Safe With God

Reflect on God’s Word

If you’ve lived in tornado country, you may be familiar with a storm cellar. You know that when a funnel cloud has been spotted, you grab your family and your pets and head to safety underground. Overhead, if the storm passes your way, you can hear the tumult, but you know you are safe.

In Psalm 119:114, David isn’t talking about tornados, but his storm is just as real when he says to God, “You are my refuge and my shield; I have put my hope in your word.”

Our God is strength. He is a safe place. A fortress. A solid rock. A storm cellar. No one else can be our refuge like him. He will protect us from the storms that threaten our peace and security and fill us with fear.

The psalms speak often of God as our refuge.

Psalm 32:7 says, “You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.”

Psalm 91:1–2 says, “Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the LORD, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.’”

Moses, thought to be the author of Psalm 91, spoke these words to the Israelites before his death as part of a larger song reminding God’s people of all he had done for them:

In a desert land he found him,

in a barren and howling waste.

He shielded him and cared for him;

he guarded him as the apple of his eye,

like an eagle that stirs up its nest

and hovers over its young,

that spreads its wings to catch them

and carries them aloft.

The LORD alone led him;

no foreign god was with him.

(Deuteronomy 32:10–12)

Sometimes, finding refuge in God and going to him when we are afraid means remembering what he has done for us in the past. Some commentators believe that King David’s Psalm 32 was written after Psalm 51, in which he repents before God of his sin with Bathsheba (see 2 Samuel 11). In verses 1–6 of Psalm 32, David recounts how it felt to be forgiven by God. He counted himself blessed that God had forgiven his transgressions. And then verse 10 says, “Many are the woes of the wicked, but the LORD’S unfailing love surrounds the one who trusts in him.”

Picture a fortress being built. Every time you bring your fears before God, a new brick is placed on the structure. Your experience of security and peace grows with each prayer for protection, with each cry of your heart for God to surround you and be your security.

The thing about fortresses, storm cellars, and places of protection is that you have to actually go to them in order for them to help you. You can’t simply know they’re there. You have to flee to their shelter. When an attacking army was spotted entering an ancient kingdom or fief, the surrounding villages were evacuated to the fortress. Anyone who chose not to go would risk falling prey to the invaders. Unless they went to the fortress and hid themselves behind the strong walls, they were vulnerable.

What does fleeing to God when you are afraid look like? It’s closeting yourself in prayer, immersing yourself in his Word. Pulling his salvation around your shoulders like a mantle. Reminding yourself of all that he has done for you in the past. In Psalm 56:3–4, David writes, “When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. In God, whose word I praise—in God I trust and am not afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?”

David often had occasion to be afraid. David Guzik, author of the popular online biblical commentary Enduring Word, says, “The young man who killed the lion and the bear, who killed Goliath, and was a successful young captain in Israel’s army, did not deny the presence of fear. There were times when he was afraid. Yet he knew what to do with that fear, to boldly proclaim His trust in God despite the fear.”^*

Release Your Fear

Try to get a concrete picture in your mind of God as a refuge or shield. Imagine God as a literal hiding place, a place you go for rest from the battle or protection from your enemies. A refuge is where you run when you are in danger. A storm cellar.

God created refuge cities in ancient Israel so people who were wrongly accused or in danger could hide out in those cities. There they would be safe, cared for, and protected from harm.

Take a moment to close your eyes and take a deep breath, then imagine being in that safe place, a refuge city. What do you see? What do you hear? How do you feel? Does your heartbeat seem to slow?

Ask God now to rejuvenate you, to give you what you need to face the day with courage and joy, regardless of what comes.

As you begin to come out of the stillness of prayer, grab onto the things God spoke to you. Internalize them, ask him to help you remember that he is a safe place. He is the true hope, the true refuge, the true rest.

Oh, Refuge and Shield, you are my safe place. You are my rest. I can trust you because I know you are absolutely sovereign and perfectly good. Let me hide myself in you now. Don’t let my heart be fooled into thinking that anyone or anything else can comfort, fulfill, or shelter me. Only you can. Remind me to run to you as my true hope, shelter, refuge, and God. Remind me that you care for me as a father cares for his child. You love me with an everlasting love. Teach my heart to trust you today. Build my faith, dear God. In Jesus’ name, amen.

JOURNAL PROMPT: In what ways do you need God to be your refuge and shield today? What is one way you can choose to rest in him?