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Psalm 118: The Stone the Builders Rejected

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Introduction

And so these Hallel psalms conclude on a note of high triumph—but it is triumph through the midst of trials. This is triumph through the heat of a great battle. It is the joy of a rejected stone, now made the corner. A likely occasion is the ascension of David to the throne. In Ezra 3:10-11, when they were laying the foundation of the temple we read that citations from the first and last portions of this psalm were sung, indicating that the whole was sung.

The Text

“O give thanks unto the Lord; for he is good: Because his mercy endureth for ever. Let Israel now say, That his mercy endureth for ever . . .” (Psalm 118:1–29).

Summary of the Text

Here is a psalm with some glorious repetitions, culminating in a great messianic promise. The repetitions are indicated in bold. Give thanks to the Lord because His mercy endures forever (v. 1). Let Israel say that His mercy endures (v. 2). Let the house of Aaron say that His mercy endures (v. 3). Let those who fear the Lord say the same (v. 4).

I called on the Lord, who answered and delivered me (v. 5). What can man do to me if the Lord is on my side (v. 6)? This passage is quoted in Heb. 13:6. The Lord takes up my side, and so I will triumph over my enemies (v. 7).

Trusting in the Lord is better than putting confidence in men (v. 8). For those who like to keep track of such things, this is the middle verse of the over 30K verses in the Bible. Trusting in the Lord is better than putting confidence in princes (v. 9). The nations surrounded me, but in the name of the Lord I destroy them (v. 10). They encircled me, but I destroy them (v. 11). They came at me like a swarm of bees, but I quenched them like a thorn fire. I destroyed them (v. 12).

They thrust me back, but the Lord sustained me (v. 13). The Lord is my strength, song, and salvation (v. 14). The tents of the righteous are filled with jubilation, and the right hand of the Lord does valiantly (v. 15). The right hand of the Lord is exalted, and again does valiantly (v. 16). I will not die because I need to talk about the Lord (v. 17). The Lord chastened me severely, but not to the point of death (v. 18).

I will go through the gates of righteousness in order to praise the Lord (v. 19). The righteous will go through this gate(v. 20). I will praise the Lord because He has heard me, and has been my salvation (v. 21).

The next verse is quoted in multiple places in the New Testament (Matt. 21:42; Mark 12:10-11; Luke 20:17; Acts 4:11;1 Pet. 2:7). The builders rejected this stone, and it has been made the cornerstone (v. 22). The Lord has done this thing, and we think it is marvelous (v. 23). This is the day the Lord has made, the day of resurrection. This is why we rejoice and are glad on this, the first day of the week, the day of resurrection (v. 24).

The next verse (v. 25) is fulfilled in the hosannas of Palm Sunday (Mark 11:8; John 12:13), and the verse after (v. 26) is cited multiple times (Matt. 21:9; Mark 11:9; Luke 13:35; Luke 19:38; John 12:13).

God is the Lord, and He made His light shine on us, and we bind our boughs to the altar (v. 27). You are my God, and I will praise You (v. 28); You are my God, and I will exalt You (v. 28). And then the psalm concludes by returning to the key note established at the beginning of the psalm. Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, and His mercy endures forever (v. 29).

In Imitation of Christ

In a moment, we are going to consider the application of this psalm to the Lord, in whom the psalm finds complete fulfillment. But the fact that we see Christ in this psalm, which we do, does not mean that we cannot see ourselves in it. In fact, because of our union with Christ, we must learn to see ourselves.

In Hebrews 13:6, verse 6 from this psalm is quoted, and is introduced with this phrase—“So that we may boldly say . . .” If God is our help, and He most certainly is, then there is absolutely nothing that man can do to us. What is it to us if the enemy has a thousand spears when the Lord has ten thousand shields?

Joshua 1:5 is quoted just before this, and this is God’s promise. “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.” The context from Joshua, and from the larger point of Hebrews, is a context on the brink of the great invasion. We are appointed to take the land, and in the Great Commission, the land is now the earth.

If you want iron in your veins, then internalize the psalms. At one point in his ministry the great Wycliffe fell ill, and the word went around that he was dying. He had been a great nuisance to the orders of friars, and representatives of four orders came to his bedside in order to exhort him to repent, to renounce what he had been doing, to make a full confession, and to die reconciled to them. When they were done, Wycliffe had a servant raise him up a bit, and he then quoted from this psalm (v. 17) in a loud voice. “I shall not die, but live, and declare the evil deeds of the friars.” In confusion, the monks tumbled out of the chamber.

Christ the Valiant

When the Lord observed the Passover meal with His disciples, we are told that when they were done, they sang together. “And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives” (Matt. 26:30; Mark 14:26). According to the custom of the Jews, what they sang was almost certainly this psalm. And it is striking for us to consider what the Lord was singing when we consider right alongside it what the Lord was facing.

The Garden was still before Him. The arrest, the impudent midnight trial, the flogging, the taunting, the crucifixion—all that was before Him. And yet, consider the jubilant and victorious tone of this agonistic psalm. “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Heb. 12:2).

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Psalm 117: The Christ of the Gentiles

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Introduction

The Hallel psalms are psalm of praise—they are Hallelujah psalms. This one also concludes with that exclamation of praise. This is a very brief psalm, and is one that many of you can already sing from memory. But although it is brief, it packs a throw weight that is considerable, and is a psalm of praise that encompasses the entire world.

The Text

“O praise the Lord, all ye nations: Praise him, all ye people. For his merciful kindness is great toward us: And the truth of the Lord endureth for ever. Praise ye the Lord” (Psalm 117).

Summary of the Text

The psalm begins with an invitation to “all nations” to render praise to Yahweh, to join together with the Jews in saying hallelujah (v. 1). Praise Him, all you goyim. Praise Him, all you tribes (v. 1). And why should we do this? We should do it because His merciful kindness (hesed) is great toward us. We should do it because the truth (emeth) of Yahweh is something that endures forever (v. 2). This is why we must sing hallelujah.

Minister of the Circumcision

The Gentile world mission, of which Paul was the most notable representative and emissary, was not the point at which God changed His mind about the Jews. Rather, the Gentile world mission was the point at which God fulfilled one of His great promises to the Jews, and at which the Jewish leaders changed their mind about Jehovah. That particular apostasy is one that we need to understand a bit better than we do.

The apostle Paul defends his mission to the Gentiles in Romans 15, and in the course of that defense he quotes our passage. Let’s see how he uses it.

“Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers: And that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy; as it is written, For this cause I will confess to thee among the Gentiles, and sing unto thy name. And again he saith, Rejoice, ye Gentiles, with his people. And again, Praise the Lord, all ye Gentiles; and laud him, all ye people. And again, Esaias saith, There shall be a root of Jesse, and he that shall rise to reign over the Gentiles; in him shall the Gentiles trust. Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost” (Rom. 15:8–13).

Christ was made a deacon of the circumcision, a servant or a minister of the circumcision. He was born in the tribe of Judah, as a fulfillment of the promise made to David. And Paul says here that Christ was made a deacon in this way in order to confirm the promises made to the fathers (v. 8). Everything that follows supports that, and everything that follows is also about the gathering in of the Gentiles. We do not just have an exhortation to the Gentiles that they ought to praise the Lord, but we know they probably won’t. No, we have a prediction that the Gentiles would in fact glorify God for His mercy (v. 9; see 2 Sam. 22:50; Ps. 18:49). In the next verse (v. 10), we have a command that was issued to the Gentiles in Deuteronomy (Deut. 32:43). And then again, we see the same thing in Paul’s citation of our text (v. 11; Ps. 117:1). And then Isaiah prophesied that the root of Jesse would spring up, and He would rule over the nations, and the Gentiles would hope in Him (v. 12; Is. 11:10). They shall not hurt or destroy in all the holy mountain, and the earth will be as full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea (Is. 11:9).

In this context, the Roman Christians (largely Gentiles) had a benediction declared over them, that the God of hope might fill them with joy in believing (all of this), that they might abound in hope, as the power of the Holy Spirit works in them.

Gentiles Were Not the Non-Christians of the Old Testament

We have to distinguish the universalization of the priesthood in the New Testament (which actually happened) and the universalization of salvation (which is not what happened).

We know from the New Testament that Christ is the only way. “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). And so, as the Westminster Confession puts it, outside the Church there is no ordinary possibility of salvation.

Now if you assume that the Jews were the Christians of the Old Testament, this creates enormous problems. In the Old Testament, salvation was not limited to just one nation. Rather, the priesthood was limited to just one nation.

How could we say that salvation was limited to the Jews? We can say that salvation is from the Jews (John 4:22, ESV), but far too many Gentiles are saved in the Old Testament to simply equate “Gentile” with “unbeliever.” Melchizedek was a Gentile (Heb. 7:3), and Abraham paid tithes to him (Heb. 7:4). When Ezekiel named three of the godliest men he could think of, two of the three were Gentiles (Ez. 14:14). Noah lived before there were any Jews, and Job was an Edomite. The inhabitants of Nineveh repented (Jonah 3:5; Matt. 12:41). Naaman the Syrian became a true worshiper of God (2 Kings 5:17; Luke 4:27). Jethro was a priest in Midian, and a servant of the true God (Ex. 18:1). The Queen of Sheba was taught by Solomon (1 Kings 10:5). (1 Kings 8:60). And Solomon built the Temple with a provision for Gentiles in view (2 Chron. 6:32-33).

So the time of the new covenant is a time when salvation explodes into the world, but this is not something that erases a former boundary. Gentiles can be saved now, but they could always be saved. The glory is that Gentiles can be priests and Levites now (Is. 66:19-21). The priestly nation has been universalized, and that is why the division now is between Christian and unbeliever.

The Covenant Lord

Over the centuries, the Jews had been praising Yahweh, praising Jehovah, the covenant God of Israel. Christ came as a minister of the circumcision in order to confirm His promises to them. Not to abrogate them, but rather to confirm them. When He came—lived His life as a perfect Jew, was crucified, was buried, and raised again—this was a confirmation that He was in fact the Son of God (Rom. 1:4). As a result of all this, the fundamental Christian confession is that Jesus is Yahweh. This means that He is the covenant Lord of Israel. “And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered (Joel 2:32). This is quoted in Romans 10:13, using the Greek word kurios for Yahweh. And just a moment before this, Paul told us that the fundamental confession was that “Jesus is Lord” (kurios).

And never forget the fact that because this priesthood is universal, it must of necessity include ethnic Israel. Their disobedience is only temporary, and they will be brought back in again (Rom. 11:23). Anti-Semitism is about the most anti-gospel frame of mind that can be imagined. And among professed worshipers of Jesus ben-David, it is also the silliest.

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Psalm 116: The Grace of Answered Prayer

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Introduction

This psalm is a wonderful testimony of praise, giving glory to God for all the things He did to undertake for the psalmist. The Lord delivered him from grievous trouble, and he is not at all ambiguous about the fact that God is the one who did it. But in order to give thanks this way, we have to adjust some of our modernist assumptions about interpreting the events of history. In his penetrating book about the theological crisis that resulted from the American Civil War, Mark Noll astutely pointed out the fact that the war badly rattled American faith in the intelligibility of God’s governance of the world. Both sides were praying to Him, were they not? And every retreated into the assumption that God’s ways are always and necessarily inscrutable. But how then can we pray as the psalmist does here?

The Text

“I love the Lord, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications. Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live . . .” (Ps. 116:1-19).

Summary of the Text

The psalm begins with a profession of love for the Lord, because He listens to prayers (v. 1). He inclined His ear to me, and that is why I call upon Him (v. 2). As long as I live. The psalmist has been in deep trouble before, down to the point of death (v. 3). That is when I called upon His name (v. 4). God is gracious, righteous, and merciful (v. 5). God preserves the simple, and it is a good thing too (v. 6). He helped when I was brought low. Calm down, soul, because God is bountiful (v. 7). God has delivered me in three ways—my soul from death, my eyes from tears, and my feet from falling (v. 8). I am going to walk around this place alive, and in the presence of the Lord (v. 9). Paul quotes this next verse in 2 Cor. 4:13, and does so from a similar context. I believed, and therefore I have spoken (v. 10).

I said, too hastily, that all men are liars (v. 11). This appears to have something to do with men who were the instruments of the answered prayer. When I was in trouble I lashed out at men, but then God used men to deliver. How shall I pay the Lord back for all His benefits (v. 12)? I will take the cup of salvation, and then raise the glass (v. 13). The vows that I promised when I was in trouble are vows that I will pay in the presence of all God’s saints (v. 14). As we saw earlier, God delivered me from death, but here it says that the death of His saints is precious to Him (v. 15). He loves bringing us home. In other words, it would have been an answer to prayer either way. God’s slaves are the ones for whom God has loosed the bonds (v. 16). The sacrifice of thanksgiving is the only way to pay Him back, and so we call on His name (v. 17). Again the vows that were promised will be vows paid—in the presence of all His people (v. 18). Thanksgiving for answered prayer will be offered in the courts of the Lord’s house (v. 19). Hallelujah.

Two Different Moments

When He was praying in the Garden, our Lord Jesus modeled for us what true submission looks like. “And he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt” (Matt. 26:39). And the apostle Paul prayed three times for his thorn in the flesh to be removed, and was three times denied (2 Cor. 12:8-9).

But then there is this . . .

“And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it” (John 14:13–14). “Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them” (Mark 11:24).

Now what many Reformed (non-charismatic) believers do is this. They treat this as though one passage can cancel the other one out, and they retreat to the (very emotionally safe) position of “not my will, but thine” be done. And thus they settle into a life of never asking God for anything specific. And when forced into asking for something specific, as when a loved one gets really sick, they spend all their time internally braced for the inevitable nothat they know must be coming.

These passages are addressing two different kinds of situation. The former is when God wants us to be content, and to be resigned to His will. The latter is when He wants us to engage in prayers that are risky.

But how are we to tell the difference? We are to recognize the differing situations by faith, and we are to resign ourselves by faith, and we are to risk by faith. But—we want to know—how can we learn to risk things in prayer? Well, by taking risks there. No, no, we reply. We want to learn how to take risks without actually taking any. It would be lovely to know how to ride a bicycle, and it would be even more lovely to never have a skinned knee.

In the Presence of All the People

God loves it when we give glory to Him. He is not this way because of some kind of megalomania, but rather because He loves what it does in His people when they see, know, and taste His goodness.

One of the things we need to get better at is the practice of boasting in the Lord, bragging on Him when He answered your prayers.

Out to the Limit

Realize that this psalm expresses two things. The first is the extent of his troubles. He was in deep trouble, and in such deep trouble that he spoke hastily about how awful men were. All men are liars. But then God sent our salvation, the man Christ Jesus. God sent a man who was the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6).

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Psalm 115: Shaped by Our Worship of Him

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Introduction

God alone is the God of all glory, and so we must turn to Him to bless Him alone. And when we give glory to Him, He in His divine grace has fashioned the world in such a way as to allow us to be a reflected glory.

This wonderful psalm can be divided into 5 sections. The first is an entreaty for God to vindicate His name (vv. 1-2). The second is a contemptuous dismissal of all idolatry (vv. 3:8), followed by the third which is a strong exhortation to the people of God to trust in their shield (vv. 9-15), and to anticipate great blessings from Him. The basic cosmological map is drawn in v. 16, and then the people are reminded that God must be worshiped in the land of the living (vv. 17-18).

The Text

“Not unto us, O LORD, not unto us, But unto thy name give glory, For thy mercy, and for thy truth’s sake. Wherefore should the heathen say, Where is now their God? But our God is in the heavens: He hath done whatsoever he hath pleased . . .” (Psalm 115:1–18).

Summary of the Text

The psalm begins by rejecting glory—not to us, not to us. Rather glory should go to the name of God (v. 1). Why should the heathen taunt us (v. 2)? Our God dwells over all, and He does whatever He wants (v. 3). Their gods are silver and gold, their own handiwork (v. 4). These idols have all the requisite sense organs, but can’t do anything with them (vv. 5-7). Those who make the idols become like the idols (v. 8). Israel should trust in her shield (v. 9). The house of Aaron should trust in their shield (v. 10). Those who fear the Lord should trust in their shield (v. 11). The Lord will bless all those who do this (v. 12). He will bless those who fear the Lord, whether small and great (v. 13). And if you are a small one, that’s all right because the Lord will increase you more and more (v. 14). You are being blessed by the Lord, the Creator of heaven and earth (v. 15). Heaven belongs to Him, but earth was His gift to us (v. 16). The dead are silenced in their earthly praise (v. 17), but the living will praise Him forever (v. 18). Praise the Lord (hallelujah).

Your Shield and Hiding Place

Idolaters trust in something that is manifestly untrustworthy. The idolatry is capable of shaping the worshiper into something ridiculous, but that is the extent of their magnificent powers.

We, on the other, are enjoined to trust in the Lord. We are to trust in the God who is in the heavens, the one who does whatever He pleases (v. 3). Israel is to trust in the Lord (v. 9). The house of Aaron is to trust in the Lord (v. 10). All who fear God must trust in the Lord (v. 11). All three categories are told to trust in the Lord, the one who is their help and shield. Trust the Lord, trust the Lord, trust the Lord.

Your help and shield, your help and shield, your help and shield.

And do not say in your heart, “Behold, I am but a small fry.” The Lord is mindful of us, and He can see strugglers at the microscopic level. He will bless, He will bless, He will bless—both small and great. If you think you are not big enough to bless, He will make you big enough to bless.

Reflected Glory as Salvation

The eternal destiny of your eternal soul is not so much a matter of where you are going as it is a matter of what you are becoming. And we see the central principle in all of it taught here—you become like what you worship.

Those who fashion deaf, dumb and blind idols are demonstrating how deaf, dumb and blind they already are, and show us all how they are on the path, if possible, to becoming even more like that. Those that make them are like unto them. If you bow down to a grotesque and twisted idol (which is what you are doing if you are not worshiping God the Father in the name of the Son through the power of the Spirit), then you are in the process of becoming just like your grotesque and twisted god.

The principle works in the other direction as well because the human race is an imaging race. We are created reflectors. We were fashioned in the image of God; we reflect the image of God. Because of our sin and rebellion, those mirrors are now pointed at absurd things—which is why they reflect absurd things back.

In regeneration, the shattered mirrors are pieced back together, and are pointed in the right direction again. And what happens?

What will happen when we see Christ as He is? We will become like Him for that reason. “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2).

And what is happening here and now, in our worship of the Father?

“But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Cor. 3:18).

But the mirror cannot reflect this glory properly unless it is pointed away from itself. Not to us, not to us (v. 1). A mirror cannot generate its own light; a mirror is not a lamp. A moon is not a sun. Chase after your own identity, pursue the glory of your own name, and you are like a man carrying a backpack full of mirrors down into a deep cavernous dungeon, a place with no lights, so that you might generate glory that you need not share with any other. And it all works out because nobody wants the kind of glory you can generate down there. But surrender your own identity, surrender your pride in your own name, and when you’ve been there, ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun, you still will not have gotten over it.

Trust in the Lord, your help and shield. What did He say about it? “He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal” (John 12:25).

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Psalm 114: Song of the Exodus

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Introduction

As we continue through the Hallel Psalms, we come to the second of them, and this is a great song of historical remembrance. When we set ourselves to praise God, to say hallelujah, we are to remember His great works of deliverance in history. Keep in mind that the Christian faith is not a faith in detached theological doctrines, but is rather a faith in God’s meaningful interventions in history—His great deeds among the people, deeds rich with theological gold. And so as we consider this song of deliverance from our older brothers, the Jews, we are reminded of an even greater Exodus, the exodus that all other deliverances point to.

The Text

“When Israel went out of Egypt, The house of Jacob from a people of strange language; Judah was his sanctuary, And Israel his dominion. The sea saw it, and fled: Jordan was driven back . . .” (Psalm 114:1–8).

Summary of the Text

The psalm begins with a burst (v. 1). “When Israel came out of Egypt” means that we are talking about the events that were inaugurated by the Red Sea crossing. The house of Jacob went down into Egypt, and did so when Jacob was still alive. Centuries later, they are still the “house of Jacob,” and they come out of Egypt still one family—about two and a half million of them. When they come out, Judah is first and is called God’s sanctuary. Israel is called His kingdom or dominion (v. 2). We then get our first inkling that the poet is treating the entire departure from Egypt and entrance into Canaan as one event, including the key events in between. The sea saw what Judah and Israel were and fled, and the Jordan was also driven back (v. 3). The mountain skipping like rams appears to be a reference to the convulsions that Mt. Sinai (or Horeb) went through (v. 4; Ex. 20:18). We then return to the Red Sea and to the Jordan. What is the matter with you, sea? What is the matter with you, Jordan? (v. 5). The same question is then posed to the mountains that trembled (v. 6). The answer is then given, and it is an obvious answer—the earth should tremble at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob (v. 7). Remember that this means the presence of the God in Jacob (vv. 1-2). He is the one who turned the rock into standing water (Ex. 17:6), the flint into a fountain of waters (v. 8).

The X on the Map

A quick orientation may help. Moving from west to east, picture Egypt, the Red Sea, the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Akaba, and then Arabia. The land of Goshen, where the Israelites were living in Egypt, was in the eastern part of the Nile Delta—up north. Now the traditional view is that Mt. Sinai is located in the southern part of the Sinai Peninsula. But this view has a number of difficulties associated with it, not least being the fact that it was identified as such by that noted archeological authority, Constantine’s mom, Helena. I consequently prefer an alternative view, which is that the mountain of God (Sinai, or Horeb) was in Midian (which is in Arabia). We see this in the burning bush incident (Ex. 3:1), where God told Moses that he would bring the people out of Egypt and back to that particular mountain (Ex. 3:12). Furthermore, the apostle Paul also places Sinai in Arabia (Gal. 4:25)—as do Josephus and Philo. This means that I believe that the Red Sea crossing was a deep-water crossing, somewhere at the northern end of the Gulf of Akaba. And that would make it a miracle with a capital M.

The Misery of Man

When Israel went through the Red Sea, the Lord was present with them. The glory cloud prevented Pharaoh from getting at them until the sea parted (Ex. 14:19-20). On the other end of their wilderness wandering, they had fashioned the ark of the covenant by this time, and so that is how the presence of God was manifested this time, causing the waters of the Jordan to stop flowing (Josh. 3:8).

The next time the mercy seat came down to the Jordan it was to be baptized by John (Matt. 3:13).

The Great Exodus

On the Mount of Transfiguration (which was probably the mountain called Tabor), Jesus met with both Moses and Elijah. Note that this means that after his life was over, Moses didmake it into the promised land. Note also that it meant that Christ was meeting with two men who previously encountered God on Mount Horeb. Moses went up on the mountain there and he met with God (Ex. 19:20). And Elijah fled to Horeb after the showdown on Mt. Carmel (1 Kings 19:8), and it was there that God spoke to him in a still, small voice. But most importantly, what were they talking about on Tabor with Jesus? Luke tells us—they were conversing with Him about the Exodus that He was going to accomplish at Jerusalem (Luke 9:31).

If we are the people of God, then this means that we are His remembrancers. We are to recallwhat He has down for us throughout the entire history of redemption. You have the Table set before you, do you not?

The Presence of the Lord

What is it that gives victory to the people of God? How is it that enemies are turned to flight? How is it that the adversary is abashed? The Red Sea fled when the Red Sea saw the sanctuary was in Judah, and that the kingdom was with Israel. They saw the presence of the Lord, in other words. “Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob” (Psalm 114:7).

In short, if God is present, who can be against us? “What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?” (Rom. 8:31).

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