Psalm 10
August 29, 2021
preached by Pastor Ryan Bouton
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Time of Reflection Quotations

“If a government is under one man who seeks his own benefit and not the good of those subject to him, the ruler is called a tyrant…[The tyrant] threatens not only the bodies of his subjects but also their spiritual welfare, since those who seek to use rather than to be of use to their subjects oppose any progress by their subjects since they suspect that any excellence among their subjects is a threat to their unjust rule. Tyrants always suspect the good rather than the evil and are always afraid of virtue. They seek to prevent their subjects from becoming virtuous and developing a public spiritedness which would not tolerate their unjust domination.”

~ Thomas Aquinas, “On Kingship, or The Governance of Rulers”

“Justice being taken away, then, what are kingdoms but great robberies? For what are robberies themselves, but little kingdoms? The band itself is made up of men; it is ruled by the authority of a prince, it is knit together by the pact of the confederacy; the booty is divided by the law agreed on. If, by the admittance of abandoned men, this evil increases to such a degree that it holds places, fixes abodes, takes possession of cities, and subdues peoples, it assumes the more plainly the name of a kingdom, because the reality is now manifestly conferred on it, not by the removal of covetousness, but by the addition of impunity.”

~ Augustine of Hippo, The City of God

“We make men without chests and expect from them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.”

“The process which, if not checked, will abolish Man goes on apace among Communists and Democrats no less than among Fascists. The methods may (at first) differ in brutality. But many a mild-eyed scientist in pince-nez, many a popular dramatist, many an amateur philosopher in our midst, means in the long run just the same as the Nazi rulers of Germany: ‘Traditional values are to be debunked’ and mankind to be cut out into some fresh shape at the will (which must, by hypothesis, be an arbitrary will) of some few lucky people in one lucky generation which has learned how to do it.”

~ C.S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man

Sermon Passage

Psalm 10 (ESV)

¹  Why, O Lord, do you stand far away?
Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?
²  In arrogance the wicked hotly pursue the poor;
let them be caught in the schemes that they have devised.
³  For the wicked boasts of the desires of his soul,
and the one greedy for gain curses and renounces the Lord.
⁴  In the pride of his face the wicked does not seek him;
all his thoughts are, “There is no God.”
⁵  His ways prosper at all times;
your judgments are on high, out of his sight;
as for all his foes, he puffs at them.
⁶  He says in his heart, “I shall not be moved;
throughout all generations I shall not meet adversity.”
⁷  His mouth is filled with cursing and deceit and oppression;
under his tongue are mischief and iniquity.
⁸  He sits in ambush in the villages;
in hiding places he murders the innocent.
His eyes stealthily watch for the helpless;
⁹   he lurks in ambush like a lion in his thicket;
he lurks that he may seize the poor;
he seizes the poor when he draws him into his net.
¹⁰ The helpless are crushed, sink down,
and fall by his might.
¹¹ He says in his heart, “God has forgotten,
he has hidden his face, he will never see it.”
¹² Arise, O Lord; O God, lift up your hand;
forget not the afflicted.
¹³ Why does the wicked renounce God
and say in his heart, “You will not call to account”?
¹⁴ But you do see, for you note mischief and vexation,
that you may take it into your hands;
to you the helpless commits himself;
you have been the helper of the fatherless.
¹⁵ Break the arm of the wicked and evildoer;
call his wickedness to account till you find none.
¹⁶ The Lord is king forever and ever;
the nations perish from his land.
¹⁷ O Lord, you hear the desire of the afflicted;
you will strengthen their heart; you will incline your ear
¹⁸ to do justice to the fatherless and the oppressed,
so that man who is of the earth may strike terror no more.