Normally I don’t blog about sermon topics but this week I’m making an exception. (You can hear the sermon at the Zoar Church website after 10-28-12.)
As I interact with people who do not believe in God I’m discovering some of the reasons why. One primary reason is the perception that “religious” people are violent and hateful. It is true that throughout the centuries “worshipers” of all types have prayed for God to kill their enemies and some have taken matters into their own hands. These prayers are called “imprecatory prayers,” meaning “to invoke a curse.”
Believe it or not, some are still praying these kinds of prayers.
In an interview with Alan Colmes, host of a nationally syndicated radio talk show, Wiley Drake, a mega church pastor and former vice president of the Southern Baptist Convention, stated that he prayed for God to kill the president of the United States. When asked how he could justify such a prayer he said he was “asking God to enforce imprecatory prayer.” (For more than you care to read or hear just google Wiley Drake.)
So what does the Bible actually have to say about imprecatory prayer and why even talk about it?
Well, the “why talk about it” question goes back to what I said about those who have great difficulty embracing belief in God. The truth is some “Christians” (as well as other religious adherents) have poorly represented their faith. So I write in the hopes of exposing the other side of the coin.
For the “what the Bible says” question, please be patient and keep reading.
In the Old Testament most imprecatory prayers are petitions for God to exercise lex talionis (the law of retaliation) on behalf of the writer… most often speaking for the Israelite nation. The law of retaliation is found in Exodus 21:23-25.
23 …if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, 24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, 25 burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.” (NIV)
As primitive as that seems, this law was actually put into place to restrict violence. The law stipulated that an offended person could only do to their enemy what the enemy had done to him. Before this law was given to the Israelites there was no real restraint on violence in the world. If you killed my mule I might burn down your barn with all your livestock in it.
So, for example, in Psalm 137:8-9 the psalmist, as a part of his prayer, cries out…
8 O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction,
happy is he who repays you
for what you have done to us—
9 he who seizes your infants
and dashes them against the rocks.
happy is he who repays you
for what you have done to us—
9 he who seizes your infants
and dashes them against the rocks.
No doubt the writer is imploring God to exercise retaliation on behalf of the people. What the Babylonian invaders had done to the Israelite children, the Israelites look forward to doing to theirs.
But is this where the biblical revelation stops? Is this all we’re left with? You slap me and I slap you? You kill my child and I kill yours?
The answer is no! At least not for followers of Jesus. Followers of Jesus Christ look at everything through the lens of his teaching and example, what Jesus said and did.
In the Sermon on the Mount, the most influential teaching every shared with human kind, Jesus addresses the law of retaliation. In a sense he gives us and upgrade!
38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ 39 But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. 40 And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. 41 If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. 42 Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you. 43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven.
(Matthew 5:38-45 NIV)
The teaching of Jesus moves us to a higher ethical and moral plane. The biblical revelation finds its completion in Jesus.
In the 1963 edition of The Baptist Faith and Message there is a line that says, “The criterion by which the Bible is to be interpreted is Jesus Christ.” (Herschel H. Hobbs, ed. The Baptist Faith and Message, Nashville: Covention Press, 1971 p.18.) That line was removed from the 2000 edition but some Baptists still believe that it contains tremendous wisdom.
For followers of Jesus everything; every teaching, every Bible passage, every philosophy, every theology, is processed through the filter of the teachings and example of Jesus Christ. What Jesus said and did is ultimately authoritative. This is central to Christianity!
That means that we are not free to model our prayers after Old Testament imprecatory prayers. Like Jesus’ original disciples we ask him to teach us to pray. And he teaches us to say, “forgive us our sins and we forgive those who sin against us.” (Matthew 6:12)
Very thought provoking, and begs the question...As a Christian, am I not allowed to defend myself, my family, or others not able to defend themselves??
ReplyDeleteI agree we are to love and forgive our enemies, or those who would harm us and others, as Christ would. Certainly we do not have to stand passively and allow these things to happen?!?
Thanks for the commment Bob. I think of myself as a tortured pacifist. I'm sure I would defend my family if I had to. But I think that the teachings of Jesus remind us of what we know intuitively. Ultimately, we will never defeat violence with violence. I think Jesus is teaching the world about a redemptive movement of global healing although global movements start with individual change.
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