O you who love the Lord, hate evil! He preserves the lives of his saints; he delivers them from the hand of the wicked. Psalm 97:10 – The first sentence in our verse is what captured my attention. That those of us who claim to love the Lord are supposed to hate something. Yes, the strong word of hate, and we are commanded by scripture to hate evil. Of all things for scripture to tell us to hate, evil at least makes sense, but where would we begin? Let’s begin with a topic the other verses in our psalm speak about, idols. This week I took my family to a Chinese buffet, and immediately as you walked into the restaurant was a large golden buddha statue with a place in front of it where offerings were being placed. Likely most everyone there didn’t think twice about it, all that was on their mind was crab rangoons, but what if it was something different welcoming the customers? What if it was a giant swastika or what if it was a flag to some terrorist organization. If that was what welcomed people into the restaurant we’d see a very different reaction from the customers. Why? For there would be a hatred towards those symbols for we know what they represent. As believers then, people who love the Lord, let’s begin to have evil by hating idols. Idols represent demonic forces pulling people away from the Savior and pulling worship away from the only true God who deserves all worship. Idols may come in the shape of golden statues to green paper in our wallet to those electronic rectangles we keep in our pockets. Whatever is in our life that is taking our focus off of God and causing us to give it more of our life than we give the Lord…hate it for it has become an idol. Treat it then as something you hate and reposition God to the central place of your worship. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 3511
Question To Ponder: What’s another way we can hate evil?
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