Psalm 83 reimagined

A song written by Asaph

Creator, you must have something to say! Are you listening? Please make a response, my God.
You must hear the commotion coming from your opponents. Aren’t you aware that they think they cannot be challenged and that they are in revolt?
They are plotting against your followers and are manoeuvring against those closest to you.
“Let us break up those who follow him / her,” they say, “so that no-one talks about him / her again.”
They are all agreed to this, forming an unholy alliance against you and your memory.
In the alliance there are distant relatives, people who once followed you and those we have disagreed with over many years.
There are those who have always opposed us, often confronting us head on, and those who are jealous of our success.
They have been joined by newer groups, who care nothing about truth and justice. Their wish is to dominate and control.

PAUSE

We remember how you protected us in the past. When we were overwhelmed by many people of no faith who tried to humiliate us into abandoning you.
You raised up leaders who strengthened our faith and our opponents became dismayed by their inability to influence events.
When we were bombarded by the powerful arguments of some arrogant and powerful thinkers, you demonstrated the reality of your power and presence.
They would have destroyed our communities who worship the Creator, but it was they who were thrown into confusion.
My Creator break up those who try to oppose you. May their arguments turn on each other and may their alliance breakdown.
May the reality of your presence rock their certainty and ignite their doubts.
Hound them with your love and disarm them with your care.
May they become ashamed of their intellectual arrogance and humbly accept your call of love, Lord.
May everyone who resists your invitation be haunted by their doubts and challenged by your values.
May those who oppose you, understand that only you are the Lord, the Greatest-of-all-Time, the one who sustains the whole universe, both what we see and all that we can’t.