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Imprecatory Praying Part 4 of 4

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• Psalm 109. And we're going to read verses 9 through 19. This is the fourth part on imprecatory praying. And I want to finish this passage today if I can. Psalm 109, beginning with verse 9. In fact, let's read verse 8. I'll pick up there where we left off last week. "Let his days be few, and let another his office take. And let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow. Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg."

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• "Let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places. Let the extortioner catch all that he hath, and let the stranger spoil his labor. Let there be none to extend mercy unto him, neither let there be any to favor his fatherless children. Let his posterity be cut off, and in the generation following let their name be blotted out. Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the Lord, and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out. Let them be before the Lord continually, that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth. Because that he remembered not to show mercy, but persecuted the poor needy man, that he might even slay the broken in heart."

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• "As he loved cursing, so let it come unto him. As he delighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him. As he clothed himself with cursing, like as with a garment, so let it come upon his bowels like water and like oil into his bones. Let it be unto him as the garment which covereth him for a girdle wherewith he is girded continually."

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• Now we've been dealing with imprecatory praying for several weeks. Remember I told you that an imprecation is of course a curse. It's calling down a malediction upon one's enemies or upon the enemies of God. And I want to very quickly give you in review just the four general principles and then the specific reasons for these imprecatory prayers. First of all, I told you general principles. Whatever problem anyone has with the imprecatory prayers in the Bible, it cannot be that there is a tension between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant or between law and grace. Never. Because you find grace in the Old Testament and you find law in the New Testament.

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• Secondly, I pointed out as a general principle that when David or any other biblical character prays an imprecation, the result is left entirely with God. God may do as He pleases. He may convert. He may remove. He may restrain. He may do whatever He pleases. It's all in the hands of the sovereign God who is the judge of all the earth. Thirdly, as a whole, no matter how severe David's imprecatory prayers were against his enemies, he was always personally kind and gracious toward them in his actions. Fourthly, I pointed out, there is not much difference, if any, between New Testament church discipline and New Testament denunciations as and between the imprecatory prayers of the Old Testament. And certainly the New Testament contains many curses, as we've already seen, and many denunciations as well. And then fifthly, the imprecatory prayers teach us that God has not appointed his people to defeat, but has given us victory in Jesus Christ. Now, I told you there were some specific reasons for these imprecatory prayers. The first one is this, that the imprecatory prayers evidence a concern for righteousness and the establishment of righteousness.

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• Secondly, the imprecatory prayers, there is a desire to see God praised and honored when those prayers are answered and the righteous are delivered. Thirdly, in the imprecatory prayers there is a purpose and a design that men may know that there is a God in the earth and that there is a reward for the righteous and a punishment for the wicked. Fourthly, in imprecatory prayers there's a purpose that everyone should know that God is absolutely sovereign and that God rules over all. Fifthly, in imprecatory prayers there's the purpose in causing the wicked to seek the Lord, some, a few, who will experience God's righteous judgment will indeed repent and turn to the Lord.

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• Some do learn a lesson. Sixthly, in imprecatory praying, there is a desire to see that the wicked do not enjoy the blessings of the righteous. In fact, we find in Scripture that the wicked and the deceitful man shall not live out half his days. And then seventhly, in imprecatory prayers, we learn to have an abhorrence of sin, and we learn to despise it.

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• Now, let me point out, last week, as we looked at the first eight verses, I pointed out that in imprecatory prayers, you must understand the lex talionis of Scripture, that is, the law of retribution. We looked at Exodus 21, Leviticus 24, Deuteronomy chapter 19, where God said, an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, life for life, limb for limb, and the lex talionis, the law of retribution, means nothing less than God always makes the punishment fit the crime. I also pointed out in the New Testament it's known as the law of sowing and reaping, Galatians 6:7-8. "Be not deceived, God is not mocked, for whatsoever man soweth, that shall he also reap." Now in each of these Old Testament passages where you have the lex talionis, or the law of retribution, that law of retribution was given to the magistrates. It was given to the judges. Don't care which passage you read, it always has the judges involved in it. The problem in the New Testament, when you get to Matthew chapter 5, verses 38 through 42, that is where our Lord is rebuking the Pharisees and reestablishing the biblical interpretation of the law, for the Pharisees had perverted the teaching of the Old Testament so that they might enjoy personal vengeance.

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• So they taught if your enemy tried to do wrong to you, you just do wrong back to him, or maybe even worse. In other words, it gave you the right to exercise personal vengeance. Where God says, no, vengeance belongs to me, saith the Lord, I will repay.

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• Now, last week we looked at verses 1 through 8 of Psalm 109. I want to go back to verse 8. And I want to read just a number of these verses again. I want you to understand the lex talionis, the law of retribution, the law of sowing and reaping in line and in light of these verses. So look in Psalm 109 verse 8 again. "Let his days be few and let another take his office."

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• "Let his children be fatherless and his wife a widow. Let his children be continually vagabonds and beg. Let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places. Let the extortioner catch all that he hath, and let the stranger spoil his labor. Let there be none to extend mercy unto him, neither let there be any to favor his fatherless children. Let his posterity be cut off, and in the generation following, let their name be blotted out. Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the Lord, and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out. Let them be before the Lord continually, that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth."

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• Now, I might add that these are very serious imprecations. Now, the question that automatically should come to your mind as we read these verses is this, since David is praying against his enemy, do these imprecations extend therefore automatically to the wife and children of his enemy?

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• Now may I remind you that Psalm 109 is referred to as the Iscariotic Psalm because it does refer to Judas Iscariot and it is quoted in the New Testament as applying to Judas. So whoever David's enemy was in Psalm 109 it found its fulfillment in Judas Iscariot. So the question is as you read these verses very obviously the wife and the children are involved and that brings another scripture to mind. Because you have to ask, is David's prayers, or are David's prayers, and his prayer requests in Psalm 109, a violation of another principle of scripture? What principle would that be?

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• Well, Deuteronomy 24:16, don't turn there, just let me quote it. Listen carefully, here's what God says, "The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither the children be put to death for the fathers, every man shall be put to death for his own sin." So God is saying every man should die for his own sin. When we read in 2 Kings 14:6 about the men that murdered King Joash's father, the Bible says this, "...but the children of the murderers he slew not, according to that which is written in the book of the law of Moses, where the Lord commanded, saying, The father shall not be put to death for the children, nor the children be put to death for the fathers, but every man shall be put to death for his own sin."

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• So, the question has to be asked then, since very obviously the mother and the children are involved in these imprecations, are these imprecations in a violation of this principle of scripture? And the answer is, no. It is not a violation of this principle of scriptures. Now listen carefully. If David's enemies are cursed, does the curse extend to their families? If it does, why does it extend to them?

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• Are there biblical principles that apply in such cases? And the answer is yes. Listen to Proverbs 3:33. "The curse of the Lord is in the house of the wicked, but he blesseth the habitation of the just." Now listen, the curse of the Lord is in the house of the wicked. Which means everyone in that wicked house is cursed. There are sins that extend to and affect entire households. Proverbs 15:27, the Bible says, "He that is greedy of gain troubleth his own house."

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• "But he that hateth gifts shall live." Notice, "...he that is greedy of gain troubleth his own house." It is possible to curse one's own family and one's own house. You have to remember the two messages that I preached not too long ago on family sins. In those two messages, I demonstrated how one man's sin affects other members of the family. Jacob's sin affected Dinah. Dinah's sin affected Simeon and Levi. There are sins that extend to entire families.

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• Now, here's a principle that you've got to understand in light of Psalm 109, because the wife and the children are involved in these imprecations. The principle is simply this, that God usually, and I'm saying usually, as a general rule, He places His elect in households. He also generally places the wicked in households. For instance, Psalm 68:6, the Bible says this, "God setteth the solitary in families." Notice that God setteth the solitary in families. Now, I know that there are exceptions to this principle.

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• Because occasionally, you will find a child that is a fool in a godly household. And occasionally, you will find a godly child in a wicked household. But usually, God places His elect in families, and He also places the wicked in families. Why? Well, listen. Proverbs 22:6, most of you can quote it. "Train up a child in the way that he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it." It is only godly families that train up their children under biblical law. It's godly families who train up their children according to biblical principles. Godly families usually produce godly children. It is wicked families that do not train their children up in the admonition of the Lord. They train their children up in their own sin and their own wickedness, and therefore it is wicked families that normally usually produce wicked children. That's a simple principle. So God does indeed place His elect in families, and usually the non-elect are placed in families as well. Now, look very quickly. Hold Psalm 109.

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• We're going to come back there, but I'm trying to establish this principle. Turn, if you would, please, to the book of Proverbs, chapter 11. And very quickly, let me show you some of these scriptures in Proverbs. We'll start in Proverbs 11. Look in Proverbs 11 and verse 17.

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• Now, remember the family or the household. Proverbs 11:17. Look what the Bible says. "The merciful man doeth good to his own soul, but he that is cruel troubleth his own flesh," not just his own body, but his own offspring as well. So he that is cruel troubleth his own flesh. Look in Proverbs 12:7. "The wicked are overthrown and are not, but the house or the family of the righteous shall stand." Look in Proverbs 13:13.

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• "Whoso despiseth the word shall be destroyed, but he that feareth the commandment shall be rewarded." Well, who is it that normally despises the word? It's the wicked. Wicked live in households. Who is it that normally obeys? It's the godly. The godly live in households. Look in Proverbs 14:11. "The house of the wicked shall be overthrown, but the tabernacle of the upright shall flourish." It's the whole house of the wicked that shall be overthrown. Look in Proverbs 15:25. Note carefully, "The Lord will destroy the house of the proud, but he will establish the border of the widow." The Lord will destroy the house of the proud.

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• Now it's important to remember that families are usually involved in the same sins and therefore they receive the same punishment. It is not necessarily that the children are cursed for the sin of the Father. It's usually the children are continuing in the same sins of the Father and therefore they have their own curse. That is, they participate in the sins of the Father and therefore they're equally condemned and justly punished.

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• Now let me give you some illustrations from Scripture. If I were to mention the name Haman, everyone should automatically remember wicked Haman in the book of Esther. Do you realize that Haman and his entire family were wiped out? Because all were equally guilty and all were equally sinful and therefore all were equally punished. Haman's sons were complicit in their father's sins. Even his wife gave him counsel. Now I want you to listen to two verses out of the book of Esther. Esther 8:7. Listen carefully. "Then the king Ahasuerus said unto Esther the queen and to Mordecai the Jew, Behold, I have given Esther the house of Haman, and him they have hanged upon the gallows, because he laid his hand upon the Jews." Note Ahasuerus gave unto Esther the house of Haman. You say, ah, but Brother Weaver, verse 7 just says they hanged Haman upon the gallows. Well, let's get to Esther 9:14. "And the king commanded it so to be done, and the decree was given at Shushan, and they hanged Haman's ten sons."

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• Why were the sons hanged? Because they were equally guilty as well. Let me give you another illustration. Turn in your Bibles to Deuteronomy 11 and then we're going to Numbers 16, okay? Deuteronomy 11 and then we're going to Numbers 16. Look in Deuteronomy 11. You remember or you at least should remember about Dathan and Abiram and Korah. I preached upon their rebellion not too long ago. But look in Deuteronomy 11:6. You remember Dathan and Abiram and Korah, they were the ones that rebelled against the Lord and against Moses and Aaron. And in Deuteronomy 11:6 we read this, "And what he did unto Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, the son of Reuben, how the earth opened her mouth and swallowed them up, and their households, and their tents, and all the substance that was in their possession in the midst of all Israel." Note if you would, God said, the earth opened up and swallowed up their households. Now if you want to be more explicit, go in your Bibles then to Numbers chapter 16 and let's begin reading there with verse 27.

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• Numbers 16:27. I want to show you how specific the Word of God is. Numbers 16:27. "So they got them up from the tabernacle of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram on every side. And Dathan and Abiram came out and stood in the door of their tents, and their wives, and their sons, and their little children. And Moses said, Hereby you shall know that the Lord had sent me to do all these works, for I have not done them of mine own hand. If these men die the common death of all men, or if they be visited after the visitation of all men, then the Lord had not sent me. But if the Lord make a new thing, and the earth open her mouth, and swallow them up, and with all that appertain unto them, and they go down quick into the pit, then you shall understand that these men have provoked the Lord. And it came to pass, as he made an end of speaking all these words, that the ground clave asunder that was under them, and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and their houses, and all the men that appertained unto Korah, and all their goods, they and all that appertained to

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• them, went down alive into the pit. And the earth closed upon them, and they perished among the congregation." Who all perished? All of them. Wives, sons, children, what? They were all involved in the rebellion. They were all equally guilty and therefore they were all equally punished. It is possible to curse an entire family. One more illustration. Turn to the book of Joshua chapter 7. I'm just showing you that God normally places His elect in families. He normally also places the wicked in families. Look, if you would, in Joshua chapter 7.

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• And let's begin reading there with verse 19. Here is what happened to Achan and his family. You remember Achan is known as the Troubler of Israel. Achan is the man who stole from Jericho when Jericho was placed under the ban, under the curse. Well, look at it. Joshua chapter 7 beginning there with verse 19. "And Joshua said unto Achan, My son, give, I pray thee, glory to the Lord God of Israel, and make confession unto him, and tell me now what thou hast done, hide it not from me. And Achan answered Joshua and said, Indeed I have sinned against the Lord God of Israel,

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• and thus and thus have I done. When I saw among the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment, and two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels weight, then I coveted them and took them. And behold, they were hidden in the earth in the midst of my tent, and the silver under it. So Joshua sent messengers, and they ran into the tent, and behold, it was hidden in his tent, and the silver under it. And they took them out of the midst of the tent and brought them unto Joshua, and all the children of Israel, and laid them out before the Lord. And Joshua and all Israel with him took Achan, the son of Zerah, and the silver, and the garment, and the wedge of gold, and his sons, and his daughters, and his oxen, and his asses, and his sheep, and his tent, and all they had. And they brought him down to the valley of Achor. And Joshua said, Why hast thou troubled us? The Lord shall also trouble thee this day.

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• And all Israel stoned them with stones, and burned them with fire, and they stoned them with stones, and they raised over him a great heap of stones unto this day. So the Lord turned from the fierceness of his anger, wherefore the name of that place was called the Valley of Achor unto this day." You say, well, wait a minute, Brother Weaver. Wait a minute. It was Achan who stoned. Why were his wife and children killed as well?

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• Where did he hide it? In the midst of his tent. Some of it under his tent. How can you hide things in a tent without your wife and children knowing? They knew. They were complicit. They tried to cover it up and hide it as well. They were equally guilty and therefore they were equally punished and all died before the Lord. It's just that simple.

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• Now, may I remind you of one other thing. You don't have to turn to any scripture, but you will remember when the children of Israel came out of Egypt, God put a sword in their hand, sent them into Canaan land, and said, kill every man, woman, child. Why? They were all equally guilty. They had all sinned against God, and the entire families were blotted out. With that in mind, I want you to go back to Psalm 109, and I want you to look at it. I want you to understand that God normally places His elect in households. He also normally places the wicked in households. It's a biblical principle. Only the godly are going to train their children, and the ungodly will not train their children. It's just that simple. So when David is praying these imprecations, it extends to the entire family. And I want you to see how everything just kind of works together. Now, I want you to note this.

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• If you look in verse 8, "Let his days be few, and let another take his office." All the way down through verse 15, each of these verses begin with a "let." Each of these verses is a specific prayer request. It is a specific imprecation. But I want you to see how they're all interrelated. How they build one upon another. How one automatically follows the other. So, look at verse 8.

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• We looked at that last week. I'm not going to deal with it in a great deal of time today. But look at verse 8. "Let his days be few, and let another take his office." Now, when David prays, "let his days be few," that means Lord take his life, Lord kill him. "Let another take his office." Very obviously, if he's dead, someone else has to take the office.

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• And hopefully, and prayerfully, it'll be a righteous man. Now, if you look at verse 9, verse 9 is just actually a continuation and verification of that prayer request. For verse 9 says, "Let his children be fatherless and his wife a widow." Now if the children are fatherless and the wife is a widow, very obviously the man is dead. So what is David's prayer request? His prayer request is for the man to die.

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• I pointed out that it is not unbiblical to pray for the death of wicked men. Who wants wicked men to continue to reign? Who wants wicked men to continue to live? Very obviously, only the wicked. So very clearly then verses 8 and 9 is praying for the death of his enemy.

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• Now look if you would please at verse 10. "Let his children be continually vagabonds and beg. Let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places." Wow. Let his children be continually vagabonds. Let them beg. Let them seek their bread out of desolate places. Do you realize that the same curse was placed upon Cain in Genesis chapter 4 and verse 12? He was to be a vagabond, continually traveling. I want you to look in your Bibles to Psalm 59. Hold Psalm 109, but go back to Psalm 59. You will see that this is a prayer request that is actually repeated in Psalm 59.

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• Notice verses 11 through 15. Here David is praying against his enemies as well. So, Psalm 59, notice verse 11. He says, "Slay them not, lest my people forget. Scatter them by thy power, and bring them down, O Lord, our shield. For the sin of their mouth, and the words of their lips, let them even be taken in their pride. And for cursing and lying which they speak, consume them in wrath, consume them that they may not be, and let them know that God ruleth in Jacob unto the ends of the earth."

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• "And at evening, watch carefully, let them return, and let them make a noise like a dog, and go round about the city. Let them wander up and down for meat and grudge if they be not satisfied." What is the prayer here? Let His enemies be like wild dogs who are not fed on a constant and continual basis. They have to run up and down, looking scrap here and a scrap there, searching wherever they can. They're continually hungry. They're continually begging for food. It's the same thing. And when He says in Psalm 109:10, "Let His children be continually vagabonds, let them beg." Now, let's think this thing through. When you go to verse 8, "...let his days be few, and another take his office."

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• Which means the man, undoubtedly, held a pretty high office. He was probably well-paid. When you get to verse 9, you see the children of fatherless, his wife is a widow, so he's dead. He can no longer provide for them. He can no longer give to them. So if the father now has lost his office, if there is no money coming in, then the necessary result is they're going to be destitute. They're not going to have anything. They're going to be vagabond. They're going to be begging.

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• This is one of the hardest lots that can befall any individual. Especially those individuals who have been born into what you and I would describe as wealth. Who are used to living lavishly. Who are used to having everything handed to them on a silver platter. Whatever their hearts desired.

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• Now all of a sudden, it's taken from them. It's gone. They have nothing. And consequently now they're begging. They're vagabonds. Do you realize it is possible for a race of tyrants to be reduced to a generation of beggars? Misused power and abused wealth only secures absolute destitution for the family. Detestation for the family. How in the world can anyone be sympathetic with a wicked man or with his family when he has put them in such jeopardy and such turmoil?

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• Let me give you a quote. John Gill, the great Baptist scholar said this, "wander from place to place begging their bread. This is denied of the children of good men in David's time." And then he refers to Psalm 37:25 where David said, "I've been young and now I'm old, yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread." In other words, God takes care of his own. But he says, "this was threatened to the children of Eli in 1 Samuel 2:36, and was very likely true of the children of Judas, and was certainly the case of the multitude of the children of the Jews, the posterity of them that crucified Christ, at the time of their destruction by the Romans, when great numbers were dispersed, and wandered about in various countries as vagabonds, begging their bread from door to door, which is reckoned by them as a great affliction and very distressing." No language could be more awful than that of Psalm 109:6-19.

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• It embraces almost every misery that we can think of. But could any man be in a more wretched condition than Judas? Could any words be too severe to express the depth of his misery, of him who for three whole years had been the constant attendant of the Savior of mankind, who had witnessed his miracles, and had shared his miraculous powers, who had enjoyed all the warnings, all the reproofs of his love, and then

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• had betrayed him for 30 pieces of silver? Can we conceive a condition more miserable than that of Judas? And this psalm is a prophecy of the punishment that should overtake him for his sin. Peter in the book of Acts of the Apostles quotes part of this psalm and applies it to Judas. He applies it as a prophecy of the punishment that he should suffer on the betrayal of the Son of God. So notice if you would please, this happened literally, not just probably to Judas, but those Jews who crucified our Lord.

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• So, he prays that his children be continually vagabonds and beg, let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places. Look at verse 11. "Let the extortioner catch all that he hath, and let the stranger spoil his labor." Let the extortioner catch all that he hath. The extortioner is the usurer. He is the creditor.

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• Now, I want you to follow how this goes. The man has died. He has lost his office. There is no money for the wife and the children. They become vagabonds and begging. And now the extortioner or the usurer or the creditor now comes and claims their home, their furniture, their everything. In other words, this is a request for absolute destitution. It is a loss of everything. Let me point out that verse 11 is a necessary consequence of verses 8 through 10. Even today, what does a man do when he has no money? He tries to borrow, and he'll go to the usurer, and he'll pledge his property, and then when he can't pay it, the usurer comes and takes it.

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• Adam Clarke, in his commentary on Psalm 109, quotes the Roman poet Juvenal who died in 140 AD. And I want you to listen to what Juvenal said. Many of these execrations were literally fulfilled in the case of the miserable Jews after the death of our Lord. They were not only expelled from their own country after the destruction of Jerusalem, but they were prohibited from returning and so taxed by the Roman government that they were reduced to the lowest degree of poverty.

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• Domitian expelled them from Rome, and they were obliged to take up their habitation without the gate Capena, in a wood contiguous to the city, for which they were obliged to pay a rent, and where the whole of their property was a basket and a little hay." Wow! The whole of their property was a basket and a little hay. Literally happened. Literally happened to those who crucified Christ.

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• They were not only vagabonds. The usurer took everything they had. Look in verse 12. "Let there be none to extend mercy unto him, neither let there be any to favor his fatherless children." Let him find compassion and sympathy in no one. When he, the enemy, and the children suffer, let them suffer alone. Let them bear it alone. Let no one be found to shed a tear of compassion over them. Let there be no one that will draw out any milk of kindness to them, show any mercy toward them. Let there be none to favor his fatherless children.

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• Now folks, I'm going to tell you, these imprecations are very severe. But the people upon whom they fell were very severe and wicked sinners. Calvin states on this verse, "David, however, includes also the wicked man himself along with his children, as if he should say, though he visibly planned a way under such calamities, and these descend to his children, yet let no one show pity towards them."

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• "We are aware, it not infrequently happens, that long-continued misfortune of an enemy either excites the sympathy of men of savage disposition, or else makes them forget all their hatred and I can't even say it. Thank you. But in this part of the psalm, David expresses a desire that his enemy in all his posterity may be so hated and so detested that the people may never be wearied with beholding the calamities which they endure, but may become so familiarized with the spectacle as if their hearts were of iron. At the same time, let it be remarked that David is not rashly excited by any personal anguish to speak in this manner, but that it is as God's messenger he declares the punishment which was impending over the ungodly."

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• "And verily the law accounts it as one of the judgments of God, his hardening men's hearts, so that they who have been passionately and unmercifully cruel should find no sympathy Deuteronomy 2:30. It is just that the same measure which they have used toward others should also be meted out to them." So what is he saying? Let there be none to extend him mercy. Let everyone be hard-hearted to him. Let everyone be hard-hearted to his children. Let no one have mercy upon them.

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• It is usual over a period of time, men tend to forget the wicked and their wicked acts. And they tend to be a little sympathetic to those children who are in such straits of desperation. But yet David is saying, don't let that happen. Don't let anyone be merciful. Don't let anyone shed a tear for them. Spurgeon says it like this. I love this quote. He says, "We're staggered to find the children included in the father's sentence. And yet, as a matter of fact, children do suffer for their father's sin."

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• "And as long as the affairs of this life are ordered as they are, it must be so. So involved are the interests of the race that it is quite impossible in all respects to view the father and the child apart. No man among us could desire to see the fatherless suffer for their deceased father's fault. Yet, so it happens, and there is no injustice in the fact."

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• "They share the parent's ill-gotten gain or rank, and their aggrandizement is a part of the object in which he aimed in the perpetuation of his crimes. To allow them to prosper would be an encouragement and reward of his iniquity, and therefore, for these and other reasons, a man perishes not alone in his iniquity. The ban is on his race, that is, on his family. If a man were innocent, this would be a crime."

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• "If he were but commonly guilty, it would be excessive retribution. But when the offense reeks before high heaven in an unutterable abomination, it is of little marvel that men devote the man's whole house to perpetual infamy, and that it so happens." There is no one among any of the commentators that are Bible believers that deny these implications are real and also that deny that they are just.

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• You could stop and think of modern-day families and modern-day clans that have their ill-gotten gain, become multi-millionaires, maybe billionaires, yet look at their family, how even the adult sons and daughters suffer, and are we sympathetic with them? I would not be. Why? Because they're enjoying the ill-gotten gain and to show them mercy would be to approve of their father's sins. Stop and think about that.

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• Every one of these prayer requests, every one of these imprecations is building one upon the other. He's lost his office. He's dead. His children are impoverished. His wife is impoverished. The creditor comes and takes everything they have. They're vagabonds. No one to extend mercy to them? Look if you would in verse 13. This is hard. "Let his posterity be cut off, and in the generation following, let their name be blotted out." So David is not only praying that the man and the children will die, but the whole name, his whole family, his whole clan will be blotted out. They'll be killed. You have to remember that having a numerous posterity among the Hebrews was counted as a great thing. It was a blessing. Therefore, to have your posterity blotted out, taken out of the way, was one of the severest curses that could be placed upon any family. And look what he's saying. "Let his posterity be cut off, and in the generation following, let their name be blotted out in the very next generation."

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• The request is that this man's family be not perpetuated at all. In fact, that the family name be blotted out. No one will even remember the family. In deeds of wickedness, there's always leaders and prime movers. And what David does here, he goes to the main man, and then he goes to the children, and then sometimes he comes back to the main man in this prayer request.

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• Spurgeon said it like this, "Both from existence and from memory, let them pass away till none shall know that such a vile brood ever existed. Who wishes to see the family of a Domitian or Julian continued upon earth? Who would mourn if the race of Tom Paine or Voltaire would come to an utter end? It would be undesirable that the sons of the utterly villainous and bloodthirsty should rise to honor, and if they did, they would only revive the memory of their father's sins." Who would want to revive the memory of Mussolini? Of Joe Stalin? Do you want to know the story? Stalin murdered over 30 million of his own. Who would want to extend the family of Idi Amin? How about Pol Pot? Yeah. Just think about that.

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• And so David is saying, let not only the children be cut off, but let the name be blotted out. Look at verses 14 and 15. I'm tying these two together. "Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the Lord, and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out. Let them be before the Lord continually, that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth."

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• Now, folks, let me tell you. You have to remember that the Bible teaches very clearly in Exodus 20:5, that God visits the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation. So it's not just the children that suffer, it's the children's children and the children's children's children that suffer as well. They suffer from the parents' sins and crimes and follies and murder and treason. In other words, this is something that God has said that He does. Period. And so, look at the request in verse 14. "Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the Lord," that is, to judge and destroy, "and let not the sin of the mother be blotted out." Now, it could be what you and I would call a parallelism in verse 14, since he's mentioned the fathers, now he's mentioning the mother. I do not know if the mother of this individual had a specific sin or just a sinner in general. You remember David said it like this in Psalm 51:5, "Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and sin did my mother conceive me."

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• So, it could be just parallelism, it could be a specific sin, or it could be just sin in general. But what he's saying is, Lord, You remember all the sins of this family, and You judge them, and You destroy this family. Then he says in verse 15, "Let them be before the Lord continually." Watch now, "that He may cut off the memory of them from the earth." May no one remember that they ever lived.

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• Now you say, that's tough. Well, hold Psalm 109 and turn back in your Bibles to Psalm 34 and look if you would at verse 16. Psalm 34:16. Why would David pray such a prayer? Well, it could be because of this truth right here. Psalm 34:16. "The face of the Lord is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth." That's a lawful prayer request. That's a biblical prayer request. The face of the Lord is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth. Oh my!

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• Again, Spurgeon said it like this. He said, "This verse is perhaps the most terrible of all. But yet, as a matter of fact, children do procure punishment upon their parents' sins and are often themselves the means of such punishment. A bad son brings to mind his father's bad points of character. People say, ah, he is like the old man. He takes after his father. A mother's sins also will be sure to be called to mind if her daughter becomes grossly wicked. Ah, they will say, there's little wonder when you consider what her mother was."

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• "These are matters of everyday occurrence. We cannot, however, pretend to explain the righteousness of this malediction, though we fully believe in it. We leave it till our Heavenly Father is pleased to give us further instruction. Yet as a man's faults are often learned from his parents, it is not unjust that his consequent crimes should recoil upon him."

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• Now, if you look in verse 8, "let," verse 9, "let," verse 10, "let," verse 11, "let," verse 12, "let," verse 13, "let," verse 14, "let," verse 15, "let." All of these prayer requests are very severe imprecations. We have to ask this question. When David prayed these prayer requests, was he vengeful, vindictive, and vicious? And the answer is no. A thousand times no. What David is doing in this psalm as well as the other imprecatory psalms, he is merely asking for the lex talionis, the law of retribution. Or if you please, the law of sowing and reaping. He is asking God to do what divine justice has proclaimed it will do.

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• That is, He will reward the wicked according to their sins. In fact, if you'll go back to Psalm 7, very quickly, and look at verse 16. Psalm 7:16. I wish I had an hour just to preach on this. Look in Psalm 7:16. In fact, let's begin with verse 14. We're talking about the wicked man. "Behold, he travaileth with iniquity, and hath conceived mischief, and brought forth falsehood."

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• "He made a pit, and digged it, and is fallen into the ditch which he made." Watch this. "His mischief shall return upon his own head, and his violent dealing shall come down upon his own pate." In other words, God is going to bring back the wickedness of the wicked on the top of his own head.

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• Now, I want you to turn back to Psalm 109. I want to demonstrate to you from Scripture what David is doing. David is not being vicious. He's not being vindictive. He's not being vengeful. He is just asking God to apply the biblical principle of lex talionis, the law of retribution, the law of sowing and reaping. Look at verses 16 through 20. In fact, remember all of these imprecations now. Look, if you would, what David prays. And here's why. Verse 16. "Because." Here's why I prayed these things.

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• "Because that he, the enemy, remembered not to show mercy, but persecuted the poor and needy man, that he might even slay the broken in heart." Now watch, "As he loved cursing, so let it come unto him. As he delighted not in blessing, so let blessing be far from him." Watch verse 18, "...as he clothed himself with cursing like as with a garment, so let it come into his own bowels like water and like oil into his bones. Let it be on him as the garment which covereth him, and for girdle wherewith he is girded continually."

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• What is he saying there? Lord, here's why I'm praying this. Because it is an agreement with your principle, with your law of retribution. It's an agreement with the law of sowing and reaping. As he is done, so let him reap. As he sowed, so let him reap. As he loved cursing, let him be cursed. As he refused to bless, let him not have any blessings. Lord, like he liked to cover others with violence, cover him with violence. Let it be done to him exactly what he did to others.

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• Can anything be more just than that? The answer is no. These imprecatory prayers are about justice and establishing justice.

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• Now, let me make some applications today and I want you to see this in the rest of this chapter. David desired three things with these imprecatory requests in Psalm 109. Each desire that David had was godly and upright. Now we're told in Psalm 37:4, "Delight thyself also in the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart." Well, David is praying out of the desires of his heart against the wicked. And here are three things that David desires. First, David desires to be delivered from his enemies.

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• Look at verses 21 through 26. By the way, is there anything unlawful, unbiblical, unholy, ungodly about wanting to be delivered from your enemies, if your enemies are persecuting you unjustly and wickedly? No. Look at verse 21. "But he says, But do thou for me, O God the Lord, for thy name's sake, because thy mercy is good, deliver thou me. For I am poor and needy, and my heart is wounded within me."

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• "I am gone like the shadow when it declineth. I am tossed up and down as the locust. My knees are weak through fasting, and my flesh faileth of fatness. I became also a reproach unto them, when they looked upon me, and they shaked their heads. Help me, O LORD my God, O save me according to Thy mercy." What does David desire first? He wants to be delivered.

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• I don't know about you, but I try to pray every day, lead me not into temptation, but deliver me from evil. I don't want to be led into evil. I don't want to be persecuted unjustly. And neither should you. I want to be delivered from my enemies. I want to be delivered from those that hate me without a cause, from those that hate me for righteousness sake, from those that hate me according to their hatred of God. So David said, I've got a desire, and my desire is I be delivered from my enemies. David desired to be delivered from his enemies in such a way that God would get all the honor and the glory. Well, first of all that everyone recognized that God is the one who delivered him. Look in verse 27. "That they may know that this is thy hand, and that thou, Lord, has done it." Lord, I want to be delivered in such a way that everyone will know that you did it and therefore men will fear God and you will get all the honor and all the glory.

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• That's why in Psalm 58:11, we looked at it before. When David finished praying his imprecatory prayer in Psalm 58, he said, "So that a man may say, Verily there is a reward for the righteous. Verily he is a God that judgeth in all the earth." David said, I want to be delivered in such a way that everyone will know that you did it. And thirdly, David wanted to rejoice in the Lord and give Him all the honor and glory. Look in verse 28.

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• He says, "Let them curse, but bless thou. When they arise, let them be ashamed, but let thy servant rejoice. Let mine enemies be clothed with shame, and let them cover themselves with their own confusion as with a mantle. I will greatly praise the Lord with my mouth. Yea, I will praise him among the multitude. Notice, for he shall stand at the right hand of the poor to save him from those that condemn his soul." So David wanted to make sure that he got all the praise and all the glory.

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• Now, I want you to turn to Psalm 149. Let me ask you a question. Will there not be enough reason to rejoice when God delivers His people from their enemies? Will there not be enough reason to rejoice when those who are against Christ and against God and against God's Word and God's people in high places and in power and authority, will there not be reason to rejoice when they're cast down?

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• I don't know about you, but I shall. I want you to see what the Scripture says concerning God's people. Notice Psalm 149. In fact, I tell you what, let me stop there. I want you to turn to one other passage. Let's go first to Psalm 140. Let's go to Psalm 140. Then we'll come back to Psalm 149. I love this passage. Look what David prays. Here's a wonderful prayer. Psalm 140:8, "Grant not, O Lord, the desires of the wicked. Further not his wicked advice, lest they exalt themselves."

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• "As for the head of those that compass me about, let the mischief of their own lips cover them. Let burning coals fall upon them. Let them be cast in the fire, into the deep pits, that they rise not up again. Let not an evil speaker be established in the earth. Evil shall hunt the violent man to overthrow him. I know that the Lord will maintain the cause of the afflicted and the right of the poor."

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• "Surely the righteous shall give thanks unto thy name, and the upright shall dwell in thy presence." I don't know about you, but I think that's a wonderful prayer request. Grant not, O Lord, the desires of the wicked. Further not his wicked device.

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• Now if you look in Psalm 149, notice if you would please, the Bible says this, verse 4, "For the Lord taketh pleasure in His people." I'm going to preach on this verse in the not too distant future. "For the Lord taketh pleasure in His people. He will beautify the meek with salvation. Let the saints be joyful in glory. Let them sing aloud upon their beds. Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two-edged sword in their hand, to execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people, to bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron, to execute upon them the judgment written. This honor have all the saints. Praise ye the Lord."

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• I told you earlier, these imprecatory prayers demonstrate that God has not appointed us to defeat, but to victory. And remember, it is the judgment that is written, that is God's Word, God's written judgments that will fall upon the wicked. And God will oftentimes use His people to execute those judgments. We pray these prayers to establish righteousness and judgment and holiness and godliness and justice in the earth. Remember, judgment and justice are the habitation of God's throne.

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• Psalm 109 is in total agreement with the rest of Scripture. And it's easily understood when you understand this imprecatory prayer in light of the lex talionis of Scripture that God gives the wicked exactly what he dished out. And God repays the wicked with his own wickedness. He pays them in kind.

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• Now, I don't want to make you stop and think. And first of all, thank God for your salvation. And secondly, I want to make you want to stay as far away from wickedness and sin as you can, because you know God will judge it. Let's pray. Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, we ask for Your grace and Your mercy and Your kindness. We do pray, Father, against the wicked, against the ungodly, especially those, Lord, who are persecuting Thy people. And Lord, I pray in the name of Jesus Christ that Thou wouldst teach us to pray that Thou wouldst establish Thy justice and Thy righteousness. And help us, Lord, to pray, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And help us to pray, O let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end, but establish Thou the just. Give us, Lord, grace and mercy to live wholly and godly. In the name of Jesus Christ we pray, amen.

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deepseek | deepseek-v4-pro | clean_readable_transcript | 2026-06-06T00:43:59Z