“The Fool Says, ‘There is No God’”
Readings: Psalm 14:1-7 (text); Romans 3:10-12; Heidelberg Catechism LD 3
June 21, 2015 • Download this sermon (PDF)
Dear Congregation of Christ: Most of us are familiar with the story of David, Nabal and Abigail in 1 Samuel 25. David fled to Carmel with his 600 loyal men from King Saul’s jealous rage. In Carmel, there was a wealthy man named Nabal with several thousand sheep and goats. During the sheepshearing feast, David sent ten of his men to Nabal to ask for a share of the food and water. David expected Nabal to be generous to his men since they have guarded his flock while they stayed there. But Nabal, being greedy and arrogant, refused him, saying with sarcasm, “Shall I take my bread and my water and my meat that I have killed for my shearers and give it to men who come from I do not know where?” (v 11).
David was furious at Nabal for refusing to help, and ordered all his men to kill Nabal and his whole household. When Abigail, Nabal’s wife, learned of David’s plan, she intervened by sending food and drink to David without her husband’s knowledge. So David was appeased. When Abigail told him that she helped David, Nabal was heartbroken and he died ten days later. Eventually, David took Abigail as his wife.
The irony in this story is in the name of Nabal, which means “fool.” Maybe his name only sounded like Nabal, for what father would name his son a “fool”? But when Abigail spoke to David, she said that Nabal was “a worthless fellow,” adding, “Nabal is his name, and folly is with him” (v 25). But is Nabal the only fool in the story? He wasn’t, for David, “a man after God’s heart,” acted foolishly and rashly as well, planning a massacre without even consulting God. In this incident, the Elvis Presley song, “Wise men say, only fools rush in,” applies to David.
But David also wrote our text, Psalm 14, that begins with a condemnation of the “fool,” “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’” He had some foolish moments in his life, but ultimately, he had wisdom in writing his psalms. In verses 1-6a, he laments that foolish and evil people persecute God’s people. Then in verses 6b-7, he praises the wise, godly people of God. Finally, David trusts that God would restore his people whom the foolish treat with cruelty.
Our theme today, then, is “The Fool Says, ‘There is No God’”: first, The Godless Who Have Become Corrupt;second, The Wise Who Take Refuge in God; and third, God’s Wise Plans for Both.
The Godless Who Have Become Corrupt
David tells us that a person who denies the existence of God is a “fool” (Heb nabal). So who is a “fool”? Isaiah 32:6-7 has a definition:
For the fool speaks folly, and his heart is busy with iniquity, to practice ungodliness, to utter error concerning the Lord, to leave the craving of the hungry unsatisfied, and to deprive the thirsty of drink. As for the scoundrel—his devices are evil; he plans wicked schemes to ruin the poor with lying words, even when the plea of the needy is right.
According to Isaiah, the fool is not only a fool in his words. He is a fool because “his heart is busy with iniquity” and he “practices ungodliness.” Like Nabal, he is greedy, and full of “wicked schemes to ruin the poor with lying words.” He speaks errors about God, believing in his own foolish wisdom. The Bible speaks of fools as wicked men doing “outrageous,” immoral deeds (Gen 34:7; Jgs 20:6; 2 Sam 13:12). A synonym for “fool” is also translated as “boastful” (Psa 5:5) and “arrogant” (Psa 73:3; 75:4). So a fool puts his godless thoughts and words into actions.
The New Testament also uses many words which means “fool” or “foolishness.”Jesus condemned the Pharisees as “blind fools” (Matt 23:17). Paul rebukes a person who doesn’t believe in physical resurrection, “You foolish person!” (1 Cor 15:36) Paul also says that all humanity know in their very being that God exists, for it is built into the human mind at creation. We’re all created in the image of God with holiness, righteousness, and a knowledge of God, although sin corrupted such image. God’s law is “written on their hearts,” whether they obey it or not (Rom 2:14-15). So Paul condemns them as foolish idolaters:
For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things (Rom 1:21-23).
Are all fools who deny or reject God idolaters? Certainly! Even if they do not worship carved idols, they worship something else other than God. Their priorities and behavior do not account for God as Creator, Redeemer and Judge. Are they all abominable and corrupt? Certainly! Their motives and thoughts, if not their actions, belie their good works. And before God’s face, their good works count as “filthy rags.”
This is why Paul writes in Romans 1,
“And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done… Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them” (Rom 1:28, 32).
The ungodly know God’s righteous laws. They know that abortion is murder. They know that sexual immorality is sin. They know that same-sex marriage is sin. They know that God is the Creator and King of the universe, but they do not want to be accountable and to submit to his rule. They instead believe in a myth called evolution. Those who believe that God used evolution to create human beings destroy Paul’s teaching that there is a literal, historical First Adam, and a literal, historical Second Adam, even Jesus Christ. Without this historical First Adam whose sin plunged the whole humanity into sin, there would be no need for a Second Adam who saves us from sin (Rom 5:12-21).
So corrupt are the godless that they are “abominable,” that is, they are extremely offensive to a holy, righteous God. What things are “abominable” to God? Some of the most commonly mentioned ones are pagan idol worship (Deu 7:25, 26), inquiring of spirits, sorcery, and fortune telling (Deu 18:9-14), and eating unclean animals (Deu 14:3). In Proverbs, lying (12:22), pride (16:5), and the sacrifice and prayer of the wicked (15:8; 28:9) are all abominable to God. In fact, all sins are abominable to God (15:9)!
With regards to sexual sins, it should be mentioned that homosexuality is also called an abomination, “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination” (Lev 18:22; 20:13). One interesting incident in the book of Judges is that of a man and his concubine who lodged for the night in a house of an old man in Gibeah. But the men of the city came to the house demanding, “Bring out the man who came into your house, that we may know him” (Jgs 19:22). What do these words remind you of? The men of Sodom who demanded of Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us, that we may know them” (Gen 19:5). The Bible calls the men of Gibeah the same name that Abigail used for Nabal, “sons of worthlessness,” which is translated also as “fools.” Therefore, God regards homosexuality as an abominable foolishness practiced by worthless men. In fact, in the New Testament, the Hebrew word for “worthlessness,” belial, became a proper name for Satan, the source of all wickedness (2 Cor 6:15).
Just as during Noah’s time, the Lord saw the great wickedness of man, concluding, “every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen 6:5). In the same way, David says in verses 2-3 that God surveys the whole earth and sees that all human beings have no understanding of him, and no one seeks after him. Then he emphatically says, “There is none who does good, not even one.” Paul uses these verses to teach that all, whether Jews or Gentiles, are under sin and are all “worthless” in God’s sight (Rom 3:10-12). He also says that according to all unbelievers, the things of God are offensive and foolish (1 Cor 2:14-15). What a contradiction of the popular belief that it is up to man’s “free will” to seek God and believe!
Sinful humanity not only do not seek and understand God on their own will, but they also oppose God’s people. David says evildoers “eat up my people as they eat bread” (v 4). According to Micah 3:1-3, those who reject God and his Son Jesus Christ are like cannibals who tear, flay, break, chop, cook and eat God’s people. Today, we see many of these utterly wicked people doing exactly the same cruel things to Christians in the Middle East and Africa. Persecution and martyrdom are the lot of many of our brothers and sisters in Christ in those lands. Let us always remember them in our prayers.
The Wise Who Take Refuge in God
But we see our persecuted brothers and sisters in these lands stand firm in the face of such horrible enemies. How are they able to be so faithful? It is because “God is with the generation of the righteous” and “the Lord is [their] refuge” (v 5-6).
Who is this generation of the righteous? David describes them in Psalm 24, “Such is the generation of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob” (v 6). In contrast to evildoers who do not call upon the Lord, the righteous seek after God. They have clean hands, innocent of crimes against their neighbor. They have pure hearts without selfish motivations before God and man. They do not lie to deceive others. Therefore, they “receive blessing from the Lord and righteousness from the God of his salvation” (v 4-5). They are blessed with salvation that comes from the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord.
Such are God’s steadfast people. Therefore, in the face of unrelenting persecution and martyrdom, God is their Refuge, Strength and Help. They depend on the Lord Jesus Christ alone, not on their undependable leaders, not even on the might of armies and weapons of war. Therefore, they can sing with joy with the psalmists for their comfort, “For you have been my refuge, a strong tower against the enemy” (Psa 61:3); and “On God rests my salvation and my glory; my mighty rock, my refuge is God” (Psalm 62:7). May this be our song as well!
God’s Wise Plans for Both
But when these evildoers see that God is the Refuge, Strength and Help of his people, they will be “in great terror.” Even in their rejection of God, they know that God is the Almighty, All-Knowing, Sovereign King and Judge of the universe. So instead of fearing God, repenting of their sins, and calling upon the name of the Lord, they are in terrible dread of him. Instead of helping the poor in body and soul, they oppress the needy with their greedy schemes. Psalm 14 is almost identical to Psalm 53, except for verses 5 and 6. In Psalm 53:5, God has a more terrible plan for the wicked: he will scatter their bones in the battlefield. This terror on Judgment Day is described by Isaiah and the Apostle John, “And people shall enter the caves of the rocks and the holes of the ground, from before the terror of the Lord” (Isa 2:19), and then they will call on the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb” (Rev 6:15). Let us pray that God will exact his just vengeance against unrepentant evildoers on Judgment Day.
In contrast, the Lord helps the materially poor through the household of God, and the spiritually poor through God’s Word and Spirit. Though they may suffer for a little while in this evil age, God would restore them. Zion, the city of our God, the church on earth and in heaven, will finally experience the completion of their salvation. There will be no more evildoers, persecution, suffering and death.
But it is not only Israel’s Jacob whom God will save. Believers from all over the earth will worship in Zion. It is truly amazing grace when Ezekiel 16:23 prophesies that even wicked Sodom and the hated Samaritans will be restored by God, “I will restore their fortunes, both the fortunes of Sodom and her daughters, and the fortunes of Samaria and her daughters, and I will restore your own fortunes in their midst.”
Consider this with awe: in that heavenly city, you, together with all believers—Jews, Americans, Asians, Hispanics, Africans, Europeans, including those from Sodom, all sinners who repent of their sin—will sing with joy and gladness psalms of praise and thanksgiving to the God of our salvation:
Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise,
In light inaccessible hid from our eyes,
Most blessed, most glorious, the Ancient of Days,
Almighty, victorious, Thy great name we praise!
