Psalm 121:6 NKJV
The sun shall not strike you by day,
Nor the moon by night.
Preserved by Day and Night
My Notes
Scripture: “The sun shall not strike you by day, Nor the moon by night.“ — Psalm 121:6 NKJV
The psalmist assures us that God’s protection is constant—covering both the visible dangers of the day and the hidden perils of the night. Day and night together represent the whole of life’s journey, and the promise is that in every season, under every circumstance, God’s hand is present.
Literally, this verse speaks of protection from the scorching heat of the sun and the chilling dampness of the night. Spiritually, it points to preservation from the extremes of prosperity and adversity. Prosperity can burn like the sun, tempting us to pride and self-reliance; adversity can chill like the night, tempting us to despair. Yet God shields His people from both, ensuring that neither overwhelms them.
Israel experienced this in the wilderness: a pillar of cloud shaded them by day, and a pillar of fire warmed them by night (Exodus 13:21–22). Jacob testified that “by day the drought consumed me, and the frost by night” (Genesis 31:40), yet God sustained him. The psalmist reminds us that the same God who kept Israel then keeps His people now.
Even the heavenly bodies, blessings of creation, can become instruments of harm in a fallen world. But for God’s children, He transforms them into sources of blessing, removing their power to destroy. His favor interposes, turning potential harm into enrichment.
Figuratively, the sun represents open assaults—trials that are obvious and glaring. The moon represents secret, subtle attacks—temptations or fears that creep in unnoticed. God promises to guard us from both. His protection is not seasonal or partial; it is perpetual, covering every hour of every day.
Key Takeaways
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God’s protection covers both day and night—visible dangers and hidden threats.
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He shields us from extremes: prosperity’s pride and adversity’s despair.
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His favor transforms creation’s potential harms into blessings.
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The promise is perpetual: His watchful care never ceases.
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Open assaults and secret temptations alike are under His watchful care.
Cross References for deeper study (NKJV)
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Isaiah 27:3 – I, the Lord, keep it, I water it every moment; Lest any hurt it, I keep it night and day.
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Genesis 31:40 – There I was! In the day the drought consumed me, and the frost by night, and my sleep departed from my eyes.
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Exodus 13:21–22 – And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so as to go by day and night. He did not take away the pillar of cloud by day or the pillar of fire by night from before the people.
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Psalm 91:5–6 – You shall not be afraid of the terror by night, Nor of the arrow that flies by day, Nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness, Nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday.
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Isaiah 32:2 – A man will be as a hiding place from the wind, And a cover from the tempest, As rivers of water in a dry place, As the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.
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1 Thessalonians 5:5–6 – You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep, as others do, but let us watch and be sober.
Meditation Questions
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What “daytime” trials (visible, obvious struggles) am I facing right now?
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What “nighttime” fears or hidden temptations trouble me in secret?
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How has God shielded me from extremes of prosperity or adversity in the past?
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What does it mean to me that His protection is constant—day and night, without pause?
Prayer
Abba, I thank You that Your protection never ceases. You shield me from the scorching trials of the day and the hidden fears of the night. Guard me from pride in prosperity and despair in adversity. Since my protection is complete—day and night, visible and hidden—help me to live with fearless confidence, knowing Your favor stands between me and every threat. I ask for this in Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Proverb for Today
Every word of God is pure; He is a shield to those who put their trust in Him. Do not add to His words, Lest He rebuke you, and you be found a liar. Proverbs 30:5-6 NKJV
Closing
He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress; My God, in Him I will trust.” Psalm 91:1-2 NKJV
Bill
Posted on 11/30/2025 by Bill Stephens
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Summary of Commentaries:
God’s keeping is ceaseless, shielding believers from all temporal forces. “The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.”This promise guarantees preservation from two great dangers: the literal harm of excessive heat (sunstroke) and the cold or dampness of night. Figuratively, it means God protects from all visible and hidden perils, the extremes of prosperity (glare) and adversity (chill), and any “injurious effects” of bright or dim doctrines (Spurgeon, Boice). Day and night cover all time, assuring us that God’s ever-present defense never ceases, safeguarding His people perpetually from every evil agency.
Commentaries:
Charles Spurgeon
“The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.” None but the Lord could shelter us from these tremendous forces. These two great lights rule the day and the night, and under the lordship of both we shall labor or rest in equal safety. Doubtless there are dangers of the light and of the dark, but in both and from both we shall be preserved—literally from excessive heat and from baneful chills; mystically from any injurious effects which might follow from doctrine bright or dim; spiritually from the evils of prosperity and adversity; eternally from the strain of overpowering glory and from the pressure of terrible events, such as judgment and the burning of the world. Day and night make up all time; thus, the ever-present protection never ceases. All evil may be ranked as under the sun or the moon, and if neither of these can smite us, we are indeed secure. God has not made a new sun or a fresh moon for his chosen, they exist under the same outward circumstances as others, but the power to smite is in their case removed from temporal agencies; saints are enriched, and not injured, by the powers which govern the earth’s condition; to them has the Lord given “the precious things brought forth by the sun, and the precious things put forth by the moon, “while at the same moment he has removed from them all glare and curse of heat or damp, of glare or chill.
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Enduring Word
Nor the moon by night: Any superstitious fears they may have had from the light of the moon were of no concern to those whom God protected. He would keep and preserve His people day and night. (Guzik)
i. “What the psalmist really means, though in figurative language, is that nothing either of the day or night can harm us if God is keeping guard. God is our covering against every calamity. He is our shade against the visible perils of the day as well as the hidden perils of the night.” (Boice)
ii. “But let the pope be the sun and the emperor the moon (as the canonists called them), yet the sun shall not smite the Church by day nor the moon by night. Luther was at the same time excommunicated by the pope and proscribed by the emperor; yet died he in his bed.” (Trapp)
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Albert Barnes
The sun shall not smite thee by day – The Septuagint renders this, “shall not burn thee” – συγκαύσει sungkausei. So the Latin Vulgate. The Hebrew word means to smite, to strike, as with a rod or staff, or with the plague or pestilence; and then, to kill, to slay. The allusion here is to what is now called a “sun-stroke” – the effect of the burning sun on the brain. Such effects of the sun are often fatal now, as doubtless they were in the time of the psalmist.
Nor the moon by night – The psalmist here refers to some prevalent opinion about the influence of the moon, as endangering life or health. Some have supposed that he refers to the sudden cold which follows the intense heat of the day in Oriental countries, and which, because the moon rules the night, as the sun does the day, is either poetically or literally attributed to the moon. Lackmann and Michaelis suppose that there is some allusion to the influence of the moon in producing various kinds of disease, and especially lunacy – an idea which gave origin to that name. Compare the notes at Matthew 4:24. See Matthew 17:15; Mark 9:17; Luke 9:39. Knapp supposes the idea is that from the moon’s not giving a clear and full light like the sun, travelers trusting to its guidance may be led into rivers or quagmires. Macrobius refers to a custom among the Orientals of covering the faces of children when asleep, from some imagined effect of the moon on the health of the child. Andersen (Orient. Reise-Beschreib. i. 8) refers to an effect, which he says is common, and which he had often seen, of sleeping in the moon-beams, of making the neck stiff, so that it could not be turned from side to side as before. See Rosenmuller, Morgenland, in loc. Others have supposed that the allusion is to the effect of the moon, and of sleeping under the open air, in producing ophthalmia – a disease very common in the East – an effect guarded against by covering the face. The influence of the moon, in producing madness or disease, the general influence of it on health, is often referred to. Thus, Shakespeare says:
“The moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound.”
Midsummer Night’s Dream, ii. 2.
“It is the very error of the moon;
She comes more near the earth than she was wont,
And makes men mad.”
Othello, v. 2.
Some of these things are evidently purely imaginary. The true idea seems to be that there were effects to be dreaded from the sudden changes from the heat of day to the cold of night, and that these effects were attributed to the moon. See Genesis 31:40. The meaning is that God would be a Protector alike in the dangers of the day and of the night.
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John Gill
The sun shall not smite thee by day,…. With its rays, which it shoots forth like darts, and which fly swiftly, and pierce and hurt: hence Apollo, the same with the sun, is represented with a bow and arrows; so the rays of the sun seem to be called in Habakkuk 2:11;
nor the moon by night; this clause should be supplied, as a learned man observes, thus, “neither shall the moon cool thee by night”; for that has no warmth in it, and cannot smite with heat, as the sun does: for even, as he observes, its rays focused by a magnifying glass will not communicate the least degree of sensible heat to bodies objected thereunto; yet some say the moon is not only moist, but heats bodies as the sun. And Isaac Vossius observes that there can be no light, which, separately considered, does not contain some heat at least: and Macrobius speaks of the lunar heat; and Plutarch ascribes heat and inflammation to it, and asserts it to be fire. It is said that some men of good credit, in a voyage to Guinea, strongly affirmed that, in the night season, they felt a sensible heat to come from the beams of the moon. The Septuagint version is, “the sun shall not burn thee by day, nor the moon by night.” And burning may be ascribed to the cold frosty air on a moonlight night, as to the north wind.
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Matthew Henry
He will protect them from all the malignant influences of the heavenly bodies (v. 6): The sun shall not smite thee with his heat by day nor the moon with her cold and moisture by night. The sun and moon are great blessings to mankind, and yet (such a sad change has sin made in the creation) even the sun and moon, though worshipped by a great part of mankind, are often instruments of hurt and distemper to human bodies; God by them often smites us; but his favour shall interpose so that they shall not damage his people. He will keep them night and day (Isa. 27:3), as he kept Israel in the wilderness by a pillar of cloud by day, which screened them from the heat of the sun, and of fire by night, which probably diffused a genial warmth over the whole camp, that they might not be prejudiced by the cold and damp of the night, their father Jacob having complained (Gen. 31:40) that by day the drought consumed him and the frost by night. It may be understood figuratively: “Thou shalt not be hurt either by the open assaults of thy enemies, which are as visible as the scorching beams of the sun, or by their secret treacherous attempts, which are like the insensible insinuations of the cold by night.”
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Miscellaneous Comments
“The sun shall not smite thee.” הַכָּה of the sun signifies to smite injuriously (Isa 49:10), plants, so that they wither (Psalm 102:5), and the head (John 4:8), so that symptoms of sunstroke (2Ki 4:19; Jdg 8:2 seq.) appear. The transferring of the word to the word is not zeugmatic. Even the moon’s rays may become insupportable, may affect the eyes injuriously, and (more particularly in the equatorial regions) produce fatal inflammation of the brain. From the hurtful influences of nature that are round about him, the promise extends in verses 7, 8 in every direction. Jahve, says the poet to himself, will keep (guard) thee against all evil, of whatever kind it may be and whencesoever it may threaten; he will keep thy soul, and therefore thy life both inwardly and outwardly; he will keep thy going out and coming in, i.e., all thy business and intercourse of life… everywhere and at all times; and that from this time forth even for ever.
—Franz Delitzsch.
“The sun shall not smite thee by day,” etc. A promise made with allusion unto, and application of that care which God had over his people, when he brought them out of Egypt through the wilderness, when he guarded them from the heat of the sun by a cloud by day, and from the cold and moistness of the night and moon by a pillar of fire by night.
—David Dickson.
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