Psalm 46 - Robust Faith

Psalm 46 - I feel strengthened in my faith and reminded to ensure my confidence is in my God and not in the “package”. Here I also see extreme turmoil, the deepest of upset and yet…the psalmist’s confidence is robust, because God is a strong and immediate help and protection.  God is all we need and He is what we need in time.  And this Lord Almighty is with me too!  I would like to find out more about what it means to be still and know God is God.

EXTREME PICTURES  of turmoil, chaos, threat and upheaval:

2 Though the earth give way
    and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
3 though its waters roar and foam
    and the mountains quakewith their surging.

• These are not minor disturbances and setbacks.  Here the psalmist says that even if creation is reversed, even if all in creation collapse, there will not be reason to fear.
• The mountains may topple into the sea in verse 2, but the city of God, bolstered by His saving presence, will not fall.  
• Nations are in uproar.

GOD IS SOVEREIGN!

• Nations may raise in uproar, but kingdoms fall before the withering voice of Yahweh.

THE PSALMIST'S ROBUST FAITH

1. He has a radical trust and an assurance of Yahweh’s protective presence.
2. His is a radical trust that God is strong and that God protects.
3. God is there when we need him.  
4. It’s a radical confidence that results in an ability to stand without fear in the face of threat.
5. To have a confident trust even if the whole cosmos is destroyed.  The roar of rushing waters and toppling mountains - we come to a more peaceful description of the well-watered “city of God” (46:4)
6. The sense of threat and the sense of calm.
7. God is present and God is a fortress.
8. That is remarkable and can only be done with a robust confident in the after life.  
9. Even when we die, we can be sure of a new life after death. 
10. I can have this faith even in the ultimate threats of life. Life with God outlasts earthly life.  
11. The life God gives us is not threatened by the imperfections of our world or by death. 
12. Yahweh promises His presence is a source of confidence and renewed faith - even in the face of attacking enemies.  
13. “God is within her, she will not fall” - absolute confidence.

TRUSTING YAHWEH.

Psalm 46:10 - God is exalted! The primary refrain of the psalm is “ The LORD Almighty is with us.”  

God is the refuge, the strength and the fortress of the faithful.
We can be confident in His protective care. - even in the face of a crumbling world. Psalm 46:2,3.

FAITH IN GOD OR FAITH IN THE TEMPLE? 

• This is assurance coupled with God’s covenant loyalty.  
• This is not just a matter of relying on the temple.  
• The temple is not a magic place it is the place to humbly meet and worship God.  (see Psalms 74 and 137)

Jeremiah 2: This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: 2 “Stand at the gate of the Lord’s house and there proclaim this message:
“‘Hear the word of the Lord, all you people of Judah who come through these gates to worship the Lord. 3 This is what theLord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Reform your ways and your actions, and I will let you live in this place.
4 Do not trust in deceptive words and say, “This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord!”
5 If you really change your ways and your actions and deal with each other justly,
6 if you do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow and do not shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not follow other gods to your own harm,
7 then I will let you live in this place, in the land I gave your ancestors for ever and ever. 8 But look, you are trusting in deceptive words that are worthless.
9 “‘Will you steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury, burn incense to Baal and follow other gods you have not known,
10 and then come and stand before me in this house, which bears my Name, and say, “We are safe”—safe to do all these detestable things?
11 Has this house, which bears my Name, become a den of robbers to you? But I have been watching! declares the Lord.
12 “‘Go now to the place in Shiloh where I first made a dwelling for my Name, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of my people Israel.
13 While you were doing all these things, declares the Lord, I spoke to you again and again, but you did not listen; I called you, but you did not answer.
14 Therefore, what I did to Shiloh I will now do to the house that bears my Name, the temple you trust in, the place I gave to you and your ancestors.
15 I will thrust you from my presence, just as I did all your fellow Israelites, the people of Ephraim.’

Psalm 74:1-8

THE LORD ALMIGHTY IS WITH US and THE CITY OF GOD.

1. “The Lord Almighty is with us, the God of Jacob is our fortress.”
2. God is our safe place - He is our help when we are in trouble.  So we will not be afraid - even if the sea goes wild and the mountains sake.
3. God is in the centre and I will not be moved - God will help me.  He is the God of my strong place.
4. God the ever-present help will aid quickly.

1. Jerusalem is Yahweh’s special city:  he is expected to protect her and her inhabitants from attack.  God is the city’s ultimate place of security.
2. God allowed the Babylonian troops to overrun the temple and Jerusalem because of the sins of the covenant people.  The Temple and Jerusalem were destroyed.. We can hear the echo of loss in Psalm 137 and verses 5 and 6.
3. Jerusalem is destroyed - what about God’s promises?
4. The city is identified with God’s holy mountain.  Mount Zion  
5. Ezekiel saw a new city in chapters 37-48.
6. Jeremiah 3:17  7 At that time they will call Jerusalem The Throne of the Lord, and all nations will gather in Jerusalem to honor the name of the Lord. No longer will they follow the stubbornness of their evil hearts. 
7. Zechariah  14:11 But Jerusalem will be raised up high from the Benjamin Gate to the site of the First Gate, to the Corner Gate, and from the Tower of Hananel to the royal winepresses, and will remain in its place. 11 It will be inhabited; never again will it be destroyed. Jerusalem will be secure.
8. Revelation 21:10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. 
9. The city of God - Jerusalem and the Holy place where God dwells - the Temple.  

WARS

He makes wars to cease- this is God’s ultimate goal to make wars cease to the end of the earth.  War is not part of God’s creation intention.

BE STILL 

• Here it means:  “cease”  “Stop”  As in break up a fight.  It doesn’t mean being quiet or calm, but it means to stop what you have been doing and be still.
• It means to cease our own frantic activity and start to experience God’s acting for us.  Only then can we know He is God.
• We will not fear though the earth give way.
• This is a confident stillness in the face of rampaging wars. 
• The reason for the calmness, is the place where God Himself dwells, the fortress God provides, the city of God that will not fall.