Psalm 14
Amár navál belibó/“The fool said at heart” (Latin Dixit insipiens) is by David, and we number it at 14.
Commentators figure it’s a lament: David, or Wisdom (i.e. the Holy Spirit) mourns the fact kids these days don’t follow God anymore. Not like “our righteous group,”
Basically, the same lament every generation has about the next one. Well, with one exception: The people from this generation, who gang up with the previous generation about their peers and successors. That’s a phenomena I’ve seen quite often lately. My parents are “baby boomers,” I’m in what marketers call “generation X,” and those coming of age right now are called “millennials”—and way too many of the preachers my age are wringing their hands over the younger generation. They’ve believed the myth that things used to be better when they were kids. Used to be better in their parents’ day.
Nope, they haven’t read Ecclesiastes.
Ecclesiastes 7.10 KWL - Don’t say, “Why were the old days better than these days?”
- You don’t ask this question out of wisdom.
It’s a really good book for deflating know-it-alls.
Anyway, Psalm 14 kinda wanders in the direction of this false nostalgia. I remind you the psalms don’t actually rhyme. Just the same, let’s put a little iambic tetrameter on it.
Psalm 14 KWL - 0 To the director. By David.
- 1 The foolish think God isn’t here.
- They wreck. They do no good. They sneer.
- 2 From heaven, the L
ORD looks to see - if any child of Adam be
- astute enough to seek God out.
- 3 But all of them are turned about.
- They’re twisted. They do nothing good.
- Not one of them 4 knows what they should.
- Their every act is sin; when all
- eat bread, it’s not the L
ORD they call. - 5 There’s no respect; no holy dread.
- God’s with our righteous group instead.
- 6 Ashamed to help the poor, are you?
- Because the L
ORD ’s their refuge, true? - 7 Was rescue sent from Zion’s hill?
- Who got this aid for Israel?
- The L
ORD will set his people free. - May Jacob—Israel—have glee.