We do not use hymnals in our congregation, though in some congregations and churches they do. If you flick through one, you will sometimes notice that there are a couple of variations of a hymn, with only some minor differences. Or perhaps a couple of settings for a psalm, with slightly different lyrics and a different tune.
Psalm 53 is one such tune. Psalm 53 mirrors Psalm 14. It speaks about fools, and their fate. In biblical language, a fool is someone who denies the reality of God and does not give him the honour he is due. As in Psalm 14, this psalm provides a description of a fool, the fate of the fool, and the hope of the righteous compared to the fool. The main difference in Psalm 53 is that the focus is on judging the fool.
Psalm 53 opens with a description of a fool. “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt, doing abominable iniquity; there is none who does good” (v.1). What sets a fool apart is not the level of intelligence or skill, but an attitude that rejects God, acting and behaving as if God does not exist.
The fool’s downside is not their intelligence, but their morality. They are corrupt instead of pure; everything is tainted by sin. They commit offences against God which are morally wrong. There is nobody whose acts are entirely pure.
The fool might ignore God’s existence, but God still sees, looking “down from heaven on the children of man to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God” (v.2). God observes to see if there are any who acknowledge him and worship him.
But fallen humankind does not actively seek God. Instead, “they have all fallen away, together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one” (v.3). The reality of the fool is they congregate together in their foolishness. What God sees is complete moral corruption, an inability to do good absolutely with a desire to motivate God. God does not see good which saves, but the sinfulness of man. And he sees it not just in little pockets here and there, but everywhere.
Again in verse four, we are directed towards the fate of the fool. Like in Psalm 14, Psalm 53 asks a rhetorical question. “Have those who work evil no knowledge, who eat up my people as they eat bread, and do not call upon God?” The fool acts like God does not exist. They prey upon and afflict God’s People, consuming them like someone at fellowship lunch cracking into a loaf of bread. They certainly do not call upon God. They act as if God is not there, not watching, and not ready to hold them accountable.
Verse five is where Psalm 53 breaks from Psalm 14, deleting and substituting one verse for two. But both Psalms deal here with the fate of the fool. Here in Psalm 53, this focus rests on judging the fool.
“There they are, in great terror, where there is no terror! For God scatters the bones of him who encamps against you; you put them to shame, for God has rejected them” (v.5). The general statement of God’s presence with his people to bring judgement on the fool is replaced by a reference to a specific event. The background here is possibly the attack of Senacherib on Jerusalem, when God attacked the Assyrian Army surrounding Jerusalem, causing the remnant to flee (2 Kings 19; Isaiah 37).
There seemed to be nothing to fear, and yet God swooped down in the night and struck down 85,000. The Israelites should not have been afraid, and yet they were. Then they woke to only bodies of corpses to bury. The fools who thought they could defy the living God came to a sticky end. The same fate awaits all who reject God today.
That specific act of deliverance leads to the hope of the righteous. “Oh, that salvation for Israel would come out of Zion! When God restores the fortunes of his people, let Jacob rejoice, let Israel be glad” (v.6). The psalm ends on a note of hope, wishing that the same deliverance of God’s People would occur on a greater scale.
As believers we know that this is the case, with God’s judgement poured out on Jesus instead of us. Now the great conflict is experienced spiritually, through our daily battle with sin and against our spiritual foes, including the Devil.
These foes are scary enough that they can be terrifying, yet there is nothing to fear. In Christ, we have overcome the world, and one day all will be overcome, both spiritually and physically.
Even though it seems like there are no consequences for the fool in today’s events, God will judge them through Jesus our Lord. While we were not righteous in our own natural state, God has saved us from our foolishness to worship him. We have been spared the fate of fools and their end.