When Righteousness Itself Becomes Offensive
The wicked will see it and be angry....
— Psalm 112
There is something almost startlingly contemporary about the final verse of Psalm 112.
“The wicked will see it and be angry.”
Angry about what?
That's the interesting part.
Go backward through the Psalm and look at the people who provoke this anger. They are described as merciful and full of compassion. They are generous. They conduct their affairs with justice. They give freely to the poor. They are steadfast and unafraid.
These are the people the wicked see.
And become angry.
Apparently human nature hasn't changed much.
There is plenty for which Christians and churches can legitimately be criticized. We have sometimes been hypocritical. We have sometimes protected institutions instead of people. We have sometimes been judgmental when mercy was required, timid when courage was required, and comfortable when sacrifice was required.
When that happens, criticize us. Sometimes we need it.
But something very different happens when people become angry not because Christians have failed to live their faith, but because they have actually lived it. Christians feed people. They build houses.
They operate hospitals, schools, shelters, food pantries and disaster-relief organizations. They visit prisoners. They adopt children. They care for the elderly. They send money quietly to people in trouble. They give enormous amounts of time and wealth away without anybody outside their churches ever knowing about it.
And yes, Christians also proclaim a moral code, and that seems to be where things can get uncomfortable.
It is possible to applaud a church for feeding the hungry on Saturday and resent that same church for preaching about holiness on Sunday.
But Psalm 112 doesn't give us permission to separate those things so neatly.
The righteous person is compassionate and righteous.
Merciful and just.
Generous and steadfast.
He gives freely to the poor and fears the Lord.
It's not either-or.
It's all of the above.
That should be particularly interesting whenever these conversations become political. The Left quite properly talks a great deal about justice and concern for the poor. Good. Christians should be able to say so, as well! Those are biblical concerns.
But they are not exclusively progressive concerns - They belong to God!
And Christians should never be embarrassed to claim them while also refusing to surrender the rest of biblical morality.
Perhaps that combination is precisely what irritates some people. A Christianity that merely operates a food pantry can be useful. A Christianity that merely condemns other people's sins can be dismissed as obnoxious. But a community that feeds the hungry, welcomes the stranger, cares for the elderly, gives generously, practices sexual morality, forgives its enemies, tells the truth, remains steadfast under pressure, and insists that all of these things belong together?
That's harder to categorize.
And apparently it can make people angry.
Psalm 112 doesn't seem surprised by that. Neither should we be.
But before we get too comfortable assigning ourselves to the righteous side of the Psalm, there is one final sting in it for us.
If we claim to be God's people but are not merciful, not compassionate, not generous, not just in our dealings, and not giving freely to the poor, then the people criticizing us may not be the wicked people in this story.
We may be.
And that's another matter entirely.
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