1. Deliver me from mine enemies, O my God. They were all round the house with the warrant of
authority, and a force equal to carrying it out. He was to be taken dead or
alive and carried to the slaughter. No prowess could avail him to break the
cordon of armed men, neither could any eloquence stay the hand of his bloody
persecutor. He was taken like a bird in a net, and no friend was near to set
him free. Unbelief would have suggested that prayer was a waste of breath, but
not so thinks the good man, for he makes it his sole resort. He cries for deliverance
and leaves ways and means with his God. Defend me from them that rise up
against me. Saul was a king, and therefore sat in high places, and used all
his authority to crush David; the persecuted one therefore beseeches the Lord
to set him on high also, only in another sense. He asks to be lifted up beyond
the reach of his adversary. Note how he sets the title My God over
against the word mine enemies. This is the right method of effectually
catching and quenching the fiery darts of the enemy upon the shield of faith.
God is our God, and therefore deliverance and defense are ours.
2. Deliver me from the workers of iniquity. Saul was treating him very unjustly, and besides that was
pursuing a tyrannical and unrighteous course towards others. Therefore David
the more vehemently appeals against him. Evil men were in the ascendant at
court, and were the ready tools of the tyrant; against these also he prays. Bad
men in a bad cause may be pleaded against, without question. When a habitation
is beset by thieves, the good man of the house rings the alarm bell; and in
these verses we may hear it ring out loudly: deliver me, defend me, deliver
me, save me. Saul had more cause to fear than David had, for the invincible
weapon of prayer was being used against him. And save me from bloody men.
As David remembers how often Saul had sought to assassinate him, he knows what
he has to expect from that quarter and from the king’s minions who were
watching for him. David represents his enemy in his true colors before God. The
Lord abhors all those who delight in blood.
3. For, lo, they lie in wait for my soul. Like wild beasts they waited to make the fatal spring, but
their victim used effectual means to baffle them, for he laid the matter before
the Lord. God waits to be gracious to us and terrible towards our foes. The
mighty are gathered against me. None of them were absent when a saint was
to be murdered. The men at arms who ought to have been fighting their country’s
battles are instead hunting a quiet citizen; the gigantic monarch is spending
all his strength to slay a faithful follower. Not for my transgressions, nor
for my sin, O Lord. He appeals
to Jehovah that he had done no ill. His only fault was that he was too valiant
and too gracious, and was, besides, the chosen of the Lord; therefore the
envious king could not rest till he had washed his hands in the blood of his
too popular rival. We shall always find it a great thing to be innocent; if it
does not carry our cause before an earthly tribunal, it will ever prove the
best of arguments in the court of conscience, and a standing consolation when
we are under persecution. Note the repetition of his declaration of integrity.
David is sure of his innocence. He dares not repeat the plea.
4. They run and prepare themselves without my fault. They are all alive and active; they are swift to shed
blood. They prepare and use their best tactics. They come up fully armed to the
attack, and assail me with all the vigor and skill of a host about to storm a
castle; and all for no cause, but out of gratuitous malice. So quick are they
to obey their cruel master that they never stay to consider whether their
errand is a good one or not; they run at once, and buckle on the harness as
they run. To be thus gratuitously attacked is a great grief. It was a cruel and
crying shame that such a hero as David should be hounded down as if he were a
monster, and beset in his house like a wild beast in its den. Awake to help
me, and behold. When others go to sleep, keep thou watch, O God. Only look
at thy servant’s sad condition and thy hand will be sure to deliver me. We see
how thorough was the psalmist’s faith in the mercy of his Lord, for he is
satisfied that if the Lord do but look on his case it will move his active
compassion.
5. Thou, thyself,
work for me personally. Therefore, because I am unjustly assailed, and
cannot help myself. O Lord, ever-living;
God of hosts, able to rescue me; the God of Israel, pledged by
covenant to redeem thine oppressed servant; awake to visit all the heathen,
arouse thy holy mind, bestow thy sacred energies, punish the heathen among
thine Israel, the falsehearted who say they are Jews and are not. Let all the
nations of thine enemies know that thou art judging and punishing. It is the
mark of a thoughtful prayer that the titles which are applied to God are
appropriate, and are, as it were, congruous to the matter, and fitted to add
force to the argument. Will Jehovah endure to see his people oppressed? Will
the God of hosts permit his enemies to exult over his servant? Will the
faithful God of a chosen people leave his chosen to perish? The name of God is,
even in a literal sense, a fortress and high tower for all his people. What a
forceful petition is contained in the words awake to visit! Actively
punish, in wisdom judge, with force chastise. Be not merciful to any wicked
transgressors. Be merciful to them as men, but not as transgressors; if
they continue hardened in their sin, do not wink at their oppression. The
psalmist feels that the overthrow of oppression which was so needful for
himself must be equally desirable for multitudes of the godly placed in like
positions, and therefore he prays for the whole company of the faithful, and
against the entire confraternity of traitors. Selah. Who would not sit
still and consider, when vengeance is being meted out to all the enemies of
God?
6. They return at evening. If foiled in the light, they seek the more congenial
darkness in which to accomplish their designs. They make a noise like a dog,
and go round about the city. David compares his foes to Eastern dogs,
despised, unowned, loathsome, degraded, lean, and hungry, and he represents
them as howling with disappointment because they cannot find the food they
seek. Saul’s watchmen and the cruel king himself must have raved and raged
fiercely when they found the image and the pillow of goats’ hair in the bed
instead of David.
7. Behold, they belch out with their mouth. The noisy creatures are so remarkable in their way, that
attention is called to them with a behold. Their malicious speech gushes
from them as from a bubbling fountain. The wicked are voluble in slander; their
vocabulary of abuse is copious. Swords are in their lips. They speak
daggers. For who, say they, doth hear? They fear no God in heaven, and
the government on earth is with them. When people have none to call them to
account, there is no accounting for what they will do. The Saulites swore at
the upstart whom the king’s majesty had sent them to arrest. When they said, Who
doth hear?, God was listening, and this David knew, and therefore took
courage.
8. But thou, O Lord,
shalt laugh at them. He speaks to God as to one who is
close at hand. Those who lie in wait are laughing at me, and longing for my
destruction, but thou hast determined to send them away without their victim,
and made fools of by Michal. The greatest, cleverest, and most malicious of the
enemies of the church are only objects of ridicule to the Lord; their attempts
are utterly futile; they need give no concern to our faith. Thou shalt have
all the heathen in derision. As if David had said, What are these fellows
who lie in ambush? And what is the king their master, if God be on my side? If
not only these but all the heathen nations were besetting the house, yet
Jehovah would readily enough disappoint them and deliver me. In the end of all
things it will be seen how utterly contemptible and despicable are all the
enemies of the cause and kingdom of God. He is a brave man who sees this today
when the enemy is in great power, and while the church is often as one shut up
and besieged in his house.
9. Because of thy strength will I wait upon thee. Is my persecutor strong? Then, my God, for this very reason
I will turn myself to thee, and leave my matters in thy hand. It is a wise
thing to find in the greatness of our difficulties a reason for casting
ourselves upon the Lord. For God is my defense, my high place, my
fortress, the place of my resort in the time of my danger. If the foe be too
strong for me to cope with him, I will retreat into my castle, where he cannot
reach me.
10. The God of my mercy shall prevent me. God who is the giver and fountain of all the undeserved
goodness I have received will go before me and lead my way. He will meet me in
my time of need. Not alone shall I have to confront my foes, but he whose
goodness I have long tried and proved will gently clear my way, and be my faithful
protector. How frequently have we met with preventing mercy—the supply prepared
before the need occurred, the refuge built before the danger comes. Far ahead
into the future the foreseeing grace of heaven has projected itself, and
forestalled every difficulty. God shall let me see my desire upon mine
enemies. Observe that the words my desire are not in the original.
From the Hebrew we are taught that David expected to see his enemies without
fear. God will enable his servant to gaze steadily upon the foe without
trepidation; he will be calm, and self-possessed, in the hour of peril, and ere
long he will look down on the same foes overthrown. When Jehovah leads the way
victory follows. See God, and you need not fear to see your enemies. Thus the
hunted David, besieged in his own house by traitors, looks only to God, and
exults over his enemies.
11. Slay them not, lest my people forget. It argues great faith on David’s part that even while his
house was surrounded by his enemies he is yet so fully sure of their overthrow
that he puts in a detailed petition that they may not be too soon or too fully
exterminated. God’s victory over the wicked is so easy and so glorious that it
seems a pity to end the conflict too soon. Let the righteous be buffeted a little
longer, and let the boasting oppressor puff and brag through his little hour;
it will help to keep Israel in mind of the Lord’s justice, and make the brave
who side with God’s champion accustomed to divine interpositions. Enemies help
to keep the Lord’s servants awake. A lively, vexatious devil is less to be
dreaded than a sleepy, forgetful spirit. Scatter them by thy power. Let
the foemen live as a vagabond race, living monuments of divine power. And
bring them down. Like rotten fruit from a tree. From the seats of power
which they disgrace, and the positions of influence which they pollute, let
them be hurled into humiliation. This was a righteous wish, and if it be
untempered by the gentleness of Jesus, we must remember that it is a soldier’s
prayer, and the wish of one who was smarting under injustice and malice of no
ordinary kind. O Lord, our
shield. David felt himself to be the representative of the religious party
in Israel, and therefore he says, our shield, speaking in the name of
all those who make Jehovah their defense. We are in good company when we hide
beneath the buckler of the Eternal; meanwhile he who is the shield of his
people is the scatterer of their enemies.
12. For the sin of their mouth and the words of their lips
let them even be taken in their pride.
Such dreadful language of atheism and insolence deserves a fit return. As they
hope to take their victims, so let them be taken themselves, entangled in their
own net, arrested in the midst of their boastful security. Sins of the lips are
real sins, and punishable sins. Pride though it show not itself in clothes, but
only in speech, is a sin; and persecuting pride, though it pile no faggots at
Smithfield, but only revile with its lips, will have to answer for it among the
unholy crew of inquisitors. And for cursing and lying which they speak.
Sins, like hounds, often hunt in couples. Whoever is not ashamed to curse
before God will be sure to lie to people. Every swearer is a liar. Persecution
leads on to perjury. This will bring its recompense.
13. Consume them in wrath. As if he had changed his mind and would have them brought
to a speedy end, or if spared would have them exist as ruins, he cries, consume
them, and he redoubles his cry, consume them; indeed, he gives a
triple note: that they may not be. Revilers of God whose mouths pour
forth such filth as David was on this occasion obliged to hear are not to be
tolerated by a holy soul. If they could be reformed it would be infinitely
better; but if they cannot, then let them cease to be. Who can desire to see
such a generation perpetuated? And let them know, that is, let all the
nations know, that God ruleth in Jacob unto the ends of the earth. He
whose government is universal fixes his headquarters among his chosen people,
and there especially he punishes sin. So David would have everyone see. Let
even the most remote nations know that the great moral Governor has power to
destroy ungodliness, and does not wink at iniquity in any. When sin is
manifestly punished it is a valuable lesson to all mankind. The overthrow of a
Napoleon is a homily for all monarchs, the death of a Tom Paine a warning to
all infidels, the siege of Paris a sermon to all cities. Selah. Good
cause there is for this rest, when a theme so wide and important is introduced.
Solemn subjects ought not to be hurried over; nor should the condition of the
heart while contemplating themes so high be a matter of indifference. Sit still
awhile and consider the ways of God with mankind.
14. Here
verse 6 is repeated, as if the songster defied his foes and reveled in the
thought of their futile search, their malice, their disappointment, their rage,
their defeated vigilance, their wasted energy. He laughs to think that all the
city would know how they were deceived, and all Israel would ring with the
story of the image and the goats’ hair in the bed. Nothing was more a subject
of oriental merriment than a case in which the crafty are deceived, and nothing
more makes a man the object of derision than to be outwitted by a woman, as in
this instance Saul and his base minions were by Michal.
15. Let them wander up and down for meat. Like dogs that have missed the expected carcass, let them
go up and down dissatisfied, snapping at one another, and too disappointed to
be quiet and take the matter easily. And grudge if they be not satisfied.
Let them act like those who cannot believe that they lost their prey: like a
herd of oriental dogs, let them prowl about seeking a prey which they will
never find. Thus the menial followers of Saul paraded the city in vain hope of
satisfying their malice and their master. The restlessness of wicked men will
increase as their enmity to God increases, and in hell it will be their
infinite torment. What is the state of the lost but the condition of an ambitious
camp of rebels who have espoused a hopeless cause and will not give it up, but
are impelled by their raging passions to rave on against the cause of God’s
truth, and of his people.
16. But I will sing of thy power. The wicked howl, but I sing. Their power is weakness, but
thine is omnipotence; I see them vanquished and thy power victorious, and
forever will I sing of thee. Yea, I will sing aloud of thy mercy in the
morning. When those lovers of darkness find their game is up, and their
midnight howlings die away, then will I lift up my voice on high and praise the
lovingkindness of God without fear of being disturbed. What a blessed morning
will soon break for the righteous, and what a song will be theirs! Sons of the
morning, you may sigh tonight, but joy will come on the wings of the rising
sun. The morning is coming, and your sun will go no more down forever. For
thou hast been my defense. The song is for God alone, and it is one which
none can sing but those who have experienced the lovingkindness of their God.
Looking back upon a past all full of mercy, the saints will bless the Lord with
their whole hearts, and triumph in him as the high place of their security. And
refuge in the day of my trouble. The greater our present trials the louder
will our future songs be, and the more intense our joyful gratitude. Had we no
day of trouble, where were our season of retrospective thanksgiving?
17. Unto thee, O my strength, will I sing. What a monopolizing of all his emotions for the one object
of praising God! Strength has been overcome by strength; not by the hero’s own
prowess, but by the might of God alone. See how the singer girds himself with
the almightiness of God, and calls it all his own by faith. Sweet is the music
of experience, but it is all for God; there is not even a stray note for man,
for self, or for human helpers. For God is my defense, and the God of my
mercy. With full assurance he claims possession of the Infinite as his
protection and security. He sees God in all, and all his own. Mercy rises
before him, conspicuous and manifold, for he feels he is undeserving, and
security is with him, undisturbed and impregnable, for he knows that he is safe
in divine keeping. Oh, choice song! My soul would sing it now in defiance of
all the dogs of hell. Away, adversaries of my soul; the God of my mercy will
keep you all at bay.
Excerpt from:
The Treasury of David
By Charles H Spurgeon
