David Delivered

Let's turn to 2 Samuel chapter 22. Now tonight, we'll look at a portion of this chapter that speaks to our God's willingness to deliver his people. And we see that pictured in David here, and in some sense as a type of the believer and what the Lord does in delivering his people.

But we must also recognize and always recognize that our deliverance is for Christ's sake. who suffered for us, willingly, and died for us, and was not delivered. He willingly laid down his life, bearing the sins of his people, as the Lamb of God, to atone for our sins. And so, he didn't deliver himself. He didn't ask to be delivered, unless it were possible to show us that there wasn't another way for us to be saved. He willingly went to the cross and laid down his life for our salvation.

And so I say that to remind us when we do suffer, when we do suffer, when we're called to suffer, and when the Lord delivers us, there's a partaking of us in our Savior and what he did for us. And the Father means that for us, to be partakers of our Lord's suffering. It's for our good.

So David describes the great sorrows and the difficulties that he faced from all his enemies who sought his life, who sought his harm, who wanted to destroy him and wanted to see him destroyed, who delighted in David's harm and destruction. And so he says in verse five and six, when the waves of death compassed me, the floods of ungodly men made me afraid. The sorrows of hell compassed me about. The snares of death prevented me. And so he's describing how the enemy is moving against him. And in that movement, like a great army coming against him, it's overwhelming.

It's overwhelming like a flood, right? We hear of floods and we often think, well, they just rise slowly, but then you hear of people dying in floods because it starts as a trickle, it seems like nothing, and before you know it, it's up to your neck and then over your head, right? And the picture here, I remember when we would go to the shore or to a beach somewhere, I loved going out into the ocean, and I like to go out far, like really far, and it's kind of scary, because you don't know what's underneath you, and you know there's things out there, but I just like it, and so I go out far, and I usually can at least touch the sand, but certain days when the waves come, they're five, six feet and they can lift you off of that sandbar and then back down. And sometimes when the wave goes by, you don't even see the shore and you're just overwhelmed by it. You can feel the immensity of it.

And that's the picture here of the enemy coming in like an overwhelming force of water. And water isn't just on the sides of us, water's underneath us. If you're in the ocean, water's above your head. You think of Jonah, how he was just overwhelmed by the water when he was thrown overboard and sunk down in the ocean.

Well, this is how David's describing the enemy. And when our enemies assault us, when the sin assaults us, when the accuser assaults us, when others neighbors or enemies or friends or whoever, when there's a coming at you, just events, just a series of things happening in your life, it can be overwhelming. It can come at you and make you afraid, as David said. The floods of ungodly men made me afraid. You can imagine that, especially with how close Saul was to taking David's life at times. When David was on the mountain or in the cave, how near death felt to him in those moments there.

And so that picture of a flood overwhelming is a good picture of enemies because we've all been there. We've been in situations where we're facing one thing that's coming at us, one difficulty, and before you can even catch your breath, you're hit with another, and then another, and it can build up and be overwhelming to us.

Turn over to Psalm 22. Let's see this. This Psalm, you know, 2 Samuel 22, which is very, very similar to Psalm 18, Psalm 18 likely coming after this one. But Psalm 22, like Psalm 18, is also picturing for us the Lord Jesus Christ and what he endured for us.

And it's described here, as David describes it, in verse 10, Psalm 22, verse 10, He says prophetically of our Lord, I was cast upon thee from the womb. Thou art my God from my mother's belly. In that language there, being cast upon the Lord from his mother's womb, you can even picture someone that was shipwrecked or out at sea and cast upon a distant shore. You can picture that, just cast, and that really is what these overwhelming floods do.

They cast us upon the Lord, they lift us up, and they carry us, who are the Lord's people, to the Lord. because he sanctifies our struggles. He sanctifies our difficulties and our hardships. And they lift us up and they cast us upon the Lord. And that's what the Lord does. It accomplishes in us to feel our need of the Lord. and makes us to know that we need him.

And that's what I believe these troubles, one of these, the design of our troubles and our difficulties and our failings or our setbacks or however we perceive them, the Lord designs it to drive us to the Lord for help. It's to put us in places where we can't gain peace by something we do. We need the Lord to do it for us. And the Lord says in verse 11, be not far from me for trouble is near for there is none to help. That's what he does. He makes it so that we know no one else can do this for us.

And there are situations. I mean, sometimes we can be comforted by a brother or a loved one. We can be comforted. But then there's other times where there's nothing anyone can say that makes us feel peace. and comfort and at rest about a thing. The only one that can do that is the Lord, because the Lord is the one who lays things to our hearts and works these things through in a way that we begin to reconcile them and realize, you know what? It's not the worst thing. if this happens. You know, the Lord is near. The Lord does give me peace. The Lord does help me. And that's something that no one else in the world can do, but the Lord is able to do that.

Many bulls have compassed me, he says. Strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round. I dislike the water. Strong bulls of Bashan. They gaped upon me with their mouths as a ravening and a roaring lion. I am poured out like water and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax. It is melted in the midst of my bowels.

And so there we see, this is speaking of our Lord Jesus Christ and he was not delivered from that. He willingly suffered for us. He went to the cross willingly for us and submitted himself to the will of the Father who allowed those men with wicked evil in their hearts and murder in their hearts to take his darling son and to put him to death. right, to work out what they had in their wicked hearts to do, and he wasn't delivered. Though he could have been, he could have called for legions of angels, but he stayed on the cross to accomplish our redemption. to do for us a wondrous work of mighty grace. And so our times and our sorrows are given to drive us, to make us feel our need of the Lord and to drive us to the Lord. And we're reminded of, we have the Lord, we're reminded of the shame that he despised, right? He endured the shame, he endured the suffering for the joy of his people that was set before him. for the joy of knowing what he had accomplished for us, that eternal inheritance and that forgiveness with the Father and peace with him. And so it drives us to the Lord.

And that's exactly what the overwhelming flood of persecution has done for David here. Let's go back to, well, hold your, no, let's go back to 2 Samuel here, 2 Samuel 22. Verse seven, he says, in my distress, I called upon the Lord and cried to my God. And he did hear my voice out of his temple and my cry did enter into his ears.

And again, you know, just in keeping with that, that, that ocean of, of trial that comes against us. When the enemy has his warships out there, has a blockade, and nothing can get through, well, his blockade cannot prevent our prayers from reaching the port of our God's grace.

His port of grace is always open, and he hears the prayers of his saints. He hears our cries. He does. He hears and he delights to hear from his people. Prayer is a direct line to the throne of God. It's like the ship to shore on the ship, right? It's the phone call in to our Lord to save us, to deliver us, to have mercy upon us. And he graciously hears our complaints. Even when by our own actions and own designs, we're the ones that put ourselves in that position. And yet he's gracious to hear us and bears patiently with us.

And you may have noticed in that verse seven there, there's a progression of David's soul's distress. First he calls upon the Lord and then he pours out his cry of his fears and his worries and his overwhelming fear that he's going to be destroyed by his enemies. It says, in my distress, I called upon the Lord and cried to my God. And that first word, Lord, if you notice in your King James, it's capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D, which is Jehovah.

And we know from our study in Exodus that Jehovah speaks to our covenant God. He is our covenant God. In covenant mercies, we are loved of the Lord and provided for by the Lord, and he cares for us, and he hears our cries. And we ought never doubt that, but even when we don't believe, he's faithful still, because he cannot deny himself. And so he's faithful to us. And so to repeat what I've been saying, the purpose of God in permitting our enemies to trouble us is to make us feel our need of him in our distresses and the overwhelmingness of these things come upon us. And when they do, they drive us to him.

I mean, how many times have you heard something about a loved one or something going on, and you think, oh, that's not good, but you don't pay much mind to it. And then you hear again a week later, it's really bad. It's really bad, and you don't realize it yet, and then, you realize, uh-oh, something's wrong.

And then you remember, I need to go to the Lord in prayer. You might have said something in your prayers once, but then when you're reminded, there's still problems going on with your loved one, like a child or something. Then when you're distressed, you pour out your concern, your heart to the Lord to have mercy upon them, to be gracious to them, to begging him to hear your prayer and your cry. And so our Lord does that. He does that with these distresses and dangers. It drives the living soul to the Lord, to the feet of our God at his throne and to pour out our heart to him and ask him for help, ask him for grace and mercy. And he does it in such a way that only he can help. When reason seems to fall flat, when logic just doesn't answer it or satisfy it, only the Lord can help. And no one else is there to do it. Turn over now to 1 Peter. 1 Peter chapter two.

I suppose there's a temptation to assume that when something goes wrong, wrong as we would judge it, right? How we perceive things when things are going wrong or bad. And we might think, well, we're suffering, you know, maybe something I did, maybe it's something I did. Well, sometimes the Lord gives us suffering for us to suffer, for us to bear in it.

And so Peter says in 1 Peter 2, down in verse 19, he says, this is thankworthy. if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully. For what glory is it, if when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently? But if when ye do well and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God.

For even hereunto were ye called. because Christ also suffered for us. He's saying we were called to that suffering. We were called to that hour of suffering. For even Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that ye should follow in his steps.

Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. Who when he was reviled, reviled not again. When he suffered, he threatened not, but, and here's the fruit here, but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously. Who his own self bear our sins in his own body on the tree, that we being dead to sins should live unto righteousness by whose stripes ye were healed. For ye were as sheep going astray, but are now returned unto the shepherd and bishop of your souls.

And so all these difficulties are given to us. We're called unto these things to learn in the midst of the trials. Because again, we all know that when everything's going well and everyone's happy and everything's going the way we would expect it to go, the heart is more set on the world than it is on the Lord. It's just the nature of things. But when things are not going the way we would think they should go, we see that the Lord gives this to us for our good, for our learning. And so he secures us to himself in the midst of our trouble, and he arises and judges our enemies, right? Those that would harm us here. And we can trust him in that. It's for our good. It's for our good here.

And here we see the immediacy and the intimacy of our God in those hours of prayer. In those times of prayer, there's an intimacy there between us and our God, because again, We, you know, I'm sure many times we think I've maybe only prayed in the spirit a handful of times in my whole life, right? And it's when we're put in those great difficult situations, that's when the prayer is most honest, most raw, most just true.

And you're just laying it before him. And I mean, I encourage us all to pray regularly, but I'm just saying that we all know when there's a desperate need it just flows out without any push, it just flows out. Even if it's a sigh and a cry to the Lord, Lord help, I don't even know how to pray about this and bring this to you. I don't even know, but the Lord knows. And so go to him with your cares and your worries, go to him.

Turn over to 1 Peter 5. 1 Peter 5, and let's pick up in verse six. and hear this in relation to when we suffer. Hear these words here, 1 Peter 5, 6, in relation to when we suffer in committing ourselves to him that judgeth righteously. Peter says, humble yourselves, verse six, humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you.

Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil has a roaring line, walketh about seeking whom he may devour, whom resist steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world. Your suffering, your trials, especially if it's someone who you disagree with, someone that you can see in the world that you have a disagreement with, the temptation in the flesh is to respond in kind to the way they're treating you and to give it back to them.

I'll give it right back to you. Let's just keep upping the ante. We'll just keep going at it like this. remembering what Peter said is, well, hold up, maybe the Lord has just put me here to suffer, to bear it, and to not respond in kind, but to bear it because there is a great temptation. Because as soon as you start upping the ante and you start getting nasty back with people, your adversary, the devil, is just ready to rend you apart and make things worse. Because now there's fighting, there's words, there's all kinds of things and it isn't good.

And so he says, resist steadfast in the faith knowing that all your brethren are suffering and going through various trials and troubles. But he says, after that you have, in the second half of verse 10, after that you have suffered a while, make you perfect, establish, strengthen, settle you.

To him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. So wait a minute, after a while, after you have suffered a while, that's right, it's God's purpose and intent that there are just times where we should suffer for a while in certain things. He intends it, it's on purpose.

And the Lord, as we can see in scripture from these verses and in other verses that may come to your mind, that it pleases the Lord to allow his child to suffer for a time. Our Lord did it and accomplished great things. And think of all that we learn in the suffering. Think of how the Lord sanctifies it to our hearts and makes it precious to us, right?

Because we learn patience. Patience is learned in it as we're waiting for things to resolve and work out. And in patience, there's experience. that you begin to experience things and say, you know what, maybe we should just be patient and just wait, because the Lord has a way of working things out. And you know that because you've seen it before. Sometimes the Lord just has a way of working things out. And then experience works hope, right? It strengthens that hope which is given to us in the Lord. To learn not to just be so quick to do what we think should be done, but sometimes to do nothing and just pray and just wait on the Lord.

In fact, our Lord said by the prophet Isaiah, therefore will the Lord wait. He'll wait that he may be gracious unto you and therefore will he be exalted that he may have mercy upon you. For the Lord is a God of judgment. Blessed are they, blessed are all they that wait for him.

And so we're not always called to just jump into action and respond in kind, but to bear it. And if you're suffering wrongfully, all the better, bear it. Recognize that the Lord has given that to you and to see your need of him, to drive you to him. And after you suffered for a while, you'll see the Lord will resolve it in a way that is peaceful, that only he can do. that you wouldn't have seen if you just did your own thing.

It made it worse. So, the following verses back in our text in 2 Samuel 22 verse 8 here, these give us a description of God's response to the cry of his saints here. When the enemy comes in like a flood to overwhelm and destroy, it says verse 8, then the earth shook and trembled. The foundations of heaven moved and shook because he was wrath or angry. And so it kind of reminds me of when I was a kid, when my dad would get mad and I'd hear him come storming into wherever I was causing trouble.

I remember one time my cousin Billy and I, he was sleeping over and we were in the bathtub. We were young, like eight or nine or whatever. We're in the bathroom, we're sloshing back and forth, like making a good waves going, and we're having a great time, and the water's all coming out onto the floor. And we're on the second floor, and I didn't know my dad was home, and he's downstairs in the kitchen, and we're filling it up again, and adding more water, and then sloshing all the more, while it's sort of leaking through the ceiling.

And I remember all of a sudden hearing him, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, like coming up and yeah, we got in trouble. That was the end of that sleepover. My cousin went home that very night. So my dad brought him home, but that's the picture there is the Lord is, he's angry and he's coming to deal with the enemies, with your enemies. He's coming to deal with them.

And we've seen this, how there are enemies that oppose the will of God and they get destroyed. As Janus and Jambres withstood Moses and Exodus, we saw that, those magicians. And as Elimus, the sorcerer, withstood Barnabas and Saul, seeking to turn away the deputy from the faith. These men picture men of religion. magicians and sorcerers, men of false religion, and even in the Jews, among the Jews, right, they withstood Paul. And they withstood our Lord.

And they stood opposed to these things. And our Lord Jesus Christ said to them, woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men. For ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in. And so these are the types of enemies. I mean, more than anything, it's self-righteous. religionists that oppose the truth, and we don't want to get wrapped up in that, because sometimes we too can get caught up in that.

Even Paul wrote to the Galatians saying to the church there in Galatia that when you see a brother who's broken for their sins, Don't you seek to lay on even more stripes, but rather be patient and try to help them, right? Or even if they're not broken, if you see a brother falling in sin, be patient and labor to help them. Galatians 6, one through three says, brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fall, Ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted.

Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ." You know, the temptation that we set ourselves up for is that, well, maybe the Lord put them in that, and put them in that distressful situation, and put them in there to teach them, to deal with them, to help them, and to also teach the church to learn and to work out the law of Christ. And what's the law of Christ? That you love one another. This is my commandment, that ye love one another as I have loved you. That's the law of Christ, to love one another, to be kind and gentle and help one another. not condemning.

For if a man think himself to be something when he's nothing, he deceiveth himself." And so, what we're seeing here is that the Lord is angry with the wicked. and the self-righteous are in that bucket of wicked men. And we don't want to find ourselves in that bucket with the wicked because he moves against the enemies who trouble his people. He may allow them to suffer for a time, but then he rises and he moves against the enemies of the church, of his people, and he'll remove them, he'll deal with them. especially if you're not doing anything and you're just trusting the Lord and waiting on him, he'll deal with the enemies, he'll do it.

Then in verse nine in our text, 2 Samuel 22, nine, there went up a smoke out of his nostrils and fire out of his mouth, devoured coals were kindled by it. And that expresses his fierce wrath there, right? And inflamed by the heat of passion of anger against his enemies.

In verse 10, He bowed the heavens also, and came down, and darkness was under his feet. And he rode upon a cherub, and did fly, and was seen upon the wings of the wind. And he made darkness pavilions round about him, dark waters, and thick clouds of the skies.

And the sense to me about this seems to be that none can see him coming but the eye of faith. The eye of faith knows my Lord will come. He's the Jehovah, the covenant God, my God. who hears my cries and hears my prayers, let me wait upon the Lord because he's coming. He'll deal with things. He'll work them out perfectly, justly and equitably.

He'll do it perfectly, what we can't do. And he has access to all powers in heaven and in earth. He can make use of any and everything that he so chooses to make use of, even though it seems impossible to us. He is absolutely able to do it. And so what's impossible with us, with you and me, is very possible with Him, because it's all His. And all things are possible to Him that believe it. And so what God chooses to do, it will be wondrous to behold. Just wait on Him.

Verse 13 and 14, Through the brightness before him were coals of fire kindled. The Lord thundered from heaven, and the Most High uttered His voice. And the sense is you can look up in the heavens and see the flashes of light. It's like cannonballs firing off, boom, boom, boom. The Lord is dealing with the enemies and it speaks of his voice. He uttered his voice and his voice is Christ and his voice is the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And that's what he does. And when he speaks, it destroys the vain imaginations of men. It destroys the vain imaginations that we have. It tears down all that opposes Christ, all that trusts in the flesh. The Lord has a way of tearing them down, of stripping that down, of teaching his people and building them up in Christ. Even if we build with wood, hay, and stubble, the Lord has a way of stripping that down and burning that up and building it back up on the foundation, which is Christ, of gold and silver and precious stones.

He's able to do that, and trust Him. He's able to do that. He's able to do that with you, and He's able to do that in your brethren. You can trust Him. Go to Him in prayer if things concern and trouble you. All right, verse 15 through 18. And he sent out arrows and scattered them, lightning and discomfited them. And the channels of the sea appeared, the foundations of the world were discovered. At the rebuking of the Lord, at the blast of the breath of his nostrils, he sent from above, he took me, he drew me out of many waters. He delivered me from my strong enemy and from them that hated me, for they were too strong for me.

And so the imagery that's being used here, actually, with the familiar, we didn't get to it yet, the plague of darkness in Egypt, but it has that sense, and the whole thing has that sense. You can see how the Lord, David seems to be drawing upon what the Lord did for Israel in Egypt. And he sees what the Lord did for him. in his own troubles, surrounded by Philistines, surrounded by Saul, surrounded by Absalom and the workers of the coup, right? He's seen how the Lord does mightily in delivering his people and extracting them. while things are dark and troublesome to the enemy. And because during that confusion, that's when the Lord plucks his people out and delivers them. While the enemy is all confused and he takes them right out of their grasp. Verse 19, they prevented me in the day of my calamity, but the Lord was my stay. And so David is drawing on this, how the Lord delivered him from all his enemies, just as he's delivered his people time and time again in the judges, in Egypt, and what he did for Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

He is the God of the living, and that's what he does for us. That's what he does for his people, you that live unto the Lord, who live by faith, walk by the spirit in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what he does for his people. And the reason why he does it and how he can do it and be so gracious and merciful to us who ourselves have sinned against him and rebelled against him and sinned and under the dominion of sin and Satan, he does it for Christ's sake. He's able to be merciful to us, to justly forgive us, to sustain us and support us and provide for us justly because Christ has paid the price for his people.

He purchased us with his own blood. He satisfied the holy justice of God, which was against us. Our debts are settled. It's paid in full and we're his people so that he now blesses us richly for Christ's sake. And so he did everything. He went to the cross willingly for us. He satisfied the Lord and he was surrounded, right?

He let himself be surrounded by his enemies, Herod, Pontius Pilate, the Jews and the Gentiles alike. all rose up against him, and he faithfully, faithfully satisfied the Father, and is well-pleasing to the Father. So you who have no righteousness of your own, you who have no ability to save yourselves from your enemy, sin, Satan, and the grave, and any other enemy, trust the Lord. He is able. In Hebrews 5, In Hebrews 5 verses 7-9 it says, who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications, with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared, though he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered. and being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him. And so Christ is our deliverance. He's our everything. He's our deliverance. Call upon him, cry out to him, and he'll show you, he'll teach you these things more and more that he is all your salvation and your deliverer from all your enemies.

David Delivered

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