighbours, friends and work colleagues who refuse to believe are the wicked? If so the judgement of the Lord, as described in the Psalms, is severe and brutal indeed. In this verse, the wicked are cast down to the ground or, more correctly, the grave. They are destined for eternal isolation from the Lord God and all His blessings. 

Conversely, might we say that there are some people who are born truly evil, they will never acknowledge the Lord, they constantly plot and scheme to satisfy their own evil desires and lusts and are way beyond the reach of God’s salvation? How do we compare such wickedness with those people who are gentle and kind and nice who occupy a kind of middle ground, they do not believe, but they are not evil all the time like the other lot who are “lost souls” from the moment they are born. This second grouping includes all the nice people we know and are close to – not really wicked but not saved either! Many church-goers fit this category, they believe, up to a point, but do not intend to fully and humbly submit to the Lord.

The problem is that the Bible does not make these kinds of distinctions, you either humbly accept the Lord as your God or you cut yourself off from Him. It seems that David and the other Psalm writers were clear that you could only belong to one camp, although the fullness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ had not been revealed to them. You were either in the family of God or out of it, and if the latter, you were labelled with the wicked. I find this troubling and food for thought! According to New Testament writers like Paul, righteousness only comes by faith and has little to do with behaviour. 

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