Psalm 121:1 A song of ascents. I lift up my eyes to the mountains-- where does my help come from? 2 My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. 3 He will not let your foot slip-- he who watches over you will not slumber; 4 indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. 5 The LORD watches over you-- the LORD is your shade at your right hand; 6 the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. 7 The LORD will keep you from all harm-- he will watch over your life; 8 the LORD will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.
Introduction
You have probably all seen those lists that tell you which passage of Scripture to read at various times in your life. When you are happy, read this chapter. When you are grieving, read this. When you need direction, this, etc. Somewhere in your Bible you might want to make a note, “When you’re afraid, read Psalm 121.
Danger is not evenly distributed in this world. In some places the people face deadly threats every single day. In our part of the world, compared to others we are pretty safe. It seems like everything you buy these days comes with safety instructions. You get a box of Kleenex and there will be a whole booklet – “Attention! Important safety information!” So you might expect that with all the safety precautions out there in our culture we would all live lives completely devoid of fear. You would think that in a place like this everyone would have forgotten what fear even feels like. But that is not the case at all, is it? Even with all the seat belts and helmets and warning labels and government regulations protecting us from ourselves, and bailouts, still – think of how many times in your life you have been afraid. Danger is not evenly distributed in this world, but fear is universal. Every one of us knows exactly what fear feels like.
Some of you know what it feels like to realize you are about to lose your spouse, or your kids. Or you find a lump on your body and there is a real good chance it is cancer, and you have to wait ten days to get the test results. On days like that there is nothing any human being can do to protect you from the thing you are afraid of.
Some of our fears are irrational. We call those phobias. We regard them as irrational because they don’t make any sense (there is no actual danger). But danger or no danger – the fear is as real as it can be.
Probably one of the most widespread fears right now is the fear of financial trouble. The threat of layoffs is constant these days. It seems just about everyone’s livelihood is at risk. And when you take a step back and you realize, “OK, I’m capable of earning this much money, and my bills are almost double that figure,” and you are plummeting further and further into debt and you can’t see any way out, that is scary. Especially when the anxiety over it causes conflict in your marriage, so you have the fear of a dying marriage relationship piled on top of all your financial fears. Just because we do not live in a part of the world where bombs are exploding every day does not mean we are foreigners to fear. Fear is universal because threats to our wellbeing are universal, and so it is good to know where to turn in your Bible when you are afraid.
What is the Promise?
But before we go through each of the promises in this psalm we need to address the question of what is being promised and what is not, because if we interpret it to be promising something other than what it is promising, we will be disappointed. Imagine a little four-year-old having a tantrum in the car on the way to the airport. He is angry because yesterday his father said, “I have a treat for you tomorrow” and the child took that to mean he was getting a piece of candy. But in reality, what the father meant was he was taking him to Disneyland. So when the kid finds out it is not a literal treat in the sense that he is used to, he regards the whole promise as worthless. We can do the same thing with God’s promises when we fail to interpret them properly. We take them to mean one thing, and it turns out they mean something much better. But our hearts are so set on the first thing that we get no joy at all from the thing that is really promised.
Watchcare
So what, exactly does God promise in this psalm? What is promised is all summed up in that word translated “watches over” or “keeps.” It is the Hebrew word SHAMAR, and it is used six times in this psalm. This is a beautiful word. The first time it appears in the Bible is in Genesis 2:15.
Genesis 2:15 Then the LORD God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it.
He was to tend it and cultivate it and guard it and watch over it. Everything about that garden was his responsibility. That is what the word means. When Cain asked that famous question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” he used that word (Gen.4:9).
“Am I his guardian, protector, caregiver? Am I supposed to keep track of him and watch over him every moment?”
It is the word used for keeping God’s Law and the Covenant. The idea is not just obeying it, but guarding it and treasuring it in your heart.
So it is not really enough to translate this word “protect.” You can protect someone without really caring about that person or tending to their wellbeing. This word is a combination of both protecting and cherishing. So I think the term “watchcare” is a good translation. And that word is a one-word summary of this whole psalm. The promise is that when you face trouble – real, serious trouble, God will be your helper and your guardian and keeper who watches over and takes care of you.
Exceptions and Conditions
Many millions have been comforted by the words of Psalm 121 in time of trouble. But many others have read it and have not found comfort, because, frankly, it just does not seem like it is true. He will not let your foot slip? God’s people stumble all the time. The LORD will keep you from all harm? Nothing harmful will ever happen to you? Don’t we suffer harm every time we sin?
Are the promises in this psalm intended as absolute, automatic, unconditional promises? Or are there exceptions and conditions? The answer is in verse 1.
1 I lift up my eyes to the mountains-- where does my help come from?
Help
The word translated help is a little stronger than the English word. When you hear the English word help you might think of an assistant. You help your wife do the dishes. You do a portion of the work, and so you’re helping. That is not the idea behind this word at all. This word means “relief or aid, as one who rescues the miserable and destitute.” It is the idea of helping the helpless out of some horrible situation. For example, in Joshua 10 there were five powerful kings who joined forces and attacked Gibeon.
Joshua 10:6 The Gibeonites then sent word to Joshua … "Do not abandon your servants. Come up to us quickly and save us! Help us, because all the Amorite kings from the hill country have joined forces against us."
If this psalm were promising that God’s people would have a completely trouble-free life, why would it begin with the question of where to look for help in the midst of calamity? People who are living a pain-free life don’t cry out for a rescuer. So it is obvious from the immediate context that it is not an absolute, automatic, unconditional promise. Clearly there are either exceptions or conditions or both.
Conditions
First let’s talk about conditions. Remember last week we found that if there is a condition attached to a specific promise anywhere in Scripture then that condition applies everywhere that promise appears – even if it isn’t mentioned. If one passage says that God will answer your prayers if you have faith, and then another passage just says, “God will answer your prayers”, that does not remove the condition. It still applies even though it isn’t mentioned.
So, is there any place in Scripture that places conditions on being protected by God from trouble? Yes. Psalm 91 is very similar to Psalm 121. And Psalm 91 makes all the same promises, except with a condition attached.
Psalm 91:9 If you make the Most High your dwelling-- even the LORD, who is my refuge-- 10 then no harm will befall you, no disaster will come near your tent.
Psalm 18:30 He is a shield for all who take refuge in him.
God will protect you if you look to Him as your refuge and make Him your dwelling. God promises to watch over us so we won’t perish, but…
Psalm 119:92 If your law had not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction.
So we not only need to make the Lord our refuge, His law must be our delight.
What about the promise that you will not stumble? And conditions on that? Or is everybody exempt from stumbling?
Psalm 37:23 If the LORD delights in a man's way, he makes his steps firm
To receive the promise your way must be delightful to the LORD. So yes, there are conditions.
Exceptions
What about exceptions? Suppose I meet God’s conditions – I make Him my refuge and I love His law and my way is pleasing to Him. Then is it guaranteed that no calamity will befall me and I will never stumble? No, it is not absolutely guaranteed because there are exceptions to the promise. Job was a man who fulfilled those requirements, and yet he suffered calamity anyway. And his friends drew some incorrect conclusions because they did not realize that there are exceptions to the promise of protection for the righteous.
I have been working on compiling a list of all the exceptions I can find in the book of Psalms, and I must say it is getting to be a pretty long list – and I am only up to Psalm 44. God will never forsake or reject us, but He will allow circumstances that seem like rejection and forsaking.
Psalm 42:9 I say to God my Rock, "Why have you forgotten me?
The psalmists speak of being in distress, weakness, sorrow, grief, mourning, consuming anguish, groaning, failed strength, affliction; they suffer contempt, slander, oppression, terror on every side, conspiracy to murder, multiplied troubles, scorn, scourge, loss of rejoicing, tears day and night, waves and breakers, and bones suffering mortal agony as foes taunt: “Where is your God?”
Psalm 22:1 My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from the words of my groaning? 2 O my God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer
7 All who see me mock me; they hurl insults, shaking their heads: 8 "He trusts in the LORD; let the LORD rescue him.
13 Roaring lions tearing their prey open their mouths wide against me. 14 I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart has turned to wax; it has melted away within me. 15 My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; you lay me in the dust of death. 16 Dogs have surrounded me; a band of evil men has encircled me, they have pierced my hands and my feet. 17 I can count all my bones; people stare and gloat over me.
We read all that and we think about Jesus, but we need to remember that all that happened to the psalmist too. Sometimes God lets horrific things happen to His people. And not just when we sin.
In Psalm 44 Israel was experiencing a terrible losing streak at war.
9 you have rejected and humbled us; you no longer go out with our armies. 10 You made us retreat before the enemy, and our adversaries have plundered us. 11 You gave us up to be devoured like sheep and have scattered us among the nations. 12 You sold your people for a pittance, gaining nothing from their sale. 13 You have made us a reproach to our neighbors
You read all that and you think, “Wow – Israel is being punished for sin again.” But…
17 All this happened to us, though we had not forgotten you or been false to your covenant. 18 Our hearts had not turned back; our feet had not strayed from your path. 19 But you crushed us … 20 If we had forgotten the name of our God or spread out our hands to a foreign god, 21 would not God have discovered it, since he knows the secrets of the heart? 22 Yet for your sake we face death all day long
He could not understand why this was happening – other than the fact that it all was for God’s sake.
So, if I can suffer all that even if I meet the conditions for God’s protection, does the promise of protection have any meaning at all? What good is a promise of protection that leaves you vulnerable to all that? If God will allow my foot to slip and let me be overcome by all kinds of disasters, what is the point of Psalm 121?
How to take delight in that
Realize the magnitude of the trouble you are in
It is interesting – in my experience the more desperate a person’s situation is, the less they tend to ask those kinds of questions. When you are in real, desperate, big-time fear, where you are absolutely petrified and totally helpless, in times like that you are thrilled to be in the care of one you trust. People in that condition don’t make a lot of demands about the form their rescue ought to take. You just say, “God, help me! Whatever the terms, whatever the process, however, whenever, whatever – just help me! Please!”
And when God answers and lets you know that He is going to help you, He allows you to experience His presence, and you know it is His presence because you now have hope and courage and strength and joy, at that moment your heart is flooded with gratitude and hope, and the absolute last thing you are thinking about is any kind of critique of how God is doing it. Even the psalmist in Psalm 22 – the one who said, “My God why have You forsaken me?” in the very same psalm said…
Ps.22:24 he has not despised or disdained the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him but has listened to his cry for help.
When you are in real desperation, and your desire is for God alone, then when He says “yes” to your cries for help, you are elated even while you are still in the midst of your suffering.
Several years ago I visited India, and in my travels at one point I found myself in a very rural, very primitive area that was many, many miles from any city. I had no idea where I was, no idea how to get anywhere, no map, and not a single person in that village spoke English. There was no phone in that village or anywhere near that village, and even if there were I wouldn’t have had any phone number to call or any ability to communicate with whoever I called.
Do you think I was just a little bit nervous in that situation? Actually – not at all. I was not the slightest bit scared, because I was with a man who grew up in India and knew his way around just fine, so I was very happy to leave him totally in charge of my wellbeing. Even when he drove in what seemed to me the wrong direction, I didn’t question him at all.
On the other hand, driving around Erie (where I live), if someone tells me to take a turn that seems wrong I will be reluctant. You see, the more certain you are that you have things under control, the less excited you will be at the prospect of a rescuer and caretaker, and the more you will question them when they do something other than what seems best to you. So how do you take comfort in a promise of protection that has conditions and exceptions? It helps if you are in real trouble.
Trust Him
It also helps if you trust Him. I read this week about a ship that was sailing from England to New York back in the mid-1800’s. One night, while all the passengers were asleep, a sudden wind storm came up, and swept across the water until it hit the ship. And at that point the ship was thrown violently on its side. It didn’t capsize, but everything that was movable went crashing and tumbling all over the place. And of course all the passengers woke up in a panic.
The captain had his family on board, including his little eight year old daughter. She woke up along with everyone else, and when she saw what was going on she was of course frightened and asked what was happening. They told her, “A wind storm as struck the ship.”
She then asked, “Is my father on deck?”
“Yes, he is on deck.”
And at that she dropped her head back down on her pillow without any trace of fear, and was soon fast asleep. It is when we have that kind of trust in our heavenly Father that His promises to watch over us and protect us really become comforting.
Only one fear: unhappiness
It helps to realize what it is you are really afraid of. Isn’t it true that most, if not all your fears boil down to one fear – the fear of unhappiness? We see some suffering on the horizon, and we figure that suffering will damage or destroy our happiness, and so it causes fear.
Your first reaction to that might be to say, “No – what I’m afraid of is pain.” But is that really true? Isn’t it true that when pain does not threaten your happiness, it doesn’t really make you afraid? Football players suffer all kinds of pain in the course of a game, yet they don’t live in mortal fear all week, because they know that playing the game will not destroy their happiness. In fact, it will likely increase their happiness, and so instead of fearing it they look forward to it. A woman who is pregnant faces extremely severe pain, and while there may be some fear connected with that, overall she is mostly looking forward to her due date rather than dreading it, because there is more happiness scheduled on that day than unhappiness. It is really the threat of unhappiness that is at the bottom of most, if not all our fears.
Or to be more precise – it is the threat of having more unhappiness than happiness. We always have some of both, but one is usually outweighing the other. And it is those times of your unhappiness outweighing your happiness that are really scary. That is what we are afraid of.
That is why sometimes you can have great fear in your heart even though you cannot identify any specific threat. Right now your unhappiness is greater than your happiness. You have been unhappy for a while, and so your fear is that you never will be happy. A lot of people are scared to death that things will just stay as they are now. The prospect of life droning on as it is without getting any better is terrifying.
So how does that help you appreciate the promise in this psalm? Here is how – if the source of your fear is hard circumstances, and the promise does not guarantee that you will never face hard circumstances, then you still have cause to be afraid. When you think that your fear is of some particular circumstance, then the only real deliverance from that fear seems to be the avoidance of that circumstance. But if your fear is really just a fear of unhappiness, then all you need to be delivered from your fear is the confidence of the availability of happiness. So if God comes along and says, “I love you, you can trust Me, and I will take care of you. I will always be available to you, and My presence will satisfy your soul and bring you joy that is greater than any sorrow.” That will calm your fear. You can take comfort in a promise that does not necessarily rule out hard circumstances when you realize that hard circumstances are not really the source of your fear. Your fear is of unhappiness, and that is something you can be protected from no matter the circumstances.
Will you suffer hardship and trouble in this life? Yes.
John 16:33 In this world you will have trouble.
But…
Romans 8:35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?
No…38 I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
You do not have to be afraid – not because there will be no trouble, but because that trouble cannot separate you from the love of your Caretaker.
And if you are not separated from the love of your heavenly Caretaker, then isn’t true that you can suffer no real harm?
Luke 21:16-18 they will put some of you to death…But not a hair of your head will perish.
They might kill you, but they cannot do you any actual harm, because they cannot take you from the grip of the One who supplies joy.
Psalm 46:1 God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. 2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
7 The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Close
OK, so now that we understand the nature of the promise, let’s look at what the psalmist says about God’s watchcare over us. The psalm gives four descriptions of God’s care for us. First, God’s watchcare is close by.
5 The LORD watches over you-- the LORD is your shade at your right hand
What does it mean that God is at your right hand? You may have heard that the right hand is the place of honor. And that is correct – when it is an inferior being brought to the right hand of a superior. So when Scripture says we are at God’s right hand that means we are elevated to a place of great honor.
But that is not what it means here. It is not that God is somehow elevated to a place of honor by being at our right hand. When the figure is used of a superior or benefactor or protector at the right hand of an inferior then the idea is that he is nearby – immediately available.
Psalm 73:23 Yet I am always with you (God); you hold me by my right hand.
Psalm 16:8 I have set the LORD always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken.
Psalm 109:31 For he stands at the right hand of the needy one, to save his life from those who condemn him.
So “right hand” means, nearby, close, always there.
When you walk through the valley of the shadow of darkness He is right there with you. You do not have to go through anything alone. Jesus promised, “Behold I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Where can you flee from His presence? If you go up to the heavens, He is there. If you go down to the depths, He is there. If you rise on the wings of the dawn – travel at the speed of light, if you settle on the far side of the sea, even there His hand will guide you, and His right hand will hold you fast. If you say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me” even the darkness will not be dark to Him. The night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to Him. No matter how far down you sink into the pit, He is still with you. No matter how pitch black it gets around you, your Guide and Caretaker can see just fine. He is as near to you as your breath.
He has His perfect and wonderful purposes for delay when you cry out for help, but no delay is ever due to Him being out of arm’s reach. When the time is right, the movement of His hand to save you will be like lightening. It will be like Jesus reaching out for Peter on the water. When you step on to the water and start sinking it takes less than a second for your head to go under. But in that fraction of a second Jesus had a hold of Peter, and those same lightening fast reactions will grab hold of you when the time is right. Your Caretaker is nearby – close to you.
When you are surrounded by loving people this is harder to appreciate. But in those times when you are abandoned by those who should be the closest to you, the realization that God is close to you means everything.
Constant
3 …he who watches over you will not slumber; 4 indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep
Most of my life I have read that and it wasn’t really any comfort to me at all. Of course God doesn’t sleep. How can I be comforted by a promise that God never sleeps when I have never once in my life worried about the possibility of Him going to sleep? I have worried about a lot of things – but never that. So how can it be a comfort?
Well, for one thing – the reason I have never worried about it is because Scripture tells us it is an impossibility. But if the Bible didn’t say that, we wouldn’t know. Secondly, the idea of God being asleep is figurative language. Sleep is used as a figure of speech to point to inattentiveness to our trouble.
Psalm 44:23 Awake, O Lord! Why do you sleep? Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever.
It is not that He thought God was literally napping. He was using that as a figure of speech to say, “God, it seems like You aren’t alert to our plight.”
So the promise that God never sleeps is a promise that God is always, at every moment of every day, paying close attention to exactly what you are going through. He is alert to what is happening to you, how it feels, what you are thinking about it, and absolutely every single implication. He never puts you on hold. He never leaves you with a problem and says, “I’ll be right back.” He does allow times when it seems like He isn’t there, but even in those times He is acutely attuned to what is happening and exactly what you are going through.
Have you ever awakened to see someone who loves you watching you sleep? You open your eyes and see that your spouse was just enjoying watching you rest? I have had that happen where the very first thing I see when I open my eyes in the morning is Tracy’s beautiful face smiling at me. That is really a wonderful experience – to suddenly realize that someone was paying attention to you and caring about you even when you were oblivious to them.
Psalm 139:18 When I awake, I am still with you.
God’s watchcare is constant – even when you are asleep, He is attending to you.
Last Monday as I was studying this passage I was having one of those days when I was just really tired. I was trying as hard as I could to stay awake and study about God never sleeping, and in spite of all my efforts I fell asleep four times before 9:00 in the morning! And I did not remember a single word I had read in the commentaries. And I thought, I still don’t know much about this passage, but one thing I do know is how totally vulnerable I am to sleep. You go too long without sleep and it will overtake you, and there isn’t anything you can do about it.
And sleep is not the only thing that catches up to us. We have all kinds of attentiveness limitations. Anyone in this room have a problem with your mind wandering while you pray? There are times when no matter how hard you try, you cannot focus your mind on the Lord for more than 30 seconds without getting distracted. Thirty seconds! Pretty soon the psychologists will figure out the dirty little secret that the rest of us already know: every human being on the planet has ADD.
You have a lot of things going in your life, and you cannot think about every one of them all the time. But it would be nice to be able to think about just one of them for at least a few minutes. Not only does God never sleep; He does not suffer from any of our attention deficit limitations. He is fully focused and fully aware of everything in your life and everything about your life at every moment of every day and every night.
Comprehensive/Complete
We have a Caretaker who is not only close, but whose watchcare over us is constant. And not only is it constant, it is also comprehensive (complete). It covers every circumstance and guards us from every kind of danger.
6 …the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. 7 The LORD will keep you from all harm--
Day and night
Sunstroke was very common in that part of the world, and in ancient times it was believed that the rays from the moon were harmful as well. So some people take this to mean God will protect us from the bad affects of both the sun and the moon. But I think it goes beyond that. The sun stands for the daytime and the moon represents the night. The idea is God shelters you from all the dangers of day and all the dangers of night. It is a figure of speech in which all the dangers of daytime and nighttime are streaming down from the sun and moon, and God is like shade, sheltering you from it all.
7 …he will watch over your life; 8 the LORD will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.
Coming and going refers to leaving your house at the beginning of the day and returning to it at the end of the day – and everything in between. All the activities of life – everything you are involved with. Nothing is left out. In any circumstance in any context you can cry out to Him for help.
Back when the Bereans had a mold problem in this building they tried to make a claim with their insurance company and were denied because of some technical definition that made the claim fall outside of the descriptions of their coverage. Somehow they decided that it wasn’t technically water damage. Having God as your Caretaker is an insurance policy that covers absolutely everything. No exclusions. We are weak, vulnerable creatures subject to countless dangers as we move through life. Our fragile lives are threatened by too much heat, not enough heat, the threats of daytime, the threats of nighttime – around-the-clock dangers, and it is all covered. When the Bereans bought their insurance policy how could they have known to ask specifically about that exact circumstance with the mold? We do not know what all dangers we will face, but God does. He has already seen them, and in this psalm He promises that His watchcare over us applies to every one of them.
Stumble coverage
In fact, this insurance policy even has a rider that include stumble coverage.
3 He will not let your foot slip
It not only covers all the various kinds of hardships that can happen to you, it also covers hardships created by you. Sometimes we are in trouble because other people threaten us. But lots of times we are in trouble because of our own failures and stumbling and mistakes and weaknesses. And a lot of Christians feel like it is OK to look to God for help when someone else is hurting you, but not when the mess you are in is your own fault. Or, “I can count on God to protect me from others, but it’s up to me to protect myself from my own folly and my own mistakes.” But the promise in this psalm even extends to protecting you from the consequences of our own klutzy, clumsy, stumbling and bumbling and mistakes.
Continuing
So His watchcare over us is close, it is constant, it is comprehensive and complete. And one more – it continues forever.
8 the LORD will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.
This promise is not just for heaven – it applies now, in this life. It starts now and never ends.
Isn’t it true that 99.99% of our fear has to do with the future? We are always afraid of what we think might happen. When you were young, you do not think much about being old. But when you start getting up there in years, and your body starts breaking down under the ravages of the aging process, you start thinking about what it is going to be like to be elderly. Are you going to be crippled? Will you have to go into a nursing home? Will you lose your mind? Will you be in a lot of pain? Will you be all alone when you die?
I can’t tell you the answer to any of those questions except the last one. You won’t be alone. Even if you lose your mind, He will still be with you. God is capable of communicating with a senile person just as easily as with anyone else. He won’t leave you. Even if your own children forget about you, and all of the worst case scenarios happen in your old age, you will have a Caretaker nearby watching over every step and guarding you from absolutely any harm that does not fit His perfect plan for you. And you do not have to worry about being unhappy, because He will be a source of joy to you – joy that is greater than any sorrow you will face.
Even when that moment comes when your heart finally makes its last pump. And your body shuts down and stops functioning. And for the first time in your existence your spirit is separated from your body. He will be right there with you even then. He will walk with you through that moment when none of the rest of us can walk with you. There won’t even be a one millisecond gap in your fellowship with the Lord when that happens. You will just go from partial ability to enjoy Him to unlimited ability to enjoy Him. His watchcare over us is close, it is constant, it is comprehensive and complete, and it continues forever.
Where does my help come from?
This psalm starts with a very simple question.
1 I lift up my eyes to the mountains-- where does my help come from?
In the ancient Near East the mountains were considered the dwelling places of the gods. That is why the high places and pagan shrines were there. And even Israel often associated the mountains with the dwelling place of Yahweh. When God came down and gave the law it was on a high mountain. So when the psalmist says, “I live my eyes to the mountains” it probably means, “I look for supernatural help.” Just like everyone else, when I get into big trouble I look for help. But when I do that, the question comes to mind, “What is the source of that help?”
Looking to the right source
It seems that question is being asked by the human heart almost constantly. When I have some physical task that my hands can’t handle, I look around for a tool or another person. If my car gets stuck in the ditch, once it becomes clear that I will never get out on my own, my first thought is to think through, “Where is my help going to come from? Who will get me out of here?” As long as you feel like you are within the bounds of your own resources so that no obstacle is stopping you, you don’t look around for help. But the moment an obstacle blocks your way, the instant reflex is to wonder what source of help there may be. And that happens countless times a day. So the question in verse 1 is universal. But the answer in verse 2 is rare.
In fact, I think it is rarer than the first glance would indicate. Most people, when they are in bad enough trouble, pray for help. That is not rare. But is that a real looking to God as their helper? In many cases praying to God for help is nothing more than the charm they are appealing to to get the thing they think of as being the real source of help. I have an idea in my head of the way I want things to be, and so I ask God to produce that scenario, but in reality it is that scenario rather than God that is my hope and my longing. So I am really looking for that scenario as my helper, and God as my servant to bring it about.
You can tell you are looking to God alone as your help when your longing is for His presence – no matter what the form or expression. The person who is racked with pain and says, “God, in order for me to be happy I have to have this pain removed. Please remove it.” – that person is hoping in relief. Relief is the ultimate desire of his heart, and God is just a servant or tool to get what he wants. But the person who desires God alone and looks to God alone as His help will say, “God, I’m miserable in this suffering. Come to me. Grant me an experience of Your presence and give me grace and mercy. And whatever form it comes in – whether it be relief or greater strength or some joy that outweighs the pain or whatever; I know that if I could just experience Your nearness and have You turn Your favor toward me, I would be happy.” That is what it means to make God your refuge.
In your life, when you are being hindered from completing a task, are you satisfied with the presence of God and His grace in whatever form He’s pleased to give it? Or do you require that the task be completed before you will be satisfied? Put your hope in Him alone. There is no good fortune except in His grace, no wellbeing but in His favor, no treasure but His presence.
Maker of heaven and earth
There is one last phrase in this psalm we need to see.
2 My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.
When you are tempted with fear or worry, conduct a little interview with God. God is offering to be my Caretaker? What are His qualifications? Creator of the ends of the earth. Wow, not bad. Anything else? Heavens. The heavens? Yeah – He holds all the stars in the palm of His hand. He is the one who keeps the galaxies spinning and upholds every molecule in the universe every second of every day. You have heard of gravity? That’s Him. Laws of physics – just at little thing He does to illustrate His faithfulness and power. Hmmm. Does He have any references? Oh yes – He has been proved an exceeding help in time of need throughout the ages. Of the countless millions of people throughout the entire history of mankind who have trusted Him and not once has He failed a single one of them.
1 I lift up my eyes to the mountains-- where does my help come from? 2 My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.
