Forsaking Vengeance, Trusting God

I’m currently reading a book that details the history of the relationship between Arabs and Jews in the Holy Land over the span of a hundred years.[i] I’m only up to the 1940s so far, but already I’m amazed at how many characteristics of the relationship today are exactly what they were a century ago and how often certain patterns have repeated themselves over and over and over again, like a broken record.

One of these patterns is that of vengeance. Someone from one side will kill someone from the other side, and in response people from that side will go out and kill random people from the first side as “pay back,” leading to an increasing exchange of violence that never resolves anything. Regardless of which side killed first in any given case, the pattern of vendetta is always the same.

And it’s against the context of this vicious cycle of retribution that the words of Psalm 52 stand out in stark contrast. This Psalm was written by David after the events described in 1 Samuel 22, when he was fleeing from King Saul and his hiding place was betrayed by Doeg the Edomite. Once Saul found out from Doeg where David was hiding, Saul pursued him and ended up killing not only the priests who had helped David but their entire town of Nob, including women, children, babies, and animals.

In the cycle of violence that characterizes the Holy Land in modern times and that is reflected in this ancient account as well, we would expect David to turn around and kill a whole town of Saul’s supporters or perhaps Doeg’s hometown, even those who had nothing to do with the atrocities committed at Nob, just as Saul and Doeg had killed those at Nob who had nothing to do with their quarrel with David. But that’s not how David responds.

He starts by criticizing Doeg, writing,

“Why do you boast of evil, O mighty man?
    The steadfast love of God endures all the day.
Your tongue plots destruction,
    like a sharp razor, you worker of deceit.
You love evil more than good,
    and lying more than speaking what is right. Selah
You love all words that devour,
    O deceitful tongue” (vv. 1-4, ESV).
 
Clearly, he is none too fond of Doeg and what he has done. We might imagine that David would continue by saying something to the effect of, “I’ll repay you for your treachery and violence. You think you can betray me and wipe out a whole town of my friends and get away with it? I’ll show you not to mess with me!” But instead, he writes,
 
“But God will break you down forever;
    he will snatch and tear you from your tent;
    he will uproot you from the land of the living. Selah
The righteous shall see and fear,
    and shall laugh at him, saying,
‘See the man who would not make
    God his refuge,
but trusted in the abundance of his riches
    and sought refuge in his own destruction!’” (vv. 5-7, ESV).

Who is the subject of each part of the first sentence? God. And who is noticeably absent from these verses? David. God is the one who will break down Doeg. God is the one who will snatch and tear and uproot. God is the one who will bring judgment, not David. Instead of obsessing over how he can make Doeg and Saul pay for what they did or worrying over how he can go on while these ruthless men are still hunting him, he focuses on the security he has in God:
 
“But I am like a green olive tree
    in the house of God.
I trust in the steadfast love of God
    forever and ever.
I will thank you forever,
    because you have done it.
I will wait for your name, for it is good,
    in the presence of the godly” (vv. 8-9, ESV).
 
Notice also that David speaks of God’s already having “done it” (past) while also saying that he “will wait” (present/future). God’s work is already sure, but sometimes we have to wait to see it brought to its full completion. We might not always see the wicked brought to justice, but we know that God’s justice will ultimately prevail, if not in this life, then in the next, and we can rest in the fact that God will either punish evil or have mercy if the evildoers turn to Jesus and accept His just payment for their debt of wrongdoing (i.e., His death on the Cross).

Perhaps you don’t live in a part of the world where revenge killings are the norm. Maybe you’ve never faced the question of how to respond when someone kills a person in your community. But I think it’s safe to say that we all have been wronged in one way or another. Maybe you’ve been slandered, betrayed, lied to, neglected, or stolen from. Maybe others have hurt you with their words, their attitudes, or their actions. Regardless of what form the wrong takes, we all have the same choice—do we retaliate in kind or do we leave the vengeance to God? As I’ve written about in another post, and as David knew well, God is fully trustworthy as the only completely just Judge to avenge evil in His own perfect way.

So instead of taking matters into our own hands when we have been wronged, may we be like David and give the wrongdoer over to the hands of God, acknowledging that He is the true avenger, not us. May we rest in the security that comes with our position of being in Christ, and may we, as David, choose to “trust in the steadfast love of God forever and ever.”

PC: Hannah Vazquez. Used with permission.

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[i] Black, Ian. Enemies and Neighbors: Arabs and Jews in Palestine and Israel, 1917-2017. [London]: Penguin Books, 2018.