Human Defiance

Psalm 76:10 (NLT) Human defiance only enhances your glory, for you use it as a weapon.

What a crazy thought! Even the rebellion of humans brings glory to God. Yet this is consistent with the rest of Scripture. Paul writes about Pharaoh...


Romans 9:17 (ESV) For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”

God gets glory from the defiance of human pride. 

If Pharaoh hadn't hardened his heart, God's miracles would not have been necessary Yet consider that it took 400 years for Israel to see those days. I imagine in the middle of that generation, many Israelites wondered at all if God cared that His people and His name were being disregarded by the powers that be. Even in our own generation, we can wonder the same. 

Yet God is not asleep. And God is not quiet forever. It may not happen in my lifetime, but somehow God will get the glory from the Nations - even the nations that defy Him and His word. 

I look at Western Civilization sliding further and further into self-reliance and Godlessness. I ask when God will rouse Himself as the Lion of this Psalm. Yet God undoes in one day what humankind seeks to do in lifetimes and generations. From the tower of Babel to modern arrogance and scientific discovery, God always inevitably humbles the proud.

Psalm 76:8–9 (ESV) From the heavens you uttered judgment; the earth feared and was still, 9 when God arose to establish judgment, to save all the humble of the earth. Selah

Perhaps you wait and wonder when God will have had enough. The times and seasons are not for us to know. It is for us to humble ourselves before Him, trust Him, and serve Him.