Finding Refuge and Justice in God's Sovereignty

"In the Lord, I take refuge." That's where David begins. That's the confession of David's heart. That's the certainty of his experience, "In the Lord, I take refuge." And he makes that confession of faith because there are people who are trying to convince him to do something else. [00:02:08]

David was in distress, and there were people who were offering him the advice that the best thing to do with trouble is to run away from it; take off. Now, it makes me think a little bit about one of my very favorite quotations from John Calvin, where John Calvin said, "We should live like birds on a branch." [00:02:41]

And David then is reflecting that the reason he has taken refuge in the Lord, the reason he is not fleeing like a bird to the mountain is because he knows where the trouble has come from, namely, from the wicked, "For behold, the wicked bend the bow; they have fitted their arrow to the string to shoot in the dark at the upright in heart." [00:05:18]

The rest of the psalm is really saying, "What the righteous do is they take refuge in the Lord knowing that He is enthroned in His holy temple." And, I don't want to anticipate what all my friends are going to say as they come to speak, but that's the assurance. [00:07:16]

And it goes right on to say that even when the foundations are being overthrown, God remains God, God remains in charge, God remains our hope and our help. "If the foundations," what foundations? What does the psalmist have in mind when he thinks about an attack on the foundations? [00:07:52]

And therefore, an attack on the foundations, David wants to make clear for us, is an attack on God Himself. It's only secondarily an attack on us. That should be some comfort to us. When the wicked fit their arrow into the bow to attack, they are ultimately attacking God. [00:09:44]

And from the teachings of Psalms 9 and 10, we could say that the one word that recurs in those Psalms about God's foundation is "justice," "justice." Justice, not just in a bare legal abstract sense, but justice as the manifestation of God's care and love for His people. [00:14:22]

God is a God of justice who keeps in mind, especially, the afflicted among His people, the weak among His people, the poor and the needy among His people. And that should arrest us, that should affect us, that should grip us. The very reason we particularly need justice is because injustice is most frequently inflicted on the weak. [00:17:07]

And the foundation at the heart of God's commitment to justice, as we see in the Old Testament, is that God has a king over His people. That king as we read about it here in Psalm 11 is King David. But King David, of course, is standing in the place of great David's greater Son, King Jesus. [00:23:19]

And the king as the protector of justice, Deuteronomy 17 tells us, is to make a copy of the Law, to keep it always with him, to meditate on it day and night so that his heart will be instructed by God's justice, by God's care, by God's love in the protection of God's people. [00:25:40]

And that's why it's so crucial that the church continue to be what God wants it to be, to be a light shining in a world of wickedness. And that's why it is so tragic, especially, I think in some ways for me as a church historian, to look at all of those who name the name of Christ around the world and see how much deceit has entered the church. [00:36:41]

But even though the wicked are overthrowing the foundations, we do not lose heart. What do the righteous do? They find their refuge in God, their hope in God, their strength in God, their life in God, their message in God. And God will honor that, and God will accomplish His purpose. [00:41:39]