Miracles of Protection

During the 1980s, Lulu and Pablo Perez ran a Christian school outside of Mexico City that was protected from the dangerous Guadalajara Cartel by a massive wall.  

One day, Lulu had an appointment in the city while her husband was away.  Lulu knew she shouldn’t make the trip alone, but she couldn’t wait for her husband to return. Despite reports of an armed gang roaming the road that connected the school and the city, Lulu committed her protection to the Lord. She left the compound in her car and started down the hill. She knew if anything happened, it would occur at a roadside shrine at the bottom of a blind rise. 

Approaching the rise in the road, she slowed her car and prayed for God to protect her. Just as she crested the rise, she saw several young men armed with machine guns walk from the shrine into the middle of the street. One raised a hand and yelled for her to stop. She did. Her mind raced. 

Should she turn the car around and hurry back to the school compound? Or should she speed past the gang, hoping they’d jump out of the way? She couldn’t just sit there, idling in her car. If she did, she was sure to be robbed, at best, and at worst . . . well, it was too horrible to contemplate. 

Just as she was about to put the car into reverse, the thugs lowered their guns and looked as if they’d seen something frightening. They turned and ran into the thick jungle paralleling the road.

Lulu made it into the city without incident, but feared she might encounter the same armed men or others on her way back to the school. So again, she asked for the Lord’s protection. And she praised Him when she came upon the spot next to the roadside shrine, where the gang had stopped her before, to see that the road was empty.

A week later, Lulu was talking with a friend. She told Lulu about a gang of hoodlums who came running into the city, breathless and scared. They were passing the word that others ought to avoid the road leading from the school to the city. They said they had stopped a woman on that road with the intention of robbing her and perhaps raping her.

But as their leader began approaching the car, the gang saw a man sitting in the passenger seat they hadn’t seen before. There was something about the passenger’s presence that unnerved them and sent them running in fear into the jungle. Lulu asked when that was. When her friend told her, Lulu felt awe and praise for the greatness of God, who had protected her.

Apparently, God dispatched one of His holy angels to ride shotgun with Lulu that day. Lulu never saw him, but when the armed gang showed signs of intending to harm one of God’s precious daughters, the angel revealed himself, and the thugs saw him—and ran in fear.

1. The Need for God’s Protection

No matter where we live, dangers surround us, Paul warned in 2 Timothy 3:1. 

When Paul said “difficult times,” he wasn’t talking about the kinds of inconveniences we all deal with daily; he was talking about clear and present dangers. 

The Greek word translated as “difficult” is chalepos. It’s used only one other time in the New Testament, in Matthew 8:28, where it describes two demon-possessed men as “extremely violent.” Paul was describing days that are fierce and menacing—filled with dangers. That certainly describes the days in which we live, in which we face physical (Proverbs 27:1) and spiritual dangers (Ephesians 6:10-12).

2. The Promise of God’s Protection (Psalm 121)

Though dangers surround us and may spring upon us suddenly, we aren’t defenseless.  God repeatedly encourages us to pray for His protection against every kind of danger we can imagine.  

Scripture is filled with promises of God’s protection. Psalm 121 is described as  “A Song of Ascents.” Jews who traveled to Jerusalem to worship had to ascend Mount Moriah to reach the temple, which was on top of the mountain. The word “keep,” or its equivalent, is used six times in these eight verses, making this a psalm of protection. 

Since the hills around Jerusalem provided perfect cover for bandits, it was foolish to travel the roads alone, so pilgrims traveled in groups that could still be ambushed. But bandits weren’t the only dangers these travelers faced. Roads were rocky and could be slick if wet, so stumbling and falling was always a possibility.

If you traveled a long distance to reach Jerusalem during the summer months, sunstroke was a risk. Even during the summer months, nights could be bone-chilling and inhospitable to pilgrims. 

So, to remind themselves of God’s care, Jews traveling to Jerusalem declared three truths about God in this psalm that these Jewish sojourners could bank on.

• God is Sovereign (Psalm 121:1-2)
• God is Awake (Psalm 121:3-4)
• God is a Shelter (Psalm 121:5-8)

3. The Means of God’s Protection

The Lord uses three primary means to demonstrate miracles of protection on our behalf: direct fortification, angelic intervention, and the Holy Spirit’s direction. As we look at each one, we’ll discover a practical application for each of us today.

• Direct Fortification (Job 1:9-10)

If you’ve spent any time around church folks, then you’ve likely heard of the “hedge of protection”—asking God to surround someone with a protective barrier shielding them against harm, danger, and spiritual attacks. I remember my parents praying for God to place a hedge of protection around me when I traveled on mission trips and to college, and Amy and I have prayed many times for God’s hedge of protection around our daughters and grandchildren. 

What you might not know is that this idea of a hedge of protection comes from the lips of Satan himself. When he appeared before the Lord, Satan said about Job, “Then Satan answered the Lord, ‘Does Job fear God for nothing? Have You not made a hedge about him and his house and all that he has, on every side?’” (Job 1:9-10).

Of course, Satan wasn’t referring to shrubbery. He was referring to God’s direct fortification over Job, protecting his person (“a hedge about him”), his family (“a hedge about . . . his house”), and his possessions (“a hedge about . . . all he has”). Notice, Satan says the Lord’s protection is “on every side”—before, behind, besides, below, and above.

Man-made fortresses may crumble, but God is our “everlasting Rock” (Isaiah 26:4). And just as Satan was only able to penetrate that hedge—that wall—with God’s permission, no evil, no accident, no attack can come upon you without that permission.

I remember one day many years ago, I left the church a few minutes early to get a haircut. On my way to the barbershop, I had just driven through an intersection when I heard the terrible screeching sound of brakes, and then a huge crash. I looked in my rearview mirror, and the driver behind me had followed me through that intersection and was broadsided by a car running a red light. His car was decimated. I pulled over to the side of the road and called 911 immediately, but it was too late. The driver was dead. 

I went home that night and thought, What if I had left work ten seconds later than I did? What if the pressure of my foot on the accelerator was a little lighter than it had been? That would have greatly impacted my life. I’m not at all suggesting that God loved me more than He loved the driver who was killed. Instead, I’m saying that things I thought were my choices really weren’t my choices. They were part of God’s plan for my life. And God has a plan for your life as well.

• Angelic Intervention (Hebrews 1:14)

The writer to the Hebrews addresses the subject of angels, reminding us: “Are they not all ministering spirits, sent out to render service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation?” (Hebrews 1:14).

When the temple guards came to arrest Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, Peter drew his sword to protect the Lord, which was a comically pathetic act, thinking he could protect God in the flesh. Jesus told Peter, “Then Jesus said to him [Peter], ‘Put your sword back into its place, for all those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword. Or do you think that I cannot appeal to My Father, and He will at once put at My disposal more than twelve legions of angels?’” (Matthew 26:52-53). 

That’s 72,000 angels!

Those same angels are available to protect you and me. 

• The Holy Spirit’s Direction (John 14:16)

On the final night Jesus spent with His disciples before His crucifixion, He said He was going away “to prepare a place” for them (John 14:2). He encouraged them not to be troubled by His absence.

It was the promise of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit—of the One who would come just like Jesus and remain with them forever.

The Greek word translated as “Helper” is parakletos and literally means “called alongside of” or “called to one’s aid.” The word is often translated “Comforter,” which can come off as sounding as if the Holy Spirit is inferior to Christ and limited to only sympathizing with our sorrow. Nothing could be further from the truth.  

He is a Person Whose presence in our lives results in all kinds of benefits, including power in times of temptation, encouragement in times of challenge, comfort in times of loss, and direction in times of confusion.  

It’s that last benefit I want to focus on briefly—direction in times of confusion. Although the Holy Spirit is a Person, He works as an internal GPS leading us always in the direction of God’s will, which is the safest place any person can be!  

In fact, the apostle Paul claims that one of the best types of evidence of our salvation is the supernatural direction the Holy Spirit provides. “For all who are being led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God” (Romans 8:14). We can conclude that those who are NOT being led by the Spirit are not the children of God.

Frankly, there are many Christians who possess the presence of the Holy Spirit in their lives, but they are not benefiting from the power, encouragement, comfort and power that the Holy Spirit offers. They don’t realize that there are some things we must do to experience the benefits of the Holy Spirit’s presence in our lives.

The Holy Spirit is always present in us, but there are four conduits that activate His power in us:  the Bible, prayer, the church, and obedience to God. 

Now here’s the point: When the Holy Spirit’s power is being generated in our lives at full capacity through Scripture, the prayer, though the church, and through our obedience, one of the benefits He provides us is direction in our lives that keeps us in the middle of God’s will—the safest place we can possibly be.

We’ve all experienced a faulty GPS that has led us in the wrong direction, sometimes what could be a dangerous direction. Not the Holy Spirit. If we are experiencing the Holy Spirit’s power in our lives, we can rest assured that He will always lead us in the right direction.