Returning Home

… INTRODUCTION …

How many of you here would consider yourself a trusting person?

Trust is one of those intangible qualities that really speak into the character of the person.

Trust is one of the hardest things to gain, and the easiest to lose.

trust sometimes gets broken, and repairing that trust takes just as much time and energy as it did, the first time...

And sometimes, we put trust in the wrong place...

I remember my very first year going to summer camp, I was maybe 9 or 10... And I went to do the blob, which is like a pillow that launches you in the air... It's really fun... But as a 9 year old, I was really really really afraid of the blob, and being launched! So I went up to the top of the blob and I got ready to jump, and all of a sudden I was completely overcome with fear....... What was I doing???? But I turned to my counselor, who was lifeguarding, and I asked him,

"Can I get hurt by this thing?"

He looked at me and said, "Absolutely not."

And I remember looking at him and saying, "ok. I trust you…” and I jumped off. And everything went fine... I had tons of fun, and I loved the blob... And I didn't think about that story for a long time, until I got a little older and then I worked for a camp, and I lifeguarded at the blob...

And I remember being 19 years old, lifeguarding, and it was like deja vu... a young boy, maybe 8 or 9, climbed up to the blob, and he was terrified to jump.... And then he turned to me and asked, "Can I get hurt by this thing?"

And I gave the same answer that my counselor gave to me, "Absolutely not."

However, I realized at that moment that I was lying to this kid... You absolutely can get hurt on the blob... That's where most kids get hurt at camp...

And then it clicked, "wait a minute... my counselor lied to me when I was a kid!!!"

Sometimes, we put our trust in the wrong places...

But today, I want to talk about a different type of trust... Trust in God... Trust in God, when you have absolutely no idea what God is doing. Trust, when it seems like God is silent... Trust, in your time of doubt...

But before we talk about that, will you pray with me?

… PRAYER …

Father in heaven may the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing in your sight. May your word, anointed by your spirit and spoken by your servant bring life to us today.

… SETTING UP THE TEXT …

Open up your Bibles with me to the Book of Psalms, chapter 121. Today we are looking at one of the beginning Psalms in my absolute favorite set of Psalms, which are called the Psalms of Ascent… And before we really get started, I want to ask a question: How many of you have ever heard of the "Psalms of Ascent" before today?

Not very many of you...

The Psalms of Ascent are a collection of 15 Psalms, Psalm 120-134... All of these Psalms are pretty short and simple, but I they are my favorite because of the story behind these Psalms make them so powerful and meaningful… And because of their story, we need to know a little bit of history about this collection of Psalms..

Throughout the Old Testament, we see the history of the Hebrews, the people of Israel who were God's chosen people... Through God's covenant with Abraham, the nation of Israel knew that they were a special people, and that God would always be on their side, and would protect them...

Because of God's protection, Jerusalem, the Holy City where they believed the presence of God dwelled, could not be conquered... Time and again throughout the Old Testament, enemies would rise up against the Hebrews, and time and time again they failed...

The Hebrews thought that God would NEVER let His people fail, no matter what some of the prophets said...

However, in 587bc, the unthinkable happened... Babylon, the epitome of evil to the Jewish people, with their evil King Nebuchadnezzar conquered the City of Jerusalem and destroyed it...

The temple was destroyed... The people were scattered... And many of them were taken into exile in Babylon.

Now, one thing that we tend to miss about this story, is that this was a major test for the faith of the Hebrews... They saw the conquering of Jerusalem as something God said would never happen, and yet it did... So what does that say about Yahweh? Was he not powerful enough to protect them? Was he still their God? Was the God of the Babylonians mightier? - These questions probably raced through the minds of some of the people.

And the Hebrews were taken to Babylon and were held in exile for 48 years...

To the Hebrews, their world was completely upside down.

Israel, the land promised to them was conquered by evil. The temple, where they believed the physical presence of Yahweh lived, had been destroyed.

But in 538bc, after the Babylonians were conquered by the Persians... Cyrus the Great allowed the Hebrews to return home...

Many of the Hebrews had a tough decision to make... Were they going to stay in Babylon? Or would they go back to Jerusalem and rebuild?

It was a tough decision, because many of them had made comfortable lives for themselves in Babylon... Their children grew up away from Jerusalem... Also, the journey back to Israel would be treacherous and dangerous, and they would NOT have government protection on their way...

So many of the Hebrews decided to stay where they were... They were the Diaspora, the scattered among Mesopotamia... But the ones who went back to Jerusalem, journeyed together... They knew they had their work cut out for them. They knew it would be a dangerous journey. But they went anyway...

And as they traveled together, they sang songs and they worshiped together... They sang as they were walking. They encouraged each other with songs...

And all of these songs were from a little hymn book, with 15 songs about a dangerous journey and the goodness of God... And these small hymn books would later be known as the Psalms of Ascent... Because they were in the valley... They were in the lowly Babylon... And it was time to ascend back to the City on a Hill, Jerusalem...

And i know in our Bible Reading plan, we’ve only read 120 and 121, but the rest of the Psalms of Ascent will come later, and I hope that you can see the theology they weave together

But for today, we’re just going to read one of the… So let’s go ahead and read Psalm 121.

… SCRIPTURE …

Psalm 121

… EXPOSITION …

In this Psalm, with only 8 verses, we see 4 different sections... Each with two verses a piece. Each section gives us a different characteristic of God.

And in verse 1, the Psalmist begins with I lift my eyes to the mountains...

Remember that Jerusalem is the height of the mountain, so this is saying that it is at the beginning of the journey for the traveler...

One thing that we can't miss is that this is a pilgrim story... These travelers aren't just going home. They are going back to the Promised Land, back to the Holy City.

So as the Psalmist looks up to the mountains, they are about to begin their pilgrimage... And they realize, even before the journey starts, that their help comes from Yahweh, who is the Maker of Heaven and Earth.

In Genesis chapter 1 is the first time in Scripture that we see the phrase "heaven and earth," and even in Genesis 1, this phrase means everything.... So the Maker of Heaven and Earth is the ultimate creator… THE CREATOR OF EVERYTHING.

In these two verses, the Psalmist is talking about the sufficiency of God... Since he is the maker of everything, then all of my help is certainly from Him.

Walter Brueggemann says it this way, "The simple, direct, unambiguous answer in verse 2 is that YHWH is the single, necessary, all-sufficient source of help who in this case will give protection."

Point 1: God protects the path of His pilgrims.

… APPLICATION …

One of the great temptations we face is to think that God's protection means God removes every obstacle from the road. But that is not what the Psalmist is saying. The traveler still has to climb the mountain. The road is still long. There are still dangers ahead. The promise is not that it will be an easy journey; the promise is that God will be with them on the journey.

There are times, I’m afraid, where we wait for God to clear the path before we obey Him. We say, "Lord, show me every step, remove every risk, guarantee every outcome, and then I'll move forward." But pilgrims don't walk by certainty; they walk by faith.

The truth is that all of our lives face uncertainty. None of us know what tomorrow holds. You may not know what the next year holds for your family, your health, your finances, or your future. You may be standing at the base of a mountain wondering how you'll ever make it to the top. Psalm 121 reminds us that our hope is not found in knowing the way ahead but in knowing the One who made heaven and earth. The God who created all things is more than sufficient to sustain His people every step of the journey.

… EXPLANATION …

Moving on to verses 3-4, we see the Psalmist talk communally about Israel... God is still watching over Israel, his people... And these travelers are a part of his people.

And this is where we see the first phrase.

"he who 'watches over you' will not slumber.

Now, here's the deal... Just letting you know what y'all are in for... Since you are here on Father’s Day, one of the least attended Sundays of the year, I know that you are wanting to worship, and that you are wanting to learn... So we're going to go a little deeper than we normally would....

"watches over you'' is the Hebrew word Shamar... Shamar is the most important word in this Psalm, because in only 8 verses, we see Shamar six times....

Hebrew is a very difficult language. And very few words in Hebrew represent just one word,… we talked about that a couple weeks ago

So when this passage says he who "watches over you." Watches is just one aspect of this word...

Keeper, watcher, preserver...

The one who keeps you, the one who watches over, and the one who preserves you, will not slumber.

So in a poetic way, the Psalmist wants the reader to know that Yahweh never sleeps, but he "shamars" his people.

Point 2: God is forever vigilant in our lives.

He is always watching over you. He is always preserving you. He is always your keeper.

… APPLICATION …

Now I am still pretty new at being a father… But being a dad has changed the way I view this Psalm… Fathers understand what it means to keep watch. When your children are little, you spend years watching over them. You check on them while they sleep. You teach them to ride a bike. You stand at the edge of the pool. You walk beside them when they take their first steps. You make sure the doors are locked at night. You try to protect them from dangers they can't even see. That's what fathers do. They watch over their children.

But every father in this room also knows his limitations. You can't be everywhere at once. You can't follow your child into every classroom, every friendship, every decision, every hardship. As your children grow older, there comes a realization that there are many things you cannot control. You can give wisdom, you can pray, you can guide, but you cannot constantly stand between them and every danger life may bring.

That is why The LORD is our Shamar is such good news. The God who watches over His people never reaches limitations like earthly fathers. When you are at work, He is watching. When you are asleep, He is watching. When your children are hundreds of miles away, He is watching. When you don't know what is happening in their lives, He knows. The heavenly Father never loses sight of His children for a single moment.

… EXPLANATION …

In verses 5-6, in the third section, the Psalmist moves from a communal message to a more personal message for each individual traveler...

Verse 6.

Sunstroke was a very common worry traveling through the semi-desert terrain outside of Jerusalem... So any time you traveled, the sun was dangerous, but God will keep you from harm...

At first, when I read this passage, I thought the Psalmist was just being poetic when they say, "nor the moon by night." Afterall, the moon can't hurt you... But after doing some research on this passage this week, I learned that many cultures during this time period, including Israel, believed that people could be "moonstruck."

Being moonstruck was thought to be the cause of madness in this culture...

So the LORD would be with his people through all the dangers of the day and of the night... And here, we see the beginning of the theme of Trust in God as your keeper, watcher, preserver, but will see that more clearly in the final section.

But if God shamars us during the day and night, then we know this:

Point 3: God is attentive of our struggles.

… APPLICATION …

What strikes me about this passage is that God doesn't just watch over His people in a general sense. He watches over them in the specific struggles they face. The Psalmist mentions the sun because it was a real danger. Heat exhaustion, dehydration, and exposure could be deadly. Then he mentions the moon, which represented fears people carried into the darkness. Whether the threat was real or perceived, God was attentive to it.

Isn't that how life works? Some of our struggles are like the sun. They are obvious. Everyone can see them. A medical diagnosis. Financial pressure. A broken relationship. A difficult season of grief. But other struggles are like the moon. They exist in the darkness. They are the fears that keep us awake at night. The worries nobody else sees. The "what ifs" that replay in our minds over and over again.

Psalm 121 reminds us that God is attentive to both. He sees the dangers that are actually before us, and He sees the fears that trouble our hearts. Nothing is hidden from His sight.

… EXPLANATION …

Finally, in the last two verses, we see a more generalized protection from God... He will keep you from all harm, now and forevermore...

Be we see three more "shamars" all in the future tense...

Yahweh will shamar us from all harm.

Yahweh will shamar your life.

Yahweh will shamar your travels.

This Psalmist has confidence that Yahweh will do these things... This Psalmist has trust...

Point 4: God is trustworthy to care for us

… APPLICATION …

As we come to the end of Psalm 121, I want us to put ourselves in the shoes of these pilgrims one more time. Would it have been difficult for them to trust God? Absolutely. It would certainly take faith…

Remember who these people were. They belonged to a nation that had experienced defeat. Jerusalem had fallen. The Temple had been destroyed. Families had been displaced. Generations had lived through hardship and uncertainty. There were seasons when it must have felt like all of God's promises had been forgotten.

And yet, as they made their way toward Jerusalem, they sang, "My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth." Their trust was not rooted in favorable circumstances. Their trust was rooted in the character of God. They believed that even when they could not see what God was doing, God was still their keeper, their watcher, and their preserver.

I wonder how many of us need that reminder this morning. Perhaps you are carrying a burden that nobody else knows about. Perhaps you are worried about your health, your family, your future, your children, or your finances. Maybe there are prayers you've been praying for years that still seem unanswered. Maybe there are circumstances in your life that make it difficult to see what God is doing.

The story of the Psalm is not that God's people never face hardship, but that God's people never face hardship alone. The God who watched over Israel is the same God who watches over His people today. The God who kept the pilgrims on their journey is the same God who keeps us on our journey.

And often it is in the difficult seasons that we learn what these pilgrims learned. We discover that God is not confined to our plans. We discover that His faithfulness is greater than our fears. We discover that His presence is not dependent upon our circumstances. And we discover that He has been keeping us all along, even when we could not see it.

So whatever road lies before you this week, whatever mountain you are facing, whatever burden you are carrying, remember this:

Take Home: The LORD is your Shamar. He is your keeper, watcher, preserver, and Savior.

And that is what gives me hope in the midst of a chaotic world. That gives me comfort when facing grief and pain. And that speaks to the Promise of eternal salvation, where I get to see The Shamar face to face...

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Bow with me.