During times of uncertainty and fear, many people look to the Scriptures for stability, comfort, and hope. Where else can we turn in the midst of the chaos and confusion? Regardless of where you fall on the spectrum of opinions about COVID-19 and the various measures being taken to prevent the spread of this virus, you’re feeling something. You’re experiencing some kind of emotion. You’re thinking about all of this and responding to the situation in some manner. All of us have been affected by it in some form or fashion, whether directly or indirectly.
So with that being said, what are you thinking? What are you feeling? How are you responding? What message are you preaching to yourself as the stock market plummets and businesses close and infection spreads and people die? In what or in whom are you finding refuge? In what or in whom are trusting?
Christianity Today published an article last week that explored the increased usage of technology in the church. It is something that has increased exponentially in recent days as a result of churches shifting their worship gatherings to some form of online meeting platform. In addition to discussing the technology being used by churches, it also discussed the immense usage of online Bible resources and applications. One of the interesting things about using online Bible resources is that you can track the particular topics and passages being looked up by their users.
With the spread of COVID-19, Christianity Today reported that BibleGateway.com saw an increase in searches pertaining “the end of the world, disease, and fear.” One of the passages being searched most often by users who are interested in learning more about the Bible’s teaching on disease and fear is Psalm 91. In fact, it was the most searched Bible passage in recent days on BibleGateway’s website. Believers have been pointing one another to Psalm 91 with some regularity during these days; days in which talk of viruses and infection and death are practically consuming the news outlets all day long. And the reason believers are pointing each other to Psalm 91 is because while dealing with the topics of disease and fear, it is also a word from the Lord that is ultimately aimed at bringing stability, comfort, and hope to the troubled hearts of his people.
The Main Idea of Psalm 91: Trust in the Lord Always (vv. 1-2)
Throughout this psalm the people of God are called to trust in the Lord no matter what we are facing – to trust him in every season, every situation, and every circumstance – because he will keep our souls safe and secure by his sovereign power and steadfast love. The psalmist begins this song of wisdom and praise by laying the foundation for everything else that follows. In vv. 1-2 he gives us the main theme or main idea of the entire psalm. There he writes:
1He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. 2I will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” (Ps. 91:1-2, ESV)
As the redeemed of the Lord, as those who have been brought into a covenant relationship with him by grace through faith, we are safe and secure in him because he is sovereign over all things and his love for us is steadfast and unchanging. Verse 1 is chock full of language that describes a deep and genuine relationship of trust and intimacy; a covenant relationship.
It states in plain words what is true of the believer “who dwells in the shelter of the Most High,” namely that he or she “will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.” One of the things that makes the psalms so wonderful is how they use images that capture our imagination and illustrate how God relates to his people. This imagery used in v. 1 about “[abiding] in the shadow of the Almighty” is probably drawn from that of a young bird finding safety and shelter under the shadow of its mother’s wings.
Many times throughout the psalms the writers describe hiding under or finding refuge in the shadow of the Lord’s wings. This kind of imagery is used just a couple of verses later in Psalm 91. In v. 4 we read, “[The Lord] will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler.” It was the Lord himself who first used this kind of imagery to help his people understand what it meant for him to be their refuge. When speaking from Mount Sinai to Moses about how he redeemed Israel from the bondage of slavery in Egypt, he described their salvation this way: “You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you in eagles’ wings and brought you to myself” (Exod. 19:4, ESV).
Those who dwell in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of his wings, and when they do they will know the Lord is indeed a refuge and a fortress for his own; a stronghold and a place of protection; a place of safety and strength that cannot be overtaken by anyone or anything. And that is because our refuge and fortress is the God who is sovereign and steadfast, the God who is all-powerful and faithful. He is the Most High God. He reigns supreme on the throne of heaven and does all that he pleases! He is the Almighty, El Shaddai, and nothing is too hard for him. Nothing is impossible for him.
This is who the Lord our God is, which is why it is such good news to know that he is a refuge and fortress for those who find shelter in the shadow of his sovereign wings. But before we move on from these opening verses notice that everything the Lord our God is for us is experienced by faith. He is a refuge and a fortress to those who “trust” in him. We are called to trust him for deliverance, to believe on him and his promises for salvation, and that is the way it has always been for those who truly walk with the Lord.
The descendants of Adam called upon the name of the Lord believing he would raise up a Deliverer from the seed of the woman who would crush Satan’s head and bring relief from the curse and consequences of sin. Abraham found refuge in the God who called him by believing his promises – promises to give him land and offspring through which the blessing of salvation would come to all the nations of the earth.
The people of Israel experienced God as their refuge and fortress when he brought them out of Egypt with a strong and outstretched arm, and they dwelt with him finding safety and security under the shadow of his wings by believing and obeying his word. After being exiled from the Promised Land the people of God found refuge in him, even while living as sojourners in a foreign nation, by believing that he would once again gather his people under the rule of his anointed king from the line of David.
All of these walked by faith, looking forward to the arrival of the Deliverer who would fulfill God’s promises; the Deliverer who would dwell with his people and care for them under the shadow of his wings; the Deliverer who would be their refuge and fortress; the one to whom they would entrust their souls knowing he would keep them safe and secure by his sovereign, saving power and steadfast love. We too walk by faith today, but we are no longer waiting, at least not for his first arrival, because he has come!
The Lord Jesus, God’s Son and anointed King, has come and accomplished our salvation. He has come and redeemed his people from our enslavement to sin. He has become our shelter when the storms of life are raging all around us. He is our refuge and strength in times of trouble. He is our everything, and on this side of his cross and resurrection, as we walk in this world under his lordship, we can do so without fear because every single one of the ways in which God reveals himself to be the refuge of those who trust him are true for us who trust in the Lord Jesus.
Trust in the Lord Jesus, Our God and Refuge (vv. 3-13)
As we make our way through the middle section of Psalm 91, we discover many reason we should trust in the Lord, regardless of our circumstances or the particular situation we may be facing. And I want to look at this ancient wisdom and truth through the lens of Jesus Christ and his saving work, seeing what it means for Christ to be our refuge here and now, seeing the spiritual blessings that have been lavished on us in him.
In vv. 3-4 we find that we should trust in the Lord Jesus because he will deliver us from the deception and death. There the psalmist writes:
3For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. 4He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler. (Ps. 91:3-4, ESV)
Once again we see the psalmist using the imagery of a mother bird caring for and protecting her young in order to help God’s people understood how he cares for and protects those who trust in him. And here we find that one of the ways he does this is by “delivering you from the snare of the fowler.” A fowler is one who sets a trap and lies in wait for the prey he is hunting and seeking to kill.
In the same way, there are many ungodly people in this fallen world who engage in similar acts of deception, except their prey isn’t a bird or some other kind of animal. Their prey is us! People may plot and scheme against us with evil intentions, and at times even appear to succeed in afflicting us through their snares and traps, but we must always come back to the truth that in Jesus Christ, we are safe and secure.
By his sovereign power he will use even the deceitful schemes of fallen man for our good and his glory. By his steadfast love he will be “a shield and buckler” for his own as he delivers us. The deception others engage in as a means of afflicting us will never and can never cause the Lord Jesus, our God and refuge, to be unfaithful to his redeemed people, to be unfaithful to those of us who are trusting in him by faith.
It is here in v. 3 that we also find the phrase which has caused so many people to look this passage up in their Bibles or in their online Bible resources and applications. God’s people can say of him, “You are my refuge and fortress, the one who keeps our souls safe and sound by your sovereign power and steadfast love,” because “he will deliver you…from the deadly pestilence.” The term pestilence refers to various plagues or diseases that are brought upon people. In God’s word we find that it is God himself who controls the pestilence. He has used it as a means of bringing judgment upon his unbelieving enemies, and he has even used it to bring judgement and discipline upon his unfaithful people.
Today we find ourselves as believers in the middle of a season during which we are literally seeing pestilence spread throughout the world. People are being infected with a disease that brings mild symptoms to some and severely afflicts and even kills others. But as we walk through this time, let us not do so thinking that the Lord, our God and refuge, has somehow lost control of this world he has created, this world that he upholds by the word of his power.
To paraphrase and even modify what many other preachers have said over the years, there is not a single molecule in the COVID-19 virus that is outside of the sovereign control of the Lord our God. According to his inscrutable wisdom and incomparable power, God will accomplish all his will in heaven and on earth, even as this disease spreads through the land. And for those who have found refuge in the Lord Jesus Christ, we know he is not only sovereign over pestilence but he also delivers us from it. In Christ we know that it ultimately has no power to harm us.
Yes, it could kill us. If it doesn’t kill or afflict us we may yet face hardship of various kinds as a result of its effects upon our society. But even so, we need not fear COVID-19 or any other form of pestilence that comes upon the earth. To use the language from vv. 5-6, in Christ we need not “fear…the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the destruction that wastes at noonday” (ESV).
We need not fear either deceitful people or deadly pestilence, both of which only have the power to kill the body. As the Lord Jesus has taught us, we need only fear and stand in awe of God himself – the One who has the power to destroy both soul and body in hell. And because of the Lord Jesus and his saving work – because he has atoned for our sins on the cross, because he has conquered the grave through his resurrection, because he rules and reigns over all things as the crucified and risen Lamb who opens the seals of God’s decrees – those who have been united to him by faith can trust him in both life and death knowing that by his sovereign power and steadfast love he will keep us safe and secure under the shadow of his wings.
Just as the psalmist invites people to take the safe and wise path of fleeing for refuge in the Lord and trusting him come what may, he invites us again to this path in v. 9 of Psalm 91 by showing us more reasons we should trust in the Lord and abide in him. He first reiterates what we have already looked at in vv. 3-8. For those who have trusted in the Lord Jesus by faith, “no evil shall be allowed to befall you, no plague come near your tent.”
There is certainly a sense in which this promise took on a more physical orientation for its original audience. As the people of Israel walked in covenant relationship with God, he was carrying out his purposes and plans for the salvation of his people – purposes and plans which culminate in the person and work of Jesus. And in order to bring these purposes and plans to pass, the Lord sovereignly and supernaturally protected his old covenant people from physical attacks, including calamities and plagues of various kinds; and that is because he needed to physically preserve them so that “in the fullness of time” the Lord Jesus could be born, live a perfect life, bear the curse of sin’s penalty, and defeat death itself.
Now that he has come and accomplished this work of salvation for all who repent and believe, the promise of v. 10 remains true for us, but it takes on a different dimension. It is true both physically and spiritually, but the spiritual aspects of the promise come first, which will then give way to the physical aspects of the promise on the last day when the Lord Jesus returns in power and glory to consummate his kingdom and make all things new. No evil shall befall Christ’s people and no plague shall come near our dwelling place, which means in Christ these things can never separate us from him or take away the eternal life he has given us. As the song says, “No power of hell, no scheme of man, can ever pluck me from his hand.”
One of the things that makes this section of the psalm so remarkable is that the Lord in whom we trust, our God and our refuge, even uses the angelic armies of heaven to protect and keep his people. In vv. 11-12 we read of how the Lord “will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways,” that “they will bear you up” when in danger. This is the verse that Satan misapplied and distorted when he tempted Jesus by calling him to prove he was the Son of God by casting himself down from the pinnacle of the temple.
Rather than seeing this verse as an excuse to live unwisely and recklessly, thinking that God will supernaturally protect us with his angels regardless of what we decide to do, we ought to understand it to mean that God will indeed use his angels to serve his people as a means of caring for them and protecting them as our heavenly Father. According to the writer of Hebrews, Christ, our Savior, is not only far superior to the angels, but he also sends them out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation.
The Promises God Gives to Those Who Trust in the Lord Jesus (vv. 14-16)
In vv. 1-2 we saw the psalmist affirming that God is the refuge of those who trust in him, and in vv. 3-13 we saw a multitude of ways in which God as our refuge protects and keeps his people. In the concluding section of Psalm 91, there is a major shift that takes place.
At this point, the psalmist is still writing, but they are no longer his words; they are God’s words. The Lord himself goes on to confirm everything the psalmist has already written about him as the refuge and fortress of his people. In vv. 14-16 we read of the many precious promises God gives to those who trust in him:
14“Because he [the one who trusts in me] holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him; I will protect him, because he knows my name. 15When he calls to me, I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will rescue him and honor him. 16With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation.” (Ps. 91:14-16, ESV)
Throughout this psalm we have been called to trust in the Lord no matter what we are facing – to trust him in every season, every situation, and every circumstance – because he will keep our souls safe and secure by his sovereign power and steadfast love. Here the Lord himself speaks directly to us and goes to great lengths to tell us that he is absolutely unswerving with regard to his loyalty and faithfulness; that he is completely committed to saving those who trust in him; and in Jesus Christ, these promises have been graciously fulfilled and given to you by grace through faith.
Because of our union with the Lord Jesus – because he forgives us of our sins and brings us into covenant relationship with himself, because he empowers us by the Spirit to hold fast to him in love – he will deliver us. In Christ God has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son (Col. 1:13). He will protect us. The Lord Jesus protects everyone who has been born of God, and the evil one does not touch him (1 John 5:18). He will answer us. When we call out to him in prayer, he will answer us by giving his children good gifts and glorifying his name.
He will be with us. Jesus has told us, “I will be with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:20). He will rescue us. In Christ, we can say with the apostle Paul, even in the face of death, “The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom” (2 Tim. 4:18a, ESV). He will honor us. After we endure all the trials that have been appointed for us in this life and we stand before him on the last day, the tested genuineness of our faith will be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
He will satisfy us with long life, or better, eternal life. In Christ we have eaten the bread of life and drunk deeply from the fountain of living water. Whoever comes to him shall never hunger, and whoever believes on him will never thirst. He has satisfied all who hunger and thirst for righteousness. And he will show us his salvation. We who are united to the Lord Jesus by faith will never perish, and no one will snatch us out of his hand.
Conclusion
If these promises are true, and in Christ they are true for everyone who trusts in him, we need not fear anything we face in this fallen world. We need not “fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in darkness, nor the destruction that wastes at noonday” (Ps. 91:5-6, ESV). Why? Because the Lord Jesus, the God in whom we trust, is our eternal refuge and fortress; which is the same reason the apostle Paul concluded Romans 8 with these beautiful words of stability, comfort, and hope:
35Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? [or COVID-19 or any of its societal effects?] 36As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” 37No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom. 8:35-39, ESV)
We can trust in the Lord Jesus no matter what we are facing – in every season, every situation, and every circumstance – because he will keep our souls safe and secure by his sovereign power and steadfast love.