We are going to look at Psalm 46 for a few weeks, a majestic Psalm, which was written to be sung, in fact, many Christian hymns in history have been based on this Psalm. It is one of nine Psalms/ Songs of Zion, the place where God reigns and rules. The Psalm is divided into three stanzas, with breaks after verse 3 and after 7. This Psalm was written around 890BC but it is extremely fitting for us today as we will see. Look at it with me:
1 “God is our refuge and strength, A very present help in trouble. 2 Therefore we will not fear, even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; 3 Though its waters roar and be troubled, Though the mountains shake with its swelling.” Selah
4 “There is a river whose streams shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacle of the Most High. 5 God is in the midst of her, she shall not be moved; God shall help her, just at the break of dawn. 6 The nations raged, the kingdoms were moved; He uttered His voice, the earth melted. 7 The Lord of hosts is with us; The God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah
8 Come, behold the works of the Lord, who has made desolations in the earth. 9 He makes wars cease to the end of the earth; He breaks the bow and cuts the spear in two; He burns the chariot in the fire. 10 Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth! 11 The Lord of hosts is with us; The God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah
In 1526, the Bubonic plague which had invaded Europe 200 years before, killing around 60% of its citizens, now returned to Europe, and the plague came to a small university town called, Wittenberg, Germany, where many of its population were told to “get out of town to save your life.” Many students and professors did exactly that, but one famous professor and former monk decided to stay and minister to those who were sick and dying. His name was Martin Luther, who nine years earlier on Halloween eve of 1517 had nailed his 95 Theses to the church door at Wittenberg, accusing the Roman Catholic organization of many heresies. He had narrowly and mercifully escaped death by execution after a trial.
Luther had been excommunicated from the church instead of being executed by the church, and now he and his wife, Katarina, found themselves in the middle of another battle, the Bubonic Plague; He and his wife opened up their own home as an infirmary for the sick, suffering, and dying. The disease almost took the life of his youngest son, his wife was pregnant, and Martin Luther, on once occasion, fainted and had to be put to bed, himself. In August of 1527, he wrote a hymn based on Psalm 46, which would become one of the most famous hymns in the Church, even today:
“A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing;
Our helper He, amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing:
For still our ancient foe doth seek to work us woe;
His craft and power are great, and, armed with cruel hate.
On earth is not his equal.”
“God is our refuge and strength.”
Look at the first phrase of the first verse with me: “God is our refuge and strength.” The Bible declares there is only One true God; the word used here is to describe Him is the word, Elohim. It is the plural word for God used in the first verse of Genesis: “In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth.” The word in the Bible denotes the Majesty and Glory of the One Supreme God. He is Almighty, He is All-Powerful. Immediately in Genesis 1:2 we see the Spirit of God, hovering over the face of the waters. Then in Genesis 1:3 God speaks and says, “Let there be light and there was light.” Remember John 1:1, where Jesus is described as, “In the beginning was the Word.”
So, Elohim is the one True God who existed before the beginning of Creation; He is the Creator God who acts powerfully, He exists personally, He is Spirit, and He also speaks. We know God to be the Father, Son and Spirit, even has He has created all things.
This God of Genesis 1 is the Supreme Only True God of Psalm 46, and the statement in Psalm 46:1, “God is our refuge and strength”, is a declaration of faith, a statement of personal and unfailing confidence in this Eternal Omnipotent God: This God, the Creator of everything we see and have, the God of billions of stars and infinite power and knowledge, the eternal God who created was before all things, is the same God who is our Refuge and Strength.
The statement that “God is our Refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” That “help” comes to me in two different ways: It comes to you and me externally: God is my REFUGE. As a verb, this word means “to flee”, but in the noun form it means, “a fortress”. In the Eternal God I find my fortress; I find an absolutely safe and well-guarded shelter. I don’t my shelter in the armed forces, or in government. I don’t find my safety in a castle or in a bomb shelter. (Remember the cold war. Some people in my neighborhood had them. We sort of did too.) Our shelter is in the Lord God Almighty. He is the one to whom I can always run for security.
Psalm 18:2 says: “The LORD is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, My God, my rock, in whom I take refuge; My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. No harm can come to me.”
Many times, God is the source of external preservation and protection. He is a shield for us from danger, as in Psalm 91:7-8: “A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand; But it shall not come near you. 8 Only with your eyes shall you look, and see the reward of the wicked.” At other times we may be afflicted and do experience suffering; then we find that God is still our helper as He doesn’t totally deliver us from but through the danger and suffering. He is our VERY PRESENT HELP IN TROUBLE.
Not only does God provide refuge externally, but He also provides strength internally. He gives me strength on the inside. How does God provide inner strength? Well, if you know Jesus as Messiah, that is if you know Him as your Savior, you know the very presence and strength of the Lord’s Spirit in you.
Isaiah 40:29-31 teaches us: “29 He gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might He increases strength. 30 Even the youths shall faint and be weary, And the young men shall utterly fall, 31 But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint.” As we call upon the Lord, our strength is always renewed. We may become weak, but God is never weak; He is omnipotent, which is to say, He is all-powerful.
“A very present help”
That God is, as the next phrase says, “A very present help in trouble”, means that God isn’t sort-of present, or halfway here and halfway distracted or distant by something going on somewhere else. We never have to concern ourselves about calling on Him and getting a busy signal, or an “I can’t talk now” message like on our phones. He is never distracted or too busy that He doesn’t have our complete and compassionate attention. He is an ever-all the time-present help. God is with us in our deepest trouble. God is at all times and always present, always available to help. One of His attributes describe Him as omnipresent. He is everywhere present and never lacking.
Listen to these verses from Isaiah 57:15: “For thus says the High and Lofty One Who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: "I dwell in the high and holy place, With him who has a contrite and humble spirit, To revive the spirit of the humble, And to revive the heart of the contrite ones.” God is especially attentive to those the humble, showering them with grace in time of need so we are revived.
Look also at Psalm 145: 18-20: “The Lord is near to all who call upon Him, to all who call upon Him in truth. 19 He will fulfill the desire of those who fear Him; He also will hear their cry and save them. 20 The Lord preserves all who love Him, but all the wicked He will destroy.” What a close comfort to those who turn to God when difficult times come. His very presence preserves us and renews us.
Though the Earth be Removed, we will Not Fear
Look at the next two verses (2-3): “Therefore we will not fear, even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; 3 Though its waters roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with its swelling.”
The verse begins with “Therefore”. It is an emphatic word that calls for reflection on what was said before. We will not fear BECAUSE God is our refuge and our strength, and BECAUSE He is forever present with us who believe in Him. Could there be anything more severe than the earth being removed? God is with us; We will not be moved. A Mighty Fortress is our God! One day the earth WILL BE removed, but we will be removed from the earth before then by our God, who is with us.
In this passage we find the first-person plural pronouns “we” and “our” six times. 1 “God is our refuge and strength, A very present help in trouble. 2 Therefore we will not fear, even though the earth be removed.” In verse 7: The Lord of hosts is with us; The God of Jacob is our refuge. 11 The Lord of hosts is with us; The God of Jacob is our refuge.” It’s almost as though the Psalmist is talking about a National Emergency. The context is certainly personal when you know the Lord as your rock and salvation, but the implication here is that we are all in this emergency together. That is always the case with the Church, the Body and the Bride of Christ. We serve our God together. We worship and pray together. In Acts the Church had such a loving and encouraging community that the unbelieving world actually stood in awe of them.
The Church functions as it should, and we function individually as we should, when our focus vertically on God as our refuge strength, and when we do not focus horizontally on our surroundings or on our problems, but instead on the Everlasting Eternal God and Savior who is our ever present help…THEREFORE we will not fear, even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea.
Faith is when we are looking at the Lord. If we are intently watching the BAD news on television, we are going to become anxious and fearful. When we are watching our Savior and Lord who IS the Gospel, He is the Good News, we will come face to face with the One who IS The Truth. When we fix ourselves on Jesus, we are focusing on He who is Perfect Love and 1 John 4:18 says: “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear!”
“Therefore, we will not fear, 3 Though (the earth’s) waters roar and be troubled, Though the mountains shake with its swelling.” Are all of these examples just examples of poetic hyperbole or will these things literally happen? Well, Jesus said in Matthew 24:35: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.” Also, Psalm 121:1-2: “I will lift up my eyes to the hills-- from whence comes my help? 2 My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.” In other words: I don’t look to the hills for help; I look to the Lord God who created the hills and the earth on which they stand. My refuge and strength are in the Eternal, Omnipotent, Omnipresent Creator God who made all things.
Everything on the earth has been changing since it was first created. It will all pass away one day. Nothing on earth is “fixed firmly” except the One who created all things. At this time in the history of the world and at this time in your own life, where is your security? Is your hope in your own personal mountains? Your income or your 401k? Your job? Your home? In your family? In your hobbies or your stuff? Maybe your mountain is in modern medicine, science, or logic. I’m not against these things, but they are all hopeless for eternity.
Paul said in 2 Corinthians 4:18: “We do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.”
If your hope and security are the things around you, the things that you can see, then you will have anxiety and fear, because those things are temporal, they are temporary. But if your security is in the God who created all things, you have an abiding and eternal security. The earth WILL one day be destroyed, and the sea will be more tumultuous than ever before as the mountains fall into them, but our God will never fail those whose trust and hope is in Him. My prayer is that you know the security of the Everlasting God and the life of His Son, Jesus, and the comfort of His very Holy Spirit. Amen
