If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?
David asked this question, then answered himself. When your presence and speech is perceived as a threat to the position and agenda of those around about, that is all you can do.
The wicked do not care to answer the questions of the innocent. Anger cannot reason with men of peace, and your peace can at times threaten those panicking over their own position.
Reassurance is needed.
The Apostles exhorted the church to encourage one another daily, and even more so as they see the dawning of the new age approaching. The Christian is to be one carved from the rock, not tossed with panic in stormy changing seas.
God is watching, and his chief concern is upon the righteous. David reminded himself of this fact. God knew what he, in his innocence, was going through. He was being wronged by those to whom he did right.
Those who do and believe in what’s right will always experience trials.
The wicked, even as David reminded himself in Psalm 11, will receive fire and brimstone, and a horrible tempest. The allusion to Sodom and Gomorrah is clear, as is David’s reasoning. Sodom and Gomorrah could not recognise righteousness if it personally visited them and spent the night in their presence. Their blindness to morality and good would be rewarded with literal blindness, and ultimately, death and destruction. Why should the Lord continue to look upon those who refuse to look upon Him?
The past year of pandemic has created an abundance of situations in which humanity has felt helpless. Futility is not a good feeling. At some point, someone, somewhere, must put a pause to our panic. We are like the disciples trying to justify our panic and fear to Jesus as he slept on the boat during the storm. Now that is futile. There is no need to fear in the presence of God. Fear not, is the first thing commanded any time God visits his children.
We must reassure ourselves as David did.
The understanding that God will punish the wicked and reward the righteous may seem like an old and archaic theology to many in our supposedly enlightened age; but it is a rock upon which we have built dignified societies and decent morality. Whether we try to convolute it into various new ideas or doctrines, this principle resides within anyone blessed with a conscience.
God is watching, is a minimum that produces a maximum.
It enables us to continue to evolve as a society, and develop laws and systems pertaining to dignified existence and growth. From the account of the Sodom and Gomorrah story in Genesis, it would seem that their degradation and corruption were so great that God had already turned away his eyes. He had to make a special visit to, ‘see what is going on down there, and whether what I hear is altogether true.’ What a sad state of affairs.
Imagine a society so wicked that God ignores it. Then imagine that the prayers and cries of injustices which constitute the reports he hears, are so desperately wicked that he must make a special envoy visit to see whether it’s actually true!
The societies who receive fire and brimstone are those who abandon the rock from which they were hewn. They destroy the foundations. What can the righteous do in such places? If Lot is an example, fleeing may become the only eventual option.
There are many worrying trends happening in societies all over the world.
Deliberate breaking of foundations is taking place. God is aware, and we must reassure ourselves so as not to panic. Minimums from which we gain societies’ maximums are being ignored.
One night recently, I was told by a nurse on staff in the quarantine hotel in which I am held in Queensland that she ‘doesn’t care about international law.’
I had been requesting fresh air breaks and/or a room with an opening window for natural airflow. I made a request citing the minimum requirements for prisoners and detainees according to the international covenant on civil and political rights.
Regardless of how well things are run or done even in a state of emergency, minimums should never be dismissed as irrelevant. They matter. We should care. Panic makes people hysterical and lose sight of the future and the big picture, and fear is the prey of predators. Minimums of law and morality stop our conscience from being seared.
As I look and see moral, individual, political, and civil foundations being removed and replaced with principles foreign to freedom and Christianity, I have asked, ‘what can the righteous do?’
I can only trust God, knowing that he sees.
I must first respect my own minimums and morals. Daniel kept his in Babylon, and flourished. The king’s delicacies were not kosher, yet Daniel kept to his foundations and requested a special diet. He and his friends were healthier than the others. May it be the same for those who for conscience’s sake do not wish to take the COVID jab. Daniel kept his spiritual minimums of praying 3 times a day against the king’s command, and God rescued him, then destroyed his accusers. God can still do the same for us. Are your foundations intact?
And, if things get really bad, we can always be rescued in a blaze of fire and brimstone. One small step, by one man, can be a giant leap for mankind.