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God’s People Protected, December 24
The Lord is thy keeper: the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun
shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve
thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul.
Psalm 121:5-7
.
When Christ ceases His intercession in the sanctuary, the unmingled wrath
threatened against those who worship the beast and his image and receive his
mark (
Revelation 14:9, 10
) will be poured out. The plagues upon Egypt when
God was about to deliver Israel were similar in character to those more terrible
and extensive judgments which are to fall upon the world just before the final
deliverance of God’s people....
These plagues are not universal, or the inhabitants of the earth would be wholly
cut off. Yet they will be the most awful scourges that have ever been known to
mortals. All the judgments upon men, prior to the close of probation, have been
mingled with mercy. The pleading blood of Christ has shielded the sinner from
receiving the full measure of his guilt; but in the final judgment, wrath is poured
out unmixed with mercy....
The people of God will not be free from suffering; but while persecuted and
distressed, while they endure privation and suffer for want of food, they will not
be left to perish. That God who cared for Elijah will not pass by one of His self-
sacrificing children. He who numbers the hairs of their head will care for them,
and in time of famine they shall be satisfied. While the wicked are dying from
hunger and pestilence, angels will shield the righteous and supply their wants.
To him that “walketh righteously” is the promise; “Bread shall be given him; his
waters shall be sure” (
Isaiah 33:15, 16
). “When the poor and needy seek water,
and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear them, I
the God of Israel will not forsake them” (
chap. 41:17
).
“Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines,”...
yet shall they that fear Him “rejoice in the Lord” and joy in the God of their
salvation (
Habakkuk 3:17, 18
)....
“The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall
preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul” (
Psalm 121:6, 7
). “He shall
deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence. He
shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust.... Because
thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation;
there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling”
(
Psalm 91:3-10
).—
The Great Controversy, 627-630
.
Those who receive the seal of the living God and are protected in the time of
trouble must reflect the image of Jesus fully.—
Early Writings, 71
.
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