Psalm 78:49
He unleashed His fury against them, wrath, indignation, and calamity--a band of destroying angels.
He unleashed His fury against them
The phrase "He unleashed His fury" indicates a deliberate and powerful action by God. The Hebrew root for "fury" is "aph," which often conveys the idea of a flaring of nostrils, symbolizing intense anger. This expression of divine anger is not arbitrary but a response to persistent disobedience and rebellion. Historically, this reflects God's righteous judgment against the Egyptians during the Exodus, demonstrating His sovereignty and justice.

wrath
The word "wrath" in Hebrew is "evrah," which signifies an overflowing rage. This term emphasizes the intensity and completeness of God's anger. In the biblical context, God's wrath is always just and serves as a corrective measure to bring about repentance and restoration. It is a reminder of the seriousness of sin and the holiness of God.

indignation
"Indignation" comes from the Hebrew "za'am," which conveys a sense of scorn or anger mixed with contempt. This term highlights God's moral outrage against sin and injustice. It is not a capricious anger but a righteous response to the violation of His covenant and the oppression of His people. This indignation serves as a warning to those who persist in their rebellion against God.

and calamity
The word "calamity" is translated from the Hebrew "ra'ah," meaning evil or disaster. In this context, it refers to the consequences of divine judgment. The calamities that befell the Egyptians were not random acts of destruction but purposeful acts of God to demonstrate His power and deliver His people. This serves as a sobering reminder of the consequences of opposing God's will.

a band of destroying angels
The phrase "a band of destroying angels" refers to the agents of God's judgment. In Hebrew, "mal'ak" means messenger or angel, and these beings are often depicted as executing God's will. The "destroying angels" were sent to carry out the plagues upon Egypt, culminating in the death of the firstborn. This highlights the reality of spiritual beings who serve God's purposes, both in protection and in judgment. It underscores the seriousness of divine retribution and the lengths to which God will go to fulfill His promises and protect His covenant people.

Persons / Places / Events
1. God
The central figure in this verse, God is depicted as the one who unleashes His fury. This reflects His role as a just and righteous judge.

2. The Egyptians
The recipients of God's wrath in the context of Psalm 78, which recounts the plagues and judgments God sent upon Egypt to deliver the Israelites.

3. Destroying Angels
These are the agents of God's wrath, sent to execute His judgment. The term "destroying angels" indicates divine messengers tasked with carrying out God's will.

4. Israelites
The people of God who were being delivered from Egyptian bondage, highlighting God's protective and redemptive actions on their behalf.

5. Egypt
The land where the Israelites were enslaved and from which God delivered them through a series of miraculous events, including the plagues.
Teaching Points
God's Righteous Judgment
God's wrath is a response to sin and rebellion. It is important to understand that His judgments are always just and righteous.

The Role of Angels
Angels are powerful beings used by God to accomplish His purposes. They serve as instruments of His will, both in judgment and in protection.

Deliverance and Protection
Just as God delivered the Israelites from Egypt, He delivers us from sin and its consequences through Jesus Christ. We can trust in His protection and provision.

The Seriousness of Sin
The plagues and judgments remind us of the seriousness of sin and the need for repentance. We must not take God's grace for granted.

God's Sovereignty
God is sovereign over all creation, including the spiritual realm. His plans and purposes will be accomplished, and His authority is absolute.
Bible Study Questions
1. How does understanding God's righteous judgment in Psalm 78:49 affect your view of His character?

2. In what ways can the role of angels as described in this verse encourage you in your daily walk with God?

3. How does the deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt parallel the deliverance we receive through Christ?

4. What steps can you take to ensure you are living in a way that honors God's holiness and righteousness?

5. How can the understanding of God's sovereignty and His use of angels in executing His will impact your prayer life and trust in Him?
Connections to Other Scriptures
Exodus 12
This chapter describes the final plague, the death of the firstborn, where God sends a destroying angel to execute judgment on Egypt, sparing the Israelites who followed His instructions.

Hebrews 1:14
This verse speaks of angels as ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation, providing a broader understanding of the role of angels in God's plan.

Revelation 16
The bowls of God's wrath are poured out, showing a future time when God's judgment will again be executed on a global scale, similar to the plagues in Egypt.
Whole Psalm: Warnings Against UnbeliefS. Conway Psalm 78:1-72
People
Asaph, David, Ham, Jacob, Joseph, Psalmist
Places
Jerusalem
Topics
Angels, Anger, Band, Bitter, Burning, Cast, Company, Destroying, Discharge, Disgust, Distress, Evil, Fierce, Fierceness, Forth, Fury, Heat, Hostility, Hot, Indignation, Letting, Loose, Messengers, Mission, Sending, Threw, Trouble, Woes, Wrath
Dictionary of Bible Themes
Psalm 78:49

     4113   angels, agents of judgment
     4829   heat

Psalm 78:41-51

     4843   plague

Library
Memory, Hope, and Effort
'That they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments.'--PSALM lxxviii. 7. In its original application this verse is simply a statement of God's purpose in giving to Israel the Law, and such a history of deliverance. The intention was that all future generations might remember what He had done, and be encouraged by the remembrance to hope in Him for the future; and by both memory and hope, be impelled to the discharge of present duty. So, then, the words
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Turning Back in the Day of Battle
I. We will first consider for a little while WHAT THESE MEN DID. They turned their backs. When the time for fighting came they ought to have shown their fronts. Like bold men they should have kept their face to the foe and their breast against the adversary, but they dishonorably turned their backs and fled. This, I am sorry to say, is not an unusual thing amongst professing Christians. They turn back; they turn back in the day of battle. Some do this at the first appearance of difficulty. "There
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 12: 1866

Limiting God
Among such sins of the first table is that described in our text. It is consequently one of the masterpieces of iniquity, and we shall do well to purge ourselves of it. It is full of evil to ourselves, and is calculated to dishonor both God and man, therefore let us be in earnest to cut it up both root and branch. I think we have all been guilty of this in our measure; and we are not free from it even to this day. Whether we be saints or sinners, we may stand here and make our humble confession that
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 5: 1859

Fifteenth Day for Schools and Colleges
WHAT TO PRAY.--For Schools and Colleges "As for Me, this is My covenant with them, saith the Lord: My Spirit that is upon thee, and My words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed's seed, saith the LoThe future of the Church and the world depends, to an extent we little conceive, on the education of the day. The Church may be seeking to evangelise the heathen, and be giving up her own children to secular
Andrew Murray—The Ministry of Intercession

Fourteenth Day for the Church of the Future
WHAT TO PRAY.--For the Church of the Future "That the children might not be as their fathers, a generation that set not their heart aright, and whose spirit was not steadfast with God."--PS. lxxviii. 8. "I will pour My Spirit upon thy seed, and My blessing upon thy offspring."--ISA. xliv. 3. Pray for the rising generation, who are to come after us. Think of the young men and young women and children of this age, and pray for all the agencies at work among them; that in association and societies
Andrew Murray—The Ministry of Intercession

Centenary Commemoration
OF THE RETURN OF BISHOP SEABURY. 1885 THE RT. REV. SAMUEL SEABURY, D.D. FIRST BISHOP OF CONNECTICUT, HELD HIS FIRST ORDINATION AT MIDDLETOWN, AUGUST 3, 1785. On the ninth day of June, 1885, the Diocesan Convention met in Hartford. Morning Prayer was read in Christ Church at 9 o'clock by the Rev. W. E. Vibbert, D.D., Rector of St. James's Church, Fair Haven, and the Rev. J. E. Heald, Rector of Trinity Church, Tariffville. The Holy Communion was celebrated in St. John's Church, the service beginning
Various—The Sermons And Addresses At The Seabury Centenary

"Thou Shalt Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother. "
From this Commandment we learn that after the excellent works of the first three Commandments there are no better works than to obey and serve all those who are set over us as superiors. For this reason also disobedience is a greater sin than murder, unchastity, theft and dishonesty, and all that these may include. For we can in no better way learn how to distinguish between greater and lesser sins than by noting the order of the Commandments of God, although there are distinctions also within the
Dr. Martin Luther—A Treatise on Good Works

Indiscreet Importunity.
"I gave thee a king in mine anger." HOSEA xiii. 11. "Ye know not what ye ask." MATTHEW xx. 22. PSALM lxxviii. 27-31. That God sometimes suffers men to destroy themselves, giving them their own way, although He knows it is ruinous, and even putting into their hands the scorpion they have mistaken for a fish, is an indubitable and alarming fact. Perhaps no form of ruin covers a man with such shame or sinks him to such hopelessness as when he finds that what he has persistently clamoured for and refused
Marcus Dods—How to become like Christ

The Mystery
Of the Woman dwelling in the Wilderness. The woman delivered of a child, when the dragon was overcome, from thenceforth dwelt in the wilderness, by which is figured the state of the Church, liberated from Pagan tyranny, to the time of the seventh trumpet, and the second Advent of Christ, by the type, not of a latent, invisible, but, as it were, an intermediate condition, like that of the lsraelitish Church journeying in the wilderness, from its departure from Egypt, to its entrance into the land
Joseph Mede—A Key to the Apocalypse

The Second Continental Journey.
1827-28. PART I.--GERMANY. After John and Martha Yeardley had visited their friends at home, their minds were directed to the work which they had left uncompleted on the continent of Europe; and, on their return from the Yearly Meeting, they opened this prospect of service before the assembled church to which they belonged. (Diary) 6 mo. 18.--Were at the Monthly Meeting at Highflatts, where we laid our concern before our friends to revisit some parts of Germany and Switzerland, and to visit
John Yeardley—Memoir and Diary of John Yeardley, Minister of the Gospel

The World's Bread
'And the apostles gathered themselves together unto Jesus, and told Him all things, both what they had done, and what they had taught. 31. And He said unto them, Come ye yourselves apart into a desert place, and rest a while: for there were many coming and going, and they had no leisure so much as to eat. 32. And they departed into a desert place by ship privately. 33. And the people saw them departing, and many knew Him, and ran afoot thither out of all cities, and outwent them, and came together
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Out of the Deep of Loneliness, Failure, and Disappointment.
My heart is smitten down, and withered like grass. I am even as a sparrow that sitteth alone on the housetop--Ps. cii. 4, 6. My lovers and friends hast Thou put away from me, and hid mine acquaintance out of my sight--Ps. lxxviii. 18. I looked on my right hand, and saw there was no man that would know me. I had no place to flee unto, and no man cared for my soul. I cried unto Thee, O Lord, and said, Thou art my Hope. When my spirit was in heaviness, then Thou knewest my path.--Ps. cxlii. 4, 5.
Charles Kingsley—Out of the Deep

The Good Shepherd: a Farewell Sermon
John 10:27-28 -- "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. And I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of my hand." It is a common, and I believe, generally speaking, my dear hearers, a true saying, that bad manners beget good laws. Whether this will hold good in every particular, in respect to the affairs of this world, I am persuaded the observation is very pertinent in respect to the things of another: I mean bad manners,
George Whitefield—Selected Sermons of George Whitefield

Adam and Zaretan, Joshua 3
I suspect a double error in some maps, while they place these two towns in Perea; much more, while they place them at so little a distance. We do not deny, indeed, that the city Adam was in Perea; but Zaretan was not so. Of Adam is mention, Joshua 3:16; where discourse is had of the cutting-off, or cutting in two, the waters of Jordan, that they might afford a passage to Israel; The waters rose up upon a heap afar off in Adam. For the textual reading "In Adam," the marginal hath "From Adam." You
John Lightfoot—From the Talmud and Hebraica

The Eighth Commandment
Thou shalt not steal.' Exod 20: 15. AS the holiness of God sets him against uncleanness, in the command Thou shalt not commit adultery;' so the justice of God sets him against rapine and robbery, in the command, Thou shalt not steal.' The thing forbidden in this commandment, is meddling with another man's property. The civil lawyers define furtum, stealth or theft to be the laying hands unjustly on that which is another's;' the invading another's right. I. The causes of theft. [1] The internal causes
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments

"The Sun of Righteousness"
WE SHOULD FEEL QUITE JUSTIFIED in applying the language of the 19th Psalm to our Lord Jesus Christ from the simple fact that he is so frequently compared to the sun; and especially in the passage which we have given you as our second text, wherein he is called "the Sun of Righteousness." But we have a higher justification for such a reading of the passage, for it will be in your memories that, in the 10th chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, the Apostle Paul, slightly altering the words of this
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 17: 1871

A Jealous God
I. Reverently, let us remember that THE LORD IS EXCEEDINGLY JEALOUS OF HIS DEITY. Our text is coupled with the command--"Thou shalt worship no other God." When the law was thundered from Sinai, the second commandment received force from the divine jealousy--"Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in the heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 9: 1863

Mosaic Cosmogony.
ON the revival of science in the 16th century, some of the earliest conclusions at which philosophers arrived were found to be at variance with popular and long-established belief. The Ptolemaic system of astronomy, which had then full possession of the minds of men, contemplated the whole visible universe from the earth as the immovable centre of things. Copernicus changed the point of view, and placing the beholder in the sun, at once reduced the earth to an inconspicuous globule, a merely subordinate
Frederick Temple—Essays and Reviews: The Education of the World

Privilege and Experience
"And he said unto him, Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine." --Luke 15:31. The words of the text are familiar to us all. The elder son had complained and said, that though his father had made a feast, and had killed the fatted calf for the prodigal son, he had never given him even a kid that he might make merry with his friends. The answer of the father was: "Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine." One cannot have a more wonderful revelation of the heart of
Andrew Murray—The Deeper Christian Life

Stones Crying Out
'For the priests which bare the ark stood in the midst of Jordan, until every thing was finished that the Lord commanded Joshua to speak unto the people, according to all that Moses commanded Joshua: and the people hasted and passed over. 11. And it came to pass, when all the people were clean passed over, that the ark of the Lord passed over, and the priests, in the presence of the people. 12. And the children of Reuben, and the children of Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh, passed over armed
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Deaf Stammerer Healed and Four Thousand Fed.
^A Matt. XV. 30-39; ^B Mark VII. 32-VIII. 9. ^b 32 And they bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech [The man had evidently learned to speak before he lost his hearing. Some think that defective hearing had caused the impediment in his speech, but verse 35 suggests that he was tongue-tied]; and they beseech him to put his hand upon him. 33 And he took him aside from the multitude privately, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat, and touched his tongue [He separated
J. W. McGarvey—The Four-Fold Gospel

Purity and Peace in the Present Lord
PHILIPPIANS iv. 1-9 Euodia and Syntyche--Conditions to unanimity--Great uses of small occasions--Connexion to the paragraphs--The fortress and the sentinel--A golden chain of truths--Joy in the Lord--Yieldingness--Prayer in everything--Activities of a heart at rest Ver. 1. +So, my brethren beloved and longed for+, missed indeed, at this long distance from you, +my joy and crown+ of victory (stephanos), +thus+, as having such certainties and such aims, with such a Saviour, and looking for such
Handley C. G. Moule—Philippian Studies

The Baptismal Covenant Can be Kept Unbroken. Aim and Responsibility of Parents.
We have gone "to the Law and to the Testimony" to find out what the nature and benefits of Baptism are. We have gathered out of the Word all the principal passages bearing on this subject. We have grouped them together, and studied them side by side. We have noticed that their sense is uniform, clear, and strong. Unless we are willing to throw aside all sound principles of interpretation, we can extract from the words of inspiration only one meaning, and that is that the baptized child is, by virtue
G. H. Gerberding—The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church

An Exhortation to Love God
1. An exhortation. Let me earnestly persuade all who bear the name of Christians to become lovers of God. "O love the Lord, all ye his saints" (Psalm xxxi. 23). There are but few that love God: many give Him hypocritical kisses, but few love Him. It is not so easy to love God as most imagine. The affection of love is natural, but the grace is not. Men are by nature haters of God (Rom. i. 30). The wicked would flee from God; they would neither be under His rules, nor within His reach. They fear God,
Thomas Watson—A Divine Cordial

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