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Whence Our Help?
Dr. Dennis Kinlaw ~ 1964
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Th e author of Psalm 121 was in need of help … “I will lift up mine eyes to the hills, from whence shall my help come?” Th e depth of need is clear. He wanted a place where his foot would not be moved (vs 3). He needed someone who could keep him night and day (vss 3-4). He needed help by day, lest the sun should smite him. Night evidently brought no relief, for the moon seemed to hold terrors of its own (vs 6). He wanted help which could protect him in his going out and in his coming in. He wanted protection from all evil.
Perhaps a true understanding of this Psalm is found only by remembering the kind of world in which the psalmist lived. It was one that did not share Israel’s understanding of the nature, transcendence, or glory of the one true God. Israel’s neighbors were victims of the darkness that comes when the light of revelation has not broken in.
Th e result was that the pagan neighbors of the writer worshipped only that which they could see and experience in their unenlightened human search. Th us, they capitalized the word “Earth” and called it their “mother.” Heaven and its bodies, the sun and the moon became deities to be feared, worshipped, and [prayed to]. Th ose were the deities that Abraham’s fathers worshipped from the “other side of the fl ood.” When we remember that
the “high places” were the sites used for such worship, we can understand that this Psalm is not an ode to nature.
It is an affi rmation of faith in One who transcends all nature. Others may go in their superstitious fear to the hills to bow down to the sun, moon, and heavens, but the psalmist does not fi nd his help there. His help is the LORD who
made heaven and earth.
It may seem strange to modern man that men could ever have worshiped natural forces and objects. Yet is not this always what happens when men are without the light of Scripture? Th ey inevitably seek their hope in the natural, the created order.
Today, we capitalize sex and think that our fulfi llment is there only to fi nd that it is delusive and destructive when taken out of God’s ordered plan.
We capitalize the political man and trust that the United Nations may yet save us, or the scientist, or the psychiatrist, or the scholar. Or else in our religiosity we look to the church as our hope. (It is signifi cant that the New Testament glories in the bridegroom and not the bride.)
Yet are not all these but parts of the same natural order as sun, moon, and stars? Have we not made gods where there are no gods? Our hope should be in Him who made all these.
Th is, of course, is the Biblical word of hope! Th ere is One who is able to save!
He is not part of our natural life. He comes to us from without. We may even shut our lives and keep Him out. But if we let Him who made us enter, we fi nd He is able to protect our going out and our coming in. And where others quake in fear, we may confi dently wait in hope. For what is a god of demonic power and frightfulness to others is but a creature of the Father’s hand, and can be used by Him for our own good and His glory.
Dr. Dennis Kinlaw (1922-2017) was
President of Asbury College from 19681981 and 1986-1991 and Chancellor of the school in 1992; he was a professor of Old Testament Languages and Literature at Asbury
Th eological Seminary (1963-1968). He was the founder of the Francis Asbury Society.
