The Lord is Our Dwelling Place

Psalm 90
December 19, 2021
Abraham Hong

Sermon Script

Dear Highland, I begin by reminding you of glorious things. Soon and very soon, we will go home. Our home is the kingdom of the new heavens and new earth. Our home is a time and a place of eternal resurrection life without sin and without suffering and without death. Our home is the holy city, the New Jerusalem. Our home is a relationship with God in which he will dwell with us, and we will be his people, and God himself will be with us as our God. Our home is seeing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ face to face. This is our true home. We will soon be home.

But until that day comes, we must wait to go home. And so that makes us pilgrims. We are sojourners through a wilderness. The Bible teaches us that we are strangers and exiles on this old and fading earth. This is who we are. This is what we are doing. We are waiting to go home. We are homesick.

And Psalm 90 is a psalm for believers in Christ who are homesick for him.

Psalm 90 is a prayer of Moses. It was not written literally by Moses himself. But it was written poetically using his voice. It was designed to recall the story of Moses and the nation of Israel in the book of Exodus. Do you remember the story? God delivered Israel from Egypt. With Moses as their leader, God brought Israel through the wilderness to the Promised Land. And God did all of this to bring them home. He did it so that he would dwell with them. He did it so that they would dwell with him. The entire story was a beautiful picture of ultimate deliverance - deliverance from sin and from death. And it was a glorious foreshadowing of ultimate home - home with God.

This is why Psalm 90 opens with these majestic words in verse 1: “Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations.” This declaration is profound. Psalm 90 is the beginning of the fourth section in the entire book of Psalms. And it picks up where Psalm 89 ends. But how does Psalm 89 and the third section of the entire book of Psalms end? It ends with these monumentally heartbreaking questions: “How long, O LORD? Will you hide yourself forever? How long will your wrath burn like fire? What man can live and never see death? Who can deliver his soul from the power of Sheol? Lord, where is your steadfast love of old, which by your faithfulness you swore to David?” The bad news here is very bad. It looked as if God had abandoned his people. Whether it was King David going through suffering and losing his throne to his enemies or whether it was Jerusalem losing her place on the map and going through exile, it seemed that God was not with us. That his covenant promises would not come true. That his love was not real. Psalm 89 and the third section of the entire book of Psalms ends with this crisis. And many times in our lives in these last days, we ask the same heartbreaking questions. We are not sure if we are going to arrive home. But Psalm 90 is a profound declaration of faith. Our home is God himself. Jesus is our life. We are united with him. The Lord is our dwelling place.

Dear Highland, let us therefore remember what our true home is. Home is having a relationship with God. The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. You were created to worship God and have a blessed relationship with him. That is your ultimate purpose. That is your true home. The Lord is your dwelling place. And home is being united with Christ Jesus. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. The Lord is your dwelling place. Jesus redeemed you from sin and from death. And now you belong with body and soul, both in life and in death, to your faithful Savior Jesus Christ. You are united with Jesus. Jesus is your true home. The Lord is your dwelling place. So when you are homesick, when you go through sufferings and trials, when there are enemies against you, when you are not sure about God’s faithfulness and love, remember that the Lord is your dwelling place.

And the Lord, who is your dwelling place, does not change. God does not change. This is one of the most underrated and neglected truths about God in the hearts and minds of believers. In verses 2-6 of today’s psalm, Moses considers how God is eternal and therefore unchanging. Before creation, before the mountains that look like they were there since the beginning, before anything existed in time and in space, God was God. From everlasting to everlasting, God is God. And Moses considers the contrasting truth about how man is changeable. We are returned to dust. We are swept away as with a flood. We are like a dream. We are like grass that flourishes and renews in the morning and fades and withers in the evening. All of this is a revelation and a declaration of a fundamental truth about God. God is eternal. He transcends his creation. He is uncreated. To be created is to be changeable. God does not change. The Lord, who is our dwelling place, does not change.

And dear Highland, this is the payoff. Because God is eternal, his covenant promises to us are eternal. God does not and God will not change his salvation of us. There is no way in which we are not condemned anymore for our sins and then somehow re-condemned again. No one will snatch us out of Jesus’ strong and mighty hand (John 10:27-28). Neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8:37-39). Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures (James 1:17-18). Let us therefore know and believe that the Lord is our dwelling place… in all generations. He always will be. He will never leave us nor forsake us. Our home with God is immoveable and unshakeable.

But this does not mean that we are now free to sin and do whatever we want. In verses 7-11 of today’s psalm, Moses’ prayer recalls the sad story about how Israel sinned against God over and over again in the wilderness. Israel wanted to go back to Egypt. Israel made idols and worshipped them instead of worshipping God. Israel complained and grumbled and rebelled against God and put him to the test. Israel indulged in sexual immorality. Israel did not want to go home. God brought his anger and wrath upon them because of their iniquities and their secret sins. And the first generation of the nation of Israel, including Moses himself, did not enter the Promised Land. They did not arrive home. This ought to make us work out our salvation with fear and trembling. How can we turn back to Egypt after all that God has done for us? God’s promises in his covenant of grace are so wonderful and glorious. Jesus took all the anger and wrath and judgment for our sins. We have a new home with the Lord. And the Lord is holy, holy, holy. Therefore, we ought to be holy as well. Because he is our dwelling place.

Dear Highland, let us therefore put away our iniquities and put to death our secret sins. We need to consider the power of God’s anger. We need to fear the Lord. Soon and very soon the Lord will return. And let us therefore be wise. The years of our lives are numbered. Back then, people lives seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty years before they died. Ask God to teach you to number you days. Ask God to give you a heart of wisdom as you put off sin, as you grow in righteousness and holiness, and as you prepare to come home to be with the Lord. Scoffers will say, “Where is the promise of Jesus’ coming?” And we might be tempted to forget about the big picture and the coming judgment of Christ. But do not overlook this one fact, Highland, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day (Psalm 90:4). The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness. Rather, he is patient. And he is giving people time to repent. But then the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. Therefore, we ought to live lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, waiting for the new heavens and new earth in which righteousness dwells (2 Peter 3), waiting for our dwelling place, waiting for our home with the Lord.

As the psalm closes in verses 13-17, Moses’ prayer ends with many requests to God. He asks God to return to his people and satisfy them with his steadfast love. He asks God to make them glad. He asks God to make his work and his power known to his people. He asks God for his favor to be upon them. And he asks God to establish the work of their hands. That is a lot of prayer requests. But our God is good and he is able to answer such requests.

Dear Highland, with the little time that we have left, let us do our best for the Lord. Use your short life. Use it for God’s glory. Moses made his requests to God with this kind of heart and mind. He wanted the joy of salvation. He wanted to be a servant for God and for others. He wanted to work for the Lord. This is what homesick believers do. What about you?

Soli Deo Gloria