Psalm 145

I wrestled for a long time over the title of this blog post. I wanted to be blunt and just title it God destroys the wicked. But I was afraid that might turn some people off before they even read what I had written, so I decided to leave it as a question and, hopefully, invite investigation.

Several times now on this blog, I have stated boldly that God does not destroy the wicked. And then I read this in today’s psalm: “The LORD watches over all who love him, but all the wicked he will destroy.” (vs 20)

Ruh-roh.

There were a lot of lovely statements in this psalm about God’s character, but I figured it would be wussy of me to skip over the very thing that would appear to contradict what I believe is one of the most beautiful character traits of God—that He does not destroy His enemies!

So, what are we to do with a verse like this? Does God kill the people who refuse to obey Him? Does He say “love Me or I’ll kill you”? And if He doesn’t, why is there a verse like this in the Bible? Even though David was writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, did he just misunderstand this part of God? Or is it really true?

Yes, it’s really true. (Hang on! Don’t stop reading!)

I want to share with you a quote about this very subject that a friend sent to me:

Doesn’t God Himself say that He destroys people? Yes, He does! Therefore it is the truth that God does destroy. We can only conclude that His way of destroying is altogether different than man’s way. God is not like us. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” Isa 55:8-9

So how does He destroy? In a nutshell, He destroys by trying to save and by not forcing His presence where it is not wanted. God comes to man in one role only, which is as a Savior. But the effect of that effort is not always a saving one. With the majority, the effect is to harden them in rebellion and to cause them to withdraw themselves from the voice of loving entreaty. Thus God destroys by trying to save. The more He exerts His saving power, the more men are driven by their rejection of it to destruction. The gospel truth ruins if it does not save! It is in this sense that He destroys.

If man drives God away and deprives Him of any possibility of remaining unless He forces His presence, then how can anyone say He is a destroyer? He acted as a savior and a savior only. He is life and when life is forced to turn away then death is our lot. He has no other choice but to leave us to our destruction. —from A God of Destruction or Salvation? (emphasis mine)

This is what I believe it means to say that God “destroys.” A perfect example is Pharaoh. God confronted Pharaoh—who was living in spiritual darkness—with the light of truth. God did this because He loved Pharaoh and wanted to save him from his spiritual darkness. Pharaoh understood the light God had given him, but he decided to ignore it and continue on in his spiritual darkness. The effect of this was the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart. The more light God brought and the more Pharaoh rejected it, the more his heart was hardened.

But the Bible also says that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and I believe it says that in the same sense that it says God destroys the wicked. For it was God who confronted Pharaoh with the light and, essentially, put Pharaoh in the position of having to choose one way or the other. Once God had approached Pharaoh as his Savior and enlightened him, Pharaoh could choose to accept that light or reject it, but he could not remain neutral. He could never again live innocently in spiritual darkness.

Thus, if Pharaoh had decided to yield to the Spirit and accept God’s light, it could have been written that “God softened Pharaoh’s heart.” That doesn’t mean God made the decision for him; it just means that God is the one who presented Pharaoh with the opportunity to choose.

So, saying that God destroys the wicked has nothing—absolutely nothing!—to do with some sort of imposed punishment on people who disobey God. Rather, it is a statement of reality: that God is the one who approaches us as our Savior. And if we reject the light He brings us, the ultimate effect of that rejection is self-destruction.

God brings us truth in order to save us, but if we will not yield to the Spirit, the same truth that is intended to save us is the same truth that will destroy us.