The Pilgrim’s Provision

Transcript

JR 22
6/25/2023
The Pilgrim’s Provision
Psalm 121
Jesse Randolph

In the summer of 1918 the Great War which would eventually become known as “World War I” was winding down. It was coming to an end. As the curtain began to fall on the theatre of war there the various nations that had been fighting began sending their boys back home. Some went home with decorations and medals. Some went home with shrapnel lodged in their bodies. Some went home with missing limbs. Some went home with haunting memories of the carnage of the battlefield. Then some went home with this deadly virus called the Spanish flu. A virus the soldiers likely had picked up by living in these cramped, and dirty, and damp conditions while warring on the Western Front. The virus carried with it a variety of symptoms including headaches and fatigue and loss of appetite. A dry, hacking cough, stomach problems, excessive sweating, and respiratory issues. For some eventually it led to their death. News was a lot slower to travel back then than it is in our day but pretty soon whether you lived in Barcelona or Boston, London or LA, Milan or Milwaukee, people across the globe started reporting the same symptoms all over the world. The virus was fast moving spreading across the globe at a dizzying rate causing mass hysteria. Here in the U.S., government officials, remember, this is 100 years ago now, started issuing a variety of different mandates such as “don’t assemble in large groups.” “Stay indoors.” “Don’t shake hands with others.” “Always wear a protective mask.” Schools were shut down. Public theatres were shut down. Dance halls were shut down. Stadiums were shut down and it was even suggested that churches shut down. Let me know if any of this is starting to sound familiar!

But as you can imagine, Washington D.C., our nation’s capital was especially abuzz with activity as our nation’s governing authorities were scrambling to manage this growing crisis. Now, as most major cities did at this time, the District of Columbia, Washington D.C. had two major newspapers. One was the morning paper, the Washington Post. The other was the evening paper, the Washington Star. During this time both newspapers were regularly pushing out updates about the spread of the virus in that district.

What I am going to do now is draw your attention to something that was published in the Washington Star, the evening paper, on the afternoon of Saturday, October 5, 1918, Lord’s Day Eve. On this day, a variety of churches, by the way they were around this time putting out these ads giving their congregants, their members updates as to whether or not they would be meeting that week or the next day. Well, this church let people know they would not be assembling that next morning, October 6. There was a Presbyterian church that put a publication out, an ad out, to let them know, let their people know they would not be meeting. Here’s what the Presbyterian church said in that evening ad in the Washington Star. “Inasmuch as it has seemed wise to the Commissioners of the District, after careful consideration of the question, to prohibit the gathering of the people on Sunday in their accustomed places of worship, may I suggest that at the usual hour of morning service you gather in your homes and unite in common prayer to the God of Nations and of families, that He will guide us in all wisdom in this time of trial, that our physicians and public officers may be led in their performance of duty and be strengthened by divine help, that the people may be wise and courageous, each in his place.” So that’s the first part of the ad. But the ad didn’t end there. It actually ended with these words written by whoever put this out in the Presbyterian church. Let us never forget that “Help cometh from the Lord which made heaven and earth. Behold He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.”

Now those last few words I just read from that ad taken out by the Presbyterian Church in the Washington Star on October 5, 1918, come from the passage of Scripture that we’ll be in this evening, Psalm 121. Which is a Psalm that’s written from the perspective of a pilgrim. Someone who is traveling. Someone who is on a journey. Someone’s on a journey with a specific destination in view. As we’re going to see this evening as we work through this Psalm, this pilgrim’s path was one that was fraught with peril, and risk, and fear. But as we’re also going to see this text at its core is not actually about the pilgrim. It’s not even, fundamentally, about the journey or even the destination. Rather, this Psalm, Psalm 121, is about the One who was providing for this pilgrim and the One who continues to provide for His people, people like you and me, today.

If you’re not there already, please turn with me in your Bibles to Psalm 121. God’s Word reads “A Song of Ascents. I will lift my eyes to the mountains. From where shall my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. He will not allow your foot to slip; He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand. The sun will not smite you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will protect you from all evil; He will keep your soul. The Lord will guard your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forever.”

Now Psalm 121 is a favorite of many, having just read it you can understand why! You know, in our circles, we uphold as we did last Sunday evening, the inerrancy of Scripture and the infallibility of Scripture, God’s Word. The authority of Scripture, the sufficiency of Scripture. What this Psalm really does is highlights the beauty of Scripture. This Psalm with its poetic imagery and just the beauty of it, it is stunning. It stands out. We are looking at one of the most exquisite pieces of Hebrew poetry every written. But unlike some of our poetry, that we’re used to in our day, you know, “Roses are red, violets are blue, Hebrew poetry is not marked by the fact that it rhymes. Instead, the beauty of Hebrew poetry comes out through various literary devices that the authors would use such as word pictures and metaphors that would richly extol as this Psalm does, the character of the God who is being described in its verses.

Psalm 121 is actually the second of 15 Psalms that are known as the Psalms of Ascents. It’s marked there by that superscription, before verse 1, where it says, “A Song of Ascents.” These 15 Psalms, the Psalms of Ascent are also known as the “Pilgrim Psalms” because of the circumstances under which they were typically sung moving on to Jerusalem, taking that annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Jerusalem, the Holy City, is where ancient Israelites would go to participate in the three annual festivals on their religious calendar.

First you had Passover which commemorated Israel’s Exodus out of Egypt. Then you would have Pentecost which commemorated God’s giving of the Law to the Israelites at Sinai. Then you had the Feast of Booths which commemorated the period of wilderness wandering for the Israelites when they lived in booths or tents in the wilderness. But Jerusalem was not simply a hop, skip, and jump for the average Israelite. No, these pilgrims, if they were sort of in that surrounding land, they had to go on a march. See Jerusalem does not sit on flat land. Rather, the Holy City sits at a high elevation compared to everything around it. So, when the ancient Israelites, those who did not live in Jerusalem already, needed to travel to Jerusalem to worship God. No matter what direction they were coming from they would have to ascend, they had to climb up, go up several thousand feet to get to where they wanted to go. As they were on the incline, as they were on that trek to Jerusalem, ascending, going up, traveling upward, with feet that were undoubtedly sore and muscles undoubtedly aching and beads of sweat that were undoubtedly forming they would sing these psalms. The “Songs of Ascent.” Psalm 121 in particular was a song that the Israelites would sing as they were approaching the hills that surround Jerusalem as the holy city, Jerusalem, began to come into view.

Now, a natural question for us to ask here is with that being the background of the context of this Psalm how in the world does this Psalm relate to us today? There are no hills here, right? I mean, what benefits can we draw? What truths can we mine from a text that has such a specific context and setting? Is this text limited to hikes and mountains and hikers and mountaineers? People that scale and rappel and the like? Hardly. As we’re going to see today this Psalm is packed with rich truths concerning our unchanging and eternal God. What we’re going to see is that the God who was guiding and providing for these Israelite wayfarers thousands of years ago is the same God who is guiding and providing for us today as we make our pilgrimage through this world. We’re going to go through this Psalm line-by-line and verse-by-verse and as we do so, we’re going to see two timeless truths concerning the character of our great God that just jump off the page. Then from that we’re going to see how those truths, in turn, inform how we should be seeking and pursuing Him in our lives.

So, here’s our first point for this evening’s sermon. It’s this. It’s hold fast to your Helper. Hold fast to your Helper. You’re going to see in a second where I’m going to get that. Look again at verses 1 and 2. The Psalmist here says, “I will lift my eyes to the mountains. From where shall my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.” Now we don’t know who this psalmist is. He doesn’t identify himself. You know, you see other psalms and they’ll say a psalm of David, or Solomon, or Asaph, or Ethan the Ezrahite, or Moses, or Korah. This psalmist is anonymous. Whoever he is, though, he has gone far enough from whatever town or village or region he’s from and he’s has gotten close enough to his destination that the hills surrounding Jerusalem have come into view. The psalmist here says, “I will lift up my eyes” that’s a Hebrew expression that simply means “I will look up at,” “I’m looking up toward.” He says, “I will lift my eyes to the mountains.” “I will lift my eyes up toward the hills.” That’s because he’s looking up at, looking toward the hills. The necessary inference here is that he is not already in the hills. He’s still in the lowlands and he still has a long way to go. He still has a steep hill to climb. “The hills” here by the way is a significant reference because “the hills” here speak of not his ultimate destination, but actually the natural barriers that exist between where he is right now and where he wants to go. Now there are a couple other things about these hills that we need to be familiar with. First, we know that the “hills” of these days were hazardous. They were known for their rough and dangerous terrain. They were known for the wild animals foraging and roving in packs. They were known for the hostile tribes, the various “ites” of the region that would raid. Packs that were going up these hills. These hills were known for exposure. If you were traveling like this you’d be exposed both day and night to the various natural elements as you climbed the hills. These hills were known for robbers and criminals taking advantage of people climbing through these hills.

In fact, we get a little preview of that in Luke 10. That’s the whole setting of Jesus’ Parable of the Good Samaritan. In Luke 10:30 the parable begins this way. “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho,” so going in the opposite direction of the psalmist here, “and he fell among robbers, and they stripped him and beat him and departed, and went away leaving him half dead.” So those words of Jesus Himself confirm there in Luke 10 that these “hills” were a source of real and present danger to the traveler. Second, we know that these hills were not only dangerous, but they were also a place where false worship and idolatry were rampant. Where false worship and idolatry took place regularly. I’m going to read off for you a few verses that speak to the pagan idolatry that was happening in these hills. Jeremiah 2:20 says “But on every high hill and under every green tree you have lain down as a harlot.” He’s speaking to the people there. 1 Kings 14:23 says “They also built for themselves high places and sacred pillars and Asherim on every high hill and beneath every luxuriant tree.” Ezekiel 20:28, “When I had brought them into the land which I swore to give to them, then they saw every high hill and every leafy tree, and they offered there their sacrifices and there they presented the provocation of their offering.” The “high hills,” in other words, not only posed a threat of physical danger to God’s people. They presented a threat of spiritual danger. The “high places,” the altars, on these “high hills” were notorious dens of apostasy, and idolatry, and gross immorality.

Now there are some liberal scholars out there who have attempted to suggest that here in Psalm 121, the psalmist is looking to the hills themselves, the natural physical beauty of the hills as his own source of refuge and strength. In other words, according to these liberals, this Psalm is just the musings of wanderlust of some ancient Israelite. He just has this impulse to seek refuge in the hills for the sake of the hills alone. He just wants to head for the hills. You know, putting it in our context, it would be like someone who wants to leave the flatlands of Nebraska just to get to the mountains of Colorado for some respite. I don’t think so. I don’t think this psalmist is just some rugged thrill-seeker looking for his next peak to climb. He’s not some rabid environmentalist looking for a tree to hug up in the hills. Instead, this is a devout worshiper of God who is looking at the hills actually as that last physical impediment to where he actually wants to get. Which is to the holy place in Jerusalem where He can worship God in His house, in the Temple.

It’s against that backdrop that this Psalmist “lifts his eyes” as it says here in verse 1. As he does so, he sees himself facing these rugged hills, this rugged terrain and he’s wondering where he’s going to find his help on this dangerous journey. We see him asking that very question in the second line there of verse 1 where he says, “From where shall my help come?” Now you might look at that question and ask if he’s worried, if he’s genuinely wondering. He’s truly not sure of how or whether he’ll receive the help he’s looking for. I don’t think that’s actually what’s happening at all. This psalmist is not asking this question from this posture of uncertainty or doubt but rather he’s asking the question as a way to set up and give greater effect to the answer he already knows!

We see him give that answer in verse 2. “My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.” The Lord alone has both the ability and the power to assist him. The “LORD” there you see, all caps, is a reference to Yahweh. LORD, that’s the personal name of God. The faithful and covenant-keeping God of Israel who has always been true to His promises. The self-existent, transcendent, unchanging and supremely holy God of the universe. Yahweh here is described as the One “who made heaven and earth.” So, this pilgrim here is not seeking assistance or help from some you know, small potatoes, lower case ‘g’ god. Instead, his help comes from none other than the Maker of heaven and earth. The One who actually sits behind and upon and above the very hills the Psalmist is looking at. The One who created not just those hills, but this world and all the planets and stars and billions of galaxies! The One whose power extends to the remotest ends and furthest corners of His creation. The logic that’s being presented here in this sort of greater-to-the-lesser style of writing is that the One who made those hills, the One who made the heavens, and the earth certainly can see his servant through his journey as he faces those hills. The hills are not this traveler’s source of help. God is.

In fact, we see similar language in Jeremiah 3:23 and it makes this point explicitly about where help comes from. Jeremiah 3:23 says, “Surely, the hills are a deception, tumult on the mountains.” But then right after that it says, “Surely in the LORD our God is the salvation of Israel.” So, the hills offer one thing. Delusion and sin and wickedness and deception and tumult. The Lord offers another. Salvation and righteousness and peace and hope; look again at verse 2 here of Psalm 121:2. He says, “My help comes from the LORD.” That’s just such a simple and powerful and significant and confident and clear statement of faith. It reminds us of Psalm 46:1 which Martin Luther turned into a hymn, which says “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” Or Psalm 55:22 says, “Cast your burden upon the LORD and He will sustain you; He will never allow the righteous to be shaken.” Another indication of the Lord’s help. We see similar truths about the Lord being our source of help scattered throughout the New Testament like in Hebrews 4:16. A familiar verse I’m sure to all of you or at least to many. “Therefore, let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” Or I Corinthians 10:13. The word help isn’t found here but the concept of help is clearly here. I Corinthians 10:13, “No temptation has overtaken you, but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape,” that sounds like help, “also, so that you will be able to endure it.”

Make no mistake about where our help comes from. Each of these verses that I just rattled off and Psalm 121 tells us that we have as believers, as Christians, a one-stop shop as it relates to obtaining help. When we’re surrounded by the dangers of this life, when we’re beset by seemingly insurmountable difficulties. When we’re tempted, when we’re tried, when we’re down. When we’re discouraged, when we’re confused, or feeling hopeless. When we’re anxious, or fearful, or feeling panicked there’s only one place we need to go. Our help does not come from Ricketts or Pillen. Or Mom or Dad or Grandma or Grandpa. No. Our help, “My help,” it says, “comes from the LORD.” I just love that.

Do you ever notice how sometimes the most powerful statements in Scripture are the simplest in how they’re stated and the easiest to remember and simple to recall. Just reminds us of all of how kind God has been to us to give us these powerful truths in such bite-sized, memorable language, right? Think of Romans 11:36, “From Him and through Him and to Him are all things.” That’s an amazingly profound statement given in very simple language. Or “His strength is perfected in our weakness,” II Corinthians 12:9. Simple, profound truth. Or “If God is for us, who can be against us”?, Romans 8:31. Nobody quibbles with that or can’t understand what that means. Simple, profound truth. We have another one here in verse 2 of our Psalm, “My help comes from the LORD.”

The pilgrim who wrote Psalm 121, moved by the Spirit, was facing these perils in the hills that he’s now approaching. There’s no doubt many of us here are facing perils, too. Again, the applicability of Old Testament Scripture. Maybe it’s not robbers or lions or vultures on a mountain road that we’re facing. But it could be an upcoming job interview or decisions that have to do with the care of an elderly parent or putting your teenager behind the wheel of a car. Or a big exam or project or deadline that’s staring you down. What God is teaching all of us this evening through His Word, through Psalm 121 is that we each need to have this eternal perspective that this anonymous author of this Psalm had. He was not oblivious to the realities of the journey up that treacherous road to Jerusalem, but he was realistic; a part of his realism was reminding himself that his help came from the Lord.

Here’s the single silver-bullet truth I want everybody here to take home tonight. So as you’re leaving the parking lot with your spouse or by yourself or with your kids as you pull out of the parking lot tonight and going down 84th Street I want you to remember that whatever hills may be in front of you in this life and those hills are there, you need to make sure you’re taking those concerns and those needs and those worries and frustrations and anxieties like this Psalmist did, to the Maker of heaven and earth. Praying to Him. Crying out to Him for help. Acknowledging that He is your only sure steady source of hope and help in this life. That’s the silver-bullet single truth I want you guys to leave here with this evening, okay?

That doesn't mean I’m closing this sermon. I’ll still get you out of here by 7:30 but that’s, that’s the one I want you to hang on to. Then actually with everything I’ve just said, with that silver-bullet truth, really is a summary of James 1:5. You all have it memorized by now. James 1:5 from our Sunday morning series many months ago now says, “But if any of you lacks wisdom,” and remember, the context of that statement, “if any of you lacks wisdom” is in the context of trials because James 1:2 says, “count it all joy” when you “encounter various trials.” James says, “let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach.” and then it says, “and it will be given to him.” That’s a truth you can take that to the bank when you’re going through trials! When you’re going through difficulties. You can cry out to God. You can pray to God. You can seek wisdom from God and He’ll grant it.

Now, we’ve covered just the two first verses here of Psalm 121 and they remind us that the Lord is our one true source of help. The remaining six verses here the Psalmist is going to highlight another aspect of God’s provision for us. Which is that He “keeps” us. He’s our source of help but He’s also the One who keeps us. So, allow your eyes, if you would, to run down the page to verse 5 because this really is the engine that drives the remainder of this Psalm. Every statement in the remainder of this Psalm points to these first few words of verse 5 there where it says, “the LORD is your keeper.”

Our second major heading or second point for tonight is to keep your eyes on the Keeper. Keep your eyes on the Keeper. See some form of that word “keep” or “keeper” appears six times either in noun form or in verb form in the final six verses of this Psalm. In fact, look at verse 3. It says, “he who keeps you will not slumber.” Or verse 4, “he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.” Verse 5 “the LORD is your keeper.” Verse 7 says “the LORD will protect you,” that’s the same verb there. The second part of verse 7 “he will keep your soul.” Verse 8 “The LORD will guard,” that could also be translated “keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forever.”

What does that mean that God “keeps” us? What is a “keeper”? Well, in most English translations they will give it to you just as you see it here in our NAS translation. It’ll be translated “keep.” But that translation I don’t think actually does full justice to what is being conveyed here. You see God is not “keeping” us in the sense of sort of passively “keeping the light on for us.” That’s too passive, too weak a translation of the significance of the verb here. Instead, that verb, the Hebrew is shamar has a more active sense. The word literally means to “watch over,” “to guard,” “to take care of,” to “protect.” It's the same word that is used back in Genesis 2:15 where it says, “Then the LORD God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it.” It’s the same word used of Abel in Genesis 4:2, which says that “Abel was a keeper of flocks,” while his brother Cain “was a tiller of the ground.” It’s the same word actually that Cain angrily shot back to God in Genesis 4:9 when he says, “Am I my brother’s,” what? “Keeper.” Protector. So, as we can see even from those contexts that word “keeper” has a real active sense. It describes guardianship or watchful care, careful stewardship.

As it relates to God, getting back to Psalm 121 the word pictures Him closely tending His people; ministering to their needs; guiding them in their journey; protecting them from harm, caring for their afflictions. So, the general idea driving the last six verses of this Psalm and impacting our understanding of the entirety of this Psalm is that “The LORD is your keeper.” God keeps us.

How does He keep us? Well, there are a number of different ways He does so which are laid out in the remaining verses of this Psalm. The first way He “keeps” us is by not allowing our feet to moved. Look at the first part of verse 3. It reads “He will not allow your foot to slip.” Now this would have course in the original context resonated in a very tangible and specific way for those early Israelites who are on their way up to Jerusalem. See, roads back then were more than trails. They were actually narrower than trails as we even think of trails today. There would have been rocks and stones and random objects sort of strewn all over these roads, these trails. There would have been beasts of burden and children and elderly people all kinds making their way up the hill at various rates of speeds. Clogging up the road. This was not like I-80 or Highway 2 or even “O” Street. This was like a dusty, narrow, dangerous, busy road with all kinds of people going at all kinds of speeds. In fact, for those who were making their way up to Jerusalem in these times, sometimes because the road was so narrow they would find themselves needing to move over to the edge of the road to faster, more assertive parties move up the road. What would happen is if you were getting pushed by you know an ox behind you or a faster moving party behind you, you would have to move to the side of the road and guess what? Your toes would be clinging to the edge of that road. This language has some clear applications here. Because as these pilgrims were moving their way up this treacherous trail to Jerusalem there was always a very real danger of slipping, of stumbling, of falling, and if your foot slipped you could very easily tumble down into some ravine and die.

The idea of the foot slipping is found in many different places in the Old Testament. Psalm 66:8-9 says, “Bless our God, O peoples; and sound His praise abroad, who keeps us in life and does not allow our feet to slip.” Or I Samuel 2:9, that’s Hannah’s prayer, she there says “He keeps the feet of His godly ones.” Or Proverbs 3:26 says, “for the LORD will be your confidence and will keep your foot from being caught.” What each of those passages teaches us is that God will in a spiritual sense always steady and secure the feet of His people. Now that doesn’t mean, this is not a promise that you and I will never slip on ice or fall off a ladder or go tripping down a trail and break a bone or sprain something. It’s not that kind of promise. Those kinds of things do happen to God’s people! Not withstanding what the prosperity teachers teach on TV. Rather, the Psalmist here is making the far more transcendent point that the Maker of heaven and earth watches over every step of His children. Yes, there are times where it feels like our grip on Him is loosening but He doesn’t loosen His grip on us. Yes, there are times we feel like we are tripping and stumbling in our walk as a believer but He’s not going to let us fall in the ultimate sense, away from Him, for the true believer. He will, if you’re His child, not allow your foot to slip.

Now, the second aspect of God’s “keeping” us is that He neither slumbers nor sleeps. Look at the next part of verse 3, moving into verse 4. It says, “He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.” So, while this Israelite pilgrim was sleeping under the stars, perhaps with worries entering his mind about you know, wild animals roaming or thieves and robbers lurking or his family’s own safety he could still find peace and rest. And not by counting sheep but rather by recalling that His Keeper was this ever-faithful watchman and guardian. A human watchman may fall asleep or slumber or snore. And so too may the so-called “gods” of the false religions systems of the world. But not Yahweh.

Actually, for an illustration of this go back with me if you would over to I Kings 18. Turn with me to I Kings 18 please. This is the account of Elijah and the false prophets of Baal. You will recall that these false prophets had been dispatched by the wicked King Ahab. What we see here, as you are turning over to I Kings 18, is sort of like a prophetic face-off between the prophets of Baal and the prophet of Yahweh, Elijah. The idea here is that both sides are going to take turns calling upon their Gods to see who truly represents the one true God. Gentleman that he is, Elijah says “you go first.” “Let’s see what you’ve got.” and the story picks up in I Kings 18:25. It says, “So Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, ‘Choose one ox for yourselves and prepare it first for you are many, and call on the name of your god, but put no fire under it.’ Then they took the ox which was given them, and they prepared it and called on the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, ‘O Baal, answer us.’ But there was no voice, and no one answered. And they leaped about the altar which they had made.” But as we turn to verse 27, Elijah becomes a tad less gentlemanly. The text there says, “It came about at noon, that Elijah mocked them and said, ‘Call out with a loud voice, for he is a god.” That’s his way of saying “Shout louder, perhaps he’s deaf and cannot hear.” Then he continues and says, “either he is occupied or gone aside.” Which is veiled way of saying maybe your so-called ‘god’ needed a restroom break. Maybe he needed to go potty and then there’s this. The he says, “or is on a journey.” Which is a way of saying “maybe he needed to take a walk or go stretch his legs to kind of clear his mind and then it says, “or perhaps he is asleep and needs to be awakened.” “Maybe he’s snoozing.” “Maybe he’s fallen asleep on the job.”

What an indictment for the false “god” of the worshipers of Baal to say that your god is deaf, he’s incontinent, and he’s dozing. Not so with the one true and living God. The God of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob and the God of, where we live today, Lincoln, Nebraska in 2023. This God, Yahweh, the eternal God Is never exhausted. He’s never weary. He’s never inattentive. This God hears and sees everything. He takes no rest breaks. He never closes his eyes on the condition of his people. He is sleeplessly vigilant. His providential eyes are ever open. That’s what it says in
II Chronicles 16:9, “For the eyes of the LORD move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart are completely His.”

Now, some have questioned whether verses 3 and 4 here are somehow redundant because in verse 3 here it says, “he who keeps you will not slumber.” Then in verse 4 it says, “He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.” So, the question has been asked, why does the Psalmist use the word “slumber” twice in those verses? There’s actually a pretty simple reason! Verse 3 is all about “you” as in, the individual Israelite or bridging it to our context today, the individual follower of Christ. Verse 4 is broader where it says the God who keeps “you,” it’s there referencing all of Israel, all of His people. In other words, it’s not only over a single Israelite that God is watching or keeping unceasingly. Instead, He watches over all His people. That should instill great confidence to any child of God who is reading this Psalm because what it tells us is the One who is the true “guardian of the galaxy” is also our individual guardian! He is as watchful over one lamb as He is over the entire flock.

I came to this uncomfortable realization preparing for this sermon, thinking of keeping and watching and protecting that from the moment I go to bed each night until the time I wake up my house and the people in it, my beautiful wife, my children, everybody under our roof, we are totally vulnerable. You know, heavy sleeper and snorer that I am, when I am unconscious, I am completely powerless to protect my family. I can put safeguards around our house. I can lock the doors and the windows. I can dial up my friends Smith and Wesson. I can be prepared. But the reality is I cannot, while sleeping, do anything, to fend off the robber, or the rapist, or the arsonist, or the murderer. Sure, I can respond once I’ve been awakened. But it would be a delayed response and would be a foggy response and it would be an overall effective response. I wish I were more vigilant than I am. But the reality is this body of flesh gets tired; and this body of flesh limits how effective a guardian I can be. I bring all this up only to illustrate the fact that my care for what’s under my roof is not at all like God’s care for His entire creation and for His people. He does not slumber or sleep. He does not grow weary. There is nothing that He does not see. He is all-knowing and all-seeing and never looking away and never distracted. Never blinking and never neglectful of His people and their good. No home security no Glock, no Sig, could buy you that amount of security!

Alright. So, we’ve seen that one aspect of God’s “keeping” us is by not allowing our foot to be moved or to “slip.” We’ve seen a second aspect of God’s “keeping” us is that He neither slumbers nor sleeps. Here’s a third aspect of God’s “keeping” us. He is our shade. Look at the end of verse 5 and reading into verse 6. After he says “the Lord is your keeper” then it says, “the Lord is your shade on your right hand. The sun will not smite you by day, nor the moon by night.” Have you ever seen people fighting for shade on a hot summer day or at a baseball game in the pitch mid of summer? People can get pretty creative. People can get pretty resourceful and people can even get aggressive to find a shady spot and box people out of their spot of shade under that little skinny tree. Well, in the part of the world this Psalmist lived in, this Psalmist, the heat that he would have been experiencing was that kind of heat you can’t stay in for too long without being broiled and totally baked and burned. Shade, in this climate was a must. It’s non-negotiable. It was a no-brainer, and it was a game-changer. So, to say that God is our “shade,” as the Psalmist does here is to give us another helpful metaphor for God’s comprehensive protection of and care for His people.

That word, by the way, “shade,” can also be translated and is translated “shadow” in other parts of the Old Testament. Like Psalm 17:8, “Hide me in the shadow of Your wings.” Or famously, Psalm 91:1 says, “He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.” Again, it speaks of protection and care.

Now here in Psalm 121:5, it says that God will be our shade “on our right hand.” What’s that referring to? Well, when the Psalmist here says that God is “on your right hand” he’s using yet another figure of speech. It does not mean that God is confined to a specific part of our body or side of our body as though He were not omnipresent in all places including our right side and our left side. No, but on our “on your right hand” or by our right side simply means he is “close” to us, He is near us, He’s at our side; and then our “shade.”

The it says in verse 6, “The sun shall not smite you by day,” or strike you by day. That’s a continuation of the thought that God is our “shade.” It says, “nor the moon by night.” Now this one’s interesting because there have been those, especially in ancient times who thought that too much exposure to the moon could either give you what’s called the “moonburn” or it could make you go crazy. In fact, the words “lunacy” and “lunatic” come from the Latin word “luna” for moon. I’m no doctor but the limited research I’ve done into this indicates that there aren’t enough beams or rays coming from any moon, any bright moonlight to actually provide any kind of burn or cause any kind of sun condition to our skin. There’s also no indication that lunacy is in any way connected to being out in the moonlight. That discussion can be saved for another day because whether the moon’s rays are actually harmful or whether they actually cause lunacy is not really the point that’s being made here. Instead, when he says, “The sun shall not smite you by day, nor the moon by night,” all the Psalmist is doing here is speaking comprehensively. He is speaking comprehensively. This is a common form of expression in Hebrew poetry where two opposites are given. East from the west, summer and winter, or here, sun and moon to express totality. What the Psalmist here is saying is that God “keeps” those who trust in Him, both day and night. He faithfully stands over His people and protects them both day and night. He does so perfectly both day and night. He is with them as their source of protection both day and night, all of the time is the idea.

The Lord “keeps” us by not allowing our foot to be moved. He “keeps” us by neither slumbering nor sleeping. He “keeps” us by serving as our source of shade as we just saw. Here’s the fourth aspect of His “keeping” of us here in Psalm 121. He keeps us comprehensively and eternally. Look at verses 7 and 8. It says, “The Lord will protect you from all evil; he will keep your soul.” Then it says, “the Lord will guard your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forever.” So, three more times in these final two verses we see the Psalmist using that same word keep, shamar. What he’s doing here is he’s summing up; he’s reiterating each of the previous promises that he’s referenced into this one broad category. Here in verse 7 these statements are given as deliberately and as comprehensively as possible as the Psalmist stresses the utter completeness of the Lord’s “keeping” and protection. He “will protect you,” it says, “from all evil.” That means He will preserve you from everything that could ever threaten your spiritual well-being. That calls to mind Ephesians 6:12 which speaks of the spiritual attacks that we will face as believers. It says, “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” But what the Psalm here is reminding us of is that God will protect us from those “world forces of this darkness.” He will protect us against the “spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” He will protect us from Satan and his demonic forces. He will protect us from spiritual harm. That doesn’t mean, by the way, He’ll never allow us to witness or see or otherwise experience evil in this life. Neither history nor modern reality nor personal experience would ever support that type of interpretation. I mean think of the early church martyrs and the blood they shed for the sake of the gospel. Think of the persecuted church today in places like China or other Muslim-dominated countries where the gospel is making inroads, but the persecution is fierce. Think of pockets of modern-day America where fanatical anti-Christian sentiments is running wild. Think of the persecution and if not persecution, ridicule you’ve faced for expressing Christian virtues and values in the post-Enlightenment world in which we live. Think of the evil that we see and hear about each and every day in our news feeds. Psalm 121 does not promise us an earthly existence free of any evil around us or influences, or thoughts, or images, or ideas. But what Psalm 121 does provide is a faint preview of what will be said later in I John 4:4 which is that “greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world.” As it says here in verse 7, He will “protect you from all evil.”

The end of verse 7 it says, “He will keep your soul.” That means He will protect you from every worldly force that would seek to rob you of your salvation. It doesn’t mean you’re going to live forever. We know from Hebrews 9:27 “It is appointed for men once to die, and after this comes judgment.” What it does mean though is God will preserve you spiritually. He will see you through your salvation through to the end. In John 10:27-28, Jesus affirms those words. John 10:27 “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.” What is Jesus effectively saying here? I will keep your soul.

Then we get the last verse here of this Psalm, verse 8. It says, “The LORD will guard your going out and your coming in.” That means He will providentially guard each and every one of your steps. And again, that expression “going out and coming in” is one of those statements of totality meaning no matter what you do, wherever you go, wherever you may be, whether it’s a difficult season of life or a joyful season of life, whether you’re at a happy phase or a sad phase or rich or poor or young or old, God is with you. He is your Keeper. Not only that, look at the last part of the verse, end of verse 8, “from this time forth and forever.” This is an emphatic assertion that Yahweh’s protection lasts forever. God guards and protects your coming and your going today and tomorrow and forevermore.

See, tying it all together, you’re going to miss the significance of this Psalm if you think of it only in terms of a journey up a mountain road a few thousand years ago. That is the original context, certainly, the immediate context of the Psalm. This Psalm also makes much broader spiritual and theological points that comforts; and the guarantees in this Psalm are not merely temporal reassurances for earthbound pilgrims on their way up to the Holy City of Jerusalem. What’s contained in this Psalm are also these are heaven-directed promises of spiritual blessings for redeemed saints from all time as we make our pilgrimage to the New Jerusalem. This Psalm then strikes a key eternal chord when it says, He “keeps” us, “from this time forth and forever.”

Now, one of the most famous sermons ever preached in our country’s history was preached at Enfield, Connecticut in 1741. The title of the sermon was “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” The preacher was Jonathan Edwards. I don’t know if this was your experience but believe it or not, I’m old enough that in high school we still read this sermon as part of our U.S. history class. You guys do that out here? We did that in California. We had to read “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” as part of U.S. history. I don’t know if they’d let you get away with that anymore today. But do you know what text Edwards preached in “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”? He preached Deuteronomy 32:35. Turn over there with me, if you would. Deuteronomy 32:35. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy 32. 32:35 says, “Vengeance is mine, and retribution, in due time their foot will slip; for the day of their calamity is near, and the impending things are hastening upon them.” Or as the ESV has it, that “their doom comes swiftly.” See I bring this up, Edwards, Deuteronomy 32, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” because Psalm 121, our text tonight, is absolutely comforting. It’s encouraging. It’s uplifting. It’s beloved by many. It’s rich. It’s poetic. It’s transcendent. But as sweet as its assurances and promises are, you cannot claim those promises if you are not one of God’s redeemed people.

If you are sitting here this evening and you are not right with God meaning, you have not repented and believed in Jesus as Savior, Psalm 121:3 where it says “he will not let your foot to slip” is not a truth you can claim. Don’t go posting that to your Facebook wall tonight. Instead, if you’re not a follower of Christ what ought to be taped to your mirror or on your dashboard, but more importantly, etched in your mind is Deuteronomy 32:35 because what that text is telling you is that your foot is not secure. Instead, you are on slippery ground and a day is coming where your foot will slip. How your foot slips, neither I nor anyone else can tell you how that’s going to happen. Maybe your foot will slip when literally you go tumbling down a hill. Maybe your foot will slip when the doctor gives you that terminal cancer diagnosis. Maybe your foot will slip when you die peacefully in your sleep, of natural causes at a ripe old age. Regardless of when it will happen the fact is it will happen. Your foot will slip; when that happens, something that you’re going to face is far more perilous than falling into some deep ravine. Instead, you are going to face eternal punishment and judgment in the hands of a holy God. The God that you’ve been living your entire life in opposition to. The God that you’ve been thumbing your nose at with the sinful life that you choose to live. That God would be just and righteous in sentencing you based on the reality and gravity of your sin to an eternity in hell.

If this describes you or anyone here this evening, if any of what I am saying is resonating with you, you need to lift your eyes to an altogether different hill. I know we don’t have hills around here to look at necessarily, but you need to look to Calvary’s hill. You need to understand that Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ, the Second Person of the Trinity, the God-Man, walked, put on flesh, walked on earth as a pilgrim. He was the ultimate wayfarer. He took the ultimate trip to Jerusalem. Instead of experiencing safety and refreshment when He reached Jerusalem, rather He was rejected and spit upon and tortured and murdered. He gave His life voluntarily, our Lord did, according to the perfect plan and foreknowledge of God. He did so as an immeasurable act of His love and mercy and grace. He did so to secure the forgiveness of sins of people like you and me, so that we would have eternal life and have our sins forgiven. Have you trusted in Jesus Christ to save you? If you haven’t, beware the slip of your foot. Know that you are a sinner. Know that, to borrow from the sermon title from Edwards, you are “A Sinner in the Hands of an Angry God!” Know that you are in grave danger and great peril and what you need to do is run to Jesus Christ today. Flee to Him. Seek shelter in Him before it’s too late.

Well, the Spanish flu, the Spanish pandemic that I mentioned at the beginning of the sermon was nothing to take lightly. The virus ended up causing a mass sense of hysteria all over the world and actually caused a staggering amount of damage and death. According to some estimates, somewhere around 500 million people were ultimately infected worldwide with some strain of the virus at some point and numbers are fuzzy because the records weren’t very clear back then. But some estimates are, somewhere around 50 million people could have died of this virus. It wiped out a significant percentage of the world’s population. Now of course we were told a few years ago that a similar virus had the potential to wipe out the world’s population in 2020. That didn’t happen and I’m not making a political point here at all. But maybe it will happen one day. No one knows. We don’t know. It could happen. Only the Lord knows. What we do know is this. That there is nothing happening out there right now, in Russia, in China, in America, on land, in the air, in the sea, in the furthest and remotest corners of the galaxy that is not under the care and protection and sovereign hand of a good God who sits on high.

So, knowing that, it’s good to remember, as we close, that we, as followers of Christ are mere sojourners. We’re mere exiles. We are just passing through this place called Earth. We need to recall where this journey ultimately goes. Where our pilgrim’s road takes us, which is the New Jerusalem. In fact, as we close, let’s turn over to Revelation 21 just to be reminded with some encouragement about where our road goes. Where our road culminates. We’ll pick it up on verse 10. It says, “and He carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God having the glory of God. Her brilliance was like a very costly stone. As a stone of crystal-clear jasper. It had a great and high wall with twelve gates and at the gates twelve angels. And names were written on them which are the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel. There were three gates on the east and three gates on the north and three gates on the south and three gates on the west. And the wall of the city had twelve foundation stones and on them were the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. The one who spoke with me had a gold measuring rod to measure the city and its gates and its wall. The city is laid out as a square. And its length is as great as its width. And he measured the city with the rod, fifteen hundred miles. Its length, height and width are equal. And he measured its walls seventy-two yards according to human measurements which are also angelic measurements. The material of the wall was jasper. And the city was pure gold like clear glass. The foundation stones of the city were adorned with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation stone was jasper; the second sapphire; the third chalcedony; the fourth emerald; the fifth sardonyx; the sixth sardius; the seventh chrysolite; the eight beryl; the nineth topaz; the tenth chrysoprase; the eleventh jacinth; the twelfth amethyst. And the twelve gates were twelve pearls and each one of the gates was a single pearl. And the street of the city was pure gold like transparent glass. I saw no temple in it for the Lord God, the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. And the city has no need of the sun or of the moon to shine on it for the glory of God has illumined it and its lamp is the Lamb. The nations will walk by its light and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it in the daytime for there will be no night there. Its gates will never be closed, and they will bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it. And nothing unclean and no one who practices abomination and lying shall ever come into it but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.” That’s where our pilgrim days are taking us. Praise Jesus Christ for securing such a place for us. The least we can do as we walk on our journey is to do what this Psalm is teaching us to do, which is to hold fast to our Helper while we keep our eyes on the Keeper.

Let’s pray. God thank you. Thank you so much as we reflect on the New Jerusalem and where this is all going and where Your people will dwell for eternity. God we can’t wait for that day, and we can’t wait for that place. We can’t wait for the reward that comes at the end of all of this. God at the end of this life there are difficulties. There are trials. There are hardships. There are frustrations. We know that from experience. We know that from the world. We know that from history. But God I thank you for Psalm 121. I thank you for the truth we’ve learned from it this evening about You being our source of help and you being the One who keeps us no matter where we are and what we’re doing. So, God help us to be honorable before You. Help us to live lives of gratitude. Help us to live lives of joyful obedience to You as we walk on the path that You have us on. Help us to be a faithful people, a God-honoring people. A people that are continually seeking Your will and Your word. And may You be pleased with us. God I thank you for this day of worship. I ask that You would go before us this week, that You keep us strong in our walk and be glorified through us. It’s in Jesus name we pray, amen.