What’s In A Name?, Pt. 21: YHWH El Sali
Psalm 18:1 1I love you, LORD, my strength [El Sali]. 2The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.
Psalm 46:1-3 1God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.
Isaiah 40:31 31but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary; they will walk and not be faint.
2Samuel 22:47 The LORD lives! Praise be to my Rock [El Sali]! Exalted be my God, the Rock, my Savior!
El Sali (el saw-lee) means strength or rock, and I imagine many believers would find it easy to understand God as our rock in terms of protection against physical attack. In the history of the Church many martyrs have given up their lives in horrible ways rather than deny their faith in their Lord Jesus Christ. Such things happen even today in pagan countries where identification as a believer is essentially a death sentence.
But there are more pernicious threats to believers these days, especially in the Western Church. Here I’m speaking of mass media, societal paradigm shifts, and the dichotomy of religion versus science which so require a dependence on the strength of God to withstand. We live in what is called a post-Christian society; Satan has done an effective job of deceiving the average person into believing God is no longer effective, or worse, that God no longer exists. This idea that God is dead arose in the early 1960’s as a way of expressing the idea that God was irrelevant to modern culture. But it is no small coincidence that just a few years later in the late 60’s (and running to the late 80’s) the Jesus Movement arose to counter-act the idea that God was dead.
We tend to ascribe great power to Satan, but we need to remember that Satan was created by God just as were we, except that angels are not made from matter. Back then, before the creation of the universe, Satan was known as Lucifer who was a powerful, intelligent, beautiful angel (in fact chief of the angels). But he rebelled against God and was cast down. It was his plan to enlist humans in the rebellion against God and hence came the Fall (Isaiah 14:12-14 and Ezekiel 28:13-17). One might ask why God allows evil to happen. Lest we think God brings bad things into our lives, let us remember it is Satan who has brought evil into the world and not God. God is not the author of bad things, but he does make use of bad things. You see, while Satan thinks he’s doing all this stuff to further the rebellion against God, God is actually making use of all these things to bring the world to his Son.
So we believers are embroiled in a conflict with a society which in large part has accepted Satan’s lies and has in essence denied God’s existence. Our society is pagan to its core and in such condition has no idea what to do with the struggles people see going on about them. We talked about the validity of absolute truth last week and this week we see the consequence of having no truth. For example, society wrings its hands at almost yearly mass shootings in high schools and public venues yet sees no problem with video games which teach that murder is painless and inconsequential.
So the believer’s response to such things must be to turn to God. I’m speaking, not of the casual relationship expressed once or twice a year at regular holidays, but of deep personal intimate commitment to God. The Isaiah verse (one of my favorites) speaks of the blessings which come from an intimate relationship with Jesus. Intimacy with anyone requires that a person spends time with that other person, and it is no different with Jesus. He wants us to spend time with him because it is this time and this relationship which gives us the strength to resist the world. Let’s be honest: When all our friends are worldly, even pagan, it takes courage to hold to higher values. We risk ridicule even when engaging in the simple things like giving a prayer of thanks at a public meal.
There are four pillars that support one’s efforts to discover the refuge and strength of God. The first is the so-called greatest commandment found in Mark 12:29-30:
29“The most important [commandment],” answered Jesus, “is this….. 30Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’
Loving in this way means making every decision, performing every activity, thinking every thought in such a way as to please Jesus. We all know this is not possible in our own strength, but that is precisely the point. This sort of determination drives us to YHWH El Sali. It is God’s strength that enables us to love in this way. The second pillar is ‘watch and pray’. Watch in this case means ‘pay attention’. So, when we see someone struggling with chemical addiction what should we do? Pray. Having a difficult marriage? Pray. Suffering under the weight of disease? Pray. Succumbing to the temptations of the world? Pray.
The third pillar in finding the strength of God is simple church. We tend to think the most successful churches are the big ones; those with super anointed speakers with gifts of communication and comedy and ushered in by world class worship. We like those because we can go there, sit in the back row, and be anonymous. But that’s not the way it was in the 1st Century. Gatherings then were small, maybe a few dozen people at most, and every member brought something to edify the group.
26What then shall we say, brothers and sisters? When you come together, each of you has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. Everything must be done so that the church may be built up. 27If anyone speaks in a tongue, two—or at the most three—should speak, one at a time, and someone must interpret. 28If there is no interpreter, the speaker should keep quiet in the church and speak to himself and to God. (1Corinthians 14:26)
Small churches promote intimacy with one another and with God. That is where spiritual, physical, and emotional health is found because people become invested in one another’s lives, caring and praying for each other.
The fourth pillar, the Sermon on the Mount, is second only to the first. The Sermon on the Mount is found in Matthew chapters 5-7 and is foundational to the Kingdom of God. It might even be considered the Constitution of the Kingdom. The reader ought to read that passage every month for the rest of his or her life so that those instructions on Kingdom living become imbedded in his or her soul. I consider the Sermon on the Mount so important that it is the subject of a 29-week series beginning in two weeks. Please stay tuned.
The material regarding the Four Pillars comes from a sermon given by Pastor Peder Olsen and can be found at www.lighthousecolorado.org/media/sermons-by-date/1-1-22