DEALING WITH CONFLICT (Psalm 129)

The history of the nation of Israel is littered with wars. It is filled with conflict. Everywhere they go in every generation, someone seems to be attacking them.

Why is that?

I believe there is a satanic strategy behind it all. Satan hates Israel, God’s chosen nation, and has fought against them from day one. Everything God ordains is hated by the devil. It is not just Israel; he hates the God of Israel.

When you come to Psalm 129, you hear the cry of a Jewish author. Whoever wrote this passage was a citizen of Israel and spoke on behalf of his nation.

Verses 1-2: “Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say: Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth: yet they have not prevailed against me.”

He repeated the phrase “many a time” to emphasize the repeated attacks of the enemy. There will be many times when you find yourself in the middle of spiritual conflict when Satan puts a target on you. But as a believer, you can also say that he has not prevailed. As I John 4:4 promises us, “Greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world.”

The Bible says in I John 3:8, “For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.” He accomplished that purpose at the cross and when He rose from the dead.

Make this your prayer: “Lord, conquer all the works of the devil in me.” You see, the Lord continues to win great victories over Satan and his kingdom. There is a spiritual warfare going on, and we are in the middle of it - Praise God, we are on the winning side.

Verses 3-7: “The plowers plowed upon my back: they made long their furrows. The Lord is righteous: he hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked. Let them all be confounded and turned back that hate Zion. Let them be as the grass upon the housetops, which withereth afore it groweth up: Wherewith the mower filleth not his hand; nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom.”

Do you see the word pictures in these verses? In verse 3, the wicked are compared to someone plowing a field, cutting long and deep. In other words, it is painful as they work against him.

But in verses 6-7, he changed direction and pointed out that those doing the cutting were really nothing more than grass themselves. In Eastern culture grass is a very delicate thing, and the people of the psalmist’s time understood this. It would grow in the morning but be withered away by nightfall after being under the burning sun. In other words, the enemies can launch their attacks and seek to destroy but the Lord will take care of them in the end.

The heart message of Psalm 129 is this: The Lord is righteous. People are going to do you wrong. Someone will do something evil or wicked today, but the Lord is righteous.

One of the dangers of living in our world today is that believers can grow callous and cynical. Don’t let yourself get there. Go back and remind yourself that although people can be wicked, the Lord is righteous. No matter how many others do wrong, He will do right. This is emphasized in verses 4-5, a call to let God take care of the enemies.

Martin Luther said, “Always remember that even the devil is God’s devil.” Instead of viewing him and his followers as your enemies, view them as enemies of God and of right. That is why you can leave it all up to God. He will take care of His own enemies.

Paul understood this. He wrote in II Timothy 4:14, “Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil: the Lord reward him according to his works.” Let the Lord take care of the enemies.

Notice the way Psalm 129 ends: “Neither do they which go by say, The blessing of the Lord be upon you: we bless you in the name of the Lord.”

The message here is that these people are so wicked they never bless you in God’s name. Why is that significant?

In Psalm 128, we saw the way to not only have a blessed life but also to be a blessing to others. That is our purpose. In Psalm 129, we see that one mark of these wicked people is how they never pass on blessing to anyone else.

Friend, don’t let that be said of your life. Pray that you will be someone who builds up others instead of tearing them down. You want to be someone who moves the work of the Lord forward instead of hindering it.

There is the blessed life and the cursed life — the life that fears God and the life that rebels against Him. There is the life that obeys the Lord and the life that disobeys Him. You will have to choose which life will be yours. Will it be blessing or cursing?

Maybe you feel today like all of the hounds of Hell have been turned loose on you. Let me remind you that they have not prevailed against you, and the Lord is righteous.

As I meditated on this psalm, God brought me back to a great scripture found in II Cor. 4:8-11.

“We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. For we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.”

Yes, you are in a warfare and the attack is real. But know that God is greater, and it is not going to last forever.

Notice the end of that chapter, in verses 16-18:

“For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.”

Don’t concentrate today on man. Concentrate on God. Focus not on the conflict but the victory; not on the temporal but the eternal. Day by day, God will give you inner strength to keep moving forward.

There will be many times that the devil comes against you, but he will not prevail. And you will be able to say in the end that the Lord is righteous.