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In regard to Numb. 14: 31-33, viz.:
"But your little ones, which ye said should be a prey, them will I bring in, and they
shall know the land which ye have despised . . . . . Your children shall wander in the
wilderness forty years . . . . . until your carcasses be wasted in the wilderness."
the following should be compared:
"Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night, nor for the arrow that flieth by day:
nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness: nor for the destruction that wasteth at
noon-day. A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it
shall not come nigh thee" (Psa. 91:).
The first of these psalms opens with the glorious words:
"Lord, Thou has been our dwelling-place in all generations. Before the mountains
were brought forth, or ever Thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from
everlasting to everlasting, Thou art God" (Psa. 90: 1, 2).
This is a great, unalterable doctrinal fact. It extends beyond the possibilities of human
experience, for it goes back to the beginning of creation, and concerns the very Being of
God. Doctrine is essential, for without it we cannot build or grow, but it is one thing to
subscribe to the "doctrine" of Psalm 90:--the children who fell in the wilderness
probably believed its truth--and quite another to enter into the truth experimentally. It is
this kind of difference that we find when we compare the opening of Psalm 90: with
Psalm 91: The latter does not take us back to a time before the creation, but deals with
the immediate present:
"He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of
the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress, my God; in Him
will I trust" (Psa. 91: 1, 2).
"Dwell", "abide", "say", "my", "trust".
This is clearly experimental truth.
The same note is again evident in verses 9 and 10.
"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 tent"
(Psa. 91: 9,10).
The change of person may be accounted for if we regard Moses as addressing Joshua
in the first place, and through him all who "wholly follow" the Lord (Deut. 1: 36).
Here then is the Refuge provided for all who "trust", for all who "abide", for all who
"dwell". Such are "covered with His feathers", and protected by His stretched-out
"wings".