Saturday, September 24, 2005
2 Samuel 22:47-51 "The LORD lives! Blessed be my Rock! Let God be exalted, the Rock of my salvation! It is God who avenges me, and subdues the peoples under me; He delivers me from my enemies. You also lift me up above those who rise against me; You have delivered me from the violent man. Therefore I will give thanks to You, O LORD, among the Gentiles, and sing praises to Your name. He is the tower of salvation to His king, and shows mercy to His anointed, to David and his descendants forevermore."
PRAISE AFTER DELIVERANCE
This word of God is the last part of a song that King David wrote towards the end of his life. This hymn was addressed to the Lord, the Bible says, "when the LORD had delivered him from all his enemies." The God we worship is not a lifeless idol or a man dead in his grave. Our God is the living Lord, and since He is alive and active and alert, He is a Rock that we can depend on. He is the Rock of our salvation, and therefore we never have reason to become discouraged or disheartened.
In the later years of his life, after David had committed those awful sins of adultery and murder and the Lord foretold that David would have to experience adultery and murder in his own family. The Lord delivered David even then from his enemies, even from his own disloyal son Absalom who rebelled against him. Therefore David wants the Lord's name to be praised.
David's song looks ahead also to the future Messiah, the Son of David, our Lord Jesus Christ. "He is the tower of salvation to His king, and shows mercy to His anointed, to David and his descendants forevermore." As an anointed king, David himself was a Messiah, for Messiah means Anointed One. But David knew from God's promise that his descendants would be kings after him, and finally his seed would culminate in the great Son of David, the final Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Just as the Lord God was a tower of salvation to David, so also God was a tower of salvation to the Son of David, Jesus, in His state of humiliation. For in His humiliation Jesus prayed to God for help and strength, just as any man should do. In His suffering, Jesus prayed to God even as David had prayed to Him, and God heard the prayer of His anointed King Jesus. The suffering came to an end and Jesus won the victory over all His enemies and ours. For us this means salvation not only from earthly enemies, but salvation even from sin, death, Satan, and hell, our spiritual enemies. It means forgiveness of sin.
