What Can the Righteous Do?*

The basic concepts of God, righteousness, justice, and truth are being attacked daily in our nation. King David sought the LORD about these same conditions: "In the LORD put I my trust...the wicked bend their bow, they make ready their arrow upon the string, that they may privily shoot at the upright in heart. If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do? The LORD is in his holy temple, the LORD's throne is in heaven: his eyes behold, his eyelids try, the children of men. The LORD trieth the righteous: but the wicked and him that loveth violence his soul hateth...(Help, LORD; for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men. They speak vanity...with flattering lips and with a double heart do they speak...Who have said, 'With our tongue will we prevail; our lips are our own: who is lord over us?...The wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are exalted.) Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and a horrible tempest: this shall be the portion of their cup. For the righteous LORD loveth righteousness; his countenance doth uphold the upright." (Ps. 11 (Ps. 12)). 'What can the righteous do?', David asked and answered. We can trust in the LORD who loves righteousness, and upholds the upright. David wrote here of the foundations, and we can discover in the scriptures what those foundations are. Paul wrote: "According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ." (1 Cor. 3:10-11). Christ is the foundation. Jesus is also described by Peter as the chief cornerstone of the foundation upon which God is building His spiritual house: "...laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and all evil speakings...desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby: ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious, to whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious, ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ...also it is contained in scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded (shamed, dishonored, disgraced). (1 Peter 2:1-6). Psalm 118:22-23 says that this cornerstone, refused by the builders, "...is the LORD's doing; it is marvellous in our eyes." This chief cornerstone, which is Christ, is precious to us who believe, but to those who are appointed to disobedience, this same cornerstone becomes a rock of stumbling and offense because they stumble at the Word of God (1 Pet. 2: 7-8). For those to whom this cornerstone of Christ is very precious, they have been chosen to be "...a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light: which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy." (v. 9-10). Peter also told the people of God to abstain from the lusts of the flesh, which war against the soul (v. 11). Our warfare and victory were accomplished at the cross, and in the promise of the resurrection of the dead. Although others may do all that they can to avoid or deny that truth, it is true nonetheless. Not only do the scriptures bear witness to the deth and resurrection of Christ, but also many testimonies of near-death experiences, and the resurrection witness of the Shroud of Turin are available for all to see and hear. As we consider again the question of what the righteous can do, we can be that royal priesthood, that holy nation, "shewing forth the praises of him that hath called you...". Jesus spoke of the prophecy from Isaiah (28:14-16) and the Psalms (118:22-24) concerning Himself as the precious chief cornerstone, rejected by the builders, about which Paul and Peter wrote above (Mt. 21:42). Jesus gave this warning at the same time about the continued rejection of Him as that chief cornerstone by those called to build with it: "Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof. And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder." (v. 43-44). The priests and Pharisees wanted to kill Jesus for saying this, because they knew He was speaking of them, but they were afraid to harm Him because the people thought of Jesus as a prophet (v. 45-46). The LORD said that He laid this precious cornerstone, Christ, in Zion, and gave the prophetic Word to Isaiah to be delivered to the scornful, to those who said that they made a covenant with death and hell, who did not fear the "scourge", who have made lies their refuge, and have hidden themselves under falsehood, which we also see today (Isa. 22:14-16). However, this precious chief cornerstone, although rejected by some, caused those who did believe on Him to be changed: "Now therefore, ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God; and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto a holy temple in the Lord: In whom you also are builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit." (Eph. 2:19-22). What can the righteous do? We can be built together by the Spirit, not into any kind of building made by man, but into the building that has Jesus Christ as the cornerstone of its foundation. That living building is the habitation of God. This is also a spiritual building about which, when trouble and pestilence flood the land in judgment, God says: "If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land...For now have I chosen and sanctified this house, that my name may be there forever: and mine eyes and mine heart shall be there perpetually." (2 Chron. 7:12-17). The LORD also instructed Solomon at that time, who had built His house, to be sure to walk as his father, David, walked before God, observing and doing the statutes and judgments of God, which are the Torah and the Prophets. We see the results of a king following the example of his "father", David, when young King Josiah, broke down the places of idolatry in Judah, repaired the house of the LORD, and read all the words of the rediscovered Book of the Covenant before the people: "And the king stood in his place, and made a covenant before the LORD, to walk after the LORD, and his testimonies, and his statutes, with all his heart, and with all his soul, to perform the words of the covenant which are written in this book...And Josiah took away all the abominations...and made all that were present in Israel to serve, even to serve the LORD their God. And all his days they departed not from following the LORD, the God of their fathers." (2 Chron. 34). Along this same line, as we consider what the righteous can and must do when we see this holy foundation come under attack, we must consider the correction of the LORD to His people given through His prophet, Isaiah. This correction came even when God's people thought that they were fasting "righteously" on a day of repentance in accordance with the law of Moses: "Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins. Yet they seek me daily, as a nation that did righteousness...ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite (naka - slay, kill, slaughter, strike, wound, give stripes (whip), beat, hurt) with the fist of wickedness...ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high...wilt thou call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the LORD?" (Isa. 58:1-5). This, on the other hand, is what the LORD is looking for from His people in their repentance and fasting: to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, to let the oppressed go free, to break every yoke, to give bread to the hungry, to house the poor in your own house, to cover the naked, to acknowledge your own flesh, to cease the pointing of the finger and the speaking of vain things. "Then shall thy light break forth as morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the LORD shall be thy rereward (asap - rearguard, to gather in)...thy light shall arise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noonday: and the LORD shall guide thee continually...and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not...thou shalt raise up (qum - to establish, raise up, rouse, endure, stand, to carry out, to give effect to) the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in." (Isa. 58:6-12, excerpt). The righteous can do this, according to the prophecy of Isaiah - raise up the foundations, with Jesus Christ as the chief cornerstone, which was laid by God Himself in Zion, and is precious to God, and to us who believe in Christ. *Based on Dr. Kenneth E. Stevenson's 2/19/23 message to the church. 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