"God is our refuge and strength,
a very present help in time of trouble.
Therefore we will not fear,
though the earth should change,
though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea;
though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains tremble with its tumult." [Psalm 46:1-3]
Let's get the promise straight: God is our refuge through trouble, not our hall-pass or get-out-of-jail-free-card to avoid trouble altogether.
The difference is important. God's love for us endures and sees us through the times when everything else in our lives feels like it's been shaken to its core. But that is not the same thing as saying, "If you believe in God, nothing in your life will ever get shaken like that in the first place." It does. Sometimes everything else comes crumbling down, and sometimes the waters really do rage and roar. Sometimes the things we thought were solid and unchanging buckle under pressure, and that reality does not mean God's love has faltered, faded, or given out on us. It means that God's love is not bound to the durability of anything else in our lives. There is no fine print, no expiration date, no set of cleverly-worded loopholes, and no escape clauses for God to squirm out of enduring it all with us. God's love doesn't keep us out of the turmoil and tumult--it holds us safe through all of that, like a castle, a fortress, or... a refuge.
These verses from Psalm 46, which many of us heard in worship this past Sunday for Reformation Sunday (or maybe even sang in paraphrase form, if you sang "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God"), offer a beautiful and comforting image that way. God is depicted as a "refuge," or like a "stronghold," or even an ancient walled city inside of which people can be safe from whatever dangers are whirling around beyond it. The idea, of course, is that we are held within the protection of those castle walls, but of course, the fortress takes the pummeling from whatever is outside. Earthquakes or landslides? The fortress will keep us from being swallowed up by tumbling mountains. Swirling seas or raging storms? The fortress will absorb the fury of the wind and the waves. Enemies with flaming arrows or catapulted projectiles? They will hit the castle in which we have taken refuge, so that we are held safe because we have fled there for protection. It's a beautiful image of God's willingness to take the hit for us, but it also means acknowledging that there will be times when all other defenses have failed and no other shelter is reliable. And we will find ourselves as refugees seeking a safe place within the embrace of a God who welcomes people from out on the margins, outlands, and unsafe places on the edges to be gathered inside.
I suppose that's the implication of calling God our "refuge"--it means we're going to find ourselves in the position of refugees at some point and in some way in our lives. There will be times that the other things we had counted on for security (we don't have to list them all, but our money and investments, our property and possessions, our health and if we're lucky our health-care, and our relative insulation from the hardships of the world) fail on us. And when that happens, the Scriptures point us to God's love as a safe place to find shelter, like townspeople hiding inside the castle walls of a fortress while the war rages outside the gates. That's the picture: God is the castle who bears the incoming arrows and projectiles of the attacking enemy outside the walls, the one whose love endures all the bombardment and bears the damage for our sake. God is the shelter when the storm comes... but that is different than saying it will never rain. It's like that achingly beautiful lyric of Leonard Cohen, "Every heart, every heart, to love will come--but like a refugee."
It's important for our faith to get this clear, both to make sure we're not imagining Christianity as some kind of silver bullet or magic charm that keeps bad things from happening to us, but also because it reminds us that God is willing to bear the fury of whatever trouble or turmoil is swirling around us. The image of a refuge is exactly that of a place that gets beaten by the wind and hail so the people under its shelter are not hurt, or the walls of the fortress that keep the people inside safe from fiery arrows by absorbing their impact into its own stone. To say that God's love endures means that God is willing to bear all that damage and destruction for our sake. And that also means that, if you find yourself going through a time of stress and storm, it's not a sign that God has failed you or abandoned you. It means God is willing to go through it with you and bear the trouble along with you while you go through it.
Someone you cross paths with this week needs to hear that. Someone you will talk with could use the reminder that God will be with them through their storm at the moment. Someone you can check in with might just need your voice assuring them that if they feel like a refugee, fleeing from trouble to find some place to shelter them, that God has already signed up to be our refuge.
Whatever comes today, that's the promise of God. Whatever comes, God is our refuge and strength. That's good news for refugees--if only we can dare to admit that's what we are.
Lord God, help us today with the troubles roaring around us and in the world, and be a refuge for all who are in need of shelter from harm today.
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