In this sermon, Pastor Chuck Smith discusses Psalm 18, where David recounts his experience of being delivered by God from his enemies. David describes the sorrows and fears he faced, as well as the supernatural intervention of God in his life. He acknowledges that God often works through natural events that we may dismiss as coincidences. David's deliverance came through an earthquake and God's response to his cry for help. Ultimately, this sermon emphasizes the sovereignty of God as the ultimate Savior and the importance of calling upon Him in times of distress.

Oh, let the Son of God enfold you With His Spirit and His love Let Him fill your heart and satisfy your soul Oh, let Him have the things that hold you And His Spirit like a dove Will descend upon your life and make you whole Welcome to The Word for Today Featuring the Bible teaching of Pastor Chuck Smith Of Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, California Pastor Chuck is currently leading us on a verse by verse venture Through the entire Bible And on today's edition of The Word for Today We'll be seeing God as the Sovereign Savior As we turn in our Bibles to the 18th Psalm Beginning with verse 1 And now with today's message Here is Pastor Chuck Smith The sorrows of death had encircled me David thought he had had it, he figured it was over The floods of ungodly men had made me afraid The troops of Saul had poured in They had surrounded him It looked like there was absolutely no way out The sorrows of hell encircled me For I was in the trap of death They had trapped him, caught in the ambush He could see no way out And in my distress I called upon the Lord I cried unto my God And he heard my voice out of his temple And my cry came before him, even into his ears And then he describes How God came to his assistance The earth shook and trembled The foundations also of the hills moved and were shaken Because he was angry There came this severe earthquake over a prolonged period of time And with the earthquake and the fissures opening up There were actually volcanic type of eruptions There went up a smoke out of his nostrils And fire out of his mouth devoured And the coals were kindled by it And he bowed the heavens also and came down And darkness was under his feet And so this storm moved in and the heavens became dark And as the clouds, when it really starts to pour It looks like the clouds just sort of descend And you can't see, you know, more than a block or so Just because of the heavy downpour As the cloud just moves down and dumps its rain The heavens bowed Came down, darkness under his feet And he rode upon the cherub and did fly Cherub, one of the great angels He did fly upon the wings of the wind And he made darkness his secret place His pavilion round about him were dark waters And thick clouds of the skies And at the brightness that was before him His thick clouds passed and hailstones And coals of fire The Lord also thundered in the heavens And the highest gave his voice and hailstones And coals of fire Yea, he sent out his arrows and scattered them He shot out the lightnings and disconfitted them And then the channels of waters were seen Over there in that land It's a land that is prone to flash floods They have all of these wadis That in a few moments can become Raging torrents of water And so David said then the channels of water were seen And the foundations of the world were discovered At thy rebuke, O Lord, at the blast of thy breath Of thy nostrils And he sent from above, he took me And he drew me out of the many waters He delivered me from my strong enemy And from those which hated me For they were too strong for me And so David's glorious deliverance by God In this supernatural way But his recognition of God in it I think that because God often uses What we look upon as natural events That we're prone to Cast off as coincidence Many times that work of God And that help of God Like the little kid who was Up on the barn roof playing And suddenly he lost his grip And he began to slide down the barn roof And he was tumbling and he cried out Oh God help me, God save me And about that time his pants got caught in a nail And he came to a ripping stop And he turned and said Well never mind God, the nail stopped me And we often are that way We cry upon the Lord in our distress and our trouble The Lord delivers us in sort of a natural way We say well never mind Lord The rain turned them back And they were distracted by this or that or the other And we failed to see the hand of the Lord And give proper credit and glory to God for his help So my enemies were too strong for me They prevented me in the day of my calamity But the Lord was my stay He brought me forth also into a large place He had been hemmed up in this valley He had been trapped And the Lord brought him out into the wide open spaces Where he could escape easily from the enemies He delivered me because he delighted in me The Lord rewarded me And again this is one of David's earlier psalms Before he became king, before his fall And so the Lord rewarded me according to my righteousness According to the cleanness of my hands He has rewarded me For I have kept the ways of the Lord Now in the 119th psalm That is a psalm that is devoted to the word of the Lord He speaks in that psalm of the ways of the Lord In several occasions And it is actually the ways that God has declared So I have kept the ways of the Lord And have not wickedly departed from my God For all of his judgments Again a reference to the written law of God All of his judgments were before me And I did not put away his statutes The rules that God established I did not put them from me So the ways of the Lord, the judgments of the Lord The statutes of the Lord I was also upright before him 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 And so as I say this is David's earlier experience He changes his tune quite dramatically After experiencing his own personal fall David said with the merciful And David had been merciful to Saul He had the opportunity to slay him He had the motive to slay him He had the encouragement to slay him But he would not touch him He was merciful and he said with the merciful You will show yourself merciful With the upright you will show yourself upright Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount said Blessed are the merciful For they shall obtain mercy David said that here With the merciful thou wilt show thyself merciful With the pure you will show yourself pure But on the other side of the coin With the forward you will show yourself forward For you will save the afflicted people But you will bring down those with the haughty looks For you will light my candle The Lord my God will lighten my darkness And I love this For by thee I have run through a troop And by my God have I leaped over a wall David is a hero of mine I would have liked to have lived in the time of David And been one of those guys that was around David He was daring And then when Saul had pursued him David was there on the hillside and they were hiding And they saw Saul and the troops coming in They were closing in on him And they watched these guys, it was evening And they watched them as they all bedded down And after they all got bedded down David turned around and said Hey, which one of you guys would like to go down with me Into the camp of Saul And go right down to where these guys had all gone to sleep The guys that were trying to kill him And so here he is For by thee, O Lord, I have run through the troops Leaping over walls As for God, His way is perfect The law of the Lord is perfect And the way equated to the ways that God has set forth in His word The word of the Lord is tried He is a buckler, going back to the first part of the psalm To all of those who trust in Him The armament For who is God, save Jehovah Who is a rock, save our God It is God that girds me with strength And makes my way complete He makes my feet like hind's feet or like deer's feet And He sets me upon the high places Or the goat's feet Beautiful animals with these long horns And they go right up the sides of these cliffs You can't believe The way they can go right up the side of a cliff You see them standing You wonder how in the world did they get to that perch And so David is saying You make my feet like these ibexes And you set me on my high places God is my strength, my fortress, my buckler, my shield And then David said And people have a little trouble with this I don't, but some people do He teaches my hands to war So that the bow of steel is broken in my arms We are in a battle And people don't seem to realize that But our battle is not against flesh and blood But against principalities and powers And these spirit forces in high places But if you don't realize that we are in a real spiritual battle Then you're at a disadvantage Because the enemy can just come at you from all different directions Oh my, what calamities befall me Oh my, you know this Oh my, you know Oh my, all the way through And you don't have any defenses You're not prepared You need to know that the enemy is out to destroy you You're in a strong conflict The flesh versus the spirit And the enemy is seeking to draw you after the flesh And God is seeking to draw you after the spirit This battle, spiritual battle, rages around us The Lord has taught my hands to war The weapons of our warfare are not carnal But they are mighty through God To the pulling down of the strongholds of the enemy And so through prayer And all God has given to us Those weapons by which we can have victory In this spiritual conflict Thou hast also given me the shield of thy salvation So the Lord is my rock, my fortress, my deliverer, my strength, my buckler The horn of my salvation, my high tower And now the shield of thy salvation And thy right hand holds me up And thy gentleness hath made me great That's quite a phrase there Thy gentleness hath made me great I think the real picture of strength Is in not the flying arrow But in the steady bow The capacity to destroy But yet not doing it There is real strength Anybody can fly off and let fly But real strength is having the capacity to destroy the enemy And not moving against him And so the gentleness that is there Thy gentleness has made me great Thou hast enlarged my steps under me My feet did not slip I have pursued mine enemies I have overtaken them And neither did I turn again until they were consumed I have wounded them that were not able to rise That they are fallen under my feet For you have girded me with your strength into battle You have subdued under me those that rose up against me You have also given me the necks of mine enemies That I might destroy them that hate me They cried and there was none to save them Even unto Jehovah, but he did not answer them Then did I beat them small as the dust before the wind I did cast them out as the dirt in the streets For you have delivered me from the strivings of the people You have made me the head of the heathen A people who I have not known shall serve me And so David speaks about the victories that God gave to him Over the enemies of the Lord As soon as they hear of me, they shall obey me The strangers shall submit themselves unto me The strangers shall fade away and be afraid out of their close places For the Lord liveth Now all through this psalm he has used the rock as a symbol of the Lord And of the Lord's strength The Lord liveth and blessed be my rock And let the God of my salvation be exalted Again going back into Deuteronomy chapter 32 This song of Moses of which David had alluded earlier In the apple of the eye and all In that psalm of Moses verse 4 He is the rock His work is perfect For all of his ways are judgment A God of truth and without iniquity Just and right is he And then in verse 15 Jezreel had forsaken God which had made him He lightly esteemed the rock of his salvation And then in verse 18 Of the rock that begat thee Thou art not mindful You have forgotten God who formed thee In Daniel As he was interpreting the vision of Nebuchadnezzar The dream of Nebuchadnezzar Who saw in his dream prophetically The kingdoms that would govern over the world Ending with a federation of 10 kings That would be rising out of the former Roman Empire And it says during the days of these kings The 10 toes of this vision As he was watching it This image that represented world governing empires As he was watching the image There came a rock Not cut with hands And it struck the image in its feet So that the whole image crumbled And the rock began to grow into a mountain That covered the whole earth And in the interpreting of this dream During the days of those 10 kings Shall the Lord of heaven come And establish a kingdom that shall never end God's kingdom Filling the earth And so that symbol of the rock It's carried through in the scripture Their rock is not as our rock Talking about the defense or the strength of the heathen They're trusting in things that will not hold them up So the Lord liveth blessed be my rock And let the God of my salvation be exalted It is God that avenges me He has subdued the people under me He has delivered me from my enemies Yes, he lifted me up above those that rise up against me And he has delivered me from the violent man Therefore Will I give thanks unto thee, O Lord Among the heathen and sing praises unto thy name My response to God, he delivered me, he set me free He gave the enemies into my hands And as a result I will give thanks to the Lord And I will sing praises Unto his name Great deliverance giveth he to the king His king And showeth mercy to his anointed To David and to his seed forevermore Here is David's, though he is not yet anointed king Saul is still pursuing him Samuel has already visited him And anointed him as the king Saul is still on the throne But David is the anointed king And he recognizes that, he knows that And so great deliverance has God given to his king He had rejected Saul from being king David was now God's king And he shows mercy to his anointed Unto David And to David's seed forevermore Seed singular For that seed that David is referring to, of course, is Jesus Christ Even as with Abraham Through his seed, all the nations of the earth shall be blessed Seed singular As of one, not seeds plural, as of many For that seed is Christ And to his seed, David's seed forevermore The mercies of God The firmament, the earth around us Shows his handiwork, or the work of his fingers Now day after day, they are speaking to us Night after night, they are revealing knowledge And there is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard The voice of nature is a universal language So that you can go to any place on the earth Any cultural group of people And there is that belief, naturally In a supernatural being As he tells about God speaking, he said Their line has gone out through all the earth Their words to the end of the world Universally, God has spoken to man And there is that universal belief in the existence of God Because of nature In them he has set a tent for the sun Which is a bridegroom who is coming out of his chamber And rejoices as a strong man to run the race Every day the sun makes its race through the sky We'll return with more of our verse-by-verse venture Through the Bible in our next lesson As we continue with The Revelation of the Lord And we do hope you'll make plans to join us But 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Box 8000 Costa Mesa, California 92628 And be sure to include the call letters Of this station with your correspondence And now, on behalf of The Word for Today We'd like to thank all of you Who share in supporting this ministry With your prayers and financial support And be sure to join us again next time As Pastor Chuck Smith continues His verse-by-verse venture through the Psalms That's right here On the next edition of The Word for Today Now once again Here's Pastor Chuck Smith With today's closing comments God bless you And may the Lord guide you In His plan for your life And may you learn as David To just commit your ways unto the Lord Knowing that the Lord will take care of things As you just submit Your life Its facets unto Him And may God just continue to Use you As His instrument In bringing His love To a needy world Looking for direction And understanding Our world values knowledge But people don't always strive to know The most important things The truth is You may be extremely knowledgeable About something But if you don't have the wisdom of God You're missing the most important knowledge A person can ever hope to attain Join the tens of thousands Who have benefited from reading Pastor Chuck's devotional Wisdom for Today Which takes you systematically Through the entire Bible One day at a time Start each day with biblical wisdom As Pastor Chuck gives practical Everyday examples In which to draw God's wisdom From your daily life To order your copy of Wisdom for Today A leather hardback For yourself or for a loved one Please call The Word for Today At 1-800-272-9673 Or visit us online for more information And to read a preview At thewordfortoday.org This program has been sponsored by The Word for Today In Costa Mesa, California