When Storms Come: Finding Refuge in God (Psalm 11)

Good morning, and what a blessing it is to study God's Word with you today.

My name is Pastor Simon, and our mission here at Dillingham Moravian Church is

to make disciples of Christ through the study of God's Word as we trust in Christ together.

This last week, I was in Bethel at our annual church council when I heard a

testimony from another pastor friend of mine from Kipnuk,

who related events that happened when Typhoon how long hit the Alaskan coast.

When the warning came of the storm coming, the threat was so great that residents

of Kipnuk were called to evacuate to the school gym on high ground.

But my pastor friend and his wife did not go. They stayed in their house.

Then, when they got phone calls from friends whose houses were floating down

the river, they then escaped to the shelter of the school gym.

Later on, residents from that village and many other villages were transported

and moved to Bethel and to Anchorage.

My point is, is that just as the residents of Kipna took refuge in their school

from the fury of the typhoon, so also as Christians we are called to take refuge

in God from the trials and storms of life. Let us pray.

Oh, Heavenly Father, we are so grateful that we have this opportunity to hear from your word.

Teach us, guide us, show us how we are to live for you by your grace and power.

Lord God, help us in the midst of all trials, in the midst of even in the times

when things are good, to run to you,

to see you as our strong tower, to see you as our safe haven in storms and disasters of life.

We praise you, we bless you. Please work in us, Lord, for your glory.

In your son's name, Jesus Christ, we pray, amen.

Turn with me today to Psalm 11, verse 1 through 7, in which David wrote his song.

Psalms 11 · chapter mention

In the Lord I take refuge. How can you say to my soul, flee as a bird to your

mountain? For behold, the wicked bend the bow.

They make their arrow upon the string, they shoot in darkness at the upright in heart.

If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?

The Lord is in his holy temple. The Lord's throne is in heaven.

His eyes behold, his eyelids test the sons of men.

The Lord tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence his soul hates.

Upon the wicked he will rain snares, fire and brimstone and burning wind will

be the portion of their cup.

For the Lord is righteous, he loves righteousness, and the upright will behold his face."

There are five points from this passage that I want to bring to your attention

today. The first timeless truth that I see God teaching us is that as Christians,

we are to take refuge in the Lord.

And although Psalm 11 doesn't specifically say what the context of this psalm

was, Bible scholars believe that the story behind Psalm 11 was taken from 1 Samuel 18.

Let's look at 1 Samuel 18, verses 6-16.

1 Samuel 18:6–16

And it happened as they were coming, when David returned from killing the Philistine,

that the women came out of all the cities of Israel, singing and dancing,

to meet King Saul with tambourines, with joy, and with musical instruments.

The women sang as they played and said, Saul has slain his thousands and David his tens of thousands.

Then Saul became very angry, for this saying displeased him.

And he said, They have ascribed to David ten thousands, but to me they have ascribed thousands.

Now what more can he have but the kingdom?

Saul looked at David with suspicion from that day on.

Now it came about on the next day that an evil spirit from God came mightily

upon Saul, and he raved in the midst of the house.

While David was playing the harp with his hand as usual, and a spear was in

Saul's hand, Saul hurled the spear, for he thought, I will pin David to the wall.

But David escaped from his presence twice.

Now Saul was afraid of David, for the Lord was with him, but he had departed from Saul.

Therefore Saul removed him from his presence and appointed him as his commander of a thousand.

And he went out and came in before the people.

David was prospering in all his ways, for the Lord was with him.

Previously, David had killed Goliath and Saul and made David live at court.

David was loved by the king's son, Jonathan.

Saul had also made David a commander of Israel's armies, and the Lord made David prosper.

However, the problems began when David was returning from killing the Philistine

Goliath, and David, along with the army, was making his way to greet the king.

It was the habit of the ladies to greet the victorious warriors with a celebration of music and singing.

The woman sung, Saul has slain his thousands and David his tens of thousands.

And from that point on, Saul was angry and jealous of David and suspicious that

David was after his throne.

The next day, David was playing his harp for the court and Saul was possessed

by an evil spirit and began raving against David while David was playing.

Saul then grabbed the spear and hurled it at David twice.

But each time David escaped. However, I want you to notice that David didn't run.

It was Saul who removed David from his presence because the Lord had removed

the Holy Spirit from Saul and had given the spirit to David.

And even though Saul had all the power physically, he was afraid of David.

Back in Psalm 11, verse 1 through 3, some well-meaning people were trying to

Psalms 11:1–3

convince David that he should flee from Saul.

They wanted David to flee as a bird would escape to the shelter of the nest on the mountain.

But David stayed until he was sent away by Saul. Why?

Because David sought the Lord as his refuge. A question we can ask is,

what is the nature of God's refuge.

In God's refuge, are we always safe from physical harm?

Obviously, David wasn't safe,

and yet he proclaimed that God was his refuge in the midst of danger.

The Lord does not always shelter the child of God away from the attack,

but God shelters His children in the midst of the attack.

God being our refuge doesn't mean the absence of persecution and attacks.

Rather, that he will strengthen us to live righteously for him in the midst of the trial.

In Philippians chapter 4, verse 10 through 13, Paul explained,

Philippians 4:10–13

But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at last you have revived your concern

for me, for indeed you were concerned before, but you lacked opportunity.

Not that I speak from want, for I have learned, this is what I want you to hear,

to be content in whatever circumstances I am in.

I know how to get along with humble means. I know how to live in prosperity.

In any and every circumstances, I have learned the secret of being filled and

going hungry, both having abundance and suffering need.

I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

In this passage, Paul claimed that he knew the secret of being content. Thank you.

In all circumstances, whether poor or well-supplied, whether having abundance or suffering need.

Paul's letter was in the context of a church that was being severely persecuted.

And Paul himself had often been attacked for his faith in Christ and was writing

the letter from prison chained to a Roman guard.

And thus the secret of being content in all situations is to believe and trust

that we can do all things in Christ who strengthens us.

Some people believe that this passage means that we can now do things and have

skills that we did not have before in Christ.

This does not mean that suddenly I can fly a plane or fix a boat engine where I couldn't before.

No, what Paul means is that we can live righteously in the confidence and the

joy of the Lord in all situations by relying on Christ's strength.

Back in Psalm 11, well-meaning friends asked David to flee from the danger of Saul.

And they asked the question in verse 4, If the foundations are destroyed,

what can the righteous do?

Let us rephrase this question so that we can understand it better.

If the foundations or the societal cultural values are destroyed,

and the culture then has turned against the righteous, what then are the righteous to do?

Or we could say it another way. If the world is rocked to its knees by a worldwide

virus and our cultures and people are in disarray, what then should the righteous do?

Or if our country is at conflict with other countries like we are now and internally

our nation is divided and polarized against each other, what are we as Christ believers to do?

This question is very appropriate for us in our time today, isn't it?

During the rest of the psalm, David answers this question. In Psalm 11,

the Lord through David gives Christians practical steps to make God our refuge

and be content in our circumstances.

And thus, the righteous are to trust that God is sovereign.

When I was a kid, I used to read Bible stories from a Bible that had pictures

of God the Father as an old loving man with a great flowing white beard.

Maybe you've seen those pictures.

Michelangelo also painted the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican with images of God in this way.

As a human being, it's tempting to try to bring God down to my own level and

to put Him into my own created constructs and ideas.

Even the images that I use to think about God as my Father is created from my

own experience or the experience of others.

This psalm teaches us that the Lord is so far beyond us and even beyond the entire universe.

God sees life and time in ways that we do not.

And we cannot hope to understand God's ways unless he reveals them to us.

And even then, we don't understand much of the time.

David went on in Psalm 11, verse 4, where he sang, The Lord is in his holy temple,

Psalms 11:4

the Lord's throne is in heaven.

In David's day, culture was controlled and dictated by the king.

In verse 4, David explained that the cultural values had been destroyed and

the culture had turned against the righteous.

Then the first thing the righteous were to do was to run to God as their refuge

by trusting that the Lord is God and that he is on the throne from heaven.

The word that the psalmist used for Lord is Yahweh, who is the life giver. He's the creator.

He's the one who is the absolute and unchangeable one, the ever existing,

ever living, who is self-consistent, who is the God of redemption.

Yahweh is the great I am who lives always in the presence throughout all time periods.

Yahweh is the only existing gods.

There are no other gods, period.

He is the creator. He is the life giver. He's the absolute master of the universe,

and he's always consistent, and he's always faithful.

There is no redemption from anywhere else other than from him.

Yahweh's throne is in heaven, and he rules from heaven.

He doesn't physically live on earth or rule from heaven or from earth, at least not yet.

And this is extremely important because the worship of God is not based upon

a deity that lives on earth. He lives on earth.

All the human created gods are connected with the earth and draw their power

from the created universe somehow.

But the Lord is beyond the created universe.

No one created Yahweh. He always was and he created everything there is.

His temple is holy because Yahweh is absolutely holy.

The Lord is the great I am. He's the unique one, the only one like himself.

The Lord is completely set apart from the universe.

And thus the Lord through David is teaching us that we can't categorize God

by anything that we as human beings have experienced on this earth.

It's just not possible. This absolute, all-powerful, and holy God is in complete

control of everything, everywhere.

And even though he didn't understand why his situation with Saul was happening,

David trusted that God was in control and he had a purpose for the situation,

especially since it was God himself that sent the evil spirit to possess Saul.

The next step for how the righteous are to make God our refuge and be content

in our circumstances is that the righteous are to trust that the Lord tests

both the good and the wicked.

A few weeks ago, my boy Jonathan had made in art class a paper mache Easter

egg created by using a blown-up balloon and slathering the paper plaster all

over the balloon and smoothing it out until it was the desired consistency and

the flaws were all smoothed.

And then when the Easter egg had hardened, the egg was then painted.

Unfortunately, when Jonathan was putting it in the car, something happened to

it. And there are a couple of dents in the egg now.

My point is there's now flaws in the eggs. And I don't know if it's going to

be able to be fixed completely.

Yet as saints or holy ones who sin, we have flaws that need to be smoothed down or removed.

And God uses tests to work in us to fix those flaws.

David, in Psalm 11, verse 44 to 5, proclaimed, His eyes behold,

his eyelids test the sons of men.

The Lord tests the righteous and the wicked, and the one who loves violence his soul hates.

David exclaimed that God tests all people, the good and the evil.

The word that David used for test meant to search out, to examine,

to try, to prove, especially regarding metals.

This concept is one of a metal worker who is searching his creation for imperfections.

And when he finds imperfections, he keeps refining the metal until there are no more flaws.

The way I see it is that God wants to sand me until all my flaws are gone.

Then God can see his son's reflection in me.

Why does the Lord test human beings? God tests us because he is righteous.

Righteousness is his nature. Righteousness searches for righteousness.

God wants to see his righteousness reflected in us.

In Psalm 139, verse 1, David stated that God searches out our paths,

Psalms 139:1

he discerns our ways, and is acquainted with all we do.

In Psalm 139, verse 23 to 24, David urged the Lord to search me, O God.

Psalms 139:23–24

Know my heart, try me, or test me, refine me.

Know my anxious thoughts and see

if there is any hurtful way in me

and lead me in the everlasting way we need

to believe and surrender the truth that god is always

searching out and knowing our ways he's sanding

us or refining us so as

to get rid of our imperfections so that we can reflect his glory the third principle

that god through david taught us so that we as god's righteousness of this can

make God our refuge is that the righteous are the trust that God has judgment planned for the wicked.

During the first couple of winters that we lived in Dillingham,

we used to have a family of foxes that used to visit us around the parsonage.

They got to be almost friendly. And then one day they were gone.

One night we were visiting a friend on the Beluga Bluffs, and he showed us a

bag full of dead foxes. They were our family foxes.

Now, I don't have a problem with trapping for the right reasons,

except those were our foxes.

My point is that the foxes were purposely snared, trapped and killed,

David proclaimed in Psalm 11, verse 5 through 6, And the one who loves violence

Psalms 11:5–6

his soul hates, and upon the wicked he will rain snares.

Fire and brimstone and burning wind will be the portion of their cup.

Here is the problem with those who are wicked and oppose God.

They think they are getting away with their deeds.

For those who are being persecuted, there is a temptation to feel that the wicked

are getting away with their sin.

Yet God has promised that he will trap those who oppose God and persecute his children.

Not just with one trap, but he will rain down traps.

Righteousness abhors or really, really hates evil deeds. I cannot stress this enough.

The righteous character of the Lord despises sins and he will destroy it.

Sin has to be destroyed and everyone who does sin has to be destroyed.

This is why Jesus had to sacrifice himself in our place, or we would have been destroyed.

You see, David used the imagery of fire and brimstone and burning wind,

all of which alluded to God's judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah.

And this imagery also looks forward to what those who do not believe in God

will experience in hell forever.

David went on to say that this will all be the portion of their cup,

meaning that the summation or total legacy of their life will be God's wrath

this is a truth that the persecuted believer can take comfort in that there

will be justice someday however this is also a warning to the person who has

not put their faith in Christ,

the sum total or value of their life will be the wrath of God fire and brimstone

and burning wind And this is such a sad truth, true.

The last principle that believers in Christ are to know and use so that we can

make God our refuge is that the righteous are to live righteously because the Lord is righteous.

Psalm 11, verse 7, For the Lord is righteous, he loves righteousness,

Psalms 11:7

the upright will behold his face.

David prayed that the Lord is righteous. The word that David used for righteousness

meant just in character and conduct.

God is completely right in everything he does, and in his character,

Yahweh never does wrong.

In fact, Yahweh is the very definition of rightness, and thus David proclaimed

that Yahweh loves just or right actions that accord with God's definition of righteousness.

Right action in response to the Lord's righteousness is obedience to Yahweh's word.

And what is the most right response that we can obey the Lord in?

Surrendering in faith to Jesus Christ as our Lord.

Not just when we initially put

our faith in Christ, but throughout our Christ life that we have in Him.

In Christ, we are righteous.

What does the verse say about those who are righteous? That God loves righteousness,

which means He loves us. And the promise is that the righteous,

because of what Christ has done, will see his face.

And although we are righteous in Christ, God loves righteous acts.

What are the deeds that God loves? Micah 6, verse 8 stated, He has told you, O man, what is good.

Micah 6:8

And what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love kindness,

and to walk humbly with your God?

As we live justly and love acting out the kindness of God and walk humbly with

God, we will be living in the righteousness of God.

As Christians, we, you, and I are

called to live with all of our beings according to the rightness of God.

My relationship with social media is that it has its uses, but most of the time I despise it.

The reason why I don't like social media, and I include YouTube in this,

is because Satan is using people who should not be influencing and shaping culture to do just that.

Now, I'm so grateful that Christians are now using social media to be influencers

in order to share God's truth and love with people.

But much of social media and YouTube is about influencing people to think that

what is good according to God is evil, and what is evil is actually good.

And people are buying into it. And many of the influencers do not understand just how lost they are.

They think that what they are teaching and influencing is good.

And what is worse, Christians are being heavily influenced by what looks and

sounds good, but is in fact evil.

Fellow believers in Christ, we are to think right thoughts. We are to do right

deeds and speak right words.

We, you and I, must seek God's righteousness.

And what has Christ promised to us? And all the things that we need will be added onto us.

What has God been teaching us in this passage?

The question we began with was when cultural values and standards degrade and

the culture turns against us, what are we who are righteous in Christ to do?

We respond by seeking God as our refuge.

We seek God as refuge by, first of all, believing and trusting in the holiness

and sovereignty of God, knowing that God tests and refines us so that we can reflect His image.

We are to trust that God hates the wicked and trust that they will receive judgment from God one day,

knowing that God loves the righteous and he loves righteousness because he is righteous.

And as we in the righteousness of Christ imparted to us trust that we are righteous.

We are to do justice, we are to love kindness and we are to walk humbly with our God.

You see, our world is rapidly degrading immorality in any semblance of true

belief in the one true God.

Our culture is beginning to turn against God's people. Yet, we,

you and I, must hold on to the truths of God's word, to live out the righteousness

of God that he has given us.

And as we do that, we will demonstrate what it truly means to make God our refuge.

Let's pray. Father, we are so grateful for your word, for your truth and your love.

Help us, O Lord, to be able to live in your righteousness and uphold your righteous

word, not just with our words, but may we do that,

but also with our actions and our thoughts.

We pray, Lord, that you will work in our country.

You'll work in the church of

america to bring us back to

your righteousness to live

according to your ways may you do a revitalization bring

your new life back into the church so that we can stand strong and tall in your

love and in your truth may you work in us for your glory in your great power.

We ask these things in the mighty name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

I'll leave you with a benediction from Romans 15, verse 13.

Romans 15:13

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing,

so that by the power of the Holy Spirit, you may abound in hope. Amen.

Have a wonderful Sunday. May the Lord bless you all.