Our Rescuer - Psalm 91

                           

Psalm 91 is a favourite of many people; it’s a psalm of confidence in the Lord and his ability to rescue us from whatever’s going on in our lives. What fascinates me about this psalm is how Satan uses it against Jesus when tempting Jesus in the wilderness to do God’s plan his way instead of God’s more difficult and painful way. However, Satan twists the verses slightly, missing the meaning completely, reminding us to be careful about reading the Bible in context.

This psalm was likely written by a priest or Levite in the temple to provide reassurance to the people of God. The psalm is written in 2 parts of 8 verses each where the second 8 verses echo the first 8 verses, amplifying the themes in the psalm. The psalmist begins with the confident declaration, “Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most-High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” This is amplified in verses 9 and 10, “If you say, “The Lord is my refuge,” and you make the Most-High your dwelling, no harm will overtake you, no disaster will come near your tent.” A few weeks ago, we reflected on Psalm 8, a “Wow!” psalm showing us the magnificence of God, Psalm 91 is another of those “Wow!” psalms, as we get a glimpse of who God is, what kind of God he is.

The psalmist shows us who God is and how he relates to his people. God’s a safe place, a safe person you can go to in order to find protection or rest. In Hebrew the word for shelter holds the sense of hiding place or covering, a place where you can go when you’re seeking somewhere your enemies cannot find you. The psalmist uses the image of a bird, likely a dove, as a place of safety and protection. Doves, both the males and females, take turns sitting on the nest to hatch the eggs and when the eggs hatch, both will take turns finding food and feeding the chicks, with one of the parents always staying behind to watch over the chicks. Since the chicks have no feathers, the parents take turns covering them with their feathers. The doves’ faithfulness in protecting and providing for their young is the image the psalmist gives us here of God’s faithfulness and protection, our shield and rampart.

These are images of belonging which gets picked up in verses 9 and 10 where the Most-High, El Elyon, the sovereign God of power, is our refuge. This is magnified by the Psalmist’s use of the name Shaddai for God in verse 1, the Almighty, a God of authority. In using these two names of God so closely together, the psalmist is reminding us that we don’t need to fear what life holds. God is sovereign, in control of all things, creator of all things, almighty, more powerful than anything life can hold, whether enemies, disease, or brokenness. The call is to trust, yet such a powerful God can seem too powerful to approach, so the psalmist also reminds us of another name of God. In verse 9 we find the name Yahweh, the Lord, the personal name of God, given to Moses at the burning bush; the eternal God. Yahweh is our refuge, reminding us of the personal relationship between the Lord and his people; we’re part of his household, part of the family. A reminder that the Thanksgiving week devotional leads us through several names of God, giving thanks for who God is.

Your tent is an image of safety and belonging; the personal nature of God’s relationship with us as part of his family. The psalmist identifies 4 terrors the Lord will keep us safe from, “the fowler’s snare, deadly pestilence, the terror of the night, and the arrow that flies by day.” The fowler’s snare are those unseen or unnoticed traps in life that can catch us by surprise. Many of our sins often fall into this area. We don’t start off deciding to deliberately sin or disobey God, and yet suddenly the realization strikes us that we’re caught in sin again. A few years back, we had a small men’s group that would get together every couple of weeks to support and encourage each other as husbands, and fathers. At one meeting the topic of smart phones came up. One man shared, “I start off looking for tools or sports scores, and then suddenly I realize I’ve started searching for sexual images and other inappropriate sites. That wasn’t my intention, but I end up there anyway.” These snares are so easy to get trapped in. Our snares may be different, but we all have snares that we tend to fall into.

There’s pestilence like locusts or insects that can devastate crops or livelihood, there are plagues and disease, things we still see today around the world, in spite of all the advances in medicine. There are the arrows that fly by day from enemies; there’s the terror of the night, all the fears and worries that seem to get bigger and heavier as we lay in our beds at night, taking us down paths where the world and life is dark, hope is faint, and fear is strong. These can paralyze some of us in the dark of night. Yet the psalmist begins with, “Surely he will save you…. You will not fear…,” and yet we do often fear.

Scott Hoezee writes, “The main message of Psalm 91 is not “Times are bad” but instead “Times are bad but for that very reason your confidence in God needs to be stronger than ever!”  The threats around us make people nervous, uncertain, afraid, and cynical.  Psalm 91 conveys a counter-message: the poet who composed these words wants to tell us that instead of letting the wider world determine how we feel, we need to let our ultimate confidence in God become the lens through which we view the wider world. God, not current events, is what shapes our viewpoints, informs our hopes, and brings us a confidence that avoids cynicism.” Psalm 91 gives us the confidence that when there are snares, pestilence, terrors, and plagues, even when we’ve gotten snared, we can come to Yahweh, our El Elyon and Shaddai and the safety of his arms. He greets us as our father, with a hug. When we make God our refuge and fortress, he accepts us, never abandons us.

This confidence comes through in verses 11 and 12, “For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.” He goes on, “You will tread on the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent.” Four powerful and frightening beasts you might encounter on the path or in the wilderness, echoing the 4 threats in the first half of the psalm. Confidently, the psalmist declares that we don’t need to fear because God sends angels to protect us. This verse has led many to believe that we have guardian angels watching over us. Our strongest confidence is knowing that Jesus is our rescuer and crunches the head of the serpent under his feet on the cross!

Yet we need to make sure that we don’t misinterpret Scripture. Satan uses these verses to tempt Jesus to throw himself off the top of the temple to prove to the people that he’s the Son of God, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down for it is written: He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.” Wesleyan pastor Danny Quanstrom writes, “Satan omits the very important “in all your ways” when he tempts Jesus to throw himself down from the heights, thus turning a confession of trust in God to determine which ways are his ways into an attempt to force God’s hand in meeting our demands at the moment.” It’s important to not twist Scripture for our own agenda, this is why, in the Reformed tradition, we emphasize Scripture interpreting Scripture.

 We trust in God’s protection, “Because he loves me, I will rescue him, I will protect him… I will deliver and honour him.” We might not find healing, but he will give us ways forward, people to walk with us, give us strength, point us to Yahweh, to El Shaddai, to El Elyon who never abandons us, gives up on us.

Yahweh, ends with, “With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation.” In the ancient Near East old people are held in honour. Old age is seen as a sign of divine favour for fearing the Lord and keeping his commands, helping us see why Jesus is identified with the ‘Ancient of Days’ in Daniel. Older men are expected to lead as elders; expected to have grown in wisdom through their life journey, learning confidence in the Lord in good and difficult times and sharing their faith and wisdom with younger generations.

Psalm 91 reminds us that our God is sovereign, almighty, and desires a personal relationship with us, “Wow!” It doesn’t promise us that there won’t be pain or struggle, but it promises that we can turn to God and he won’t turn us away, he’s there with us, giving us what we need to make it through, reminding us he’s always faithful to us.