Leaving Egypt Ministries, Obadiah D. Morris

I recently read straight through all of the Psalms over the course of a couple of days for a project I am working on. Among many other things that we can take from the Psalms, there is one inescapable theme that runs throughout nearly all of them: The existence of evil men of our world (i.e., the state rulers and their supporters) who conspire against God’s children to plunder them, and God’s destruction of these enemies of ours and His. 

Despite the dominance of this theme, however, it rarely seems to be pointed out. (Popular summaries don’t really mention it. Others allude to the praise to God for His greatness in the Psalms, but don’t really mention that His greatness and work is highly related to drowning Pharaohs and officers in seas. And others give just a general picture of how the book is constructed). Most people seem to treat the Psalms as just some nice, devotional sort of portion of scripture, as prayers, poems, or as Biblical songs or hymns that we should sing without thinking much about the words within them, or maybe just words of praise without any real theme or meaning. There is, of course, much praise to God going on, much talk of trusting in God, and things of this nature that men typically take from a book like the Psalms. 

But there is a rather persistent theme that almost always seems to be ignored, but is quite evident if you just start reading straight through all of them. Of all the great things we can take from the Psalms and which men usually see in this book, this theme is at the same time unavoidable:

(1) the existence of wicked and evil men in our world, i.e., government agents and their co-conspirators, who prey upon us; 

(2) our need for God’s protection from them; and, 

(3) the destruction of these wicked men at the hand of God. 

I do not intend to say here that the Psalms are only about this theme or confined to it. But to think of the Psalms as nothing more than religious praise songs or beautiful poetry—again I don’t mean to downplay a powerful liturgical role here—would be to severely reduce their meaning. But it is really when we have these more or less neglected themes in mind—the wicked conspirators of the world and God’s punishment of them—that the praise and trust in God begin to make sense: the praise to God is related to these other themes. We praise God and trust in Him, because He takes care of our enemies for us. We put our faith in God to save us from enemies, not “governments” who claim to be “protectors.”

Not that they don’t praise God regardless, but in many places the psalmists seem to suggest that their praise will be even greater when God does take care of their enemies for them.

“How long, O Lord, will You look on? Rescue my soul from their ravages, my precious life from these lions. Then I will give You thanks in the great assembly; I will praise You among many people. Let not my enemies gloat over me without cause, nor those who hate me without reason wink in malice. For they do not speak peace, but they devise deceitful schemes against those who live quietly in the land. They gape at me and say, ‘Aha, aha! Our eyes have seen!’ O LORD, You have seen it; be not silent. O Lord, be not far from me. Awake and rise to my defense, to my cause, my God and my Lord! Vindicate me by Your righteousness, O LORD my God, and do not let them gloat over me. Let them not say in their hearts, ‘Aha, just what we wanted!’ Let them not say, ‘We have swallowed him up!’ May those who gloat in my distress be ashamed and confounded; may those who exalt themselves over me be clothed in shame and reproach. May those who favor my vindication shout for joy and gladness; may they always say, ‘Exalted be the LORD who delights in His servant’s well-being.’ Then my tongue will proclaim Your righteousness and Your praises all day long” (Psalm 35:17-28).

The dominance of this theme

It is curious that we never really hear about the wicked conspirators of the world or God’s aim to destroy them. It is more or less impossible to avoid this theme in the Psalms, or in the whole scripture for that matter. One could almost read a few Psalms at random and more than likely see the theme among one of the few, if not the first one and the next few they choose, too.  

At any rate, a great amount of the Book of Psalms is all about acknowledging (1) the existence of the conspiratorial men who rule the world, (2) our need to pray for divine protection from them, and (3) God’s destruction of them. One of the repeated promises we get is that “the evildoers will be cut off” (Psalm 37:9; cf. 75:10).

It is not hard to show the prevalence of this theme of being surrounded by enemies who conspire against God’s people. There are 150 Psalms. “Enemies” is mentioned 69 times in the version that I read straight through (the Berean Standard Bible); “wicked” is mentioned 109 times; “evildoers” 12 times; “workers of iniquity” 9 times. But this doesn’t exhaust the mention of “deceitful men” (26:4), “men of bloodshed” (26:9), “ruthless men” (54:3), “fierce men” (59:3), “men of violence” (140:1), “men who do iniquity” (141:4), etc.

Evil men, ie., the political conspirators of our world, are everywhere in the Book of Psalms. Our enemies—the demonic statist rulers who control the world’s institutions—make up a major theme in the Psalms, whether pointing out their existence or God’s punishment of them. It is not surprising to find this theme in the Psalms, either. God is referred to as a “God of vengeance” (94:1), as the “judge of the earth” (94:2).

Who are the evil men?

Others miss this, I suppose, because they aren’t keen on the evils going on in the world. They hold the ideas they have learned from their worldly propaganda—that government is “we the people” and “the soldiers fight for our freedom”—when they read the Bible and so miss the things they don’t want to see. Moreover, many men are unrepentant idolaters and refuse to be rebuked for the sinful ideology of statism.

But we are not merely talking about some vague “evil” men. The “wicked men” are not merely some “bad guys” from the streets or the general population. The “wicked ones” in the scriptures are those people who have been possessed by evil to plunder their fellow man under the title of “the government.” They are the men who hide behind a badge and claim the “authority” to come into your house, bind you up, throw you in their vehicle, and haul you off to a prison cell because you disobeyed their king (who is certainly not Jesus). They are the men who throw global “pandemics” to lock people down, inject them with drugs they made, and cause a panic among billions of people, all because they enjoy the chaos they create. They are the men who print the money and fund the wars. They are the “proud” men who set themselves up as “gods” in the kingdoms of men. They are the statists.

Though these verses may not necessarily specify who these enemies or wicked men are (though it does refer to men who do violence and shed blood and oppress people), it’s plainly obvious to discerning men who these evildoers of the world are: They are the evil statists who rule the world, those who work for them, and those who follow after them and their lies. Is it not more obvious than ever, even to the previously blinded, that we’re being ruled by evil men?

And these things—the conspirators, their plots against us, and God’s judgment upon them—are arguably major themes in the Psalms. The Psalms are the original conspiracy theorists’ manual, an exposé of the conspiring political elite who have plotted against humanity (and God himself) from time immemorial. Unfortunately secular conspiracy theorists haven’t yet realized that the schemes against humanity by its political rulers are Biblical and spiritual and a bit more deep than just some attempts by regular old humans to rob others, because when they do the conspirators are going to be truly exposed for all the evil that they are.

The state-serving conspirators

This theme of the wicked, conspiring men of our world (i.e., those men who set up governments to plunder humanity) permeates the pages of the Psalms. This book is all about the statist plunderers who surround God’s people historically and in the present age, from the scheming global elites who concoct international agendas to the lowly, order-following police officers who Pharaoh uses to assure the violent enforcement of his decrees. It is all about our political enemy that stalks the people to bring back revenue for the crown. 

“He lies in wait near the villages; in ambush he slays the innocent; his eyes watch in stealth for the helpless. He lies in wait like a lion in a thicket; he lurks to seize the oppressed; he catches the lowly in his net. They are crushed and beaten down; the hapless fall prey to his strength” (Psalm 10:8-10). 

These verses always make it more plainly obvious that the wicked men being referenced are the political rulers who control the world’s institutions, namely the State, its various agencies and departments, and all its allied organizations (banks, corporations, contractors, NGOs, etc). 

The Psalms are full of the awareness that ungodly men conspire against God and His children. 

“With cunning they scheme against Your people and conspire against those You cherish, saying, ‘Come, let us erase them as a nation; may the name of Israel be remembered no more.’ For with one mind they plot together, they form an alliance against You” (Psalm 83:3-5). 

God’s protection from evil statists

Besides pointing out (1) the existence of these conspirators, as well as (3) God’s judgment upon them, another essential part of the Psalms is (2) calling upon God’s protection from these even men of the world, i.e., the state rulers who conspire against us and plunder us in order to enrich themselves. But we never hear much about this. The Psalms are said to be prayers, but those who point this out never really include that they are prayers to God to deliver us from evil men who rule over us. They are treated in sort of a generic sense that disregards the general state of being spied upon and stalked by conspirators from which the psalmists are often writing.

We may take Psalm 140 as an example, but this is not an isolated Psalm but rather one that is truly expressive of the nature of the whole book of Psalms. Arguably, reading this Psalm alone can give you a good idea of what all of the Psalms are about. 

“Rescue me, O LORD, from evil men. Protect me from men of violence, who devise evil in their hearts and stir up war all day long. They sharpen their tongues like snakes; the venom of vipers is on their lips. Guard me, O LORD, from the hands of the wicked. Keep me safe from men of violence who scheme to make me stumble. The proud hide a snare for me; the cords of their net are spread along the path, and lures are set out for me. I say to the LORD, ‘You are my God.’ Hear, O LORD, my cry for help. O GOD the Lord, the strength of my salvation, You shield my head in the day of battle. Grant not, O LORD, the desires of the wicked; do not promote their evil plans, lest they be exalted. May the heads of those who surround me be covered in the trouble their lips have caused. May burning coals fall on them; may they be thrown into the fire, into the miry pits, never to rise again. May no slanderer be established in the land; may calamity hunt down the man of violence. I know that the LORD upholds justice for the poor and defends the cause of the needy. Surely the righteous will praise Your name; the upright will dwell in Your presence” (Psalm 140:1-13).

We are to be calling upon God to save us from the evil men who rule the world and prey on God’s children. 

“They conspire against me and plot to take my life. But I trust in You, O LORD; I say, ‘You are my God.’ My times are in Your hands; deliver me from my enemies and from those who pursue me” (Psalm 31:13-15). 

Why praise the Lord?

As I have mentioned already, praising the Lord is not merely some theme that is outside of this general theme of God destroying our enemies for us; the latter is often a reason for the former. We are not praising the Lord without reason, though reverence to God simply for being God is also a darn good reason to praise the Most High. We are to “sing to the LORD a new song, for He has done wonders” (98:1). What kind of wonders? We are speaking here of the “signs and wonders” upon Pharaohs and their armies, i.e., God’s destruction of state rulers and their militaries and police forces, who have set out against both God and His people (Ex 3:20, 4:21, 7:3-5, 11:9-10; Deut 4:34, 7:19, 26:8, 34:11; Acts 7:36). Many praises to God within the Psalms might well be rephrased as, “Praise God, He destroys statists.” Such praise to the Lord is done mostly in this sense: Praise the Lord, He removes my enemies. 

Do we praise God merely for His majesty? Do we revere the Lord merely because He is the Lord? We can’t say this is wrong. But we can probably submit that we don’t merely praise God for some entirely vague reasons, but really because God is a state-smasher who takes care of our enemies when we have faith and fear in Him alone. God is—praise Him—with us against the evil elites who concoct endless global schemes against us.

Even when it’s not explicit that we are to praise God because He destroys the statist enemies for us (as when it’s in the same verse), it is clear, after talking about God being a God of judgment, that even the psalms of pure praise that come in between the others are more or less for this reason. 

Aside from the praises to the Lord being given mostly as a thanks to God for protecting us from these evil men, we see that (1) the existence of the wicked, (2) their conspiring against us, and (3) their eventual demise at the hand of God, makes up a significant part of the Book of Psalms. If we excluded chapters of exclusive praise to God (or counted them in assuming they are connected to this thesis here), we could probably show that most of the chapters of the Psalms are about this theme of (1) evil men conspiring against God’s people and (2) our need for divine protection from them. 

The acknowledgements of the wicked conspirators in our world (ie., those evil men who run “governments”) is not really mentioned in the Psalms without the accompanying calls to the Lord to protect us from these violent, scheming men. We praise God for keeping us out of the hands of the plunderers of the world. “Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us as prey to their teeth” (Psalm 124:6). 

Psalms of destruction upon the enemy

Let us keep proving how dominant this theme is in the Psalms. I’ll make some extra effort here to show that I am not making this up. Here are the psalms that either explicitly or implicitly mention either (3) God’s judgment or destruction of the evil, conspiring men of the world (i.e., those who form governments to plunder us); (2) our need for God’s protection from them; or both: 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 13, 17, 20, 21, 22, 25, 28, 31, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 40, 44, 46, 47, 50, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 81, 82, 83, 86, 89, 91, 92, 94, 96, 98, 101, 102, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 112, 119, 120, 121, 123, 125, 129, 135, 136, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 145, 147, 149.

Here we have at least 88 out of 150 (about 59%) psalms that contain (3) this theme of God’s vengeance upon the wicked of the world. (And I have not even included all the mentions of the conspirators here; just specific mentions of their destruction or our need for God’s protection).

Most of the others not listed here are sort of praise oriented. But since I have argued that the reason for praise toward (and trust in) God is necessarily connected to the other themes like God taking care of our enemies for us and smashing the global political conspirators, we may well include pretty much all of the Psalms as falling under (3) this umbrella theme of destruction of the wicked. 

To furthermore avoid the charge that we are just “cherry-picking” verses here, we have entire Psalms (eg., 54, 59, 83, 86, 140, 142, 143) that are prayers to God to destroy the wicked! (And I probably missed some here, since I only started keeping track into the fifties). 

Moreover, this theme of God’s destruction of the wicked is supported by the prophets. In Isaiah alone we read, for example, that “the Lord alone will be exalted” (2:11), “woe to the wicked [for] disaster is upon them” (3:11), “I will punish the world for their evil and the wicked for their iniquity” (13:11), “the spirit of Egypt shall fail” (19:3), “the Lord shall smite Egypt” (19:22), “the Lord shall punish…the kings of the earth” (24:21), “there is no peace..unto the wicked” (48:22), etc.

A breakdown of the Psalms

But don’t take my word for that this theme of (3) God’s destruction of the wicked and (2) our need to call upon God to destroy them is found all throughout the Psalms. Allow me to cite the specific and explicit instances of them.

The Psalms are full of (3) the hopeful message that the wicked—the statists of the world—will be torn down, cut off, and judged by God, and that God takes care of our enemies for us: Psalm 1:4, 6; 2:9; 5:5-6; 6:10; 9:5-6, 16-17; 10:17-18; 11:6; 20:8; 21:8-12; 25:3; 34:21; 37:1-2, 9-10, 14-15, 17, 20, 22, 32-33, 35-36, 38; 44:1-3; 46:8-9; 47:3; 50:16-21; 52:5, 53:5; 55:23; 60:6-8, 12; 62:12; 63:9-10; 64:7-8; 68:1-2, 21; 72:4; 73:18-20, 27; 75:10; 76:4-5, 12; 78:11-12, 42-55; 81:14-15; 82:1; 89:10, 22-23; 91:9-16; 92:7-9; 94:13, 23; 96:13; 98:9; 101:8; 104:35; 105:5-7, 28-36; 106:7-11; 107:40; 108:7-9, 13; 109:15; 110:5-6; 112:10; 119:119; 121:7; 125:5; 129:4; 135:8-11; 136:15, 17-20, 23-24; 145:20; 147:6; 149:6-9. 

The Psalms are full of (2) calls or prayers directly to God to take care of our enemies for us or save us from them: Psalm 3:4-7; 5:10; 7:1-2, 6, 9; 9:19-20; 10:2, 15; 13:3-4; 17:6-13; 22:5, 11-21; 25:1-2, 19-20; 28:4-5; 31:3-4; 9-18; 35:1-8, 17-27; 36:10-12; 38:19-22; 40:13-16; 44:4-7; 54:1-7; 55:16-18; 56:1-4; 57:2-3; 58:6-8; 59:1-17; 60:11; 61:1-5; 64:1-6; 68:20; 69:1-4, 13-28; 70:1-5; 71:1-15; 74:22-23; 77:1-3; 79:5-12; 82:2-4, 8; 83:1-18; 86:1-17; 89:50-51; 91:2-3; 94:1-2; 102:1-8; 107:1-7; 108:6, 12; 109:1-15, 26-27; 119:134; 120:1-2; 123:3-4; 139:19-20; 140:1-13; 141:10; 142:1-7; 143:1-12.

And they are full of the hope that the righteous will be redeemed, that God will vindicate those oppressed by the plunderous statists: Psalm 1:3; 9:18; 12:5, 25:13; 34:22; 37:3-7, 9, 11, 18-19, 22, 29, 34; 58:10-11; 68:3; 75:10; 85:9, 12-13; 92:12-15; 102:28; 106:4-5; 112:2; 135:12. 

There are more Psalms than these listed that fit this narrative since I have only listed the ones where such mentions are very explicit. Yet others, however, are implied but still there. (The psalmist, for instance, might be speaking of God’s salvation in general, but since it isn’t a direct call or prayer to God, I didn’t include it). A repeated theme is still that (1) wicked men conspire against us and (2) we are in need of God’s protection. If I added all the verses of the evil men of the world conspiring against God’s children, as I will do in a second part, they would be even more numerous.

Conclusion

There is much more to the Psalms than what I have stated here. We’re talking about God’s rich words of wisdom after all. There is all kinds of powerful stuff in between the themes I am addressing here. I don’t want to take away from many other lessons we could derive from the Psalms, or even suggest that this is the main theme. But it is an unmistakable part of the narrative that (1) wicked men conspire against us, (2) our protection is in the Lord, and (3) God always tears them down. I am not arguing other themes are subordinate to this one, but it is still impossible to miss for anyone who reads through the Psalms. 

But, praise God, the evil men who rule the world and perpetuate endless schemes against God’s children and His creation will pay for their crimes against humanity. It is written.