It is good to be with you here today By means of introduction for those who don't know which is likely a fair few of you. My name is John, right? I have been coming to Cedar Heights for over 15 years and usually you find me in the back doing the sound but I am occasionally Given the privilege of preaching to this congregation, right? It's been a couple years since I've done it though So I really am hoping it's like riding a bike and Ken Ritchie when he posted that picture of me on Facebook set the expectations pretty high All right, so as you know, or may know, this summer we are working through some Psalms, namely the ones that are specific in terms of having a distinct context spelled out somewhere else in the Bible. Today, we're in Psalm 57, so go ahead and turn there, or swipe there, or however you get to it, and as soon as you get there, we're gonna leave it, but we will be back. So, Psalm 57, verse one, the superscription, which is where God is giving us the story clues that go along with this song. To the choir master, according to, do not destroy, a miktam of David. We'll be coming back to that word, but this is King David. A lot of the storied Psalms that we've been going through are about him. We're basically doing an anthology of David's life this summer, okay? When he fled from Saul, in the cave. Now, because David lived a very exciting life, this event, the anointed king hiding in a cave in order for the current king to keep from killing him, happened more than once. And it happened more than once in part of a very extended chase scene, the likes of which have not been seen since Raiders of the Lost Ark. From the horse, to outside the truck, to inside the truck, to under the truck, anyway. Indiana Jones, though, was not running from his own father-in-law. David escapes Saul with Jonathan's help, and after foolishly trying to return the sword of Goliath to his hometown, he manages to escape from Gath by acting crazy, and hides out by himself in the caves at Adullam. This is 1 Samuel 22, where some people think, 1 Samuel 22 is where he writes Psalm 57, our text for today. This does fit the chronology. And if you look at Psalm 56, the one right before it, it also gives us a clue. When the Philistines seized him in Gath, right? So you could make the argument that Psalm 56 and Psalm 57 are kind of a pair. So if you look at Psalm 56, it starts down. David is lonely. He is discouraged, but by the end of the Psalm, God has remembered his prayer in verse nine. And in verse 13 of Psalm 56, David says, you have delivered my soul from death. And from there, David is encouraged. He continues with Psalm 57, verse one to three, confident that God is going to preserve him. So is this the cave we're looking for? It could be. But there's another option. So I'll catch us up to the second time. So in 1 Samuel 22, everyone hears David is hiding out at the caves in Adullam, including Saul. But David keeps managing to slip away. In 1 Samuel 22, Saul is indignant until Doeg the Edomite comes out of the shadows and basically says, I saw David with the high priest, and he took Goliath's sword with him when he left. And we've read that story recently, and really, if you read it, it was the only weapon there. But to Saul, who is not thinking clearly, this is a symbol, a sign that the young shepherd boy who struck down a champion and won the hearts of the nation is attempting to do the same thing to him. So Saul finds Ahimelech, the priest who gave David the sword, and Ahimelech says, this is your right-hand man, your son-in-law. He said he was on a mission from you. But Saul will not listen to reason, and he orders Doeg to kill everybody. David, meanwhile, in 1 Samuel 23, has won a victory over the Philistines, but he is stuck in a city, and Saul then surrounds it. And David asks God if they're gonna give him up, and they are. So David escapes to the caves again in 1 Samuel 24, this time with 600 of his men. Now, 600 men. These were large caves. It definitely would have been possible to fit them all in. Maybe not one cave, per se, but it is definitely doable. Continuing that story, then, in 1 Samuel 24, Saul gets placed in a particularly vulnerable position at one point. And though David refuses to kill Saul, he does cut off a portion of his robe and is struck by his conscience when he does it. As Saul is leaving, David then comes out of the cave and produces the corner of Saul's robe, showing him that he definitely doesn't want to kill Saul, or he would have done it. And Saul, seeing that, says at the end of 1 Samuel chapter 24, I know now that you shall surely be king. I think of the two options, this one fits better, and I hope to explain that a little bit as we go along. So, with the context sorted, let's go back to Psalm 57. Psalm 57, verse one, to the choir master, according to do not destroy. That's the melody to which this psalm is set, and it's very fitting, because in 1 Samuel 24, Saul does not destroy David because he is protected by God. But David does not permit the destruction of Saul either. A miktam of David. I said we'd be coming back, and here we are. This is a vocabulary word that only happens in a couple of other Psalms. It's in Psalm 16, and then it's in Psalm 56 through 60, and that's it. And there has been a lot of speculation about what this term means, and I assure you that preparing for this morning, I spent an egregious amount of time determined to come up with the ultimate answer. And so, I can confidently say, definitively, that nobody knows. Nobody knows what it means. And that's fun, right? That should be fun for us because I know that it's frustrating because we want to know all the things. That's what we want to know. We want to know all the things. But knowledge puffs up, right? And we can begin to think ourselves very erudite, meaning academic, culture, scholarly, theologically savvy. We use words like erudite. And there's nothing wrong with that, per se, as long as we remember our place. But we forget our place often. And so God, in his kindness, by use of one word, has reminded us of the hierarchy here. Is it a teaching psalm? Does it mean golden? Is it just a different technical term? Some things are not for us to know. Some things you will not find out. And we haven't even gotten anywhere yet and God put this obscure vocabulary word here to put us right back under the authority of his word and under the authority of his wisdom where we belong. there's a similar danger. As we look to the context, we've got these ambiguities and decisions to make regarding interpretation. Is it 1 Samuel 22? Is it 1 Samuel 24? What's McTown, right? And if we're not careful, we'll fix it in our heads that coming to a conclusion on these matters means that we've dealt with the text. And these are exactly the kinds of things that we want to look for in the text, 1 Samuel 22, Mictam. These are the things that we look for to make sure that the text doesn't look at us. You can interpret in your head all day, and it might even be right, but that doesn't mean you've applied it with your heart. And that is where these Psalms are helpful. Here is where our emotions and our affections are being trained. So it is not our main goal this morning to define McTom. It is not our job here to leave wondering or deciding on if it was 1 Samuel 22 or 24. Rather, it is our job to see how David, in a desperate situation, remembers the Lord. And with that in mind, let's start with the text. I have split this into three uneven sections because we are Baptists after all. Verses one to four functions as the first verse of the song. David remembers the Lord in his petition in verses one to four. Then there's a bridge in verses five to six. David remembers the Lord's providence. And finally, a second verse in verses seven through 11, where David remembers the Lord in praise. So let's start with the first section. David is deeper in the cave. He has some problems. Think low ceiling, okay? Then he's gonna start walking out in verses five and six. And in verse seven, he's at the mouth of the cave in the open air. That's kind of the flow. That's how this works, right? So he begins, be merciful to me, oh God, be merciful to me. There's a lot of repetition throughout this song, which makes sense because it's a song, right? But he starts his plea with mercy. Mercy is related to grace, but they're distinct things. The person asking for mercy is generally an offender. However, David is not explicitly in sin here, so when he asks for mercy, it could be for cutting Saul's robe, or he is asking an authority, he is asking God, one who has power, one who has authority, for forbearance, or for compassion. We're not told exactly how or when this song was written, but if he sees Saul, David's advisors are saying that it's a good time to finish him off, right? And he's stuck in a pickle of all pickles because that's what his advisors are telling him, right? But if he doesn't act, if David doesn't act, Saul could just as easily find him, and then all bets are off. So the choice to act or not to act has drastic consequences on a horizontal and a vertical level, and all of the feelings that David is having just come up out of nowhere, and they just come up over the top, and he just goes, have mercy on me. He's crying out for mercy, for compassion, for help, okay? And he grounds the plea in these next words. The next words, for in you, my soul takes refuge. Usually we try to save this stuff for the end, but here it is right at the start. So I ask you, what does your soul take refuge in? When the storms of destruction are raging, where do you run? To whom or what do you cry for mercy? We know what the answer should be, we're in church. But we know in our hearts, we do not take refuge in God. As Pastor Carter said, we've picked something else. savings account, spouse, friends, your own morality, it could be anything. And we know that about ourselves, and so we feel guilty, and so we hesitate. But for David, when the world is on fire, he runs to God first for refuge. David is asking for mercy from God, but he can honestly say that he takes refuge in him. And we should be following David's example here, however poorly we might start out. The song repeats, in the shadow of your wings, I will take refuge. David is using this illustration. He says he's like a baby chick running under the wings of its mother. And that's helpful to us for several reasons. Because firstly, he knew he had to run somewhere. Now I know that these days we are struggling to get our men to be men. And as we try to recover that, there is a certain kind of defiance that seems like bravery on the surface. But running for shelter in a tornado is not weakness, it is wisdom. Sometimes you're gonna need help. And so you can white knuckle your problems and try to hold on, but don't kid yourself and call that being tough. It is wisdom to know that you need help and to run toward it. Next thing, David is in a dark cave right now, but he is comfortable there because he's in the shadow of God's wings. A child who runs to his parent for shelter will also see darkness, but it's security, not fear that they experience. And that comes from David being all the way under God's wings. He does not stand at arm's length from God Almighty like we want to in our Midwestern fashion and say, God, if you just want to help me out a little bit, I don't need a lot. I'm not helpless. I'm not trying to be lazy. I don't want to bother you too much. I don't want to take up too much of your time. So if you could just give me a boost, I'm sure I can manage the rest of it on my own. I know you must be tired of me coming to you all the time. I'm going to try not to make a habit of this. No. In the shadow of your wings. This is intimate. It's personal. It's warm. You as a parent know how amazing it feels to have your child run to you for comfort. Moving on to verse two. I will cry out to God most high. I will just point out here in passing that cries are loud. Cries are loud. Anybody in here can look at a small child who just took a face full of concrete and know that despite them being two feet tall, you better hold on because how quiet they get when they take that first breath, that is how loud the yelling is about to be. So, when is the last time that you cried out? Not physically necessarily, stepping on a Lego does not count for here, but rather what is stirring your soul? What is causing you to lose sleep? What is causing you to cry out? And to what or whom are you crying out? Because we've got it mixed up, right? We think the goal, the objective for all of us is to never have to cry out. Right? We want it to be a super easy job. After our conversion, we would rather it be a downhill coast with a gentle breeze as we slide off into glory. But that's not what happens. We live in a sinful world, full of sinful people, and we are one of them. More than that, though, there are things God is going to do in your life that must be done through trial. There are parts of his character and parts of your character that need hardship to be brought to light. David, writing this psalm, is on the run in a cave for a second time, wondering when it's gonna be his turn. And he has years yet to go, years. The anointed king has years. So why should we be any different? but we can learn from him because David doesn't just wallow in it and wish it were all different than it was. David knows rather who he's bringing his cries to, to God most high who fulfills his purpose for me. He knows the promise that's been given to him. He knows the honor that's coming to him, but he is waiting on the Lord to accomplish it. Moreover, it's God who fulfills God's purpose for David, not David fulfills David's purpose for David. He has learned that lesson. Now he's gonna forget again later, which is why he's great for us. But when we're in fellowship with God, when we're praying and there's that connection, we're gonna get what we have in 1 Samuel 24, which is highly contrasted in 1 Samuel 21, where David was trying to be sneaky and slippery all on his own. and will know the difference between right and almost right. His godly counsel, David's advisors, when Saul is in the cave and he comes in, they're saying, the Lord has given Saul into your hand. Now, has he expressly said that? No, he hasn't, but my goodness, David, would you meet God halfway? He is on a silver platter. If you just finish it off, you get your rightful place on the throne. He's already been trying to kill you anyway. What exactly are you waiting for? And at first blush, it seems right. We think we could argue a good case for that, but David doesn't do it. Like Marchandis said last week, David would ask the Lord for justice. He asks the Lord to take vengeance, but he would never take it himself. He has not been given specific instruction to lay hand on the Lord's anointed, which is why even cutting his robe is too much. Also, killing Saul at this point would be a Saul move, not a David move. Just like Saul grasped at offering the sacrifices when God told him to wait, Saul would have done it, and he would have made a big show about giving glory to God for bringing the usurper into his hand, but it would have been a selfish act. And if he were not in communion with God, not in fellowship at that moment, David would have gained a short-sighted victory that would turn into a disaster long-term, the same as it did for Saul. It's grasping what God has promised, but not yet given. So for us, we always must examine our motives and examine them. And we need to hold them up to God's word because it's not like, well, I have this thing that I really want or really want to avoid and I can spin it a little bit and make it sort of line up with what I know God has actually said. And that's how Abraham got Ishmael. And we know how that turned out. But David remembers the Lord. Instead of trusting in his own strong hand, he is going to wait on God because, verse 3, he will send from heaven and save me. He will put to shame him who tramples on me. David knows the score still, okay? He knows he has enemies. He's not glossing over that fact. Okay. Verse four, even though his soul is in the midst of lions, he lays down amid fiery beasts, the children of man whose teeth are spears and arrows, who tongues are sharp swords, all of that's going on. And he can be calm among them because God will send out his steadfast love and faithfulness. David is sure that God will fight for him. And that is where we need to be. In God's wisdom, God has put you in a time, in a place that is increasingly hostile to Christianity. We, as a nation, are determined to throw off the shackles of Christianity, forgetting that they aren't shackles, but rather the chains holding us back from the abyss. That's the time we live in. That's where we are. It was a focal point of the Olympic Games. Okay? Maybe for you, though, that culture is sitting at your table during every family gathering. You, you might be the odd one out when you refuse to go along with that which is against God's law. But David was in that situation. Jesus was in that situation. The church throughout her history has been in that situation. In the Roman Empire, the call that was often heard was Christians to the lions. The devil prowls about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. If you're dealing with the sharp swords, the children of men, it's okay to recognize it. But you also must recognize that you're not special. This is not a surprise. We should be prepared to be slandered, be prepared for people to accuse us of things that we didn't do. So I don't want you to pretend that you don't see what you see. But I don't want you to despair either. Because when we despair, we are remembering the wrong thing. We're remembering how good it used to be, how easy it was back then, how naive we were, wishing we could go back before all this trouble. But there was trouble back then, too. Because man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward. And it might look easy now, but when you were slogging through it, it didn't seem so rosy, did it? God is the one who brought you to and through the trouble in your life. And when we remember that with God, the lions are nothing, we can lie down among them. See, David's goal at this time is to bring his requests before God. He is honestly looking at his situation, and things could indeed be better. But he has recognized that this moment, right, this trouble is from God. And his goal, as we get to the bridge, is that verse five, God's glory would be over all the earth. The bursting forth of his cry does not culminate with, Lord God, please change my situation. but be exalted, O God, above the heavens. It's not the ending of the trouble, but instead the resolve that however it plays out, God would be exalted. So we can ask God to end this trouble, to end this trial we're in, but like David, we need to have it firm in our minds and hearts that we will act and think and pray in a way that brings glory to God regardless. As I said, I cannot quite prove this because we don't know exactly how the song was written, but I think it makes sense that verse 6, the pit they dug for themselves, was written after the whole incident in the cave. Saul is constantly pursuing David, and David is consistently catching Saul. He runs right into him multiple times. David has cut off the corner of Saul's robe, proven to Saul for the moment that he doesn't want to kill him. And Saul had to eat a whole bunch of crow as he retreats. David says, they set a net for me. I was trapped. They dug a pit, but then they fell into it themselves. And he marinates on that for a minute, right? Saul put a rake down for me, but he stepped on it instead. And as David replays it more and more, it makes his heart stronger, more resilient. He has done with it what we should. He is not gloating over his enemy's defeat. He's not saying, well, that's over, and now I'm allowed no trouble for at least a couple of months, so I'm gonna coast for a bit. No, no, he's using it. He's using it to fortify his heart for the next trouble. Verse seven, my heart is steadfast. My heart is prepared. When they prepare their next trap, I will remember this one and prepare my heart to ask for the same thing I asked in verse 3 and verse 5. That loop of verse 3 and verse 5 and verse 7 is the exact opposite of doom scrolling, because we are remembering the right thing and we are fixing our heart. And a fixed heart is a powerful thing. GK Chesterton said, once we had a fixed heart, we have a free hand. A free hand in this case, to praise the Lord for his deliverance. And not just a little. The trouble has passed, the storms of destruction have rolled through, and David is still standing, and he's in awe of how God has done it again, even though he knew he would, and so he says, Awake, my glory, all that I have and everything in me. I need the instruments. The sun needs waking up, and I intend to be its alarm clock. I will give thanks to you, O Lord, among the peoples. I will sing praise to you among the nations. Now, I'm not saying that you have to be singing all day. But I do want to know, and I do want to ask, how often that you say you're thankful to God. Thankful to God for your wife. Thankful to God for your husband. Thankful to God for your job. Thankful to God for anything. Do your coworkers know that you are thankful to God for things? Or is it just generic gratitude? Or is it ingratitude? Okay, I'm gonna preach for myself here and you can just listen for a minute. I have this idea, right, and it's wrong, okay, that the more subdued you are, the more dispassionate you can be, the more people will think of you as a wise person that should be taken very seriously. Because after all, that's what I want. I want to be taken seriously. Because I have many leather-bound books that I read in the original Greek, because that's how seriously I take this stuff. And if they see joy or happiness, they might confuse it with flippancy, and I could never live that down. But this whole summer has been a correction to that. Every psalm has feelings in it, a lot of them. The second half of this text has big, loud shouts of praise. Feelings are bubbling up and overflowing, and so what this tells me is, since we have emotions, we should use them fully. Now, they need to be trained, of course, but don't let that be a cop-out. Okay? Now I say that because what we often think of when we say trained is repressed. In the Midwest, we hate somebody making a scene, right? On the scale of one to 10, as far as strength of emotion, if anybody steps out of that four to seven range, eyebrows are going up, okay? Which is why if you come to my house, my eyebrows are always up. That's how I have come a million wrinkles on my forehead, because I am struggling to get my children to get into that acceptable range, okay? And thank God, because I need the lesson. and their ground state is at 10. They live their life on a level that I can only dream about, which means, for our purposes here, when it comes to exalting the Lord, verse 11, or to borrow from another psalm, when they go to ascribe to the Lord the glory due His name, they're gonna be ahead of me. Their muscles in this area are going to work, where mine have atrophied, because in my fear of man, I chose my dignity over closeness with God." At another moment in David's life, the Ark of the Covenant was being brought back to Jerusalem, and David was dancing. And Michael, his wife, gets an eyeful of this spectacle of the new king supposedly acting a fool in front of everyone, and she lets him have it. But David's conscience, David's conscience was clear about all this and he throws it right back and essentially says, oh, I'll show you what I think of my dignity. And he was right. Michael was punished by God. It says she had no children for the rest of her days. A king could have come from her. So when God has brought us through trial after trial and given gift after gift, if we continue to insist on our dignity, he may just let us keep it. And what a terrible trade that would be. So we can contrast that, however, with the story in Luke 18. Jesus is passing by and a man cried out like our text, Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me. And he got more than the Midwestern side-eyed glances, right? He got rebuked and told, be quiet. But this man knows what he needs, and he knows that only Jesus can give it to him. He's a blind beggar, there's no dignity left in him. Just the same plea that David had, be merciful to me, oh God. And he was. So now, you. Take the trial you're in, the trouble that's coming and remember the Lord, how he encouraged you, how he held you up, how he provided for you. And if you're sitting here today and all that you can remember right now is your sin, then bring that. Bring your sin and your shame and your cold heart and repent of it all and ask Jesus for mercy. And he will give it. You need to remember that's why he came. We've seen the shadow in King David. And now as we close, we're gonna speed run this song one more time to see the true form. Centuries after David composed this song, we find Jesus in the darkness with a few of his followers waiting to be discovered by those who would take his life. He ran for refuge to his loving father, to the shadow of his wings and asked for mercy, not for himself, but for you and for me. And the price of that mercy, the cost of our souls to be able to take refuge in God would mean the death of the only one who didn't deserve to die. In order for the storms of destruction, of sin and death and judgment to pass by us, they must come crashing down on Jesus Christ. And as each wave of judgment came down, he would cry out to God Most High, who had a purpose to fulfill since Genesis 3.15. God will send from heaven and save me. But that's not what happens to Jesus. Instead, we hear, he saved others, but he can't save himself. Indeed, for to save others meant that he cannot save himself. It appears that God has not sent out his steadfast love and faithfulness to great David's greater son, but instead holy wrath and punishment for sin. The cry instead is, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? The crowd misunderstands. He's calling Elijah. Let's see that legion of angels. His soul is in the midst of lions. The children of men whose teeth are spears and arrows are eagerly waiting for him to die. mocking, scornful, bloodthirsty. They would get their wish, but with the last cries of it is finished and into your hands I commit my spirit, God the Father was exalted in his son's successful mission. This is what he came for, and now, verse five, the glory of the Lord will be over all the earth. Satan and his hordes set a trap, and they sprung it. and his soul was bowed down, but had they known what they were doing, they would have never crucified the Lord of glory. Because the God of cliffhangers, the God of reversals, laughs. He laughs at Satan's moment of triumph because as Jesus breathed his last, the pit the devil had so carefully crafted was a perfect fit for himself. Because now your sins and my sins have been dealt with. Jesus Christ died the death you should have died, and now, as N.D. Wilson says, even the tunnel of the grave is lit with Christmas lights. And he can light them because on the third day, the steadfast heart of the Son of God, the heart that was committed to the plan of God and your salvation, the heart that bled for you and me and all who would call on him, began to beat once more. The blood that paid the price for us began to flow once more, and the lungs that held no air began to breathe once more, and the Lord Jesus Christ stood outside the cave of death and awoke the dawn in praise to God Most High once more. Amen? Amen. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word to us. We thank you for this psalm, and we thank you for your people. When you finished your redemptive work on the cross, you established your church and it grew despite constant trial and trouble because you had mercy on it. Have mercy on us as we leave this place. Encourage us whether we're in the depths of a cave or in the sunshine preparing our hearts for the next bit of trouble. Help us remember that you have promised the spread of your kingdom such that on the last day, Jesus will give thanks to you among the peoples, among his inheritance of nations. They all will see your steadfast love is great to the heavens, and on that day, we will see it as well. We will know it, and we will shout with the whole church, be exalted, oh God, above the heavens. Let your glory be over all the earth. Make it so, Lord, in Jesus' name, amen.