Sheltering in God's Shadow in Stormy Seasons (Psalm 91:1)

Today’s Bible Verse: "Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty." (Psalm 91:1)

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Full Transcript Below:

Hello, thank you for listening to your daily bible verse, the podcast that examines one verse each day to learn more about God and His will for us. I'm your host, Jennifer Slattery. And after this short word from our sponsor, we'll dive into today's Bible verse, Psalm 91:1

Today's Bible verse is Psalm 91:1, "Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty." 

It's tornado season in Nebraska where I live and while some of our friends unfortunately experienced significant damage in our neighborhood, the storms have been more clamorous than catastrophic. While we've had to hunker down in the basement a couple times for the most part, we've remained comfortably tucked in our beds, finding the emergency sirens, the howling wind, and occasionally house shaking thunder more of a nuisance than fear. I cannot say the same for our daughter and son in law's dog, Bubba. However, as we discovered about a week ago, when he and his little sister spent the weekend with us, the poor guy does not weather storms, well, terrified, he wanted to not only remain as close to us as possible, but he also dove under the blankets trying to seek shelter beneath us. While we certainly weren't the biggest or even strongest thing he could hide under from his perspective, we were the most powerful and so when afraid, he turned to us to keep him safe.

 In two recent faith over fear podcast episodes, another podcaster and I talked about some powerful Scripture that helps quiet fear if you struggle with anxiety, I encourage you to check those out the first dropped on June 18. And the second on the 25th. Again, you can find full on the Faith Over Fear podcast accessed wherever you listen to podcast content. 

In today's verse, God invites us to seek shelter in him. And unlike my husband and I his strength and power are limitless, and he's bigger than anyone or anything coming against us. He is the Most High, a low when or Elohim, a word in the original Hebrew that emphasizes his supremacy, the fact that he is greater than or stronger than all and above all, he is the highest possible being and the highest object of human worship. He is also the Almighty, the English translation for Shaddai, which in the original Hebrew means breasts, field or land and therefore has the connotation of provision, fruitfulness and nourishment. Putting these two names together then we see the psalmist is declaring God to be big and strong enough to keep him safe and capable of providing for all his needs. No wonder he can rest in the shelter of God's presence although some translation state in his secret place. 19th century theologian Albert Barnes wrote that this implied abiding where God abides adding quote, "the idea is that of having one's home or residence in the Most Holy Place in the tabernacle or temple, and of sitting with him in that sacred place" and quote, in Psalm 27:5 ancient Israel second king, a man by the name of David wrote that God would hide him in the shelter of His Sacred tent. Therefore to abide or dwell in God's shadow is to abide or to dwell to reside with to remain connected with God. 

Resting in a shadow implies the same level of proximity. I'm reminded of a game my daughter and I used to play when she was young while outside on sunny days, we would try to jump on or catch one another shadows while the other person tried to keep enough distance between them to keep that from occurring. But simply, one must follow someone closely in order for their shadow to fall upon them. remaining in God's shadow then means seeking His will and doing our best to remain yielded to His Spirit in every moment. This in turn leads to the sole deep rest of knowing we don't have to figure everything out. We don't have to solve our own problems, fight our own battles, meet our own needs, make ourselves righteous or earn our salvation. All we must do in each moment is follow. However, God leads trusting him to take care of everything else of all that concerns us. In Christ, we can cease our stressing, striving and conniving and lean into a steady strong an ever present embrace knowing he will respond onto our storms in one of three ways, he will lead us well away from the storms path before we're even aware the rain has begun to fall. Or he'll tell us to flee and will show us precisely how to do so. Or he'll give us what we need to stand strong amidst the howling wind. We see in Scripture, examples of God caring for his children in each of these ways. What we don't see, however, is him abandoning them in their fear, nor will we ever see him respond to us in that way. He will always offer a shelter in his secret place in the shadow of his will.

Let's pray. Holy Father, you are so loving, faithful, attentive, powerful, and gracious. You are God. Almighty, you hold all power in your hands, you reign supreme. You are faithful and you are loving and you are always present, you will never leave us. You will never forsake us. You surround us with Your love and you Speak tenderly to us. You invite us to draw near always you never turn us away. When we are afraid. May we turn to you? May we rest in you may we seek your will. May we listen for your voice and may we follow however you lead knowing that you will watch over us that you will keep us in your loving embrace. Thank You that we don't have to figure everything out. Thank You that we don't have to fight our own battles. They choose that you fight on our behalf. Thank you that you have good plan for us and you have the power to bring that good to pass. Thank you for sending Jesus Christ, the one who allowed us to have a deeply connected relationship with you from now to eternity. We love you and we praise you and it is in the name of Jesus our Savior, your son that we pray. Amen.

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