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.

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.

The LORD will keep you from all evil;

he will keep your life.

The LORD will keep

your going out and your coming in

from this time forth and forevermore.

(Psalm 121 ESV)

I wanted to share the good news that at this point, I've reached my fundraising goal of $4000! Any amount I still receive above $4000 I will apply to my airfare to Japan (about $1600). The remaining airfare I have pledged to commit out of the abundance of my job that God has graciously given me for this coming fall. If for some reason I receive more funds than that, they will be donated to MTW.

I'm thankful to God and the generosity of all my supporters for their gracious donations and willingness to partner with me on my short-term missions trip. While this was my first time fundraising, I was amazed at how God has more than delivered the finances I need to go on this trip.

Recently, I read through Psalm 121 as I was going through my devotions and was amazed by the depth of meaning of what it means for the Lord to be our provider of help and what a striking message I believe this psalm carries.

First of all, I want to highlight how Psalm 121 comments on God's awesomeness. Verse 2 writes that God is the one "who made heaven and earth," meaning that God is a creator God, powerful and mighty.

God also keeps and watches over His people perfectly and incessantly. Verses 3-8 repeat the word keep which I looked up in Hebrew (shamar) to mean keep, guard, or watch over. God here is depicted as keeping his people all the time, never resting (verse 4), never failing (verse 3, verse 6), and always close at hand (verse 5). I particularly am amazed at the hyperbole here...the thought of God being at my right hand is one that I seldom think about but am amazed at the proximity He grants me to Him.

And of course, what makes this even more amazing to me is how undeserving we are of this. There is nothing in Psalm 121 that talks about any caveat or thing we must do so that the Lord fulfills these things. He just does! Amazing! What incredible help we have in such an amazing God. And I'm amazed that He is the one I can count on for help, despite the fact that He is so much bigger and more awesome than I.

Which I think points me to my final reflection on this Psalm for the day; and all of this is made possible through Jesus, the reconciler of unrighteous, unworthy me to a perfect and mighty God. I believe this is pointed towards in verse 8, where God is depicted as our keeper but eternally "from this time and forevermore." Is not Christ our ultimate source of aid in saving us into salvation? And further, are these promises not ours because the one who suffered the forsaking of these promises and of protection in our stead? (Luke 23) As such, I'm amazed God has provided for me in my finances and know He will be keeping me even more, wherever the Lord might lead me. And I have comfort in this and am ever more amazed at the power of the gospel to adopt me into this kind of relationship with God.

Kevin