Psalm 121: Your True Helper

PSALM 121: YOUR TRUE HELPER

In an emergency, when you need help, sensing that you cannot make it on your own, that you are suddenly not in control of impending events, most all of us turn immediately to God for help. That is why it is said that there are no atheists in fox holes. Having been in fox holes as a Marine, and later serving as a chaplain in the National Guard, I can attest to that truth.

I vividly remember a cry to God for help late one November evening in 1961. An 18-year-old freshman, I was driving myself, my brother and sister back from Clearwater, Florida, to the University of Florida, after our Thanksgiving break. In the pitch blackness of a Florida night, they were fast asleep in the car, while I struggled to stay awake. As I approached an intersection, busy even at that hour, cruising over 60 miles an hour, I hit my breaks in preparation to stop. Nothing; the breaks simply were not there. And I could not pull off the road because it was a narrow two-lane highway with no shoulders, but with steep gullies on both sides. Though I was an agnostic at that time, without apparent forethought, I looked up at the dark sky and silently crying out “HELP!” to the possible “You” of a hidden God. Most fortunately, I crossed the intersection safely, seemingly between cars as if they were briefly parted, rather like the parted Red Sea, temporarily permitting safe passage for the Israelites.

Perhaps the most perfect and succinct Biblical cry for help, together with a strong assurance of the protective presence and promise of God is Psalm 121. Its eight verses say all that needs to be said in a cry for help. I suggest that after you read and pray it, you risk letting it in, and fully trusting in its majestic, peace-bearing words:

“I lift up my eyes to the hills– from where will my help come?
My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.
He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is your shade at your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life.
The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time on and forevermore.”

As Paul said, “If God is for us, who is against us?” (Romans 8:31b). Sense how absolute trust, together with an acceptance of being completely dependent upon God as your true and eternal Helper, makes you feel. Surely free from fear. Imagine living your life that way.