Read
(A special psalm by David for the music leader. To the tune “Mahalath.”)
No One Can Ignore God
1 Only a fool would say,
“There is no God!”
People like that are worthless!
They are heartless and cruel
and never do right.
2From heaven God
looks down to see
if anyone is wise enough
to search for him.
3But all of them
are crooked and corrupt.
Not one of them does right.
4Won't you lawbreakers learn?
You refuse to pray,
and you gobble up
the people of God.
5But you will be terrified
worse than ever before.
God will scatter the bones
of his enemies,
and you will be ashamed
when God rejects you.
6I long for someone from Zion
to come and save Israel!
Our God, when you bless
your people again,
Jacob's family will be glad,
and Israel will celebrate.
Reflect
In his book The Shattered Lantern, Ronald Rolheiser observes that many people suffer from a kind of functional agnosticism. Even those who profess to believe in God may struggle to detect, perceive and experience his presence.
Rolheiser examines cultural conditions that are decreasing our capacity to “imagine or feel God’s existence.” Intriguingly, he detects a link between morality and epistemology—between living right and seeing right.
It is popular (and proper) to point out that the gospel has much more to do with relationship than morality. We don’t earn our way into God’s affections. Salvation is a gift of sheer grace.
And yet moral integrity still matters. God gave the universe a moral grain, and if we live against that grain, life won’t work the way it should. We’ll suffer distortions in the way we perceive ourselves and the universe.
This contemporary quandary turns out to be a very ancient problem. Psalm 53, like its near-identical twin, Psalm 14, opens with a blanket indictment of those who deny God’s moral claim on their lives:
“Only a fool would say, there is no God!”
The Hebrew word translated “fool” has connotations of moral, rather than cognitive, deficiencies. We could translate the sentence:
“Only a person who rejects wisdom and insists on his own way would say, there is no God!”
In this framework, the claim “There is no God!” has less to do with refuting God’s existence than with denying his involvement in daily life. Most critically, it rejects God’s role as ruler and judge. (1)
Psalm 53 describes a downward spiral in which the person who denies God’s authority impoverishes his own wisdom, and that lack of wisdom keeps him from perceiving God. If we refuse to align ourselves with the grain of the universe, we can expect corruption in both behavior and perception (v 3).
In any millennium, the fear of the Lord is still the beginning of wisdom (See Psalm 111:10 and Proverbs 9:10). This is true not because God withholds grace from the foolish, but because the foolish stubbornly blind themselves to God’s grace.
- These insights on Ps 53:1 come from the ESV Study Bible.
Respond
Lord of all Creation, you made this universe and you made me. Help me to align my heart to your design. I ask for the wisdom to understand your commands and the power to obey them. Most of all, I ask to see you in every aspect of my life. I pray this in the name of your Spirit. Amen.
Carolyn Arends
Carolyn Arends (MA, Theological Studies, Regent College), has released 12 award-winning albums and 3 critically-acclaimed books. Her prose has been recognized by The Word Guild, The Evangelical Press Association, and the Canadian Church Press. Carolyn is currently the Director of Education for Renovaré, a far-reaching organization that encourages and nurtures spiritual renewal. She continues to be available on a select basis for speaking, retreat facilitation, concerts, worship leading and songwriting and performance seminars. She lives in Surrey, BC with her husband Mark and their two children. Book Releases 2012 Theology in Aisle 7 (CTE Books) 2008 Wrestling With Angels (Harvest House/ConversantLife)* Album Releases 2014 Christmas: The Story of Stories (2B Records), 2009 Love Was Here First (2B Records/Signpost Music).