When the Barbarians Sack the Sanctuary Text: Psalm 79:1-4
Introduction: A Familiar Desolation
We live in a time of managed decline, a time when the ruins of a once-great Christian civilization are all around us. The barbarians are not at the gates; they are in our universities, our statehouses, and increasingly, in our pulpits. They have taken over the institutions, and their great project is one of defilement. They want to tear down every standard, erase every distinction, and profane everything holy. And so, when we come to a psalm like this one, a psalm of raw lament, we should not treat it as a historical curiosity, a relic from a distant, dirtier time. We should read it as a dispatch from the front lines, a description of our own backyard.
This is a psalm of Asaph, but given the subject material, it is likely "Asaphic" that is, of the school of Asaph, in the tradition of Asaph. The scenes described here fit very well with Israel's later history, particularly the Babylonian conquest, and not really with the time of David or Solomon. This is a psalm written from the rubble. The holy city has been desecrated, the people slaughtered, and the watching world is laughing. This is what happens when God's people fall into covenant unfaithfulness and God hands them over to a time of judgment. He uses the pagans as His rod of correction, and the pagans, being pagans, always overdo it.
But this is not a psalm of despair. It is a psalm of appeal. It is a covenantal lawsuit. The psalmist is not crying into the void; he is crying out to the God who made promises. He is cataloging the outrages of the heathen, not to inform God of something He missed, but to lay out the evidence for his case. The case is this: "O God, look at what they have done to Your name. Look at the reproach they have brought upon Your inheritance. How long will you let this stand?" This is a prayer for God to vindicate His own glory. And as we look at the wreckage of our own culture, as we see the holy things of God mocked and trampled, this must be our prayer as well. We must learn to pray prayers that are concerned, first and foremost, with the honor of God's name.
The Text
O God, the nations have come into Your inheritance;
They have defiled Your holy temple;
They have laid Jerusalem in ruins.
They have given the dead bodies of Your slaves for food to the birds of the heavens,
The flesh of Your holy ones to the beasts of the earth.
They have poured out their blood like water round about Jerusalem;
And there was no one to bury them.
We have become a reproach to our neighbors,
A mockery and derision to those around us.
(Psalm 79:1-4 LSB)
The Invasion of God's Property (v. 1)
The psalm opens with the raw shock of invasion and sacrilege.
"O God, the nations have come into Your inheritance; They have defiled Your holy temple; They have laid Jerusalem in ruins." (Psalm 79:1)
Notice the first and most fundamental charge. The nations have come into "Your inheritance." This is not primarily about what has happened to "us," but what has happened to what is "His." The land, the people, the city, the temple, it all belongs to God. He is the offended party. This is the foundation of all righteous lament. Our complaints must be rooted in God's property rights. The heathen have not just crossed a geopolitical border; they have trespassed onto holy ground. They have invaded God's personal estate.
And what is the first thing they do? "They have defiled Your holy temple." This is always the goal of the pagan. The ungodly hate holiness because it is a standing rebuke to their sin. They cannot stand the presence of a place set apart for the one true God. So they must pollute it, desecrate it, and make it common. Think of Antiochus Epiphanes sacrificing a pig on the altar. Think of the Roman standards being set up in the holy place. And think of our modern pagans, who seek to defile the church, which is the temple of the living God, with every form of sexual perversion and doctrinal compromise. The spirit is the same. The goal is to erase the distinction between the holy and the profane.
The result of this spiritual invasion is physical destruction: "They have laid Jerusalem in ruins." When the heart of a city, its place of worship, is defiled, the rest of the city cannot stand. The walls crumble. The houses are burned. The social order collapses. A city without a true temple at its center is just a pile of rocks waiting to happen. This is a picture of covenant judgment. God had warned them this would happen if they turned away from Him. And now it has. But even in this, the psalmist's appeal is to God's reputation. This is Your city, and look what they have done to it.
The Utter Contempt for God's People (v. 2-3)
The psalmist then moves from the desecration of places to the desecration of people, God's people.
"They have given the dead bodies of Your slaves for food to the birds of the heavens, The flesh of Your holy ones to the beasts of the earth. They have poured out their blood like water round about Jerusalem; And there was no one to bury them." (Psalm 79:2-3)
This is a portrait of ultimate contempt. In the ancient world, to be denied a proper burial was the final indignity. It was to be erased from memory, to be treated as less than human, as mere carrion. And notice again the possessive language. These are "Your slaves," Your servants. These are "Your holy ones," Your saints. The attack on them is an attack on their Master. The pagans are not just killing people; they are making a theological statement. They are saying, "Your God cannot protect you, not even in death. Your bodies are worthless, just like your God."
The imagery is graphic and brutal. Blood poured out like water signifies the cheapness of life in the eyes of the conquerors. It is plentiful and worthless. The bodies are left unburied, a public spectacle of defeat. This is not just warfare; it is psychological and spiritual terrorism. The goal is to demoralize any who remain, to show the utter futility of trusting in Yahweh.
This is a fulfillment of the covenant curses laid out in Deuteronomy 28, where God warns that if Israel disobeys, "your dead body shall be food for all birds of the air and for the beasts of the earth, and there shall be no one to frighten them away" (Deut. 28:26). The psalmist knows this. He understands that this horror is not random. It is the righteous judgment of God. But he is also pleading that the judgment has gone far enough. He is appealing to God's mercy by showing Him the full, bloody extent of His own curse being carried out by gleeful pagans.
The Public Humiliation (v. 4)
The psalm then turns from the internal devastation to the external mockery.
"We have become a reproach to our neighbors, A mockery and derision to those around us." (Psalm 79:4)
After the carnage comes the comedy. For the surrounding nations, the fall of Jerusalem is high entertainment. Israel was supposed to be a kingdom of priests, a light to the nations, a city on a hill. They were set apart by God, and they were supposed to be distinct. But when they fell into sin and were judged, their unique status made their fall all the more spectacular. The world always loves to see the people of God fall flat on their faces.
The words here, "reproach," "mockery," and "derision," all point to public shaming. The neighbors are pointing, laughing, and telling jokes. "So that's what happens to the people of Yahweh. Some god he is." This is the heart of the psalmist's complaint. The shame does not terminate on Israel; it is a reflection on their God. When God's people are a laughingstock, God's name is being dragged through the mud. This is what Nehemiah understood when he grieved over the broken walls of Jerusalem. He said, "You see the distress that we are in, how Jerusalem lies waste, and its gates are burned with fire. Come and let us build the wall of Jerusalem, that we may no longer be a reproach" (Nehemiah 2:17).
This is not about hurt feelings or a poor self-image. This is about the reputation of the living God in a world that hates Him. The psalmist is saying, "God, for the sake of Your own name, you cannot let this stand. Our shame is Your shame." This is a profoundly God-centered way to view our own suffering and humiliation. When we are mocked for our faith, when the church is derided in the public square, our first concern should not be for our own comfort, but for the glory of the name we bear.
Our Ruin and Our Refuge
So what do we do with a psalm like this? We are living in a generation that is actively seeking to bring about this same kind of desolation. Our inheritance, the Christian West, has been invaded by pagan ideologies. Our holy places, our churches, are being defiled from within and without. And the world looks on and laughs, mocking the faith that built everything they are now enjoying as they tear it down.
First, we must recognize that when judgment comes, it is deserved. The psalmist is not claiming innocence. The rest of the psalm makes it clear that this is happening because of Israel's sin. We cannot look at the rot in our culture and pretend that the church is blameless. We have compromised, we have been cowardly, we have loved the world, and we are reaping what we have sown. Any true lament must begin with confession.
Second, our lament must be God-centered. Like the psalmist, our ultimate concern must be for the glory of God's name. We should be jealous for His reputation. Our prayer should be, "Lord, the heathen are mocking Your name because of our faithlessness. For the sake of Your own glory, rise up and act." This is the kind of prayer God loves to answer, because it is a prayer for what He wants most, which is the hallowing of His own name.
Finally, we must remember that this scene of desolation is not the final word. The temple in Jerusalem was destroyed, but the true Temple, the body of Jesus Christ, was also laid in ruins on the cross. His blood was poured out like water. His body was given over to the contempt of men. He became a reproach and a mockery. He endured the ultimate covenant curse for us. But on the third day, God raised that Temple up. And in doing so, He guaranteed that His true inheritance, His church, will never ultimately be laid in ruins. We may face times of judgment. We may see our institutions crumble. But the gates of Hell will not prevail against the Church for which Christ died. This psalm is a cry from the midst of the battle, but we know how the war ends. Therefore, we can pray this psalm with sorrow, with confession, but also with a rugged and defiant hope.