Psalm 31 – Duck and Cover

In event of an emergency, please proceed in an orderly fashion to the nearest exit. In the event of a tornado, please move to the basement and keep away from the windows. In the event of a fire, please exit the building as quickly as possible and move away from the building. In the event of a nuclear attack, well, it used to be crawl down under your desk and cover your heads, duck and cover. We like to be prepared for an emergency. We want to know what to do. We want to be safe.

So we know what to do in the event of a tornado or a fire or some other similar emergency. We know how to be safe. But what do we do in the event of pride? Where do we go when the greed starts to grip our minds? When we face temptations, when we’re under attack, when our bodies begin to grow weak, when our minds begin to forget, when life gets heavy, when life ends, where do we go then? What do we do? How can we be safe?

In the event of sin, in the event of our own sin, in the event of the sin of others, please find refuge in the shadow of the cross. Duck and cover in the refuge of the Lord. Verse 1:

In you, O LORD, I have taken refuge;

We have seen enough. We’ve seen too much. We’ve been hurt too often. We’ve lost too much. We’ve said too many goodbyes; we’ve gone to too many funerals. We’ve piled up too many regrets. We’ve spoken too many words we wish we could take back. We’ve carried too many worries. We’ve failed too many times. We have felt the pain of sin, our sin, the sin of others, too many times, and enough is enough.

And the only shelter, the only protection, the only refuge we have ever found to work is the Lord. We’ve tried other shelters. We’ve tried our work, our jobs, our careers. But at the end of the day, the pain was still there. So we tried our families, our children. But our children grew up and moved away. And sometimes, our own sin affected our children, and our children’s sin affected us, and family became a threatening place instead of a safe place. So we tried recreation, but when we stopped playing, the pain was there waiting. So we tried church. Come on, it’s church! Church work, committee work, good holy work, that will take away the pain and regrets and temptations, right? If we can just stay busy enough at church, then we won’t remember, and we won’t have time to be tempted, and life will be good right?

Well, we know better. Church can be a source of greed and envy and coveting, of words spoken in anger, just like any place else. Work, family, play, church, there is no place in life that can hide us from sin. There is only one place, in the Lord. And after we’ve tried everything, when we’ve been beaten up enough, then we will crawl into the safety of the refuge of the Lord, and let Him take the pain and the regrets and the worries and the temptations away. Verse 1 still:

let me never be put to shame; deliver me in your righteousness.

We’ve had enough of the life that leads to shame. We don’t want to go back. We want to stay as far away from the sin that we end up regretting, we want to be protected from the people who have it in for us. We want to be safe.

So we hid in the refuge of the Lord, and we ask Him, verse 2:

Turn your ear to me…be my rock of refuge, a strong fortress to save me

We need Him to be tougher than the temptation. We need Him to be stronger than the pain. We need our Lord to be bigger than our enemies. And He is. He is our rock, our refuge, our strong fortress. As long as we stay with Him, as long as we stay inside our safe refuge, there is no temptation strong enough to pull us down. There is no regret that cannot be erased. There is no despair too deep that hope can’t be found.

That’s why we pray, verse 5:

Into your hands I commit my spirit

Into your hands I commit my spirit. Those precious, awful words. The last words spoken by our Savior Jesus as He breathed His last breath on the cross. The words that Jesus spoke as He died for us, are the same words we speak to find our only refuge.

Because we are safe only when we have given ourselves up to the Lord. We’re safe only when we’ve admitted defeat at finding safety any place else. He can be our rock of refuge, He can be our strong fortress only when we are completely committed to Him. We are not safe when our commitment to the Lord is 1 day out of 7, when Sunday is our day for God, and the rest of our days belong to us. We are not safe when our commitment to the Lord means 10 percent of our money for Him, 90 percent our money for us. We are not safe when our commitment to the Lord means we will work for Him when we retire, but until then our lives are our own.

Our safety is complete when our commitment is complete. And our commitment is complete when we have committed our spirits to God in the same way Jesus did. Jesus died as He spoke these words, that was the level of His commitment. And our level of commitment can be no less. When we commit our spirits into the hand of God, we are dying to ourselves. We don’t get a say about our own life anymore. We don’t get to decide what happens to us and what doesn’t happen to us. We don’t get to decide how well off we are financially, how secure we are in our jobs, how enjoyable and relaxing our retirement is. All of that is out of our hands when we commit our spirits into the hands of God.

But it’s then, only then, when we’ve joined Jesus in His death, it’s only then that we find safety. This is the only way we enter the refuge. When we have turned away from our own way of doing things, and turned to God’s way of doing things. Verse 6:

I hate those who cling to worthless idols; I trust in the LORD.

But entering the refuge of the Lord, coming into the safety of our Savior doesn’t mean that suddenly life gets easier. The refuge of the Lord doesn’t mean we don’t go through struggles or face temptation or experience loss. Actually, when we have given up our lives to Him, when we’ve committed our spirits into His hands, sometimes we face more temptations, we experience even more loss. Look through scripture and see Jeremiah at the bottom of the pit, Paul in prison, John the Baptist beheaded, the apostle John on the island of Patmos. Living in the shelter of the Lord often means a tougher life.

But when our lives are committed to God’s hands, then we have a place run when life gets tough. From inside the shelter, with lives committed to God, in the middle of the pain, we cry out, verse 9:

Be merciful to me, O LORD, for I am in distress; my eyes grow weak with sorrow, my soul and my body with grief.

Our eyes grow weak with sorrow for many reasons. The loss of our health, verse 10:

my strength fails because of my affliction, and my bones grow weak

The loss of a job. The loss of a husband, a wife, a mother, a father, a child. The loss of a friendship. Verse 11:

I am the utter contempt of my neighbors; I am a dread to my friends— those who see me on the street flee from me. I am forgotten by them as though I were dead; I have become like broken pottery.

What do we do when life is hitting us hard? What do we do when the people we trusted the most have done the most damage? What do we do when our own bodies let us down, our own minds let us down? What do we do our whole life is shook apart?

Because we have committed our spirits into the hand of God, because we have joined Jesus in His death, because we have picked up our own cross and died to ourselves, then when life hits hard, we can say, verse 14:

But I trust in you, O LORD; I say, “You are my God.”

I don’t know where the next job is going to come from, but I trust in you, Lord. You are my God. I don’t know how the bills are going to get paid this month, but I trust in you, Lord. You are my God. I don’t know how I’m going to live with this illness, or whether I’m even going to live. But I trust in you, Lord, You are my God. Verse 15:

My times are in your hands

Our times are in His hands. Our financial security is in His hands. Our families, the people we love so much, are in His hands. We committed ourselves, we committed our lives, we committed our spirits to His hand, so then we ask Him, verse 15:

deliver me from my enemies and from those who pursue me. Let your face shine on your servant; save me in your unfailing love. Let me not be put to shame, O LORD, for I have cried out to you;

You don’t have deliver yourself, you don’t have to figure things out, you don’t have to get yourself through the mess anymore. You have committed you to the hands of the Lord. Your times are in His hands.

And they are good hands, hands we can trust, hands that have constructed every moment of your life right up to this moment, and every moment of your life into eternity. Verse 19:

How great is your goodness, which you have stored up for those who fear you, which you bestow in the sight of men on those who take refuge in you.

It’s not easy to commit our spirits into the hands of the Lord. It’s so easy to take back our times, to take back our lives, to take back whatever is precious from His hands. It’s easier, sometimes, to trust ourselves. Which means, of course, that we’re leaving the refuge of the Lord, we’re stepping out from the safety of our Savior.

But remember how great His goodness really is, remembering how He has protected in the past, hearing again from others how they have experienced His safety, we calm down, we begin to trust, we recommit our spirits into His hands, we leave our times in His care. We again take refuge. Verse 20:

In the shelter of your presence you hide them from the intrigues of men; in your dwelling you keep them safe from accusing tongues.

Have you found shelter? Are you safe? Are you in the refuge of the Lord? Maybe it doesn’t seem necessary right now? I mean, why head for the basement when the skies are blue? Why evacuate the building when you don’t smell smoke? Why die to yourself, why commit your spirit into the hands of the Lord when you’re healthy and employed and secure and happy?

Because when the storm hits, it will be too late. You want to be in the basement before the tornado hits. You want to be out of the building before the flames engulf the room. And you want to be committed, completely, to the hands of the Lord before life becomes hurtful and heavy. Come in where it’s safe, and trust. Let go of your life, and trust. Expect God to protect, expect Him to heal, expect Him to deliver, and trust. If it doesn’t seem like He’s doing anything, then ask Him. Remind Him, even though He doesn’t need reminding. You turned your times, your life, your hopes over to His hands. Now watch what those hands do with your life. Verse 23:

Love the LORD, all his saints! The LORD preserves the faithful, but the proud he pays back in full. Be strong and take heart, all you who hope in the LORD.