Psalm 46 – Our Refuge And Strength

Translation & Sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ The Redeemer Church, Manhattan, KS, 13 Dec 2020

Introduction: What are you afraid of?

• A big fear that I’ve heard expressed over the past year is that of getting the latest virus and dying an early and painful death.

  • Then there’s the family members who fear poverty and neglect if their income provider - or care provider - were to die of the virus and leave them still living.

  • Only slightly less-worrying is the question of, “What if my job is shut down over these health restrictions? How will I make ends meet?”

• I’ve also heard a lot of fears expressed about the consequences of favorite candidates losing in the election.

  • What if we lose our religious freedom?

  • What if Americans loose faith in the election system and the nation falls apart?

  • What if sexual preference quotas are enforced in businesses like racial quotas have been?

  • What if we sustain further losses to our free enterprise? What if programs to help the needy get slashed?

  • This list of things to worry about is indeed substantial!

• It wasn’t that long ago that we were worrying about floods. The house of one of our members almost floated away down Wildcat Creek! Natural disasters can be so vast in scale, that humans are powerless to do anything but flee and watch helplessly as their property is destroyed. This seems to have been a concern in Psalm 46:¹

  • When the earth shifts/is troubled/is removed/gives way/is changed up (the Hebrew verb pictures sending something away and getting something different back – an earthquake is moving the ground around, and you don’t know where the ground you’re standing on is going to end up!)

  • When the mountains are overthrown/carried/removed/slip/fall into the heart of the seas! Can you imagine the earth in such an upheaval that entire mountains are sliding off into the lakes? That would be terrifying! ²

  • Then, of course, chucking a mountain into the ocean that would displace vast amounts of water in the heart of the sea, making the waters roar and roll and foam.

    • I remember the gigantic tsunami tidal waves caused by earthquakes – was it in the late 1990’s? – that decimated many of the coastal cities of Asia. There was nothing to do but scramble away from the ocean as fast as they could and watch their homes be crushed like matchsticks by unstoppable forces of water.

    • It was also around that time that former Vice President Gore scared folks silly with alarming predictions of rising ocean levels. (But as I read v.3, maybe that’s not such a new concern after all!)

• Back in the 1500’s when Roman Church officials were trying to kill Martin Luther for teaching what the Bible plainly says, Luther found great comfort in Psalm 46. He even made a hymn out of it as he was travelling to the Diet of Worms to be tried as a heretic. We know that hymn today as “A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing… And though this world with devils filled should threaten to undo us, we will not fear, for God has willed His truth to triumph through us...” It is said that whenever after Luther would encounter some new problem, he would say, “Come, let us sing the 46th Psalm!3” God protected Luther’s life in the midst of deadly national upheavals so that he could raise a family, translate the Bible for the first time into German, and start a network of churches that endures to this day.

• Let us look at this Psalm too, and apply its principles to the fears we face today!

  • Psalm 46:1 It is God who has truly been found to be a refuge, a strength, and a helper for us in crises, therefore we will not be afraid when the earth shifts and when the mountains are overthrown into the heart of the seas. Its waters roar; they roll. Mountains will quake with its uprise. SELAH

  • 4 There is a river whose streams will make the city of God happy, the holy residences of the Most High. It is God who is in her midst! She will never be overthrown; God will help her at the dawnings of morning. Nations roared; kingdoms were overthrown. He projected with his voice; the earth melted. Yahweh of hosts is with us; a high-fortress for us is the God of Jacob. SELAH 

  • 8 Y’all come look at Yahweh’s works, by which He has imposed desolations throughout the earth. He will shatter the bow and mow down the spear. The transport-vehicle He will burn in the fire, causing wars to cease unto the end of the earth. Relax and know that it is I who am God. I will be exalted throughout the nations; I will be exalted throughout the earth! Yahweh of hosts is with us; a high-fortress for us is the God of Jacob. SELAH

v.1 The Axiom

• This Psalm opens with

  • an emphatic subject: “God” (emphasized by making it the 1st word in the Hebrew sentence),

  • followed by 3 assertions made about God (that He is a “refuge,” “strength,” and “helper”),

  • then ending with an emphatic verb, stating forcefully that this is what “has truly been found!”

  • Most English versions make this verb into an adjective describing “helper” (because “helper” is the nearest noun), and translated it with the English word “present” (which, if it has “been found,” it is therefore “present” with you). But the sons of Korah liked to create chiastic sentences where the subject is first in the Hebrew sentence and the verb is last in the sentence, so I prefer my translation⁴, although it doesn’t greatly change the meaning.

• The three things which “God… has truly been found” to be for His people are:

1. מַחֲסֶה “refuge/shelter for us” (cf. Psalm 61:3, 62:8)

• Isaiah 25:1&4 "O Yahweh, you are my God; I will exalt you; I will praise Your Name, for You have done a wonderful thing... You have been a stronghold to the poor, a stronghold to the needy in his distress, a shelter from the storm, a shade from the heat..." (NAW)

• Joel 3:16 "...The heavens and earth will shake; But the LORD will be a shelter* for His people, And the strength* of the children of Israel." (NKJV)

• Proverbs 14:26 “In the fear of the LORD there is strong confidence, And His children will have a place of refuge*.” (NKJV)

2. עוז "strength… for us" (cf. 29:11, 61:4, 62:8-12, 71:7, 93:1, 138:3, etc.)

• Psalm 28:7-8 "Yahweh is my strength* and my shield; it is in Him that my heart has trusted, so I will be helped* out, and my heart will rejoice, and through my song I will respond to Him. Yahweh is the strength* of His people, and He is the source of strength behind the salvations of His anointed one." (NAW)

• Psalm 68:35 “...The God of Israel is He who gives strength* and power to His people. Blessed be God!" (NKJV)

• Psalm 118:14 “The LORD is my strength* and song, And He has become my salvation." (NKJV)

3. עֶזְרָה בְצָרוֹת “a helper ...for us… in crises” (cf. 27:9, 31:8, 34:17, 50:15, 54:7, 86:7, 94:17, 40:17, etc.)

• Psalm 34:6 "This lowly man called out, and Yahweh Himself heard and made him safe from all his crises*." (NAW)

• Psalm 37:39 "Verily the salvation of righteous men is from Yahweh; He is their strength* in a time of crisis*." (NAW)

• Psalm 63:7 "Because You have been my help*, Therefore in the shadow of Your wings I will rejoice." (NKJV)

vs. 2-3 The Response of Believers

• Verse 2 opens with the logical conclusion: “[Because] God… therefore we.”

  • Because “It is God who is our refuge, strength, and helper… therefore we will not fear” because anything else that exists, is less powerful than God.

  • Because “God is our refuge, strength, and help… therefore we will not fear” because we have a sure resource of refuge, strength, and help in any earthly crisis which could possibly occur.

    • Psalm 21:7 “Because the king is trusting in Yahweh and in the lovingkindness of the Most High, he will in no way be overthrown*.” (NAW)

    • Psalm 16:8 “I have set the LORD always before me; Because He is at my right hand I shall not be moved*.” (NKJV)

• The earth is not God’s reference point; His base is not on this planet, so no seismic catastrophe can rattle Him. Therefore if our eyes are on Him to be our refuge, strength, and help, we have a reference point that is stable, even though all the other earthly reference points to which men and women look for refuge – like banks and businesses, and buildings – are all moving willy-nilly in the earthquake.

  • Psalm 125:1 "Those who trust in the LORD Are like Mount Zion, Which cannot be moved*, but abides forever." (NKJV)

  • Isaiah 54:10 "For the mountains* may recede and the hills may slip away*, but my lovingkindness will not recede from you and the covenant of my peace will not slip* away, says Yahweh, your Compassionate One." (NAW)

  • Matthew 7:24-25 Jesus said, "Everyone therefore who is hearing these words of mine and doing them will be likened to a smart man who built his house upon the rock, and the rain came down and the rivers went [up] and the storm-wind blew and dropped down before that house, and it did not fall down, for it had been founded upon the rock." (NAW)

• God has told us that He is in control of all these powerful forces on the earth. If the wind and the waves obey His will, then we can trust that they are not out of control; they will only do what God wants them to do. We know they will not be the end of the world for us because God loves us and will never allow anything to cut us off from enjoying Him forever.

  • Job 38:1 "Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said... 4 'Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? … 8 Or who shut in the sea* with doors, When it burst forth and issued from the womb... 11 When I said,"This far you may come, but no farther, And here your proud waves must stop!"'" (NKJV)

  • Isaiah 51:15-16 “...I am Yahweh your God, who stirs the sea* and its billows roar*, Yahweh of Hosts His name! And I set my words in your mouth, and in the shadow of my hand I covered you..." (NAW)

  • Isaiah 17:13 "The communities roar* like the roaring of many waters*, but He will rebuke it, and it will flee far away, chased like chaff on the mountains before the wind and whirling dust before the face of a storm-wind." (NAW)

• Listen to the resolve of this community of faith: “We will not fear!” We will not fear. Take that up as your banner, people of God, “We will not fear!” Why? Because God… God is our refuge, strength, and helper!

• In the next verses, the scene changes suddenly from tumultous, cataclysmic disasters to a beautiful, peaceful landscape:

vs. 4-5 The River & The City of God

• Rivers mark boundaries and deliver much-needed water for farm and home use.

• I can’t help but think that this scene is partly-inspired by the remembrance of when God provided a “river” of water out of the rock in the desert for the Hebrews during their sojourn from Egypt to the Promised Land (Psalm 105:41).

• But there is no river near Jerusalem, so what can this mean?

• I’m also reminded of the prophecy of Ezekiel 47:1-12 “Then he brought me back to the door of the temple; and there was water, flowing from under the threshold of the temple toward the east... there, along the bank of the river, were very many trees on one side and the other. Then he said to me: "This water flows toward the eastern region, goes down into the valley, and enters the sea. When it reaches the sea, its waters are healed. And it shall be that every living thing that moves, wherever the rivers go, will live…. Along the bank of the river, on this side and that, will grow all kinds of trees used for food; their leaves will not wither, and their fruit will not fail. They will bear fruit every month, because their water flows from the sanctuary. Their fruit will be for food, and their leaves for medicine." (NKJV)

  • There is a great hymn based on Ezekiel 47: “Like a river glorious is God’s perfect peace, over all victorious in its bright increase. Perfect yet it floweth fuller every day. Perfect yet it groweth deeper all the way. Stayed upon Jehovah, hearts are fully blessed, finding as He promised perfect peace and rest.” We will not fear, for God is with us.

• Having God’s law is also likened to living by a river in Psalm 1:1-3 "Blessings of the man who didn't walk in the counsel of the wicked didn't stand in the path of sinners, and didn't sit in the bench of the scornful; for his delight is in the law of Yahweh, And he meditates in the law of Him day and night. He will be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, who his fruit gives in its season, his leaf does not wither; and all which he does prospers." (NAW)

• Another way to identify this river is to look at the grammar of this Psalm.

  • Because of the differences between English and Hebrew, it is not quite as clear in English, but in Hebrew, 5 of the 11 verses in start with an emphatic subject as the first word.

  • Notice the pattern to these five words: v.1 “Elohim/God,” v. 4 “Nahar/River,” v. 5 “Elohim/God,” v. 7 “Yahweh/The LORD,” and v. 11 “Yahweh/The LORD.”

  • Do you see the pattern? I think that the Hebrew grammar of this psalm is telling us that these five emphatic subjects are all the same; the River which makes the city of God happy is God/the LORD Himself.

  • That’s what v.5 says, “It is God who is in the midst of her [the city]”

• The happiness of the city of God, according to v.5, consists of

1. The presence of God with her. At Christmastime, we use the name of God from Isaiah “Emmanuel, God with us” (Isa. 7:14; 8:8; Mat. 1:23), and the root of that Hebrew word is in Psalm 46 verse 7 “Emmanu” - “with us” is the Lord of Hosts! This River is all three persons of the Trinity (Barker).

• The New Testament often connects the Holy Spirit with the metaphor of water⁵, and the fulfillment of this prophecy is the outpouring of the Holy Spirit into the hearts of Christ’s people: 1 Cor. 3:16-17 “Haven't y'all known that y'all are the inner-sanctum of God, and [that] the Spirit of God resides in y'all? ... the inner-sanctum of God is holy, which is what you yourselves are.” You who have the Holy Spirit are the “holy dwelling places of God” spoken of in this Psalm!⁶ He is with us now in the Church through the presence of the Holy Spirit convicting, comforting, illuminating, and filling us with gladness – like the river in the Psalm does – for indeed, joy is one of the fruits of the Spirit! (Gal. 5:22)

• Furthermore, Jesus said in John 7:37-39 "…If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water...” (NKJV, cf. John 4:14) and Hebrews 12:22 says, “...y’all have come to the mountain of Zion and to the city of the Living God – to the heavenly Jerusalem...” You who trust in Jesus to be your refuge from the wrath of God against your sin are in the city with the river running through it!

• And God will be with us in the future in the “new Jerusalem” Rev. 21:2-4 where “the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain… Rev. 22:1-5 And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb." (NKJV)

• The presence of God with us is a real source of joy for us!

2. The second thing that makes the residences of the Most High God glad is the security of “never falling, never being overthrown/moved.”

• Think of the difference between walking down a dark alley all by yourself vs. walking down that dark alley with an armed bodyguard. Suddenly that alley doesn’t seem so scary when you know that nobody’s going to be able to succeed in jumping you!

• Security. The mountains may flip over and fall and slip into the sea and be removed, but not us. (Of course some church members will fall away, some will experience dismaying losses, and some will be martyred, but the church will endure through all earthly upheavals, and none of Christ’s sheep will be lost.) Jesus said, "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father's hand." (NKJV, John 10:27-29)

• The Apostle Paul put it this way: Rom. 8:31-39 “What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: ‘FOR YOUR SAKE WE ARE KILLED ALL DAY LONG; WE ARE ACCOUNTED AS SHEEP FOR THE SLAUGHTER.’ Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (NKJV) Now, that’s security!

3. The third happiness of the city of God in v.5 is the knowledge that no matter what happens in the future, God will be a strong ally who can be depended upon to swoop in and help - every day.

• The Hebrew word for “dawn/break” is plural, and the Hebrew preposition before it implies to me that this is not just a one-time affair, but a help that comes morning after morning after morning⁷.

• I think it also points back to a particular time when God intervened with help for His people, because there is only one⁸ other time that this Hebrew phrase lifnot boqer (translated “right early” – or more literally “dawnings of morning”), occurs in the Hebrew Bible, and that is Exodus 14:27, where Moses and the children of Israel freshly-escaped from slavery in Egypt, were scrambling up the far bank of the Red Sea, watching in terror as the entire Egyptian army came thundering after them. Then, “at the dawnings of morning [lifnot boqer],” God helped His people. The water of the Red Sea slammed together on Pharoah and his soldiers, and God drowned the most powerful army in the world, leaving the entire nation of Israel free to walk away from their captors without fear of any further pursuit. Can God do what it takes to defend us when we need help? Absolutely.

vs. 6-7 God Has the Power to Confront the Nations (and handle any crisis)

• The same Hebrew verb “roared” used in v.3 describing the sound of the waters, appears again at the beginning of v. 6, now describing the raging/uproar of nations – and perhaps the waters in v.3 are intended to represent the nations of the world.

• Likewise, there is a connection between the mountains in v.2 which are “overthrown/moved/slipping and falling” and the kingdoms in v.6 which are doing the same thing, but, by contrast, the city of God isn’t “falling or being removed.” God’s people have no fear of being overthrown!

• Exodus 15:15 and Joshua 2:9, 24 use the same Hebrew word at the end of v.6 to describe the Canaanite nations “melting” before the Israelites when they came into the Promised Land, and later passages (Psalm 75:3, Amos 9:5, Nahum 1:5) speak of how all the nations of the earth will likewise “melt” before God's presence in judgment.

  • At a mere word from God, all the noise of the world ends. It “dissolves” when “God, our refuge, strength and helper,” our “river” of happiness who “lives in” us, “uttered/raised/projected His voice” from “our midst.”

  • I love the way Augustine, around the year 400AD, described this confrontation between God and the nations: "The fanatics of idolatry, like frogs in the marshes, clamoured, the more tumultuously, the more sordidly, in filth and mire. But what is the brawling of frogs to the thunder of the clouds? For out of them ‘the Most High gave His Voice, and the earth was moved.’”

• In v.7, the title, “Lord of Hosts” indicates that our God is backed up by an army.

  • It would be one thing if an enemy were to amass troops at one of our borders, and then for our President to go meet with their general and say, “Hey, we’re not ready to fight right now, please go away.”

  • It would be quite another if all our armed forces were set up on our side of the border with all their tanks and guns and jets, and our President were to tell the enemies, “Stand down or we will wipe you out!”

  • Our God, even though He is perfectly capable of getting done whatever He wants to do without help, nevertheless has hosts of angels standing ready to back Him up with whatever He commands.

  • God is not to be trifled with. And with a God like that “with us” as our ally/helper, there is nothing in the world that can threaten us.

• Now, why is He called the “God of Jacob” twice in this psalm⁹? Rabbi Cohen, who wrote a commentary on the Psalms in the 1940’s suggested that it’s because of how often Jacob got himself into trouble and got bailed out by God! If God protected that rapscallion Jacob who lied and cheated his way through life and about got himself killed by his brother and his uncle and his neighbors; God can take care of whatever trouble you’ve got too!

• He is the ultimate stronghold/fortress. He is a safe place that no enemy can get at.

  • Psalm 18:2 “Yahweh is my rock-mountain, my stronghold, and my deliverer, my God, my landmark-rock. I will take refuge in Him, my shield and horn of my salvation, my high-fortress*!” (NAW)

  • Psalm 9:9-10 And Yahweh will be a high-fortress* for… times when there is a crisis. Then those who know Your name will trust in You, for You did not forsake those who were seeking You, Yahweh!" (NAW)

• That’s why we will not fear!

vs. 8-10 But how do you get in to God’s Refuge?

• What if you aren’t so strong in your faith? What if fear is really hard for you to overcome? v.8 tells us¹⁰ what to do: “Come¹¹ look at the LORD’s works” throughout history a while.

  • The word “works” only occurs two other places in the Bible, once in Proverbs 8:22 to refer to God’s work in creating the world, and the other in Psalm 66:5, referring to God’s parting of the Red Sea and the Jordan River

    • Psalm 66:5-7 “Come and see the works* of God; He is awesome in His doing toward the sons of men. He turned the sea into dry land; They went through the river on foot. There we will rejoice in Him. He rules by His power forever; His eyes observe the nations; Do not let the rebellious exalt themselves.”

  • The other word “desolations” in v.8 is generally used in the Bible to refer to God’s acts of punishment against the wicked, destroying entire cities by wars and leaving them vacant¹².

• There is nothing like reviewing the great Bible stories of the past to bolster our faith! Put your phone down for a minute, close your computer, and remember:

  • how God saved Noah and his family from a flood,

  • how God blasted Sodom and Gommorah with fire and brimstone,

  • how God delivered the city of Jericho into Joshua’s hands,

  • how the giant Goliath was killed by a shepherd boy with a sling,

  • how God delivered Jerusalem from Sennacharib’s seige, then delivered Jerusalem up to Nebuchadnezzar,

  • how God delivered Daniel from lions and Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego from an incinerator, but turned King Nebuchadnezzar into an animal,

  • Remember how God sprung Peter and Paul from jails, healed lepers, raised the dead, and converted whole towns from scoffers to saints,

  • but struck Lying Ananias dead, consumed Proud Herod with worms, and blinded Elymas the Magician.

  • and then come back and say, “Now, what was I worrying about?”

• Not only can we fight fear and find refuge in God by looking back at what God has done in the past, we can also still our fears with the knowledge of God’s promises for the future.

• In v. 8, all the verbs were past tense (Hebrew perfect tense), but in vs. 9-10 they change to Hebrew imperfect tense, which can be translated present or future tense in English.

  • Although many English versions translate the verbs in v. 9 as present tense, I think the future tense fits better with the description of a world without war: “He will shatter the bow, He will mow down the spear, and He will torch the army trucks¹³, putting an end to war in every place as far as you can travel – and for the rest of all time¹⁴.” And then, in v. 10 “I will be exalted exalted among the nations; I will be exalted throughout the earth.”

  • Certainly in the present time, "the Dayspring from on high visits those... in the sha­dow of death... to guide our feet into His way of peace" (Luke 1:78-79)¹⁵. Certainly, even now, the Gospel is being preached in every nation on earth, and God is being exalted as tens of thousands are becoming Christians every year around the globe.

  • but we will see even greater fulfillment in the future: “In the latter days… [God] will judge between the nations... and they shall beat... spears into pruning-tools; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.” (Isaiah 2:4, NAW, cf. Micah 4:3)... (It was a tradition in ancient times to heap up and burn all the equipment of the loosers in a war to show that the war was over and they would not be able to rise up again¹⁶.) “After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, saying, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!’” (Rev. 7:9-10, NKJV)

• So, “Cease striving/Calm down/Relax. Jesus is God – not you, and He’s got this. Just review what you know of His promises for the future:

  • Jesus will return from heaven and make war against evil with righteousness (Rev. 19:11),

  • Jesus will strike all the enemy nations and armies with His sharp sword (Rev. 19:15),

  • Jesus will destroy everyone who stands opposed to Him, even though they gather armies like the sands of the sea (Rev. 19:21, 20:9),

  • Jesus will judge the earth and bring every wicked person to full accountability (Rev. 20:13),

  • Jesus will make a new world for us

    • in which only righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3),

    • where the “wolf and the lamb together will [dwell safely] ... and they will not hurt nor destroy in all [God’s] holy mountain” (Isa. 65:25, NAW)

    • where “there is no more death or pain or crying” (Rev. 21:4).

  • Lord, I believe your promises are “faithful and true” (Rev. 21:5).

  • Therefore we will not fear…. If God is for us, who can be against us?!

v.11 Conclusion

• That is faith, to believe what God has done in the past and trust Him to do what He says He will do for the future.

• Stop trying to play God by fretting over how to control your world, and trust Him to lead you safely through the present chaos into the fulfillment of His promises.

• In this way, you, too will “truly find” God to be your “refuge, your “strength, your “helper, and your “river” of gladness, and you can say with the Psalmist, “We will not fear… The LORD of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is for us a high-fortress.”

• For the last decade and more, Christians in Yemen have lived through a war in one of the world’s most religiously-oppressive systems, with famine, death, and instability all around, and many have never known the comfort of Christian fellowship because they don’t know a single other person who is a Christian. Let me close with a song written by one of these believers, who, like Martin Luther did in “A Mighty Fortress,” brought the truths of Psalm 46 into his present-day context:
  
  My Lord Jesus, present God and He who continues with me
  
  You carry my burdens and guide my steps 
  
  You removed my anxiety and are my confidence 
  
  My dear Jesus 
  
  Thank you for all the bounty and for dying for me
  
  I will give my life to you and not to my own way
  
  My Lord saved me and became my fortress… 

Psalm 46- Side-by side comparison of versions^A