Psalm 121:4 Behold, He who keeps Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.
During the Battle of Britain, the German Luftwaffe rained down about thirty-five thousand bombs upon London during nightly air raids, causing terrifying fear and tremendous destruction and mayhem in large parts of London.
For months, as sirens wailed out warnings of approaching German bombers, the general population automatically hurried toward the nearest Air Raid Shelter! People learned to look after one another during the nightly raids and the ‘morning after’ walkabouts and clean-ups.
After a terrible night of bombardment, an elderly woman was not seen in a certain neighborhood for several days. Her neighbors assumed that she had either been killed by the falling bombs or that she had gone to the countryside to escape the danger, disruption of life, and incessant noise.
Sometime later, a neighbor spotted the elderly woman walking down the street and articulated his happiness that she was alive and well.
“It’s nice to see you back”, he said.
“I have not been away”, she replied.
“Where have you been?” he asked.
“I’ve been at home,” said the woman.
“What have you been doing at home during the air raids?” inquired the neighbor.
“Sleeping,” she answered.
“How could you sleep with all the noise and explosions?” he asked.
“Oh”, she replied, I was reading my Bible and found Psalms 121:4 where it declares that God doesn’t slumber nor sleep, so I thought there was no point in both of us staying awake.”
As the world gets more chaotic during these last days as fear abounds, may the Lord grant you the ability to rest in Him for truly He neither slumbers nor sleeps as He watches over you!
Copyright 1999-2025 Worthy Devotions. This devotional was originally published on Worthy Devotions and was reproduced with permission.
How to display the above article within the Worthy Suite WordPress Plugin.
[worthy_plugins_devotion_single_body]Most people reading this passage tend to focus in on the fruit that is produced. Okay…But a closer look will reveal that the Lord is really focusing on the tree. The fruit merely demonstrates the quality of the tree. We have all encountered this: there are trees whose fruit is healthy and delicious, and there are trees whose fruit is scarcely edible, or even useless.
One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on in every person. He said, “My son, the battle is between two ‘wolves’. One is evil — it is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego. The other is good…
There’s an interesting story about the great English actor, Macready. A respected preacher once asked him, “I wish you would explain something to me.”
We live in a day and age that everywhere we turn, there’s a “self-help” theory. Books, videos and dvds, websites, world-renown speakers, you name it — all dedicated to helping us “feel good about ourselves”. Yet somehow, still many of us struggle with self-consciousness, even as Christians!
Early in the last century, sculptor Gutzon Borglum gazed at the cliffs of South Dakota’s Black Hills. As any great artist would, He saw what no one else could the sculpted faces of US presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt. After 14 years, he finally completed his project — Mount Rushmore.
Counselors, encouragers, and people who offer care to others often encounter those whose past failures threaten to define them and hinder their development, healing, and sanctification. Our enemy capitalizes on our failures and regrets, pressing home the current influence of what we could have, would have, or should have done, if only we were wiser, more courageous, honest, or godly.
A careful reading through the life of the Apostle Paul will yield insight concerning those who surrounded him. In this brief devotion, I want to focus on two of Paul’s friends — Luke and Demas.