Lift up your eyes (Psalm 121)
Lift Up Your Eyes
Psalm 121 — and the prayer that finds you in the dark.
Lift Up Your Eyes
Psalm 121 — and the prayer that finds you in the dark.
I was sitting at our kitchen table in San Diego, alone, well past dark, with a Bible and a journal and no idea what to say. It was one of those weeks. My job was in flux. Money was tight. Melanie and I were a few weeks out from Jane being born. And underneath all of it, my younger brother had been in the ICU for almost three months. The whole family was praying around the clock and trying not to panic.
I knew I needed to pray. I just didn't have any words.
When I don't have my own words, I lean on the Psalms. If the whole Bible is God's word to us, the Psalms are our words back to God — the prayer book of God's people for thousands of years. That night I flipped open to Psalm 44 and a stanza near the end stopped me cold: Wake up. Why are you sleeping, Lord? Get up. Don't reject us forever.
I would have never prayed something that audacious on my own. But there it was, basically giving me permission — if you feel this, you're allowed to say it. So I did. I journaled, then prayed out loud, then louder, until I was almost yelling: Where are you, God? Why are you sleeping? Wake up. Save my brother. Save my family.
That's when my phone buzzed. A friend in ministry — who had no idea what was going on with us — had texted me. Hey Tyler, I was praying for you today and felt like God wanted me to encourage you with this verse. The verse was Psalm 121.
I was already in the Psalms. So I flipped forward and read this: I lift my eyes toward the mountains. Where will my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He won't let your foot slip. Your protector won't fall asleep on the job.
I still get goosebumps. Out loud, I had accused God of falling asleep. He answered with the exact verse that refutes it.
Psalm 121 is a Psalm of Ascent — one of fifteen prayers (Psalms 120–134) the Jewish pilgrims sang as they walked up the desert mountains toward the temple. So when the psalmist says, I lift my eyes to the mountains, he isn't being vague, and he isn't shopping for a god. He's looking at Mount Zion. He knows where his help is. He just can't see Him yet, so he fixes his face on the only place he knows he'll find Him.
Which makes verse 1 a psalm about attention. The Hebrew word for "help" here is one of the strongest in the Bible — deliverance, rescue, salvation. Not help me move the couch. This is I am drowning. And the first thing the psalmist does in the drowning is pick up his eyes and put them somewhere on purpose.
Thomas Aquinas said the false hopes we lift our eyes toward fall into four buckets: power, pleasure, money, and honor. All four are good in their place. All four become idols when they sit at the top of our attention. Power becomes tyranny. Pleasure becomes addiction. Money becomes anxiety. Honor becomes vanity.
If I'm honest, my version of all four lately is the same thing: my phone. When I'm anxious, I don't pray — I scroll. I lift my eyes to the god of dopamine — three-second sprays of laughter and outrage and I'm-so-informed — and I get up emptier than I started. The psalmist names what I keep forgetting: what we pay attention to shapes both our future and ourselves.
Watch what happens next. Verse 1 is "I." From verse 3 on, it's "you." Three things can be happening at once in that shift. A worship leader turning around to preach truth back to the pilgrims: your God hasn't fallen asleep on you. A community gathering around the one about to lose her grip: we'll have faith for you tonight. And an individual, alone, preaching the gospel right back into his own ear: He's not asleep. He has my family in His hands.
This is Holy Week. We are one Sunday from Easter, and the whole point of Lent has been to feel our great need before the great rescue arrives. So here's my invitation. Pray Psalm 121 every day this week. Five minutes is enough. Start with verse 1 and ask yourself honestly: what have I been lifting my eyes to lately? Then read the rest and let it preach back.
And then flip the script. Be the friend who sent the text. Ask God for one name — a neighbor, a coworker, a family member — and send them Psalm 121 with a short note. I was thinking about you, and this verse encouraged me. Would you come with me to church on Easter? That's it. No pitch. Just a finger pointed at the mountain and an open seat.
Somebody is sitting at their own kitchen table this week, accusing God of sleeping. May we be the people God uses to prove He's wide awake.
