The urgency of prayer (Isa 56-59; Psalm 70; 1 Cor 16)

Sometimes prayer is urgent. Isn’t it amazing that in Psalm 70 God gives us permission to as him to hurry up! “Make haste, O God to deliver me!”

David is facing enemies at this point, and He asks God to thwart their plans. David is the Lord’s anointed king, to act against Him is to act against God and His plans. This is not good for anyone, and so David prays for their downfall.

David prays against his enemies, but for those who seek God (v4-5), he prays for rejoicing as they see God’s deliverance of His suffering king. David ends the psalm by reminding God again of His need, and places His confidence in God.

How would Jesus have sang this Psalm? As the Lord’s anointed king, He faced awful opposition. And yet Peter tells us that Jesus entrusted himself to the one who judges justly (1 Peter 2:23). As He recognised the reality that people’s sin is primarily against God, He felt compassion on them. Whilst on the cross, He prayed that His Father would forgive them, for they didn’t realise the awful thing they were doing. They didn’t realise they were opposing God, and they would face His wrath. There will come a day when the Lord Jesus will punish all those who oppose Him, but until that day, he holds out mercy, He prays that His enemies would be put to shame, desiring that many would come to love his salvation.

Jesus was delivered on the third day, when he rose again, but he had to go through the agony of suffering for us to the point of death before his vindication. He is the one we can turn to, and He is the one who still cares for His oppressed people. Do you remember what he said to Saul as he oppressed the church? He said “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” When you oppose Jesus’ people, you oppose Him. We are called to love our enemies, and we can do that because we can know that their sin is primarily against God, that should lead us to pray for God’s mercy, for it is an awful thing to fall into the hands of the living God (Heb 10:31).