Heaven's Eagle: A Revelation of the Holy Spirit in Psalm 91

Copyright © 2013 Daniel O’Neil.

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All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.

Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations marked KJV are from the Holy Bible, King James Version, copyright c 2000. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NLT are from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright c 1996 by Tyndale Charitable Trust. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NASB are from the New American Standard Bible, copyright c 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by the Lockman Corporation, A Corporation Not for Profit, La Habra, CA. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked AB are from the Amplified Bible, copyright c 1965, Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

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ISBN: 978-1-4908-1169-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-1170-3 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-1168-0 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013918579

WestBow Press rev. date: 10/24/2013

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1   An Overview of the Mighty Eagle

Chapter 2   The Preparation of Moses—Part One

Chapter 3   The Preparation of Moses—Part Two

Chapter 4   The Secret Place of the Most High—Theologically

Chapter 5   The Secret Place of the Most High—An Eagle’s View

Chapter 6   The Shadow of the Almighty

Chapter 7   He Is My Fortress

Chapter 8   He Will Cover You with His Feathers

Chapter 9   You Will Not Fear Man

Chapter 10   You Will Not Fear the Arrow that Flies by Day—Part One

Chapter 11   You Will Not Fear the Arrow that Flies by Day—Part Two

Chapter 12   You Will Not Fear the Pestilence

Chapter 13   You Will Not Fear Death

Chapter 14   Only With Your Eyes

Chapter 15   No Evil Will Befall You

Chapter 16   They Will Lift You Up in Their Hands

Chapter 17   You Will Trample the Great Lion and the Serpent

Chapter 18   I Will Set Him on High

Chapter 19   I Will Show Him Jesus

Footnotes

Dedicated to Paul Gildernew, pastor, teacher, friend, and the most Christlike man I ever knew

Introduction

Most people who have a good acquaintance with Scripture can readily name a number of the types that are used to illustrate the Holy Spirit in some tangible way. This is because some Bible passages make very clear analogies of the Holy Spirit. Jesus, for instance, described the Holy Spirit’s working as water: On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, ‘If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.’ By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive (John 7:37-39).

The Holy Spirit is also described to us in the likeness of wind in passages such as Acts 2 and John 3. His personal presence is described in Acts 2:3 as tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. Again, fire is the analogy used in Matthew 3:11-12 as John the Baptist describes how the coming Messiah will baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire.

Aside from such elemental forces of wind, fire, and water, we see the Spirit of God portrayed in the glory cloud that led Israel through the wilderness (Ex. 13:21) and the anointing oil that was used on Old Testament kings and priests (1 Sam. 16:13).

But are there more personal pictures of the Holy Spirit in Scripture? My heart, and those of many others, cries out for more images like the gentle dove falling upon Jesus when He is baptized by John (Matt. 3:16). Here is the sweet Spirit that meets us in private solitude over a morning cup of coffee, who tags along like a little brother waiting to have our back in a fight, who acts as a humble servant when we grope for words in the middle of bearing witness to an unbeliever, and yet who enters the room like Solomon robed in splendor on Sunday morning.

Psalm 91, which in many ways describes the wonderful Holy Spirit as a mighty eagle, is one of those Scripture picture passages that slake our thirst for more details on this dear friend. It not only provides a broad overview of the many workings of the Spirit in our lives, but describes him in the tender fashion of a mama or papa eagle raising its young—and that’s you and me, folks! Here’s a God-given portrait of the Spirit that includes us in the picture.

Many years ago my wife and I first became aware of God’s use of the eagle as an autobiographical element in the Word of God. I was always fascinated with Isaiah 40:31: "But those who wait for the Lord—who expect, look for and hope in Him—shall change and renew their strength and power; they shall lift their wings and mount up [close to God] as eagles [mount up to the sun]; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint or become tired" (AB).

The verse is exciting because it promises that the believer can soar like an eagle, enter the heavenly realms, overcome weariness, and renew spiritual power and strength. On top of that, though, I knew that God Himself was pictured as an eagle in Scripture in passages such as Deuteronomy 32:11, Jeremiah 48:40, and Exodus 19:4, where he says, You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. What a thought, being in the heavenlies with God! Was this just poetic license? If I was tempted to think so, the Holy Spirit soon taught me otherwise.

My wife, Linda, and I took a vacation during a time of very hectic business and ministry activity. We were virtually newlyweds, and added to the normal stresses were questions of how to forge ahead spiritually. We had been catapulted into a large, public ministry, and with everything so new and strange to us, we were very cautious about any life move that could throw things out of balance. I would often say, Let’s wait on the Lord for that one. At one point, her rejoinder was It seems like all we do is wait! Needless to say, our vacation represented a respite in which we were looking to get some answers.

I frequently read Isaiah 40:31 and thought about what it meant to wait upon the Lord, as the King James puts it. The Hebrew root word used here and translated as wait is qavah (pronounced kaw-vaw’). It signifies binding together and implies twisting.¹ I tried on a number of occasions to get my mind around that one, and kept coming up with the picture of a man waiting for someone as he stood on a street corner. I kept thinking how time-lapse photography would show a path of walking in various patterns like circles and figure eights that would look like something being twisted together. I also pictured two men waiting together and could almost visualize a little better the whole idea of twisting representing waiting. But on our vacation God gave me something much better than anything my imagination could come up with.

As we traveled to various points on our shore vacation, we took a lot of time for devotions and did some fasting as well. We kind of winged it as far as some accommodations, and oddly enough, kept finding places to stay and to eat that had the word Raven in the title. Raven is the Hebrew word ‘owreb (pronounced o-rabe’) and comes from the word ‘arab (pronounced aw-rab’), which is used in a number of ways, including a meaning of braid.² That got me thinking in the right direction for what happened next.

A hurricane struck the coast, and we decided to divert our trip up into the mountains. At one point we were enjoying a drive on a sunny day and came to a beautiful scenic overlook that had attracted quite a group of tourists. As we perched ourselves adjacent to a stone wall and looked over the undulating, forest-covered hills of the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, I spied three large birds circling not all that far above us. They were each circling in different loops that intersected, much like how the Olympics’ logo is patterned. As I watched them soar, I said aloud to myself, I wonder if those are eagles.

Immediately, a heavily accented voice responded from nearby in the group of onlookers. Those are American black eagles! he said authoritatively in English marked with a Dutch inflection. I am an amateur, expert ornithologist. I am from Holland, and I come to the United States every year on two months of vacation in order to enjoy your natural beauty, and to watch the birds. In Holland, everything is man-made and geometrically planned, so I enjoy the naturalness and wildness of your country. Those are American black eagles, he said once again, pointing skyward.

I thanked him, and turned my attention back to the majestic birds. With wings spread they soared higher and higher, completely effortlessly in what must have been a warm updraft. As we all watched they went from a few hundred feet above us to a single dot in the sky. The image was that of a rope being twisted together. They seemed to braid their three flight paths into a single, tightening configuration that eventually made them one lone object in the distant air, far above us.

As I stood watching and wondering, my inner man heard, That’s you, me, and Linda, and I sensed that those were the words of Jesus. Through His blessed Holy Spirit, the Lord was speaking to me about His plans to invest Himself in our lives as we took time to wait upon the Lord, let Him get involved in our lives, and get our lives, aspirations, and feelings tangled up in His. He had sent His Comforter, as He had promised in John 16:13-14: He will not speak on His own; he will speak only what he hears, and will tell you what is to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you.

It was the Holy Spirit conveying the words of Jesus into my heart, and beginning to lead me on a path of intimacy with the Father and the Son by teaching me the ways of the Spirit.

Perhaps you’re reading this today and thinking, Well, that’s a good thought about how God can work in a marriage relationship. But the image of being knit together with the Spirit of God, like eagles soaring in braided paths, goes to a much more elemental level than marriage or any other external relationship. Consider the words of the psalmist: For thou hast possessed my reins: Thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb (Ps. 139:13 KJV). The word translated as reins is from the Hebrew word kilyah, pronounced kil-yaw’. It can be translated reins (kidneys) or mind, but actually is broader in meaning (the NIV simply says inmost being), and is closely related to a very similar word, masculine in gender, that designates a vessel or receptacle.³ The convoluted shapes of the kidney and the brain, with their many layers folded intricately on one another, makes me think of the more orderly spiral of the DNA molecules that make up our genes, and that seem to actually fit the meaning or this psalm more closely.

Psalm 139 is about God’s intimate knowledge of our every trait, about His fashioning each and every human being in incredible uniqueness and in amazing complexity, as the psalmist declares, I am fearfully and wonderfully made (Ps. 139:14). In light of this, Thou hast possessed my reins, can be understood as you have created (or owned) my DNA.

How does the Holy Spirit do this? The Scriptures plainly tell us. The second part of verse 13 says, Thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb (KJV), and the word translated as covered literally means to entwine as a screen.⁴

Like a pair of eagles rising upward in spirals that are separate but related, the DNA molecule is portrayed as a double helix. A helix describes a spiral shape, and in this case, two columns of nucleic acids rise like twin banisters to a spiral staircase, connected only by faint electrical attractions. To this we add the image of the Holy Spirit entwining himself about them in a protective and creative custody that recalls Genesis 1:2—And the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

Many times the Spirit has reminded me that His creative process does not end when we break forth from our mothers’ wombs. What a comfort to know that He is working with us until Christ is formed in us (Gal. 4:19), predestining us to be conformed to the image of his son (Rom. 8:29).

With this in mind, I have written this book, as an inside look at the Holy Spirit intimately schooling and creating mere human beings, just as mama or papa eagle school their young eaglets: soaring with them, leading them, guiding them into the many delights of the life of an eagle. In the ensuing chapters, we will go verse by verse through Psalm 91 and see the parallels between the life of an eagle and that of a Christian intimate with the Holy Spirit. We will see some of what God intends for us, and how one of the greatest tragedies of so many Christian lives is a neglect that rivals the effects of sin, for this is a neglect that walks away from the constant invitations of fellowship with the Spirit and a neglect that thwarts a beautiful creative process intended to build Christlikeness into our lives along with holy empowerment, sensitivity, and wisdom.

I pray that each of us will soar to new heights in God as we explore the blueprint of fellowship with the Holy Spirit contained in Psalm 91.

Chapter 1

An Overview of the Mighty Eagle

Most Bible scholars attribute authorship of Psalm 91 to Moses. The more I read this psalm, the more I am impressed with its beauty and imagery, and yet, these impressions do not match the excitement I feel about entering into the devotions and thoughts that passed between the God of heaven and a man who saw God move in ways no other human being has witnessed. In many ways, Psalm 91 is an anthem for the most powerful period of Moses’ life.

Psalm 91 presents the image of a large and powerful eagle hovering over, protecting, and training its young. It is not difficult, in the verses of the psalm, to find the heart and mind of Moses. Here is Moses, perhaps fresh from the experience of Passover, possibly the seminal event of his life, meditating on the awesome things that have just taken place. Pesach, the Hebrew word for the Passover event, is a noun with an etymology going back to the Egyptian word pesh, which means ‘to spread wings over’ in order to protect.¹ In this psalm, one can see Moses, the shepherd, walking the desert floor in the midst of the millions of Israel and calling upon the one who hovered over the houses of the Israelites on the night of Passover. Moses had told the people: When the Lord goes through the land to strike down the Egyptians, he will see the blood on the top and sides of the doorframe and will pass over that doorway, and he will not permit the destroyer to enter your houses and strike you down" (Ex. 12:23).

Again, we see Moses calling on the image of a great eaglelike protector, in reality God’s Holy Spirit, when he speaks in other places concerning the plagues, the Passover, and the wilderness journey. In Exodus 19:4, God is an eagle rescuing His young and bringing them to a place of safety. In Deuteronomy 32:11 He is an eagle guiding and motivating His young as He leads Israel. In Deuteronomy 28:19, His judgment is promised to come with the swiftness of an eagle.

So why has God chosen the eagle as a vehicle of analogy and simile for His wonderful Holy Spirit? When God is searching for an analogy for something He wants to say, He does not have the limitations that most of us have. If He cannot find an adequate symbol, He can make one! I believe that most things in this world were created on that basis: to reflect the glory of God and teach mankind lessons about God and the unseen world.

In the case of the eagle that is very easy to believe. There are approximately sixty-five species of birds known as eagles,² and most of them possess impressive size and other attributes that speak eloquently of God’s might and majesty.

Some Statistics on Eagles

Eagles common in North America, the golden eagle and the bald eagle, range up to thirty-six inches in length and fifteen pounds in weight, and have wingspans of up to seven and a half feet.³ A number of other eagles are considerably larger. The white-tailed sea eagle, which inhabits portions of Northern Asia, Scotland, and Scandinavia, has a wingspan that may exceed eight feet.⁴ The harpy eagle of South America may weigh as much as twenty pounds,⁵ and Stellar’s eagle of Japan may grow to forty-two inches in length.⁶ Moreover, the hollow bones and feathers of eagles mean that their size and appearance are much more arresting than measurements such as weight would indicate. A large, trained eagle on the arm of a falconer may resemble a man in size from the waist up, so that from a distance you may think you’re seeing double!

Coupled with their impressive size, eagles have the capacity to impact animals that are large enough to interact with humans. When a man or woman sees a bald eagle swoop down and carry off a young piglet or a lamb from a flock of sheep,⁷ this can inspire an awe and a fear of the bird’s power. Whereas most eagles in North America are observed to seize and carry off up to about four pounds, harpy eagles have been known to swoop into trees and kill large monkeys and sloths, and carry off parts of them,⁸ giving the impression they are carrying off an entire, large animal. Again, eagles do seize and carry much larger animals in short, descending flights from an elevation such as a tree or mountainside.⁹

Moreover, when it comes to striking prey, the eagle’s talons are much fiercer than the teeth of most land-bound predators. The African fish eagle may beam in on a prey fish at twenty miles per hour, and strike the fish with what is calculated to be five thousand foot-pounds of energy—more than the muzzle energy of a bullet from a heavy rifle. The female harpy eagle traveling at the same speed (females are usually larger and stronger than males in all eagle species) has a striking force with its talon that has been calculated at almost three times that! ¹⁰

Naturalists in the American West have seen bald eagles swoop down on wolves, coyotes, and even mountain lions eating carrion and successfully drive them off from the food source with a strike of their talons.¹¹

Another facet of the eagle’s inspiring presence is its phenomenal speed and majestic flight. A golden eagle may average about thirty miles per hour in level flight,¹² but can reach speeds as high as eighty miles per hour, and more than double that in a dive!¹³ To see something with a seven-and-a-half-foot wingspan moving that quickly is terrifying.

Moses’ Experience with Eagles

Facts, of course, only begin to touch on the eagle’s impressiveness. In Moses’ wilderness years, he frequented a part of the world where golden eagles are fairly common, and where the imperial eagle and steppe eagle, slightly smaller in size, also appear. The golden eagle is still on the official crest of Egypt to this day, and still inhabits most of the area where Moses shepherded and later traveled with the children of Israel under his guidance. We can easily envision Moses tending his sheep on the back side of Sinai or in the vicinity of Midian, and being alarmed at the presence of eagles and the danger they presented to his flock. More than likely he originally felt an animosity toward the large predators, much as ranchers and herdsmen in the American West do today.

He may have been shepherding in the foothills of one of the mountains on the Sinai and looking down upon a herd of antelope that began to behave strangely, nervously moving in and out amongst one another as they do when a predator is near. Moses would have seen no foe in sight, but finally, as his keen eye surveyed the sparse grass and brown hills of the landscape, he would have seen a large golden eagle circling overhead, lazily riding an updraft, wings entirely motionless for a long time, cruising in circles several hundred feet above the wary herd below. Then, without warning, it would have plunged in a power dive, reaching speeds of up to two hundred miles per hour, generating sound we would describe today as being comparable to that of a small airplane,¹⁴ the eagle would fasten its powerful talons onto the neck region of one of the herd and remain there for several seconds, working its razor-sharp talons into the vulnerable spine and arteries. Perhaps the prey would collapse and the eagle would begin to tear its flesh with its powerful beak, or perhaps the sad animal would free itself for a time, maybe running in Moses’ direction, perhaps passing only feet away, spraying arterial blood and panting with adrenaline-driven gasps of desperation¹⁵ before the fierce and hungry predator was on it once again.

On another day, Moses may have been higher in the foothills of a similar mountain. He may have paused to see a sure-footed mountain goat exhibiting its prowess, making its way up a promontory, secure from would-be predators. His eye might have been admiring the strength and grace of the goat when it caught sight of an eagle perched on a rock, well above the goat. He would have watched the eagle as it looked steadfastly upon the goat, calculating a strike, stirring and then stopping, rousing itself, and finally fluttering forward a few feet to another rock. Moses might well have scoffed at the eagle’s thought of attacking this sturdy creature, but then he would have seen the long wings emerge from their retracted positions at the eagle’s side and extend out a seemingly impossible breadth. He would have seen the wings flap somewhat awkwardly, like the wings of a large bat, less than fully extended and undulating from front to back in the air currents. Slowly, by comparison to its often startling speed, it would descend dramatically, heading for a prey that seemed much too formidable for a creature the size of an eagle. Then there would be the strike of the talons, the grasping of large and bright yellow feet, almost as large as a man’s hand and dangling ominously at the ready only moments before. There would be the bucking of the young male goat with its emerging horns.

Silly! Moses may have said to himself—this bird flapping and pushing on the powerful goat.

The wrestling match would have continued, the bird at times moving the goat toward the edge of the precipice, talons fastened, wings flapping loosely and gracelessly. The goat would have heaved back, trying to pin the eagle to the stone wall of the mountain path.

Very futile… He’ll have to fly off, maybe leaving some talon wounds in the goat, Moses may have speculated.

But then… with a Herculean burst of flaps, Moses would have seen the goat begin to stumble toward the cliff’s edge, and then leave the safety of terra firma. Descending with a goat in his grasp, yet airborne, the eagle would have relinquished his hold on the goat once free of outcroppings and in an area of considerable free fall. The goat, plummeting downward with his body at an odd angle, with a stiffness like that of a child’s toy, strikes a rock, bounces, hits a portion of another outcropping, and then free falls to his death. The eagle, wings still moving seemingly awkwardly in the tight surroundings, descends upon him to tear and to eat.¹⁶

Moses looks on, aghast. He is feeling a flush of shock and anger at the outcome, as stupefied as if his neighbor’s teenage girl had manhandled someone akin to a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound palace guard. As he stands with head lowered for a moment, he is keenly aware of the feel of his beard against his heavy yet breathable desert tunic. He senses the tingling of the hair of his arms as they rub against the garment. He looks at the field of rocks before him and contemplates finding a smooth one to place in his shepherd’s sling and launch at this strange and apparently alien force.

Was this what had caused that ewe to fall off a mountain crag a few weeks ago? Had this creature that looks so majestic in the air, yet so like a refugee from a cave leading from the underworld when moving on its prey, carried off those missing lambs?

Moses would have been like many, many herders and cattlemen who greatly fear and even vilify eagles. In reality, eagles seldom attack livestock, yet in the United States alone, hundreds of thousands have been shot or poisoned over the past century, many times to collect government-levied bounties. Some have even undertaken shooting the birds from airplanes.

But of course this only underscores the fearsome nature of these birds, whose noble faces are modeled after one of the four visages presented by the awe-inspiring cherubim (Ezek. 1:10), and not all men respond to their imposing skills and appearance with retaliatory malice. In Mongolia and other parts of Asia, golden eagles are trained by expert falconers for hunting, and in some regions there are one or two eagle hunters in every village. These birds kill large prey for their masters, and their services may be hired to protect herds and flocks from large and fierce predators. Imagine the stealth and speed of an eagle, coupled with great striking power and sharp, deadly talons. Eagles in Mongolia, Kirgizistan, and Kazakhstan have been called upon to hunt noisome wolves. One golden eagle killed fourteen wolves—in a single day! ¹⁷

In the West there are those who have attempted to emulate the Asian falconers, but few have met with much success. One man sustained broken bones in his hand when his eagle bridled at being denied something it had started eating, and its foot squeezed him too tightly, producing the damage despite the enormously thick glove used for handling an eagle.¹⁸ Such is the gripping power of the eagle, and experts report that literally tons of pressure are generated at the tip of the sword-sharp talons. This is something unlike anything that the most powerful falcon can produce, and much more than most bird handlers can negotiate.

On a visit to Mongolia, an American falconer queried his host about many aspects of keeping and training the awesome birds. After some prodding, his host confessed that one bird he knew of had suddenly turned on a hunting trip, and killed one of the hunting party.¹⁹ In the United States, an eagle that turns on its master may be kept permanently in a rehab facility, obviously, because of the danger he would pose to humans and domestic animals.²⁰

However, despite the often bad feelings that traders in livestock have toward eagles, and the caution with which such formidable animals are regarded, we know that Moses came to see them as a great inspiration and a figure of the living God. Whether he grew into this relationship toward the magnificent birds, or whether he had always resisted the temptation to fear and abhor them, we do not know. Whatever the situation, it is not hard to imagine a harried Moses, staff in hand, now dressed in slightly finer apparel, befitting one who works at judging and ruling his people, walking in the torrid heat of the Sinai Desert. Two million people or more are now under his charge. He walks with a mantle pulled over his eighty-plus-year-old head, perhaps feeling the effects of a night with very little sleep. His rulership of God’s people is a unique feat in all of human history. God is now using him to begin the process of forming a nation without any geopolitical boundaries, without a true culture separate from that of Egypt, without an army, without coins or a treasury, without a mission statement or any vision other than following a pillar of cloud by day and fire by night. Every barking dog, every woman who can be accused of not completely closing her makeshift tabernacle before she changes, every man whose eyes wander, every child who is a nuisance, every fistfight, every case of missing property is a case for him to judge and a form of attack on his one and most precious resource—his ability to hear God.

I am convinced that there were times when the shadow of a large eagle would pass over Moses and a portion of the large throng, and a mighty cheer would swell up from the tens of thousands in the vicinity. Moses would look skyward, and as the days passed, an affinity would develop between man and bird. Perhaps Moses would encounter the bird on walks he took alone outside the camp. Perhaps there were several birds that God placed in Moses’ path at strategic times.

Some Examples of Eagles and Other Birds Relating to Man

I remember very well the experience of managing an office where a great deal of strife existed among the employees. I absolutely dreaded going to work in the morning. I would park a good distance from the office at the start of each day, and enjoy the walk past grass, trees, and some birds and squirrels. Usually there would be an enormous plane overhead, homing in on the nearby airport. It would seem as though I could reach right up and touch it, and yet it seemed so incredibly lifeless. The birds by contrast were full of life, and as time went by, I absolutely came to revel in their presence and their songs. It seemed as though they would watch me each morning, and that they enjoyed my spectatorship as they hummed about. It was oftentimes the best fellowship of the day.

I did not share this experience of the birds with very many people for a long time, but one day a number of years