Jesus and the Imprecatory Psalms

 The 'Christo-centric' (RHM) preaching approach is absolutely the only way to preach or make sense of the (many!) imprecatory Psalms and passages in the Psalms. On the one hand, the 'imprecations' are simply cries for justice, and such a passion is surely right. So for example, despite the troubling, shocking ending to Psalm 137, the writer is appealing to simple justice. If any fair-minded observer is asked the question: 'what do the perpetrators deserve?' the answer would be 'the degree of suffering they imposed on others.' [...] If we 'tone down' the cry against injustice as something 'primitive' we cannot appreciate the cross--because there we see that the punishment for such cruelty is exactly what the Psalmist has called for. We see God's 'little one' being dashed to pieces. Yes, the punishment that human injustice and evil deserves is just as bad as the imprecation stated! But what the Psalmist could not see is that when God's Messiah came the first time, he came to bear the judgement on human evil, not mete it out. And the Psalmist could not see that he deserves to be condemned as well for his own life-record. At the Psalmist's 'stage in Redemptive-History' he was stating truth as far as he could see it. But we now have been both humbled by the cross (so we cannot cry for vengeance in the same way) and we have been given enormous hope by the cross. We see that God will do justice in the earth. He is so passionately against it that he experienced it himself so that he could some day end all evil without ending us. This keeps me from having to put myself in his place and become sucked up into the endless cycle of vengeance and retaliation.

  So the Imprecatory Psalms are taken very seriously by the cross--they point to the drastic action God took on the cross. Yet because of the cross, we do not cry for vengeance in the same way. We can seek out justice in society without any blood-lust (or indeed even ill-will).

  In short, there is no way to preach the imprecatory Psalms without pointing to Christ. A non- Christological reading of these Psalms will only lead to Christians being led into an anachronistic 'holy war' mentality.

~from Tim Keller's "Preaching Syllabus" (underlining mine)