Psalm 91 (ESV)
1 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High
will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.
2 I will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust.”
3 For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler
and from the deadly pestilence.
4 He will cover you with his pinions,
and under his wings you will find refuge;
his faithfulness is a shield and buckler.
5 You will not fear the terror of the night,
nor the arrow that flies by day,
6 nor the pestilence that stalks in darkness,
nor the destruction that wastes at noonday.
7 A thousand may fall at your side,
ten thousand at your right hand,
but it will not come near you.
8 You will only look with your eyes
and see the recompense of the wicked.
9 Because you have made the Lord your dwelling place—
the Most High, who is my refuge—
10 no evil shall be allowed to befall you,
no plague come near your tent.
11 For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways.
12 On their hands they will bear you up,
lest you strike your foot against a stone.
13 You will tread on the lion and the adder;
the young lion and the serpent you will trample underfoot.
14 “Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him;
I will protect him, because he knows my name.
15 When he calls to me, I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble;
I will rescue him and honor him.
16 With long life I will satisfy him
and show him my salvation.”
Psalm 91 is a beautiful Psalm, full of amazing promises from God. No one knows who wrote this Psalm, though many people think Moses might have written it. Since we don’t know for sure, I will simply refer to the author as the psalmist. In this Psalm, it tells us that God will be our shelter and deliver us from harm. Also, that God will cover us and so we don’t need to fear anything, for evil won’t befall us: God’s angels will guard us and keep us from hurting ourselves. This Psalm declares this to be truth. We know that God’s Word, this Psalm included, is true. So how does this work in actuality? Is this Psalm telling us that no harm will ever come to a believer? How can that be when bad things do indeed happen to believers? Let’s dive into the text and see what we find out.
Looking at verse one, we see in the Hebrew that it is translated as, “he who dwells in the secret place of the Most High, shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.” Reading it that way, it seems like in order to abide under the shadow of God, we must dwell in the secret place of God. What does that mean to “dwell in the secret place?” The Hebrew word for dwell is yashab, and it means, “to sit, remain, dwell.”
The Hebrew word for abide is luwn, and it means, “to lodge.” Both dwell and abide speak to the idea of making a home. Our home is where we stay. It is where we rest. It’s not a temporary stay or visit. A home is our permanent address. The Psalmist is saying, those who make the shelter, or rather, the secret place of the Most High their permanent address, shall then dwell or lodge in God’s shadow. In order to abide under the shadow of the Almighty, we must dwell in the secret place of God. In other words, we are to make the secret place of God our home.
Multiple time throughout the Psalms, we see God described as a literal dwelling place. In Psalm 90:1, Moses says, “Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. In Psalm 71:3, King James Version, it says, “Be thou my strong habitation, whereunto I may continually resort: thou hast given commandment to save me; for thou art my rock and my fortress.” Both terms, dwelling place and continually resort, speak to a literal permanent, or lifelong, habitation.
And certainly, in Old Testament times, especially, we see a literal dwelling place where God resides. Within the tabernacle, the Holy Place and the Most Holy Place were divided. Because the presence of God was observed in the second compartment, also called the Most Holy Place, it was the location of God’s earthly residence. Once a year, the high priest, and only the High Priest, was permitted entry into “the Most Holy Place” (Hebrews 9:7). I think this is what the psalmist was most likely thinking about. This “secret place” was the Most Holy Place inside the tabernacle. For this is where God would dwell. With that understanding, it makes it rather profound what the Psalmist is saying, though, doesn’t it? He’s saying that the believer who makes that secret place their home will be residing in the shadow of God. But how can that be if it’s only the High Priest who can enter that location? And even he can only do so once a year? How could anybody make that secret place their home?
When I first became a Christian, I wanted to move into the church I got saved at. I wanted to live at church. Every service they offered, and every chance I got, I drove over to the church. I just wanted to be in God’s presence and worship Him. I actually moved into the church for a yearlong internship and lived on campus, but it was during that time of residence that the Lord showed me I didn’t need to go to a specific location to be in His presence. He showed me that He was always with me and all I needed to do to experience His presence was to quiet myself and turn to Him in prayer. His presence was right there, waiting for me to notice. God, Himself, became my home. He became my refuge.
I think, though, that there are Christians who think they have made the Lord their refuge, but they have not. There is a huge difference between someone who really dwells, and someone who merely appears to dwell or just imagines that he or she dwells in God. One person believes in God, but the other person has made God their home. The person who has made God their home and is dwelling in that secret place of God, they are following Jesus: they are obeying God’s Word. They aren’t making sin and the world’s enticements their home. God is their home.
Maybe you’re heard people use that sort of metaphorical language before to describe their loved ones. Someone will say affectionately, “you are my home.” There are song lyrics, movies, signs you can buy at Hobby Lobby type stores, all declaring that sentiment. People find their “home” in other people. When they say that, they mean that person has become their shelter, their place of rest. They feel most “at home” when they are with that person. If we want to be under the shadow of the Almighty, then God must be our home, not the world or other people.
The psalmist is saying that when we are under God’s shadow of protection, the way a mother bird spreads out her wings to protect her babies, then we are in God’s presence. And when we are in God’s presence, and we know He is with us, then whatever troubles we face, we know we are protected. That’s why it’s so important that we dwell in that secret place. It’s secret, not just because of the literal secret place of the tabernacle that nobody but the High Priest got to see, but because the secret place is also the secret place of our heart. Nobody but you and God knows what the secret place inside your heart really looks like, do they? Even Jesus refers to this idea in Matthew 6:6 when He says, “But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”
But even if we truly have made God our dwelling place, and we are not walking outside of His known will, and we are following Him with our whole heart, body, soul and mind, even then, we know as a fact, that we will still encounter trouble. If we stop to consider the great troubles in this world even for one moment, we then might keep looking at this Psalm and say, “Yes, here all these amazing promises of God to deliver us from harm, yet why does God not fulfill these promises?” We might never move past that question, for we all know of circumstances where it looks like God did not keep His promise, whether in our own lives or in the lives of other Christians. It seems like a contradiction, doesn’t it?
Elizabeth Elliot, whose missionary husband was martyred while in the jungles of Ecuador, titled the book she wrote about his missionary work and tragic death, Shadow of the Almighty. Her choice of title is so profound, for it is proof that being in the shadow of the Almighty doesn’t mean that everything goes according to our plan or desires. What it does mean is that wherever we are, in whatever circumstances or place, we can be in the shadow of the Almighty: we can be under God’s protection and care. Even when it means, from our perspective, our earthly lives are cut short.
In one of the best books I’ve ever read, Evidence Not Seen: A Woman’s Miraculous Faith in the Jungles of World War II, the author, Darlene Deibler Rose, recounts her harrowing ordeal. She was a missionary during WWII, when she and others were captured and imprisoned under Japanese soldiers on an island in the Pacific. But through it all, she vividly describes how present the Lord was with her, helping her and covering her, just as the Psalmist describes. She suffered greatly, but greater still was her awareness and help of the Lord. So, this Psalm isn’t promising us believers that nothing bad will ever happen to us. It’s promising us that when we face bad things, the Almighty is right there with us and we can turn to Him and find that He is there to help us and to shelter us under His presence.
I think of Stephen from the New Testament. He was martyred for his faith, yet while he was being stoned to death, Acts 7:54-56 tells us this, “Now when they heard these things they were enraged, and they ground their teeth at him. But he, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. And he said, ‘Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.’” Stephen dwelled in the shadow of the Most High. Even though he would soon die, he was covered by the Lord’s shadow. He was physically injured and killed, but the end result of that was not death, but life. For Stephen was departing to be with the Lord. No longer just in His shadow, He would be physically present with Him.
To explain how this works, let me give another example. I live in the desert. The sun gets incredibly hot. After just a few seconds outside at the hottest time of the day, I can feel my skin starting to burn. When I walk out of the sun and stand in the shade, under the shadow of a tree or building, the relief is immediate. It is still hot outside. I haven’t gone inside and left the heat, but the shade, or shadow, makes all the difference in being able to tolerate the heat or not. I wonder if the Psalmist is making this same point about the Lord. We live in this dangerous and oppressive world, yet when we dwell in the shadow of the Almighty, we find immediate relief and comfort. We are still in the heat, but we are not burned up.
That is why the Psalmist then lists a multitude of calamites that God provides help in. Notice, in all these situations, bad things are happening all around. In order to be delivered from the fowler’s snare, a person has to be in the fowler’s snare, and then is rescued. “He delivers us from the deadly pestilence,” means the person has been sick and then is healed. Trials and tribulations are on all sides. There is terror in the night, arrows flying by day. There is pestilence that stalks in darkness, and destruction that wastes at noonday. Violence is at our side and right hand, and though it says it “will not come near you,” it must be near enough to be worrisome, for it at our side and hand.
Then the psalmist repeats the condition that brings God’s protection. Verse 9 says:
9 Because you have made the Lord your dwelling place—
the Most High, who is my refuge—
10 no evil shall be allowed to befall you,
no plague come near your tent.
This is a cause-and-effect scenario, a conditional statement: because you have made the Lord your home, then no evil shall be allowed to befall you. What does that mean, “evil befall”? It makes me think of the verses about putting on the full armor of God, as Ephesians 6 tells us. We are told that we are to put on the full armor of God so that we can take a stand against the devil’s schemes. That would mean that the devil is still attacking, though. But when we stand, wearing the full armor of God, then evil won’t befall us. In other words, evil won’t overcome and destroy us. No matter what happens, nothing can separate us from the love of God, as Romans 8 says. Remember what Jesus says in Matthew 10:28: “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” What is more plague like than sin? Sin is a plague that destroys souls. This Psalm promises us that if we are dwelling in the secret place with God, then the plague of sin will not come near our tent. Sin, or any literal plague for that matter, cannot destroy a soul who has made God their dwelling place.
Not only that, but as verse 11 tells us in this Psalm, Jesus sends His angels to guard us in all our ways. Proof of how important this simple verse is, is that Satan quotes this Psalm to Jesus, after Jesus had been fasting and praying in the desert. But the devil leaves something important out. Matthew 4:5-7 recounts the conversation. It says, “Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, “He will command his angels concerning you,” and “On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.”
The devil left out the line, “to guard you in all your ways.” Is that significant? I think so. Other translations word it as, “to keep you in all your ways.” I think this psalm is assuming that the believer is following the Lord. I don’t think the Psalmist is saying that the Lord offers protection to guard us in our sinful behavior. If Jesus had gone along with the devil and had thrown Himself off the temple, He would have been going against God’s way. That was not something Jesus was supposed to be doing, so of course, He did not bother with that and did not test God in that way. In the same way, if we go and follow the devil, and get into sin and danger on the purpose, how can we expect God to protect us? Amazingly and thankfully, He many times still does help us and protect us even when we stray from His path, but we do not have the right to claim this promise of protection when we willfully stray away from Him. I think the Psalmist assumes that the believer’s way is the way of the Lord.
And of course, the devil also omitted the following line as well. Verse 13 says, “You will tread on the lion and the adder; the young lion and the serpent you will trample underfoot.” I’m sure he omitted this, for the lion and the adder are representative of the devil and his attacks. We are promised by this psalm that we will trample the devil and his schemes. We do this by the power of the Holy Spirit who lives inside us, and through the authority of Jesus. We don’t have the power by ourselves, but Jesus certainly does. We also see in the New Testament, in Acts 28, this verse being applied literally. When Paul was on the Island of Malta, a venomous snake bit him and it did not harm him. I too can testify to this: a scorpion stung me and it did not harm me. Jesus tells us this is possible in Mark 16:17-18. He says, “And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.” But, just as Jesus demonstrated when Satan tempted Him in the desert, we are certainly not to put the Lord to the test and go around picking up snakes or drinking poison. I still wear shoes in my house, so as not to be stung by any more scorpions.
Now we get to the end of the Psalm, and the Psalmist changes grammatical tense. It switches to first-person present tense. Verses 14-16 say,
14 “Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him;
I will protect him, because he knows my name.
15 When he calls to me, I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble;
I will rescue him and honor him.
16 With long life I will satisfy him
and show him my salvation.”
Again, here is the conundrum, isn’t it? Written from the perspective of God, we see a promise. God tells us that those who hold fast to Him will be delivered. That if we call out to God, He will answer us. He says He will be with us in trouble, rescue us and honor us, and give us a long life. But again, how does that work out in actuality? These promises don’t always seem true, for those things do not always happen, as so many martyrs would testify. But I think those martyrs, if we could speak to them, they would testify and tell us that God did keep the promise of Psalm 91. I think they would say that He protected them, delivered them, answered and rescued them, and has honored them. They would say have seen God’s salvation.
This is where we have to have faith in order to believe these promises. If we view these promises through our limited perspective of the lens of our present circumstance, they don’t seem true. But viewed through the lens of faith, we can believe them.
So many times we have been rescued, but since we were rescued, we are unaware of the danger that we evaded. It is only when God does not act in the way we want Him to, or we encounter the trouble or danger, that then we ask “where is God?” But He has always been here with us, making our way straight and blessed. If we blame God for bad things happening, we must remember to credit God when anything good and nothing bad happens. If we drive across town and do not get into an accident, do we thank God for His amazing provision? Or do we only blame God if, while driving, we get a flat tire or get hit by another car? Is it fair to accuse God of lack of action only if we encounter trouble? Or should we credit God for His care and deliverance of every unseen thing He has spared us from?
Psalm 91 promises us that if we make God our home, then no matter what happens to us, we are sheltered under His care. He is watching over us. He is taking care of us. Even when arrows whiz by our heads, terror stalks our tents, danger and sickness lurks around the corner: even in the midst of all of those things, He promises to be our home and our shelter. For even if our earthly bodies die, which is inevitable unless Jesus returns first, our ultimate deliverance is that we depart and be with the Lord.
Let us make Jesus our home, so we may find peace and security in His love for us. We can trust what His Word says. This psalm undoubtedly applies to every believer who has made God their home and resides in the secret place of God’s presence. If we walk with Him and live in His presence, then He will lead us and guide us, and watch over us in all our ways.
Prayer: Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your promises. Help us to abide in the secret place of Your presence. You are our home and our dwelling place. We look to You to help us in our troubles, Lord. Please shelter us in Your shadow and take care of us. Help us to trust that You are with us and will answer our prayers. Help us to have faith that Your answer is always the best. We love You and thank You for the gift of salvation given to us through Jesus. Help us to always remember that our deepest desire is to achieve the ultimate goal of eternity with You. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.
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