By Bunni Pounds

*This blog is part of our weekly, virtual Bible Study through the book of Psalms. For information on how to participate, please visit this page.

When wickedness looks like it has taken over the world – God’s faithfulness reaches to the clouds. This is the promise that David was clinging to in Psalm 36, and it was lifegiving to him in a very dark time period in his life.

“Your mercy, O Lord, is in the heavens;
Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds.
Your righteousness is like the great mountains;
Your judgments are a great deep;
O Lord, You preserve man and beast.” (verses 5-6)

Heavens, clouds, mountains, and the deep of the ocean are all pictures of God’s vastness and how LARGE His ability to save really is. God is completely able to “preserve man and beast.” His salvation is transformative even against the most heinous evil.

Let’s think for a minute about the beginning statement of the Psalm - which I think is extremely significant to us today – “An oracle within my heart concerning the transgression of the wicked….” (verse 1)

The wickedness that the Psalmist was feeling on the earth was so deep that he chose for whatever reason to not blast out this Psalm in song through open praise like he did most of the time. Here - he is simply mediating on truth and wrote the song within his heart.

Meditations on truth – whether spoken or in our hearts – are extremely powerful and life transforming either for good or against evil.  Many times, we underestimate the power of our own thoughts and the internal dialog within our own souls. Thoughts of rejection, hopelessness, loneliness, or perversion can overtake our lives – if we let them, but this is why the apostle Paul told us to take every thought captive to the Word of God.

“For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.” – 2 Corinthians 10:4-6

The worst thing we can do is turn off truth in our minds and let our thoughts be taken over by wickedness or isolation. Taking thoughts captive and forcing them into submission to Christ is how we live a victorious life. Wicked and bad thoughts will come to every believer – but the question is – what are we doing with them? Are we letting them live with free rent in our heads or are we kicking them out with vigilance?

Here David was using this song as a meditation in his own mind to push back on the narrative of defeatism and hopelessness that he was feeling over the wickedness that was swirling around him.

Let’s go back and look for a minute at the reality of what he was having to deal with in his world. How deep was the wickedness in the people around him?

“There is no fear of God before his eyes.
For he flatters himself in his own eyes,
When he finds out his iniquity and when he hates.
The words of his mouth are wickedness and deceit;
He has ceased to be wise and to do good.

 He devises wickedness on his bed;
He sets himself in a way that is not good;
He does not abhor evil.” (verses 1b-4)

Currently – we have people in our world that lay around and think about how to deceive the masses and how they can push their evil agenda. Everything they speak is deception and evil. It should make us concerned, and we should be crying out to God for wisdom and discernment like never before.

As I was writing this – one of my political consultant friends put this out on Twitter and it is so true (unlike most things on Twitter) – “There is no substitute for discernment. Not from the politicians. Not from the experts. Not from the institutions. YOURS. You own it. Stop giving away to the pimps masquerading as purveyors of virtue.”

In this time – just like in David’s time – we must have discernment and see through their crafty wicked ways. It is imperative upon our lives that we don’t just rest like sitting ducks and believe it all without asking God for wisdom and doing research. We are going to be dealing with wickedness every where we go in our culture and nation. Let’s not be lazy. Let’s take every thought captive to the Word of God and see how it lines up with truth.

“How precious is Your lovingkindness, O God!
Therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of Your wings. They are abundantly satisfied with the fullness of Your house,
And You give them drink from the river of Your pleasures.
For with You is the fountain of life;
In Your light we see light.” (verses 7-9)

In the middle of wickedness – David knew where His strength came from more than ever before – in the presence of God with God’s people.

Community – especially community found in the Body of Christ – is one of our greatest needs in this modern world. I am not just talking about just “going to church”. We can go to church and never have community. The question we must ask ourselves about our community is this -  do we have people in our lives that we worship, pray, and do life with? Do they know the depths of what is going on in our lives? Do they love us knowing the full “reality” of it all?

When David is talking about the “fullness of Your house”, he is not talking about a building. He is talking about the people that he worships with. Together they drink in the “river” of God’s pleasures and they “see light” together.

God is the fountain of life EVEN in a time of extreme wickedness. When our heads and hearts seem to be exploding from the pressure of it – we can find peace and life inside the fullness of God’s house (which is another reason why we cannot let government ever shut down the church again!)

Here is our New Testament exhortation that is so critical for our lives and families right now.

“And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.” – Hebrews 10:24-35

After being on the road for two and a half months every Sunday – Tim and I were finally back at our home church this last Sunday. I cannot tell you how refreshing it was to see Pastor Marty and Melia Reid and people that love us.

This last weekend – we also buried our former Pastor of the church where Tim and I met years ago – Jim Borchert. It was heartbreaking but we were together. Many of our “old friends” gathered. Many of them are still some of our best friends who we have fellowshipped with for years – some even coming to our house church for 10 years. Many of them know everything about us – not just the shiny beautiful stuff that you all see on social media, but the struggles and the trials of our lives. They know us. They really know us. And we really know them.

The comfort is in their presence just knowing that at 3 am any night – if we needed them to pray or to comfort us, they would be there for us. This is what real community is all about – breaking open God’s Word together, repenting together, praising together, and doing life together. We need it even more in this time in history.

“Oh, continue Your lovingkindness to those who know You,
And Your righteousness to the upright in heart.
Let not the foot of pride come against me,
And let not the hand of the wicked drive me away.
There the workers of iniquity have fallen;
They have been cast down and are not able to rise.” (verses 10-12)

The final victory is found here in this passage – the truth stands: God’s got us! His lovingkindness is vast and deep.

Remember the ocean and the mountains and the picture of His faithfulness. His faithfulness is vast.

The “hand of the wicked” is not going to win in the end. They are going to be unable “to rise”.

His faithfulness reaches to the clouds.

He will always cause us, the righteous, to RISE.

Not because of our goodness or faithfulness, but because of His lovingkindness.

His faithfulness reaches to the clouds.

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