Psalms 83:9 - Meaning and Application

The psalmist speaks here in the name of the church. He prays for the defeat of these allied enemies, and in God’s name he also foretells it. A prayer like this, asking that it may happen, is also a prophecy that it will happen. And that prophecy reaches to every enemy of the gospel church. Whoever opposes Christ’s kingdom can read their own doom here.

In short, the prayer is that these enemies, who have joined forces against Israel, would fail in every plan. They should end up destroying themselves, so God’s Israel may be kept safe and continue. This is explained in two ways. First, by past examples. Their punishment should be like the fate of others who once rose up against God’s people. The defeat of earlier attacks can be used in prayer and can strengthen our faith and hope, because God is still the same. He is the same toward his people, and the same against their enemies. With him, there is no change.

He prays that their armies would be destroyed as earlier enemies’ armies were destroyed (Psalms 83:9, 83:10). “Do to them as you did to the Midianites,” he says. Let them be thrown into panic, as the Midianites were, even more than by Gideon’s 300 men. He also asks that God treat them as he treated Sisera’s army, Sisera being the commander under Jabin, king of Canaan, whom God confused at the brook Kishon (Judges 4:15). Near that place was Endor. Their bodies became like dung on the ground. They were tossed aside like manure in heaps, or spread on the soil to enrich it. Barak’s small but victorious army trampled them like dirt. Deborah later made this a pattern for future generations when she said, “So let all your enemies perish, O Lord” (Judges 5:31), which means, so they will perish.

He also prays that their leaders would be destroyed, as leaders had been destroyed before. The ordinary people would not have been so harmful if their princes had not stirred them up. That is why the prayer is especially aimed at the rulers (Psalms 83:11, 83:12). Their anger against God’s people was this: “Let us take God’s houses for ourselves” (Psalms 83:12). The phrase can also mean “God’s pleasant places.” This may point to the land of Canaan, a beautiful land and Immanuel’s land, or to the temple, which was truly God’s pleasant place (Isaiah 64:11). Another suggestion is the pleasant pastures, which these Arabian people, who dealt in livestock, especially wanted. The princes and nobles wanted to enrich themselves through war, and their armies had to be made like dung for the ground to serve their greed and pride.

Their fate should be like Oreb and Zeeb, two Midianite princes who were captured in flight by the Ephraimites and killed (Judges 7:25). It should also be like Zeba and Zalmunna, whom Gideon killed himself (Judges 8:21). In effect, the prayer is, “Make these enemies as easy a prey to us as those enemies were to the people of God then.” We should not tell God what to do, but we may ask him to deal with the enemies of his church in our time as he did in the days of our fathers.

Second, the psalmist uses comparisons. He asks God to make them like a wheel (Psalms 83:13). That is, let them be in constant motion, restless, unsettled, and dizzy in all their plans and decisions, so they may quickly roll down to ruin. Some think the meaning is that God would break them, as grain is crushed or threshed by a wheel, which was then used for threshing. A wise king is said to “bring the wheel over” the wicked when he scatters them (Proverbs 20:26). Those who trust in God have steady hearts. Those who fight against him are unstable, like a wheel.

He also asks that they be chased like stubble or chaff before a strong wind. A wheel keeps turning but stays fixed at its center. These enemies, however, should have no more steadiness than light stubble that the wind blows away and no one tries to save (Psalms 1:4). That is how the wicked are driven away in their wickedness and pushed out of the world.

He goes on to pray that they would be consumed like wood in a fire, or like briers and thorns, like fern or furze on the mountains, burned up in the flames (Psalms 83:14). Stubble blown by the wind may finally settle under a hedge or in a ditch. But he asks that these enemies not only be driven away like stubble, but burned up like stubble. This will be the end of wicked people (Hebrews 6:8), and especially of all the enemies of God’s church.

The meaning is summed up in Psalms 83:15: “So pursue them with your storm, and terrify them with your hurricane.” See how sinners are made miserable. The storm of God’s wrath fills their own hearts with fear, and that makes their misery complete. God can deal with the proudest and boldest sinner, one who has openly challenged his justice. He can make such a person afraid as a grasshopper. Even demons tremble, and that is part of their torment.

Third, the psalmist points to the good results that would come from their defeat (Psalms 83:16-18). He asks God, after filling their hearts with terror, to fill their faces with shame. Then they would be ashamed of their hatred toward God’s people (Isaiah 26:11). They would also be ashamed of their foolishness in standing against all-powerful God and against their own true good. They tried to shame God’s people, but in the end shame will fall on themselves.

The first purpose of this shame might be their conversion. “Break and frustrate their plans,” he says, “so that they may seek your name, O Lord.” Let them be stopped long enough to think. Let them pause and consider whom they are fighting and how weak they are compared with him. Then they may humble themselves, give in, and ask for peace. Let them be made to fear your name, and perhaps that will lead them to seek your name. We should earnestly ask God this for our enemies and persecutors, that he would bring them to repentance. We should desire their humiliation only if it may lead to their conversion.

If shame does not lead to repentance, then its full completion will still bring honor to God. If they will not be ashamed and turn back, let them be shamed and destroyed. If they will not be troubled and converted, which would end their trouble in a happy way, then let them be troubled forever and never find peace. That will glorify God (Psalms 83:18), because others will know and confess, if they themselves will not, that you, whose name alone is LORD, the one unique covenant name of God, are the Most High over all the earth.

When God triumphs over his enemies and the enemies of his church, it will clearly prove several great truths. It will show that he is, as his name Jehovah means, the one who exists by himself and needs nothing from outside himself. He has all power and perfection in himself. It will also show that he is the Most High God, the sovereign Lord over all. He is above every false god, above every king, and above all who lift themselves up and claim greatness.

This rule is not only over the land of Israel, but over the whole earth. It reaches even the nations that do not know him or honor him, because his kingdom rules over all. These are great truths, and they cannot be denied. Yet people are slow to accept and believe them. That is why the psalmist prays that the downfall of some may warn and convince others.

In the end, the complete ruin of all God’s enemies on the great day will prove this beyond question before angels and people. When sinners rise to everlasting shame and contempt (Dan 12:2), that very judgment will bring lasting honor and praise to the God to whom vengeance belongs.