Psalm 5:5-6

Psalm 5:5-6

The arrogant cannot stand in your presence. You hate all who do wrong; you destroy those who tell lies. The no bloodthirsty and deceitful you, Lord, detest.

Yesterday, we read that 'evil people' are not welcome in
God's presence. But who does David mean? Did you assume that he was talking about you? Or were you pretty confident that he meant someone else? Our world assumes that most people are basically good. There might be a few 'evil people' but they're the extreme cases and it's always someone else, never me.

So, is David is just talking about them? Murderers, oppressive dictators, those who habitually hurt and destroy other people in
particularly brutal ways without any remorse? We might think that if we only read v.4, but today's verses rule it out.  Yes, God hates the 'bloodthirsty' but he feels just the same about the liar. Top of his list of those who cannot stand in God's presence are 'the
arrogant'. For me, these verses hit close to home. Pride and self-sufficiency come high on my personal list of besetting sins. Your sinful nature may invest its energies in some other way of rebelling against God. But one way or another, we all fall into the category of 'those who do wrong' (v5). 

If we rejoice that God punishes wickedness, we must also
confess that he would be right to punish us. When we celebrate the fact that heaven will contain nothing evil, we must also admit that we deserve be excluded.

Each one of should be counted amongst the evil people of
v.4-6 but that's not the end of the story. God hates evildoers but he also loves his enemies. As we’ll see in tomorrow’s verse there is a way for us to escape his anger.  So, we don't need to
despair. But we DO need to acknowledge that we are those who do wrong. We do not love or worship God as he rightly deserves and we do not properly love those around us. Let's confess those things to God today. And if that honest confession of sin isn't part of our regular prayer life, let's ask for God's help to become those who are humble before him, instead of arrogant. The more
we honestly acknowledge our need of the forgiveness that comes only through Jesus, the greater our love and appreciation of him will become.