Refuge While the Ground Shakes

Psalm 46:1-3 · open the passage to read it whole

The psalm calls God a refuge and strength, then describes the earth giving way and the mountains falling into the sea. The help is called a very present help in trouble, so the promise is set inside the danger rather than after it.

• What Scripture says

  Help is described as present in trouble, and the trouble is still being described in the next two verses.

  Psalm 46:1-2

• What Scripture says

  A river is set against the roaring sea, and the city it gladdens is where God dwells.

  Psalm 46:4-5

• What Scripture says

  Be still is spoken while nations rage and kingdoms are moved, so it is a command given inside a war.

  Psalm 46:6-10

• What Scripture does not tell us

  Scripture does not name the historical crisis behind this psalm, so any particular siege we picture is our reconstruction rather than the psalm's statement.

  Psalm 46:1

• Psalm 46:7

  The refrain, and what it repeats about who is with them.

• Isaiah 8:9-10

  The same name, God with us, set against raging nations.

• Matthew 8:26

  Christ speaking to a sea that behaves like Psalm 46:3.

Each question opens into Scripture rather than into an answer.

• Where does the psalm place God's help in relation to the danger?›

  Look in Scripture

  • Psalm 46:1-3
  • Psalm 46:7

  Read verse 1 and then verses 2 and 3 without stopping. Ask whether the danger has ended by the time help is promised, and what the refrain in verse 7 adds.

• What is happening around the command to be still?›

  Look in Scripture

  • Psalm 46:6
  • Psalm 46:8-10

  Read the verses either side of verse 10. Notice who is being addressed and what God says he will do among the nations.

• God is a present help while the trouble lasts.

  Psalm 46:1

• The Lord of hosts is with his people.

  Psalm 46:7

• God will be exalted among the nations.

  Psalm 46:10

God, you are called a present help, and I have been praying as though you were far off. I bring you the thing that is shaking, without tidying it first. Be my refuge while it shakes. Amen.

Name one thing that is unsteady today, then read Psalm 46:1-3 over it and pray the refrain of verse 7 as it stands.