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Misusing Psalm 91

We are misusing Psalm 91 if we use it to test God.

misusing psalm 91

Psalm 91:11–12 (ESV)
“He will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.”

These verses, which we examined last week, are quoted in the New Testament, and it is vital to consider what Jesus says about them so we properly apply not only these verses, but the entire psalm.

Surprisingly, Psalm 91 makes its appearance in the New Testament on the lips of Satan! Jesus is in the wilderness of temptation, enduring 40 days and nights of fasting. At the end of that time, Satan comes and tempts Jesus to turn stones to bread. Jesus refuses.

Matthew 4:5–7 continues, “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.”'”

Satan is quoting from Psalm 91:11–12. Satan is correct in his interpretation of Scripture: God will protect you. He will command angels to protect you, angels that have the power to bear you up when necessary to protect you from injury.

When necessary

Bear you up when necessary. In fact, when necessary, Jesus could walk on water. Perhaps he was stepping on the hands of angels when he did that. When necessary, at the proper time, Jesus could defy gravity and float—fly—from earth and ascend into heaven to sit at the right hand of God (see Acts 1:9–11). So if it had been necessary and fitting in the will of God for Jesus to jump off the temple and be gently born to the ground on the hands of angels, he could have done so safely.

But it was not necessary. And because the idea of jumping from the temple was Satan’s idea, Jesus knew it was not God’s will. Just as Satan had twisted God’s words and purposes in the Garden of Eden with great subtlety when he tempted Eve to eat from the forbidden fruit, so Satan was now misusing Psalm 91.

Right interpretation, wrong application

Jesus instantly recognized it. He saw the sin to which Satan was leading: the sin of testing God. So “Jesus said to him, ‘Again it is written, “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test”’” (Matthew 4:7).

Satan had correctly interpreted Psalm 91 but had misapplied it, saying to Jesus, “Throw yourself down.” If Satan had pushed Jesus off the pinnacle of the temple, the angels would have born Jesus on their hands to the ground safely. But Satan was not there to kill Jesus; he was there to deceive, confuse, and tempt him into sin. That would have defeated all God’s purposes in sending his Son to earth. If Jesus had sinned, he would have lost the ability to die as a substitute for our sins and save us from condemnation. He would have died on the cross for his own sin.

If God had told Jesus, “Throw yourself down,” Jesus could have done so safely. But it was Satan who gave the order.

Testing God

What does it mean to test God? It can mean deliberately sinning to see if one can get away with it. This is testing God by pushing the limits, like a child who knowingly disobeys a parent’s instructions to see if the parent will punish him. This is what Israel did in the desert time and again when they grumbled against the Lord.

Testing God can also mean trying to force him to act in the way you want. This is testing God by trying to manipulate him. It is playing God. Israel also did this.

There is a world of difference between (a) asking God to do something and believing he will answer your prayer based on the promises of Scripture and (b) presuming God must do something that is your idea. There is a difference between God’s telling you to do something, Satan’s telling you to do something, and your telling yourself to do something.

The place for caution

By no means do I want to make it complicated to trust in Psalm 91. But people are misusing Psalm 91 when they think it gives them grounds to do reckless, unnecessary things God has not commanded.

When God commands you to do something, it becomes necessary. When he commanded Israel to invade the Promised Land, it became necessary. Apart from that command, however, the invasion was utter folly, doomed to failure. (See Exodus 14:1–45)

We are called to deal with worldly dangers much like those who do not believe in God and his protection. We should not fear like those who distrust the Lord, but we should use the same common sense, observing normal precautions and protections.

For example, Christian pilots should check the plane before each flight to make sure it is safe and follow the limits about how many passengers and how much cargo weight the plane can carry. They should not fly into massive thunderstorms. Christian doctors and nurses should wear the same protective equipment as others.

Misusing Psalm 91

What we have learned from Satan’s misuse of Psalm 91 with Jesus is that interpreting the Bible is one thing; it is another to apply the Bible to our lives correctly. We can get the interpretation perfectly correct but completely mishandle the application. In fact, we can misapply a correct interpretation so badly that we sin.

Therefore when we determine to live a fearless life based on Psalm 91, we must not abuse it. That will keep us from bad consequences and increase our faith, because we will understand why some who try to walk confidently in the promises of Psalm 91 do not experience the protection they are expecting. We will understand why Psalm 91 did not “work” for them or perhaps for us.

When we need him, God is faithful to protect us. When we are doing God’s will, we should be fearless.

Jeremiah 9:23–24: “Thus says the LORD: ‘Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.’” (ESV)

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Getting Great Faith

How is your faith doing? Are you confident God hears and answers your prayers? Are you confident your prayers have great power?

Persistent faith is great faith!

by Pastor Brian Larson, delivered 1-10-21

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Guardian Angels

You probably have never recognized your guardian angels at work, but you regularly benefit from their protection.

Psalm 91:11–12
“For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.” (ESV)

I have said much in this series of articles on Psalm 91 about God’s ability to protect you through his direct control over everything large and small, but in these verses we see something different. We see God’s indirect protection for you through guardian angels.

Angelic protection is real and occurs regularly. You have benefited from it time and again though you are unaware of it except in the most unusual circumstances.

Therefore when you think about safety and protection for yourself and those you love, guardian angels should be part of your worldview, confidence, prayers, and faith.

One world, two realms

Fundamental to the biblical worldview is that our universe has two overlapping realms: the material and the spiritual, the visible and the invisible. Populating the invisible, spiritual realm are God, angels, and demons.

The key takeaway of Psalm 91:11–12 is that the spiritual realm interacts with the material realm, and it happens regularly.

For example, Job 1–2 narrates a detailed interaction between the two realms in which Satan is a principal actor.

On the other hand, we see holy angels at work in the Book of Revelation, which speaks 56 times of angels controlling events on earth. They pour out bowls and blow trumpets of judgment. They hold back or release the wind. They enable the movement of human armies. They convey messages to prophets and decree major shifts in world events. And much more. Clearly they and their decrees carry great authority.

Although God could do all these things without them, he created angels and apparently likes to use them to execute his plans just as he does humans.

Guardian angels

So it is no surprise they play a role in your protection. Does every person have a guardian angel? Psalm 91:11–12 supports that idea. In fact, these verses suggest multiple guardian angels assigned to you: “He will command his angels concerning you.”

Psalm 91 describes one example of how angels could protect you. “On their hands” guardian angels can “bear you up lest you strike your foot against a stone.” They could literally lift you up so that you pass over a stumbling stone. Or perhaps they cover the stone with their hands as you step on their hands. Whatever it is, they intervene with the physical world to protect you.

When an angel sprung Peter out of jail (see Acts 12), his intervention included poking Peter to wake him, causing the chains on Peter to fall off without touching them, telling Peter what to do, enabling himself and Peter to bypass guards unnoticed apparently by putting them to sleep, and causing a large, iron, city gate to open without touching it.

Even the Son of God believed in the role of angels in God’s protection for him. At his capture in the Garden of Gethsemane, he said, “Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels?” (Matthew 26:53)

Like Jesus, you can pray and trust God to use guardian angels to protect you in whatever threats your world presents.

Jeremiah 9:23–24: “Thus says the LORD: ‘Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.’” (ESV)

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Rejoicing in the Truth

I took a short break from writing the blog over the holidays. Be inspired by this message titled “Rejoicing in the Truth.”

In the middle of the love chapter of the New Testament—1 Corinthians 13—there is an important statement about truth. 1 Corinthians 13:6 says, “[Love] does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.” (ESV)

“Rejoicing in the Truth,” by Craig Brian Larson, delivered December 27, 2020
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He Will Be Great

I’m taking a short break from writing the blog over the holidays. Be inspired by the greatness of our Lord Jesus in my Christmas message, “He Will Be Great.”

“He Will Be Great,” by Craig Brian Larson

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No Evil Befall You

Psalm 91:10 promises blanket protection.

Psalm 91:9–10 (ESV)

“Because you have made the LORD your dwelling place—the Most High, who is my refuge—no evil shall be allowed to befall you, no plague come near your tent.”

The psalmist now circles back to repeat several of the first ideas in the psalm, showing again that verses 1–2 are foundational to every promise given. He repeats the covenant name LORD (in Hebrew, Yahweh). He repeats the idea of dwelling in him as a person dwells in a home. He repeats the idea that God is Most High and that he is a refuge.

He repeats these ideas and not the others from verses 1–2 as a shorthand reminder that we should draw all the ideas in these two verses back to mind.

He says, “Because you have made,” indicating that Yahweh becomes our dwelling place and refuge when we make him so. Dwelling in the LORD day by day, moment by moment, is a choice. It is a choice to trust him and believe he is the Most High, the Almighty. We choose to believe his Word and live accordingly. We choose to regard his Word as reality, though spiritual realities are invisible.

So the all-encompassing, blanket promise that the psalmist is about to pronounce is based on that life-changing choice.

He speaks of “The Most High, who is my refuge.” For the second time in the psalm, the psalmist brings himself into the picture (see verse 2). By this he indicates he is speaking from experience. The Lord has proven himself to the psalmist for a long time. These principles are tried and true.

Psalm 91:10, No evil befall you

Verse 10 promises, “No evil shall be allowed to befall you.”

The word “evil” covers every bad thing mentioned or unmentioned in the psalm. After having noted several specific examples of evils from which God protects a person—fowlers and their snares, pestilence, arrows, night terrors, destruction—the psalmist now covers all bases. Any evil you can imagine or encounter. As Jesus taught us to pray, “Deliver us from evil” (Matthew 6:13).

And then the psalmist uses a word pregnant with theological implications: “allowed.” No evil can strike a person unless it is “allowed.” Who must allow it? The Most High, the Almighty refuge and fortress, the God in whom we can trust (see vv. 1–2). That is what it means to be the Most High, Almighty God. Absolutely nothing can happen unless he allows or does it (Mat. 10:29).

When Scripture refers to God as the Most High and Almighty one, it does not mean approximately so, or “Very High most of the time,” or “in the top ten of mighty ones.” No. Scripture speaks in absolute terms. God is the only Most High, all the time. Absolutely everything that happens in the universe, galactically large or atomically small, he must allow or do.

If you believe that, you will not fear. If you do not believe it, fear will be your regular companion, perhaps even your tormenting lord.

Psalm 91:10, No plagues of judgment

Verse 10 continues, “no plague come near your tent.” This is the first time the psalm uses the word “plague.”

When we hear the biblical word plague, what comes to mind are the ten plagues God sent on Egypt and its idols to judge them and compel them to release Israel from slavery (Exodus 11:1; 12:13).

Moreover, Scripture uses the word plague to describe God’s judgments on Israel itself when they later rebelled against him in the desert (Exodus 32:35), as well as later times in the history of the nation (Exo. 30:12; Num. 11:33; 16:47; 25:8; 31:16; 2 Sam. 24:21).

Plague described punishments Israel would incur if they transgressed the rules of the tabernacle of God in their midst (Numbers 8:19).

So plague is a word tightly connected to divine punishment for sin.

What Psalm 91:10 promises, therefore, is forgiveness and escape from punishment. Like all the other promises of the psalm, it can be claimed by those who make the true, Most High LORD, who has revealed himself in the Bible, their dwelling place, the God in whom they trust (vv. 1–2).

New Covenant Developments

Several hundred years after Psalm 91:10 was written, God gave further revelation to Israel of what that trust entailed. He sent his Son Jesus to earth, who lived a perfect life, went willingly to the cross to die for the sins of mankind, rose again from the dead to overcome death on our behalf, and ascended to the right hand of God as Savior and Lord of the Universe. And he gave this promise:

“God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.” (John 3:16–18)

The protection of Psalm 91 comes to those who draw near and stay near to God through faith in Jesus Christ. It comes to those who confess their sins (1 John 1:5–10) and repent of evil (Acts 2:38), in obedience to Jesus Christ. In this way, they receive forgiveness and escape the plagues—the judgments of God—on evildoers.

Your protection is in a person, the Lord Jesus Christ. Will you trust him?

And if he wills it, will you suffer for him? That is another development in the New Covenant. While Psalm 91 promises blanket protection, the New Testament qualifies that somewhat, saying, “All who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2 Timothy 3:12) and “through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22).

Nevertheless, when we are persecuted, the Lord assures us he will protect us from ultimate evil: “The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom” (2 Timothy 4:18).

Jeremiah 9:23–24: “Thus says the LORD: ‘Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.’” (ESV)

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Why Do Bad Things Happen?

If, as Psalm 91:8 says, calamities are the recompense of the wicked, how can we be confident God will protect us, since we all sin?

Psalm 91:8


Psalm 91:7–8 (ESV)
“[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.”

Verse 8 is puzzling. It suggests the death or disease that befalls the thousand at your side and the ten thousand at your right hand (v. 7) happens because they are wicked. And it does not strike you because you stay near God.

This is the same, neat and clean, binary, black-and-white reasoning that Job’s friends used to explain his suffering. Good things happen to good people; bad things happen to bad people. If you walk with God, nothing bad will ever happen to you. If you are wicked, sooner or later calamity will catch up to you. You get what you deserve.

How do we interpret this verse?

Psalm 91:8 and calamity

As always, the most important rule of interpretation is to consider the context. What does the rest of Psalm 91 tell us? What does the remainder of the Bible tell us? In other words, we should not interpret this verse in a way that contradicts the meaning of Psalm 91 or the remainder of the Bible. Rather, all of Psalm 91 and the Bible tell us how to interpret verse 8 (because God wrote the entire Bible, and he does not contradict himself).

With that in mind, what meaning should we rule out for verse 8?

What Psalm 91:8 cannot mean

First, verse 8 cannot mean that everyone to whom something bad happens is wicked. The book of Job explicitly forbids that interpretation. The Bible tells the stories of other righteous people who suffered violence or disease: King Josiah (2 Kings 23), John the Baptist (Matthew 14:1–12), Stephen (Acts 7:54–60), the apostle James (Acts 12:1–2), the apostle Paul (2 Corinthians 12:7–10; Galatians 4:13–15), and of course Jesus.

James 5:14–16 says, “[14] Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. [15] And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. [16] Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed.”

Notice that verses 15 and 16 imply that there can be a connection between sickness and sin, but sin is not necessarily the cause of someone’s sickness. Verse 15 says, “if he has committed sins.” “If” means sin might or might not be the cause of the sickness.

Each of us sins daily. We need to confess our sins daily. If we fall sick, we need to search our hearts prayerfully with special attention if there is some sin on which the Lord is putting his finger.

But the “if” of verse 15 implies we are not to conclude that one’s sickness is necessarily the result of sin.

What Psalm 91 certainly does mean

On the other hand, the undeniable overall message of Psalm 91 is that there is indeed a connection between experiencing God’s protection and walking in close communion with him. If you dwell in God’s shelter, if you abide in his shadow, if you trust him to be your refuge (verses 1–2), if you hold fast to him in love, if you know his name, if you call on him (verses 14–15), he will protect you.

The message of Psalm 91 is we should trust God for that. That is our default expectation. Protection is the normal experience of those who walk with the Lord. We should quote the promises of Psalm 91 and trust that they will be fulfilled in us. We have a physical, natural immune system and a spiritual immune system. A close relationship with God strengthens both systems.

We must not fear that the exception to the rule will happen to us. We should not live dreading the anomaly, but rather believing the promise. Scripture confirms the message of protection in Psalm 91 in innumerable other stories and promises throughout the Bible (Psalm 23; Psalm 121; 2 Corinthians 1:8–10; 2 Thessalonians 3:3; and 2 Timothy 4:18, for starters).

If the anomaly comes, we trust him and be sure our heart is clean through daily repentance and prayerful self-examination. But when we have done that, we should not live with the crushing assumption that a calamity that has befallen us signals an ongoing failure in our relationship with God, that he is punishing us for something we cannot identify. The comforting promise of 1 John 1:7–9 removes that possibility:

“If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Summary

Calamity is not necessarily a recompense for wickedness. Although wickedness always brings the recompense of calamity, calamity is not always the recompense of wickedness. (In the language of formal logic, if all A is B, that does not imply that all B is A.)

Although calamity may befall even a person walking close to God, we should believe we will experience his perfect protection.

Jeremiah 9:23–24: “Thus says the LORD: ‘Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.’” (ESV)

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Pillar and Buttress of Truth

One of the common refrains that you hear from people today is that they believe in God, but not in organized religion. In other words, they want God, but they do not want the church.

What 1 Timothy 3:15 tells us is, that attitude is a huge mistake. If you choose to reject the church, then you are opening yourself to falsehood and deception, for the church is a pillar and buttress of truth.

This is the fourth message in the series, You and Truth.