[0:00] Thank you again for inviting me here. As I said it's been so lovely to meet all of you. Can I have a Bible Peter? Thank you.!
[0:11] So we as humans are needy people aren't we? We have many needs. We cannot just exist in this world.
[0:25] In fact if we if we were to stay still for too long we would surely pass away. But one of our most pressing needs as human beings is the need for shelter.
[0:36] Where we're so fragile and we need this covering from the elements from the rain and the cold and the heat. And if you ever go camping you know that one of the most important things to have prepared besides water and food is a place to sleep.
[0:50] We need shelter. Because there is a real danger in being exposed to the elements. We're not like the camel who can spend all day in the hot desert sun of just baking.
[1:03] We're not like the cow who is fine to spend her time in the rain and the brisk weather in the fields. If we lived like either of these animals we would certainly die of exposure over time.
[1:14] Um, so we need shelter and we work so hard to find shelter and to keep it and maintain it. So much of our lives is devoted just to making sure we have an apartment or a house and that it's fixed.
[1:27] And that we have a place prepared for our children to sleep and to be comfortable. But we also spend money on insurance to protect us from floods and fires. So suffice to say so much of our lives are revolved around shelter.
[1:42] Uh, we, we plan, we plan for emergencies, but what ought to be clear to us is that we cannot plan perfectly. Because the things of the world are really outside of our control.
[1:53] Um, and our shelters that we construct are ultimately always temporary. Um, not far from where I live are the outer banks as I'm sure the ladies from America are familiar with.
[2:05] Uh, the outer banks of North Carolina. These are thin barrier islands that stretch out from our coastline into the Atlantic. And all over the outer banks are houses built literally on the sand.
[2:19] However, over time they've, they've drifted and gotten closer and closer to the shore. Uh, in fact, there is a hurricane that came through about a month ago, I think called Aaron.
[2:30] And you can look this up and you see waves just battering these houses, just crashing right onto them. Um, and they weren't originally built so that waves could crash on them, but they drifted over time.
[2:41] And over time, the sea will overtake them. Um, they are subject to destruction over time. And this reminds us that every human made fortress, no matter how grand, no matter how strong from our perspective, is in the grand sweep of time, but a mere tent to be blown by the wind.
[3:00] Even here in Ireland, you have the great castles, but if they're not maintained well, they will disintegrate eventually. Though they have stood the test of time.
[3:11] So then, if there is no true safe shelter in this world, how can we have peace of mind? How can we walk in this life with peace? Our psalm today gives us the answer in Psalm 91.
[3:25] Uh, we will see today from God's word that although the world gives us many reasons to fear, we can hide ourselves in Christ. Christ. And we'll see that Christ is the one whom the psalm points us to and points us to trust in and to hide in.
[3:40] So, I'm going to pray as we begin our time. Our Father in heaven, you have graciously given us these words of Psalm 91 to your children for our benefit, that we'd find comfort in them.
[3:54] But also, Lord, so that we'd see the beauty of your son, Jesus Christ. Christ. Um, and we recognize that Jesus, Lord, when you came to this earth, you died and rose again and ascended.
[4:06] You did not desire to leave us alone. But, Lord, you said you would be with us to the end of the age. And that you would send your Holy Spirit to our hearts to comfort us, to guide us, and to convict us of sin.
[4:18] So, I pray, Lord, that we would know your presence, Holy Spirit, and that you would convict our hearts this morning of the ways in which we fall short of your glory. And, God, guide us to marvel at the glories of Christ today in this text.
[4:34] Help us to hide ourselves in you and find shelter in you. And we pray this in Jesus' holy name. Amen. So, we're going to read the text. Psalm 91, page 600, in case you have not gotten there yet.
[4:49] Amen. Amen. The text reads this.
[5:00] Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress, my God in whom I trust.
[5:17] Surely, He will save you from the fowler's snare and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with His feathers and under His wings you will find refuge.
[5:29] His faithfulness will be your shield and your rampart. You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday.
[5:46] A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. You will only observe with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked.
[5:58] If you say, the Lord is my refuge, and you make the Most High your dwelling, no harm will overtake you. No disaster will come near your tent, for He will command His angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways.
[6:16] They will lift you up in their hands so that you will not strike your foot against a stone. You will tread on the lion and the cobra. You will trample the great lion and the serpent.
[6:27] Because He loves me, says the Lord, I will rescue Him. I will protect Him, for He acknowledges my name.
[6:38] He will call on me, and I will answer Him. I will be with Him in trouble. I will deliver Him and honor Him. With long life I will satisfy Him and show Him my salvation.
[6:53] This is the word of the Lord. It's important to note, when studying the Psalms, to understand that there's a particular flow to the book of Psalms.
[7:05] There's five books in the book of Psalms, and here we're in book four, I believe. In the Psalm before 91, we have Psalm 90, and there's a focus on the people of God as a whole dwelling in the presence of God.
[7:22] So there's a collective dwelling in the presence of God. But when we get to Psalm 91, we fix our eyes on an individual. There's a turn to a specific person.
[7:34] And this person, as we've read, seems to be a conquering king. He's a man dealing with battles and attacks and enemies. And throughout the Psalms and the Old Testament as a whole, there's this key connection between the covenant of people of God thriving and flourishing and the righteousness of the king.
[7:57] We see this as we read Samuel, as you are in a series on Samuel, as you get to King Saul and then David eventually and the rest of the kings.
[8:08] There's a clear pattern that when the king is dwelling in righteousness, the people also dwell in righteousness. But when the king is unrighteous, in general, the people largely move to idolatry and the practices of the surrounding peoples.
[8:23] So as the king goes, so the people go. So in this Psalm, in 91, we see a picture of the perfect king or leader of the people of Israel.
[8:36] But who is this king and what is the identity of this man? Well, it's the same identity as the blessed man of Psalm 1 and the anointed one of Psalm 2.
[8:48] These Psalms point to the Messiah, the true king of Israel, who will lead the people of God into peace and who will judge his enemies. This is a king who has fully submitted his life and his well-being into the hands of Yahweh, the Lord, his covenant name.
[9:07] This is a king in the Psalm who is reflected by David in many ways, but who is greater in every way than David. This is a king who leads his people into everlasting peace because this king's throne is from everlasting to everlasting, as we see in a psalm after Psalm 91.
[9:29] This is a king who leads his people into peace. However, the beauty of the Psalms is although they point to Christ, they prophesy of him, they are messianic, they also apply to us as the people of God and we can find peace.
[9:45] And we could be called blessed and we can know and we can experience the benefits of making God our refuge. But why is that? It's because ultimately this is what our Messiah has come to bring us.
[10:01] As the king goes, so the people go. As Jesus goes, so we go as well. So we're going to break this text down kind of line by line.
[10:12] The text says in verses 1 and 2, So we see here many different metaphors or ways of looking at who God is, what his character is like.
[10:38] And the writer of this psalm is not afraid of combining many metaphors. We see here four different images that help us picture what God is like. Number one is the most high is a shelter.
[10:52] And this is a beautiful contrast that speaks to the character and nature of God. God who is both over his creation is also with his creation. God who is the most majestic and greatest of all is also like a ground level structure.
[11:09] He's like a tent. He's like a small building which God provides for protection. The man of Psalm 91 lives inside of the most high God.
[11:19] And this relationship of dwelling with the most high God is rather unique to Christianity. This isn't found in the other religions of the world. This is a God-man relationship that is exclusively Christian.
[11:34] Some religions keep God only high above us. Other religions make their gods too close to us as humans, making them more like us than God-like.
[11:45] For example, we think of Greek or Norse mythology where the gods mixed with the humans. But our faith unites the majesty of the creator of the universe, the one God, with the humility of a baby in a manger, Jesus Christ.
[12:01] Jesus is the perfect picture of the most high becoming, like a ground level structure. God coming to earth. God coming to earth. So we see that's our first image.
[12:14] The second image is that we see the shadow of the Almighty, dwelling in the shadow of the Almighty. This is a parallel image, another image that presents the same truth that we just read in the first one.
[12:28] The man abides in the shadow of the Almighty. It gives this image of a really hot desert, scorching, barren desert. And God is like the one cloud in the sky that you'd want to stay under, that you'd hope would continue to cover the sun at high noon.
[12:45] You'd want to keep where the cloud was. You'd want to follow the cloud by day to keep from getting sun burnt or overheated. God is our almighty covering. The third image is that of God as a refuge.
[12:59] A refuge highlights something similar to an oasis in a desert. It's a place of refreshment, a water source, a place to cool off from the heat of the day, the heat of the desert.
[13:12] And this points us to God is our sustainer and provider at all times, but especially in a desert time, in a time of need, a time of lack. God is our almighty covering, and God will give us all that we need.
[13:27] And finally, the last image here is God as a fortress. He is a castle surrounded by a thick moat. He is a castle with high towers made with thick stones that arrows cannot penetrate.
[13:43] God is immovable, unbreakable, and unchangeable. And some people think that theology isn't practical. They think, why should we learn theology?
[13:55] But when we know that, when we know who God is rightly, and we put our trust in him, we become unshakable because our God is unshakable.
[14:05] When we understand what it means that God is immutable, which means that he doesn't change. He's not subject to change. This should help us trust God as our mighty fortress.
[14:16] God cannot be affected to ever change in his nature. And this means that we can always rely on the fortress of his deep love for us. And God truly is love.
[14:28] You've heard the verse before, God is love, right? For God truly is love and never ceases to be love. He never changes. We can rely on him as a mighty fortress in that way.
[14:39] So, these initial images describe the man's trust in God. What does it look like to trust in God? What are some ways to think about that? And this degree of trust is the grounds by which the rest of the psalm takes place.
[14:55] So, because he trusts in God, then God will, and it continues on. There's many promises that we have read and will read in this scripture. And so, let's unpack these dangers that God will protect him from.
[15:10] And these dangers are arranged in a specific way in this psalm. The first two dangers speak of escaping the judgment of God. So, the first, protection from God's judgment.
[15:23] We see this in verse 3. Surely he will save you from the fowler's snare. So, we see this image. And a fowler's snare is a bird trap.
[15:34] That's not a term, a phrase we use in common speech. As far as where I'm from. But you might read this and think that it seems like an odd danger for the psalmist to speak of, to mention.
[15:48] What does a bird trap have to do with all this? Well, a bird trap in this context and in the Bible is used as a metaphor for God's sudden judgment.
[16:00] We see this in several texts in the Bible. It's a picture of a trap clamping down with serrated teeth on its victim in an instant.
[16:11] It's instantaneous. This is a picture of God's judgment that the wicked ought to fear. It ought to bring fear. For God's judgment comes when we're least expecting it.
[16:21] Like a thief in the night. When we see in the New Testament. But for the man in this psalm, instead of falling into sudden condemnation, likened to a bird trap, God will save him.
[16:35] God will save him. God is not against the man, but is for the man. And God is likened to a majestic mother bird. God, like a mother bird, will cover this man like one of her chicks.
[16:49] One of her young. So I love that image of God as protecting us and we're under his wings. So God doesn't suddenly condemn the man, but he swoops in to cover him, to save him.
[17:04] Verse 3, the second half of verse 3 mentions deadly pestilence. We see this mentioned again in verses 6 and 10. Pestilence is an older word for disease.
[17:16] It's a common theme in the Old Testament. Pestilence is that symbolizes judgment for sin. We read of pestilence in Exodus 32. Moses knew of pestilence when God sent a plague on the people of Israel for making the golden calf.
[17:32] David knew of pestilence when it's recorded towards the end of his reign that he decided pridefully to take account of the people without asking God. And God sent a pestilence, a disease, to wipe out 70,000 men of Israel.
[17:49] David, in that moment, he decided to take a census. Did not consider God as his refuge, but he pridefully sought to work in his own strength.
[18:00] But when we make God our refuge, God will not send us a pestilence for judgment. Or he will not clamp down on us as a bird trap.
[18:11] And the reminder of these verses is that when we put our trust in the judge, we are not under his condemning judgment. Romans 8.1, one of my favorite verses in the Bible.
[18:24] There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Romans 3.26 tells us that God is the just and the justifier.
[18:36] He's both the judge and the one who makes us just before his eyes. So we can trust in him. Unlike the courtrooms of this world, we cling to our judge, trusting in him that his verdict on us is not guilty.
[18:51] When we come to our judge, we trust in him. Unlike the courtrooms of the world. And why? It's because Jesus bore the punishment we deserved on the cross.
[19:03] By God's grace, we have escaped the condemnation of our sin. There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Cling on to that. And it's important to note that not one of the kings or leaders of Israel were completely saved from God's judgments.
[19:20] Nor did they perfectly deliver the people of Israel from these dangers. Moses and David might have been the closest. But as I said, even they dealt with pestilence and judgment at times.
[19:32] Certainly the rest of the kings led the people into judgment. If you've read the books of 1 and 2 Kings, it's just judgment after judgment and division after division.
[19:44] And so only the Messiah would be able to lead the people and himself into this kind of peace spoken of in Psalm 91. However, Jesus would only lead his people into peace after first taking on God's judgment on himself on the cross.
[20:02] Jesus took on our punishment and judgment that we would have peace. That we would have this shalom, as is said in the Old Testament. And in his resurrection, he brings new life to his people.
[20:16] And it promised that there will one day be a world with no more disease or infection. There will one day be no more judgment for sin because God will come and judge those who do not trust in Jesus.
[20:30] And we will live in a perfect new heavens and a new earth. So we've seen God's protection from judgment. But now we see protection from evil.
[20:42] In verses 4 and 5, it says, He will cover you with his feathers and under his wings you will find refuge. And then he highlights this. His faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
[20:55] You will not fear the terror of the night nor the arrow that flies by day. So because the man makes God his refuge, God will be a shield and a rampart.
[21:09] And I think we all understand what a shield is. But a rampart, I had to look into this a little bit because, again, that's not a word I come across very often. A rampart can be understood as a wall-like protection on all sides of a person.
[21:23] And I kind of imagine, like, if you were to have a rampart in a battle, maybe it would be similar to if you've seen, like, Spartan movies or something, like the movie 300, where the soldiers, they're all holding up their shields.
[21:37] And it's basically they're all covering one another. And so they're protected on all sides from the arrows flying at them. So that's how I kind of imagine a rampart to be. It's God protecting us on all sides.
[21:50] So God isn't merely like a singular shield, but he's like a rampart on all sides of us. And we want God to protect every part of us, to watch over every part of us, not just our bodies, but also our minds, our souls.
[22:07] So God protects every part of us. In verses 7 and 8, it says that God will protect the man from the thousands who are against him. And so imagine this, a lone soldier against an army of thousands.
[22:23] There were many against this man in Psalm 91. But this is a reminder that the people of God as a whole have enemies. And some people think that Christianity or being a Christian is just about trying to be nice to everybody, to be friendly with everyone.
[22:37] And we do seek to show people the love of Christ. But the reality is, is people are against us and spirits are against us. There is both spiritual enemies and physical enemies that we come across.
[22:51] Both people and spiritual enemies at times seek our harm. But when God is our refuge, who can stand against us? Paul answers in Romans 8 that no one can stand against us.
[23:06] No enemies, no height nor depth. Nothing can stand against us. In verses 11 through 12, though there are thousands against the man, God will send his angels.
[23:18] We see this promise of angels. This man and we can trust that God will protect us. And to protect us, God often uses the means of angels. We can't see them, but they are there.
[23:30] Angels are powerful spiritual beings. In some cases, they are messengers. In the case of the angel Gabriel to Mary. But there are also warriors. In the case of the archangel Michael.
[23:43] And how often we often forget about the angels around us. But the Bible makes it clear that there are more who are for us than who are against us. We can't even comprehend the angels' armies around us at all times.
[23:59] But God is protecting us from things that we don't even know are happening around us. Spiritual realities that are happening. We ought to pray more often for spiritual protection from the schemes of the enemy.
[24:12] We ought to pray more often that God would send us his angels to protect us. And then as we continue in verses 14 and 16, we see many promises highlighted.
[24:23] God will deliver. He will protect. He will answer. He will be with him. He will rescue him. He will honor him. He will satisfy the man with long life.
[24:35] And show the man his salvation. And we could spend a lot of time looking at each of these individual promises. But I just encourage you to cling on to these.
[24:46] To memorize them. Remind yourselves of them often. And how much peace we so often lack because we simply forget and we neglect these verses and these promises.
[24:57] God promises his people to be delivered from evil. And he promises these things because he is a good father. What good father wouldn't protect his children?
[25:08] And I know I would do all that I could to protect my daughter Eleanor. But think about how much God who is all powerful and who himself is love will protect you.
[25:21] Because the most high is our shelter. We have nothing in this world to fear. And so when we think of how this text points us to the Lord Jesus Christ.
[25:32] We can be reminded that Jesus chose to deliver himself to evil. He could have been rescued at any time of his earthly life. But Jesus went head first to face evil.
[25:45] Before Jesus would go to the cross. Jesus went to the wilderness for 40 days to fast and be tempted by Satan, the adversary. In this 40 day wilderness temptation.
[25:58] Jesus was tempted by the devil to use his powers to his own advantage. And to be rescued from the angels. And Satan quoted this very psalm.
[26:08] But Jesus did not cower. He did not seek to evade the evil that was against him. But he responded to the devil that it is written. That you shall not put the Lord your God to the test.
[26:22] So Jesus was faithful and did not use his powers to avoid Satan. But he faced Satan head on. After the 40 days. I love this. This is so interesting. Matthew noted that angels did come to minister to the Lord Jesus.
[26:36] But Jesus in the moment that he was facing the devil did not cower back an inch. He didn't move an inch. And that's because Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil head on.
[26:48] But where would he ultimately do this? The cross. Through his death to confound the wisdom of the world. On the cross, sin was paid for. And the powers of evil were defeated.
[27:01] Both are true. On the cross, Jesus could have sent down legions of angels to rescue him. And when Jesus was on the cross, there was another devilish attack on him.
[27:12] A man sought to tempt Jesus to step off the cross and come down. But Jesus did not use his powers to make his life any easier. He didn't want to make anything easier or avoid the judgment of God.
[27:26] He knew he had to finish the task given to him by his father. So Jesus faced evil head on for our salvation. Though he could have been rescued if he so willed it.
[27:39] However, Jesus, though he faced evil on the cross and in his life, in his resurrection and ascension, and in his return one day, very soon, he shall not take on evil more, evil anymore.
[27:54] No evil shall ever befall Jesus again. He shall finish evil with a word, sending the devil into the lake of fire. It was and is finished on the cross, church.
[28:06] Jesus, the perfect king, will never have to struggle again against the powers of evil. And Jesus did that in his body, in his life, and in his death. And he is now victorious.
[28:17] And because of that, evil will be judged, which is the next emphasis of this psalm. Evil will be judged.
[28:27] In verses 8 and 13, we see this. Evil will be repaid and conquered. Evil here is represented by the lion and the serpent.
[28:39] In some older translations, it even uses the word dragon. So this harkens back to Genesis 3.15, which is a promise to the serpent who tempted Eve and Adam both to sin, breaking God's relationship with humanity and plunging us into death.
[28:58] God said to the serpent, I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring. He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel.
[29:09] And here in this promise, in this psalm, it promises that the man will tread on the lion and the cobra. You will trample on the great lion and the serpent.
[29:20] So this is certainly a reference back to Genesis 3.15. And the apostle Peter in the New Testament looks back to this theme as Satan as a roaring lion in 1 Peter 5.8, saying to flee him.
[29:35] Run from the lion. But we are so often like the child at the zoo who stands innocently behind the glass as we did at FOTA the other day, while the lions are on the other side.
[29:46] But in our case, the reality is there's no glass between us and Satan. And so often we walk right up to the lion, curious about his ways and his seeming beauty.
[29:57] But church, flee the lion. Do not be tempted by his beauty or his ways. Don't fall prey to his false words. Be like the antelope who knows to flee the lion on sight.
[30:11] Flee, run from the lion, and fly to Christ. And the promise here in this verse is that the work of the serpent shall be defeated by the man of Psalm 91. So this reigning king not only has victory against evil, but against the author of evil and the one from whom all evil flows, the devil, the roaring lion.
[30:33] And so Jesus, of course, is the one who accomplished this, as we've seen. He defeated the devil in his temptation in the wilderness, and he defeated the devil by dying on the cross and rising from the dead.
[30:46] Through Jesus' resurrection, there is a reversal of what was wrought for humanity by the ancient serpent in the garden. Death was destroyed by the seed of the woman, Jesus Christ.
[31:00] Now, in saying that this text, it prophesies Jesus, are we saying that we cannot find comfort in it? Absolutely not. Jesus came to bring us peace with God.
[31:11] Jesus came that we would be more than conquerors through him. Jesus came to overcome the world so that we would also overcome through him. And not only that, Paul says in Romans 16, 20, that in some sense, God crushes Satan under our feet as well.
[31:30] This is a reminder of our close union we have with Jesus. His victory is ours. His death is ours. His redemption is ours. His resurrection is ours.
[31:42] And his victory is ours. All for the glory of the triune God. No glory to ourselves. So when we make God our refuge and abide in Christ as he calls us to do, these things can be true of us as well in a spiritual and in a future sense.
[32:00] But this psalm is not given to us to think that we'll always avoid sickness or that the evil in this world can't do us any damage. It's given to us to remember that because of what Jesus has done for us, we don't have to fear though the earth gives way.
[32:19] We don't have to fall into despair when we fall ill. Evil may kill us. Pestilence may kill our bodies. But evil shall not overcome us.
[32:31] Evil and pestilence cannot kill the soul. So we don't have to act in our own strength to overcome the evil and the injustices in this world. Jesus has done this for us and promises that because he rose from the dead, we can have a true hope for the future when these dangers and illnesses and uncertainties and injustices will be no more.
[32:57] So the question for us today is how can we hide ourselves in God in the midst of our struggles that we're going through right now? And it's crucial to note that the first elements of danger in the psalm highlight the judgment of God.
[33:11] But if you are in Christ, you will not face the judgments, the condemning judgments of God. You will face discipline, but not condemnation for your sin.
[33:22] The dangers we face are used by God to make us more like Jesus Christ. So what are those things in your life that God is allowing you to face right now?
[33:33] What are the challenges? And how can you live in the midst of them with God as your refuge? So first, when we consider the material struggles of this life, such as money issues, living situation issues, finding housing, in light of this psalm, we can have peace and we can be led to repentance for leaning on our own understanding.
[33:57] We can be led to repentance when we realize we have been putting our trust in created things to give us security. We can say, Lord, I'm sorry for finding peace in my circumstances and not in you.
[34:11] And then we can seek to view ourselves as hiding, not in the shadow of money or in a house or in a visa acceptance letter or anything else, but as hiding under the shadow of the Almighty God.
[34:26] And this is a lot easier said than done, I know, to just say it like that. But the more you meditate on these truths, let them pierce your soul, let them embed themselves into you, I believe the more God will conform your heart to hide in Him, to find refuge in Him and not in these material things.
[34:50] And maybe for some of you, the world around you and the culture is changing at such a pace that you're not ready for and you don't know what's going on and maybe the place where you grew up is not the place you see today.
[35:04] And I don't want to know how to, I don't want to pretend to know how to speak to that particular issue in this context, but I encourage you to meditate on this psalm and ask God, God, how can I have peace when everything around me is changing?
[35:18] Think upon the unchanging nature of God. He does not change. And the unchanging God, though everything around us changes, the unchanging God is the one whom you are hiding in.
[35:33] Thirdly, others for us here, we are struggling with relationship troubles. Sometimes the conflicts we find ourselves in are our own doing and we have to seek forgiveness from people.
[35:45] But other times we are wronged and it feels like certain people are against us. It feels like certain people are against us. Or maybe some of you have spouses who aren't believers and you feel a constant conflict between your worldviews, between your mindsets and decision making.
[36:05] And all these relationships, though they are troublesome to us at times, we can have peace in the midst of them, trusting that God will work things out in His timing and in His sovereignty.
[36:18] I think of my older brother who, one of my older brothers, who for the longest time did not trust in the Lord, did not walk in His ways, but we had been praying for him for many years and now it seems like he is seeking to follow Jesus, seeking to grow in His knowledge of His Word and in prayer.
[36:36] And so it takes time. So we pray for the salvation of the souls we love and we wait on God to work in His timing. We wait for God to change hearts and to lead people to repentance and to seek forgiveness, both from God and from us at times, for reconciliation that we'd be brought together.
[36:57] So this is a reminder that we ought to not draw peace from our relationships with other fallen, sinful human beings, but we ought to draw our peace and security in our relationship with the unchanging God.
[37:12] And then another area we can apply this psalm to is in our temptations to sin. We might not all struggle in the same way, but certainly we all struggle to fight sin.
[37:24] We fight and then we lose in our own strength. But we fight and we win by God's grace and by His power in us. We cannot fight our battles with sin and temptation alone.
[37:37] We need God at every single moment. We need His strength and His power. And we have it when we abide in Christ, when we hide in Christ, when we remain in Him.
[37:49] Christ is our life and He is our faithful High Priest who is able to sympathize with us in our weaknesses. He lived as a human just like us. So God is not just up there waiting to be disappointed by us when we sin, but God is actually rooting for us and He's not just up there, but He is with us.
[38:10] He's given us His Holy Spirit. He is in us and ready to give us strength, especially when we ask. We need to ask Him for strength.
[38:21] The Scripture today says in verse 15, He will call on me and I will answer Him. I will be with Him in trouble. I will deliver Him and honor Him.
[38:33] And it goes on in verse 16, With long life I will satisfy Him and show Him my salvation. And this is a precious promise that we can cling to. We can call on God when we are tempted to sin.
[38:47] And He promises to be with us and to deliver us. And how often we fall into sin simply because we forget this promise and don't call on Him. We simply fail to call on Him and ask for help and so we fall and fall into sin.
[39:03] So God, have mercy on us for we are so forgetful, Lord, and how limited we are, right, as human beings. How dependent we truly are. We need shelter.
[39:15] We need a covering. And yet, in our flesh, we crave to be without one. We crave independence from God. we think we should have power in us to rule ourselves.
[39:27] And we crave a life where no one tells us what to do or we don't need anything or anyone. We crave this in our flesh. We crave a life of unrestrained chains of dependence.
[39:39] We don't want to be clasped down by the fetters of dependence. independence. And this temptation towards independence from God has been floating around in us ever since the serpent whispered into the ear of our first mother Eve.
[39:57] He said to her, for God knows that when you eat of the fruit, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. So she was tempted to be her own God in that time.
[40:10] And we are tempted to think that we don't need God because we think we can be like Him in our own strength. We think we have the power to govern ourselves, to provide for ourselves, to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps.
[40:26] But the truth is painfully obvious that we are actually in control of nothing in this world. And to many of us, this is abundantly clear. When you go through times of failure, it's just obvious that we are in control of nothing.
[40:41] And so, so what are we to do with this? We are to hide ourselves in the one who needs nothing and who is all-powerful, trusting in God to work in us and through us.
[40:55] So, church, let's hide in God this week, not relying on the crumbling shelter of our own selves. So, Quark Baptist, make God, who is the Most High, your shelter.
[41:08] Live under his shadow. Let's pray. Our Father in Heaven, we confess the areas in which we have sought to live in our own strength by our own wisdom without the fear of you, Lord.
[41:28] But God, we confess these things and we seek to turn from our ways, from our desire for independence from you. God, help us to hide ourselves in you.
[41:42] Help us to call out to you when we are faced with temptation to sin. God, help us to think upon Christ often who defeated evil. God, when we are hurt by others, friends and families, both inside and outside the church, help us to remember the evil Jesus faced.
[42:03] Help us to remember that we are no better than anyone. Humble us, Lord, for we as well would have put Jesus on the cross.
[42:15] We sin against him every single day. So help us to offer forgiveness as he offered forgiveness for those who were staring at him on the cross, saying, Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.
[42:32] So thank you, Lord, for your grace. God, sanctify us as we think upon these things this week. Help us to hide in you and not in the things of the world, not in the material things, not in our living situation, nothing at all.
[42:48] And I pray for the soul here, the heart here that does not know you, that does not, has not ever found him or herself hiding under your shadow, but rather under the shadow of one's own self or of the government or of any other thing that they have sought to find peace in.
[43:06] I pray that they would surrender their hearts and their lives to you, knowing that you are the God of the universe who loves them and who has sent your son to die in their place on the cross to live a perfect life and then to die and then to rise from the dead on the third day, defeating death, defeating sin, and offering us eternal life and abundant life with you when we trust in you, Jesus.
[43:35] Thank you, Jesus, for this time. We pray that we would depend on you, we would live for you and live in you, remain in you, Lord. We love you and it's in your holy name, Jesus, we pray.
[43:47] Amen. Amen.