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Our Scripture lesson this morning is taken from Psalm 91.
On January 8, 1956, Jim Elliot and four other missionaries were killed by the Auca people of Ecuador, whom they were attempting to evangelize.
Some years later, his widow Elisabeth, wrote a profile of her husband entitled, Shadow of the Almighty.
The title comes from the first verse of our psalm.
The title of Elisabeth Elliot’s book, as well as Psalm 91, were composed with the intent of making us ponder the question, “Is God True to His Promises?”.
If you will recall this was one of the Faith Shaking Questions we encountered in Psalm 89.
The final editors of the Psalms included Psalm 91 in Book IV of the Psalms in answer to the question, “Is God True to His Promises?”.
There are four things I want us to consider today in answering that question:
A Big Promise
A Big Problem
A Big Answer
Let us begin with the first:
A Big Promise
Psalm 91 begins with the author’s own profession of faith:
Then the author tells his readers what God will do for them if they trust in God, this is found in verses 3-13.
Finally, and most importantly, the author records for us God’s own words:
That is A Big Promise and this big promise causes us A Big Problem!
A Big Problem
Reading over the list of things God does for the person who trusts in Him seems to provide ample evidence that God is not true to His word.
For example:
There is not one person here who has not had some of the evils of this life fall upon them.
The plague of cancer has come near the tent of us all.
What family has not had a family member or friend beset by this deadly plague?
Where was God’s “shield and buckler” when the arrows of the Auca Indians stuck down Elisabeth Elliot’s husband and four other men?
Don’t be embarrassed to ask these hard questions, because that is the intent of the author, more importantly that is the intent of God, that we ask these hard questions.
Only by appreciating how big the problem is can we appreciate how big the answer is!
A Big Answer
The answer is found in verses eleven through thirteen.
When we began this series on the Psalms, we learned that Psalm 1 and Psalm 2, were the keys to unlocking the rest of the Psalms.
Psalm 1 tells us to meditate upon the Torah day and night.
If we have done this we will immediately recognized that the “lion and serpent” of verse 13 may have a deeper meaning.
In Genesis 3 we learn that the great enemy of humanity is a fallen Seraphim (the Hebrew word Seraphim is the plural of serpent) and it is this “serpent” that the Promised Seed of Eve will “trample underfoot.”
This Promised Seed brings us to the second key, the Anointed on of Psalm 2, who is Jesus Christ.
Jesus is the most important key for unlocking the Psalms.
It is no accident that Jesus was tempted with this very Psalm!
This promise of angelic guardians brings us back to the Torah; there we learn that God promises to send His angels as guards over His people in their journey to the place He has prepared for them.
Therefore, this promise is not a promise of protection against mere earthly dangers; rather it is a promise of protection against spiritual dangers that would to prevent us from arriving at the place God has prepared for us.
Satan’s temptation of Jesus was one of these spiritual dangers.
If Satan had been successful, he would have derailed Jesus from His path of glory.
This path to glory had to go through the suffering of the cross.
The same is true for us.
As simplistic reading of Psalm 91 outside of the context of the Torah and of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is very misleading.
If fact, it is the time of spiritual misdirection that Satan uses to lead us off the path to glory.
Shortly before his death, Jim Eliot cited these words of Jesus’ in his diary.
Reflecting on these words, Jim Eliot wrote, “He is no fool who parts with that which he cannot keep, when he is sure to be recompensed with that which he cannot lose.”
After his death, Life magazine published a ten-page article on Elliot’s and his friend’s mission and death.
Reading news of their deaths, thousands of American Evangelicals were inspired to become missionaries and even more were inspired to give sacrificially to missions.
Today the Auca tribe and hundreds of others now profess Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior!
This is why Paul encourages us with these words found in Romans and 2 Corinthians:
We read Psalm 91 thinking God is promises us a trouble free life, when He is promising us a Serpent crushing glory!
Paul understood this; this is why he concludes his letter to the Romans with these words:
God is not a liar, He is true to His promises and His promises are much bigger and better than we can imagine!
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