Psalms 125:2

So the Lord is round about His people.

The Divine protection

The 125th Psalm is of the returning exiles. They are only about fifty thousand. They have made the difficult journey across the desert sands. They have reached Jerusalem. It is an utter ruin--walls levelled, Temple destroyed, everything in confusion. There are Samaritan enemies, too, and all sorts of obstacles, as they set about the enormous task of rebuilding, reorganizing. How unable, defence-less, they seem to themselves! But if, to-day, one stands in what was the Temple area at Jerusalem and looks about him, he will see, rising above him and around him, on the east the Mount of Olives; on the south, the Hill of Evil Counsel; on the west, the ridge beyond the valley of Jehoshaphat; on the north, the high ground about Scopas--all these loftier than Jerusalem. Well, one day the singer of this psalm did stand there amid the ruined Jerusalem, did feel his own helplessness and shetterlessness; but, seeing how Jerusalem was girded by the higher hills, he saw the only real refuge for helpless and shelterless man anywhere, viz. in God; and, getting figure for his trust in what he saw, he bravely sang: “As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about His people from henceforth even for ever.” Think, then, of the Divine protection of man, helpless and shelterless in himself.

I. God stands about His people, as the mountains do about Jerusalem, with protecting atonement of sin.

II. God stands about His people, as the mountains do about Jerusalem, with the protection of discipline administered with infinite and loving wisdom. For a forgiven man is by no means a perfect man.

III. God stands about His people, as the mountains do about Jerusalem, with the protection of proffered help for the daily duty.

IV. God stands about His people, as the mountains do about Jerusalem, with the protection of a final and triumphant deliverance. (W. Hoyt, D. D.)

The security of the Church

I. The Church as a whole is secured by God beyond the reach of harm. She is ably garrisoned by Omnipotence, and she is castled within the faithful engagements of the covenant. How often has the Church been attacked; but how often has she been victorious! The number of her battles is just the number of her victories. Foes have come against her; they have compassed her about, but in the name of God she has destroyed them.

1. Persecution has unsheathed its sword, and sought to rend up the Church by its roots, or fell it with its axe. Tyrants have heated their furnaces, have prepared their racks, have erected their stakes. But has the Church been subdued?

2. But by and by the devil grew wiser. He saw that overt persecution would not suffice for the putting down of God’s Church, and he therefore adopted another measure not less cruel but more crafty. “I will not only slay them,” said he, “I will malign them.” Did you ever read in history the horrible reports which were set afloat in the early ages of Christianity concerning the Christians? Never were men so fearfully belied. The very heathens, who revelled in vice, despised the followers of Jesus on account of crimes which the voice of the liar had laid to their charge. A few years elapsed and the mud which had been cast upon the snow-white garments of Christ’s Church fell off from them, leaving them whiter than before. But the devil has adopted the same plan in every period. But has the Church suffered through their slander, or hath ever a solitary Christian lost aught by it? No; the Lord God who set the mountains round about Jerusalem has so put Himself about His people, that no weapon that is formed against us shall prosper, and every tongue that riseth against us in judgment we shall condemn.

3. Again Satan learned wisdom, and he said, “Now, inasmuch as I cannot destroy this people, neither by sword nor slander, lo, this will I do; I will send into their midst wolves in sheep’s clothing; I will inspire divers heretics, carried away by their own lusts, who shall in the midst of the Church promulgate lies and prophesy smooth things in the name of the Lord. And Satan has done all this with a vengeance. In every era of the Church there have been numberless bands of heretics. Now, this is one of the attempts of the enemy to put down the truth; but he will never be able to do it, for “As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about His people from henceforth even for ever.”

4. The craftiest invention of the devil, with which he seeks, in the last place, to put out the Church, is a device which has amazed me above every ether. “Now,” says Satan, “if I can quench the Church, neither by persecution, nor slander, nor heresy, I will invent another mode of destroying her.” And I have often marvelled at the depths of deceit which are centred in this last invention of Satan. Satan seeks to divide the Church, to set us apart from one another, and not allow those who love the same truth to meet with each other and to work together in love, and peace, and harmony. But, despite all this, the Church is secure, for God hath set Himself round about her “even as the mountains,” etc.

II. The fact which relates to the Church includes in it every member of the Church. God has fortressed His people; so that every believer is infallibly secure. The Christian is fortified and secured from all harm. And yet, O child of God, there be many that will seek to destroy thee, and thy fears will often tell thee that thou art in the jaws of the enemy.

1. Providence will often seem against thee, thine eyes shall be seldom dry; it may be funeral shall follow funeral; loss shall follow loss; a burning house shall be succeeded by a blasted crop. The Christian in this world is not secured against the perils which happen to manhood. Oh! child of God, it may seem that all things are against thee; perhaps all God’s waves and billows will go over thee; but, oh I remember, that neither famine, nor hunger, nor poverty, nor sickness, nor weakness, nor contempt, can separate thee from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus thy Lord.

2. Again, you may be tempted by the world; traps may be set for you on every hand, you may be tempted by your flesh; your corruptions may have great power over you, and often stagger your faith, and make you tremble, lest you should be utterly overthrown, and the devil may set upon you with fiery darts; he may pierce you with foul insinuations, he may almost make you blaspheme, and with terrible suggestions he may drive you well-nigh to despair.

3. And thou mayest, too, be overcome by sin. Thou mayest fall. Conscience will whisper, “How couldst thou be a child of God, and yet sin thus?” And Satan will howl in thine ears, “He that sinneth knoweth not God.” And so thou wilt be ready to be destroyed by thy sin. But do thou then, in the hour of thy dark distress, read this verse--“As the mountains,” etc. (C. H. Spurgeon.)