Psalm 18. And just to remind you of the context, the book of Psalms is not one book with 150 chapters. It's 150 individual psalms. And these psalms are psalms. This is basically the ancient Jewish hymn book. But we do know obviously that it was inspired by God. This is the Word of God. And the book of Psalms is divided in five different sections. Book 1, is Psalm 1 through 41, and we've seen just with incredible clarity that the theme of this particular book is human suffering and the need for divine deliverance. We're helpless without the Lord, you know that. And we've seen it over and over and over again. David writing, Lord deliver me from this and deliver me from that. And we've seen it over and over again. Psalm 18 is a little bit different because it is a psalm of thanksgiving and deliverance. But we have to understand, let's read this introduction to the psalm again. It says, To the chief musician, a psalm of David, the servant of the Lord, who spake unto the Lord the words of this song in the day that the Lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul. But we know that this is not a specific event that David was delivered from. In fact, what's special about Psalm 18, is we know the time of life in which David wrote this. He was an old man. This was in the final years, possibly even the final year of his life that he wrote these words. And the reason we know that is because it's almost an exact copy of what David wrote in 2 Samuel chapter 22. 2 Samuel chapter 22 and Psalm 18 are almost identical. And so the chronology of 2 Samuel lets us know that this was written in the last days of David's life. He was an old man and he was looking back on his life and he was reflecting not on one event that God had delivered him from, but the entirety of the deliverance throughout his life. That's a very powerful thing to me. I'm really hung up on that thought about an older David looking back on his life. You know, David was not a man who was unfamiliar with suffering. He was not unfamiliar with temptation. In spite of his successes, he was not unfamiliar with failure either. I mean, David had lost sons, some of which even as a judgment against his sin. He had lost a wife. Absalom, his son, had betrayed him and tried to take the throne by deception and by force. He knew what it was to face battles. The last years of his life, the sword never departed his house. He was never a great king like he was prior to his adultery. It was never the same for David. And so in those last moments of his life, what would he think about? When he looked back on his life, what would he talk about? What would be the things that really stick out in his mind? And what amazes me is above anything else, he talked about the Lord. The greatness and the goodness and the power and the mercy and the holiness of God. These were the things that were the biggest to him. That's amazing to me. And so we're going to look at that in a different aspect today. Let's read the first five verses just to get the context of where we left off. I'm actually preaching in verses 6 through 19, but he said in Psalm 18 and verse 1, I will love thee, O Lord, my strength. The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my strength in whom I will trust, my buckler and the horn of my salvation and my high tower. We saw a couple of weeks ago all of these personal ways to express God. I'm glad He's my God, aren't you? I will call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised. So shall I be saved from my enemies. The sorrows of death come past me, and the floods of ungodly men made me afraid. The sorrows of hell, or death is what that means, come past me about. The snares of death prevented me. In my distress I called upon the Lord, and I cried unto my God. And he heard my voice, and out of his temple and my cry came before him, even into his ears. And so what we're going to see, you know, in basically every psalm we've looked at up to this point, When David cries out for deliverance, he's in the middle of whatever he's facing. What's interesting about this psalm is he's in a place of goodness and safety and comfort looking back on times when he was in trouble. And he says, God delivered me. And what we're going to see in verses 6-19 is David goes into great detail. He uses very powerful rhetorical language and imagery to describe who God is. What we're going to see is in a situation like this, especially in the poetical books, when we come to this kind of language and imagery, it's best to try to get the general point of what's being said instead of looking at every single verse under the microscope. And so with that being said, I want to try to deal with What did David concluded about God when he came to the end of his life and looked back? Let's read our text and then we'll pray. Psalm 18, verse 6. In my distress I called upon the Lord and cried unto my God. He heard my voice out of his temple, or out of his dwelling place is what that means. The temple hadn't been built yet. And my cry came before him, even into his ears. Then the earth shook and trembled. The foundations also of the hills moved and were shaken, because he was wroth. There went up a smoke out of his nostrils, and fire out of his mouth devoured, and coals were kindled by it. He bowed the heavens also and came down, and darkness was under his feet. And he rode upon a cherub and did fly, yea, he did fly upon the wings of the wind. He made darkness His secret place. His pavilion round about Him were dark waters and thick clouds of the skies. At the brightness that was before Him, His thick clouds passed, 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, and He shot out lightnings and discomfited them. Then the channels of water were seen, and the foundations of the world were discovered at thy rebuke, O Lord, at the blast of the breath of thy nostrils. He sent from above. He took me. He drew me out of many waters. He delivered me from my strong enemy and from them which hated me, for they 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 delivered me because He delighted in me. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we love you. Thank you so much for your word. God, I'm so thankful that we can have the Word of God in our hand and read along to the way that you've revealed yourself unto mankind. I pray that you would empty me of sin and self and fill me with your Holy Spirit. And God, I pray that I would just communicate your Word in a powerful and clear way that can be applied to our hearts and lives. And Lord, I pray that we would just love you more as a result of reading and preaching your Word this morning. Meet us where we are and take us where we need to be, and if one's not saved, Lord, I pray that today would be the day of salvation, that they would call upon you in repentance and faith. And we give these things to you. It's in Christ's name I pray these things. Amen. I'm going to preach on the thought this morning of the God who delivers. The God who delivers. What did David concluded about God when he came to the end of his life and looked back in spite of everything that he had been through? Well, the first one I want you to see is that God is holy. Look at verse 6 and as we read this, I mean just really picture this imagery in your head. I mean this is really intense stuff and I feel like a lot of people read this and They might be turned off by it. They may not understand it. Maybe it goes against their concept of who they think God to be. But just let the Word of God speak for itself for a minute. We'll pick out some things. In verse 6, he said, In my distress I called upon the Lord. I cried unto my God. He heard my voice out of His temple, and my cry came before Him even into His ears. Then the earth shook and trembled. The foundations also of the hills moved and were shaken because He was wroth." He was angry. There went up a smoke out of His nostrils and fire came out of His mouth and devoured. Coals were kindled by it. He bowed the heavens also and came down and darkness was under His feet. And so, we find here in this imagery that even creation itself is trembling before the Creator. It's trembling before God. The mountains and the earth are trembling before God. And when I read this, it really reminds me of Isaiah chapter 6. You remember when Isaiah had a vision of God high and lifted up and his train filled the temple and the seraphim, these heavenly angelic creatures in the midst of God, they are covering themselves and they are trembling and they're crying out, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. And you know, even Isaiah who was a saved man, he was already a prophet by this time. And when he sees this vision of God in his holiness, even as a prophet, he said, woe is me, for I am a man of unclean lips. Lord, forgive me. I mean, wow, he saw God. And by the way, he saw Jesus Christ high and lifted up on the throne. John tells us this in the New Testament, that it was the glory of Christ that Isaiah saw. Isn't that an amazing thought? And by the way, holiness is the only attribute of God that is mentioned three times like that. You know, God is all loving, but He's never called love, love, love. Holiness is the only attribute that is repeated three times like that. And the word holy, as it pertains to God, comes from the Hebrew word kados, which means to be set apart. And it really speaks to the otherness of God. God is wholly different than we are. He is wholly separated. He is higher than we are. He is not a man like us that he should lie, Deuteronomy tells us. He is God. And I tell you, as we get into this imagery here, I tell you the problem that so many people run into when we get to preaching a big God like this, is it doesn't fit the narrative with what they already believe or what they've already been told. God is not like us. And the mistake that a lot of people make is they start from human logic and they work up from there. And what they're doing is they're trying to bring God down to our level and trying to raise man up to His level. You can't do that. The lower view of God you have, the higher view of man you have and vice versa. God is not like us. He is holy above us. He is eternal. He's holy. He can't even sin. He can't be tempted with sin. And so this is speaking of the otherness of God. And listen to the imagery in verses 8 and 9 as you think about this concept. There went up a smoke out of his nostrils. Fire came out of his mouth and devoured. Coals were kindled by it. And all of this is because he's angry at this sin. And he bowed the heavens also and came down. Darkness was under his feet. And I love how in verse 9 it states that the darkness was under his feet. as in he's conquering darkness, he's over and above it. And so here is what we have to understand, that prior to a person coming to Christ in salvation, we belong to darkness. Outside of Jesus Christ, the Bible says that person is a child of wrath by nature. They are children of the devil. They are dead in their trespasses and sins. Their righteousness is as filthy rags in the sight of God. There is none righteous, no, not one. There is no such thing as a good person. Romans chapter 3 and verse 11 says, there is no one who seeks after God. And this really again flies in the face of what a lot of people believe and told. And here's the thing, I love what J.C. Ryle said one time. He said, if we get the wrong diagnosis, then we're always going to seek for the wrong cure. And when we are wrong about the nature of human corruption and depravity, then we're going to have the wrong idea of what we need. We get man's greatest need wrong, we're going to get the search for the cure wrong, and here's man's greatest problem. We're going to talk about this at Calvary this afternoon in detail. Here's man's greatest problem. We are born sinners in rebellion against God. We do not love God. We may love a God that we've created in our image, in our likeness, but we don't love God. The Bible is unequivocal about this doctrine. Even Jesus told the rich young ruler, He said, well, there's none good but God. People take that to say, well, see, Jesus wasn't God. He said, none is good but God. But He said it in reference to Himself. They just didn't catch it. There's none good but God. And so, you know, if people think they're a good person, then all they need God to be is some kind of a life coach or some kind of a therapist. They don't need Him to be a Savior or Redeemer. What do they need to be redeemed from? What do they need to be saved from? And if you think about it, it really goes back to Adam and the fall. Again, we died and sinned in Adam. He represented us. And ever since the fall, man is born in sin. Man is born in depravity. Think about all the times that God talked about the wickedness of man. I mean, even the Tower of Babel. The whole world got together and tried to rebel against God, and they erected, they called it a tower into heaven. It was probably a pyramid, if we're being honest. It was more of a false worship center. It was a temple to false gods other than the real God. God said, okay, I'll just confound your language. That's why we speak different languages today. Think about the flood. God looked down from heaven, and what did he see? There was nobody that was good. In fact, he said every imagination, every heart was only evil continually. And were it not for Him giving grace to Job, the whole human race would have died in that judgment. But God's faithful to His promises, and He already promised that the Messiah would come to the seat of the woman back in Genesis 3. I mean, think about when Christ came to this earth, we're talking about God in the flesh, God incarnate, the creator of all things that entered into His creation. He never did anything wrong. He only did that which was good. He only preached truth. He only healed and helped. What did they do? They murdered Him. Everybody put aside their differences and came together to kill Him. That just shows the wickedness of the world. Let me ask you a question. Do you think that the world now is any different than it was during the flood? Any different than it was when Jesus came to this earth? Do you think we're better right now than they were back then? Yeah, that's what they thought too. and they all drowned, and they nailed Jesus to a cross, and they died at Sodom and Gomorrah when He rained fire and brimstone. Why would we be any better? We're not any better at all. In fact, if Jesus came back to this earth right now, you know what we'd try to do collectively as humanity? Put aside differences to try to kill Jesus. We're not good. And so we have to think about, even in terms of our own personal sin, personally, what have you done in your life? What you've done may not seem that bad if you compare yourselves with other people, but here's what we have to get. When we look at our lives against the standard of this holy God, it ought to make us tremble. It really ought to make us tremble. And get this, we have to get this. Before you can be saved by the Lord, you have to understand that you have to be saved from Him. In order to be saved by Him, you have to understand you have to be saved from Him. And, you know, people hear this and, man, they're just like, oh, that just upsets me, or I just, that's not true, or how can you say that, that, you know, God is so loving, and He is. Listen, we're going to get there. I'm going to tear it open and then I'm going to salve it up before we get out of here. But I can't, you know, if you go to the doctor, you know, let's just say you have cancer and he finds that cancer. The loving thing to do is to tell you that, to level with you, right? I mean, if he just told you, oh, everything's all right, you got a clean bill of health and you walked out and you die, that's not a very loving thing to do. The loving thing to do is give the proper diagnosis and then say, but hey, we got hope here, we can beat this, there's a treatment for this. When it comes to the gospel and it comes to God, the reason the gospel is so scandalous is because people reject the bad news about the gospel. And that is that we're sinners under the wrath of a holy God. That is the bad news of the gospel. That's not good news. But the good news is, that Jesus Christ came to pay for our sin, that He could pay for our sin and pardon us, that God wouldn't become the unrighteous judge by pardoning us, and I'm gonna get there. But if you think about this, and I briefly mentioned this at the funeral, and I'm not allowed to tell you how brief it was, because y'all might expect it every week. But, I mean, if you think about it, without the wrath of God, without this ferocious holiness that we read about from the hand of David. I mean, he looks like a fire-breathing dragon coming out of the sky. That's how it looks like when I read this. You know, without that aspect of God, without His holiness, the cross doesn't even make sense. I'm telling you, the gospel that so many churches in America preach, it doesn't even make sense. Why did Jesus have to die such a horrible, bloody, murderous death? Why did He have to do that? I'll tell you why. It's because he was wearing our sins in his body on the tree. And God the Father was pouring out this dragon-like wrath upon his son while he was on that cross for our sin. That's what was happening. That's what was going on. The Romans didn't kill Jesus. The Jews didn't kill Jesus. We read about it in Isaiah 53 that it pleased God to bruise his son. It pleased him to crush his own son. Why? That sounds weird, doesn't it? But why is that? It's because of his love. He's also holy and he's just against sin. Injustice is unloving, is it not? God's not an unjust God, so even His holiness and wrath are intertwined with His love. And so, you know, people hear things like this, and they get this picture of God like He's some kind of a monster, but we're looking at things backwards if we come to that conclusion, because here's the thing, God is good. And it's like Paul Washer said, Paul Washer said, do you want to know the most terrifying truth in the Bible? The most terrifying truth in the Bible is that God is good. And what is a good God supposed to do with sinners like us? The problem is that most people see themselves as good and they see God as just applauding their efforts. But friends, if we could see God for just five seconds in the unbridled way that David is describing Him, it would cure us of our ego. and any delusion of our own goodness. David got to the end of his life, and when he looked back, he was in awe at the holiness and the bigness and the greatness of God. Most people act as if God stands in awe of them. I subscribe to a lot of these different videos and shorts and podcasts about these different heresies and things, and I'm not kidding you. There was a preacher that went viral a couple weeks ago because he preached a message about how God worships us. I heard it out of my own mouth, and I felt like I needed to crawl under the table. My friend, God does not worship us. I got news for you. The creature is not worshiped by the Creator. But it's sad. It's where we're at. God is holy. A God that would stand in all of us and worship us, that's not a God-worthy worship, and it's certainly not the God of the Bible. But then number two, y'all are not listening that fast, so I gotta hurry up. Number two, David sees and says that he is both powerful and mysterious, and I think these things go together. Look at verse 10. And he rode upon a cherub. A cherub essentially is an angelic being that basically guards the throne of God. But I don't think it's literal, I think this is imagery here. It's talking about the fact that he was moving swiftly through the sky. He did fly. Yeah, he did fly upon the wings of the wind. He made darkness his secret place. His pavilion round about him were dark waters and thick clouds of skies. At the brightness that was before him, his thick clouds passed, hailstones and coals of fire. The Lord also thundered in the heavens, and the highest gave his voice, hailstones and coals of fire. Yea, he sent out his arrows and scattered them, and he shot out lightnings and discomfited them." And so, you know, God is powerful. He's all-powerful. And yet, in many ways, he's chosen to conceal himself. Now, that certainly doesn't make him small. He's just chosen to work in that way. And, you know, I will say this. I think he's done this for a few reasons. I think he conceals himself partly because of the fall in human sin. I think he does it partly for our benefit because in our sinfulness and even in these human bodies as Christians, we couldn't handle being in the unbridled presence of God. You ever thought about that? I mean, think about Moses in the Old Testament. He went up the mountain. He was feeling really good about this encounter with God. He said, Lord, I want to see your face. And he said, no man can see my face and live. You can't even look at me without dying. I think about the high priest in the Old Testament. When he had to go into the Holy of Holies in the middle of the temple where the presence of God was said to dwelt right there, he would go in once a year. and make a sin offering for the people. And the high priest had to make a blood sacrifice for his sin before he could go make an offering for the other sin or he would die. And it was such an intense thing that what the Jews did, the other priest, when it came time to make that yearly atonement, they would put bells on his priestly robe. and then they would tie a rope to his leg. And when he went into the Holy of Holies, they would listen for those bells jingling. If the bells ever stopped jingling for any length of time, they would know that he'd probably been struck dead by the presence of God, and they could pull his body out. Think about that. That's how serious that is. I mean, think about even Jesus being veiled in human flesh, and He peeled it back just a little bit on the Mount of Transfiguration, and Peter, James, and John fell down like dead men. That's what we're talking about here. I don't know what happened when the Roman soldiers came to arrest Jesus, probably a similar thing to the transfiguration, but these hardened Roman soldiers fell down like dead men. And it's a serious thing. You ought to take it seriously. And get this, there are, though, there are many ways in which God has chosen to conceal himself, but he does reveal himself. He reveals Himself in two main ways, and I've got to say this and move on. He reveals Himself, number one, in general revelation. And what I mean by that is through creation and through the conscience. Creation and conscience. Romans 1 makes this incredibly clear. That even somebody out in the jungles of nowhere who's never read a Bible, never heard the name of Jesus, never seen a missionary, they can know based on what's around them and what is in them that there is a Creator. Anybody can see that. This has design. This has design. The human cell is more complex than any computer that man has been able to develop. It had to have a creator. It had to have an intelligent designer. Everybody knows this. To say otherwise is just strictly irrational. It doesn't even, I don't have enough faith to believe that. But also the conscience, the moral law within our hearts, we know right from wrong. I love it. Man, one of the greatest joys of my life is when I go out to the, like the college campus or, you know, the fair or whatever and I, Of course, we do the good person challenge. There's no such thing as a good person. Changed my mind. And it's like, you know, you get atheists that come up that have no standard of morality at all as far as, you know, I'm not saying they can't do moral things. I'm just saying they can't give a justification for it. And you ask them a question, you know, they'll say there's no such thing as absolute truth. Well, first of all, is that absolutely true? There's no absolute truth? Or is rape wrong? And boy, just to see the conundrum they get in when they ask questions like that. If they say yes, they're appealing to an absolute standard of morality. Where'd that come from? The moral law giver. And if they say no, they reveal just how crazy their worldview is. They're in trouble either way. And so he reveals himself generally through creation, through the conscience. But he has specifically revealed himself through Scripture. I mean, listen, I told the Sunday school class this morning, if people reject Jesus Christ, it is not for lack of evidence. I mean, it is unbelievable. the fulfilled prophecies, the things that we can fact check even today historically, the archaeological evidence, it is unbelievable. The Old Testament prophets and the things that they said and the way it came true in history, only a God who is outside of time could do something like that. But again, it's not because of what people lack of their knowledge, it's because of what they love and people love darkness rather than light. The Lord can be known for those that genuinely want to know Him. Hebrews 1 verses 1 through 3 says, God, who at sundry times and in diverse manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds, who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high. The greatest revelation that God ever gave us was the incarnation of His Son, the enfleshing of His Son, God in the flesh, and we have His words today through the eyewitnesses, through the inspired eyewitnesses in the New Testament. And so, God is powerful, He is mysterious, and yet He can be known. And I'm glad about that. I'm glad He's big, but He's personal. But then number three, I've got to come to a close here in just a minute. Number three, we look at what David said looking back, and he came to the conclusion that God is full of grace. God is full of grace. Look at verse 15. Then the channels of waters were seen, and the foundations of the world were discovered at thy rebuke, O Lord, at the breath of thy nostrils. He sent forth from above. He took me. He drew me out of many waters. He delivered me from my strong enemy and from them which hated me, for they were too strong for me. Now this enemy here, and I'm not trying to allegorize this too much, but it really looks like he's talking about death here, something too great for him. And the reason I say that, I find it interesting that in verse 15, it talks about the channels of water that basically flow from the rebuke of God. And then the very next thing he says is he said, He delivered me. He drew me out of many waters. In other words, it's like David is saying that God saved me from His own rebuke. God saved me. He pulled me out of His own judgment. David, and I love this too, verse 19 is such a great picture of grace here. Because it says, He brought me forth also into a large place. He delivered me because He delighted in me. Now listen. David didn't say that he as a person was delightful, but that God delighted in him. This is grace personified. Grace defined is this. Grace is the undeserved favor of God. It's when God gives us something that we don't deserve. Mercy on the flip side, mercy is when he doesn't give us what we do deserve. Talking about judgment. And so this is why, and I mentioned this briefly at the funeral, this is why I've talked to so many people that say, well, you know, we do believe in salvation by grace, but we also believe it's a combination of grace and works. That cannot be possible. Because the very definition of grace means that it's something He gives us and it's undeserved. But the concept of work says, I have to do something in order to deserve this. So if you work in order to deserve the grace of God, it ceases to be grace. That's not what grace is. Now, I've said it many times. I do believe that if you're truly saved, you will desire to serve the Lord. That's not what we're talking about. I do believe that if there is a root of salvation, there will be fruit of salvation, but we don't work in order to be saved. We work because we are saved. That's the difference. And so salvation is either by grace or it's by works, but it's logically impossible that it could be both. That's why Ephesians 2, 8, 9 says, For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. It is the gift of God. Salvation is the gift of God. And so David got to the end of his life, and he looked back, and he said, The Lord could have come down in order to condemn me, but instead he came down in order to save me. And so, this is the truth that God is a God that delivers first and foremost from our sin. This is a God that saves. And you can know and have a relationship with that God through Jesus Christ. And so, you know, I would just say this. You know, ultimately, we're either going to be submitted to the truth of his word or we're not. We're either going to believe what the God, what the Bible says about God or we're not. But if we reject this truth here, then we are going to create a God in our own mind. We're going to worship a Jesus of our own making. We're going to follow a Jesus that's not of the Bible. And when we do that, we're not worshiping the true God. We're worshiping a false God that we've erected and given the right name. That's what we're doing. You know, that's why if you think about it, the first of the Ten Commandments is don't worship any other God. Don't worship a false God. But the second commandment was that they weren't to make any graven images of God. And basically what that saying is, whereas the first commandment says don't worship a false God, the second commandment says don't worship the true God in a false way. That's what a lot of people do. And the bottom line is, if you don't recognize the holiness and the justice and the wrath of God, you can't even begin to comprehend the love of God. the grace of God, that He gives us that we don't deserve. And see, this is what, you know, saving faith and repentance go hand in hand. And this is what repentance is. Repentance is when a person basically takes sides with God against themselves. Yes, Lord, you're right and I'm wrong and I need your salvation. That's the God that delivers. And I would just say to you, if you don't know Him as Lord and Savior, you need to come to Him in repentance and faith today. Forsaking your illusion of your own goodness, forsaking your dead works, and coming unto Christ and His salvation through the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Because of all the things that David could have been consumed by at the end of his life, and we've talked about many of the things that he went through, of all those things, nothing was bigger to him than the Lord. And I really hope, my prayer is, that I can get to the end of my life and I'm bitter instead of bitter. That I have lived my life in such a way that I have been so dependent upon God that even when we get to the place where we're facing death, we can say, Lord, I know you're big enough for that too. That kind of trust, that kind of affection and love is the greatest thing ever to know God and to have a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. Is that you today? What is your view of God? Does it match up with the scripture? If not, today could be the first day of the rest of your life.