10
📚Why do you stand far off,O LORD?
Why do you hide yourself
in times of trouble?
10:1 Apparently this psalm was written when wickedness in the land had the upper hand. Yet God seemed to stand afar off doing nothing about it. This has often perplexed God’s people – why does God not immediately put down wickedness and reward righteousness (Ps 73:3-12; Job 9:24; 21:4-34; Hab 1:2-4)? Part of the answer is found in verses like Ps 103:8 and 2 Pet 3:9. If God immediately destroyed all the wicked Saul of Tarsus would never have become Paul the apostle. And what would have happened to us when we were still in our sins? Also we should understand that God in His wisdom often allows men’s wickedness to be revealed to the full before bringing a halt to it (Gen 15:16).⚜
2 📚The wicked in his pride
persecutes the poor.
Let them be taken in the schemes
they have devised.
3 📚For the wicked boasts
of his heart’s desire,
and praises the covetous,
whom the LORD abhors.
10:3 See how far the fallen heart of man can sink. A bad man can reach the place where he actually takes pride in that of which he should be deeply ashamed. Compare Phil 3:19. And do we not see this on every hand?⚜
4 📚The wicked, in the pride 📖
of his countenance,
will not seek God.
God is not in any of his thoughts 📖.
5 📚His ways are always prosperous.
Your judgments are far above,
out of his sight.
As for all his enemies,
he snorts at them.
6 📚He has said in his heart,
“I will not be moved;
for I will never
be in distress”.
10:5-6 Compare Ps 73:4-12.⚜
7 📚His mouth is full of cursing
and deceit and oppression.
Under his tongue are trouble
and evil.
8 📚He sits in ambush
in the villages;
in secret places he murders
the innocent.
In secret his eyes are fixed
on the poor.
9 📚He lies in wait secretly like
a lion in his den.
He lies in wait to catch the poor.
He catches the poor,
when he draws him
into his net.
10 📚He crouches, and lies low,
that the poor may fall by his strength.
11 📚He has said in his heart,
“God has forgotten.
He hides his face.
He will never see it”.
10:2-11 The writer recounts to God the character of wicked people that so much merits God’s judgment. Certain sins are emphasized – pride (vs 2,4,5) and preying on the weak (vs 2,8-10), and words full of boasting and contempt for God and His laws (vs 3-7), and cruelty and murder (vs 8-10).⚜
10:11 Ps 73:11. Such people have enough knowledge of right and wrong that they do not want God to see and know what they are doing – so they persuade themselves that He does not. Their ideas of God are not based on reason or revelation, but on what they want to think. This too is very common among people everywhere.⚜
12 📚Arise 📖, O LORD! O God,
lift up your hand!
Do not forget the humble.
13 📚Why does the wicked spurn God?
He has said in his heart,
“You will not require an account 📖”.
14 📚You have seen it;
for you look at trouble
and sorrow to repay it
with your hand.
The poor commits himself to you.
You are the helper of the fatherless.
10:14 He is confident that eventually God will come to the aid of the helpless who commit themselves to Him (vs 16-18).⚜
15 📚Break the arm of the wicked
and the evil man!
Search out his wickedness
until you find none.
10:15 See note at Ps 35:8.⚜
16 📚The LORD is King 📖
for ever and ever.
The nations have perished
from his land.
17 📚LORD, you have heard
the desire of the humble.
You will prepare their heart;
you will cause your ear to hear,
18 📚To execute justice for
the fatherless 📖 and the oppressed,
so that the man of the earth
may no longer oppress.