Keep Calm and Trust God
Texts: Psalm 131, Philippians 4:6-7
Pastor Phil Hughes, American Fork Presbyterian Church, Utah
February 11, 2024
Keep Calm and Carry On was a popular sign a few years ago. Easier said than done sometimes. How do you keep calm with all that is going on in our world and in our lives?
There is a prayer which has become somewhat well-known called the Serenity Prayer, which was written by the theologian Reinhold Niebuhr in the 1940’s. It is a prayer that has become vital in the recovery movement. The Serenity Prayer goes like this:
God grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change;
Courage to change the things I can;
And wisdom to know the difference.
Knowing what is beyond us and being OK with it. And then gaining serenity.
Before the Serenity Prayer there was Psalm 131. Psalm 131 is the second shortest of all the psalms. It is a prayer. It is a prayer of someone who has learned how to calm himself at the breast of God. He is not proud nor are his eyes “haughty.” “Haughty” means to be arrogant or conceited.
Sometimes the stress of our lives is caused by reaching above ourselves. We think we have all the answers. We think we are too strong to fail. We think we can control the circumstances. We get a little proud in our own abilities. Enough knowledge and we can do anything. And then when none of that is happening our lives begin to break.
But the psalmist recognizes his limits. He knows there are things too high or too marvelous for him. He has been ambitious about this and that but has learned some things are beyond his reach.
There are things that happen in our lives and we wonder why. And sometimes we don’t know and we will never know. Why this illness and why can’t doctors fix me? Why is this relationship so hard? Why is this world the way it is?
There are limits even in our great age of discovery. There are limits to technology. There are limits to progress. There are limits to science, medicine, and industry. We all have personal limits. I know there are people who know it all and seem to have all the answers. They can tell you what is wrong with the world, how to end the war, how you are supposed to live. Sometimes we can be those people. We can be a little proud.
The psalmist knows his limits. He knows when he is above his head. There are just some things that are too much for him to know. He confesses that there are things that baffle him. He knows how to say, “I don’t know. I may never know. And I rest all of it with God.” He has learned not to spend too much time worrying about these things.
He has gained the serenity to accept what he cannot change and wisdom to know the difference.
The psalmist describes himself as a child on the breast of his mother. When a child is at the breast of his or her mother that child is supported. The child can fully lean on the mother. The child isn’t worried or anxious about life or what is happening because the child trusts the mother. The child becomes calm and quiet.
When a child is crying a mother doesn’t hold the child away. She brings the child close to herself as she rocks and soothes the infant. The child becomes fully content knowing the mother is there, that she will take care of him, and will hold the child.
In the Old Testament God tells Israel how he carried them as a parent carries a child. In Deuteronomy 1:31 the LORD tells Israel how he carried them in the wilderness after they came out of Egypt, “as a father carries his son, all the way you went until you reached this place.”
In Isaiah 46 the LORD says to his people that he has upheld them since their birth and has carried them since they were born.
4 Even to your old age and gray hairs
I am he, I am he who will sustain you.
I have made you and I will carry you;
I will sustain you and I will rescue you.[1]
And so God will carry us. He will hold us. We become calm at the breast of God.
It’s interesting that when it says in Psalm 131, “I am like a weaned child upon its mother” that verse can also very accurately be translated “I am like the weaned child that is with me” suggesting that the psalmist is a mother who knows what it is to hold the calmed infant. Some Bibles will have a footnote recognizing this. And while God is our heavenly Father, he also has qualities of a loving mother.
Note that the Psalmist says he has calmed himself. Has a part to play. Stress comes to all of us. How we choose to face that is up to us. I have tried freaking out. Trust me, it doesn’t make me calm.
Psalm 131 is about us being like a child and calming ourselves upon God in the face of things that are way bigger than us. There are situations, relationships, and experiences that are beyond us. We can’t figure out or understand. We can fully trust God to be in control. And the deeper we can trust God, the quieter our souls will become.
As it says in Isaiah 26:3, “You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you.”
The word for “calm” was a Hebrew word referring to leveling the ground. The calm life is the level life. Stress makes our journey rough. It raises mountains that are hard to climb. It puts things before us that can trip us up. Sometimes it steeply descends into the pits of hard, hard places. Calm is to find level ground in the Lord.
If we become calm it means we were stirred up previously. No reason to become calm if you are already calm. The psalmist was anxious. And it seems to be from his own striving, his own ambitiousness, his own attempts to control life. But he came to God and found rest.
This takes a certain humility. That is one thing an infant has: humility. Jesus used children as models of humble faith. One time when his disciples were lifting their eyes for things too marvelous for them and were in a competition about who was greatest in the kingdom of heaven – which is always a popular game in our world - Jesus “called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.’”[2] From who is the greatest to not even getting in.
A wise friend of mine said that one day he realized that his mind was much too busy and argumentative to know the peace of God. He was always reasoning and worrying and had no time to cultivate that silence in which God speaks. He said the main thing for him became not to know all the answers, but to know God, made real and personal in Jesus. He needed a hunger for his Word and greater love for him. He said, “Theories about when, where, how and why don’t bother me much anymore.” He thinks about such things from time to time, but they don’t hang him up the way they used to.
We all have questions but we don’t always have to have all the answers. Part of knowing the calm that comes with God is living with paradox and mystery. We know some things but in humility we need to acknowledge the mystery of all things. We live amongst things we don’t always fully understand.[3]
One of my favorite phrases is “I don’t know.” And when I can be OK that I don’t have to always know it provides a certain freedom. I can rest more easily in the Lord.
One thing that can cause our souls to panic is our own sin. Sin has a way of pointing a finger right in our faces. It accuses. We know our wrong and we worry we are out of God’s range.
Brennan Manning, was a former Catholic Priest and recovering alcoholic, who wrote so eloquently and clearly about the depth of God’s love. I recommend his books to you. He said that if we wallow in shame or guilt over our failings it shows a distrust in the love of God.
He said that preoccupation with our past sins or present weaknesses shows that we have not accepted the acceptance of Jesus Christ. We don’t trust his redeeming work.
Brennan Manning said, “We simply do not trust that he can handle all that goes on in our minds and hearts” and that “In order to grow in trust, we must allow God to see us and love us precisely as we are.”[4]
God can handle all that goes on in our minds and hearts.
Worry has a way of keeping us occupied with ourselves. Trust has a way of keeping our eyes fixed on God.
There are any number of ways to reach for a state of calm when we are upset. We may need rest. We might need to take a walk. We can do some deep breathing. We can write down what is troubling us or talk to a friend. We can listen to some soothing music. Certainly for the Christian prayer is a gift to lean on God and find calm.
Paul, addressing the anxiety we all experience, writes that we are take our petitions to God in every situation. Every situation, it says. Not just the big things. And we shouldn’t feel like we can’t take the little things. Every situation is worth bringing to our loving Father.
And Paul says that the peace of God, which transcends and passes all understanding, will guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. The word for “guards” in that verse refers to a military sentry keeping post at a doorway. God’s peace is like a guard who won’t let trouble in.
And this peace passes all understanding. We don’t know how we got it. We can’t figure it out. And we don’t raise our eyes too high or try to figure it out. We just receive it in humility, like a trusting child.
But Psalm 131 is much more than just for one person. The final verse says, “Israel, put your hope in the LORD.” It is a call to the entire nation of God’s people. Israel is to hope in purposes of the LORD though all of his purposes may not be seen or understood. The LORD is sovereign. He is provident. He is in control.
One of the favorite verses in the Bible for many people is from Psalm 46, “Be still and know that I am God.” That psalm is about when seas roar and mountains fall and everything seems to be falling apart. And yet the invitation is to be still and know God.
Do you remember the story of the disciples in the boat and a storm whips up and they think they are going to capsize? They cry out to Jesus who is asleep, for gosh sakes, while the waves beat the boat. Jesus gets up and tells the sea to be still. And it says, “Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm.”[5]
God can do that.
You know there is more to the Serenity Prayer than what I quoted earlier. Usually those few lines are all that people know or hear.
God grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change;
Courage to change the things I can;
And wisdom to know the difference.
But here is the rest of the prayer which I find interestingly has largely been edited out by the unbelieving world. The rest of the prayer goes like this:
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
As it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right
If I surrender to His Will;
So that I may be reasonably happy in this life
And supremely happy with Him
Forever and ever in the next.
Our God cares for us like a mother for her child. He knows the world situation. He knows our situations. He knows our need. He knows what concerns you have today. Yes, the world, our lives, lots of things can be crazy. But keep calm. Trust God. Because he is God.
He has us in the storms. He has us in the valleys. He has us in the darkness. He has us when everything around us is stirring us to panic. So like a weaned let us calm our souls in him.
Prayer: Heavenly Father, hold us in this world where so much disturbs us. Give us this gift, the calm that Jesus gives. Thank you that we can hope in you at all times and in all places. Amen.
[1] Is. 46:3-4
[2] Matthew 18:3,4
[3] David Roper, In Quietness and Confidence, pp. 90 and 93
[4] Ruthless Trust, pp.16-17
[5] Mark 4:39