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Psalm 18

Royal Thanksgiving for Victory

To the leader. A Psalm of David the servant of the L ord, who addressed the words of this song to the L ord on the day when the L ord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul. He said:

I love you, O L ord, my strength.

The L ord is my rock, my fortress, and my deliverer,

my God, my rock in whom I take refuge,

my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.

I call upon the L ord, who is worthy to be praised,

so I shall be saved from my enemies.

The cords of death encompassed me;

the torrents of perdition assailed me;

the cords of Sheol entangled me;

the snares of death confronted me.

In my distress I called upon the L ord;

to my God I cried for help.

From his temple he heard my voice,

and my cry to him reached his ears.

Then the earth reeled and rocked;

the foundations also of the mountains trembled

and quaked, because he was angry.

Smoke went up from his nostrils,

and devouring fire from his mouth;

glowing coals flamed forth from him.

He bowed the heavens, and came down;

thick darkness was under his feet.

He rode on a cherub, and flew;

he came swiftly upon the wings of the wind.

He made darkness his covering around him,

his canopy thick clouds dark with water.

Out of the brightness before him

there broke through his clouds

hailstones and coals of fire.

The L ord also thundered in the heavens,

and the Most High uttered his voice.

And he sent out his arrows, and scattered them;

he flashed forth lightnings, and routed them.

Then the channels of the sea were seen,

and the foundations of the world were laid bare

at your rebuke, O L ord,

at the blast of the breath of your nostrils.

He reached down from on high, he took me;

he drew me out of mighty waters.

He delivered me from my strong enemy,

and from those who hated me;

for they were too mighty for me.

They confronted me in the day of my calamity;

but the L ord was my support.

He brought me out into a broad place;

he delivered me, because he delighted in me.

The L ord rewarded me according to my righteousness;

according to the cleanness of my hands he recompensed me.

For I have kept the ways of the L ord,

and have not wickedly departed from my God.

For all his ordinances were before me,

and his statutes I did not put away from me.

I was blameless before him,

and I kept myself from guilt.

Therefore the L ord has recompensed me according to my righteousness,

according to the cleanness of my hands in his sight.

With the loyal you show yourself loyal;

with the blameless you show yourself blameless;

with the pure you show yourself pure;

and with the crooked you show yourself perverse.

For you deliver a humble people,

but the haughty eyes you bring down.

It is you who light my lamp;

the L ord, my God, lights up my darkness.

By you I can crush a troop,

and by my God I can leap over a wall.

This God—his way is perfect;

the promise of the L ord proves true;

he is a shield for all who take refuge in him.

For who is God except the L ord?

And who is a rock besides our God?—

the God who girded me with strength,

and made my way safe.

He made my feet like the feet of a deer,

and set me secure on the heights.

He trains my hands for war,

so that my arms can bend a bow of bronze.

You have given me the shield of your salvation,

and your right hand has supported me;

your help has made me great.

You gave me a wide place for my steps under me,

and my feet did not slip.

I pursued my enemies and overtook them;

and did not turn back until they were consumed.

I struck them down, so that they were not able to rise;

they fell under my feet.

For you girded me with strength for the battle;

you made my assailants sink under me.

You made my enemies turn their backs to me,

and those who hated me I destroyed.

They cried for help, but there was no one to save them;

they cried to the L ord, but he did not answer them.

I beat them fine, like dust before the wind;

I cast them out like the mire of the streets.

You delivered me from strife with the peoples;

you made me head of the nations;

people whom I had not known served me.

As soon as they heard of me they obeyed me;

foreigners came cringing to me.

Foreigners lost heart,

and came trembling out of their strongholds.

The L ord lives! Blessed be my rock,

and exalted be the God of my salvation,

the God who gave me vengeance

and subdued peoples under me;

who delivered me from my enemies;

indeed, you exalted me above my adversaries;

you delivered me from the violent.

For this I will extol you, O L ord, among the nations,

and sing praises to your name.

Great triumphs he gives to his king,

and shows steadfast love to his anointed,

to David and his descendants forever.

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

21. For I have kept the ways of Jehovah. He had spoken in the preceding verse of the cleanness of his hands, but finding that men judged of him perversely, and were very active in spreading evil reports concerning him, ⁴¹⁴⁴¹⁴ “Et que bien legerement on semoit de luy de mauvais bruits.” — Fr. he affirms that he had kept the ways of the Lord, which is equivalent to his appealing the matter to the judgment-seat of God. Hypocrites, it is true, are accustomed confidently to appeal to God in the same way; yea, there is nothing which they are more forward in doing than in dallying with the sacred name of God, and making it a cover to conceal their hypocrisy; but David brings forward nothing which men might not have certainly known to be true, if any regard to justice had existed among them. Let us, therefore, from his example, endeavor above all things to have a good conscience. And, in the second place, let us have the magnanimity to despise the false judgments of men, and to look up to heaven for the vindicator of our character and cause. He adds, I have not wickedly departed from my God This implies, that he always aimed directly at the mark of his calling, although the ungodly attempted many things to overthrow his faith. The verb which he uses does not denote one fall only, but a defection which utterly removes and alienates a man from God. David, it is true, sometimes fell into sin through the weakness of the flesh, but he never desisted from following after godliness, nor deserted the service to which God had called him.

22. For all his judgments were before me. He now shows how he came to possess that unbending rectitude of character, by which he was enabled to act uprightly amidst so many and so grievous temptations, namely, because he always applied his mind to the study of the law of God. As Satan is daily making new assaults upon us, it is necessary for us to have recourse to arms, and it is meditation upon the Divine Law which furnishes us with armor to resist. Whoever, therefore, would desire to persevere in uprightness and integrity of life, let them learn to exercise themselves daily in the study of the word of God; for, whenever a man despises or neglects instruction, he easily falls into carelessness and stupidity, and all fear of God vanishes from his mind. I do not intend here to make any subtle distinction between these two words, judgments and ordinances. If, however, any person is inclined to make a distinction between them, the best distinction is to refer judgments to the second table of the law, and ordinances, or statutes, which in Hebrew are called חוכות, chukoth, to the duties of piety and the exercises immediately connected with the worship of God.

23. I was also upright with him. All the verbs in this verse are put by David in the future tense, I will be upright, etc. because he does not boast of one act only, or of a good work performed by fits and starts, but of steady perseverance in an upright course. What I have said before, namely, that David takes God for his judge, as he saw that he was wrongfully and unrighteously condemned by men, appears still more clearly from what he here says, “I have been upright with him.” The Scriptures, indeed, sometimes speak in similar terms of the saints, to distinguish them from hypocrites, who content themselves with wearing the outward mask of religious observances; but it is to disprove the false reports which were spread against him that David thus confidently appeals to God with respect to them. This is still more fully confirmed by the repetition of the same thing which is made a little after, According to the cleanness of my hands before his eyes In these words there is evidently a contrast between the eyes of God and the blinded or malignant eyes of the world; as if he had said, I disregard false and wicked calumnies, provided I am pure and upright in the sight of God, whose judgment can never be perverted by malevolent or other vicious and perverse affections. Moreover, the integrity which he attributes to himself is not perfection but sincerity, which is opposed to dissimulation and hypocrisy. This may be gathered from the last clause of the 23rd verse, where he says, I have kept myself from my iniquity In thus speaking, he tacitly acknowledges that he had not been so pure and free from sinful affections as that the malignity of his enemies did not frequently excite indignation within him, and gall him to the heart. He had therefore to fight in his own mind against many temptations, for as he was a man, he must have felt in the flesh on many occasions the stirrings of vexation and anger. But this was the proof of his virtue, that he imposed a restraint upon himself, and refrained from whatever he knew to be contrary to the word of God. A man will never persevere in the practice of uprightness and of godliness, unless he carefully keep himself from his iniquity.

⁴¹⁴ “Et que bien legerement on semoit de luy de mauvais bruits.” — Fr.