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Good morning. My name is Pete Butland, and I'm the pastor at West Derby Neighbourhood Church — we used to be West Derby Chapel, and then West Derby Evangelical Church. About three years ago we entered a time of transition, and I became pastor after some years as a primary school teacher (I may have taught some of your kids — I'm sorry).
The name West Derby Neighbourhood Church came from the parable of the Good Samaritan. A man asks Jesus, "Who is my neighbour?" — trying to justify who he helps and loves. Jesus' conclusion is that the neighbour is the one who goes and does. So we realised church isn't a building we come to — our neighbourhood is everywhere we go, and our neighbour is everyone we meet.
About 18 months ago we became part of the Frontline family, and the support since then has been brilliant. It's been so good working with John, and I'm looking forward to working with Jack and Jenny too.
This morning we're looking at Psalm 121.
Father God, we thank you for your word, we thank you for your word Jesus, and we thank you for your scripture. We thank you that when we seek you, we will find you. As we spend time reflecting this morning, would you speak to our hearts, let us be open to hearing from you, and receiving the incredible goodness you have for us. Be present, Lord, by your Spirit, in Jesus' name. Amen.
A few weeks ago I sent some flowers to an elderly distant relative turning 80, using a company called Blossoming Gifts. The flowers were great — but from that moment on, they spammed me daily with emails: special offer, limited time deal, lowest price on chrysanthemums this year. I felt like if I didn't act immediately, my family would think I didn't love them.// I hadn't asked for any of this — except, it turned out, I had.
Has anyone heard of a soft opt-in? If you buy something from a website, they're legally allowed to assume you're interested in everything else they do — and they'll send you all their marketing unless you specifically say no. There's a tick box, already ticked, and you have to actively untick it to opt out. I had to go back into my account and manually unsubscribe.
What has that got to do with Psalm 121? Some of you are already ahead of me.
Look at verses 1 and 2 — I keep circling back to these, particularly verse 2.
"I lift up my eyes to the hills — where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth." (Psalm 121:1-2)
This Psalm is one of the Psalms of Ascent (120–134), believed to have been sung by the people of Israel as they climbed up to the temple to worship — songs of preparation and readiness.
We don't know who wrote this Psalm. If it was David, the reference to hills would make sense — he was a shepherd boy in the hills around Bethlehem. But any author would have been familiar with the hills of Judea, because Judea is a hilly, mountainous region — and because of what went on in those hills.
Those hills were well known for pagan worship, particularly to the goddess Ashera, a goddess of fertility and life, symbolised by trees. Groves would be planted in the hills, strange religious ceremonies and sacrifices would take place, and carvings and figurines would be shaped in her image. People would also worship gods of the sun and moon — which is why later in this Psalm we read that the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. There was real, felt danger in daytime and night-time, and people made offerings to ward it off.
So the psalmist looks at the hills and wonders: where does my help come from? Could it be from up there, where everyone else seems to find theirs?
Time and again in the Old Testament, the people of Israel took on the culture around them. They compromised their relationship with God — not usually by consciously rejecting him, but by drifting. It was rarely a deliberate turning away; it was more a case of everyone else is doing it, it can't do any harm, can it? They mindlessly went with the flow.
Scripture tells us they worshipped Baal, they worshipped Ashera, they made themselves a golden calf, they worshipped the gods of Syria, Zidon, Moab, and the Philistines. This Psalm is a warning against exactly that kind of drift.
The hills haven't got the answer. You can look to what everyone else is doing, but you won't find it there.
I think there's an emphasis in verse 2 worth noticing:
"My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth."
It's personal. You can look wherever you like — but for me, my help comes from the Lord. What a privilege, what a gift, that we get to say that. Not something we have to beg for — we have the right to declare it.
There are so many strongholds in this world, but I believe most of them are, in and of themselves, neutral. They only take power when we give them permission to have power over us. So we have to consciously say: I speak Jesus over this. I am not giving this permission to influence me — because my help comes from the Lord.
Eugene Peterson, in his paraphrase of Romans 12:2 in The Message, writes:
"Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God."
That's exactly what this Psalm is about.
We're about six weeks from a general election. You might have a strong political affiliation — in Liverpool there tends to be one party we really don't like and one we definitely do. But we need to be careful.
A study in the USA looked at a group of Christians and their political affiliation. Initially, their Christian convictions shaped which party they joined. But over time, it reversed — their political affiliation began shaping them far more than their faith in Jesus. Those who joined one party over an anti-abortion stance drifted into being pro-guns and Christian nationalists. Those who joined another party over social justice concerns drifted into an unthinking liberalism. In both cases, their actions became increasingly shaped by politics rather than by Jesus. They did the soft opt-in without paying attention, and lost sight of him.// 加 Brian Zahnd, a pastor and writer, says our primary political affiliation must be to Jesus Christ first and foremost. We won't find a party or candidate that perfectly matches him — there is no one who compares to Christ. We find the best fit we can, but we don't let everything that comes with that party influence us beyond that.
Where does my help come from? Not from a prime minister, an MP, a political party, or an ideology. Politics is neutral until we let it have power over us. If we start with Jesus, seeking his voice and his heart for a broken world, then when we come to mark that ballot, we'll know how to vote.
As I've been praying and preparing, the word diagnosis kept coming back to me. I wonder if this is for someone here.
Maybe you or someone you love has received a diagnosis — life-altering, or life-limiting. There's a lot of information out there, and not all of it is bad; we should take what's good. But over that diagnosis, we're called to declare: my help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.
This Psalm says he will never let our foot slip, never let us stumble or come to harm. That doesn't mean life won't happen to us — a broken world does what it does. But he walks with us through it, shows us the path, and if we do stumble, he picks us up and leads us on again.
And if you're waiting for a diagnosis — Google can be a wonderful thing, and a terrible thing. We can research ourselves into fear and anxiety while we wait. But in that waiting, we get to decide what has influence over us: the fear of the worst, or gratitude and trust, even without answers yet.
God never causes us to stumble, but there will be times we do. The path in front of us might look certain — I know where I'm going, I know what to do here — and then it turns out that wasn't the right way after all. We're never promised an easy journey.
All of us have stories of God's faithfulness, his provision, sometimes his miraculous intervention. Sometimes it takes honest soul-searching to see it — but it's there. He is worthy of us looking only to him for help, because he never lets us down. Taste and see how gracious I am — try me out.
As we come to respond this morning, I want us to think about one hill in particular — the one hill where we truly find our help: Calvary.
That is where God himself — Jesus, God in human skin — surrendered his life, died an awful death, and suffered, for you and for me. So that all the noise around us — everything that overwhelms us, occupies our thinking, distracts and distorts our view of the world — we can push aside and say: no, not for me, because my help comes from the Lord.
And then he came roaring back. Death is no longer to be feared. Sin no longer has any hold over us. We can lift our eyes to the hill of Calvary, and there we find grace, mercy, forgiveness, peace, joy, and unconditional love, poured down like a river.
There are so many voices, so many sources that want authority and influence over us — and we need to actively, deliberately say no, not for me. And the good news is: if you've stumbled down that path already, overwhelmed by all of it, it's never too late to go back into the settings and say, unsubscribe — no thank you — and speak Jesus' name over those things instead.
As we enter a time of worship, communion is available, and it's a wonderful way to respond this morning — to declare over ourselves that my help comes from the Lord. Prayer ministry will also be available. If the Spirit is speaking to you, don't let it pass — seek his ministry.
