Part 30: The Blessings Of Being Close To God Series

Great Prayers of the Old Testament

Part 30: The Blessings of Being Close to God

Psalm 91:1-16

Sermon by Rick Crandall

(Grayson Baptist Church - August 27,2017)

(Revised August 18, 2025)

BACKGROUND:

*James 4:8 makes a great promise to us when it says, "Draw near to God and He will draw near to you." And when we draw closer to God, He will bless us in amazing ways. Psalm 91 shows us some of those ways.

*John Phillips called this Psalm "The Hiding Place," and said that "We do not know who wrote it. Was it Moses, David, Hezekiah, Nathan the seer, or Isaiah the prophet? It was clearly intended to be a bookend to Psalm 90, the great "Prayer of Moses the man of God." Perhaps someone read that great wilderness song, and decided that it needed a partner to stand beside it in the Hebrew songbook.

*So, we approach this psalm with the knowledge that the human authorship is unknown, but we are equally sure that God wrote it. We know it contains truth that can work in our lives today. And we call this Psalm "The Hiding Place," for it is a good place to run when danger or disease come our way. (1)

*James Hastings called this the Psalm of "God's inner circle." And he wrote that "for every advance on man's part, there is an immediate and corresponding advance on God's part. When man goes out to seek God, God meets him more than half way. When he calls upon God, God will answer him. Loving faith on man's part will be met by faithful love on the part of God." (2)

MESSAGE:

*Christian author, William MacDonald had a remarkable testimony about this Psalm: He began by saying: "Psalm 91 is my Psalm. In 1922, in the Western Hebrides, a five-year-old lad was dying of diphtheria. A mucous membrane was forming across his throat, and breathing was becoming increasingly difficult. His Christian mother turned her back so she would not see him take his last breath.

*At that very moment, there was a knock at the door. It was her brother-in-law from an adjoining village. He said, 'I've just come to tell you that you don't have to worry about the child. He is going to recover, and one day God is going to save his soul.' She was distracted and skeptical. 'Whatever makes you say that?' Then he explained he had been sitting at his fire reading Psalm 91 when God distinctly spoke to him through the last three verses. And here they are from 'The Scottish Psalms:'

14. 'Because on me he set his love,

I'll save and set him free;

Because my great name he hath known,

I will set him on high.

15. He'll call on me, I'll answer him;

I will be with him still,

In trouble to deliver him,

And honor him I will.

16. With length of days unto his mind

I will him satisfy;

I also my salvation

Will cause his eyes to see.'"

*Then Willian MacDonald wrote, "I was that boy. God delivered me from death that night. He saved my soul thirteen years later, and He has satisfied me with long life. So you will understand why I refer to Psalm 91 as my Psalm. I usually add, with tongue in cheek, that I am willing to share it with others. But it is definitely my Psalm!

*Most theologians don't agree with me at all. They say that this is a Psalm about our Savior. And of course they are right. Its primary interpretation concerns our wonderful Lord Jesus Christ. And we are going to study it from that perspective. But remember that in a lesser way, we can take part in its precious promises: 'All the rivers of Thy grace, I claim; Over every promise write my name.'" (3)

*Christians: We can claim this Psalm as ours today, because God has promised to bless us in special ways when we draw close to Him.

1. FIRST: WHEN WE DRAW CLOSE TO GOD, HE WILL MOVE US TO THE ULTIMATE PLACE.

*The Psalmist describes this place in vs. 1. "He who dwells (that is, he who remains, sits down, or lives) in the secret place of the Most High Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty." The best possible place we can ever be is "the place of the Most High God."

[1] NOTICE THAT IT IS A SECRET PLACE.

*God has secrets. That's easy to understand, because God knows all the mysteries in the universe. God has secrets. But the great news is that God loves to reveal his secrets to those who seek His face! And God's place is secret right now because the world cannot see it in a physical way.