This morning at River West we are looking at Psalm 90. I get to lead a quick word with our worship team before the service begins. Here's a few quick thoughts on this passage.
Refuge in the Wilderness
The weight of this passage begins with some historical context. This Psalm was originally spoken by Moses as he lead God's people through the wilderness.
I've been walking through a few Exodus passages on abrahambates.com and let me tell you: the wilderness was an interesting place. It was both tremendously maturing and terrifyingly unsettling.
First, the 'terrifyingly unsettling'. There's nothing in the wilderness: no water, no food, no place to call home. It's flat, it's wide open, it's dangerous, it's horrible. There's no ownership. You can't grow crops. No one can settle down. It's a constant nomadic movement from one temporary encampment to another.
Second, and yet it was 'tremendously maturing'. The wilderness is where God gave them everything they needed to know who they were as God's people. He rescued them, walked alongside them, fed them, and gave them water. Spiritually he also provided the law to correct and guide them, brought his presence into their camp, and instructed them how to build a tabernacle where they worshiped him.
Their entire identity of who they were as a people of God was given to them in the wilderness.
So when Moses says, "you have been our dwelling place," he means this, because they don't have one. Another translation says refuge. God has been their refuge in the middle of the wide open wilderness where they otherwise had no identity.
End of Moses' Life
This passage is tied to another in Deuteronomy 33 where Moses gives one last prayer for his people. Then in chapter 34 we read the story of God taking him out to the wilderness to die.
Psalm 90 was spoken from Moses at the end of his life. As he looks back on all the nomadic traveling, grumbling and complaining, twisted and perverted people, he knows that in it all God is their refuge. Not just their refuge once, but generation after generation after generation.
Included in the Psalter
Think about why this is included in the Psalter? Moses spoke this years ago, it's about their time in the wilderness, and yet generations later it's included in their national book of poetry.
What's interesting about this is that by now they've made it to their land. God's established their kingdom. They now have a king, a centralized way of life, and they are about to build the temple. Their identity is as firm as it has been in many generations.
And yet, the still need to hear that God is their refuge even in their current situation. Why? They've made it to a place to call home. They have a city to live in. They have a ruling king named David to guide them. And yet, they still need to hear: a) that God was their refuge in the wilderness, and b) he will continue to be their refuge in the city.
My point is this: in everyday life we constantly need to be brought back to the truth that God is our refuge. No place, no home, no job, no person will ever give you the kind of refuge you find in God. So, you may be in a wilderness experience or you may be in a time of incredible security and growth. God is always to be your refuge; there is nothing else that can fill this gap for you.
A Few Questions
- Where are you living in a place without a home? Where are you wide open, open to danger and strife?
- What your wilderness experience: personal identity, financial strife, or relational interactions gone wrong?
- Where is God telling you that he is your refuge through it all, good and bad, thick and thin, strong day and weak ones?
In Psalm 90 Moses is going to unpack a way of life as wisdom (v.12) and tell us that God is about establishing the work of our hands (v.17), but that will be for another blog post another time. In the meantime read it...it's a tremendous Psalm.
AB
*written by Abraham Bates - Photography by Abraham Bates - Copyright AbrahamBates.com
