When God Stands Up Text: Psalm 68:1-3
Introduction: The Necessary Confrontation
We live in an age that has tried to domesticate God. Modern, effeminate Christianity wants a God who is always nice, always affirming, and never, ever disruptive. They want a divine therapist, a celestial butler, a God who can be summoned to bless our plans but who would never dream of overturning our tables. This is the god of civic religion, the god of sentimentalism, the god who is welcome in our hearts as a private preference but is strictly forbidden from entering the public square with any kind of authority.
But the God of the Bible is not safe. He is not tame. He is the sovereign Lord of heaven and earth, and when He decides to move, the world shakes. This psalm, Psalm 68, is a potent antidote to our weak-kneed, gelatinous conception of the divine. This is a warrior's song, a victory chant. It begins not with a polite suggestion, but with a thunderous summons: "Let God arise." This is a prayer that understands the true nature of reality. It is a prayer that knows that all of human history, all of our political squabbles, all of our cultural battles, are ultimately resolved by one thing and one thing only: the presence of the living God.
This psalm is what we call an imprecatory psalm. That is a fifty-cent word that simply means it calls down judgment upon the enemies of God. Our squishy generation gets very nervous about such prayers. We have been taught to love our enemies, which is true, but we have forgotten that the highest form of love for our enemies is to pray that God would either convert them or, failing that, restrain their evil and bring their wicked schemes to nothing. To pray for God to arise is to pray for a great sorting out. It is to pray for a definitive confrontation between good and evil, between truth and falsehood, between the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of men. When God stands up, no one remains neutral. His presence forces a decision. You are either with Him or against Him. You either rejoice in His light or you are scattered like smoke in His wind.
And this is not just an Old Testament sentiment. This is the prayer of the Church throughout the ages. It is a prayer for the victory of the gospel. It is a prayer for the advancement of Christ's kingdom. It is a confident, postmillennial prayer that recognizes that Christ is currently reigning and is putting all His enemies under His feet. So let us not be timid. Let us pray with the psalmist, with full-throated confidence, for God to arise in our time, in our land, in our churches, and in our hearts.
The Text
Let God arise, let His enemies be scattered,
And let those who hate Him flee before Him.
As smoke is driven away, so drive them away;
As wax melts before the fire,
So let the wicked perish before God.
But let the righteous be glad; let them exult before God;
And let them rejoice with gladness.
(Psalm 68:1-3 LSB)
The Divine Intervention (v. 1)
We begin with the great summons in verse 1:
"Let God arise, let His enemies be scattered, And let those who hate Him flee before Him." (Psalm 68:1)
This language is not new. It is a direct quote from the book of Numbers. This was the prayer that Moses would pray every time the Ark of the Covenant, which represented the manifest presence of God, would set out before the people of Israel in their journey through the wilderness. "Arise, O LORD, and let Your enemies be scattered; and let those who hate You flee before You" (Numbers 10:35). This is the prayer of a people on the march. It is not the prayer of a people hunkered down in a defensive crouch. It is the prayer of an advancing army, led by God Himself.
Notice the direct and necessary connection between God arising and His enemies scattering. The two are not separate events. The one causes the other. The very presence of God is a disruptive, terrifying, and fatal thing for those who have set themselves against Him. His enemies are not scattered by our clever arguments, our political maneuvering, or our cultural savvy. They are scattered by God Himself. Our task is not to generate the power, but to call upon the one who has all power. This is a prayer of radical dependence and absolute confidence.
And who are these enemies? They are defined as "those who hate Him." This is crucial. The conflict is not fundamentally between different political parties or social classes. The conflict is theological. It is a battle between those who love God and submit to His authority, and those who hate God and rebel against His authority. All of our cultural conflicts are downstream from this basic religious divide. To hate God is to hate His law, to hate His Christ, to hate His people, and to hate His created order. When you see the world raging against the clear distinctions God has made, between man and woman, between good and evil, between the sacred and the profane, you are seeing a manifestation of this hatred for the Creator. This prayer asks God to deal with that hatred directly.
The Frailty of the Wicked (v. 2)
Verse 2 gives us two powerful similes to describe the complete and utter impotence of God's enemies when He decides to act.
"As smoke is driven away, so drive them away; As wax melts before the fire, So let the wicked perish before God." (Psalm 68:2 LSB)
The first image is smoke. What is smoke? It is insubstantial. It looks dark and threatening, it can fill a room and choke you, but it has no real substance. A puff of wind, and it is gone. This is what the mighty empires of men, the proud towers of Babel, the arrogant philosophies of the wicked, look like to God. They appear formidable to us, but in the face of the wind of His Spirit, they are nothing. They are a passing vapor, a momentary darkness that is instantly dispelled by the hurricane of His presence.
The second image is wax before a fire. Wax can be hard and resistant. You can form it into shapes. But bring it near the heat, and its integrity dissolves. It loses all form and substance. It simply melts away. This is what happens to the wicked when they come into the presence of the holy God. All their carefully constructed arguments, all their defiant pride, all their hardened rebellion, simply melts. God's holiness is a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29), and in His presence, all that is impure cannot stand.
These are not images of a negotiated settlement or a truce. This is a picture of total, effortless victory. God does not struggle with His enemies. He does not arm-wrestle with them. The battle is not a contest between two equal and opposite forces. It is the confrontation between the Creator and the creature, between the uncreated fire and the melting wax. The outcome is never in doubt. The prayer is that God would simply show up. That is all that is required. "So let the wicked perish before God." Their destruction is not an act of arbitrary cruelty; it is the natural and inevitable consequence of their refusing to bow before the source of all life and goodness.
The Joy of the Righteous (v. 3)
The response of the righteous to this divine intervention is the polar opposite of the wicked's fate. While the wicked are scattered, driven away, and perish, the righteous are gathered, welcomed, and rejoice.
"But let the righteous be glad; let them exult before God; And let them rejoice with gladness." (Psalm 68:3 LSB)
The same presence of God that is a terrifying, consuming fire for the wicked is a warming, comforting, and joyful fire for the righteous. It is all a matter of relationship. For those who are His enemies, His presence is judgment. For those who are His children, His presence is salvation. The sun that melts the wax also hardens the clay. The presence of God has a different effect depending on what you are.
And who are the righteous? In the ultimate sense, there is none righteous, no not one (Romans 3:10). The righteous are not those who are sinlessly perfect. The righteous are those who have been declared righteous by faith. They are those who have taken refuge in Christ, who have had their sins washed away by His blood and have been clothed in His perfect righteousness. They are the ones who, when God arises, do not have to flee, because their sin has already been judged at the cross.
Notice the piling up of joyful words: "be glad," "exult," "rejoice with gladness." This is not a quiet, somber affair. This is ecstatic, exuberant, overflowing joy. This is the joy of liberation. It is the joy of seeing justice done. It is the joy of seeing your King vindicated and victorious. There is a holy and righteous pleasure in seeing God's enemies defeated and His kingdom advance. To pretend otherwise is a form of false piety. The saints in heaven rejoice when Babylon falls (Revelation 18:20). We should not be more "spiritual" than they are. When God acts to bring justice, His people ought to celebrate.
Conclusion: Praying for the Rout
So what does this mean for us? It means we must recover the backbone of biblical prayer. We are in a spiritual war, not a political debate. Our enemies are not flesh and blood, but the spiritual forces of wickedness that animate the rebellion around us (Ephesians 6:12). And the central strategy in that war is to call upon our commanding officer to arise.
This is a prayer for revival. It is a prayer for the gospel to run and be glorified. When God arises, His enemies are scattered. What does that look like? It looks like conversions. It looks like proud, God-hating rebels being broken at the foot of the cross, their rebellion melting away like wax. It looks like strongholds of wickedness being torn down. It looks like the lies of our age being exposed and blown away like smoke. The greatest way for God's enemies to be scattered is for them to be converted and brought into the camp of the righteous.
But it is also a prayer for judgment. For those who will not bend the knee, we pray that God would break their power. We pray that He would confound their plans, frustrate their councils, and bring their evil designs to ruin. This is not a vindictive, personal prayer. It is a prayer for the glory of God and the health of the society He has ordained. We are praying, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." And the coming of that kingdom necessarily means the scattering of all rival kingdoms.
Therefore, let us not be ashamed of these prayers. Let us pray them with faith. Let us look at the chaos and the rebellion of our world and, instead of despairing, let us call upon our God. Let us ask Him to arise. And when He does, His enemies will be scattered, the wicked will perish from His presence, and we, the righteous, will be glad and rejoice with a joy that no one can take away.