A Strong Refuge Is Our God

Proverbs 18:10 “The name of the Lord is a fortified tower; the righteous run to it and are safe”

Scripture: Psalm 46:1-3 “God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging.”

I would like to take a quick poll. Raise your hand if you do not lock your doors at night. When Nikki and I moved to Pennsylvania the realtor who sold us our home claimed that the area was so safe that folks around there didn’t have to lock their doors at night. Maybe it was the fact that he was a salesman but somehow I just couldn’t bring myself to believe that was true. Yes most of us lock our doors at night. And when we get into a car we buckle our seat belts. My wife has a little trouble with that one. Most of us place our money into the bank rather than hiding it under the mattress. And if we have surgery we want someone to come and pray over us before we are rolled into the operating room.

Because we believe that locking our door at night makes us safe. Buckling our seatbelt makes us safe. Seeking God’s blessing brings a sense of safety and security into our lives. We do all of these things and many, many more because safety is important to us. We want our children to be safe. We want our spouses to be safe. We want our homes to be safe. We want our country to be safe. And the truth is not only do you desire safety and security for your family God wants us to be safe as well. We know this because within the pages of our Bible we find God continually expressing the fact that He wants his children to be safe. He points us toward safety. He leads us toward safety. He provides for our safety. He yearns for our safety. He died for our safety. It’s true. He died for our safety.

Do you know what the opposite of safe is? No, it’s not unsafe because that would be too easy. The opposite of safe is vulnerable, dangerous, harmful or unprotected. And in spite of the fact that God wants us to be safe there are millions within this world Christians included who continue to place themselves in dangerous situations, vulnerable and subject to harm; without the protection, peace or security God yearns to provide. We hold tightly to the things of this world and loosely to that of our God. We place our trust in the physical and turn a cold shoulder to the spiritual.

BIBLICAL DEFINITION TIME: Trust – Beyond that of faith, BIBLICAL trust has a broader perspective within the Bible; one that speaks of our assured reliance on the strength, ability, wisdom, and truth of God above and beyond anything else (Faith – concept, theory, idea,).

CHECK THIS OUT: In Proverbs 3:5 Solomon writes: “Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.” There it is; the battle for control. Do we lean on God or rely on self? I don’t know about you friend but more times than not relying on my self has led to complete and utter failure.

- According to scripture it is the Lord in whom we are to trust, not ourselves; certainly not the world’s wisdom or devices.

- According to scripture we trust in the Lord because He and He alone is trustworthy.

- According to scripture we are to trust Him with all our hearts, committing every aspect of our lives to Him.

- According to scripture we are not to trust in ourselves because our understanding is temporal, finite, and tainted by our sinful nature.

Earlier this year as Nikki and I were flying home from Boston our plane flew through a bit of turbulence and as it did I reached out and grabbed Nikki’s arm. I wanted her to feel safe. Thousands of feet above the ground; subject to the wind, the weather, the mechanics of this flying machine, and the skill of an unknown pilot I wanted her to feel that she was safe and so I grabbed her arm. And that’s a good thing; that we would want to bring comfort to one another in our time of stress and anxiety is a good thing. But as much as I want to be the one to make her feel safe, God’s Word teaches us that our safety in this world will not be determined by how tightly we hold to our spouse, our children, our job, or our possessions. What the Word of God is teaching us is that our safety will be determined by how tightly we hold onto Jesus and how loosely we hold the world.