Psalm 18
Prayer: Father, I ask that You would impress upon us this morning Your wonderful, sovereign love. I pray that it would be potent in our lives, in our marriages and families and community, for Jesus’ sake, Amen.
Introduction
A version of Psalm 18 is also found in 2 Samuel 22 right before the last words of David, at the end of his life, and so the title is often taken to be referring to the rest he enjoyed at the very end of his life.
When David looked back over his life, what did he see? What did he think? Even though he was aware of things that were not right (2 Sam. 23:5ff), his main thought was that he loved the Lord because He had been so faithful through all the storms and battles and therefore David sings. This Psalm opens with David’s love for God and closes with God’s love for David.
The Text: “To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David, the servant of the LORD, who spake unto the LORD the words of this song in the day that the LORD delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul: And he said, I will love thee, O LORD, my strength…” (Ps. 18:1-50)
Summary of the Text
Psalm 18 opens with a jubilant cry of love and praise because God is his rock and deliverer (Ps. 18:1-6). David describes God’s deliverance as a terrible storm that simultaneously scatters and terrifies his enemies and saves him and puts him on solid ground – like a combination of the Flood, the Exodus, and Jonah all wrapped into one (Ps. 18:7-19). David sings that God’s deliverance is proof of God’s assessment of him – that he is righteous and clean in his sight (Ps. 18:20-28). He describes God’s deliverance again but this time in terms of actual battle – this was how God’s storm appeared and saved him (Ps. 18:29-42). Finally, David sings that this is how God will subdue all his enemies, showing mercy (covenant lovingkindness) to His anointed (Messiah), to David’s seed forever (Ps. 18:43-50).
God’s Judgement as Salvation
God’s judgement is described here as a terrible storm: earthquakes (Ps. 18:7), lightning and wildfires (Ps. 18:8), deep dark clouds and hurricane winds (Ps. 18:9-10), torrents of rain and hail stones (Ps. 18:11-12), terrifying thunders and lightnings and hail (Ps. 18:13-14), and fierce flooding (Ps. 18:15).
But what is remarkable is that David sings that in that terrible storm God sent from above and took him and drew him out of many waters and delivered him and brought him out and set him on a broad and solid place (Ps. 18:16-19).
We serve the true Storm God – every detail of every inch of wind and waves and lightning obey Him perfectly (1 Kgs. 18:38, 45, Ps. 46, Ps. 107:25, Mk. 4:41). His judgments fall with laser precision and perfect justice (Gen. 18:23ff). This is why David loves God: because of God’s amazing love for him. And this includes all kinds of storms: political/cultural storms, medical/health storms, and family/marriage storms. But if you know Christ, Christ is with you in the boat. This is the love of God for you.
Standing in Grace
David says that God has dealt with him according to his righteousness (Ps. 18:20-25). God’s precision care demonstrated God’s assessment of him – righteous and blameless. How is this possible for a fallen, sinful creature to sing? David hints at the answer: with the purified, God shows Himself pure (Ps. 18:26), He saves the humble (Ps. 18:27), and God is His light (Ps. 18:28). How can a man be pure? Through humble confession of sin and walking in the light of forgiveness (1 Jn. 1:7-9). David’s righteousness, in other words, is a gift, but it is a true gift. True humility accepts this gift. It would be weird to receive a gift for your birthday and then to keep going around saying that it isn’t really yours. Of course it would be equally weird to pretend you got it all by yourself.
Paul makes the same point in Romans: Having been justified by faith, we have peace with God, and we stand in grace (Rom. 5:1-2). God’s grace in Jesus Christ is not merely a shelter we stand under (sort of cowering). We stand in grace and rejoice in hope of the glory of God – not only that, we rejoice even in our suffering (in the storms), knowing that God is working character and virtue into us and we will not be put to shame (Rom. 5:3-5). Grace is the most solid rock. Grace is God Himself with you and for you. This is why David sings, “By You I can run through a troop and by my God, I can leap over a wall” (Ps. 18:29). God and His grace is David’s strength and armor (Ps. 18:30-42). So of course he sings. He loves God because God loves him.
Conclusion & Applications
This is why worship is warfare – our Lord’s Day worship here but also singing Psalms around your dinner table and in the car. Never forget that as we read and sing the Psalms, the Bible teaches that these are the “words of Christ” – the Songs of Christ, dwelling in us richly with all wisdom (Col. 3:16).
There is a difference between merely “going to church” or “doing family worship” and aiming your weapon into the storm, singing into the storm – this is the faith that overcomes, faith that expects to see God’s steadfast love to us and to our children forever in Christ in your life, in your story. When the storm clouds get dark, do you panic or do you sing? If His words are in us, then He is with us, and our enemies will submit or fade away (Ps. 18:44-45). He sings and fights for us (Zeph. 3:17).
This is not a limp or tentative faith; it is a living faith that works by love. David knows that it is God who upholds him, God who lights his lamp, God whose storm is scattering all his enemies, and therefore, David is active. David is singing and working, singing and fighting. Why? Because Christ is. This is what love does: it imitates, it obeys from the heart, with a song. We are all called to this kind of love, and parents, you are required by God to teach this to your children, and the most important way you teach this is by doing it.
Prayer: Father, please cause Your Spirit to confirm Your great love for us so that we may have that kind fiercely singing and working love. Guard us from trying to gin this up on our own; turn our eyes to Jesus. And so we pray as He taught us…
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