Gathered Under His Wings

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, but you were not willing! See! Your house is left to you desolate.”

Luke 13:34–35

There’s a beautiful picture hidden in verse 4 of Psalm 91. It’s a picture of a mother hen protecting her chicks. The scriptures above record how the Lord Jesus looked at Jerusalem and lamented over it. Later, Jesus wept over Jerusalem, saying, “For days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment around you, surround you and close you in on every side, and level you, and your children within you, to the ground; and they will not leave in you one stone upon another, because you did not know the time of your visitation” (Luke 19:43–44). The Greek word for “wept” in verse 41 is klaio, and it means to be so affected emotionally as to sob and wail aloud.

Can you see the Lord’s tender mercies toward Israel as He shed much tears over her? He wished that He could gather Israel under His feathers as a mother hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but the Lord could not force His protection on them because they rejected Him. I believe that as our Lord wept, He foresaw not only the Roman siege of Jerusalem, when the temple was burned to the ground and many of the Jews killed or sold as slaves, but He also foresaw the horrors of the Holocaust.

Notice that the Lord said, “But you were not willing!” This clearly tells us that the Lord will not force on us His protection if we are not willing to come under His wings.

Beloved, are you willing to have the Lord Jesus protect you and your family today? Then tell Him. Let’s never take our Lord’s protection for granted. Instead, let’s take time daily to let Him know that we are putting our trust in Him for His covering and protection.

Do you want to know what happens when you do that? Look at what Boaz said to Ruth: “The Lord repay your work, and a full reward be given you by the Lord God of Israel, under whose wings you have come for refuge” (Ruth 2:12). Wow! It was already a privilege for this Moabite outcast, who was disqualified by the law, to find refuge under the wings of the God of Israel. But God even rewarded her for doing so.

In the same way, it is a privilege for us to be able to take refuge under His wings. Yet when we tell the Lord that we need Him and want His refuge, He gives us a full reward for trusting Him and for coming under His wings. What a God!

This devotional is taken from the book The Prayer of Protection Devotional—Daily Strategies for Living Fearlessly in Dangerous Times.