Why Do the Mean People Win?

There was a man named Asaph,
who wrote songs for God's own house.

One day Asaph looked around,
and his heart went sour inside him.

He watched the man who shoves to the front,
the man who lies and laughs,
the man who grabs the biggest piece
and never says sorry,
and nothing bad happens to him at all.

The proud ones, the cruel ones,
had full plates and easy days.
They slept soft. They woke up smiling.
They did wrong, and the wrong cost them nothing.

"I tried so hard to be good," Asaph said.
"I kept my hands clean,
I washed my heart every single morning.
And for what?
The mean people win.
Maybe being good is for nothing at all."

Maybe you have felt that hot, unfair sting,
when the bully gets the prize
and you are left with empty hands.

Asaph almost slipped.
His feet were sliding off the edge of trusting God.
One more step, and he would have fallen.

Then Asaph went into God's house.
He came close. He stopped talking.
He stopped looking sideways at the mean people,
and he looked up.

And there God showed him
how the story ends.

The loud and the cruel
were not standing on solid ground at all.
They were standing on a slippery place,
like a dream that slips away the moment you wake.
Here for a morning. Gone by night.
All that winning would not last.

And Asaph, who felt like he had nothing,
saw what he truly had.

"God," he whispered, "I am still with you.
You are holding my hand.
You will not let me go."

Whatever the mean people grabbed,
they could not grab the one thing that mattered.
Their arms were stuffed with things that would not last.
Asaph was holding on to God himself.

"Who is there for me in all of heaven but you?" he sang.
"There is nothing on all the earth I want more than you.
My heart may grow weak. My hands may grow tired.
But you are mine, and you stay.
You are the strength of my heart,
my treasure that lasts forever."

Little one, the unfairness you feel is real.
God is not pretending it away.
He sees it, and he is making you a promise.

There is a day coming,
a real day with a real morning,
when the One who loves you will stand up
and set every crooked thing straight.
Every bully answered. Every hurt mended.
Every empty hand of every good and tired child
filled all the way up.

And the prize at the end
will not be a bigger piece of anything,
but Jesus himself,
yours, and never taken away.

Asaph could feel that day coming, far off,
like sunrise still hidden behind a hill.
The light had not climbed over yet.
But the birds were already singing,
the way birds do
when they know the morning is near.