The Refuge

The psalm opens with a promise wrapped in the greatest of the names of God. He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. The most High, the Almighty, and yet there is a secret place with him, a hidden intimacy, and a shadow he casts, near enough to fall over the one who dwells there. And the psalmist makes it his own confession. I will say of the LORD, he goes on, He is my refuge and my fortress; my God; in him will I trust. The great and high God is a refuge, a fortress, a hiding place, for the soul that dwells in him.

The whole promise turns on a single word, dwelleth. It is not he that visits the secret place of the most High, nor he that flees there in emergencies, but he that dwelleth there, who lives there, who has made the secret place his home. The shadow of the Almighty falls over the one who abides under it continually, not the one who runs beneath it only when the storm breaks. There is all the difference in the world between visiting God in crisis and dwelling in him always, and the promises of this psalm belong to the dweller, not the visitor.

DWELLING, NOT VISITING

For most of us treat God as a refuge to run to when trouble comes, a shelter we seek in the storm and leave when the sky clears. We are visitors to the secret place, coming in our emergencies and departing in our ease. But the psalm speaks of dwelling, of making God our habitual home, of living in the secret place so that when the trouble comes we are already there, already sheltered, already under the shadow. LORD, thou hast been our dwelling place, Moses prays, in all generations. The soul that has made God its dwelling place does not have to run for shelter when the storm breaks, for it is already home, already hidden, already safe.

And there is a great difference in the two kinds of soul when the trouble comes. The visitor, who sought God only in crises, comes to the secret place as to a house he barely knows, unfamiliar, unsure of his welcome, having to find his way in the dark. The dweller comes to it as home, knows every room, is at ease there, has the peace of one who is where he belongs. The habit of dwelling in God in the days of ease is what makes him a sure refuge in the days of storm, for the soul that lives in him is not thrown into a strange place by trouble but only drawn deeper into the home it already knows.

UNDER THE SHADOW OF THE WINGS

And the shelter this psalm describes is not a cold fortress only, but a warm and tender covering. He shall cover thee with his feathers, it says, and under his wings shalt thou trust. It is the image of the mother bird gathering her young beneath her wings, sheltering them with her own body, warm and close and safe. The refuge of God is not merely a high wall between us and danger but an intimate covering, the soul gathered close under the wings of God as a chick under the hen. How often would I have gathered thy children together, the Lord grieved over Jerusalem, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not. He longs to gather us so, and the dweller in the secret place is gathered.

This does not mean the dweller escapes all trouble, for the psalm is honest about the terror by night and the arrow by day, the pestilence and the destruction. The promise is not that no trouble comes near, but that the one who dwells in God is kept through it, covered, sheltered, not abandoned to it. A thousand may fall at his side, and it shall not come nigh him, not because he is spared all danger, but because he is hidden under the wings of God, kept in the midst of the danger, held through what he is not always held from. The refuge is not an exemption from the storm but a shelter within it.

BECAUSE HE HATH SET HIS LOVE

And the ground of the whole refuge is love, God’s toward us and ours toward him. Because he hath set his love upon me, God says at the end of the psalm, therefore will I deliver him; I will set him on high, because he hath known my name. The refuge rests on a mutual love and a knowing of the name. The one who dwells in the secret place is the one who loves God and knows his name, and it is to such a soul that God binds himself with these great promises. He shall call upon me, God says, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him. The dwelling in God is not a technique for safety but a life of love, and the safety flows from the love.

So the secret place is entered by love and known by the name. The soul that would dwell there does not merely seek shelter from God as from an impersonal fortress, but comes to know him, to love him, to call upon his name, and in that loving and knowing makes its home in him. And to such a soul all the promises belong, for God has bound himself to the one who has set his love upon him, to deliver, to answer, to be with in trouble, to honour at the last. The refuge is a Person, loved and known, and dwelt in.

A VERY PRESENT HELP

There is a word in another psalm that tells us what kind of refuge God is, and it turns on a single precious phrase. God is our refuge and strength, it says, a very present help in trouble. A very present help. Not a distant refuge we must travel far to reach, not a shelter that may or may not be at hand when the storm breaks, but a present help, near, immediate, at hand in the very moment of trouble. The refuge is not a far-off fortress we must run to across dangerous ground, but a presence already with us, closer than the trouble itself, a help that is very present in the hour it is needed.

This is the heart of what makes God a refuge, that the refuge is his own presence. The LORD of hosts is with us, the psalm goes on, the God of Jacob is our refuge, and it says it twice, as though the truth were too good to state only once. The God of Jacob is our refuge, and he is our refuge because he is with us. It is not that God gives us a shelter separate from himself, some safe place he sends us to; the shelter is himself, his own presence with us, the LORD of hosts at our side. To be in the refuge is to be with God, and to be with God is to be in the refuge.

This is why the dweller in the secret place need never fear that he cannot reach the shelter in time, cannot cross the distance to safety before the trouble overtakes him. There is no distance to cross. The refuge is a very present help, already there, already with us, for the God who is our refuge is the God who has promised, I am with thee, and I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. The soul that dwells in him is never far from its shelter, because its shelter is a Presence that does not depart, present in the trouble as truly as in the peace, a very present help in the very hour of need.

So the trembling soul, overtaken suddenly by trouble with no time to prepare, may find the refuge already at hand, for it was never anywhere but at hand. It has only to turn to the God who is with it, to shelter in the Presence that has not left it, to know that the LORD of hosts is with us and the God of Jacob is our refuge. The refuge is not somewhere else. It is here, present, a very present help, and the soul that dwells in God dwells in a shelter that is always exactly as near as God himself, which is to say nearer than the trouble.

So do not treat God as a shelter to visit only in the storm, but dwell in him, make him your habitual home, live in the secret place so that when the trouble comes you are already there. Take shelter not in a cold fortress only but under the warm covering of his wings, gathered close as a chick beneath the hen. Do not expect exemption from all trouble, but trust to be kept through it, sheltered in the midst of it. And enter the secret place by love, knowing his name, calling upon him, for the refuge is a Person loved and known. He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.