O Lord, God of vengeance, let your glorious justice shine forth. Arise, O Judge of the earth; give the proud what they deserve. How long O Lord? How long will the wicked be allowed to gloat? How long will they speak with arrogance? How long will these evil people boast? They crush your people, Lord, hurting those you claim as your own. They murder widows, immigrants, and orphans. They say “the Lord isn’t looking and besides, He doesn’t care.”

Think again, you fools! When will you finally catch on? Do you think the one who made your ears is deaf? Is the one who formed your eyes blind? He punishes the nations, won’t He also punish you? He knows everything. Doesn’t He also know what you are doing? The Lord knows people’s thoughts; He knows they are worthless!

Joyful are those You discipline, Lord, those You teach with Your instructions. You give them relief from troubled times until a pit is dug to capture the wicked. The Lord will not reject His people; He will not abandon His special possession. Judgment will again be founded on justice and those with virtuous hearts will pursue it.

Who will protect me from the wicked? Who will stand up for me against evildoers? Unless the LORD had helped me, I would soon have settled in the silence of the grave. I cried out, “I am slipping!” but your unfailing love, O Lord supported me.

Lord, when doubts fill my mind, when my heart is in turmoil, quiet me and give me renewed hope and cheer. Can unjust leaders claim that God is on their side? Leaders whose decrees permit injustice? They gang up against the righteous and condemn the innocent to death. But the Lord is my fortress; my God is the mighty rock where I hide. God has made the sins of evil men to boomerang upon them. He will destroy them by their own plans. Jehovah our God will cut them off. Psalm 94, Adapted

Lord, how long will the wicked triumph? Shall wrong rule forever? Are slavery, robbery, tyranny never to cease? Since there is certainly a just God in Heaven, armed with almighty power, surely there must sooner or later be an end to the ascendancy of evil. Innocence must one day find a defender. This “how long?” of the text is the bitter complaint of all the righteous in all ages. and expresses wonder caused by that great puzzlement of providence, the existence and dominion of evil. It is akin to a howl, as if it were one of the saddest of all the utterances in which misery bemoans itself. Many a time has this bitter complaint been heard in the dungeons of the Inquisition, at the whipping posts of slavery, and in the prisons of oppression.

In due time God will publish His reply, but the full end is not yet.

Adapted, Spurgeon and the Psalms, Charles Spurgeon (1834 – 1893)