Imagine today after you leave church you are going directly out on a battlefield to fight against a fierce force trained to take you out. Or that it was very likely that a large fighting force was going to attack at any moment. Where would you look for encouragement and confidence? Well… you are. When you leave church this morning, you are going out to battle. And this psalm is for you. It is for your encouragement and confidence as you fight. Life is war. The Christian life is war. We are in the war of the ages. It’s a war of two kingdoms - darkness and light. It’s a war of truth versus lies. And both individual souls and churches hang in the balance. Of course, we know the outcome… but we are called to the fight nonetheless. It’s part of the story we are in… God, the Author is a perfect Author and you are part of this story. After Adam and Eve fell in the garden, God set the terms of this war when addressing the serpent. Francis Schaeffer called it the antithesis:

I will set enmity between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring; he will bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. (Genesis 3:15)

Psalm 91 is NOT a psalm of comfort so you can live at ease and safe from all harm. It is not a psalm so that your life in Christ can be a dreamy spiritual vacation on the beaches of Fiji, basking in the bounty of God’s goodness. It is a psalm to strengthen you to enter the fray… to enter the battle… to go onto the field of battle where arrows are flying. This is a psalm that is meant to make you strong so you can fight and live and die and take risks for God’s kingdom completely confident that your life is in the hands of the Most High, Almighty God.

And so Psalm 91 is not for the faint of heart. It is a psalm of deep comfort for saints walking through a world full of dangers, toils, and snares, a world with devils filled (Luther), yet confident in the LORD. The backdrop of this psalm appears to be an imminent battle. You hear of arrows flying and terror in the night and pestilence stalking and people dropping like flies. This is a battle song. The psalm was probably written by Moses and it is quite possible that he penned this and sang it with the men of Israel on the eve of battle against one of their adversaries.

This psalm has been known as “The Soldier’s Psalm” in the American military at least since WWI. One account is of a commander in the US Army’s 91st Infantry Division giving each of his soldiers a card with the 91st Psalm printed on it. The soldiers read the psalm and took the cards into battle, praying for safety. Not safety from the battle, but confidence and safety as they entered battle.

Overview of the Text

In verse 1 we see both a description of a certain kind of man and we see a description of God. The man is one who dwells in the shelter or secret place of the Most High and abides in the shadow of the Almighty. He lives near God. This is not what we may call a “Sunday Christian”. Someone who shows up to church, but scarcely gives a thought about God most of the rest of the week. He lives near God. 

And clearly he knows his God. Two names of God are used in verse 1. God is the “Most High”. There is no one higher than the Most High. There may be high thrones, people with great authority, and even unseen authorities and principalities (demons), but God is the Most High. The Supreme Court is the highest court in the land. The Most High is the supreme Ruler and Judge of all the earth. And God is also given the name the “Almighty”. He is El Shaddai… the God of all might, all power. There are people and nations and shadowy organizations with great power… and hungry for more. The devil has great power. But our God is ALmighty. He has all power. Every other power derives its power from God. Right here in verse 1, we see the importance of theology. RC Sproul wrote a book entitled, “Everybody is a theologian.” Every time you think about God you are engaging in theology. You cannot get away from it. Good theology is like ballast for your little sail boat in the stormy seas of this world.  

Verse 2 turns attention toward God. Moses confesses to God who He is. He proclaims, “I will say to the LORD, ‘My refuge, my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” What a confession. This is a deeply personal confession. He does not merely say to God, “you are a refuge and fortress”, but “you are MY refuge and fortress”. In other words, this man has hidden himself in God as his fortress and has found God to be more than a match for his trouble. 

Verses 3-4 describe what God will do for such a person; what God will do for you if you are hidden in Him. Verse 3, God will deliver you from being caught in a snare. He will deliver from deadly disease. Verse 4, God will come down and cover you like a mother hen covering her chicks. Spurgeon said in his commentary on this verse that we should not dare to make this comparison unless it were in the bible… which it is, right here in Psalm 91. O the infinite love and divine tenderness expressed here! 

Verses 5-8 shift from talking about God’s action of shielding and protecting to the soldier in the fray. And it begins with the words, “You will not fear”. That’s interesting. We know the bible commands us not to fear many, many times. This says, “You will not fear”. And there five obstacles that are no longer fearsome when you are dwelling in the shelter of the Most High. First, the terror of the night. Nighttime can be a time when fears are exasperated, and new fears are imagined. And of course there are real dangers, lurking in the darkness. You will not fear any of them. You will not fear the arrow that flies by day. Arrows may be flying… the flaming arrows of the evil one are flying every day. You will not fear them. Nor the pestilence that stalks in darkness. Deadly disease? You will not fear it. Nor the destruction that wastes at high noon. So we see this man who is abiding in the shadow of the Almighty is fearless in the night and the day; whether the danger is from visible forces such as arrows or invisible viruses and invisible demons; and even if thousands are dropping like flies all around him. He is unmoved. 

Verses 9-10 reiterates the point that this man has made the LORD his dwelling and the Most High his refuge. For that reason, no evil shall be allowed to befall him. Verses 11-13 grounds this in the fact that God is the Lord of Hosts… and has an army of angels to dispatch to our aid. God is the One who commands angels… we certainly don’t. But God does command His angels… sending them on errands to help. Hebrews 1:14 describes the angel’s ministry as “sent out by God to serve those who are to inherit salvation” (that’s us!).  And aided by angels, whether we are aware or not, verse 13 says, you will wreak havoc on the enemies of God described as the lions and serpents.

Finally, verses 14-16, it is clear that God is the One speaking… and this is awesome! God says what he will do for this person who “holds fast to him in love”. Another phrase that indicates this is not a nominal believer. This is not someone who is sorta a Christian. No, this person clings to God in love. or the one who does that, God says, “I will” do eight things (eight times) for that person. 

I will deliver him. I will protect him. I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble (not keep from trouble). I will rescue him. I will honor him. I will satisfy him in life. I will show him my salvation. This is God’s pledge to the one who clings to him in love. This is awesome! This is almost unparalleled in its promise of protection and safety in the midst of real trouble, real battle, real danger. 

It begs the question: Who can claim this for himself? Who is this for?

Who is this for? 

We described the person earlier in our overview, but it bears thinking about this more deeply. It uses language that we should consider seriously. Spurgeon describes the person this way:

The blessing is for the one who is in intimate, personal, secret, abiding communion with God, dwelling near the mercy seat, within the veil. 

Spurgeon said in his commentary that this blessing is not for all believers, but for those who live in close, living fellowship with God. And I think the language bears this out. Verse 1 says this is a man who dwells in the shelter of the Most High. He lives there. He doesn’t pop in from time to time. He lives there. He is a man who abides in the shadow of the Almighty. He abides. He remains there. There is a conscious nearness to God in fellowship. . 

Again, verse 9 says that it’s because this man has made the LORD his dwelling and the Most High his refuge (think refugees). Dwelling. Abiding. Refuge. So many professing Christians live in constant fear, anxious about their health, anxious about the government, anxious about the future economy, anxious about a future pandemic, anxious about the upcoming election, anxious about WWIII, anxious about their financial state, anxious about ______________.  From Psalm 91, isn’t that evidence that such a person is not dwelling and abiding near God? I’m chastened by this!

Verse 14 describes the person as one who holds fast to God in love. That great commandment to love God supremely, we all know. But this says the man or woman of Psalm 91 clings to God in love. I can’t help but think of the way that Mary Magdalene loved Christ. Jesus said the one who is forgiven much loves much. Mary was forgiven much… and O how she loved her Lord. 

Listen, I really want this psalm to be a deep encouragement for you. But it won’t be if you dismiss the fact that it is for those who live in close communion with Him and if you dismiss the fact that it is for entering into battle. This is lost on many I fear. To be sure, it is for every Christian in the sense that Christ is the door to this glorious experience. Through His blood you may enter into the shelter of the Most High and Abide in the presence of the Almighty. But to experience the nuclear power of this psalm requires dwelling and abiding there and facing life’s battles from there. A Scottish Missionary John Paton knew this well (explain context):

I climbed into the tree and was left there alone in the bush. The hours I spent there live all before me as if it were but yesterday. I heard the frequent discharging of muskets, and the yells of the Savages. Yet I sat there among the branches, as safe as in the arms of Jesus. Never, in all my sorrows, did my Lord draw nearer to me, and speak more soothingly in my soul, than when the moonlight flickered among those chestnut leaves, and the night air played on my throbbing brow, as I told all my heart to Jesus. Alone, yet not alone! If it be to glorify my God, I will not grudge to spend many nights alone in such a tree, to feel again my Savior’s spiritual presence, to enjoy His consoling fellowship.

I am sure some are doing the “what about” thing

What about…

What about stories of apparent loss and suffering and death and defeat? What about the death of my dad and Cindy and you fill in the blank. These people must not have been dwelling there. Not so fast. Because then you would have to go to the bible and say what about Stephen and Paul? What about all the martyred apostles?

This psalm is not saying that bad things never happen to God’s people… even the most eminent of saints. Don’t go down the dark path of thinking that says, “If you have enough faith or say all the right things and claim the promises of God, nothing bad will happen.” To be sure, there have been many times when God miraculously protected and kept his people safe on the battlefield and from plagues and so forth and many times when they have died on the battlefield and succumbed to sickness and died. So how do we make sense of this? 

Here’s the issue! Remember, theology matters. Who can outmuscle the Almighty? Who can outmaneuver the LORD of Hosts? Who can climb up on the throne of the Most High and push Him off? Who can outwit the only wise God? I hope your answer is a resounding NOBODY! He has no rival! And so if you are dwelling in the Most High as your refuge, abiding under the shadow of the Almighty, it is not possible for anything to happen to you, unless the Most High God, the Almighty permits it for his own wise, holy, and often unknown purpose.. John Paton understood this. 

I realized that I was immortal till my Master’s work with me was done. The assurance came to me, as if a voice out of Heaven had spoken, that not a musket would be fired to wound us, not a club prevail to strike us, not a spear leave the hand in which it was held vibrating to be thrown, not an arrow leave the bow, or a killing stone the fingers, without the permission of Jesus Christ, who has all power in Heaven and on Earth. He rules all Nature - animate and inanimate - and restrains even the Savage of the South Seas.

You see how knowing God (theology) and dwelling in close, loving communion with Him frees us to risk and face battles and run to the battlefield without fear?

So the million dollar question is

Is this where you dwell?

Does the person here describe you? If you are a Christian through faith in Christ, the bible says you have been placed in Him. But would you describe your life as one of abiding in Him? Are you enjoying near, sweet fellowship with Him? Do you know Him as the Most High? Do you know Him as the Almighty in whom you seek refuge. Where else would you rather dwell? 

Because this is the root of confidence that nothing can touch you… except that which Almighty Jesus Christ permits for his wise and good purposes and for your ultimate good. 

We sing these words: ”No power of hell, no scheme of man can ever pluck me from his hand, till he returns or calls me home, here in the power of Christ I stand.” Do you believe it? Another missionary said almost the same thing as Paton in short form. Henry Martyn, “I am immortal until God’s purpose for me is complete. The Lord reigns.” 

So again, the point is not that nothing bad will ever happen to you. Moses lived a hard life. It was one continuous battle from Pharaoh, his family, the people of Israel, and the pagan nations they faced. The point of this psalm is you can be confident in the LORD, the Most High, the Almighty, and do his work in his way knowing that you are immortal until his purpose for you is complete. He reigns! He’s the Most High. He’s the Almighty. 

So dwell near God. Abide in Christ… and enter into the raging battle (WHICH IS THERE!), full steam ahead without fear. Let’s pray.