A Devotional Thought From Psalms

Thou hast shewed thy people hard things: thou hast made us to drink the wine of astonishment.     Psalm 60:3

     When David wrote this song tradition tells us his armies had just returned from a successful campaign against numerous nations, among them the Moabites who were defeated in a battle where his general of the army, Joab, had killed 12,000 of the enemy. Why David should write such a gloomy verse in the midst of successful battle campaigns escapes us. We can only speculate. Perhaps, he was thinking, despite the victories, of the many loyal soldiers of his army who might have given their lives in battle: cut down by the sword; run through with the spear; punctured by arrows; bashed and broken by blunt objects; or other men blinded, or who had lost a limb, or become paralyzed with a broken back never to be the same again. It was as hard and heartbreaking for the ancients to welcome home and care for their wounded warriors as it is for us today. The tragedy of war and evil is astonishing. The reality of death and destruction is hard on the soldiers who fight as well as those who wait at home.

     The world today is watching hard things and drinking the wine of astonishment as we look at the butchery of violent extremist Islamic radicals who in their quest for world domination are committing atrocities that the modern world, rehabilitated in part by the love of God revealed in Christ, cannot fathom. Though we recognize that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, and that among those who sin are people who have the poison of asps in their lips, and do not do righteousness, no, not one, those of us who have been changed in our hearts to love one another, and all the little children of the world, are still shocked by the monstrous deeds of these evil people. How could they behead reporters and aid workers for the simple reason that they are Americans, or take captive until she died an aid worker who was bringing help to embattled Syrians just because she was an American, not to mention the numerous other international hostages currently held or previously executed?  How can they crucify and bury alive little children? How can they target and shoot down Jews shopping in a delicatessen in Paris for no other reason than that they are Jews? How can they burn to death a captive Jordanian pilot? As we watch such evil it is hard to believe that whatever religion they use to excuse or give cover to their despicable, disgraceful, vile, appalling actions is anything other than devilish. We are astonished that they, or anyone, could do such things. It is a hard thing to know that humanity is capable of such malicious wickedness.