God Greater Than the Hills
Tuesday, August 23
"Shall I lift up my eyes to the hills? whence should my help come?" (Psalm 121:1,margin)
The marginal reading is to be preferred; because our help comes from God, and not from the hills.
"Truly in vain is salvation hoped for from the hills, and from the multitude of mountains: truly in the Lord our God is the salvation of Israel." (Jeremiah 3:23)
The ancient heathen built their temples on the hills, but no help could come from them, because the gods that were in those temples had no power. They were on the hills: but God, whose temple was also on a hill, is above the hills.
God, by the strength with which He is girded, sets the mountains fast (Psalm 65:6); but the mountains cannot impart strength.
The Source of Strength
Wednesday, August 24
"My help comes from the Lord, which made heaven and earth." (Psalm 121:2)
Our need is too great and too pressing to allow us to be content with any secondary source of strength, if there were any such. We must draw from the original source of strength.
The mountains and all things that God has made reveal His everlasting power and divinity, but they cannot impart any of it. They can only declare the glory of God, directing us to their Maker and ours, as the one who has help to supply for all need. He is worthy of eternal thanks, because: "[He] is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us." (Ephesians 3:20)
A Firm Foundation
Thursday, August 25
"He will not suffer your foot to be moved." (Psalm 121:3)
Who is it that will not suffer our foot to be moved? It is God, who made "the everlasting hills," setting them fast by His strength.
In His strength we may be even more immovable than they: for the mountains shall be carried into the sea: but God says that though the mountains depart, and the hills be removed, His lovingkindness that holds us up shall not depart from us.
When the mountains and the hills move out of their places, it will be good to be able to rest in the hand that can both set them fast and move them.
The Unsleeping Keeper
Friday, August 26
"He that keeps you will not slumber. Behold, He that keeps Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep." (Psalm 121:3-4)
There are two words here, "slumber," and "sleep." The last one means to be asleep, while the first one means: "to fall asleep from weariness or lassitude. The primary idea seems to be that of nodding."--Gesenius.
This God never does.
"The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, faints not, neither is weary." (Isaiah 40:28)
God does not nod over His work; His hands never relax through weariness, and allow what they are holding to drop. How wonderful! And because God wakes, we can sleep, and be sure of waking.
Kept Constantly by God
Sabbath, August 27
"The Lord is your keeper." (Psalm 121:5)
Your keeper, remember; not your jailer. Have you ever thought what you should do if the Lord should fall asleep? Of course you would never do anything again.
Have you ever thought how it is that you are kept alive during the night, and wakened from your unconscious condition in the morning? The sleeping man is dead in every respect except that he breathes. He lives, but he is certainly doing nothing then for his living.
How is this breath of life continued to us, when we are awake, as well as when we are asleep? By no other means than that by which the first breath was given to Adam.
Everyone thinks of God as very near to Adam when He made him; but if God, whose hands have fashioned us as truly as they did Adam, were not as close to us as to the first man when he was made, we could not live a moment. "In Him we live, and move, and have our being." (Acts 17:28)
A Keeper and a Shade
Sunday, August 28
"The Lord is your keeper: the Lord is your shade upon your righthand." (Psalm 121:5)
There is another wonder: "The Lord God is a sun," (Psalm 84:11) and He is at the same time a shield from the sun: "The Lord God is a ... shield." (Psalm 84:11) "[He is] a consuming fire," (Hebrews 12:29) and He is also "the fountain of living waters." (Jeremiah 2:13)
This is beyond all comprehension; but the truth of it we may grasp and clearly perceive when we remember that all things come from Him. The earth itself is the offspring of God, as truly as we are, who come from the earth. "In Him were all things created ... and in Him all things consist." (Colossians 1:16-17)
So He is both sun and shade to us, indicating that in Him we get everything in exactly the right proportion. Safely we may...
Sit down beneath His shadow,
And rest with great delight;
The faith that now beholds Him
Is pledge of future sight.
--Frances R. Havergal, Hymn: Sit Down Beneath His Shadow.
Protection from the Elements
Monday, August 29
"The sun shall not smite you by day, nor the moon by night." (Psalm 121:6)
Every Bible student involuntarily thinks of the description of "the seven last plagues" (Revelation 16) when the sun will have "power to scorch men with fire," and is glad of this promise. God will then be a shade for His people.
When the wicked are destroyed and the righteous dwell in "everlasting burnings," ( Isaiah 33:14) "There shall be a tabernacle for a shadow in the daytime from the heat, and for a place of refuge." (Isaiah 4:6)
But why not bring the application nearer? The Lord is the same now that He will ever be. Then why should any of His servants now suffer from sunstroke? The Bible says: "The Lord is your shade upon your right hand." (Psalm 121:5)
Is He? See how this does not indicate a way of enduring the great heat of summer without discomfort.
Preserved from Spiritual and Physical Evils
Tuesday, August 30
"The Lord shall preserve you from all evil; He shall preserve yoursoul." (Psalm 121:7)
Blessed promise! Why should we limit it? We believe that He is able to keep us from all spiritual evil, and we must believe that He is just as able to preserve us from physical evils. But whatever God is able to do for His people, He has done. "What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it?" (Isaiah 5:4) "His divine power has given unto us all things that pertain to lifeand godliness." (2 Peter 1:3)
If all good men had always trusted God as much for their life as they did for godliness, the history of the world would have been different.
And a change must even yet take place, because every promise of God must be practically demonstrated among men before the end comes.
A Constant Companion
Wednesday, August 31
"The Lord shall preserve your going out and your coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore." (Psalm 121:8) "What shall we say to these things. If God be for us, who can beagainst us? He that spared not His own son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?" (Romans 8:31-32)
He cannot do otherwise, because "In Him all things consist." (Colossians 1:17)
Then let us accept all His gifts in the spirit in which He has given them and for the purpose for which He designed them, and life will nevermore be "a burden," but a joy.--Medical Missionary, Daily Bread, August 1904--Psalm 121:1-8.