Psalm 60 – You Were Angry
The superscription for Psalm 60 – You were angry, says it is for our instruction. Why was God angry? What are we to learn about God’s anger from this psalm?
Psalm 60 is both a lament and a psalm of triumph. The triumph comes after losses and lessons learned from those losses. The superscription reads:
“For the director of music. To the tune of “The Lily of the Covenant.” A miktam of David. For teaching. When he fought Aram Naharaim and Aram Zobah, and when Joab returned and struck down twelve thousand Edomites in the Valley of Salt.”
This psalm is another “miktum” meant for instruction or teaching. What are we to learn?
Losses in Battle
Psalm 60 – You were angry, begins with David saying God has rejected the Hebrew nation and asking God to restore them.
“You have rejected us, God, and burst upon us; you have been angry—now restore us!
You have shaken the land and torn it open; mend its fractures, for it is quaking.
You have shown your people desperate times; you have given us wine that makes us stagger.” (1-3)
Why does David say God was angry? We hear only of victories in this psalm. However the events leading up to the great victory remind us that in war, we rarely go from victory to victory but suffer setbacks. Israel’s defeat was a hard one causing confusion, or “wine that makes us stagger.” Bitter wine. Such is the despair of defeat.
“Psalm 60 comes in the dark moment when David has been caught off guard by Edom, suffering an unnerving, even devastating, first wave of losses. David and the nation are undone. In their shock and embarrassment and fear, they feel rejected by God.
As we’ll see in Psalm 60:1–3, David and his people are anxious, in some measure, about God’s abandonment. Was he not supposed to protect them? And yet, in this psalm, in this painful defeat, David sees the banner still flying. Hope is not lost yet. He falls back to the banner.” Fall Back to the Banner: Four Lessons for Our Devastations | Desiring God
“But for those who fear you, you have raised a banner to be unfurled against the bow.” (4)
God’s Banner
What is this banner in Psalm 60 – You were angry? Most likely a flag, the standard of the army. The Hebrew people are marching under God’s banner. It is God who leads them into battle.
“Who will bring me to the fortified city? Who will lead me to Edom?
Is it not you, God, you who have now rejected us and no longer go out with our armies?
Give us aid against the enemy, for human help is worthless.
With God we will gain the victory, and he will trample down our enemies.” (9-12)
God grants them victory once again. At one point they had strayed, not followed God. Now they are back under God’s banner.
Why was God Angry?
What did David and his people do to cause God’s anger? There is no specific mention of the sin of the people in this psalm. They assumed that any losses they experienced in battle was because they had sinned in some way, turned away from God. This presumes that as long as God is “on their side” they will have the victory. We know the problems with this thinking. First it presumes that God is on any one side in battle. This has led to terrible violence and loss of lives throughout history, all in the name of God.
As I ask in another blog post on this psalm: “Was it God’s fault that the Hebrew’s suffered a great defeat? Or was it a poorly planned venture on the part of the ruler? Were they defeated because God abandoned them, or because of foolishness on the part of the king who chose to go into battle without truly listening to God?”
We don’t know. We know David believed God was angry. But what angers God?
Angry God
We do have a God who gets angry. One of the many things I love about the Psalms is the depth of the emotions throughout them. The emotions of the people, but also emotion attributed to God. I’m glad that we have a God who feels the range of emotions that we do, not some unfeeling deity in the sky.
What angers God? I believe that what angers God is meanness, cruelty, unkindness. To me, the third commandment against using “God’s name in vain“ applies to people who justify and perpetuate injustice, violence, and hatred, all in the name of God.
This especially applies to religious leaders that abuse their people or lead them astray. Just think of Jesus in Temple, chasing out the money lenders or his angry words addressed to the Pharisees. Jesus’ harshest criticism is against the religious leaders who know every tittle of the law but have no compassion.
This causes God’s anger, not the small errors, mistakes, slip ups, that we come to regret or unknowingly do. God’s forgiveness is ours even before we ask for these. It is the harsher, unrepentant sins against those who are vulnerable that merit God’s anger.
Psalm 60 – You Were Angry
As I mentioned, I’m glad we have a God who feels the wide range of emotions that we do, including anger. I’m glad that we have a God who is approachable. We see in Psalm 60 – You were angry, that even though David felt God was angry, he was not afraid to come before God and ask for help, confident that God will provide that help. How great is that? Pretty great.
Psalm 60 – You were angry, reminds us once again of God’s great love and compassion for God’s people. God’s love isn’t cold and calculating but passionate. God gets angry with us when we act in sinful ways. God’s anger is there to correct us and lead us back to our best selves.
Have you experienced God’s righteous anger in your life? How did that help you grow?
(For another take on this psalm, see Psalm 60: Playing the Blame Game – Patricia M Robertson)
This post is part of a series of blog posts on the Psalms. Sign up to follow this blog and receive a free copy of Still Dancing, the second book in my Dancing through Life Series. click here to sign up
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