Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray with Me”.
As the Coronavirus pandemic escalates in Europe and North America, I turn to Psalm 91. Here’s what it offers me.
As a psalm of trust in God, it opens with powerful images:
The one who lives in the shelter of the Most High,
will rest at night under his shadow (v. 1). *
Say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress,
my God in whom I trust.”
Surely he will save you from the hunter’s snare
and from the deadly pandemic (vv. 2-3).
The psalm continues with these pictures of God’s protection:
He will cover you with his feathers,
and under his wings you will find refuge;
His faithfulness will be your shield (v. 4).
In World War II, when my father was a medic in the Philippines, a wasting disease ran through the troops. My father took these verses from Psalm 91 for his comfort and protection:
I will not fear the terror of night,
nor the arrow that flies by day,
nor the disease that stalks in the darkness
nor the epidemic that destroys at noon.
A thousand may die at your side,
ten thousand at your right hand,
but it will not come near you (vv. 5-7).
God kept my father from the disease and protected his life in the war. Twenty years later, mid-way through his fifties, he got cancer and turned to Psalm 91 again, this time to God’s promise:
You will call on me and I will answer;
I will be with you in trouble,
I will deliver you and honor you.
With long life will I satisfy you
and show you my salvation (vv. 15-16).
After a cancer operation and radiation my father lived the rest of his life cancer-free. When he died at age 78, with tears in my eyes I read Psalm 91 at his funeral from his worn King James Bible.
Today, in the Coronavirus pandemic, I turn to Psalm 91 because it brings me home to my father’s faith and to my own. God was with my father in his times of trouble–the Great Depression in the 1930’s, World War in the 1940’s, and cancer in the 1960’s. God is my refuge too. He will see me through the plunging stock market, the raging pandemic, the social distancing, and the changed world that emerges.
Let’s pray.
Our father, we pray parts of Psalm 91.
We live in your shelter
and spend our nights in your shadow.
In times of trouble we run to you for refuge,
we trust you with our lives.
Save us from the hunter’s snare,
from the deadly pandemic.
Cover us with your feathers,
Protect us under your wings, so that
we will not fear the terrors of night,
nor the arrow that flies by day,
nor the disease that stalks in the darkness
nor the plague that strikes at noon.
Thank you for your promise to us:
Because we love you, you will rescue us.
You will protect us because we acknowledge your name.
You say to us:
Call on me and I will answer you
I will be with you in trouble,
I will deliver you and honor you.
With long life will I satisfy you
and show you my salvation.
Amen.
I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”.
- See Alter, Robert. The Book of Psalms: A Translation with Commentary. (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2007. 91:1) for translating verse 1b as a night image.
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