Ps 58

Ps 58:1 Do you indeed speak righteousness, you silent ones? Do you judge uprightly, you sons of men?

:2 No, in heart you work wickedness; you weigh out the violence of your hands in the earth.

:3 The wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies.

:4 Their poison is like the poison of a serpent; they are like the deaf cobra that stops its ear,

:5 which will not heed the voice of charmers, charming ever so skillfully.

:6 Break their teeth in their mouth, O God! Break out the fangs of the young lions, O Lord!

:7 Let them flow away as waters which run continually; when he bends his bow, let his arrows be as if cut in pieces.

:8 Let them be like a snail which melts away as it goes, like a stillborn child of a woman, that they may not see the sun.

:9 Before your pots can feel the burning thorns, he shall take them away as with a whirlwind, as in His living and burning wrath.

:10 The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the vengeance; he shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked,

:11 so that men will say, “Surely there is a reward for the righteous' surely He is God who judges in the earth.”

This is headed The Just Judgment of the Wicked.

The evil today in our world is a reflection of the evil in the hearts of humans.

David prayed that God would bring the evil ones to justice in His court.

Jesus is full of grace and mercy toward those who repent and believe in Him, but He will also be the judge of all mankind in the end. When the ones who reject Him stand before Him they will have nothing to say to justify their disobedience and sin.

We will stand before Him also, but in evaluation, not condemnation. The only way to avoid God's condemnation is to accept the gift of God's grace.

David used a series of vivid images to picture the judgment of God on lawless leaders and unjust judges.

1. He asked God to break the fang of these lion like evildoers(verse 6)
2. He wanted the wicked to evaporate like water poured out on the hot sand (verse 7)
3. He asked that their arrows would be as harmless as sticks with no points (verse 7)
4. Slugs or snails don't really melt away as they crawl, but the trail of slime they leave makes the appear to , that is what he wanted to happen to all those who were corrupt and crooked (verse 8)
5. He hoped they are scattered the way cooking pots over a campfire are scattered by a tornado (verse 9)
6. Then, like a soldier taking soil from a battlefield gets blood on his shoes, he wanted God to “wash his feet in the blood of the wicked” (verse 10).

Powerful, difficult images of the final end of those who pursue their own way instead of following God's way.