Psalm 121
121:1. It is wise to look to the strong for strength. Dwellers in valleys are subject to many disorders for which there is no cure but a sojourn in the uplands, and it is well when they shake off their lethargy and resolve upon a climb. Down below they are the prey of marauders, and to escape from them the surest method is to fly to the strongholds upon the mountains. Often before the actual ascent the sick and plundered people looked towards the hills and longed to be upon their summits. The holy man who here sings looked away from the slanderers by whom he was tormented to the Lord who saw all from the high places, and was ready to pour down succor for his injured servant. Help comes to saints only from above; they look elsewhere in vain. Let us lift up our eyes with hope, expectancy, desire, and confidence. Satan will endeavor to keep our eyes upon our sorrows that we may be disquieted and discouraged; be it ours firmly to resolve that we will look out and look up, for there is good cheer for the eyes, and they that lift up their eyes to the eternal hills will soon have their hearts lifted up also. The purposes of God; the divine attributes; the immutable promises; the covenant, ordered in all things and sure; the providence, predestination, and proved faithfulness of the Lord—these are the hills to which we must lift up our eyes, for from these our help must come. It is our resolve that we will not be bandaged and blindfolded, but will lift up our eyes.
Or is the text in the interrogative? Does he ask, “Shall I lift up mine eyes to the hills?” Does he feel that the highest places of the earth can afford him no shelter? Or does he renounce the idea of recruits hastening to his standard from the hardy mountaineers? Does he again inquire, “Whence cometh my help?” If so, the next verse answers the question, and shows whence all help must come.
121:2. What we need is help—help powerful, efficient, constant: we need a very present help in trouble. What a mercy that we have it in our God. Our hope is in Jehovah, for our help comes from him. Help is on the road, and will not fail to reach us in due time, for he who sends it to us was never known to be too late. Jehovah who created all things is equal to every emergency; heaven and earth are at the disposal of him who made them, therefore let us be very joyful in our infinite helper. He will sooner destroy heaven and earth than permit his people to be destroyed, and the perpetual hills themselves will bow rather than he fail whose ways are everlasting. We are bound to look beyond heaven and earth to him who made them both; it is vain to trust the creatures: it is wise to trust the Creator.
121:3. He will not suffer thy foot to be moved. Though the paths of life are dangerous and difficult, yet we shall stand fast, for Jehovah will not permit our feet to slide; and if he will not suffer it we shall not suffer it. If our feet will be thus kept we may be sure that our head and heart will be preserved also. In the original the words express a wish or prayer—“May he not suffer thy foot to be moved.” Promised preservation should be the subject of perpetual prayer; and we may pray believingly, for those who have God for their keeper will be safe from all the perils of the way. Among the hills and ravines of Palestine the literal keeping of the feet is a great mercy; but in the slippery ways of a tried and afflicted life, the boon of upholding is of priceless value, for a single false step might cause us a fall fraught with awful danger. To stand erect and pursue the even tenor of our way is a blessing which only God can give, which is worthy of the divine hand, and worthy also of perennial gratitude. Our feet will move in progress, but they will not be moved to their overthrow.
He that keepeth thee will not slumber—or “thy keeper will not slumber.” We should not stand a moment if our keeper were to sleep; we need him by day and by night; not a single step can be safely taken except under his guardian eye. This is a choice stanza in a pilgrim song. God is the convoy and bodyguard of his saints. When dangers are awake around us we are safe, for our Preserver is awake also, and will not permit us to be taken unawares. No fatigue or exhaustion can cast our God into sleep; his watchful eyes are never closed.
121:4. The consoling truth must be repeated: it is too rich to be dismissed in a single line. It were well if we always imitated the sweet singer, and would dwell a little upon a choice doctrine, sucking the honey from it. What a glorious title is in the Hebrew—“the Keeper of Israel”—and how delightful to think that no form of unconsciousness ever steals over him, neither the deep slumber nor the lighter sleep. He will never let the house be broken up by the silent thief; he is ever on the watch, and speedily perceives every intruder. This is a subject of wonder, a theme for attentive consideration; therefore the word Behold is set up as a waymark. Israel fell asleep, but his God was awake. Jacob had neither walls, nor curtains, nor bodyguard around him; but the Lord was in that place though Jacob knew it not, and therefore the defenseless man was safe as in a caste. In after days he mentioned God under this enchanting name—“The God that led me all my life long”: perhaps David alludes to that passage in this expression. The word keepeth is also full of meaning: he keeps us as a rich man keeps his treasures, as a captain keep s a city with a garrison, as a royal guard keeps his monarch’s head. If the former verse is in strict accuracy a prayer, this is the answer to it. In verse 3 the Lord is spoken of as the personal keeper of one individual, and here of all those who are in his chosen nation, described as Israel: mercy to one saint is the pledge of blessing to them all. Happy are the pilgrims to whom this psalm is a safe-conduct; they may journey all the way to the celestial city without fear.
121:5. The LORD is thy keeper. Here the preserving One, who had been spoken of by pronouns in the two previous verses, is distinctly named—Jehovah is thy keeper. Here is a glorious person—Jehovah, assuming a gracious office and fulfilling it in person—Jehovah is thy keeper, in behalf of a favored individual—thy, and a firm assurance of revelation that it is even so at this hour—Jehovah is thy keeper. We may journey through the valley of the shadow of death and fear no evil.
The LORD is thy shade upon thy right hand. A shade gives protection from burning heat and glaring light. We cannot bear too much blessing; even divine goodness, which is a right-hand disposition, must be toned down and shaded to suit our infirmity, and this the Lord will do for us. God is as near us as our shadow, and we are as safe as angels.
121:6. Doubtless there are dangers of the light and of the dark, but in both and from both we shall be preserved—literally from excessive heat and from baneful chills; mystically from any injurious effects which might follow from doctrine; spiritually from the evils of prosperity and adversity; eternally from the strain of overpowering glory and from the pressure of terrible events, such as judgment. Day and night make up all time: thus the ever-present protection never ceases. All evil may be ranked as under the sun or the moon, and if neither of these can smite us we are indeed secure. God has not made a new sun or a fresh moon for his chosen; they exist under the same outward circumstances as others, but the power to smite is in their case removed from temporal agencies; saints are enriched, and not injured, by the powers which govern the earth’s condition; to them has the Lord given “the precious things brought forth by the sun, and the precious things brought forth by the moon,” while at the same moment he has removed from them all bale and curse of heat or damp, of glare or chill.
121:7. The LORD shall preserve thee from all evil. It is a great pity that our admirable translation did not keep the word “keep” all through the psalm, for all along it is one. God not only keeps his own in all evil times but from evil influences and operations, indeed from evils themselves. The wings of Jehovah amply guard his own from evils great and small, temporary and eternal. There is a most delightful double personality in this verse: Jehovah keeps the believer, not by agents, but by himself; and the person protected is definitely pointed out by the word thee—it is not our estate or name which is shielded, but the proper person. To make this even more intensely real and personal another sentence is added, The LORD shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul, or Jehovah will keep thy soul. Soulkeeping is the soul of keeping. If the soul be kept all is kept. Our soul is kept from the dominion of sin, the infection of error, the crush of despondency, the puffing up of pride; kept from the world, the flesh, and the devil; kept for holier and greater things; kept in the love of God; kept unto the eternal kingdom and glory. What can harm a soul that is kept of the Lord?
121:8. When we go out in the morning to labor, and come home at eventide to rest, Jehovah will keep us. When we go out in youth to begin life, and come in at the end to die, we shall experience the same keeping. Our exits and our entrances are under one protection. Three times have we the phrase, “Jehovah shall keep,” as if the sacred Trinity thus sealed the word to make it sure: ought not all our fears to be slain by such a threefold flight of arrows? This keeping is eternal, continuing from this time forth forevermore. The whole church is thus assured of everlasting security: the final perseverance of the saints is thus ensured, and the glorious immortality of believers is guaranteed. Under the aegis of such a promise we may go on pilgrimage without trembling, and venture into battle without dread. None are so safe as those whom God keeps, none so much in danger as the self-secure. To goings out and comings in belong particular dangers, since every change of position turns a fresh quarter to the foe, and it is for these weak points that an especial security is provided: Jehovah will keep the door when it opens and closes, and this he will perseveringly continue to do so long as there is left a single person who trusts in him, as long as a danger survives, and in fact as long as time endures. Glory be unto the Keeper of Israel, who is endeared to us under that tide, since our growing sense of weakness makes us feel more deeply than ever our need of being kept.
The Treasury of David by Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892)
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