Won’t Someone Help Me?: A Meditation on Psalm 121
If you’ve ever watched daytime sports TV, you know that there are a lot of tired cliches. One line that is often used when a team is struggling goes like this: “[insert player] is not walking through that door.” What does this mean? It’s a roundabout way for the coach to call on his team to work harder. In a sense, the coach is saying, “No one is coming to save you.”
This sentiment is felt in the anxiety we feel as we handle hardship. As a single mother’s bank account continues to drain, she feels anxious. As a small business owner’s customers continue to leave him for a larger competitor, he feels anxious. Why? Because it brings to the surface this feeling, this voice that seems to say, “You’re all on your own. No one is coming to save you.”
How do we respond as people of faith? Are we resigned to this anxious hopelessness that comes with hardship? Is there a better way? This is the question the Psalmist asks in our passage today. Let’s read Psalm 121 together.
“I lift up my eyes to the hills.
From where does my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
who made heaven and earth.He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.
Behold, he who keeps Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.The Lord is your keeper;
the Lord is your shade on your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day,
nor the moon by night.The Lord will keep you from all evil;
he will keep your life.
The Lord will keep
your going out and your coming in
from this time forth and forevermore.” – Psalm 121 (NIV)
The Journey Ahead
In order to understand this psalm, we first must understand the situation in which the author has in mind. Psalm 121 is one of the fourteen Psalms of Ascent. These are songs that would have been sung by the Israelite people as they journeyed from their hometowns to the capital city of Jerusalem. They were like the playlists we listened to on a long road trip.
However, unlike the music we listen to, these songs had a purpose beyond merely passing the time. The purpose of these Psalms was to help the people keep their eyes on the city they were traveling toward. As the days became long, the heat of the sun pounding on them, the Israelites would take heart by reminding themselves of these precious truths.
How does this help us understand this chapter? It helps us in at least two ways. First, it shows us that this song was sung as a reminder, a response to the anxiety felt along the way. We can imagine these people in their weariness. They look up to the mountains, and it dawns on them how much further they have to go. They begin to wonder if they will make it to Jerusalem or if they should turn back. As they go to sleep, we can picture them reminding themselves, “God does not slumber or sleep (v.3), therefore I will sleep peacefully tonight.”
Second, the context of the psalm helps us understand that this song is primarily about God Himself. Even though they are looking forward to a great party in Jerusalem, they do not put their trust in the city or the people around them. No, this was a great affirmation that their trust was solely in God Himself. Their trust was not in what kind of shape they were in, or the way they had planned the trip, but in the God who was sustaining, helping, and protecting them.
It is in this light I want to look at this psalm with two very simple questions in mind. First, we ask the same question the Psalmist asked, “Where does my help come from?” What difference does it make when we trust in God as we journey through life?
Where Does My Help Come From?
An important question for us all, whether you are a follower of Jesus or not, is this question of Help. When the bottom falls out, when the cupboard runs dry, when you are left with just yourself, where do you run for help? I think we all run in three directions. First, we run to Things. For some of us, it's food and drink. When times get tough, when we are stressed out, we find that we’re constantly “treating” ourselves. For others of us, we run to technology. When the real world is too much, we escape to our phones, our computers, and all the other screens that dominate our lives.
The second place we run to is People. When we’ve had a difficult day at work, we cope by dumping our problems onto someone else. We might even have people in our lives we go to for advice, for rescue. It should be said that this is good and right, but we inevitably run into a dilemma. And the dilemma is this: people, just like things, end up failing us. Friends give us bad advice; family members can’t handle our constant complaining.
The third place we run to is Ourselves. This is often the solution we look to after our first two solutions (things and people) have failed us. We begin to embody the coach who says, “No one is coming to save me. Therefore, I’d better protect myself.” The problem with all three of these solutions is that while they may work in the short term, they fail in the long run. Things might make you feel good for a little while but after a while, you feel sick. People end up letting you down. You work on yourself, and you realize that the problems are outside of you.
So, what’s the solution? The solution we see in this Psalm is that instead of looking around us at Things and at People, and instead of looking Inside us at ourselves, the psalmist urges us to look outside of ourselves to the God who created us. We know this with certainty because the psalmist does us a favor by answering his own question. In verse 1 he poses the question and in verse 2 he says, “My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.”
In short, he looks up. He urges us that even though we are tempted to look down at our feet, the best advice he can give is to look up. And when he looks up, he discovers two things about God’s protection. He discovers that we can trust God with our problems when we run into trouble because (1) God’s protection is Personal and (2) God’s protection is Complete.
God’s Protection is Personal
Verses 3 and 4 tell us, “He will not allow your foot to slip; your Protector will not slumber. Indeed, the Protector of Israel does not slumber or sleep.” Notice the contrast from verses 1-2 and verses 3-4. In verse 2, He is the Lord, but in verse 3, He is your Protector. In verse 2, He is the Maker of heaven and earth, but in verse 4, He is the Protector of Israel.
So, which is it? Is God this big celestial being that can handle all my problems, or is He the God who cares about me? I think the psalmist presents it this way to assure us that He is both! The same God who parted the Red Seas is the same God who protected Moses from Egyptian persecution as a baby. The same God who rescued David from Goliath is the same God who led him to repentance.
The same is true for us. God is not too far off and busy with the affairs of the world to hear your prayers, but He’s also not so weak that He can’t deal with your problems. Isn’t that a God you would want to have in your corner when you run into problems?
He doesn’t stop there. He shows us that because God is personal, His protection is personal as well. To the Israelites who were taking thousands of steps every day, he says, “God will not allow your foot to slip; your Protector will not slumber.” What does this mean? It means that God’s care, His help, and His protection are not for “the world” but it’s for you. God stays awake, for you. What an encouragement to know that the God who is in my corner is not a God who fails. God is both extremely powerful and also extremely personal in how He looks after me.
Do you believe that? Is the God you pray to One who is extremely interested in you? When you pray do you believe that on the other end is a God who is not only listening to you but acting on your behalf, to catch your foot from slipping and arranging all your details?
God’s Protection is Complete
With this topic of protection, it’s hard not to think about insurance. I think you can tell someone’s age by how familiar they are with insurance. When you’re young you start with car insurance, move to health insurance, and eventually to home insurance. My take on insurance is that it’s strangely boring and terrifying at the same time. Boring because you’re presented with long lists of situations that will probably never happen to you, and terrifying because it’s a reminder that you’re not invincible!
Insurance exists because of the fear that something could happen to us, I call the insurance, and they say, “Oh what kind of coverage do you have? Sorry, that’s not good enough for this particular incident.”
Here’s the point: we all want the peace of mind that comes with being completely covered and completely protected. And that’s why it’s such good news to know that because God is a personal God, He is not like insurance. You never have to worry that you’re going to call God and He gives you the, “Oooh sorry, what kind of coverage do you have?”
That’s the picture of God we get from the psalmist in this psalm. In verse 5 he says, “The Lord protects you; the Lord is a shelter right by your side.” God’s protection is available no matter where you go. In verse 6 he says, “The sun will not strike you by day or the moon by night.” God’s protection is potent even against the sun and the moon. There is not a power or circumstance in the world that can withstand His power. Verse 7 says, “The Lord will protect you from all harm; he will protect your life.” Don’t you get the sense that he’s saying that God’s protection is complete? His protection is against all harm. There is no plot, no plan against you that will catch God off guard or overpower Him.
Conclusion
Psalm 121 has shown us that God is completely trustworthy because He is both strong and kind. He is incredibly concerned with our physical and mental health, and He is incredibly committed to taking care of us. You can trust God because of what His Word says about Him: He is a God who is strong enough to save and a God who is kind enough to come after us, even when we mess up.
What difference should this make in our lives? How do we know we have internalized the truths of this psalm? The first difference is in our thought life. Because God’s protection is both personal and complete, I don’t have to spend time worrying about what might happen. When we believe that God is taking care of us, we can put into practice what the Psalms say about sleep. We can rest knowing that God never rests. Instead of constantly looking at our own feet, ensuring we don’t slip up, we can look up at the world around us. In a sense, when we “allow” God to be God, it frees us to be human again. When I am trusting God, I am saying to myself in the mirror, “I release you from the pressure and responsibility of being God.”
The second difference this should make in our lives is in our work lives. Because God’s protection is both personal and complete, I can work hard from a place of rest. The truth of this psalm flows down from our thought life and into our work life. From our heads to our hearts to our hands. How does it change the way we work? The gospel releases us from the anxiety that says our work defines us. We can work hard while understanding that the work ultimately belongs to the Lord. When our trust is in God’s power above our own, it frees us, allowing us to move forward so that we can cease being anxious and start being productive.
As we conclude, here are a few questions to consider whether or not you are experiencing the freedom of Psalm 121:
Do you sense God’s presence in your life? Do you feel pressured to be perfect at home, at work, or among friends?
Do you allow yourself time to rest? What do you believe will happen if you take a break?
Is your relationship with God marked by peace and rest? Or anxiety and performance?
When we experience the rest that only comes from God, we will be able to go to work and work not from a place of anxiety, but from a place of trusting rest in the God who saves us. Trust in Him today!
