Do I Dare?
Psalm 121:1b – From where does my help come?
Reading: Psalm 121
We know God would want us to do it. He’s spelled it out in the Bible. But we can think of so many good reasons why we shouldn’t do it. The financial cost, perhaps, or the public reaction, or the energy involved and the way it eats at family time. The conviction grows, settles in our minds: it’s actually not responsible to do what I know I should do…
This second Song of Ascents pictures the man of Israel standing at the door of his house, seeing the hills he needs to cross to get to the presence of God in Jerusalem, and weighing up the pros and cons of going. “From where does my help come?” he asks himself. In other words: can I swing it? Is it responsible to leave home and field, family and cattle, to make the trip? On the journey itself, can I handle the heat of the sun, the risks of the trail, or even the threat of bandits? Or should I use my head and stay home? Do I dare?
Consciously or subconsciously we ask that very question day by day. The Holy Spirit has left us the psalmist’s answer for our instruction: “My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth” (Ps. 121:2) This God is so almighty that he won’t let my foot slide out on the pebbles of the trail, and he won’t
let me suffer sunstroke at high noon or let the moon’s shadows fill me with fear at night. He won’t even let possible bandits or bears endanger me, for always this God—who was mighty enough to form this world with a word—is mighty enough never to doze, never to sleep, but always to keep me in his care. That’s the confidence of the psalmist.
Should I dare to do what God wants me to do? Jesus did. He went up to Jerusalem, up to the cross, in humble obedience. But he—unlike us—received no protection from his God as he approached his judgment seat, but received only wrath, infinite wrath. Yet he dared approach holy God, and there he paid for our sins so that God might be my Father again.
So I know what I’ll do. I’ll factor his victory into my decision-making. For Jesus’ sake the Lord’s promises in Psalm 121 are true for me.
Yes, obedience makes all the sense in the world.