We all need guardian angels. I sure hope I have a whole team, because I need them. And I say to them now, “Sorry, my bad.” The next two verses of Psalms 91 describe the protection God has for us in a beautiful way. These verses opens our eyes to the gentle, loving, care of God our Father for both His Son and those of us who are in Christ through salvation.
Psalm 91:11-13 New International Version (NIV)
11 For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways;
12 they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
13 You will tread on the lion and the cobra;
you will trample the great lion and the serpent.
Read it again. Can you see God our Father speaking to Jesus and telling His Son, “When the time comes to send you to earth, I am going to command My angels to watch over you, to guard you in everything you do, and in every place you go (“all your ways”). The angels will hold you up, so that you won’t hurt yourself; you won’t even trip over a stone.
God’s love and care for His Son is easily seen because He makes sure that His Son knows ahead of time that He will be watching over Jesus every moment, and that is loving. The Father promises that Jesus will be protected and cared for, and that the Father will give Him the power to overcome any wild animals that might attack Him, and that is loving. So our picture of God the Father is of a loving, powerful, careful protector.
But wait! Look again! There is another picture here in theses same verses…like a picture inside the picture of the Father being protective and loving to the Lord.
Let’s look at the words of Scripture very closely. Why do you think that God, when He was writing these verses, chose the lion and the serpent as animals that wouldn’t harm Jesus? Do you remember in the garden of Eden when Satan entered into a serpent? And do you remember that the Scripture says that Satan is like a lion, looking for people to devour? Ohhhh!!! The lion and the adder are word pictures of Satan!
So God is telling Jesus He has protection against Satan himself! And when God tells Him that He will trample the lion and serpent under His feet, He is also promising that Jesus will certainly be victorious over Satan!
Because we can understand what God meant in our verse – that the lion and the serpent really mean Satan, we can see the hidden picture! We see the Son of God standing tall and powerful in our verses! Jesus is much more powerful than just being able to tread down a lion or a snake. Jesus is extremely mighty and able to tread down and to destroy all the power of Satan himself. When Satan tempted Jesus in the wilderness, Jesus overpowered Satan in His thinking and reasoning with him. But at the end of His earthly ministry, He trampled Satan all the way down when He was on the cross. When Jesus was dying and looked most defeated, He was really at the greatest point of His victory over Satan, and evil and death! It is there that God put His enemies under Jesus’ feet! There is another rich and wonderful picture!
Thank you, dear Father, for painting beautiful pictures of You and Your Son in the Word so that we can know you more completely. Thank you, too, for guarding Jesus and us against the Evil One. Thank you for sending Jesus to save us!
Thank you, Lord Jesus, for your great power and glory. Thank you for triumphing over your enemy and ours by dying on the cross, and rising in three days as you said you would!