In Time of Trouble

GOLDEN TEXT: “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” —Psalm 46:1

PSALM 142; 46:1-3,10,11

PSALM 142 is thought to be a prayer of David while hiding from Saul in the cave of Adullam. (I Sam. 22:1) It is a cry to the Lord for help in a time of great need. The last verse of the Psalm reveals David’s confidence that God would answer his prayer—“For thou shalt deal bountifully with me.” This closing verse of the Psalm also indicates the Psalmist’s motive in thus praying for deliverance. It was that he might praise the Lord.

The praise and honor of the Lord should be the motive for all our prayers. Prayers which seek blessings merely to gratify ourselves are not favorably heard by God. James wrote, “Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.” (James 4:3) In other words, all selfish praying is asking “amiss.” David’s prayer sought the honor and praise of his God, so the Lord heard it and delivered him.

God has always been the refuge and strength of his people, and they have always been in special need of his protecting care. When pronouncing sentence upon our first parents because of their disobedience to his law, the Lord said that he would place enmity between the seed of the woman—The Christ—and the seed of the serpent—all those who have, knowingly or unknowingly, been his servants and, as such, have been the persecutors of the Lord’s people.

Because of this enmity, the servants of God have always been a persecuted people. Satan did not know just who would constitute the “seed” of the woman, so he has persecuted all in every age upon whom God has manifested his blessing. It was in the divine plan that Jesus should die for the sin-cursed world, but it was the enmity of Satan that led to his death. His followers since have also been the special targets of the Adversary.

But in all their tribulation God has been their refuge and strength. The Lord has not promised to spare his people from trial, but he has promised to sustain them in their trouble, to be their “refuge and strength.” This has always been true, but we think that our Golden Text and its context has reference to a special “trouble” which was to be experienced at a certain time in the outworking of the divine plan; namely, at this end of the age.

It is, we think, the great “time of trouble” foretold by the Prophet Daniel in chapter 12, verse 1 of his prophecy. Jesus quoted this prophecy and applied it to the end of the present age and to the time of his second presence. He calls it “great tribulation.” (Matt. 24:21,22) In Luke 21:24-26, Jesus likens this tribulation to the roaring of the sea and waves, and tells us that because of it, men’s hearts would fail them for fear.

Our lesson refers to this time of fear, and to the time when the “waters thereof shall roar and be troubled,” but says that “we will not fear [at this time when the hearts of the whole world are filled with fear] though the [symbolic] earth be removed, and though the [symbolic] mountains be carried into the midst of the [symbolic] sea.” The Lord’s people do not fear because they know that he is their refuge and strength in this “time of trouble.”

One of the special means by which the Lord strengthens his people at this time is by enlightening them concerning his plans and purposes, enabling them to understand the meaning of world events with which they are surrounded. To the unenlightened world these calamities spell the doom of civilization; but because of the truth the Lord’s people see them as the precursors of the long-promised kingdom of Christ.

Jesus told his followers that when they saw these things beginning to come to pass upon the earth, they were to look up, and lift up their heads; because their deliverance would be near—their deliverance, that is, from this present evil world, and their exaltation with him in the kingdom. (Luke 21:28) Verse 5 of the 46th Psalm gives us the same assurance. While the symbolic earth might be removed, and the “mountains” carried into the midst of the sea, “she [the true church] shall not be moved,” and the promise further is that the Lord will help her, that is, deliver her in the dawning of the morning (see margin).

The psalm continues by depicting in more detail the effects of the “time of trouble” upon the nations, showing that great desolations will be inflicted upon man’s selfish social order with the objective of making “wars to cease unto the end of the earth.” But finally, when this great plowshare of trouble upon the nations shall have accomplished the purpose designed by God, the voice of divine authority will be heard saying, “Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen [nations], I will be exalted in the earth.”

QUESTIONS

What were the circumstances under which the 142nd Psalm was written?

What is the proper motive for effective prayer?

Why have the Lord’s people always been a people of trouble?

What particular trouble seems to be referred to in our Golden Text?

What are some of the similarities between this Psalm and the prophecy of Jesus pertaining to the end of the age?

How has the Lord been the “refuge” of his people in this “time of trouble,” and how will he “help” them in the dawning of the morning?

When will the nations hear the command, “Be still, and know that I am God”?

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