HEBREW WORD STUDY – FOR ALL THE OPPRESSED –  LACAL ‘ASHAQIM לכל עשׁוקימ

 Psalms 103:6: “The LORD executeth righteousness and judgment for all that are oppressed.”

So just how does righteousness and judgment help the oppressed?  If I am oppressed I would just be satisfied that the oppressor gets off my back.  If God wants to administer righteousness and judgment, well He is welcomed to it, but first, just get this oppressor to stop his oppressing.

Perhaps there is a more significant message in this verse than that which first meets the eye.  First what constitutes being oppressed?  I could say that these past few weeks I have been under great oppression from various sources, at least according to my definition of oppression. The word for oppression is ‘ashaq in the Hebrew.  It has the idea of being pressed down, crushed. This often comes from being defrauded or deceived such that you feel this weight of disappointment and sadness. In the Akkadian language, it has the idea of roughness or as we say being roughed up or beaten up.  Akkadian warriors would engage in hand to hand combat during their training with each other and I mean it would be no holds barred.  If they did not come out feeling ‘ashaq beaten up then they would not qualify as a warrior.

Do you ever feel this way, that the enemy has really beat you up, has you on the ground with his foot on your head holding you down?  Righteousness and judgment just do not seem to be important at that moment. But soft, look at what righteousness is.  It is the word tsedaqah. This is a legal term used when the truth of a matter has been proven.

Truth is very important to God for our enemy is a liar, the master of lies and it is his lies that oppress us. Every so often you get that letter from the county – jury duty. Sure our system of justice is not perfect, it is made up of humans after all, and mistakes are made.  Still, the truth is so important in our legal system that it is entrusted not to one but twelve strangers to listen to the evidence and work together to find the truth. It is still a good system, the best in any nation in the world.  But God has the perfect system, he knows the truth and he will make the truth known and the truth shall set you free John 8:32.  The truth is that Jesus died on the cross and that the enemy has no power or hold over us any longer. The truth is that the blood of Jesus will force the enemy to take his foot off your head and free you from the oppression you are under.

The only thing he has is lies.He will tell you whatever lie he can to oppress you and keep you from loving Jesus.You will try to praise or worship God and the enemy will whisper in your ear, “Just who do you think you are trying to praise God? What makes you think God will listen to you and pay attention to you after what you have done?  You’re just fooling yourself, He is not going to hear you, He will not answer your prayer, you are not good enough, you have sinned too much.”   

So you stand there and scratch your head and say: “You know, you’re right.”  Then he will put you under that oppression. Recently I attended a church in the Lawndale area of Chicago, gang drug-infested with the highest crime rate in Chicago. You could feel the oppression of the people in that church for their families, children, and themselves.  The pastor stood in front of that church and pointed his finger to the enemy as said: “Satan, you’re a liar, I will tell you the truth, the blood of Jesus has cleansed every sin, and because of His sacrifice, His blood, we can worship God.”  It felt like a cloud of oppression lifted from the congregation when the Pastor proclaimed that and the people spent the rest of the hour just celebrating the joy of the Lord.  Everyone was filled with the joy of the Lord and expressed it in the way they wanted to express it, they didn’t care if they looked foolish or not,  they were free, the truth, the tsedaqah had set them free and they were free indeed.

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