“Only fools say in their hearts, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, and their actions are evil; not one of them does good!” Psalms 53:1 NLT
David, the Psalmist, is again in contemplative mode. In a zone of musings, as he thinks about what is going on about him. He is obviously much influenced by people around him, and he sees their hypocrisy, their lip service to God but in reality they deny Him, even His existence, with their thoughts and actions. And he concludes that they are “fools”. But if he is right, there are an awful lot of fools around us today. Nothing has changed from David’s day. Worse, though, there are many more who openly declare that there is no God. That everything happened by chance. Chemical reactions brought about carbon-based life. A Big Bang caused the universe to appear. And these people then sit back in a self-satisfied state of “knowledge”, not realising that they have talked themselves into being fully paid up members of the Society of Fools.
David draws the conclusion that without an open acceptance of God and His ways, the God-deniers, the atheists and agnostics of his day, are corrupt and evil in all they think and do. They adopt a life that is biased towards their own personal gain, selfishness being fuelled by an evil desire not held in check by the thought there is a God in Heaven looking on. Deep within us is a God-shaped hole that yearns and aches for Him to fill it. And today there will be those who, in spite of their God-denying, will try to fill their internal ache by doing good things for their society, perhaps helping out at a fund raising function, putting out their neighbour’s bins, visiting sick in hospital, or donating to a charity somewhere.
But David’s musings remain in the zone of the foolishness of denying God, and the impact such denial will have on thoughts and actions, extending as they do into evil, and general corruption. Worldliness on a global scale.
So what about us. Christians can’t sit back and believe they have nothing to fear from Psalm 53. To the contrary, perhaps there is a wake up call here, for us to review and examine our hearts, bringing to the surface all that is God-denying. All that is evil and corrupt. And then bring it under the Blood of Jesus, in sorrowful and heart-felt repentance. Then the grace of God will flood over us once again. Praise His Name!
Being a Pilgrim 