He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
Parallel Translations
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He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
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He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
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O thou that dwellest in the covert of the Most High, and abidest in the shadow of the Almighty;
Cross-references (22)
Passages linked to Psalms 91:1 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Psalms 32:7 You are my hiding place. You will preserve me from trouble. You will surround me with songs of deliverance.
- Psalms 27:5 For in the day of trouble, he will keep me secretly in his pavilion. In the secret place of his tabernacle, he will hide me. He will lift me up on a rock.
- Psalms 36:7 How precious is your loving kindness, God! The children of men take refuge under the shadow of your wings.
- Psalms 17:8 Keep me as the apple of your eye. Hide me under the shadow of your wings,
- 1 John 4:15-16 Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God. We know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and he who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him.
- Psalms 31:20 In the shelter of your presence you will hide them from the plotting of man. You will keep them secretly in a dwelling away from the strife of tongues.
- Isaiah 25:4 For you have been a stronghold to the poor, a stronghold to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shade from the heat, when the blast of the dreaded ones is like a storm against the wall.
- Psalms 61:3-4 For you have been a refuge for me, a strong tower from the enemy. I will dwell in your tent forever. I will take refuge in the shelter of your wings.
- Psalms 121:5 Yahweh is your keeper. Yahweh is your shade on your right hand.
- Isaiah 32:2 A man shall be as a hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the storm, as streams of water in a dry place, as the shade of a large rock in a weary land.
- Psalms 90:1 Lord, you have been our dwelling place for all generations.
- Psalms 57:1 Be merciful to me, God, be merciful to me, for my soul takes refuge in you. Yes, in the shadow of your wings, I will take refuge, until disaster has passed.
- Lamentations 4:20 The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of Yahweh, was taken in their pits; of whom we said, under his shadow we will live among the nations.
- Psalms 52:8 But as for me, I am like a green olive tree in God’s house. I trust in God’s loving kindness forever and ever.
- Psalms 25:13 His soul will dwell at ease. His offspring will inherit the land.
- Hosea 14:5-6 I will be like the dew to Israel. He will blossom like the lily, and send down his roots like Lebanon. His branches will spread, and his beauty will be like the olive tree, and his fragrance like Lebanon.
- Isaiah 4:5-6 Yahweh will create over the whole habitation of Mount Zion and over her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night, for over all the glory will be a canopy. There will be a pavilion for a shade in the daytime from the heat, and for a refuge and for a shelter from storm and from rain.
- Song of Solomon 2:3 As the apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons. I sat down under his shadow with great delight, his fruit was sweet to my taste.
- Ezekiel 11:16 “Therefore say, ‘The Lord Yahweh says: “Whereas I have removed them far off among the nations, and whereas I have scattered them among the countries, yet I will be to them a sanctuary for a little while in the countries where they have come.” ’
- Judges 9:15 “The bramble said to the trees, ‘If in truth you anoint me king over you, then come and take refuge in my shade; and if not, let fire come out of the bramble, and devour the cedars of Lebanon.’
- Isaiah 8:14 He will be a sanctuary, but for both houses of Israel, he will be a stumbling stone and a rock that makes them fall. For the people of Jerusalem, he will be a trap and a snare.
- 1 Chronicles 28:1-21 David assembled all the princes of Israel, the princes of the tribes, the captains of the companies who served the king by division, the captains of thousands, the captains of hundreds, and the rulers over all the substance and possessions of the king and of his sons, with the officers and the mighty men, even all the mighty men of valor, to Jerusalem. Then David the king stood up on his feet, and said, “Hear me, my brothers, and my people! As for me, it was in my heart to build a house of rest for the ark of Yahweh’s covenant, and for the footstool of our God; and I had prepared for the building. But God said to me, ‘You shall not build a house for my name, because you are a man of war, and have shed blood.’ However Yahweh, the God of Israel, chose me out of all the house of my father to be king over Israel forever. For he has chosen Judah to be prince; and in the house of Judah, the house of my father; and among the sons of my father he took pleasure in me to make me king over all Israel. Of all my sons (for Yahweh has given me many sons), he has chosen Solomon my son to sit on the throne of Yahweh’s kingdom over Israel. He said to me, ‘Solomon, your son, shall build my house and my courts; for I have chosen him to be my son, and I will be his father. I will establish his kingdom forever if he continues to do my commandments and my ordinances, as it is today.’ Now therefore, in the sight of all Israel, Yahweh’s assembly, and in the audience of our God, observe and seek out all the commandments of Yahweh your God; that you may possess this good land, and leave it for an inheritance to your children after you forever. You, Solomon my son, know the God of your father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind; for Yahweh searches all hearts, and understands all the imaginations of the thoughts. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will cast you off forever. Take heed now; for Yahweh has chosen you to build a house for the sanctuary. Be strong, and do it.” Then David gave to Solomon his son the plans for the porch of the temple, for its houses, for its treasuries, for its upper rooms, for its inner rooms, for the place of the mercy seat; and the plans of all that he had by the Spirit, for the courts of Yahweh’s house, for all the surrounding rooms, for the treasuries of God’s house, and for the treasuries of the dedicated things; also for the divisions of the priests and the Levites, for all the work of the service of Yahweh’s house, and for all the vessels of service in Yahweh’s house; of gold by weight for the gold, for all vessels of every kind of service; for all the vessels of silver by weight, for all vessels of every kind of service; by weight also for the lamp stands of gold, and for its lamps, of gold, by weight for every lamp stand and for its lamps; and for the lamp stands of silver, by weight for every lamp stand and for its lamps, according to the use of every lamp stand; and the gold by weight for the tables of show bread, for every table; and silver for the tables of silver; and the forks, the basins, and the cups, of pure gold; and for the golden bowls by weight for every bowl; and for the silver bowls by weight for every bowl; and for the altar of incense refined gold by weight; and gold for the plans for the chariot, and the cherubim that spread out and cover the ark of Yahweh’s covenant. “All this”, David said, “I have been made to understand in writing from Yahweh’s hand, even all the works of this pattern.” David said to Solomon his son, “Be strong and courageous, and do it. Don’t be afraid, nor be dismayed; for Yahweh God, even my God, is with you. He will not fail you, nor forsake you, until all the work for the service of Yahweh’s house is finished. Behold, there are the divisions of the priests and the Levites, for all the service of God’s house. Every willing man who has skill, for any kind of service, shall be with you in all kinds of work. Also the captains and all the people will be entirely at your command.”
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain 1 He that dwelleth in the secret place of…
1 He that dwelleth in the secret place of the High One. Some Hebrew interpreters read the three first verses as one continuous sentence, down to the words, he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler The whole would then run thus — “He who dwells in the covert of the Most High, and abides under his shadow, to him will I say of Jehovah, that he is his hope and defense, and the God in whom he may safely rest, for he shall deliver him from the snare,” etc. This is evidently a forced construction to put upon the verses, and the reason which has led some to adopt it is weak and insufficient. They consider that the first verse repeats the same thing twice, and therefore conveys no proper meaning. But this is a great mistake; for the inspired penman of the psalm, whoever he may have been, states two ideas quite distinct, That he who is hid under the Divine protection occupies a safe and secure position, where no hostile weapon can reach him. Or should the verse be read — He who has God to be the guardian of his safety shall rest under the shadow of God; still the second clause would retain an emphatic meaning, for the power of God would be contrasted with that weak defense which man is able to extend. Those, too, who dwell in the secret place of God are here said by the Psalmist to dwell under his shadow, in the sense that they experience to what a rich extent his protection reaches. Men generally seek out a great-variety of hiding-places, having recourse to one or another, according as the calamities are different which threaten to overtake them; but here we are taught that the only safe and impregnable fortress to which we can betake ourselves is the protection of God. He contrasts the security of those who trust in God with the vanity of all other confidences by which we are apt to delude ourselves.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain He that maketh God his defense and trust, shall…
He that maketh God his defense and trust, shall perceive his protection to be a most sure safeguard.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Psa 91:1 He that dwelleth in the secret place…
Psa 91:1 He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
Ver. 1. He that dwelleth in the secret place, &c.] The safety of a saint is in this whole psalm ( Quo nihil neque solidius neque splendidius dici potest) set forth to the life, Verbis vivis, animatis sententiis et spiritus fervore flagrantissimo.
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Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty] Under the pleasant and assured defence of God; he shall lodge under the shadow of Shaddai, and there sing away care and fear.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain The secret place; or, hiding-place. He that makes God…
The secret place; or, hiding-place. He that makes God his habitation and refuge, as he is called below, Psa 91:9, resorting to him, and relying upon him in his dangers and difficulties, shall not be disappointed of his hope, but shall find a quiet and safe repose under the Divine protection. A
shadow in Scripture phrase commonly signifies protection. See Gen 19:8; Jdg 9:15; Psa 17:8, &c.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain In these verses we have,
In these verses we have,
I. A great truth laid down in general, That all those who live a life of communion with God are constantly safe under his protection, and may therefore preserve a holy serenity and security of mind at all times (Psa 91:1): He that dwells, that sits down, in the secret place of the Most High, shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty; he that by faith chooses God for his guardian shall find all that in him which he needs or can desire. Note, 1. It is the character of a true believer that he dwells in the secret place of the Most High; he is at home in God, returns to God, and reposes in him as his rest; he acquaints himself with inward religion, and makes heart-work of the service of God, worships within the veil, and loves to be alone with God, to converse with him in solitude. 2. It is the privilege and comfort of those that do so that they abide under the shadow of the Almighty; he shelters them, and comes between them and every thing that would annoy them, whether storm or sunshine. They shall not only have an admittance, but a residence, under God's protection; he will be their rest and refuge for ever.
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II. The psalmist's comfortable application of this to himself (Psa 91:2): I will say of the Lord, whatever others say of him, "He is my refuge; I choose him as such, and confide in him. Others make idols their refuge, but I will say of Jehovah, the true and living God, He is my refuge: any other is a refuge of lies. He is a refuge that will not fail me; for he is my fortress and strong-hold." Idolaters called their idols Mahuzzim, their most strong-hold (Dan 11:39), but therein they deceived themselves; those only secure themselves that make the Lord their God, their fortress. There being no reason to question his sufficiency, fitly does it follow, In him will I trust. If Jehovah be our God, our refuge, and our fortress, what can we desire which we may not be sure to find in him? He is neither fickle nor false, neither weak nor mortal; he is God and not man, and therefore there is no danger of being disappointed in him. We know whom we have trusted.
III. The great encouragement he gives to others to do likewise, not only from his own experience of the comfort of it (for in that there might possibly be a fallacy), but from the truth of God's promise, in which there neither is nor can be any deceit (Psa 91:3, Psa 91:4, etc.): Surely he shall deliver thee. Those who have themselves found the comfort of making God their refuge cannot but desire that others may do so. Now here it is promised,
1. That believers shall be kept from those mischiefs which they are in imminent danger of, and which would be fatal to them (Psa 91:3), from the snare of the fowler, which is laid unseen and catches the unwary prey on a sudden, and from the noisome pestilence, which seizes men unawares and against which there is no guard. This promise protects, (1.) The natural life, and is often fulfilled in our preservation from those dangers which are very threatening and very near, while yet we ourselves are not apprehensive of them, any more than the bird is of the snare of the fowler. We owe it, more than we are sensible, to the care of the divine Providence that we have been kept from infectious diseases and out of the hands of the wicked and unreasonable. (2.) The spiritual life, which is protected by divine grace from the temptations of Satan, which are as the snares of the fowler, and from the contagion of sin, which is the noisome pestilence. He that has given grace to be the glory of the soul will create a defence upon all that glory.
2. That God himself will be their protector; those must needs be safe who have him for their keeper, and successful for whom he undertakes (Psa 91:4): He shall cover thee, shall keep thee secret (Psa 31:20), and so keep thee safe, Psa 27:5. God protects believers, (1.) With the greatest tenderness and affection, which is intimated in that, He shall cover thee with his feathers, under his wings, which alludes to the hen gathering her chickens under wings, Mat 23:37. By natural instinct she not only protects them, but calls them under that protection when she sees them in danger, not only keeps them safe, but cherishes them and keeps them warm. To this the great God is pleased to compare his care of his people, who are helpless as the chickens, and easily made a prey of, but are invited to trust under the shadow of the wings of the divine promise and providence, which is the periphrasis of a proselyte to the true religion, that he has come to trust under the wings of the God of Israel, Rut 2:12. (2.) With the greatest power and efficacy. Wings and feathers, though spread with the greatest tenderness, are yet weak, and easily broken through, and therefore it is added, His truth shall be thy shield and buckler, a strong defence. God is willing to guard his people as the hen is to guard the chickens, and as able as a man of war in armour.
3. That he will not only keep them from evil, but from the fear of evil, Psa 91:5, Psa 91:6. Here is, (1.) Great danger supposed; the mention of it is enough to frighten us; night and day we lie exposed, and those that are apt to be timorous will in neither period think themselves safe. When we are retired into our chambers, our beds, and have made all as safe as we can about us, yet there is terror by night, from thieves and robbers, winds and storms, besides those things that are the creatures of fancy and imagination, which are often most frightful of all. We read of fear in the night, Sol 3:8. There is also a pestilence that walketh in darkness, as that was which slew the first-born of the Egyptians, and the army of the Assyrians. No locks nor bars can shut out diseases, while we carry about with us in our bodies the seeds of them. But surely in the day-time, when we can look about us, we are not so much in danger; yes, there is an arrow that flieth by day too, and yet flies unseen; there is a destruction that wasteth at high-noon, when we are awake and have all our friends about us; even then we cannot secure ourselves, nor can they secure us. It was in the day-time that that pestilence wasted which was sent to chastise David for numbering the people, on occasion of which some think this psalm was penned. But, (2.) Here is great security promised to believers in the midst of this danger: "Thou shalt not be afraid. God by his grace will keep thee from disquieting distrustful fear (that fear which hath torment) in the midst of the greatest dangers. Wisdom shall keep thee from being causelessly afraid, and faith shall keep thee from being inordinately afraid. Thou shalt not be afraid of the arrow, as knowing that though it may hit thee it cannot hurt thee; if it take away the natural life, yet it shall be so far from doing any prejudice to the spiritual life that it shall be its perfection." A believer needs not fear, and therefore should not fear, any arrow, because the point is off, the poison is out. O death! where is thy sting? It is also under divine direction, and will hit where God appoints and not otherwise. Every bullet has its commission. Whatever is done our heavenly Father's will is done; and we have no reason to be afraid of that.
4. That they shall be preserved in common calamities, in a distinguishing way (Psa 91:7): "When death rides in triumph, and diseases rage, so that thousands and ten thousands fall, fall by sickness, or fall by the sword in battle, fall at thy side, at thy right hand, and the sight of their fall is enough to frighten thee, and if they fall by the pestilence their falling so near thee may be likely to infect thee, yet it shall not come nigh thee, the death shall not, the fear of death shall not." Those that preserve their purity in times of general corruption may trust God with their safety in times of general desolation. When multitudes die round about us, though thereby we must be awakened to prepare for our own death, yet we must not be afraid with any amazement, nor make ourselves subject to bondage, as many do all their life-time, through fear of death, Heb 2:15. The sprinkling of blood secured the first-born of Israel when thousands fell. Nay, it is promised to God's people that they shall have the satisfaction of seeing, not only God's promises fulfilled to them, but his threatenings fulfilled upon those that hate them (Psa 91:8): Only with thy eyes shalt thou behold and see the just reward of the wicked, which perhaps refers to the destruction of the first-born of Egypt by the pestilence, which was both the punishment of the oppressors and the enlargement of the oppressed; this Israel saw when they saw themselves unhurt, untouched. As it will aggravate the damnation of sinners that with their eyes they shall behold and see the reward of the righteous (Luk 13:28), so it will magnify the salvation of the saints that with their eyes they shall behold and see the destruction of the wicked, Isa 66:24; Psa 58:10.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain He that dwelleth in the secret place of the…
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High,.... Or the Supreme; a title of God, who is superior to all beings, the Creator and Preserver of them, God over all, higher than the highest of angels or men; see Gen 14:22, "his secret place" is his heart, his bosom, where his only begotten Son lies; and into which he takes his people, where they are set as a seal, and who enjoy intimate communion with him; which is no other than his gracious presence, called "the secret of his presence", Psa 31:20, which none but saints are admitted to, when his everlasting love, which was a secret in his heart, is made known unto them, and in which they also dwell, Jo1 4:16, as they likewise do in the eternal decree of election; which perhaps is meant by "the clefts of the rock, and secret places of the stairs", where the church is said to dwell, Sol 2:14, unless rather Christ the Rock, and who may be signified by the cleft of that Moses was put into, when the goodness of the Lord passed before him, is intended; and who is the hiding place from the wind: mention is made of "the secret" of God's "tabernacle", Psa 27:5, in which he hides his people; alluding to the tabernacle, or temple, and the most holy place in it, called his secret place, Eze 7:22, and may refer to the ministry of the word and ordinances, where saints dwell, and enjoy much communion with God; and who are particularly under his special providence, protection, and power; which may here be designed:
shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty: who is able to do all things for his people, and is "Shaddai", all sufficient, as this word is thought to signify; has a sufficiency of happiness in and for himself, and of provisions for all his creatures, and of power and grace for his own children: his "shadow" may be the same with his secret place, his power and protection, often in this book of Psalms called "the shadow of his wings", Psa 17:8, in allusion to birds that overshadow and protect their young with their wings; though perhaps the allusion here may be to the shadow of a tree, and design the word and ordinances of the Lord's house, which are a delightful, refreshing, reviving, and fruitful shadow, Sol 2:3, where gracious souls dwell, and abide with great delight and pleasure. Christ, the Son of God, is sometimes compared to the shadow of a rock, or tree, which screens and shelters from heat; as he preserves his people from the heat of a fiery law, the flaming sword of justice, the wrath of God, the fiery darts of Satan, and the fury of persecutors: under this shadow do they abide or lodge all night, safe and secure, as the word (o) signifies: the Targum calls this shadow the shadow of the clouds of glory; the Arabic version, "the shadow of the God of heaven."
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(m) So in Tikkune Zohar, correct. 20. fol. 50. 1. (n) T. Hieros. Sabbat, fol. 8. 2. (o) "indesinenter pernoctans", Junius & Tremellius; "pernoctat", Piscator, Gejerus; "pernoctabit", Michaelis.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain This psalm is a dialogue, wherein one declares the…
This psalm is a dialogue, wherein one declares the safety of them, who take God for their keeper, ver. 1. David declares this to be his resolution, ver. 2. Various promises are made to him, ver. 3-13. Which God himself confirms, ver. 14-16.
He - He that makes God his habitation and refuge.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain The safety of the godly man, and his confidence,…
PSALM XCI
The safety of the godly man, and his confidence, 1, 2.
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How he is defended and preserved, 3-10.
The angels of God are his servants, 11, 12;
and he shall tread on the necks of his adversaries, 13.
What God says of, and promises to, such a person, 14-16.
NOTES ON PSALM XCI
This Psalm has no title in the Hebrew; nor can it be determined on what occasion or by whom it was composed. It is most likely by the author of the preceding; and is written as a part of it, by fifteen of Kennicott's and De Rossi's MSS., commencing before the repetition of the four last words of the ninetieth. It is allowed to be one of the finest Psalms in the whole collection. Of it Simon de Muis has said: "It is one of the most excellent works of this kind which has ever appeared. It is impossible to imagine any thing more solid, more beautiful, more profound, or more ornamented. Could the Latin or any modern languages express thoroughly all the beauties and elegancies as well of the words as of the sentences, it would not be difficult to persuade the reader that we have no poem, either in Greek or Latin, comparable to this Hebrew ode."
Verse 1. He that dwelleth in the secret place] The Targum intimates that this is a dialogue between David, Solomon, and Jehovah. Suppose we admit this, - then
DAVID asserts: "He who dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty," Ps 91:1.
SOLOMON answers: "I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress; my God, in him will I trust," Ps 91:2.
DAVID replies, and tells him what blessings he shall receive from God if he abide faithful, Ps 91:3-13.
Then the SUPREME BEING is introduced, and confirms all that David had spoken concerning Solomon, Ps 91:14-16: and thus this sacred and instructive dialogue ends.
In the secret place of the Most High] Spoken probably in reference to the Holy of holies. He who enters legitimately there shall be covered with the cloud of God's glory - the protection of the all-sufficient God. This was the privilege of the high priest only, under the law: but under the new covenant all believers in Christ have boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus; and those who thus enter are safe from every evil.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Psa 91:1. He that dwelleth in the secret place,…
Psa 91:1. He that dwelleth in the secret place, &c. — He that makes God his habitation and refuge, as he is called Psa 91:9, that has recourse to him, and relies on him in his dangers and difficulties; that has access to him, intercourse with him, and worships within the veil, living a life of constant communion with him; shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty — He shall not be disappointed of his hope, but shall find a quiet and safe resting- place under the divine care. A shadow, in Scripture, often signifies protection. But there evidently seems to be an allusion to the most holy place in the tabernacle and temple, and to the outstretched wings of the cherubim covering the ark and mercy-seat: see notes on Psa 27:5; Psa 32:7. And it is as if the psalmist had said, He shall dwell like the ark in the holy of holies, under the immediate shadow and protection of the Divine Majesty. It is justly observed here by Dr. Horne, that “in all dangers, whether spiritual or corporal, the members of Christ’s mystical body may reflect, with comfort, that they are under the same almighty Protector.”
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain He that dwelleth - Everyone that so dwells. The…
He that dwelleth - Everyone that so dwells. The proposition is universal, and is designed to embrace all who are in this condition. It is true of one; it is true of all. The word rendered “dwelleth” here is a participle from the verb to “sit,” and here means “sitting:” literally, “sitting in the secret place,” etc. The idea is that of calm repose; of resting; of sitting down - as one does in his dwelling.
In the secret place - On the meaning of this see the notes at Psa 27:5. Compare Psa 31:20; Psa 32:7. Abiding where God abides. The idea is that of having one’s home or residence in the most holy place in the tabernacle or the temple, and of sitting with him in that sacred place.
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Of the Most High - Of God, represented as exalted above all; over all the universe.
Shall abide - Margin, as in Hebrew, “lodge.” That is his home - his resting place - where he lodges, or passes the night. He takes up his lodging there; he makes it his home.
Under the shadow of the Almighty - Under his protection, as if under his wings. Compare the notes at Psa 17:8. This is a general statement, and is designed as an introduction to the whole psalm, or as expressing what the psalm is intended to illustrate, “the blessedness” of the man who thus dwells with God; who makes him his friend; who makes the home of God his home.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain Psalms 91
Psalms 91
1 He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High
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Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
2 I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress:
My God; in him will I trust.
3 Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler
And from the noisome pestilence.
4 He shall cover thee with his feathers,
And under his wings shalt thou trust:
His truth shall be thy shield and buckler.
5 Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night;
Nor for the arrow that flieth by day;
6 Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness;
Nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday.
7 A thousand shall fall at thy side,
And ten thousand at thy right hand:
But it shall not come nigh thee.
8 Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold
And see the reward of the wicked.
9 Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge,
Even the Most High, thy habitation;
10 There shall no evil befall thee,
Neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.
11 For he shall give his angels charge over thee,
To keep thee in all thy ways.
12 They shall bear thee up in their hands,
Lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.
13 Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder:
The young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet.—
14 “Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him:
I will set him on high, because he hath known my name.
15 He shall call upon me, and I will answer him:
I will be with him in trouble;
I will deliver him, and honor him.
16 With long life will I satisfy him,
And shew him my salvation.”
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Contents and Division. The idea of the Psalm is contained in the thought, that he, who commits himself with full confidence to the protection of the Almighty, shall share that protection; that he will receive this the more fully, the more he makes his dwelling with Him, that thus deliverance will be afforded him from the greatest dangers, and that he will receive, besides, positive blessings. These comforting and elevating reflections are couched in expressions both lively and impressive. The true division, however, has become a matter of dispute, from the fact that a change of person appears on many occasions, which is quite unprovided for. And yet the supposition of different persons or a chorus (Van Till, J. D. Michaelis, Stier, Maurer, Olshausen, Delitzsch), is to be viewed with suspicion, especially as this change occurs on one occasion even in the same verse (Psa_91:9), and as in the concluding strophe (Psa_91:14-16) God is undoubtedly to be regarded as the speaker. This Psalm is significantly employed in the Church-service as an Invocavit for Sunday, and, together with Psalms 3, has been designated by the Talmudists as the Poem of Accidents, that is, a song of protection in the midst of impending dangers (Del.). It may perhaps be divided as follows. There is first presented a declaration made (Psa_91:1-2) by the psalmist with regard to himself. Then he utters words of encouragement of a lyrico-prophetical character, in which he holds up to view the promises of miraculous aid from God, for his own consolation (Psa_91:3-4), encouragement (Psa_91:5-6), and the assurance (Psa_91:7-8), of safety with God (9, 10). And, finally, God’s acceptance of his confession and ratification of His own promises are announced in the form of an oracle (Psa_91:14-16). Those assumptions which fix the time of composition shortly after the desecration of the Second Temple (Ewald) or before the Passover of the year 162 B. C. (Hitzig), are mere guesses; and yet they are entitled to rather more respect than is the superscription: A song of praise of David, (Sept.), or the supposition that the Psalm was addressed by Moses to Joshua (Venema). [Alexander: “An amplification of the theme that God is the dwelling-place and refuge of His people. This and other points of contact with the prayer of Moses seem to mark it as an imitation of that Psalm, and account for its position in the Psalter.”—J. F. M.]
Psa_91:1-2. Dwelling [E.V.: He that dwelleth]. The supposition that אַשְׁרֵי has fallen out from the beginning of the Psalm (Olshausen, Hupfeld) is untenable, especially as it necessitates the change of אֹמַר Psa_91:2 into אֹמֵר, and proceeds from the unnatural assumption that the Church both speaks and is addressed (Olshausen). Now if we consider the psalmist as occupying this double place, we have a confession recorded, which in the first verse is described as an individual one, springing from a sense of a personal relation to God, while in the second the substance of that confession is given. That the punctuators so intended is clear from the fact that they have not, in the second sentence, allowed a participle pointed אֹמֵר to follow the ישֵׁב which begins the psalm. This would give the following connection: He who dwells …. is speaking (Jerome, Luther and most). But they have pointed the 1st imperfect אֹמַר, which shows that they not only viewed the person dwelling and the person speaking as one and the same, but also regarded the Psalmist as that person. It was also not without an object but with good reason, that they separated, by the accentuation, אֹמַר from the following word, although the fact has been either overlooked or misunderstood by most expositors. It was just the usual connection of the words that was to be avoided. For, beside a direct address to Jehovah, an address by the speaker to himself would be much more unexpected and harsh, than the mention of what the Psalmist had confessed to God and experienced in communion with Him. Since the two members of the first verse are connected by “and,” and a finite verb occurs in the second member, the idea might be suggested, that they stand in the relation of protasis and apodosis (Sept., Isaaki, Calvin, Geier, J. H. Michaelis, De Wette). But this would result in an insupportable tautology, which could only be concealed, by foisting, against usage, upon the idea of passing the night, that of resting. In view of the parallelism between the members of the sentence and the thoughts, the resolving of the part. into the corresponding finite verb is seen to form a suitable transition to the conclusion of the sentence. By this mode of viewing the passage the change of persons in Psa_91:9, appearing suddenly and then entirely vanishing, may also be explained. The psalmist interrupts his confession by addressing to himself words of encouragement. We need not, therefore, supply אֲמַרְתָּ before (Theodoret, Isaaki, Clericus, Hupfeld) or after אַתָּה (Hitzig), or expand the latter into the former. [Dr. Moll therefore renders Psa_91:1-2 :
Dwelling in the protection of the Highest,
(As he who) passes the night under the shadow of the Almighty,
I say: In Jehovah is my refuge and fortress,
My God, in whom I trust.
Dr. Alexander translates: “Sitting in the secret place of the Most High, in the shadow of the Almighty he is lodged.” This verse he supposes to be “descriptive of an ideal person with whom the speaker is tacitly identified.”—J. F. M.].
Psa_91:3, etc.Terror by night (Psa_91:5). The best view is that which supposes attacks of enemies to be referred to, (Sol. Son_3:8; Pro_3:23-26). The psalmist does not here enter an incorporeal, unearthly realm (Stier); and יָשׁוּר does not relate to demons (Shedim) or ghosts (the ancient translators). Nor is the devil and his brood; as a contrast to the angels, denoted either directly or indirectly by the lions, adders and dragons (Stier and Schegg, and Delitzsch in part). The dangers, especially those which threaten travellers, are represented here by illustrations readily suggested. But the nature of these dangers and the mode of overcoming them, are set forth in such a way as that they may be applied to all the powers, either of nature or of the spirit-world, which threaten destruction (Luk_10:19; Mar_16:18; Rom_16:20). So the snare of the fowler, in Psa_91:3, is not identical with the snare of the devil (2Ti_2:26), but at most an emblem of death (Ewald, Hitzig), though probably only a representation of dangerous snares generally (Ecc_9:12). For in Psa_91:3, pestilence does not yet appear as a disease, but represents the plague-like attack of ruin or evil (Hos_13:14). The picture is still a general one. It is only in Psa_91:5, that the dangers of war by night and by day are added to it. In Psa_91:6 pestilence and sickness [E. V.: destruction] are introduced as diseases. In Psa_91:11 ff., after a description of God’s protection of the righteous dwelling in his tent, the dangers of the traveller are brought into view. The concluding sentence enlarges the view after Psa_50:23.—The emperor Alexander I. is said to have been awakened by means of this Psalm. The Countess Tolstoj gave it to him in writing on the evening before his march against Napoleon in the year 1812.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. He who knows God, knows also what he has in Him, and what he knows of God he will declare under different circumstances and at different times. But to call upon, pray to, thank, and praise Him in all times of need is not an easy thing for even pious men to do. For the dangers which threaten men, the enemies which lurk around them, their menacing conduct, are innumerable and of many forms; visible and invisible, foreseen and unsuspected, concealed and openly displayed, by day and by night, in the house and by the way, at home and abroad, with violence, cunning, and malice, planned and executed for the ruin of many.
2. But if our path of life is full of obstructions, over which we are walking in constant danger of death, we have not merely to do with attacks from without, but also to contend with temptations which arise within ourselves, from timidity, want of faith, and weakness. For this we need, in equal measure, divine encouragement to our soul, which holds up to view and confirms the promises of God’s help, as well as that help itself in actual experience.
3. We must therefore take refuge in God’s Truth as well as in His Omnipotence and Love. Then will we in all dangers not only trust in the protection of God; we will also be guided by His word, and learn to distinguish between the fearless and confident resort to God in the true paths of our calling, and the presumptuous courting of danger so as to tempt God (Mat_4:6). Then, since we not merely hide ourselves under the wings of the Almighty (Psa_17:8; Mat_23:37), or refresh ourselves under the shadow of His house (Num_14:9; Hos_14:8; Jer_48:45), but take up our abode in God as our Dwelling-place, we can raise our contemplation above the conditions of time, to a life whose duration none can declare, and wait for the coming deliverance.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
No man can do without God’s assistance, but it is only believers who acknowledge it, and derive consolation from that assistance in conformity with the Divine promises. Many experience the protection of God, but it is only those who trust Him, that gain lasting profit therefrom.—He who has taken refuge in God, will not leave Him again, but remain ever with Him.—Men must be guided by God’s word, if they would learn to rely upon His will.—We know most assuredly that God is for us, because we can be with Him and He with us.—Whether life be long or short, the main thing is that we gain during it the gracious presence of God, and experience the saving help of the Highest.—God does not merely send His servants and messengers; He comes also Himself to help and deliver the righteous.
Starke: He who has God for his dwelling-place is raised so high, that the devil, the world, and all temptations cannot harm him.—True hope in God is naturally a token of a state of grace, for none can have a true living hope in Him, who have not true faith in and sincere love for Him.—The chief ground of the assurance of the righteous that they will obtain God’s protection, is His truth and faithfulness in graciously fulfilling His promises.—What to others is a poison and rod of anger, must to believers be a wholesome medicine: God even knows how to direct everything by His wisdom and goodness for the highest good of His children.—Beware of rejecting anything, which God graciously sends to thee.—The hut of the believer is a surer defence against all the afflictions and punishments which come from God, than the grandest palaces of the ungodly.—God is indeed very willing to protect us and to do us good, but we must do our part too, and with humility and faith seek with Him these blessings.—It is not our merit and worthiness that make us partakers of the defence and help of God, but true faith, by which we know His name.—Six times in succession does God say: I will. How great is such love! Call thou out to Him in reply: I will. I will accept the order in which Thou dost promise to prove Thy readiness to help.—Arndt: It is a comforting word, that God, the chief captain of the guard, Himself keeps watch and guard over His children.—How men by sincere trust in God are so well assisted, is proved, partly by what God does for them, and partly by the words of comfort they address to themselves.—Tholuck: God’s covering extends everywhere, and thou needest not seek any other.—Vaihinger: Vital union with God is the ground of help.—Umbreit: Enjoyment in a long earthly life does in no way exclude a striving after immortal glory and the hope of eternity, but supposes only a peaceful contentment with the present, and a child-like pleasure in the glad light of the sun.—Diedrich: Let God rule outside with His thunder: but keep thyself completely shielded in Him.—Schaubach: The Christian should exult in the victory of Jesus Christ, not with vain and harmful delight, but as a living witness to the Divine truth and righteousness, to the honor of God and the comfort and strengthening of his own soul.—Taube: It is not merely a safe progress through this world of sorrow that is here kept in view, but satisfaction in and from the God of salvation and life; and only then can we be satisfied.
[Barnes: Religion blesses a man in this life and blesses him for ever. In possession of this it is a great thing for him to live long: and then it is a great thing for him to die—to go to be for ever with God.—J. F. M.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 1. Dwelleth—Sitteth, or waiteth.
1. Dwelleth—Sitteth, or waiteth.
Secret place—The allusion is to the holy of holies in the tabernacle.
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Shadow of the Almighty—Referring to the wings of the cherubim that “shadowed the mercy seat.” See Exo_25:18-20; Heb_9:5. But this could be taken only in the spiritual sense, as in Mat_6:6; Heb_10:19-22. To abide under the shadow of the Almighty is to abide under his immediate protection. The “secret place” is also an oriental phrase for the interior room or rooms of the house or tent, reserved for the master or chief. See on Psa_27:5; Psa_31:20; Psa_61:4
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 1. Whoever takes refuge with God will find himself…
1. Whoever takes refuge with God will find himself under the protection of an Almighty guardian. “He shall be treated as God’s guest … His Almighty Power shall be spread around him during the night of trouble and peril. Loving faith on man’s part shall be met by faithful love on God’s part” (Kay). Such is the sense of the A.V., which is certainly the most natural rendering of the verse. It is however rejected by most modern commentators as tautological. The predicate, it is said, simply repeats the subject, for the verb shall abide, or lodge, does not bear the emphatic meaning of permanent sojourn. But the verb is not used of temporary sojourn only (cp. Psa_25:13), and if the emphasis is on the words in the shelter of the Almighty, the second line is not merely a repetition of the first.
Other renderings which have been suggested are (1) As one that dwelleth in the covert of the Most High, that lodgeth in the shadow of the Almighty, I will say, &c. Cp. R.V. marg. This construction however is harsh and cumbrous. (2) With the insertion of a word at the beginning of Psa_91:1, Happy is the man that dwelleth … that lodgeth … that saith …; an emendation plausible enough in itself, but without any support from the Ancient Versions. (3) With a slight change of text, He that dwelleth … that lodgeth … saith of Jehovah. This emendation has much to commend it. It is supported by the LXX (ἐρεῖ), and it gets rid of the supposed tautology, as well as of the somewhat perplexing first person I will say in Psa_91:2.
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But it is unnecessary if Psa_91:1 is explained as above; the gain to the sense is doubtful; and the elimination of the first person destroys a feature of the Psalm. Its use here is supported by its recurrence in Psa_91:9.
secret place] Covert or hiding-place. Cp. Psa_27:5; Psa_31:20; Psa_32:7, &c.
the shadow] Shelter or protection. The figure is probably (cp. Psa_91:4) derived from the care of the mother-bird for her young (Psa_17:8, &c.), rather than from the hospitable roof (Gen_19:8), or sheltering rock (Isa_32:2).
the Most High … the Almighty] Significant titles, chosen to emphasise the power of the Sovereign Ruler of the world to defend His people.
1, 2. The theme of the Psalm; Jehovah a secure defence for those who take refuge in Him.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (1, 2) He . . . I.—The especial difficulty…
(1, 2) He . . . I.—The especial difficulty of this psalm, its abrupt changes of person, meets us at the outset. The text literally rendered, runs: “He sitting in the hiding place of the Most High; In the shadow of the Almighty he lodgeth, I say to Jehovah, My refuge and my fortress, My God, I trust in Him. The change in the last clause presents no particular difficulty, as many similar instances occur; but that from the third person, in the first verse, to the first, in the second, is very awkward, and many shifts have been adopted to get out of it. The best is to supply the word blessed: “Blessed is he that,” &c[16] The different names for God employed here should be noticed. By their accumulation the poet makes the sum of assurance doubly sure.
[16] The omission of this word by a copyist would be very natural, from its confusion with the numerical heading of the psalm and the initial letter of the word that now begins it.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain THIS psalm, like the majority in the present Book,…
THIS psalm, like the majority in the present Book, is without a title. Jewish tradition, however, ascribed it to Moses a conclusion which Dr. Kay and others accept as borne out by the facts, especially by the many close resemblances between it and De 32 De 33. Other critics, and they are the majority, trace in it a different hand, but regard it as suggested by Psalm 90.
The subject is the security of the man who thoroughly trusts in God. This subject is worked out by an "antiphonal arrangement" (Cheyne) the first speaker delivering vers. 1, 2; the second, vers. 3, 4; then the first responding with vers. 5-8; and again the second with vers. 9-13. In conclusion, a third speaker, making himself the mouthpiece of Jehovah, crowns all by declaring the blessings which God himself will bestow upon his faithful ones (vers. 14-16).
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This psalm is, apparently, liturgical, and is "the most vivid of the liturgical psalms" (Cheyne). It has a certain resemblance to the speech of Eliphaz the Temanite in Job_5:17-23, but stands at a higher elevation.
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High. (comp. Psa_90:1) He who has his thoughts always on God is said to "dwell in him to "make his abode with him to "sit down in his secret place." He has the Almighty, as it were, for his constant companion. Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. This is not "tautology." What is meant is that "loving faith on man"s part shall be met by faithful love on God"s part" (Kay). God will extend his "shadow" over the man who places himself under his protection.
HOMILIES BY S. CONWAY Vers. 1-16. The man that trusts in God.
I WE HAVE HIS DESCRIPTION.
1. He dwells in the secret place, etc.
2. He abides under the shadow of the Almighty.
II HIS CONFESSION OF FAITH (Ver. 2) The Lord is his Refuge, Fortress, the Joy of his soul, his God, his constant Confidence.
III HIS COMMENDATION OF GOD TO OTHERS. (Vers. 3-13)
1. As a sure Deliverer from the hidden foe and from the devouring pestilence.
2. As Protector; like that of the mother bird over her young; like that of shield and buckler to the soldier.
3. As the Inspirer of confidence. (Ver. 5) Against the midnight attack the terror by night (cf. Judges 7). Against open war, when the flight of arrows almost darkened the sky. Against secret disease (ver. 6) and sudden death the sickness that wasteth at noonday.
4. As rescuing from the very jaws of death. Thousands falling all around, but God"s servant kept unharmed (ver. 7). Seeing only, but never experiencing, the awful recompense of the wicked (ver. 8).
5. He gives the reason of this. (Ver. 9) He made the Lord his Refuge and his Habitation; there no evil could come, nor any plague.
6. He tells of the angelic ministries through which God thus guards his people; they keep and they upbear, so that no hurt shall come. Still more, they render the man invulnerable (ver. 13). Forces terrible as the lion and subtle like the adder cannot harm. Thus, from his own experience, the man that trusts in God commends him to his fellow man. And next
IV THE DIVINE APPROVAL AND DELIGHT IN BOTH THE MAN AND HIS TESTIMONY. At ver. 14 God begins to speak.
1. Declaring his mind towards his faithful servant. We may regard these verses (14-16) as a Divine soliloquy, in which God, well pleased, meditates what he will do, and why, for his servant. He will deliver, exalt, answer, keep near to, honour, satisfy with long life, and reveal to him the fulness of his love.
2. Endorsing the testimony in the mind of him to whom it has been given. Making him feel that it is all true, and that much more is true. Thus does God deal with his faithfully witnessing servants, and for and through them to others. This psalm is as true for today as for the day when it was written. Let us but thus trust in God, confess, and commend him. S.C.
Vers. 1-3. Abiding under God"s shadow.
In order to understand this most precious promise, inquire
I WHAT IS THE SECRET PLACE OF THE MOST HIGH? The idea of this "secret place" is frequently met with.
1. Sometimes it tells of some secret hiding place, such as David often resorted to when a fugitive; and the sure protection of God is likened to such safe shelter.
2. At other times, the central tent of the commander of an army seems to be meant, as in Psa_27:5, "He shall hide me in his pavilion," etc. The enemy would have to break through rank after rank of the encamped army ere he could reach the well guarded central tent of the leader. So inaccessible to the foe, so strongly placed was it, that it is taken as an emblem of our security in God.
3. But it is to the most holy place of the tabernacle and temple that we think allusion is here made. That sacred chamber was emphatically the secret place of the Most High. It was entered but once a year, and then only by one person, the high priest, bearing the blood of atonement. For all the rest of the year no footfall was heard in that secret place, no eye looked upon the glory of God that shone forth there. That loneliness told of the sad alienation that had sprung up between God and man through man"s sin. But that secret place was the earthly dwelling place of God. There, between the cherubim, his glory shone forth, and there he was said to dwell.
II BUT WHAT IS IT TO DWELL THERE? Literally, no man ever dwelt there. We are driven, therefore, to seek the spiritual meaning of this word. And we note that:
1. Israel entered there in the person of the high priest, when he bore in his hand the atoning blood, which he was about to sprinkle upon the mercy seat. All Israel found entrance there in their high priest, their representative. And whilst they continued in the faith of God, obeying and trusting him, they spiritually dwelt in that secret place, and, as a fact, were under the shadow the high priest was so literally of the Most High. No evil befell them, no plague came nigh their dwelling. It was well with them indeed.
2. And we enter and dwell there when, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, we come to God, pleading his all-sufficient sacrifice and atonement, of which the blood berne by the high priest told. And we dwell there as we continue in that precious faith. Then we, too, are under the shadow of the Almighty. The Law"s condemnation, sin"s power, earthly care, death, and the grave, can do us no harm; we are under the sure and blessed shelter of our God. Next let us note
III THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THIS INDWELLING.
1. The Lord is to us our Refuge. The Law"s condemnation would fasten upon us but for this. And he is our Fortress the place of vantage whence we fight successfully the spiritual warfare. And he is our God, in whom we trust; he is the confidence, the delight, the joy of our souls; so that we say of him, "He is my God.
2. And all this we take personally, each of us individually appropriating it. The Lord is not merely a Refuge," but "my Refuge," "my Fortress," etc.
3. And we confess it. "I will say of the Lord," etc.; "With the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
IV THE SURE FRUIT OF SUCH DWELLING IN THE SECRET PLACE OF THE MOST HIGH. We shall commend God to others. The rest of the psalm is one prolonged testimony to the blessedness of thus dwelling in God. "Surely he shall deliver thee," etc. Are we, then, thus individually and avowedly dwelling in God? S.C.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK Ver. 1. Our place of safety.
The construction of this psalm is peculiar (see exegetical notes). Ewald gives the best suggestion concerning its structure. Partly the poet expresses his own feelings as from himself, and partly as if they were uttered by another. He seems to listen to the thoughts of his own spirit till they become clear and distinct, like some prophetic words, or some Divine oracle speaking to him from without, and giving him thus the assurance and the consolation afresh which had already sprung up in his heart. The associations of the psalm, and the authorship, cannot with any certainty be traced, but the Jewish idea that it belongs to the age of
Moses deserves consideration. Certainly the experiences of the wilderness life give the most effective illustration of both the figures and the sentiments of the psalm. Bishop Wordsworth says confidently, "The scenery of the psalm is derived from the circumstances of the sojourn of Israel in the wilderness." Dean Plumptre says, "The psalm is an echo, verse by verse almost, of the words in which Eliphaz the Temanite describes the good man"s life." (Job_5:17-23) Perhaps the two sentences of ver. 1 would be better read as a repetition, according to the customary construction of Hebrew poets. "He that dwelleth... he that abideth... shall say unto the Lord." Working out the Mosaic association, show
I THE WILDERNESS PERILS. As Moses would be impressed by them. Limited food. Dangers of pestilence by remaining too long in a place. Active enemies. Local difficulties, as from serpents. Temper of the people. Influence of mixed multitudes. Wearying effect of constant changes, etc. We seldom fully realize the persistent and exhausting anxieties of Moses. Sometimes even his life seemed to be in danger.
II THE WILDERNESS SAFETIES. Moses could not help contrasting the holy quiet of those forty days he had spent in the "secret place" with God, and the forty years of strain and stress he had spent with the stiff-necked and rebellious people. He must often have yearned for a renewal of those restful hours. And yet the spiritual fact and truth for him was that he did still "dwell in the secret place," he did still "abide under the shadow of the Almighty;" for this, in very truth, is a mood of soul experience, and not a mere bodily relationship. Moses with God in the mount does but illustrate Moses with God always, resting and safe in his "shadow." R.T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Charles H. Spurgeon 1885 · Public Domain This Psalm is without a title, and we have…
This Psalm is without a title, and we have no means of ascertaining either the name of its writer, or the date of its composition, with certainly. The Jewish doctors consider that when the author's name is not mentioned we may assign the Psalm to the last named writer; and, if so, this is another Psalm of Moses, the man of God. Many expressions here used are similar to those of Moses in Deuteronomy, and the internal evidence, from the peculiar idioms, would point towards him as the composer. The continued lives of Joshua and Caleb, who followed the Lord fully, make remarkably apt illustrations of this Psalm, for they, as a reward for abiding in continued nearness to the Lord, lived on "amongst the dead, amid their graves." For these reasons it is by no means improbable that this Psalm may have been written by Moses, but we dare not dogmatize. If David's pen was used in giving us this matchless ode, we cannot believe as some do that he this commemorated the plague which devastated Jerusalem on account of his numbering the people. For him, then, to sing of himself as seeing "the reward of the wicked" would be clean contrary to his declaration, "I have sinned, but these sheep, what have they done?"; and the absence of any allusion to the sacrifice upon Zion could not be in any way accounted for, since David's repentance would inevitably have led him to dwell upon the atoning sacrifice and the sprinkling of blood by the hyssop.
In the whole collection there is not a more cheering Psalm, its tone is elevated and sustained throughout, faith is at its best, and speaks nobly. A German physician was wont to speak of it as the best preservative in times of cholera, and in truth, it is a heavenly medicine against plague and pest. He who can live in its spirit will be fearless, even if once again London should become a lazar-house, and the grave be gorged with carcases.
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On this occasion we shall follow the divisions which our translators have placed at the head of the Psalm, for they are pithy and suggestive.
Ps 91:1-2 The state of the godly.
Ps 91:3-8 Their safety.
Ps 91:9-10 Their habitation.
Ps 91:11-13 Their servants.
Ps 91:14-16 Their friend; with the effects of them all.
Ver. 1. He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High. The blessings here promised are not for all believers, but for those who live in close fellowship with God. Every child of God looks towards the inner sanctuary and the mercyseat, yet all do not dwell in the most holy place; they run to it at times, and enjoy occasional approaches, but they do not habitually reside in the mysterious presence. Those who through rich grace obtain unusual and continuous communion with God, so as to abide in Christ and Christ in them, become possessors of rare and special benefits, which are missed by those who follow afar off, and grieve the Holy Spirit of God. Into the secret place those only come who know the love of God in Christ Jesus, and those only dwell there to whom to live is Christ. To them the veil is rent, the mercyseat is revealed, the covering cherubs are manifest, and the awful glory of the Most High is apparent: these, like Simeon, have the Holy Ghost upon them, and like Anna they depart not from the temple; they are the courtiers of the Great King, the valiant men who keep watch around the bed of Solomon, the virgin souls who follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth. Elect out of the elect, they have "attained unto the first three", and shall walk with their Lord in white, for they are worthy. Sitting down in the august presence chamber where shines the mystic light of the Sheckinah, they know what it is to be raised up together, and to be made to sit together with Christ in the heavenlies, and of them it is truly said that their conversation is in heaven. Special grace like theirs brings with it special immunity. Outer court worshippers little know what belongs to the inner sanctuary, or surely they would press on until the place of nearness and divine familiarity became theirs. Those who are the Lord's constant guests shall find that he will never suffer any to be injured within his gates; he has eaten the covenant salt with them, and is pledged for their protection.
Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. The Omnipotent Lord will shield all those who dwell with him, they shall remain under his care as guests under the protection of their host. In the most holy place the wings of the cherubim were the most conspicuous objects, and they probably suggested to the psalmist the expression here employed. Those who commune with God are safe with Him, no evil can reach them, for the outstretched wings of his power and love cover them from all harm. This protection is constantthey abide under it, and it is all sufficient, for it is the shadow of the Almighty, whose omnipotence will surely screen them from all attack. No shelter can be imagined at all comparable to the protection of Jehovah's own shadow. The Almighty himself is where his shadow is, and hence those who dwell in his secret place are shielded by himself. What a shade in the day of noxious heat! What a refuge in the hour of deadly storm! Communion with God is safety. The more closely we cling to our Almighty Father the more confident may we be.
Whole Psalm. The Talmud writers ascribe not only the ninety-first Psalm, but the nine ensuing, to the pen of Moses; but from a rule which will in no respect hold, that all the psalms which are without the name of an author in their respective titles are the production of the poet whose name is given in the nearest preceding title. And though it is impossible to prove that this highly beautiful ode was not written by David, the general drift of its scenery and allusions rather concur in showing that, like the last, we are indebted for it to the muse of Moses: that it was composed by him during the journey through the wilderness, shortly after the plague of the fiery serpents; when the children of Israel, having returned to a better spirit, were again received into the favour of JEHOVAH. Besides political enemies, the children of Israel in the wilderness had other evils in great numbers to encounter, from the nature and diseases of the climate, which exposed them to coups de soleil, or sun smiting, during the heat of the day; and to pestilential vapours, moon smiting, during the damp of the night, so as to render the miraculous canopy of the cloud that hung over them in the former season, and the miraculous column of fire that cheered and purified them in the latter, equally needful and refreshing. In Egypt, they had seen so much of the plague, and they had been so fearfully threatened with it as a punishment for disobedience, that they could not but be in dread of its reappearance, from the incessant fatigues of their journeying. In addition to all which, they had to be perpetually on their guard against the insidious attacks of the savage monsters and reptiles of "that great and terrible wilderness", as Moses describes it on another occasion, "wherein were fiery serpents, and scorpions, and drought; where there was no water" (De 8:15); and where, also, as we learn from other parts of Scripture, bears, lions, leopards or tigers, and "the wolf of the evening", as Jeremiah has beautifully expressed it, prowled without restraint. Now in the Psalm before us, and especially in Ps 91:6-13, we have so clear and graphic a description of the whole of these evils presented to us, as to bring its composition directly home to the circumstances and the period here pitched upon, and to render it at least needless to hunt out for any other occasion. J. M. Good's "Historical Outline of the Book of Psalms", 1842.
Whole Psalm. It is one of the most excellent works of this kind which has ever appeared. It is impossible to imagine anything more solid, more beautiful, more profound, or more ornamented. Could the Latin or any modern language express thoroughly all the beauties and elegancies as well of the words as of the sentences, it would not be difficult to persuade the reader that we have no poem, either in Greek or Latin, comparable to this Hebrew ode. Simon de Muis.
Whole Psalm. Psalm 90 spoke of man withering away beneath God's anger against sin. Psalm 91 tells of a Man, who is able to tread the lion and adder under His feet. Undoubtedly the Tempter was right in referring this Psalm to "the Son of God" (Mt 4:6).
The imagery of the Psalm seems to be in part drawn from that Passover Night, when the Destroying Angel passed through Egypt, while the faithful and obedient Israelites were sheltered by God. William Kay.
Ver. 1. He, no matter who he may be, rich or poor, learned or unlearned, patrician or plebeian, young or old, for "God is no respecter of persons", but "he is rich to all that call upon him." Bellarmine.
Ver. 1. He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High. Note, he who dwells in the secret place of the Most High is not he that conjures up one or two slight and fleeting acts of hope in Him, but the man that places in him an assiduous and constant confidence. In this way he establishes for himself in God by that full trust, a home, a dwelling place, a mansion, ...The Hebrew for he that dwelleth, is bvy, that is, dwelling in quietude, and resting, enduring and remaining with constancy. Le Blanc.
Ver. 1. He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High. What intimate and unrestrained communion does this describe! the Christian in everything making known his heart, with its needs and wishes, its thoughts and feelings, its doubts and anxieties, its sorrows and its joys, to God, as to a loving, perfect friend. And all is not on one side. This Almighty Friend has admitted his chosen one to his "secret place." It is almost too wonderful to be true. It is almost too presumptuous a thought for such creatures as we are to entertain. But He himself permits it, desires it, teaches us to realise that it is communion to which he calls us. "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him." And what is this "secret"? It is that in God which the world neither knows, nor sees, nor cares to enjoy. It is his mind revealed to those that love him, his plans, and ways ("He made known his ways to Moses", Ps 103:7), and thoughts opened to them. Yea, and things hid from angels are manifest to the least of his friends (1Pe 1:12). He wishes us to know him, and by his Word and by his Spirit he puts himself before us. Ah! it is not his fault if we do not know him. It is our own carelessness. Mary B. M. Duncan, in "Under the Shadow", 1867.
Ver. 1. By secret here is meant a place of refuge from the storms of the world under the secret of his providence, who careth for all his children. Also, by the secret of the most High, some writers understand the castle of his mighty defence, to which his people run, being pursued by enemies, as the wild creature doth to his hole or den for succour, when the hunter hath him in chase, and the dogs are near. This then being the meaning of that which the prophet calleth the "secret place of the most High", and our dwelling in it, by confidence in him; we learn, in all troubles, to cleave to God chiefly or only for help, and to means but as underlings to his providence...
That which is here translated dwelleth, is as much in weight as sitteth, or is settled; and so, our dwelling in God's secret, is as much as our sitting down in it: the meaning is, we must make it our rest, as if we should say, Here will we dwell. From whence we learn, that God's children should not come to God's secret place as guests to an inn, but as inhabitants to their own dwellings; that is, they should continue to trust in God, as well in want as in fulness; and as much when they wither in their root, as when they flourish in it. Robert Horn.
Ver. 1. He that dwelleth, etc.
1. "He dwells", therefore he shall "abide." He shall lodge quietly, securely.
2. "He dwells in the secret place", therefore he shall "abide under the shadow." In the cool, the favour, the cover from the heat
3. "He dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High, therefore he shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty; "i.e., of the all powerful God, of the God of heaven; of that God whose name is Shaddai, All sufficient. Adam Clarke.
Ver. 1. Shall abide. The Hebrew for "shall abide" is Nkwlty, which signifies, he shall pass the night. Abiding denotes a constant and continuous dwelling of the just in the assistance and protection of God. That help and protection of God is not like a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, or in a vineyard; which is destroyed in a moment, nor is it like a tent in the way which is abandoned by the traveller. It is a strong tower, a paternal home, wherein we spend all our life with the best, wealthiest, and mightiest of parents. Passing the night also denotes security and rest in time of darkness, temptations and calamities. With God Abraham passed the night, when He foretold to him the affliction of his descendants in Egypt, and their deliverance, Ge 15:12-16. Then also God said to him (Ge 15:1), Fear not Abram. I am thy shield. And leading him forth he showed him the glittering stars, and said, Tell the number of the stars, if thou bc able; so shall thy seed be. Le Blanc.
Ver. 1. The shadow. The allusion of this verse may be to the awful and mystic symbols of the ark. Under the ancient ceremony, the high priest only could enter, and that but once a year, into the holy place, where stood the emblems of the divine glory and presence; but under the present bright and merciful dispensation, every true believer has access, with boldness, into the holiest of all; and he who now dwelleth in the secret place of prayer and communion with the God of salvation, shall find the divine mercy and care spread over him for his daily protection and solace. John Morison.
Ver. 1. Under the shadow of the Almighty. This is an expression which implies great nearness. We must walk very close to a companion, if we would have his shadow fall on us. Can we imagine any expression more perfect in describing the constant presence of God with his chosen ones, than thisthey shall "abide under his shadow"? In Solomon's beautiful allegory, the Church in a time of special communion with Christ, says of him"I sat down under his shadow with great delight" (So 2:3) "sat down", desiring not to leave it, but to abide there for ever. And it is he who chooses to dwell in the secret place of the most High, who shall "abide under the shadow of the Almighty." There is a condition and a promise attached to it. The condition is, that we "dwell in the secret place, "the promise, that if we do so we "shall abide under the shadow." It is of importance to view it thus. For when we remember the blessing is a promised blessingwe are led to feel it is a gifta thing therefore to be prayed for in faith, as well as sought for by God's appointed means. Ah, the hopes that this awakens! My wandering, wavering, unstable heart, that of itself cannot keep to one course two days together is to seek its perseverance from God, and not in its own strength. He will hold it to him if it be but seeking for stedfastness. It is not we who cling to him. It is he who keeps near to us. Mary B. M. Duncan.
Ver. 1-4, 9. 0 you that be in fear of any danger, leave all carnal shifts, and carking counsels, and projects, and dwell in the rock of God's power and providence, and be like the dove that nestles in the holes of the rock; by faith betake yourselves unto God, by faith dwell in that rock, and there nestle yourselves, make your nests of safety in the clefts of this rock. But how may we do this thing, and what is the way to do it? Do this, Set thy faith on work to make God that unto thee which thy necessity requires, pitch and throw thyself upon his power and providence, with a resolution of spirit to rest thyself upon it for safety, come what will come. See an excellent practice of this, Ps 91:1, He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty; that is, he shall be safe from all fears and dangers. Aye, that is true, you will say, who makes any doubt of it? But how shall a man come to dwell, and get into this secret place, within this strong tower? See Ps 91:2: I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress; as if he had said, I will not only say, that he is a refuge; but he is my refuge, I will say to the Lord; that is, I will set my faith on work in particular, to throw, devolve, and pitch myself upon him for my safety. And see what follows upon this setting faith thus on work, Ps 91:3-4: Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence. He shall cover thee with his feathers, etc. So confident the Psalmist is that upon this course taken, safety shall follow.
Our safety lies not simply upon this, because God is a refuge, and is an habitation, but "Because thou hast made the Lord which is my refuge, thy habitation, there shall no evil befall thee, "etc. It is therefore the making of God our habitation, upon which our safety lies; and this is the way to make God an habitation, thus to pitch and cast ourselves by faith upon his power and providence. Jeremiah Dyke.
Ver. 1. We read of a stag that roamed about in the greatest security, by reason of its having a label on its neck, "Touch me not, I belong to Caesar": thus the true servants of God are always safe, even among lions, bears, serpents, fire, water, thunder, and tempests; for all creatures know and reverence the shadow of God. Bellarmine.
Ver. 1.
1. The secret dwelling place. There is the dweller in the dark world, in the favoured land, in the holy city, in the outer court; but the holy of holies is the "secret place" communion, acceptance, etc.
2. The protecting shadowsecurity, peace, etc.; like hamlets of olden time clustered beneath castle walls. Charles A. Davis.
Ver. 1.
1. The person. One who is in intimate, personal, secret, abiding communion with God, dwelling near the mercyseat, within the veil.
2. The Privilege. He is the guest of God, protected, refreshed, and comforted by him, and that to all eternity.
Ver. 1-2. Four names of God.
1. We commune with him reverently, for he is the Most High.
2. We rest in him as the Almighty.
3. We rejoice in him as Jehovah or Lord.
4. We trust him as EL, the mighty God.
Psalms 91:2*
Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David (1869–1885) — public domain. Psalms only. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain He that dwelleth in the secret place of the…
Psa_91:1-16
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
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A song of faith
I. The solitary voice of faith. He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High--how high up that secret place must be; how deep the silence up there; how pure the air! How far above the poisonous mists that cling to the low-lying swamps; how far out of the reach of the arrows or shots of the foeman, is he that dwelleth with God by communion, by constancy of desire, by aspiration, and by clear recognition of the Divine goal of all his work! He that dwelleth thus, in the secret place of the Most High, shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty--and since He is Almighty the long shadow that that great rock casts will shelter him who keeps beneath it from the burning rays of the fiery sunshine, in every weary land. Let me keep myself in touch with God, and I keep myself master of all things, and secure from the evil that is in evil.
II. The great assurances which answer to this solitary voice of faith. Now, is it true, as the psalmist goes on to portray under a double figure of battle and pestilence, that the man who thus trusts is saved from widespread calamities which may be devastating the lines of a community? If we look on the surface it is not true. Those that dwell in the secret place of the Most High will die of an epidemic--cholera, or smallpox--like the men beside them that have no such abode. But, for all that, it is true! For suppose two men, one a Christian, another not, both dying from the same epidemic. Yet the difference between the two is such that we may confidently say of the one, He that believeth shall never die, and of the other that he has died. It is irrelevant to talk about vaccination being a better prophylactic than faith. No doubt this psalmist was thinking mainly of physical life. No doubt, also, you and I have better means of interpreting and understanding Providence and its dealings than he had. And for us the belief that they who dwell in the secret place of the Most High are immune from death, is possible and imperative, after a fashion far nobler and better than the psalmist could have dreamed. We must remember Old Testament conditions when we read Old Testament promises, and apply New Testament interpretations to Old Testament assurances. When we read, there shall no evil befall thee, and think of our own harassed, tempest-tossed, often sorrowful lives, and broken, solitary hearts, we must learn that the evil that educates is not evil, and that the chastening of the Fathers hand is good; and that nothing that brings a man nearer to God can be an enemy. The poison is wiped off the arrow, though the arrow may mercifully wound; and the evil in the evil is all dissipated.
III. A deeper voice still coming in, and confirming the enlarging all these promises. God Himself speaks, promising deliverance consequent upon fixed love. Because he hath set his love upon Me, therefore will I deliver him. As the word in the original suggests, when a poor man presses himself close up against the Divine breast, as a dog might against his masters limbs, or one that loves might clasp close to himself the beloved, then God responds to the desire for close contact, and in union He brings deliverance. Further, He promises elevation consequent on acquaintance with Divine character. I will set him on high--high above all the weltering flood of evil that washes vainly round the base of the cliff--because he hath known My name. Loving acquaintance with the revealed character of God lifts a man above earth and all its ills. Further, there is the promise of Divine companionship consequent on sorrows. I will be with him in trouble. Some of us know what that means, how we never get a glimpse of God until earth was dark, and how when a devastating flood as it seemed came sweeping over the fair gardens of our lives, we found, when it had gone back, that it had left fertility that we knew nothing about before. With long life will I satisfy him, through the ages of eternity, and show him My salvation in the glories of an immortal life. (A. Maclaren, D.D.)
The special providence of God
Rarely, if anywhere, has faith made so complete a shield of God, or planted itself so firmly within the circle of His defence. No wonder we find this psalm called in the Talmud a Song of Accidents, that is, a talisman or prophylactic in times of danger. And no wonder the ancient Church used it as its Invocavit, to rally and encourage the hearts of the faithful in troublous and stormy times. The question is, How are we to understand it? Is it true? Can a man, because he is a Christian, and fears God, count upon such immunity as is here described? Does he lead a sort of charmed life, clothed with impenetrable armour, which no shaft of pestilence can pierce, so that while thousands or tens of thousands may fall at his right hand, he shall never be touched? We know that it is not so. Is there, then, any way in which we can interpret it, so as to use it with intelligence and profit to ourselves?
I. The difficulty we feel in connection with the psalm is not that it assumes a special providence, as we call. It. This is taught everywhere in Scripture. It is difficult, indeed, to see how there can be any providence at all if it does not condescend to particulars, and take the individual, as well as the community or the race, into account. In the Old Testament its primary concern is with Israel as a people, and with the individual only in a subordinate and secondary degree. In the New Testament the individual is more distinctly and definitely an object of Divine regard. He, and the community of which he forms a part, are equally essential to one another, and that because the Church is not moved and governed from without, but from within; and such a government is impossible, except by the indwelling of the Spirit of God in the heart of each individual believer.
II. The difficulty which meets us here, then, is not that of a special providence, but of the manner in which it is said to act.
1. In the Old Testament the Divine providence was specially concerned in so guiding and controlling the history of Israel, that in it as a nation the kingdom of God, or of the Messias, should be realized. He was to judge the world with righteousness, and the poor with judgment. His reign was to be an era of peace and prosperity which should know no end. Those who were to be more immediately about Him, and to occupy the chief places of honour and authority, were to be His own people, to whom in a special sense He belonged. And round them, in ever-widening and more distant circles, were to be the other inhabitants of earth, all under the sway of the same benignant sceptre.
2. In the New Testament the point of view is entirely different. Religion is not embodied in a national history, nor is the kingdom of God an earthly kingdom, as even the disciples believed it would be up to the Day of Pentecost. Its essential characteristics are spiritual--righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. What made the difference? It was the Cross of Christ. On this stone of offence Israel had stumbled, and been broken in pieces. The kingdom of God was henceforth to appear under altered conditions. The old things having passed away, all things became new. And on this new creation was the impress of the Cross. And how had the Cross so transformed the whole spiritual outlook and hopes of men? It had shown that the greatest evil was sin, and that the righteousness which was to characterize the kingdom of the Messias could only be reached by atonement. Henceforward the great evil to be shunned was not poverty, nor hardship, but that which all along had arrayed itself against Him, and finally had nailed Him to the tree. Henceforth the greatest blessing to be gained was to have His spirit of disinterested and generous self-sacrifice. But the Cross of Jesus was more than the altar of expiation, more than the revelation of a love that passeth knowledge. It was also the consummation of His own experience, the perfecting of His humanity. But the sacrifice of the Cross, it may be said, was voluntarily borne. And though Christians must be ready to suffer for the truth, and to lighten the worlds burden, by bearing it as Christ did, may they not expect to be delivered from those evils which are neither imposed by loyalty to the Gospel, nor assumed for the good of others? Have they no right to look for special protection in times of famine or pestilence; or does God send these indiscriminately on the evil and the good, just as He sends the sunshine and the rain? Undoubtedly He does, and Christians have no right to look for immunity from the ills that are the common lot of men. Inasmuch as they are still a part of a sinful humanity, they must share in the judgments which may come upon it. But does a Christian, then, derive no advantage from his Christianity in such visitations? By no means. For he has placed himself under Gods care, who spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, and who cannot allow His servant to suffer, simply because He will not take the trouble to save him, or grudges what the effort might cost. Moreover, he is persuaded that God is acquainted with every particular connected with his trial, the very hairs of his head being all numbered, and that if He chose He could secure his absolute safety. And what reconciles him to the fact that God does not choose? What but the conviction that there is thus to come to him a larger blessing than he would otherwise receive? (C. Moinet, M.A.)
Gods secret and shadow
I. The position indicated.
1. The place. We are to enter and to abide in the secret of God.
(1) Gods Word has its secret. There are some who read it through chapter by chapter, who have a large amount of superficial biblical knowledge, but who know comparatively nothing of its grand, glorious, momentous secrets. There are others who so read it that they grasp the real meaning, the grand spiritual realities that underlie its utterances; they so read it that they catch the very spirit of its Divine Author, so that the views formed and the feelings kindled towards the subject of which it treats, are the same as Gods. Such may be said to enter into the secret of God, or into the secret place of the Most High.
(2) Communion with God has its secret. There are some who say their prayers very regularly and very devoutly. So far as outward decorum and forms of speech are concerned, they are faultless. But communion with God there is none. There are others whose communion with Heaven is a sublime reality. The very presence of the Heavenly Father is consciously enjoyed.
(3) The love of God has its secret. There are some, and we fear professing Christians too, whose feelings towards God are those of polite reserve. They know nothing of living in the love of God. But there are others who get into His very heart. They are children.
(4) The purpose of God has its secret. There are some who feel little or no interest in that which lies close to Gods heart, engages His profoundest sympathies, and employs His untiring energies. They have never entered into that purpose, never felt its vital importance, never conceived its glorious design. Never seriously considered whether by their lives and actions they were co-operating with God, or opposing Him. But there are others who have so closely identified themselves with Gods purpose that it is the great centre to which every line of thought, of feeling, of intention, and of sympathy converges.
2. The attitude. He that dwelleth. To dwell means a fixed, settled, habitual mode of life. It must be so with our conduct in reference to Gods Word, Gods friendship, Gods love, and Gods purpose. We must dwell in them, live in them. We must ask for no holiday, no leave of absence, there must be no departure.
3. How attained. How can we reach and take up our abode in this the very heart of God? Christ supplies the answer, I am the way, etc.
II. The blessing enjoyed.
1. We have indicated what it is to dwell in the secret place of Gods Word. With minds thus furnished and filled we are under their protection. The worlds thoughts, and ideas, and principles of things may assail us, but they cannot do much with us; we know better; we have received a higher education, our minds are fortified with Gods thoughts, guarded with Gods ideas, protected with Gods principles.
2. We have indicated what it is to dwell in the secret place of Gods communion. In that position we get our whole nature animated with holy impulses, sympathies, tastes, and dispositions. We get our whole nature magnetized with the nature of God. With our whole nature thus infused, fired, animated, and magnetized with the very impulses and inspirations of Gods nature, we are under their protection. We are lifted into a higher sphere of life.
3. We have indicated what it is to dwell in the secret place of Gods love. In that position we get our best, strongest, and supreme affections impregnated with the love of God. We live under its shadow and protection. By its high and holy and potent influence we are preserved from the love of low, base, temporal, inferior things.
4. We have indicated what it is to dwell in the secret place of Gods purpose. In that position our energies, our sympathies, our interests, our intentions, and our pursuits are all enlisted and engaged in co-operating with God in bringing about the desire of His heart and the great pleasure of His will. In our labours and toils, our efforts and struggles to destroy sin and to establish holiness, whether it be in our own hearts, in the lives and conduct of our children, or in the spirit and practice of the world, we are under the protection and shadow of the Most High, because we are identified with Gods purpose. (B. Pierce.)
The believer safely dwelling in God
I. The place the psalmist has in mind. Intercourse and communion with the God that made us is not, as some represent, a fallacy. You may describe it as an idle thing; and so might the blind man say of the light of this glorious sun, and so might the deaf man say of music. But the thing is real; and your doubts of its reality lie in this--you want the discerning faculty. You want to be brought into contact with your God.
II. The conduct of the believer. Strip the text of metaphor, and this dwelling in God is only another term for trusting God. Try your confidence by these two tests. Is it an habitual, everyday confidence? Did it lead you yesterday, the day before, and the day before that,--has it led you to-day--to cast yourselves on the Lord? Is it a habit of faith? And then--is it grounded on the blood of the Lord Jesus? Is it a confidence in a reconciling, pardoning, redeeming God?
III. The blessing which the believer finds in the habitation he dwells in. This is expressed in almost the same terms in which his conduct is expressed. He dwells in the secret place of the Most High; that is his conduct. He shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty; that is his privilege. Make God your refuge, and He will be your refuge; take Him as your habitation, and He will be your habitation; seek shelter in Him, and He will shelter you; go to Him for refreshment, and He will refresh you; delight thyself in Him, and He will give thee the desires of thy heart. (C. Bradley, M. A.)
A home in Christ
The psalmist has been pierced with the shafts of unkindness, yet he speaks of what he seems perfectly sure when he speaks of his dwelling in the secret place of the Most High, and abiding under the shadow of the Almighty. What is more sweet than this promise?
I. The secret place.
1. Some think the secret here spoken of is that intimacy of fellowship which Gods children enjoy in communion with Him.
2. Others think it has a more definite or special meaning. To my mind it is certain that the secret spoken of contains a promise and an expectation of the coming Messiah. The Wonderful, named in Isa_9:1-21, is in the margin rendered secret. So, in the text, the word rendered secret is connected with the Messiah; then the Christians hiding-place is in Christ.
II. Dwelling in this secret place. He that dwelleth, he who has a home, in Christ shall abide in the shadow of the Almighty. Every congregation might be divided into those who make their home in the world and visit Christ, and those who have their home in Christ and visit the world. A home in Christ. Oh, wondrous thought! The psalmist speaks of God as a refuge, a home, an abiding-place. John says, We dwell in Him and He in us. He is in all we have, all we are, and all we hope to be or hope for. You might as well undertake to describe a sunset to the blind or music to the deaf, as to talk of dwelling in Christ to one who has never tasted of the graciousness of the Lord. No man knows this but he who is already in Christ.
III. The promise. He shall abide, etc. When Gods love makes a promise, His sovereignty secures its fulfilment. He shall abide in the shadow of the Almighty.
1. In that shadow the Christian finds protection. We may live and die in its shadow. It is always the same, yesterday, to-day and for ever.
2. There is also refreshment in this shadow. He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High has a perfect home, complete in all that can contribute to its safety, rest, and perfectness. Oh, make the experiment! (J. A. M. Chapman, D.D.)
God our dwelling, and in our dwelling
Where is the secret place of the Most High? We can find it by two spiritual lines of measurement, as by latitude and longitude at sea. The longitude, we will say, is the omnipresence of God. All do not practically believe that God is everywhere. Many will acknowledge this in words, while they have no realizing sense of it which makes it of practical value. To know the longitude at sea would be of little use without another element in the calculation, the latitude; as to know the latitude without the longitude leaves the mariner bewildered. Frequently a passing ship will set her signals to inquire of another ship, What is your longitude? though the latitude may have been determined by the sun at noon. Hence the other element of measure to find the secret place of the Most High, though we know Him to be everywhere, is a praying heart. It is interesting to know that the place here mentioned is not confined to one spot. A man may always live under the same tent; the place where he eats and sleeps will always be a secret place to him; yet the tents may be movable, sometimes in a valley, then on the side of a hill; then upon the hill top. So the secret place of the Most High is movable. As there is no latitude at the poles, no longitude at Greenwich, because longitude is the distance east or west from Greenwich and latitude is the distance from either pole, this represents that which heaven will be to us, where there are no seeming distances from God; for we shall no more walk by faith but by continual sight. But on earth, in all our journeyings toward heaven, we have constant need to find the secret place of the Most High, that is, a place of communion with God. The promise in the text is to such as make praying their breath; who hold continued communion with God, referring all things to Him as their fixed habit; breathing out love, adoration, confession, supplication, more intimately than they commune with the dearest friend. The promise is that they shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. This may signify--
1. Nearness. A child walking with you abides under your shadow; you are never far from him, you keep him in sight, within reach.
2. Protection. We cannot estimate the benefit of frequent prayer. (N. Adams, D. D.)
The secret of the Most High
We have here two distinct aspects of the one life in their living relations with one another. The first clause furnishes the living reason for the second; while the second is the necessary complement of the first. The luxuriance of the figures which the psalmist employs is due to the exuberance of a profound faith that has mastered all difficulties and contradiction, and dares to assert to the utmost possibilities of language the perfect security of those that dwell in the secret of the Most High. We are here in truth at the very highest point of pre-Christian revelation with regard to mans spiritual relation to God, and it would be difficult even now to express the truth in question more grandly and truly than it is here expressed.
I. The secret of the true life. There is something inspringly grand in the conception here offered, that the secret of mans truest and noblest life is identical with the secret of the Most High. The brute may find its life in the relations of the visible and temporal. But it is precisely in this that man is essentially different from the brute. He is not true man until he occupies the eternal standpoint; he does not begin to live until he has the vision of God. When man finds Gods secret place, he finds the place of eternal calm.
1. Such a life is marked by inwardness. In finding the secret of the Most High, man finds his most inward self. He enters into the inner temple of spirit, and feels the throb of life at its deepest point where it reveals its affinity to the essential life of God.
2. Again, to dwell in the secret of the Most High is to know God and be in fellowship with Him. By knowing God I do not mean an intellectual belief in His existence or a correct conception of His nature and attributes. I mean by it the direct consciousness of His presence. The life enters into the inner realm where God is seen, and gazes upon the glorious vision.
3. Such a life will be actuated and inspired by the highest ideals of service. Those that stand in the presence of God are of necessity ministers of His that do His pleasure. Those that truly walk with God will walk like God.
II. The security of the true life. There are three stages.
1. In the first (Psa_91:1-8), the idea of temporal security predominates. The man of God is immortal until his work is done.
2. In the second stage (Psa_91:9-13), the figures used are more suggestive of spiritual or quasi-spiritual foes.
3. The next and last stage (Psa_91:14-16), leads us from security and victory to honour and glorification. The relation between the victorious man and God grows wondrously near; it is a relation of mutual knowledge and of mutual love. The language grows indefinite, the glory gathers in nebulous suggestion of a dazzling beyond, the godly man becomes transfigured before us, and a cloud receives him out of our sight. (John Thomas, M.A.)
The secret of His presence
There is some thing about the word shadow that always interests, for there never has been a shadow without the light; thus the secret place must be a place of brightness. It is a place where God is, for the nearest of all things to me in the sunlight as I journey is my shadow, and he who walks in my shadow or rests in it must be very near to me, so that when I am in the shadow of God I can reach forth my hand and touch Him; I can lift up mine eyes and see Him face to face. I know there is a sense in which God is always near us; He is in all things and He is everywhere; but there is something about the secret of His presence to which every one is a stranger until he has dwelt there.
I. The typical reference must be to the holy place of the tabernacle, which the priests were privileged to enter; but Peter assures us that we have become in this new dispensation a holy priesthood, so that it is possible for us to enter on that ground. For in the tabernacle just beyond the veil was a glory cloud, and all the magnificence that could be wrought in gold and silver, purple and fine linen; but I am persuaded that even that was as nothing when compared to that which awaits us when we enter the secret place of God.
II. It would be impossible for one to read the verses immediately following the text without being impressed with the fact that the most remarkable results will follow our abiding and dwelling is the secret place.
1. In the secret place there is peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation, our Master said, but in Me ye shall have peace. I have read that a certain insect has the power to surround itself with a film of air, encompassed in which it drops into the midst of muddy, stagnant pools, and remains unhurt. And the believer may be thus surrounded by the atmosphere of God, and while he is in the midst of the turmoils of the world he may be filled to overflowing with the peace of God, because God is with him. This is true whatever your occupation, if it is ever so menial. The Rev. F. B. Meyer tells us of Lawrence, the simple-minded cook, who said that for more than sixty years he had never lost the sense of the presence of God, but was as conscious of it while performing the duties of his humble office as when partaking of the Lords Supper. What peace he must have had.
2. In the secret place there is purity. I suppose we might have been with Jacob when in his dream he saw the heavens opened and beheld the angels going up and coming down and heard the voice of God, and we should only have seen the dreary mountains round about. I doubt not but that we might have been with Paul when he was caught up to the third heaven, and we should have seen nothing but the humble surroundings of his tent; and I doubt not but that if Paul were here he would see God here this morning, and he would have walked on the street with Him yesterday. Is not the trouble with ourselves instead of our surroundings or our times? Every permitted sin encrusts the windows of the soul and blinds our vision. And every victory over evil clears the vision of the soul, and we can see Him a little plainer.
3. In the secret place there is power. There can be no effective service that is not the outcome of communion. Our Lords Day precedes the week of work, and this is always the plan of God. That wonderful fifteenth chapter of John is founded on that idea. We must abide first, and after that we cannot help but bear fruit. Oh that we might be so near to Him that we should be magnetized and charged with a spiritual force that the world can neither gainsay nor resist.
III. How may i enter into this secret place? Cannot something be said that will make the way plain? It can all be summed up in this answer. None can know the Father but the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal Him. Jesus Christ said, I am the way, I am the door, by Me, if any man will, he shall enter in. There are some places in the Bible where the way seems plain. He that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood dwelleth in Me and I in him. (J. W. Chapman, D. D.)
Abiding in God
Mr. Meyer says, The sun says to the little earth planet, Abide in me. Resist the temptation to fly into space; remain in the solar sphere, and I will abide in the formation of thy rocks, the verdure of thy vegetation, and of all living things, baptizing them in my fire. Abide in me, says the ocean to the alcove, that shows symptoms of division from its waves. Keep thy channel unsilted and open, and I will pour my fulness up to thy furthest shore twice in every twenty-four hours. Abide in me. The vine says it to the branch, that it may impart supplies of life and fruit; the air says it to the lung, that it may minister ozone and oxygen to its cells; the magnet says it to the needle, that it may communicate its own specific quality, and fit it to guide across the ocean the mighty steamer, laden with the freight of human life.
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain Psalms 91
Psalms 91
THE solemn sadness of Psalms 90 is set in strong relief by the sunny brightness of this song of happy, perfect trust in the Divine protection. The juxtaposition is, however, probably due to the verbal coincidence of the same expression being used in both psalms in reference to God. In Psa_90:1 and in Psa_91:9, the somewhat unusual designation "dwelling place" is applied to Him. and the thought conveyed in it runs through the whole of this psalm.
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An outstanding characteristic of it is its sudden changes of persons; "He," "I," and "thou" alternate in a bewildering fashion, which has led to many attempts at explanation. One point is clear-that, in Psa_91:14-16, God speaks, and that He speaks of, not to, the person who loves and clings to Him. At Psa_91:14, then, we must suppose a change of speaker, which is unmarked by any introductory formula. Looking back over the remainder of the psalm, we find that the bulk of it is addressed directly to a person who must be the same as is spoken of in the Divine promises. The "him" of the latter is the "thee" of the mass of the psalm. But this mass is broken at two points by clauses alike in meaning, and containing expressions of trust (Psa_91:2, Psa_91:9 a). Obviously the unity of the psalm requires that the "I" of these two verses should be the "thou" of the great portion of the psalm, and the "he" of the last part. Each profession of trust will then be followed by assurances of safety thence resulting. Psa_91:2 having for pendant Psa_91:3-8, and Psa_91:9 a being followed by Psa_91:9-13. The two utterances of personal faith are substantially identical, and the assurances which succeed them are also in effect the same. It is by some supposed that this alternation of persons is due simply to the poet expressing partly "his own feelings as from himself, and partly as if they were uttered by another" (Perowne after Ewald). But that is not an explanation of the structure; it is only a statement of the structure which requires to be explained. No doubt the poet is expressing his own feelings or convictions all through the psalm: but why does he express them in this singular fashion?
The explanation which is given by Delitzsch, Stier, Cheyne and many others takes the psalm to be antiphonal, and distributes the parts among the voices of a choir, with some variations in the allocation.
But Psa_91:1 still remains a difficulty. As it stands it sounds flat and tautological, and hence attempts have been made to amend it, which will presently be referred to. But it will fall into the general antiphonal scheme, if it is regarded as a prelude, sung by the same voice which twice answers the single singer with choral assurances that reward his trust. We, then. have this distribution of parts: Psa_91:1, the broad statement of the blessedness of dwelling with God; Psa_91:2, a solo, the voice of a heart encouraged thereby to exercise personal trust; Psa_91:3-8, answers, setting forth the security of such a refuge; Psa_91:9 a, solo, reiterating with sweet monotony the word of trust; Psa_91:9-13, the first voice or chorus repeating with some variation the assurances of Psa_91:3-8; and Psa_91:14-16, Gods acceptance of the trust and confirmation of the assurances.
There is, no doubt, difficulty in Psa_91:1; for, if it is taken as an independent sentence, it sounds tautological, since there is no well-marked difference between "sitting" and "lodging," nor much between "secret place" and "shadow." But possibly the idea of safety is more strongly conveyed by "shadow" than by "secret place," and the meaning of the apparently identical assertion may be, that he who quietly enters into communion with God thereby passes into His protection; or, as Kay puts it, "Loving faith on mans part shall be met by faithful love on Gods part." The LXX changes the person of "will say" in Psa_91:2, and connects it with Psa_91:1 as its subject ("He that sits, that lodges shall say"). Ewald, followed by Baethgen and others, regards Psa_91:1 as referring to the "I" of Psa_91:2, and translates "Sitting I say." Hupfeld, whom Cheyne follows, cuts the knot by assuming that "Blessed is" has dropped out at the beginning of Psa_91:1, and so gets a smooth run of construction and thought ("Happy is he who sits who lodges who says). It is suspiciously smooth, obliterates the characteristic change of persons, of which the psalm has other instances, and has no support except the thought that the psalmist would have saved us a great deal of trouble, if he had only been wise enough to have written so. The existing text is capable of a meaning in accordance with his general drift. A wide declaration like that of Psa_91:1 fittingly preludes the body of the song, and naturally evokes the pathetic profession of faith which follows.
According to the accents, Psa_91:2 is to be read "I will say. To Jehovah [belongs] my refuge," etc. But it is better to divide as above. Jehovah is the refuge. The psalmist speaks to Him, with the exclamation of yearning trust. He can only call Him by precious names, to use which, in however broken a fashion, is an appeal that goes straight to His heart, as it comes straight from the suppliants. The singer lovingly accumulates the Divine names in these two first verses. He calls God "Most High," "Almighty," when he utters the general truth of the safety of souls that enter His secret place; but, when he speaks his own trust, he addresses Jehovah, and adds to the wide designation "God" the little word "my," which claims personal possession of His fulness of Deity. The solo voice does not say much, but it says enough. There has been much underground work before that clear jet of personal "appropriating faith" could spring into light.
We might have looked for a Selah here, if this psalm had stood in the earlier books, but we can feel the brief pause before the choral answer comes in Psa_91:3-8. It sets forth in lofty poetry the blessings that such a trust secures. Its central idea is that of safety. That safety is guaranteed in regard to two classes of dangers-those from enemies, and those from diseases.
Both are conceived of as divided into secret and open perils. Psa_91:3 proclaims the trustful souls immunity, and Psa_91:4 beautifully describes the Divine protection which secures it. Psa_91:5-6 expand the general notion of safety into defence against secret and open foes and secret and open pestilences; while Psa_91:7-8 sum up the whole, in a vivid contrast between the multitude of victims and the man sheltered in God, and looking out from his refuge on the wide-rolling flood of destruction. As in Psa_18:5, Death is represented as a "fowler" into whose snares men heedlessly flutter, unless held back by Gods delivering hand. The mention of pestilence in Psa_91:3 somewhat anticipates the proper order, as the same idea recurs in its appropriate place in Psa_91:6. Hence the rendering "word," which requires no consonantal change is adopted from the LXX by several moderns. But that is feeble, and the slight irregularity of a double mention of one form of peril, which is naturally suggested by the previous reference to Death, is not of much moment. The beautiful description of God sheltering the trustful man beneath his pinions recalls Deu_32:11 and Psa_17:8; Psa_63:7. The mother eagle, spreading her dread wingover her eaglets, is a wonderful symbol of the union of power and gentleness. It would be a bold hand which would drag the fledglings from that warm hiding place and dare the terrors of that beak and claws. But this pregnant verse (Psa_91:4) not only tells of the strong defence which God is, but also, in a word, sets in clear light mans way of reaching that asylum. "Thou shalt take refuge." It is the word which is often vaguely rendered "trust," but which, if we retain its original signification, becomes illuminative as to what that trust is. The flight of the soul, conscious of nakedness and peril, to the safe shelter of Gods breast is a description of faith which, in practical value, surpasses much learned dissertation. And this verse adds yet another point to its comprehensive statements, when, changing the figure, it calls Gods Troth, or faithful adherence to His promises and obligations, our "shield and target." We have not to fly to a dumb God for shelter, or to risk anything upon a Peradventure. He has spoken, and His word is inviolable. Therefore, trust is possible. And between ourselves and all evil we may lift the shield of His Troth. His faithfulness is our sure defence, and Faith is our shield only in a secondary sense, its office being but to grasp our true defence, and to keep us well behind that.
The assaults of enemies and the devastations of pestilence are taken in Psa_91:5-6 as types of all perils. These evils speak of a less artificial stage of society than that in which our experience moves, but they serve us as symbols of more complex dangers besetting outward and inward life. "The terror of the night" seems best understood as parallel with the "arrow that flies by day," in so far as both refer to actual attacks by enemies. Nocturnal surprises were favourite methods of assault in early warfare. Such an explanation is worthier than the supposition that the psalmist means demons that haunt the night. In Psa_91:6 pestilence is personified as stalking, shrouded in darkness, the more terrible because it strikes unseen. Psa_91:6 b has been understood, as by the Targum and LXX, to refer to demons who exercise their power in noonday. But this explanation rests upon a misreading of the word rendered "devastates." The other translated "sickness" is only found, besides this place, in Deu_32:24 ("destruction") and Isa_28:2 ("a destroying storm," lit. a storm of destruction), and in somewhat different form in Hos_13:14. It comes from a root meaning to cut, and seems here to be a synonym for pestilence. Baethgen sees in "the arrow by day" the fierce sunbeams, and in "the heat (as he renders) which rages at noonday" the poisonous simoom. The trustful man, sheltered in God, looks on while thousands fall round him, as Israel looked from their homes on the Passover night, and sees that there is a God that judges and recompenses evil-doers by evil suffered.
Heartened by these great assurances, the single voice once more declares its trust. Psa_91:9 a is best separated from b, though Hupfeld here again assumes that" thou hast said" has fallen out between "For" and "Thou."
This second utterance of trust is almost identical with the first. Faith has no need to vary its expression. "Thou, Jehovah, art my refuge" is enough for it. Gods mighty name and its personal possession of all which that name means, as its own hiding place, are its treasures which it does not weary of recounting. Love loves to repeat itself. The deepest emotions, like song birds, have but two or three notes, which they sing over and over again all the long day through. He that can use this singers words of trust has a vocabulary rich enough.
The responsive assurances (Psa_91:9-13) are, in like manner, substantially identical with the preceding ones, but differences may be discerned by which these are heightened in comparison with the former. The promise of immunity is more general. Instead of two typical forms of danger, the widest possible exemption from all forms of it is declared in Psa_91:10. No evil shall come near, no scourge approach, the "tent" of the man whose real and permanent "dwelling place" is Jehovah. There are much beauty and significance in that contrast of the two homes in which a godly man lives, housing, as far as his outward life is concerned, in a transitory abode, which tomorrow may be rolled up and moved to another camping place in the desert, but abiding in so far as his true being is concerned, in God, the permanent dwelling place through all generations. The transitory outward life has reflected on it some light of peaceful security from that true home. It is further noteworthy that the second group of assurances is concerned with active life, while the first only represented a passive condition of safety beneath Gods wing. In Psa_91:11-12, His angels take the place of protectors, and the sphere in which they protect is "in all thy ways"-i.e., in the activities of ordinary life. The dangers there are of stumbling, whether that be construed as referring to outward difficulties or to temptations to sin.
The perils, further specified in Psa_91:13, correspond to those of the previous part in being open and secret: the lion with its roar and leap, the adder with its stealthy glide among the herbage and its unlooked-for bite. So, the two sets of assurances, taken together, cover the whole ground of life, both in its moments of hidden communion in the secret place of the Most High, and in its times of diligent discharge of duty on lifes common way. Perils of communion and perils of work are equally real, and equally may we be sheltered from them. God Himself spreads His wing over the trustful man, and sends His messengers to keep him, in all the paths appointed for him by God. The angels have no charge to take stones out of the way. Hinderances are good for us. Smooth paths weary and make presumptuous. Rough ones bring out our best and drive us to look to God. But His messengers have for their task to lift us on their palms over difficulties, not so that we shall not feel them to be difficult, but so that we shall not strike our foot against them. Many a man remembers the elevation and buoyancy of spirit which strangely came to him when most pressed by work or trouble. Gods angels were bearing him up. Active life is full of open and secret foes as well as of difficulties. He that keeps near to God will pass unharmed through them all, and, with a foot made strong and firm by Gods own power infused into it, will be able to crush the life out of the most formidable and the most sly assailants. "The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly."
Finally, God Himself speaks, and confirms and deepens the previous assurances. That He is represented as speaking of, not to, His servant increases the majesty of the utterance, by seeming to call the universe to hear, and converts promises to an individual into promises to everyone who will fulfil the requisite conditions. These are threefold.
God desires that men should cling to Him, know His name, and call on Him. The word rendered "cling" includes more than "setting love upon" one. It means to bind or knit oneself to anything, and so embraces the cleaving of a fixed heart, of a "recollected" mind, and of an obedient will. Such clinging demands effort: for every hand relaxes its grasp, unless ever and again tightened. He who thus clings will come to "know" Gods "name," with the knowledge which is born of experience, and is loving familiarity, not mere intellectual apprehension. Such clinging and knowledge will find utterance in continual converse with God, not only when needing deliverance, but in perpetual aspiration after Him.
The promises to such a one go very deep and stretch very far. "I will deliver him." So the previous assurance that no evil shall come nigh him is explained and brought into correspondence with the facts of life. Evil may be experienced. Sorrows will come. But they will not touch the central core of the true life, and from them God wilt deliver, not only by causing them to cease, but by fitting us to bear. Clinging to Him, a man will be "drawn out of many waters," like Peter on the stormy lake. "I will set him on high" is more than a parallel promise to that of deliverance. It includes that; for a man lifted to a height is safe from the flood that sweeps through the valley, or from the enemies that ravage the plain. But that elevation, which comes from knowing Gods name, brings more than safety, even a life lived in a higher region than that. of things seen. "I will answer him." How can He fail to hear when they who trust Him cry? Promises, especially for the troubled, follow, which do not conflict with the earlier assurances, rightly understood. "I will be with him in trouble." Gods presence is the answer to His servants call. God comes nearer to devout and tried souls, as a mother presses herself caressingly closer to a weeping child. So, no man need add solitude to sadness, but may have God sitting with him, like Jobs friends, waiting to comfort him with true comfort. And His presence delivers from, and glorifies after, trouble borne as becomes Gods friend. The bit of dull steel might complain, if it could feel, of the pain of being polished, but the result is to make it a mirror fit to flash back the sunlight.
"With length of days will I satisfy him" is, no doubt, a promise belonging more especially to Old Testament times; but if we put emphasis on "satisfy," rather than on the extended duration, it may fairly suggest that, to the trustful soul, life is long enough, whatever its duration, and that the guest, who has sat at Gods table here, is not unwilling to rise from it, when his time comes, being "satisfied with favour, and full of the goodness of the Lord." The vision of Gods salvation, which is set last, seems from its position in the series to point, however dimly, to a vision which comes after earths troubles and length of days. The psalmists language implies not a mere casual beholding, but a fixed gaze. Delitzsch renders "revel in My salvation" (English translation). Cheyne has "feast his eyes with." Such seeing is possession. The crown of Gods promises to the man who makes God his dwelling place is a full, rapturous experience of a full salvation, which follows on the troubles and deliverances of earth, and brings a more dazzling honour and a more perfect satisfaction.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain There is no title prefixed to this Psalm. We…
INTRODUCTION
There is no title prefixed to this Psalm. We know not who is the author of it. The conjecture, which has been made by some, that it was written by Moses, is very inadequately sustained. Neither do we know the time or occasion of its composition. The Psalm is general in its character, and applies to the whole Church.
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A remarkable feature of the Psalm is the frequent change of persons, from which some have inferred that it was composed for singing by alternate choirs. The explanation of Hengstenberg seems to us more reasonable: “That the Psalmist speaks at one time from his own person to the soul of the righteous one who is in danger, and revives its courage, while at another time he expresses confidence from the soul of the righteous man; and thus in that pleasant alternation which forms the characteristic peculiarity of the Psalm, he employs at one time the thou in the character of teacher, and at another time the I in the character of scholar.… The call of instruction in Scripture (this is the meaning of the alternation), ought always to be responded to by the acknowledgment of the hearer.”
For our homiletical purpose we shall divide the Psalm thus:—The safe hiding-place of the godly (Psa_91:1-2), The inviolable security of the godly (Psa_91:3-10), The angelic ministers of the godly (Psa_91:11-13), The glorious privileges of the godly (Psa_91:14-16).
THE SAFE HIDING-PLACE OF THE GODLY
(Psa_91:1-2)
Into these two verses is condensed the contents of the whole Psalm. The statement of the first verse expresses in brief what is afterwards set forth with some particularity,—the safety of him who places his trust in God. And in the second verse the Poet expresses his own firm assurance of his safety in Jehovah his God. We have in the text—
I. An implication of danger. That the Psalmist was sensible of danger is clear from the fact that he regarded God as a “refuge” and a “fortress.” The godly are in peril by reason of—
1. The trials of life. Bodily pains, mental perplexities, spiritual sorrows and struggles, involve danger to those who pass through them. The very nature of trial, i.e., testing, involves the idea of possible failure. Bodily pain may result in petulance or bitterness of spirit, mental perplexities may lead to a paralysing unbelief, spiritual conflicts may issue in loss, and even in defeat. The godly soul is in danger and needs a “refuge.”
2. Spiritual adversaries. The good man has to contend with foes. His “adversary the devil as a roaring lion goeth about, seeking whom he may devour.” He is hated by the world. Its spirit and principles, many of its practices, many of its amusements, and much of its literature, are opposed to the interests and even the life of the godly soul. Temptation to evil is a great and sad fact in this world. Moreover, the good man finds that in himself there are “fleshly lusts which war against the soul.” His life is a great moral battle. Numerous and powerful forces are arrayed against him. Seductive influences also are brought to bear upon him to lead him astray. His life is one of peril. He needs a “fortress” from which he may hurl defiance at his foes.
II. An assurance of safety. “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. Notice here:
1. The condition. To realise this safety the godly man must “dwell in the secret place of the Most High.” סֵתָר, which is here translated “the secret place,” signifies primarily a veil, a covering, then, what is secret, then, a hiding-place, protection. The latter we take to be the meaning in this place. The godly soul dwells in the hiding-place, i.e., in the protection of the Most High. His trust he reposes in God. He looks to Him for protection from the fiery darts of the wicked, and for support and shelter in the storms of life. To assure his safety the good man must “dwell” in the hiding-place of the Most High. The literal rendering is, “He that sitteth in the,” &c. He dwells in quietude, he finds rest there, he is settled there. “God’s children should not come to God’s secret place as guests to an inn, but as inhabitants to their own dwellings.” Speaking without any figure, the condition of spiritual safety is constant trust in God as our Protector. “They that trust in the Lord shall be as mount Zion, which cannot be removed, but abideth for ever.”
2. The promise. “Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.” The rendering in the margin is “shall lodge”. Hengstenberg translates: “spends the night.” The idea is, that that is his home, the place where he passes his nights. Under the shadow is explained by some by the bird who hides her young ones under her wings for their protection. Others explain it as indicating the great nearness of God to His people, and their consequent safety. We must be and continue very close to a person for his shadow to fall constantly upon us. Thus to abide under His shadow is to realise His constant presence, and to be always secure in His protection. The names of God which are here used set forth the ground upon which this assurance of the godly man is based: “the Most High,” “the Almighty.” What power can harm the man who is protected by the constant presence of the Supreme and Omnipotent Being? In the time of temptation, affliction, and darkness, we shall pass the night under His shadow. And in the toil and battle of the day, with its heat and burden, we shall rest secure beneath the Almighty’s shade. In His nearness to us our safety lies. While we are under His shadow no evil can befall us. Distance from Him means danger. Closeness to Him means entire security.
III. An expression of confidence. “I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress; my God; in Him will I trust.” Consider here—
1. The aspects in which God is regarded. He is spoken of as a “Refuge.” God is the refuge of His people from the storms of life. In times of suffering and trial they find safety and comfort in Him. He is also a “fortress.” The idea of this word is different from that of a refuge. The refuge was a quiet and secure hiding-place; the fortress is a place of defence against foes, which is strong to resist the attacks of opposing forces. In life’s warfare God is the stronghold of His people; He is their shield. “O God the Lord, the strength of my salvation, Thou hast covered my head in the day of battle.” Having His protection we are invulnerable. In life’s storms He is the safe and quiet shelter of His people. “My soul trusteth in Thee: yea, in the shadow of Thy wings will I make my refuge, until these calamities be overpast.” The Psalmist also speaks of the Lord as his “God” the object of His worship; One who is worthy of all obedience and affection, all reverence and confidence, all praise and glory. Jehovah was to the Psalmist all that a man expects in his God.
2. The confidence which is expressed in Him. The Psalmist’s confidence in God is manifest
(1) In his resolve to trust Him. “In Him will I trust.” The Psalmist confidently leaves His interests in the hands of God. Believing in His power, goodness, and faithfulness, he trusts Him—confides in Him.
(2) In the appropriating nature of his faith. He says, “My refuge, my fortress, my God.” There is little or no strength or encouragement to be drawn from believing in the Lord as a refuge and a fortress unless we realise our interest in Him. But when faith is in vigorous exercise and we claim God as our own, then are we inspirited and strengthened. Can we look to God and say, “My refuge, my fortress, my God”?
(3) In the declaration of his confidence. “I will say of the Lord,” &c. He was determined to proclaim his confidence in God. He believes, and, therefore, he speaks. Men are ready enough now-a-days to speak of their doubts. But he is the noble man and the useful man who can intelligently and reverently speak of his faith; who says, “I know whom I have believed,” &c.; and who is “ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh him a reason for the hope that is in him with meekness and fear.” Great was the confidence of the Psalmist in God, and his great confidence he declares unto others.
CONCLUSION.—We also are exposed to trials and dangers, and need a refuge and a defence. Our safety is in God alone. Having Him for our God we are beyond the reach of any real harm. We secure His protection by trusting in Him. By faith we dwell in the secret place of the Most High, and are ever secure under His shadow. Do not fear or hesitate to trust God fully and for ever. Commit yourself with confidence into His hands, and you shall dwell safely by Him for ever.
THE INVIOLABLE SECURITY OF THE GODLY
(Psa_91:3-10)
In these verses the Poet sets forth with a measure of particularity what he has already expressed briefly and generally. He expresses in joyous song his strong confidence that he is safe from dangers of every kind, because he is protected by God. The inviolable security of the godly is here represented—
I. As effected by God. “Surely He shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence. He shall cover thee with His feathers, and under His wings shalt thou trust: His truth shall be thy shield and buckler.” The Psalmist felt that he had for protector no less a being than God Himself. Two features of the Divine protection are here brought into view.
1. Its tenderness. “He shall cover thee with His feathers, and under His wings shalt thou trust.” The young birds under the wing of their mother are tenderly guarded. (See our notes on Psa_57:1; Psa_63:7.) Gotthold tells how that during a fire at Delft, in Holland, certain storks, finding it impossible to preserve their brood, placed themselves upon the nest, spread over them their wings, and so perished with them in the flames. “Under these wings,” says Bernard, “four blessings are conferred upon us. For under these wings we are concealed: under these we are protected from the attacks of the hawks and kites, which are the powers of the air: under these a salubrious shade refreshes us, and wards off the overpowering heat of the sun: under these also we are nourished and cherished.”
2. Its effectiveness. Wings and feathers indicate the tender and loving character of the Divine protection. Yet wings and feathers are weak and may be easily broken. But the Divine protection is as strong as it is tender, as efficient as it is gracious. “His truth shall be thy shield and buckler.” God’s word, and His faithfulness to His word, are as armour to His people, preserving them from the onslaughts of their enemies. In such a protector we do well to trust and rejoice. He is wise to baffle the crafty designs of the cunning fowler; tender to shelter us from the storm and tempest; and strong to defend us in the day of battle.
II. As gloriously complete. The Psalmist labours to set forth the completeness of the safety of the godly man. He represents him as being—
1. Safe from all perils. It is perhaps impossible to assert with certainty what the Psalmist meant by each of the phrases and figures he employed. “The snare of the fowler” indicates danger arising from the craft and cunning of enemies. The great enemy of God and man is especially signified. The Lord delivers His people from “the wiles of the devil.” “The noisome pestilence.” There is a difference in both the translations and the interpretations of this clause. Perowne translates—“The devouring pestilence.” Barnes—“The fatal pestilence; the pestilence that spreads death in its march.” Hengstenberg—“The pestilence of wickedness.” And Matthew Henry says—“The contagion of sin is the noisome pestilence.” We think the latter view the correct one. The first clause of the verse (Psa_91:3) we regard as representing the subtle temptations of Satan, and the second the ruinous contagion of sin. God delivers from both all who trust in Him. Hengstenberg, as we think with great probability, interprets Psa_91:5 as setting forth the safety of the godly from the attacks of men, and Psa_91:6 as setting forth their safety from sickness. Perowne, on Psa_91:5, says—“Terror by night (comp. Son_3:8; Pro_3:23-26), in allusion, probably, to night attacks like those of Gideon (Judges 7), a favourite artifice of Oriental warfare; or perhaps to a destruction like that of Sennacherib.” And it has been pointed out on Psa_91:6, that “the diseases of all hot climates, and especially where vegetation is highly luxuriant, and marshes and miry swamps are abundant, proceed from the accumulating vapours of the night, or from the violence of the sun’s rays at mid-day. The beriberi of Ceylon, the spasmodic cholera and jungle-fever of India, and the greater part of the fevers of intertropical climates, especially that called the yellow-fever, chiefly originate from the first of these—‘the pestilence that walketh in darkness;’ while sunstrokes, apoplexies, inflammations of the brain, and liver complaints of most kinds, proceed from the second, ‘the destruction that wasteth at noonday.’ And it is in allusion to this double source of mischief that the Psalmist exclaims most beautifully on another occasion (Psa_121:6), ‘The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.’ ” The seventh verse seems to refer to warlike relations, and to express the security of the godly in battle. And in Psa_91:10, where the plague is mentioned as not coming nigh the dwelling of the righteous, there is, perhaps, an allusion to the exemption of the Israelites from the plagues of Egypt. But, leaving the examination of details, let us take hold of the main idea of the Poet, that the godly are safe from perils of all kinds and from all perils. “The variety of figures employed shows that the Psalmist is thinking of peril of every kind, coming from whatever source, and that he paints all dangers and fears vividly to the eye of his mind, in order to express the more joyfully his confidence that none of these things can move him, that over all he is more than conqueror. It is St. Paul’s fervid exclamation, ‘If God be for us, who can be against us?’ expressed in rich poetry.” From all the assaults of Satan, from the fatal contagion of moral evil, from the attacks of enemies both by night and by day, from hurtful diseases, from every plague, from all evil, the godly man is preserved.
2. Safe at all times. “By night, by day; in darkness,” and “at noonday” the Divine protection is alike exercised. “He that keepeth thee will not slumber. Behold, He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.… The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.” The guardianship of God is unremitting, constant, and unchangeable. They who trust in Him are at all times safe in His keeping.
3. Raised above the fear of danger. “Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday.” A stout heart may well be excused if it were afraid of perils such as these, and especially when they approach us in darkness and at night. In the darkness of night evil is apt to assume an exaggerated character. Imagination increases its terrors. If we could clearly see the perils which threaten us they would lose much of their terror-inspiring power. But the godly man, trusting in the Lord, shall not be afraid of the terrors of the night or the perils of the day. In the midst of dangers he shall walk calmly because of his trust in the all-sufficient protection of God.
But is all this true? Is it not a fact that pestilence seizes the saint as well as the sinner? Does not the plague enter the dwelling of the good man as well as that of the evil? It is unquestionable that the godly are not exempt from “the ills that flesh is heir to.” Loss, sickness, suffering, death, fall to their lot even as to others. What, then, does the Psalmist mean in these verses? How are we to understand them?
We must bear in mind that we are interpreting poetry, not prose. The sacred poets of the Hebrews, like all other poets, used figurative and rhetorical language. And to interpret their poems in the same way as we interpret an historical document, or a logical treatise, or an apostolic letter, would be utterly misleading. The plain truth expressed in these verses is, that God is the Protector of His people, and that they are secure who put their trust in Him. Nor is it difficult to show that in times of pestilence and peril the position of the godly man is far superior to that of the ungodly. We may mention at least three things in which this is clearly manifest.
(1) Faith in God is a great safeguard against disease and danger. Stier states that some years ago a distinguished physician in St. Petersburg recommended this Psalm as the best defence against the cholera. And Tholuck admirably says—“As the general who carries within him the conviction that he is called to a great work, whilst the bullets fall thick as hail about him, stands with calm eye and firm foot, and says: I know that the bullet is not yet cast which can strike me, so stands the man of prophetic faith in the hour of danger, with the conviction that the thunderbolt will turn aside from his head, and the torrent dry up at his feet, and the arrows fall blunted from his breast, because the Lord wills it.” Faith in God is the great condition of calmness and courage in time of danger.
(2) The godly man observes the laws of health. Pestilence and disease find their victims chiefly amongst the intemperate and licentious, who by their sinful habits are predisposed to their attacks, and unable to resist their power. But the godly man, by reason of his life of virtue, temperance, and cleanliness, often escapes the most deadly diseases without any attack, or if attacked frequently recovers.
(3) Suffering and death wear a different aspect to the godly man from that which they present to the wicked. He knows that suffering is educational; “that tribulation worketh patience;” that out of affliction and conflict the saints often bring great spoil of spiritual treasures; that “these light afflictions, which are but for a moment, are working for him a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.” He has gracious support in all his trials and afflictions; and, being sanctified by God, great blessings accrue to him by means of them. And to the godly men of this Christian age death is not an evil; it signifies not loss, but gain; it is the gate of life; it is birth into a higher and diviner form of life. It is true, then, that no real evil can befall the godly soul who is trusting in the Lord. And if suffering and sorrow and loss should be his portion, God will educe from them blessings of transcendent and perpetual value. “We know that all things work together for good to them that love God.”
III. As conditionated by trust in God. The godly man is thus secure because he has made the Lord his refuge, and the Most High his habitation. (See notes on the condition of safety in the preceding homily.) This verse (the 9th) is in substance a repetition of the first verse. If we would secure the protection of God we must trust Him fully and constantly.
CONCLUSION.—
1. Let the godly ever trust and rejoice in their Protector.
2. Sinner, seek and secure this protection while you may. “Let the wicked forsake his way,” &c.
THE REWARD OF THE WICKED
(Psa_91:8)
These words suggest—
I. That there is a difference between the sufferings of the righteous and the wicked. The same external afflictions and trials may befall them; but to the righteous they are educational, to the wicked they are punitive—“the reward,” &c.
II. That the Divine rule in this world is righteous. Under it the godly are protected by God, while the wicked are punished.
III. That the righteousness of the Divine rule is not always manifest in this world. If the present were our only state of being, there are many things which we could not reconcile with the fact that God reigns in righteousness.
IV. That the righteousness of the Divine rule will ultimately be clearly manifest to all. The godly with their eyes “shall see the reward of the wicked.” There is a state where all the apparent inequalities of the moral government of our world will be clearly rectified. “Woe unto the wicked! it shall be ill with him; for the reward of his hands shall be given him.”
V. The weak and fearful believer, notwithstanding his fears, shall not perish with the wicked. “Only with his eyes shall he see the reward of the wicked,” while he himself shall enjoy the glorious inheritance of the good.
THE ANGELIC MINISTERS OF THE GODLY
(Psa_91:11-13)
In pursuance of the main topic the Poet here speaks of angels as charged by God to help and defend His people. Literally the word angel signifies a messenger, and may be used personally or impersonally. It is used in the Scriptures to designate ordinary messengers, prophets, Christian ministers, &c. In this place it denotes superhuman spirits—angels, as the word is commonly understood at present. From the representations of the holy Word it is clear that the angels rank high in the scale of being. They are said to possess great power. “Angels that excel in strength.” “Mighty angels.” And most astonishing achievements of power are attributed to them. They also possess great intelligence. This is plainly implied in the words of the Lord—“But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but My Father only.” It is also implied in the statement that they are “full of eyes before and behind,” and “full of eyes within.” The amazing power that they wield is chiefly the power of intelligence and wisdom. They also possess complete moral purity. They are spoken of in the Bible as “saints,” “holy ones,” and “holy angels.” Dwelling in that world where not even the shadow of moral defilement can enter, and standing in the immediate presence of God, they must be entirely free from even the smallest moral stain or imperfection. Their power, intelligence, purity, differ from ours in this, that they are perfect in kind. They differ from those of God in this, that they are imperfect in degree. There is before the angels a career of constant progress, both moral and intellectual, through all eternity. Moreover, they are represented as interested in the affairs of this world, and as actively employed by God in connection with those affairs. “They are represented as being, in the widest sense, agents of God’s providence, natural and supernatural, to the body and to the soul. Thus the operations of nature are spoken of as under angelic guidance fulfilling the will of God.… More particularly, however, angels are spoken of as ministers of what is commonly called the ‘supernatural,’ or perhaps more correctly the ‘spiritual’ Providence of God; as agents in the great scheme of the spiritual redemption and sanctification of man.” “The angel of the Lord” is said to “encamp round about them that fear Him, and to deliver them.” They are represented as watching over Christ’s little ones; as rejoicing over a penitent sinner; as bearing the spirits of the redeemed into Paradise; and as “ministering spirits” for the spiritual guidance and help of the heirs of salvation. And in the text they are said to be charged by God to uphold and aid His people. That they should thus minister to the godly is in the highest degree reasonable.
(1) From the interest which they take in man (Luk_15:10; 1Pe_1:12).
(2) Inasmuch as a fallen angel led man to his ruin, and still by malign influences seeks our destruction, does it not seem appropriate and reasonable that holy angels should aid us in every virtuous and worthy effort?
(3) It is the law of God’s universe that His creatures should minister to each other. All things and all beings are made for service. The higher order of beings are made to minister to the lower—the strong to help the weak, the enlightened to instruct the ignorant, &c. Our Lord “came not to be ministered unto, but to minister.” “I am among you,” He said, “as He that serveth.” God is the Great Minister of all His creatures. How reasonable then that angels should minister to men! If we are asked in what way angels minister to men? or, how they serve us? we may with strict fairness decline to reply. We may accept a fact without being able to explain its mode. All men, indeed, do so in many things. So we accept as true the statement that angelic beings aid men, though we are unable to explain by what method they do so. But may it not be that they aid us by suggesting to our mind thoughts, reasons, and motives to action, and by awakening emotions in our souls? &c. Any way, we thankfully accept and rejoice in their ministry as a precious reality.
“Oh! th’ exceeding grace
Of highest God that loves His creatures so,
And all His works with mercy doth embrace,
That blessed angels He sends to and fro,
To serve to wicked men, to serve His wicked foe.
“How oft do they their silver bowers leave,
To come to succour us that succour want!
How oft do they with golden pinions cleave
The flitting skies, like flying pursuivant,
Against foul fiends to aid us militant!
They for us fight, they watch and duly ward,
And their bright squadrons round about us plant;
And all for love, and nothing for reward.
Oh! why should heavenly God to men have such regard!”—Spenser.
In the text the angelic ministers of the good are said to be—
I. Commissioned by God. “He shall give His angels charge over thee.”
1. They are “His angels.” He called them into being. He sustains them. The most mighty and glorious of their number is dependent upon Him. He is sovereign over them all. Loyally and reverently they acknowledge His sovereign right over them.
2. They are commissioned by Him. He allots to them their respective duties. They “do His commandments, hearkening unto the voice of His word.” They are “His hosts, ministers of His that do His pleasure.” The “charge “which in the text they are said to receive is more than a mere direction or order; it is a solemn command. All the angelic ministers of the godly obey His behests; they serve under Him,—they are carrying out His purposes.
This angelic ministry is—
II. Exercised for the godly as individuals. “He shall give His angels charge over thee.” God is profoundly solicitous for the well-being of each one of His people. He does not overlook the individual in the multitude. He cares for every godly soul with a care as complete and constant as though He had no other soul to care for. So in the ministry of His angels unto men He gives them charge not simply of His Church or of the communities which compose it, but of every individual member who trusts in Him. So that every true believer may say, “In my lonely labour, and sorrow, and conflict, when far removed from human help and fellowship, my angelic helpers still have me in their charge, and are still near to help me.” Thus an angel ministered to Elijah (1Ki_19:4-8); to Daniel (Dan_6:22); to Peter (Act_12:7-10).
This angelic ministry is—
III. Exercised for the godly only when they are in their true path. “To keep thee in all thy ways.” It is significant that when Satan quoted this verse in the temptation of our Lord, he omitted this clause. Had he quoted the whole verse, his temptation would have refuted itself. “The ‘ways’ spoken of in the Psalm are the ‘ways’ of obedience and duty, not the ‘ways ‘of presumption or self-seeking.” In the ways which God has prescribed for us to walk in we shall find safety and support even when the way is roughest and we are feeblest. But if we step out of the way, we forfeit the help of the angel ministers. If we are out of the way, their business is not to help us but to oppose us, if haply their opposition may lead us to retrace our steps and re-enter our true path. So long as we are in our way we are sure of the Divine help and protection, for His angels will not fail in their charge; but if we are out of our way, we are exposed to dangers from every quarter. The path of duty is the path of safety.
The angelic ministry is—
IV. Exercised for the godly always when they are in their true path. “To keep thee in all thy ways.” God calls men to tread different ways. He also calls the same person to tread different ways at different times. There are the ways of arduous duty, and of severe trial, and of peaceful progress, &c. God’s way for one man is the way of patient endurance, He calls him to suffer; His way for another man is the way of constant and perhaps difficult service, He calls him to work; His way for vast numbers is that of quietly and faithfully discharging “the daily round and common tasks” of life, He calls them to diligence and faithfulness. In all the paths of life which He calls us to tread our angelic ministers are near for our help. When our path lies by the rippling waters of gentle streams, beneath azure skies, amid beauteous scenes and with genial breezes, they keep us in our way. And when we travel the steep and rugged way, beneath heavy clouds and amid furious storms, they bear us up on their hands lest we dash our foot against a stone. In the thronged and dusty way of life’s busy scenes, and in the retired and peaceful paths of quiet service, they keep us. “To keep thee in all thy ways.”
V. By means of the exercise of this angelic ministry the godly are enabled to surmount all the hindrances and conquer all the foes that beset their way. “They shall bear thee up on their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone. Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder; the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under foot.” “By the ‘lion and adder,’ ” says Perowne, “there is no need to understand exclusively, or chiefly, the powers of darkness, the evil spirits. As by ‘a stone’ all hindrances, so by ‘the lion and dragon’ all hostile powers are denoted.” By means of this angelic ministry the godly are—
1. Preserved from falling. “They shall bear thee up on their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.” One great object of the ministry of angels is to guard the good lest they stumble and fall into sin. They aid us to overcome the hindrances of life. “If we cannot have the way smoothed, it answers every purpose if we have angels to bear us up on their hands.”
2. Enabled to conquer the most powerful foes. “The lion” and “the young lion” represent enemies of great strength and violence. Satan is said to go about “as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.” The most powerful enemies of the good cannot cope with one of the angels of God. One angel of the Lord in one night smote one hundred and eighty-five thousand Assyrians. The man who trusts in the Lord, looking upon the most numerous and most powerful enemies, in full assurance of victory may say, “Fear not; for they that be with us are more than they that be with them.” Our helpers are more numerous and more powerful than our enemies.
3. Enabled to conquer the most cunning foes. “The adder” and “the dragon” represent enemies of great secrecy and cunning. Satan is designated a serpent and a dragon. “And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world.” St. Paul speaks of the “wiles of the devil.” Many of the foes against which the godly have to contend in society to-day seek to gain their victory not by strength but by subtlety, not by force but by fraud. But our angelic helpers aid us in this respect also. We have assurance of complete victory over both “the roaring lion” and the “old serpent.” Triumphantly we shall tread our foes under our feet. Over both the might of opposition and the cunning of temptation we shall be more than conquerors.
CONCLUSION.
1. Our subject affords encouragement to trust in God. How numerous and efficient are the agencies He employs to save us!
2. Our subject reveals the dignity of the godly man. Angels, the highest beings in creation, the holy, the glorious, the powerful, are employed by God to serve him. Child of God, realise thy dignity, walk worthily of it.
3. Our subject calls us to the service of others. Angels serve us, Christ serves us now in heaven, the Holy Ghost serves, the Heavenly Father serves, God is the great servant of all. To serve God by ministering to our fellow-creatures is our duty and privilege. Let us secure the blessedness of unselfish and hearty service.
THE FOES AND VICTORY OF THE GOOD
(Psa_91:13)
I. The foes of the good. These are—
1. Numerous. “The lion and adder, the young lion and the dragon.”
“Angels your march oppose,
Who still in strength excel,
Your secret, sworn, eternal foes,
Countless, invisible.”
—C. Wesley.
The enemies of the good in human society, in commerce, in amusements, in literature, are very many. And to these and the countless evil spirits must be added the “fleshly lusts which war against the soul.”
2. Various. “The lion,” whose strength, courage, and ferocity are proverbial. The word which is translated “adder” signifies “a poisonous snake.” “The young lion” is mentioned as particularly fierce and violent. And the word which is translated “the dragon,” signifies here a “land serpent of a powerful and deadly kind.” Thus varied are the foes of the godly man. The world, the flesh, and the devil are all arrayed against him. He has to battle with the syren enticements of temptation and the fierce attacks of persecution, &c.
3. Terrible. “The lion, adder, young lion, and dragon” are very terrible foes to the traveller. If once they have him in their power, they will destroy him. The foes of the godly soul are to be dreaded for their malignity, subtlety, and power. He is a fool who thinks lightly of the forces of evil which are working and fighting in this world.
II. The victory of the good. This is—
1. Complete.
(1) Over all foes. “The lion and adder, the young lion and the dragon” shall all be vanquished. The world, the flesh, and the devil, persecutions and seductions, inward foes and outward, shall all be overcome by the man who trusts in God.
(2) Over all foes completely. “Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder, the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet.” “His meaning is, thou shalt intentionally tread upon them like a conqueror, thou shalt tread upon them to testify thy dominion over them. You shall have power to overcome whatsoever may annoy you.” “The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly.” The Christian will come out of life’s conflicts “more than a conqueror” through Christ.
2. Certain.
(1) Because angels aid us against our foes. They are intelligent, powerful, swift, glorious allies.
(2) Because God guarantees it. “Thou shalt tread,” &c. Here is no perhaps, but a certain promise from Him who is the truth. Take courage then, brother, in life’s battles. Trust and fight, and a glorious victory will be yours.
THE GLORIOUS PRIVILEGES OF THE GODLY
(Psa_91:14; Psa_91:16)
The inspired poet in these verses represents God Himself as declaring the high privileges of His servants. We have here—
I. Some features in the character of the godly.
1. Love to God. “Because he hath set his love upon me.” The good man loves God with the love of gratitude—loves Him because of what He has done and is still doing for him. “We love Him because He first loved us.” When we reflect upon the evils from which He delivers us, and the blessings He bestows upon us, and the glory which awaits us in the future, our heart glows with gratitude and affection to Him. The good man loves God with the love of esteem also,—loves Him because of what He is in Himself. The love which springs from gratitude is first in order of time in the spiritual history of most men; but the love which springs from esteem is first in order of excellence. To love Him because of the divine beauty of His character and life, is a far higher thing than to love Him because of the benefits which we have received from Him, or which He has promised to bestow upon us.
“My God, I love Thee, not because
I hope for heaven thereby;
Nor because they who love Thee not
Are lost eternally.
“Not with the hope of gaining aught,
Nor seeking a reward,
But, as Thyself hast loved me,
O ever-loving Lord.
“So would I love Thee, blessed Lord,
And in Thy praise will sing,
Because Thou art my loving God,
And my redeeming King.”
—Xavier.
The expression, “Set His love upon me,” indicates fixedness of affection. God requires from us an intense single-hearted love. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind.” Our supreme love must be fixed upon God. There is encouragement for us in this verse. “It is not because of perfect love that God will deliver. It is to the will to love and serve—it is to the setting the heart that the promise is made—to the full purpose of heart, that is set to cleave unto the Lord.” Do we love God supremely?
2. Knowledge of God. “He hath known my name.” Knowledge of God and love to God are closely connected. We must have some knowledge of God before we can love Him. A true knowledge of God leads to trust in Him. “They that know Thy name will put their trust in Thee.” To know God’s name is to know Himself. Proficiency in this knowledge is attainable only to the man who loves God. As we must have some knowledge of God before we can love Him, so we must love Him before we can know much of Him. “Every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.” We can know the heart of God only as we love Him. Where the keen intellect fails to discover any trace of God, He is clearly and preciously manifest to the pure and loving heart.
3. Prayer to God. “He shall call upon Me.” The godly soul cannot live without prayer. In times of need he calls upon God for grace to help him. In the enjoyment of blessing He calls upon God in grateful praise. At all times he acknowledges his dependence upon God. And there are seasons when prayer grows into holy and blessed communion, in which there are no petitions, but an intense and blessed realisation of the presence of God, and adoration of Him, which humbles and purifies and strengthens the spirit.
II. Some of the glorious privileges of the godly.
1. Deliverance from danger. The assurance is twice given, “I will deliver him.” The good man has enemies to contend with, but God will deliver him out of their hands, and give him the victory over them. The good man is exposed to dangers, but God delivers him safely out of them all.
2. Exaltation and consequent safety. “I will set him on high.” I will place him out of the reach of danger. God raises those who trust Him above the stormy sea of this life, places them on an immovable rock, where the threatening and thundering waves cannot reach them. “He shall dwell on high; his place of defence shall be the munitions of rocks.” God thus exalts His people above the perils of life, because they know His name and confide in Him.
3. Answers to prayer. “I will answer him.” The answer to prayer is not necessarily the granting of our requests. “It may be a refusal, an explanation, a promise, a conditional grant.” Excellently says Matthew Henry, “I will answer by promises (Psa_85:8), answer by providences, bringing in seasonable relief, and answer by graces, strengthening them with strength in their souls; thus He answered Paul with grace sufficient.” True prayer is always answered by God, and answered in infinite wisdom and love.
4. The presence of God in trouble. “I will be with him in trouble.” The good man is not exempted from trouble, but supported in the midst of trouble. The celebrated William Dawson says, “At other times God will leave them in the hands of angels: ‘He shall give His angels charge over thee to keep thee,’ &c. But when they are in trouble, I will say to the angels, ‘Stand aside, I will take care of them Myself. I will be with them in trouble.” So He speaks to His people: ‘When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee,’ &c. When languishing in sickness, He will make His bed and his pillow; when travelling through the valley of the shadow of death, the Lord will be with him, and enable him to sing, ‘I will fear no evil; for Thou art with me,’ &c. Thus He is with them as their physician and nurse, in pain and sickness; as their strength in weakness; as their guide in difficulty; their ease in pain; and their life in death.”
5. The conference of distinguished honour. “I will honour him.” God honours His people in this life by delivering them from danger and trial, by sustaining them in suffering and sorrow, and by raising them into the most exalted relationships. “Now are we the sons of God.” In the life that is to come God will honour them by raising them to the highest dignities, the most delightful fellowships, the most glorious service, and to His own immediate presence. “To him that overcometh I will give to sit with Me in My throne,” &c. “We know that when He shall appear we shall be like Him,” &c.
6. Satisfaction with the duration of their life upon earth. “With long life will I satisfy him.” “The special promise of long life at the close,” says Perowne, “as a temporal blessing, is in accordance with the general character of the Old Testament. Still it is possible that men like the Psalmist, full of faith in God, attached a deeper and more spiritual meaning to promises and hopes like these, than was attached to them by the majority of their countrymen.” Matthew Henry’s exposition seems to us admirable. “
(1) They shall live long enough; they shall be continued in this world till they have done the work they were sent into this world for, and are ready for heaven, and that is long enough. Who would wish to live a day longer than God has some work to do, either by him or upon him?
(2) They shall think it long enough; for God by His grace shall wean them from the world and make them willing to leave it. A man may die young, and yet die full of days, satur dierum—satisfied with living. A wicked worldly man is not satisfied, no, not with long life; he still cries, Give, give. But he that has his treasure and heart in another world has soon enough of this; he would not live always.” The good man’s life upon earth is a completed thing, whether he die young or live to become a centenarian. He knows that his life is ordered by infinite Wisdom, and whenever it ends he is satisfied.
7. Full salvation. “And show him My salvation.” When the good man’s life upon earth is ended, God will admit him to the enjoyment of His complete, glorious, and everlasting salvation in heaven. Here we catch glimpses of His salvation; there we shall see it fully and clearly revealed. Here we know its power and blessedness in part; hereafter we shall know them in their completeness. Here we conquer and have to battle again; there the warfare is all over, and the victory is glorious and endless. Here we partake of His salvation in the kingdom of grace; there in the kingdom of glory.
CONCLUSION.
1. Have we these distinguishing characteristics of the godly? Do we love, know, and pray to God?
2. Do you who have them, value and rejoice in your exalted privileges?
3. And you who do not bear the marks of the godly man, what is your hope? Through Jesus Christ every man may attain to this supreme love to God, this blessed knowledge of Him, and this hallowed communion with Him.
LONG LIFE
(Psa_91:16)
“With long life will I satisfy him.” The present life is not a vain thing, but a thing of solemn reality; not a trifling thing, but a thing of stupendous importance; it ought not to be a mean thing, but a thing of sublimity and honour.
I. Long life is desirable.
1. Because of the obedience which, we may render to God. In this world we obey God in the face of many difficulties and much temptation. In heaven all influences combine to aid its inhabitants in their joyous obedience and service. But here, alas! it is very different. Yet obedience in a state like the present develops some of the noblest elements of character, and is specially well-pleasing to God.
2. Because of the service we may render to our race. In heaven holiness is universal and supreme. In hell evil holds undisputed sway. Upon earth good and evil are present, and in conflict. Here we may labour for the cause of righteousness and truth as we cannot in any other state of being.
“Awake, my zeal; awake, my love,
To serve my Saviour here below,
In works which perfect saints above,
And holy angels cannot do.
Awake, my charity, to feed
The hungry soul, and clothe the poor;
In heaven are found no sons of need;
There all these duties are no more.”
—Watts.
3. Because of the reward which we may obtain. Obedience and service rendered in this life will be appropriately and proportionately rewarded in the life to come. Therefore it is natural and right to desire to live long that we may obey long, and serve long, and reap a rich reward.
II. The tendency of true religion is to promote long life. “Keep My commandments; for length of days, and long life, and peace shall they add to thee. Length of days is in her (Wisdom’s) right hand.” The truly religious man lives virtuously, temperately, cultivates cleanliness, and avoids all violent passions, and such a life contributes incalculably to the prolongation of life.
III. A true estimate of the length of life is not formed by simply numbering its months and years. “They only,” said Sheridan, “have lived long who have lived virtuously.” “He lives long,” said Fuller, “that lives well; and time misspent is not lived, but lost.”
“We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths;
In feelings, not in figures on a dial.
We should count time by heart-throbs. He most lives
Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best.”—Bailey.
“He liveth long who liveth well!
All other life is short and vain;
He liveth longest who can tell
Of living most for heavenly gain.
“He liveth long who liveth well!
All else is being flung away;
He liveth longest who can tell
Of true things truly done each day.”
—Bonar.
IV. A truly godly man at the close of life will be satisfied with its length as determined by God, whatever that length may be. “My times are in Thy hand.” Our days are determined, the number of our months is with Him; and He orders all things well. “In short measures life may perfect be.”
Conclusion.—Let us see to it that, by the help of God, we live well and earnestly; and thankfully leave the length of our life with Him.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain These are the words of one who had known…
Psa 91:1
These are the words of one who had known almost more than any other man of the shafts of unkindness, and the arrows of death, and the cruel torments of life. None, probably, save only David’s Son, ever equalled David in the degree in which he had passed through all the sympathies of our common nature. And this is his testimony, that in the midst of all there is a "place," a "secret place," as deep in its secrecy as God is high in His omnipotence, shadowed over by the hand of God.
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I. What is meant by the secret place? The secret of the whole of the Old Testament is the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore to the mind of David—i.e., in its first intention—the expression, "the secret place of the Most High," would certainly connect itself with Christ.
II. The Psalmist designates the man who "dwells" in the secret place. It is a beautiful idea—the man who has his home in Christ. It is to have Jesus all round us—our covering, our beauty, our defence, our rest.
III. Every promise has in it the dignity and the security of prophecy. "He shall abide." The image assures us of two things: (1) safety; (2) peace. He who refreshes himself in Christ has a refuge to which he can return again and again, and it is always there. It is the same "yesterday, today, and for ever."
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 9th series, p. 134.
References: Psa 91:1.— J. N. Norton, Every Sunday, p. 257. Psa 91:1, Psa 91:2.— R. S. Candlish, The Gospel of Forgiveness, p. 227. Psa 91:2.— Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxii., No. 1297. Psa 91:3.— Ibid., vol. iii., No. 124. Psa 91:4.—Ibid., vol. xv., No. 902. Psa 91:11.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. xv., p. 143; J. H. Keble, Sermons for Saints’ Days, p. 372.
Psa 91:1-2
Three parties speak in this Psalm: the witness for God, the brother in peril, and God Himself.
I. The witness for God, the sympathising friend of the party exposed to danger, speaking from his own experience, declares generally, "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty" (Psa 91:1, and see also Psa 91:9). Three lessons are taught in that inner school: (1) That God is true, true to Himself and true to you. (2) In your new dwelling-place you see the reward of the wicked. (3) You learn that there are members of the family not involved in your peril who yet are deeply and affectionately interested in your safety: "He shall give His angels charge over thee," etc.
II. The second party in this discourse and dialogue—the brother in peril—says very little. But the little which he does say is very comprehensive: "I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress, my God; in Him will I trust" (Psa 91:2). It is a prompt response to the very first appeal made to him. It is the language not of faith only, but of love.
III. What God Himself is overheard to say at the close of the Psalm is the glorious corner-stone of this edifice of confidence. (1) Mark the cause assigned by the Lord for the warm interest which He feels in His servant thus exposed: "He has set his love upon Me; he has known My name." (2) Mark how the Lord speaks, connecting His servant’s love to Him and knowledge of His name with His own purpose of deliverance and exaltation, as if His honour were concerned to make it plain that the love is not misplaced: "I will deliver him." (3) Mark what the Lord expects on the part of His servant: "He shall call upon Me." (4) Mark the assurance of the Lord’s gracious interposition, answering to His servant’s calling upon Him: "He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him," etc. (5) Nor is it to be all trouble with the man of God while he is fighting the good fight and finishing his course. Nay, there is so much enjoyment for him as to make him rather wish for its continuance, and welcome the concluding promise which he hears the Lord giving: "With long life will I satisfy him, and show him My salvation."
R. S. Candlish, The Gospel of Forgiveness, p. 227.
References: Psa 91:3.— Spurgeon, Morning by Morning, p. 24. Psa 91:5.— C. Kingsley, Discipline, and Other Sermons, p. 198; Spurgeon, Evening by Evening, p. 113. Psa 91:5-10.— R. Lee, Sermons, p. 44. Psa 91:9.— Spurgeon, Morning by Morning, p. 58. Psa 91:11.— Ibid., My Sermon Notes: Genesis to Proverbs, p. 157. Psa 91:12.— H. Melvill, Sermons on Less Prominent Facts, vol. ii., p. 170.
Psa 91:13
The definite promise, "Thou shalt tread upon the lion and the dragon," was a reference not only to reptiles and wild beasts of outward evil, but to evils in which the deadliness of vice is concentrated in our individual hearts: evil thoughts, and deeds, and habits which assail and hurt the soul. The fitness of the metaphor is shown by the fact that we find it also in the heathen mythology. The Greek type of a deliverer of the world was the hero Hercules. They saw, as we see, that he who would indeed conquer evil in the world must first conquer it in his own heart. The moral is finely conveyed in the legend of his conquest of the Nemaean lion. Every man’s Nemaean lion lies in the way for him somewhere. All future victories depend upon that. Kill it, and through all the rest of your lives what was once terrible becomes your armour; you are clothed with the virtue of that conquest.
I. In the first place, this lion is to be fought in the darkness, and in the cavern, and with no earthly weapons. The lion is that inward sin, that special impulse and temptation to evil, which is most directed against your individual heart.
II. Observe the infinite superiority which Christ has granted to us in these days. The Greeks had noble ideals, but their conduct fell as far short of these ideals as ours does. But often these ideals were grievously corrupt. Human strength and knowledge are at the best but perfect weakness. But it is the mercy of God that He has given us in the life of our Lord Jesus Christ an ideal not human, but Divine.
III. Notice that the more early this battle is undertaken, the more surely it is won. He who strangles serpents in his youth slays monsters in his manhood. He who has early had strength to conquer temptations will not be so likely later to lose his self-reverence and his self-control.
F. W. Farrar, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiii., p. 33.
References: Psa 91:14.—A. Fletcher, Thursday Penny Pulpit, vol. xvi., p. 233. Psalm 91—M. G. Pearse, Some Aspects of the Blessed Life, pp. 81, 114. Psa 92:2.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xix., No. 1138. Psa 92:4.—Ibid., Morning by Morning, p. 227. Psa 92:5, Psa 92:6.—F. Tholuck, Hours of Devotion, p. 99. Psa 92:10.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xix., No. 1122, and vol. xxviii., No. 1649. Psa 92:12.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ii., p. 188. Psa 92:13-15.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxiii., No. 1365; Homiletic Magazine, vol. xi., p. 7. Psa 93:2.—Spurgeon, Evening by Evening, p. 325. Psa 93:5.—G. W. McCree, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxv., p. 285; A. Watson, Sermons for Sundays, Festivals, and Fasts, 2nd series, vol. iii., p. 9.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
F. W. Grant 1903 · Public Domain The Second Man.
The Second Man.
Thus the ruin of man has been seen; and it is utter. As a being made for a dependent life of immortal blessing, he has failed to maintain this; and death is the seal of condemnation; his taking from the earth in which he was placed. What follows death does not come into view, for it is not in question. It is death itself that is so complete an assurance that God has judged and set aside the creature H has made. Thus he has lost God as his habitation; and, though he take to heart the lesson of his judgment, and look back with desire of heart to the place whence he has fallen; the way is not yet found by which he shall be reinstated in it.
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It is this that the ninety-first psalm begins to open up to us. The whole is not by any means told in it; but a commencement is made, and with what is first and central in its relation to it. We learn here of a Second Man -not called so, indeed, but most evidently in opposition to the universal condition of men as shown us in the preceding psalm, and designedly set before us in this character. It is One who has "made Jehovah, even the Most High, His habitation," and who can claim rightly all the consequences of this. No plague can come near Him; no power of the enemy prevail against him; heaven provides Him with a watchful and powerful escort; all nature is in agreement with Him: thus there is a Man who is entitled indeed to be called a "Second Man," though but a part of the truth about Him has yet been told.
1. The principle of perpetuity in life and blessing is first of all stated, and in terms which directly refer to the previous psalm. "He that abideth in the secret of the Most High shall lodge under the shadow of the Almighty." That is, the protection of One all-competent to protect is assured to the man who abides in the secret -or "dwells in the secret place" -of the Most High: the God who is going to take His place as that, in those millennial times which are to come for the earth, -King of kings and Lord of lords.
Manifestly, this is the "Lord" of the previous psalm, who has been a "habitation for us in all generations"; and, as plainly, this "habitation" is that very "secret," "or secret place" -of the Most High which it has shown us to have become such: man having dropped out of the knowledge of it, and lost the resulting blessing.
When God appeared to the man who was to bring Israel out of Egypt, and gave him his commission to do so, Moses desires to know by what name he is to declare God to them. And the Name of God today is hidden from multitudes by a worse confusion than that which began at Babel. The day is yet to come when in all the earth "there shall be One Jehovah and His Name One" (Zec 14:9). But these many names only reveal the practical estrangement of men from Him whose character His Name reveals. Little hope can there be naturally as to a creature who permits even the name of his God to slip away from him! But who abides in the secret place of the Most High? We have already had the answer.
Yet in the next verse a response is heard, which at first indeed may not seem to be as distinctly indicative of the Speaker as it afterwards is found to be: "I will say of Jehovah," he replies, "He is my Refuge and Fortress: my God: I trust in Him." Faith in all times would have answered in similar terms, it might be said: and this is true. The Spirit of Christ in all His people has indeed used the language of Christ, and of course, truly; yet how different after all is the One Voice from the others! That the voice of absolute Truth has spoken here is made known by the echoes it awakens around, and presently by that of God Himself which attests it. That this psalm was written of the Messiah, Satan surely knew when he quoted to Him the eleventh and twelfth verses with the comment, "If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down." And the whole structure of the book, as we have considered it, and shall do more at large, proves the same thing.
2. The words used are those of absolute dependence; and now another voice, which is that surely of the Spirit of prophesy, answers again with the assurance of how completely this faith is justified and made good. He has made God His refuge, and shall find it a perfect and absolute one: from the snare of the trapper and the pestilence alike He will deliver; and in the tender love of endeared relationship, covering with His feathers and the broad shelter of His outstretched wings, -love pledged to Him who has cast Himself entirely upon it, so that His truth becomes a shield and buckler.
The inward realization answers to this perfect care: no terror of the night, no arrow flying openly by day, alarms. Nature is at peace with Him with whom its God is: pestilence nor destruction touches Him; and the fall of thousands round Him only demonstrates the more the complete protection which the divine government throws round the Man whose sole reliance is in God. Only shall He see with His own eyes the end of the wicked.
3. A new division of the psalm begins here: which seems, at first sight, very much a repetition of what has been said before, but goes beyond it, and opens the heavenly side of blessing. He has made Jehovah, the refuge of His saints, the Supreme, His habitation; and heaven opens towards Him in consequence. Notice the words here for the first time, "my refuge." It is but a hint indeed, for as yet there can be no more, but a real hint nevertheless, of such refuge opening now to others, through Him who has in fact never known nor sought any but in God. And He has made Him His habitation; not professed to do so, nor labored to do so. but done so -abode in God as a new and perfect Man; for whom no excuse is to be made, and no reduction from the full demand for absolute perfection. Hence evil has no hold on Him; nor opportunity against Him: there shall no evil befall Thee, nor plague come near Thy tent." "Tent," mark: so that, with all the perfection of Manhood which is His, He is yet a Sojourner and Pilgrim upon the earth. He is not another man of the earth merely, a mere Adam that has never fallen: and who by virtue of that very unfallen state, could never have been a pilgrim. But here is One whose glory shines out in His very humiliation. He is a Wayfarer, not because a steward turned out of his stewardship; outside paradise, indeed, but not banished from it; One with His home in God, yet in an alien world, and whither should His steps be directed, but towards God His home, and in the place where His home is?
Thus even here heaven opens to Him. He is in a hostile world, and must have an escort; and angels are charged concerning Him, to keep Him in all His ways. Those blessed feet, so traveling through a place which is all in disorder, and might seem even haphazard, must be preserved from casualty.
But there is the power of the enemy also, "the lion and the adder" -force and craft. Both must give way to Him. He turns not aside, but tramples them under His feet. Good is ordained to victory, necessarily, or it would not be God that ruled: and that is, I suppose, why the number here is that of divine government. We do not see things work in this simple manner doubtless, and there is plenty of room left for exercise, and for faith. But the rule itself is absolute, and must be.
And now the voice of God Himself is heard; and He too owns and testifies to the Man in whom He delights. Heart has met heart: "because He has set His love upon Me, I will deliver Him." And here we find where His path necessarily ends: "I will set Him on high, because He has known My Name."
But this does not begin a new section, apparently, and therefore must come under the number which speaks of victory; at first sight difficult to understand or recognize as appropriate. Yet in fact this is the time of which it is said: "He has gone up on high; He has led captivity captive; He has received gifts for men." And this connects readily with the previous verse, -the power of the enemy trampled in the dust. Thus the structure reveals its significance; and again we have a hint, and yet more than a hint of a work accomplished for others: not the cross (for that is not in the line of this psalm; and involves the giving up in grace of what is seen to be proper to Him here) but that which in fact triumphed in the cross itself. For the priest’s white linen robe was that in which he went in to God; and when He cried "with strong crying and tears unto Him that was able to save Him
out of death, He was heard for His piety" (Heb 5:7). By the power of His absolute perfection He rose necessarily from all that He endured, into His own sphere: and this was truly the greatest of victories, and is perfectly in the line of the psalm before us.
Accordingly the next verse reminds us of the cross itself, although the peculiar features of the cross are not in it. There is the call that was heard, but no forsaking: "He shall call on Me, and I will answer Him: I will be with Him in strait; I will deliver Him and honor Him:" -a perfect response to personal perfection; while the last verse, with its significant number, overlaps time and stretches through eternity. "With length of days will I satisfy Him; and show Him My salvation." Compare Psa 21:4 for the interpretation: "He asked life of Thee, -Thou hast given it Him: length of days for ever and aye." It is the same Person before us in both psalms.
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain This Ps. describes the safety of those who trust…
This Ps. describes the safety of those who trust in God, and may have a special reference to the nation of Israel at a time when other nations were involved in calamity. The dangers that threatened Babylon towards the end of the exile have been suggested as a probable occasion for it. The Psalmist sometimes speaks in the first person (Psa_91:1-2, Psa_91:9), and sometimes addresses his promises to the godly man, or to the nation, in the second person (Psa_91:3-8, Psa_91:9-13). God Himself is the speaker in Psa_91:14-16.
1. Secret place] covert. Shadow] the shelter which a mother-bird gives her brood, as in Psa_91:4 : see Psa_17:8.
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3. And .. pestilence] LXX 'from the destroying word,' the snare being explained as malicious speech: see Psa_38:12. 'Pestilence' comes later, in Psa_91:6.
5. The terror, etc.] assaults by night, as compared with attacks by day.
6. Destruction] plague. Pestilence and Plague are here personified: see 2Sa_24:16-17; Isa_37:36.
9. Because.. refuge] RV 'For thou, O Lord, art my refuge!' Even .. habitation] RV 'Thou hast made the Most High thy habitation.'
11, 12. These vv. are quoted in the accounts of our Lord's temptation (Mat_4:6; Luk_4:10).
13. Dragon] RV ' serpent.'
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain Psalm 91
Psalm 91
Christ, the Second Man
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1. In dependence (Psa 91:1-2)
2. In security (Psa 91:3-8)
3. His triumph and exaltation (Psa 91:9-16)
This Psalm has no inscription. Its author is unknown, but we know it is the testimony of the Spirit of God concerning the second Man, our Lord. Satan knew this also for he quoted this Psalm to our Lord in Mat 4:1-25, omitting the words “in all thy ways” (Psa 91:11-12 and Mat 4:6). It is the Psalm God’s people love to read on account of its precious assurances given to those who put their trust in Him. In a larger and prophetic sense we have here the blessings of God’s power in the kingdom age when under the rule of the King His people will be kept from all evil. But let us not forget that we have in it a prophetic picture of our Lord as He walked as the dependent Man on the earth. He dwelled in the secret place of the Most High and trusted in Him, walking in perfect obedience. Death had no claim on His life, for He knew no sin. No evil could come near Him. Angels ministered unto Him. The lion and the adder--Satan in his two-fold character, as the powerful enemy and as the sneaking, hidden serpent--He tramples under His feet. And some day the enemy will also be completely bruised under the feet of His people. Then His exaltation, “I will set Him on high.”
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain The Safety of the Believers in Every Emergency.
The Safety of the Believers in Every Emergency.
The author of this psalm is not mentioned in the Bible, but the contents and the spirit of the hymn suggest the name of David, the pestilence referred to probably being that described 2 Samuel 24.
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v. 1. He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High, sheltered in the fellowship of God by faith, abiding secure from all assaults, shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty, safe under the protection of His almighty wings.
v. 2. I will say of the Lord, that is the boast of the believer, He is my Refuge and my Fortress, Jehovah, the God of grace, shielding him against the counsels and attacks of all enemies; my God, with the emphasis on the pronoun; in Him will I trust, every believer confidently and cheerfully yielding his life to the guiding hand of God.
v. 3. Surely He shall deliver thee, so the psalmist assures every believer, from the snare of the fowler, from Satan, who, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he might devour, and from the noisome pestilence, from the plague of destruction, the afflictions and temptations of Satan and his host.
v. 4. He, Jehovah, the God of salvation, shall cover thee with His feathers, His wings forming a protecting wall about the believers, and under His wings shalt thou trust, knowing that the enemy cannot penetrate to the asylum of God’s protection; His truth, the faithfulness of His promises of salvation, shall be thy shield and buckler, an unfailing protection against each and every danger.
v. 5. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night, of affliction and tribulation which is intensified by darkness, nor for the arrow that flieth by day, those with which the Evil One tries to wound the hearts and consciences of the believers,
v. 6. nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness, the destruction threatened by the various temptations assailing the believers, nor for the destruction, the severe plague, that wasteth at noonday, chiefly by the threats of the enemies of the Lord in the world. Against all such dangers the faithful are secure in the protection of their God and heavenly Father.
v. 7. A thousand shall fall at thy side and ten thousand at thy right hand, overcome by the attacks of the enemies, submitting to the various secret and open attacks of the devil and the children of this world; but it shall not come nigh thee, not be able to harm those who cling to the protection of the Lord in firm faith.
v. 8. Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked, for the unbelievers will be taken by the enemy and will have to suffer for their wickedness.
v. 9. Because thou, every believer, hast made the Lord, which is my Refuge, rather the psalmist speaks for himself, "For Thou, Jehovah, art my Refuge," even the Most High, thy Habitation, literally, "the Most High hast thou made thy Habitation. "
v. 10. there shall no evil befall thee, coming upon the believer with sudden destruction, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling, no stroke of misfortune and enmity which can bring us real harm, diminish our salvation, and the blessings of God’s grace.
v. 11. For He, Jehovah, the God of salvation, shall give His angels charge over thee, placing the believers in their special care, as a guard against all evil, to keep thee in all thy ways, as long as the believers walk on the ways of God’s will and good pleasure.
v. 12. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone, carefully carrying the believers over all obstructions of their faith and spiritual life, so that their salvation will never be really endangered. Every Christian lives the life and performs the work which God has intended for him. If death takes him away, it means that the goal set by God has been reached, so far as he is concerned, that all the difficulties and obstructions and afflictions of life are behind him. In the mean time, it is true,
v. 13. thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder; the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet, overcome all the attacks of the powers of hell, no matter how fierce and insidious they are. The Lord now Himself takes up the strain of the psalm, substantiating what His servant has said.
v. 14. Because he hath set his love upon Me, clinging to the Lord with the assurance of complete trust, therefore will I deliver him, from all afflictions and from the attacks of Satan and his host; I will set him on high, exalt him out of the enemy’s reach, because he hath known My name, set his faith upon God, accepted His grace, mercy, and salvation.
v. 15. He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him, coming to the believer’s assistance no matter what difficulty he may find himself in; I will be with him in trouble, standing at his side even in the hour of death; I will deliver him and honor him, bringing him up to the glories of heaven.
v. 16. With long life, that of eternity in and with God, will I satisfy him, in an everlasting enjoyment, and show him My salvation; for in heaven we shall see God face to face and know Him and all His wonderful blessings upon us, even as we are known.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 General Information:
General Information:
Parallelism is common in Hebrew poetry. (See: Poetry and Parallelism)
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He who lives ... will stay ... of the Almighty
Because "live" and "stay" mean almost the same thing, as do "shelter" and "shadow," which are both metaphors for protection, you may need to combine the two lines into one. AT: "The Most High, the Almighty, will care for all those who live where he can protect them" (See: Metaphor and Doublet)
who lives in the shelter of the Most High
The word "shelter" is a metaphor for protection. AT: "who lives where the Most High protects him" (See: Metaphor)
the Most High
The words "the Most High" refer to Yahweh. See how this is translated in Psalms 18:13.
will stay in the shadow of the Almighty
The word "shadow" here is a metaphor for protection. AT: "will stay where the Almighty can protect him" (See: Metaphor)
the Almighty
the one who has power and control over everything. See how this was translated in Psalms 68:14
I will say of Yahweh
"I will say about Yahweh"
my refuge and my fortress
A "refuge" is any place a person can go and have someone or something protect him. A "fortress" is something that people make so they can protect themselves and their property. Asaph uses them here as metaphors for protection. AT: "the one to whom I can go and he will protect me" (See: Metaphor)
translationWords
life
Most High
shadow
Almighty
Yahweh
stronghold
God
trust
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 Ps 91 This wisdom psalm expresses confidence in the…
Ps 91 This wisdom psalm expresses confidence in the Almighty God, who provides a shelter for those who take refuge in him. They receive redemption, life, and glory from the Lord, who loves and cares for those who seek him.
91:1-2 The Lord is an ancient shelter (see 90:1), open to those who seek refuge in him.
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91:1 The Most High is an ancient title that expresses the Lord’s exalted status as the ruler and protector of the godly (see Gen 14:19).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.