Psalm 7 · a question people ask
"Arise, LORD, in your anger" (7:6). How can a prayer ask God to act in anger?
The verse speaks to the LORD and asks the LORD to act: "Arise, LORD, in your anger. Lift up yourself against the rage of my adversaries. Awake for me. You have commanded judgment" (7:6). It sets the anger it asks for against "the rage of my adversaries", and it ends on judgment. The psalmist doesn't say he will strike anyone; he asks, "Judge me, LORD" (7:8). His prayer about the wicked is "Oh let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end, but establish the righteous" (7:9). And what the psalm says of the one who dug a pit is that his own trouble comes back on him: "The trouble he causes shall return to his own head" (7:16). Psalm 7 is not the only psalm that asks God to act against enemies, and Christians read these prayers in more than one way. The chapter on Psalm 109 sets out the main readings, each resting on its verses, and chooses none. These notes don't choose either.
The verses
“Arise, LORD, in your anger. Lift up yourself against the rage of my adversaries. Awake for me. You have commanded judgment.”
“The LORD administers judgment to the peoples. Judge me, LORD, according to my righteousness, and to my integrity that is in me. Oh let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end, but establish the righteous; their minds and hearts are searched by the righteous God.”
“He has dug a hole, and has fallen into the pit which he made. The trouble he causes shall return to his own head. His violence shall come down on the crown of his own head.”
“For the Chief Musician. A Psalm by David. God of my praise, don’t remain silent, for they have opened the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of deceit against me. They have spoken to me with a lying tongue. They have also surrounded me with words of hatred, and fought against me without a cause. In return for my love, they are my adversaries; but I am in prayer. They have rewarded me evil for good, and hatred for my love.”