What Defines You?

“I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.” 

Psalm 121:1

The DCE at Trinity Frankfurt comes from a church in Florida.  The Pastors there have a very strange custom.  At Christmas time, when the congregation is done decorating the church, the Pastors will sing a Christmas Carol to the melody of a Lenten hymn.  Imagine “Deck the Halls” sung to the tune of “Stricken, Smitten and Afflicted.”  “Deck the Halls with boughs of Holly, Fa la la…”  Doesn’t sound right does it – to take a fun, happy song and make it sound like a funeral dirge. 

Have you known people who can do that with life?  There are people who are defined by negativity. You know what I mean – people for whom the glass is always half empty not half full… people who can see the dark side of any situation.  We even have them at Church.  Someone comes up with a great idea and these people can always be counted on to come up with a dozen reasons why it won’t work or it’s too much work.  Some are like that all the time.  All of us are like that some of the time.    We each get in those moods where all we seem to be able to do is complain or worry… nothing makes us happy or joyful. There are times when each of us is defined by negativity.  It’s understandable.  Our journey through life is not easy, even for followers of Jesus.  A couple of weeks ago, on Sunday, my sermon was about the fact that there will be trials in life.  Temptation will come.  We will make wrong choices and do wrong things.  The economy that prospers, will go into recession.  Jobs will be lost.  Marriages and families will have difficulties.  Divorce happens.  People get sick.  Loved ones die.  The list of trials we encounter in life is long.  It’s no wonder that there are times when the song we sing on our journey is a sad one, lamenting life’s hard road. 

Such a lament could easily have become one of the Psalms of Ascent.   A walking journey up to Jerusalem was not easy.  Linda and I experienced this on our first trip to Israel.  It was a hiking trip, the kind Ray Van Der Laan leads.  The purpose of the trip is to experience the climate and geography of Israel.  We did just that, hiking 70 some miles that week.  The land is rocky.  They say God had rocks left over when He created the world, so He just dumped them in Israel.  In some places the land is fertile fields, in others its rugged mountains or arid dessert.  The climbing isn’t easy.  I did stumble and fall.  9 months of the year there is a blue sky, a blazing sun. It’s hot. It’s humid in some places, bone dry in others.  Sun stroke happens.  At night it can get very cold.  I am sure on such pilgrimages to Jerusalem, people got tired, grumpy, and found lots of things to complain about.  I did.   

That’s why Psalm 121 is so powerful and comforting.  For this song is not a lament. This Song celebrated God’s love and care on the journey.  The central point of this Psalm is not the dangers we encounter.  Psalm 121 is about the God who walks with us.  The point is that in the midst of all those dangers, we have a God to look to for help.   “I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.”  Picture again those Hebrews making their pilgrimage.  The hills which they could see ahead of them were the hills of Jerusalem.  There on the highest point sat the temple… the symbol of God’s presence among His people. Where does my help come from?  The temple provides the answer.  My help comes from the Lord…”   As we journey through life, we have one who journeys with us… one whom the Bible says is greater than the temple. We have Jesus who made this pilgrimage ahead of us. We have Jesus who was tempted in every way that we are except He was without sin.”    We have Jesus who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross despising the shame and sat down on the right hand of God…   He paid the price for our failings… He endured the pain of our falling. He carried our sorrows, our worries, our fears, our wounds, our sicknesses to the cross… and by His wounds we are healed.  On the third day He conquered them all.  He says to us, “IN the world you will have tribulation but be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world.”  “Where does our help come from?  Our help comes from the Lord.”   Therefore, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus the author and perfecter of our faith…”   In the midst of temptation… when guilt weighs us down… when sickness or worry or any other danger comes our way… we know where to turn.  We know Jesus.  “Let us approach the throne of grace of with confidence that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”

There is a word that summarizes God’s care and protection – Providence.  That’s our song this week… Psalm 121 is a song of God’s Providence.  This is what that providence looks like “He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.   The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.”   In other words, all along the way… from the beginning to the end of your pilgrimage, in the face of every danger that comes your way – God will be with you, protect you and take care of you. Paul described it this way in Romans 8.  Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?  …No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Sometimes it can be very easy to let the dangers and struggles of life define our lives. It can be easy to obsess with the things that go wrong or might go wrong.  But then I think back Marcia Williams, who lived every day bedfast, paralyzed, only able to move her right arm and her head.  Do you know what I remember the most about her?  Her smile… the fact that she would almost always be on the phone encouraging others, talking about Jesus.  Her ailments didn’t define her.  Her faith defined her. Her Savior defined her.  God’s care defined her.  His love for her and her love for others – defines her in my memory.  That’s the point of God’s providence.  That’s the message of this Psalm.  Walking with Jesus our journey through life is not defined by our troubles.  In Christ our journey is defined by Gods Providential care.  Our journey through life is defined by our God who preserves and protects us through the troubles.  Our journey is defined by Jesus. This is the song God gives us to sing on our journey up to the heavenly Jerusalem.  Where does our help come from?  My help comes from the Lord.  Amen!