Psalm 18: God Is My Strength
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God providentially delivered, and David expressed his gratitude: “The LORD liveth; and blessed be my rock; and let the God of my salvation be exalted. It is God that avengeth me, and subdueth the people under me. He delivereth me from mine enemies: yea, thou liftest me up above those that rise up against me: thou hast delivered me from the violent man. Therefore will I give thanks unto thee, O LORD, among the heathen, and sing praises unto thy name” (Psalm 18:46–49). This psalm covers the entirety of David’s struggle with his enemies.
From each one, David emerged victorious.
“This commemorative Song of Triumph is heart history, the story of a human heart ever devoted to God and sincere in its integrity in the things of God.” God’s intervention on behalf of His servant David is depicted as the forces of nature in all their magnificent power—Jehovah is in them all (vv. 7–15)! Verses 16–19 relate that “God intervened because David did not deserve the treatment he was receiving at the hands of Saul and his other enemies. God rewards and recompenses according to His eternal law. Verses 20–30 enlarge on the reason for God’s delivering David.” This psalm was written prior to David’s sin with Bathsheba; after that event, he could not write, “I was also upright before him, and I kept myself from mine iniquity. Therefore hath the LORD recompensed me according to my righteousness, according to the cleanness of my hands in his eyesight” (vv. 23, 24). David writes, God is the “God of my salvation” (Psalms 25:5; 27:9; 38:22; 51:14; 88:1). He saw “the importance of the union of human and divine effort. God arms His servant with material means of protection and then gives him support as he employs these means.” “God moves in a mysterious way / His wonders to perform; / He plants His footsteps in the sea, / And rides upon the storm.”
