Please read Psalm 74 (23 verses)

The Lord seems to have cast off His people and allowed the desecration of His holy sanctuary. Mount Zion has become an everlasting ruin! The enemy has brought destruction and have roared and raved in the places of the holiness of God. The ungodly have behaved like vandals, smashing and destroying the fabric of the temple and burning every place where God is worshipped in the land. The enemy has deliberately ruined all the places of the godly and all outward remembrances of the Lord. Their wanton acts of vandalism have destroyed the land and the precious things that are valued by the people of God. They have breathed out threat and slaughter towards the people of God, and God seems to have rejected His holy nation.

No prophets are left and the voice of the Lord is no longer heard in the land. God has withheld His hand of judgment on evil and now it is rampant. Only God can bring salvation on the earth, but for now, evil has stirred and is trashing all the holy things in sight.

The psalmist is in no doubt as to the power of God to save, but wonders at His reluctance to intervene. God has power over the mighty waters of sea and river and the huge beasts that frolic there. Day and night, the seasons, the sun and moon belong to the Lord, and He orders the natural rhythms of the whole world and universe. The writer asks the Lord to remember the wickedness of the wicked and to not forget His people, who He has delivered in the past. He reminds the Lord to not forget His covenant promises, that God will not leave His people or forsake them. The clamour of the foes continually rise to heaven and their violence fills the dark earth. The plea of the psalmist to know the full deliverance of the Lord rises to the skies. This Psalm is his petition and prayer. He asks God to rise up and defend His name.