A Life Delivered
Download MP3We are nearing the end of our study of 1st and second Samuel. After today, there will be, only 4 more sermons as we near the end of David's life and reign. It is printed in your worship guides, and you are going to need it. So, find it in your worship guide, or, find it in your Bible. It is a lengthy song attributed to King David.
Jeffrey Heine:We will be in 2nd Samuel chapter 22, and it's a song that looks back on David's life, his long journey to become king, the tumultuous years of his reign, and through it all, David sees the divine providence, the limitless mercy, and the ultimate rescue by the Lord his God. It is, it's long. You can see that in your worship guide. It's like Don McLean's American Pie. And halfway through, you think this is over.
Jeffrey Heine:Right? And it's not. It's a long 50 verse epic, spans the years of David's life of conflict with his enemies, and the full lyrics are, as I said, printed in your worship guide. I broke it into 4 parts to kinda help us as we move through the song. And over the course of our time this morning, we will read all 50 verses.
Jeffrey Heine:But as we begin, let's first look and listen to the opening lines in part 1, and together, ask the Lord to lead us as we study His word. So let us listen carefully for this is god's word. 2nd Samuel chapter 22 beginning in verse 1. And David spoke to the lord the words of this song on the day when the lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul, he said, the Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold and my refuge. My savior, you saved me from violence.
Jeffrey Heine:I call upon the lord who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies. For the waves of death encompass me, the torrents of destruction assailed me, the cords of Sheol entangled me, the The snares of death confronted me. In my distress, I called upon the Lord. To the to my God, I called. From his temple, he heard my voice, and my cry came to his ears.
Jeffrey Heine:This is the word of the Lord. Thanks to God. Let's pray together. Almighty God, will you show us your grace this morning by meeting us in your word? Will you comfort us, correct us, challenge and change us to be more like your son, our savior?
Jeffrey Heine:So would you speak, Lord? Your servants are listening. Pray this in the name of the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Amen. The inscription attributing this song to king David highlights that it was spoken to the Lord, quote, on the day when the Lord delivered him from the hand of all of his enemies and from the hand of Saul.
Jeffrey Heine:While that could mean years earlier in David's life, when Saul died and David assumed the throne of Israel, we do find one chapter back in 2nd Samuel chapter 21 that there had been a severe drought, a 3 year drought in Israel, and it was causing massive devastation. And when David inquired of the Lord as to why this drought was continuing for so long, the Lord said that it was a continued judgment on Israel due to king Saul's sin against god in killing the Gibeonites. I'm sure you remember that. That means that even years later, both the people and the land of Israel were still being punished because of Saul's disobedience. So even though Saul was long dead, David was still in need of deliverance from the hand of Saul, the effects of Saul, which means that this inscription could be referring to these years of David's youth or these more recent times in David's life.
Jeffrey Heine:It wouldn't be unusual for the editors of 1st and second Samuel to place this song at the end of 2nd Samuel, even though it wasn't chronologically in the right place. The song could be used as this retrospective epilogue and and used as a bookend to the 2 volume epic story. You may recall in 1st Samuel, it begins with the song of Hannah. Might be hard to remember that far back, but 25 sermons ago, we opened this study of 1st and second Samuel by looking at this song of a barren woman named Hannah. In 1st Samuel chapter 2, we read her song, a prayer of hopeful deliverance and confidence in the strength of the Lord.
Jeffrey Heine:Hannah had been pleading with God that he would show his kindness to her and give her a child. And Lord heard Hannah's cries and answered her prayers with a son. That child of Hannah would grow up to be a prophet, a man who at the divine direction of the Lord would anoint David to be king over Israel. And when we recall Hannah's song at the beginning of First Samuel, we can see numerous threads that course throughout the 53 chapters of First and Second Samuel here to the end of 2nd Samuel and the song of David. The two songs serve as a bookend to the story of David and his life.
Jeffrey Heine:Many of the themes and phrases from Hannah's song parallel and are repeated in the words of David's song, especially these opening opening lines of praise to the lord. These opening lines that we just read, they declare 2 main themes of the song. Number 1, Yahweh alone is David's god. And number 2, when David called upon the lord, the lord answered him. David uses a flurry of metaphors to describe the strengths and trustworthiness of god.
Jeffrey Heine:He says Yahweh is my rock, my fortress, my shield, my horn, my refuge, my stronghold. And David goes on to call Yahweh his deliverer and savior, the one who saves him from violence, from violent people. And after declaring the source of his rescue and his hope, David describes the intensity of his situation, the intensity that he is facing. He uses images that were prevalent in the ancient culture to symbolize power and chaos and calamity, Crashing waves, torrents of water, images of drowning. He offers images of snares and ropes entangling, dragging him down to Sheol, the place of the dead.
Jeffrey Heine:David describes facing certain death, and he cries out to the Lord for help. David declares that in his great distress and facing certain death, he called out. And from God's temple, God's heavenly dwelling, God hears David's cries. He says, My voice reached the ears of Yahweh. It gets better, I promise.
Jeffrey Heine:So not only does God hear David's words, he responds to David's cries. Let's look at Part 2, the response to Yahweh. This response of Yahweh starting in verse 8. Then the earth reeled and rocked. The foundations of the heavens trembled and quaked because He was angry.
Jeffrey Heine:Smoke went up from his nostrils and devouring fire from his mouth. Glowing coals flamed forth from him. He bowed the heavens and came down. Thick darkness was under his feet. He rode on a cherub and flew.
Jeffrey Heine:He was seen on the wings of the wind. He made darkness around him, his canopy, thick clouds and gathering of water. Out of the brightness before him, coals of fire flamed forth. The Lord thundered from heaven, and the Most High uttered his voice. And he sent out arrows and scattered them, lightning, and routed them.
Jeffrey Heine:Then the channels of the sea were seen. The foundations of the world were laid bare at the rebuke of the lord, at the blast of the breath of his nostrils. The lord responds to David. He came to his rescue in a furious defense. David describes a fantastical scene of rescue, the earth quaking in God's anger as He tears through the heavens and comes down to rescue David.
Jeffrey Heine:There's an image of God flying on a cherub, riding on the wings of the wind, thundering from heaven, scattering arrows, controlling the chaotic seas, the mountains and the oceans that the Canaanite people worshiped as gods themselves. Here Yahweh is commanding them to serve His purpose of rescuing David. In verse 17, he sent from on high. He took me. He drew me out of many waters.
Jeffrey Heine:He rescued me from my strong enemy, from those who hated me, for they were too mighty for me. They comforted me in the day of my calamity. But the Lord, the Lord was my support. He brought me out into a broad place. He rescued me because he delighted in me.
Jeffrey Heine:David closes this section of this song by, again, using imagery of Israel's history to describe Yahweh's great work of deliverance. Verse 17 alludes to deliverance that occurred for Moses when he was rescued as an infant, and pharaoh's daughter drew him up out of the waters. Actually, is the sounds like the Hebrew verb for drawing up out of the waters, is why Moses was named Moshe. And that same language is used here, that the Lord drew David up out of the waters to rescue him. David admits that his his enemies were too mighty for him.
Jeffrey Heine:He didn't stand a chance on his own, in his own strength. The enemy was was strong, and they hated David, and they were too mighty for him. And the last line, part 2, sets us up for the next section of the song, where we will be spending the majority of our time this morning, part 3. But at the close of part 2 in verse 20, David declares this. He rescued me because he delighted in me.
Jeffrey Heine:God's delight is the basis for how David understands his rescue. This is crucial for how we are going to interpret and understand this song. In the following section, part 3, David will further expound on this remarkable basis for his deliverance. But before I go any further, I I do feel the need to caution you. If you've been following along in this series, if you've been listening to these sermons, especially the last few weeks, And there's a good chance that what you are about to hear David say, you're not going to like it.
Jeffrey Heine:I have studied and preached and taught on the life of David many times over the years, and I don't believe that there's been a time where I have disliked David as much as I have in this current series. His ruthless disobedience of the Lord, his casual indifference to suffering that He caused, His narcissistic calculated cruelty, His unbridled arrogance, they're all on display. So what David is about to say, at the very least, is perplexing. And in light of all that we have learned in our study in David's life, when you first hear it, it's challenging to reconcile what he is saying. But he says it, and it's in our bibles.
Jeffrey Heine:And as a family of faith, we are committed to figuring out what it means together before the lord. So here it goes. Verse 21. The lord dealt with me according to my righteousness. According to the cleanness of my hands, he rewarded me.
Jeffrey Heine:For I have kept the ways of the Lord and have not wickedly departed from my god. For all his rules were before me, and from his statutes I did not turn aside. I was blameless before him, and I kept myself from guilt. And the lord has rewarded me according to my righteousness, according to my cleanness in his sight. What?
Joel Brooks:For the
Jeffrey Heine:last few years, I've wanted to start a theology podcast because we need more of those. And I wanted to call it what? And it would be about passages like this and things in church history that just make you say, what? So David is saying that the basis for his rescue by god is that he was blameless before god and clean in his sight. When was that?
Jeffrey Heine:Remind me when David was blameless before the Lord because I think I missed it. The editors of 1st and second Samuel understand that that we just read 2 whole volumes about this man, and all the instances of his selfishness and sinfulness. We didn't just flip open our Bibles, put our finger down, and start reading like it's a love love letter from God directly to us, because we don't do that. Right? So where does David get off saying these things?
Jeffrey Heine:How in the world can he say, for I have kept the ways of the Lord and have not wickedly departed from my God. For all His rules were before me, and from His statutes I did not turn aside. Just in the story of Bathsheba and Uriah, David broke at least 40% of the Ten Commandments, arguably more. So how can he say I was blameless before him? There have been numerous attempts to understand or explain away these words.
Jeffrey Heine:I'll quickly summarize a few of those options. 1st option, David wrote this when he was much younger, before David, met Bathsheba and Uriah. But, really, was there a time when David really was completely blameless before the lord? That that option doesn't really resolve the issue. Option 2 is that David is being sarcastic.
Jeffrey Heine:He's he's being sarcastic. Maybe he's being hyperbolic. He's like, he's just emphasizing the need for righteousness, and he's just kind of speaking in flowery language. It's a stylistic choice. But that that's not really what it says.
Jeffrey Heine:That's not how it reads. Another option is that someone else wrote it. Maybe some fans of David later on in Israel wrote it, and they were just wanting to honor this great king. And so they included it. They they inserted it in there at a later time.
Jeffrey Heine:But that doesn't check out with the Hebrew in in that section. It's it's it's a more archaic, older Hebrew that's there. It's consistent with the rest of the Psalm, and so that doesn't check out. So it really leaves us with just 2 options. Two options of how to understand this.
Jeffrey Heine:Number 1 would be David is arrogant and wrong. And the other option, David is audacious, but he's right. And after struggling with these verses and reading them over and over again, and even in other languages and reading commentaries and sermons and he's right, which leads to a huge and he's right, which leads to a huge question. How? How can David be right?
Jeffrey Heine:How does David get to say these things, mean these things, and be right in these things? How does David get to say, and the Lord has rewarded me according to my righteousness, according to my cleanness in his sight? I wanna highlight 2 key phrases that will lead us in interpreting and in understanding this right leads. They're in verses 24 and 25, if you'll look with me. I was blameless before him, and I kept myself from guilt.
Jeffrey Heine:And the Lord has rewarded me according to my righteousness, according to my cleanness in his sight. Before him and in his sight. That first phrase, before him, it's a positional statement. Before the Lord Almighty. David stood blameless.
Jeffrey Heine:That means positionally. In the presence of God, David is blameless before him. This is different than David saying, I have never sinned. I've never done anything wrong before. We all know that it's impossible for David to say that.
Jeffrey Heine:But he is saying positionally, standing before the lord, I am blameless. The second phrase, in his sight, it emphasizes the view, the perspective of Yahweh. It means that Yahweh looks at David, and in his sight, he sees David as clean. So David is saying that he stands before God and is seen by God as blameless and as righteous. But how?
Jeffrey Heine:Certainly, anyone who has read these pages of David's life, we can agree that David can't say this because he lived blamelessly. We all know that he did not live blamelessly. When Nathan confronted David over Bathsheba, David exclaimed, I have sinned against the Lord. Later in Psalm 51, David confesses to God, my sin is ever before me. He did not live blamelessly.
Jeffrey Heine:David is not writing here ignorant of his sinfulness. He isn't writing here with a blindness or amnesia. He he isn't writing from a delusional place of grandiosity, thinking that he has been ever righteous in his life on his own? But if he did not live blamelessly and righteously, how can he stand before god and be seen by god as blameless and righteous? Well, it's the same way that you and I can.
Jeffrey Heine:It's the same way that you already do stand before the Lord as blameless and righteous. It's the same way that one day, you will literally and physically stand before God's throne and glory and stand before him blameless and righteous. Our only plea is Jesus, and David's only plea is Jesus. While David did not yet know how God would accomplish all that he had promised, Nevertheless, David hoped in god's deliverance, and it was ultimately a hope in the victory of Christ. Jesus is how David can say these things, mean these things, and actually be right in these things.
Jeffrey Heine:We read in the New Testament letter of Jude in verse 24, now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy. And we read in Paul's letter to the Ephesians, chapter 1, blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. It has always been the mission of God, even before the foundation of the world, that His children would stand before Him holy and blameless. We must never forget that Jesus not only took our unrighteousness upon Himself on the cross, but he has also clothed us in his righteousness. And Jesus not only washes us clean by his blood, but he also keeps us and will present us blameless before the glory of the father.
Jeffrey Heine:And we are told that he does this. Jesus does this with exceedingly great joy. And even though it might seem like madness at first reading, David is not being arrogant, and he is not wrong. He is singing his song from a place of ultimate deliverance and eternal victory. And so that's our answer to how does David get to sing these words of blamelessness and cleanness, and then we move on to a better question, and that is, why don't we?
Jeffrey Heine:Why don't we have this same courageous confidence in our standing before God and the righteousness of Jesus? Why aren't we so resolute and bold in our deliverance that has come to us in Christ? Why don't we join in Christ's victory song? Whatever feels like your greatest enemy in this life, the ultimate enemy is your own sin and the death it incurs. And Christ has defeated your greatest enemy.
Jeffrey Heine:He meant it when he said, it is finished. And because nothing can separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus, then nothing can separate you from his victory. You are not your own, but you belong body and soul to your lord and savior Jesus Christ. His claim on you is your claim on His victory. It isn't a license to boast in yourself, but it is an invitation to boast in Christ.
Jeffrey Heine:We know and have heard the horrors of David's sin, And yet because of Jesus, David is blameless. He's blameless because God has made him blameless in Christ. David did not know how this deliverance and this blamelessness would come about, but he trusted in Yahweh to accomplish it on his behalf. David knew he was desperate for the work of God in his life. The real enemy was not the Canaanites.
Jeffrey Heine:It was not the Ammonites. It was his own sin. And God promised him victory somehow. And we know in the unfolding plan of God's redemption that that somehow is through Christ alone. It is the agenda of the Son to present you blameless before the presence of His glory with great joy, and nothing will prevent the son from accomplishing this mission.
Jeffrey Heine:And if He is going about this mission with great joy, then those of us who are receiving such a great deliverance, we are invited, called, commanded to share in that same joy and confidence in Him. David knew he was a sinner. Throughout 1st and second Samuel, we've seen many times that that David, sometimes he chose faithfulness, other times, unfaithfulness. And I must confess that perhaps one of the reasons that I have come to dislike David so much is because the more time I spend with him, the more I see myself. I see my own inconsistencies.
Jeffrey Heine:I see my own hypocrisy. I see my own halfheartedness. The story of David is a mirror that I don't wanna look at because it shows me my own desperate need for deliverance. There's a great danger in viewing someone else as unworthy and unable to obtain God's grace and deliverance. We start to pray like the Pharisee that Jesus spoke of in Luke 18 who said, thank you, god, that I'm not a wicked sinner like that tax collector over there.
Jeffrey Heine:All the while, the tax collector prayed, God, have mercy on me, a sinner. I must learn from David of my own desperate need for deliverance. And while I learn from his desperate need, I can also learn from his audacious hope in God. My righteousness, victory, my blamelessness before the Lord has nothing to do with my behavior or my will or my strength and everything to do with the Lord and his grace in setting his love on me and delivering me through Christ alone. David, he already spoke of this back in verse 20 when he said, he rescued me because he delighted in me.
Jeffrey Heine:The father has chosen to delight in delivering you. And the son delights with great joy to present you blameless before the father in glory. It is his joy. We're told that it was for the joy that was set before him that he endured the cross. That is the joy.
Jeffrey Heine:We dare not neglect so great a salvation, and we dare to join in the victory song of deliverance, claiming the righteousness of Christ as our own because Christ has made us his own. David goes on, and so must we. He goes on to describe the character of God displayed in deliverance. Part 3, looking at verse 26. With the merciful, you show yourself merciful.
Jeffrey Heine:With the blameless man, you show yourself blameless. With the purified, you deal purely. And with the crooked, you make yourself seem torturous. You save a humble people, but your eyes are on the haughty to bring them down. For you are my lamp, oh lord, and my god lightens my darkness.
Jeffrey Heine:For by you, I can run against a troop, and by my god, I can leap over a wall. This god, his way is perfect. The word of the Lord proves true. He is a shield for all those who take refuge in Him. Here, David is declaring that God shows His mercy, His blamelessness, His purity to those whom He is delivering.
Jeffrey Heine:And at the same time, God shows judgment toward the crooked and the proud. God's greatness empowers David to live valiantly, against his enemies, apparently also able to leap over a wall. Don't know what that's about. But he says it, and he seems pretty excited. All of this rejoicing, all of this marveling at God's character leads David to exclaim in verse 32, for who is God but Yahweh?
Jeffrey Heine:Who is God but Yahweh? And who is a rock except our God? This God is my strong refuge and has made my way blameless. Again, David highlights the work of God in making his way blameless. David isn't saying he's not claiming here that he has made his own way blameless, but that Yahweh has made his way blameless.
Jeffrey Heine:It's a firm confidence in the work of God to establish David as righteous and blameless. David's rescue is not his own doing. David's righteousness is not his own doing. It is all the work of god. Hear these words of David in this, 4th and final section here in the song of deliverance verse 34.
Jeffrey Heine:This final section revisits the acts of God in rescuing David. Kind of different than part 2, where David was explaining his deliverance in vivid metaphors. This section, while there is some metaphor, it's mostly literal descriptions of situations that David had personally experienced. Not all, but but most. So let's look at 34.
Jeffrey Heine:He made my feet like the feet of deer and set me secure on the heights. He trains my hands for war so that my arms can bend a bow of bronze. You have given me the shield of your salvation, and your gentleness made me great. You gave me a wide place, for my steps under me and my feet did not slip. I pursued my enemies and destroyed them and did not turn back until they were consumed.
Jeffrey Heine:I consumed them. I thrust them through so that they did not rise. They fell under my feet. For you equipped me with strength for the battle. You made those who rise against me sink under me.
Jeffrey Heine:You made my enemies turn their backs to me, those who hated me and I destroyed them. They looked, but there were was none to save. They cried to the Lord, but he did not answer them. I beat them fine as the dust of the earth. I crushed them and stamped them down like the mire of the streets.
Jeffrey Heine:You delivered me from strife with my people. You kept me as the head of the nations, people whom I had not known served me. Foreigners cringing to me. As soon as they heard of me, they obeyed me. Foreigners lost hard and came trembling out of their fortresses.
Jeffrey Heine:David describes victory over his earthly enemies. And as we have read in first Samuel and second Samuel, David has had countless adversaries throughout his life, armies, giants, wild animals, a murderous king, his own sons. And now, as his days are coming to an end, he sings a victory song depicting the great vanquishing of his enemies. And he says that all of it occurred through the might and power of the Lord. He knew his own weakness, and that is in his own strength, he would never survive.
Jeffrey Heine:But the strength of the lord was his hope, his only hope, which leads to his closing declaration of praise and thanksgiving in verse 47. The lord lives, and blessed be my rock, and exalted be my god, the rock of my salvation, the god who gave me vengeance and brought down peoples under me, who brought me out from my enemies. You exalted me above those who rose against me. You delivered me from men of violence. For this, I will praise you, oh lord, among the nations and sing praises to your name.
Jeffrey Heine:Great salvation he brings to his king and shows steadfast love to his anointed, to David and his offspring forever. Over time, this personal song of David's deliverance became a corporate song of hope and thanksgiving for the people of Israel. Sometime after the death of David, the song was edited. It was updated with some more contemporary Hebrew language, and it was included in the Psalms, the songbook of the people of Israel. And the song appears as Psalm 18.
Jeffrey Heine:And this song of David became a song for the people to sing, a song of praise and thanksgiving to God for deliverance. And 500 years after David, after the reign of David, the people of Israel needed this song when Jerusalem was overwhelmed by the Babylonians and taken off into captivity in 586 BC. The people needed a reminder, a lifeline to the promises of Yahweh. While they were enduring captivity and enslavement by a foreign power, while they were exiles taken out of their promised land, they too were looking and longing for deliverance. They were struggling to survive and struggling to hope in God.
Jeffrey Heine:And so these words that were of David were a lifeline for them. They were a thread that they could follow back to the covenant that Yahweh made with king David, the covenant that God made when he promised to David, your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me. Your throne shall be established forever. Living in exile, strangers in a foreign land, the people of God needed to be reminded and to remind one another that their God, the only God, Yahweh, promised to be their deliverer. And when they could not see their king, and they could not see his throne, and they couldn't even see his kingdom, they held fast to the promises of god, the certain promise that he would be their deliverer.
Jeffrey Heine:We need that reminder today. I know I do. I need to remember that my deliverer is coming and that I can join in his victory song today. And I think you need that too. Regardless of the enemies that you see in your life, past or present, your deliverer is coming, and you can join in his victory song today.
Jeffrey Heine:We don't have to wait. We don't have to pretend like our struggles have disappeared or that they don't hurt. We don't have to hype ourselves up with some self made confidence. We we don't have to ignore our pain or our suffering that we experience in this life, but we are welcomed by God to join in the victory song of Christ and to declare together that all he has promised will come to pass, because beyond reason and beyond our understanding, the father has chosen to delight in us. He has chosen you in Christ before the foundation of the world that you should be holy and blameless before him with great joy.
Jeffrey Heine:He who calls you is faithful. He will surely do it. Let's pray. Oh, lord, in this time, would you speak your truth to the very depths of our hearts? Convince us, Lord, of your great love and your promise of deliverance.
Jeffrey Heine:Help us to join in the victory song of Christ today. Help us not to wait. Help us not to forget, but help us to believe. And in our believing that we would love Christ more, that we would trust Christ more, and that we would obey Christ more from our hearts. We pray these things in the name of Christ our King.
Jeffrey Heine:Amen.
