On finding comfort from Old Testament prayers that God [probably] won’t answer

This morning, I found out that Trump’s stock-tumbling tweet about Boeing and 2020 Air Force One orders “Cancel It!” came an hour after Boeing’s CEO criticized him. I don’t know why I still have capacity to be appalled by this man’s ability to be thin-skinned, self-centered and irresponsible. But I clearly do.

As I thought about all of his antics again and got increasingly irritated, Psalm 37 came to mind. I had discovered verse 1 by accident while looking for verse 4 on Sunday, and had read the whole passage, somewhat guiltily, substituting “evil men” for Trump and “those who do wrong” for Bannon.

Then I repented for praying a vengeance prayer that God probably doesn’t approve of and so probably won’t answer.

This morning, it came back to mind. “Do not fret because of Donald Trump… or be envious of those on his cabinet who do wrong. For like grass they will soon wither, like green plants they will soon die away.”

I should probably be praying for their souls and for them to find repentance. But this is sooo much more satisfying… 7 ” Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him, do not fret when Trump succeed in his ways, when he carries out his wicked schemes… for he will be cut off, and those who hope in the Lord will inherit the Land.”

Well I’m not actually praying for him to be cut off literally. Just for his influence and empowerment of neo Nazis and white supremacists to stop. God I know you can turn his heart around… ooh what’s that 10: “A little while, and Trump will be no more… ” sure what I mean is he’ll be gone in four years and 14: “Donald Trump and his Department of Health and Human Services appointee draw the sword and bend the bow to bring down the poor and the needy [with their plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act and roll back Medicare/Medicaid]. But their swords will pierce their own hearts, and their bows will be broken.”

God forgive me – I don’t really mean any of this literally – I’m just drawing comfort from knowing that their evils plans will not stand forever- wait what 32: “Steve Bannon and his neo Nazis lay in wait for the righteous, seeking their very lives; but the Lord will not leave them in their power”

This is hard Lord. I really want to pray for our future leaders and pray for his heart to be turned towards you. But this makes me feel so much better right now, especially when I switch from NIV to the Message: 35: “I saw Wicked Trump bloated like [an orange] toad, croaking pretentious nonsense. The next time I looked, there was nothing, [like] a punctured bladder, vapid and limp.”

Somehow I don’t think this is what God had in mind when he said we should pray for our leaders and rulers. But it’s not Jan 20 yet. And I’m a work in progress.

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s