Imprecatory Prayer

There's a diary at Daily Kos about a guy I've never heard of, Rev. Wiley Drake, who uses imprecatory prayer to pray for the death of certain individuals, including President Obama.

If you visit that link, there's a radio broadcast with the guy with Alan Colmes, in which he explains some of this. As far as Drake is concerned, what he's doing is just agreeing with God.

Some of the comments at Daily Kos take the viewpoint that God would never want that, and also assume that Drake means God is speaking to him personally.

Whether you like the idea or not, the way I take Drake is this, not that God is speaking to him personally, but that he (Drake) reads various passages out of the Bible, probably the Psalms mostly, and since that is taken as God's word, God is saying what He's saying there. Look through the Psalms, several are labeled by commentators as imprecatory Psalms.

In the Psalms the speaker lambastes his enemies and wishes bad things to happen to them. If this is God's word, and the person praying prays the old prayers as God's will, the hope, on that person's part, is that God will answer the prayer for the death or injury of the person.

Maybe it doesn't sound exactly like Christian love is supposed to sound like, but that's probably the standpoint he's taking. He probably should also listen to the verse that says, "Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap" (Galatians 6:7).