1 I will lift up my eyes to the hills. Where does my help come from?
2 My help comes from Yahweh, who made heaven and earth.
Free Grace note
Help That Made the Mountains The pilgrim lifts his eyes to the hills and asks where help comes from. Some read the hills as a threat, the haunt of bandits and false shrines; others as a hopeful gaze toward Zion. Either way the answer moves higher: my help comes from Yahweh, who made heaven and earth. The Maker of the mountains outranks the mountains. Notice the pattern that runs through Scripture, that our confidence rests not in the created thing but in the Creator, the same One who upholds all things by His word (Hebrews 1:3). A maturing believer learns to press through every scenic comfort and every earthly source of help until the eyes land on God Himself. He is the only help that never fails and never runs out.
3 He will not allow your foot to be moved. He who keeps you will not slumber.
4 Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
5 Yahweh is your keeper. Yahweh is your shade on your right hand.
6 The sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night.
7 Yahweh will keep you from all evil. He will keep your soul.
Free Grace note
Kept, Not Coddled Six times the psalm uses the word keep. Yahweh keeps you, keeps Israel, keeps your soul. Some object that this cannot be true, since believers still suffer sunstroke, loss, and grief. But the promise is not that trouble will miss you. It is that you will never face it unattended, and that your soul, your truest self, is guarded for good (verse 7). Jesus prays the same over His own, that the Father keep them (John 17:11). This keeping reaches from your going out to your coming in, from now into forever (verse 8). For the believer that guarantee is anchored in eternal life itself, a possession God keeps for us so securely that nothing can pluck us from His hand (John 10:28).
8 Yahweh will keep your going out and your coming in, from this time forward, and forever more.
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