Saved From My Enemies (Psalm 18:3)

 


Saturday, 6 September, 2025


Psalm 18:1-31

1 Kings 6:1-14, 6:37-7:1

Acts 26:1-18


Saved From My Enemies (Psalm 18:3)


I call upon the Lord, who is worthy to be praised,
    and I am saved from my enemies.


Apparently Mel Gibson is making a sequel to The Passion Of The Christ, the movie he made about Christ’s passion and crucifixion. In interviews he has said that there were two scripts: one fairly reasonable, and the other completely out-of-this-world. I suppose it depends from which perspective we look at Christ’s resurrection: from human eyes, there was a quiet grave, and then it was empty. But what about from another angle? What was happening in the realm beyond our perception?


I bring this up because while Psalm 18 has a pretty explicit blurb at the start telling us the what, who and why of it (“A Psalm of David, the servant of the Lord, who addressed the words of this song to the Lord on the day when the Lord delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul.”), it also seems very much like a prophecy of Christ’s resurrection. And if we are to be expecting a movie adaptation, then it would be good to read the book first!


They say the book is always better, and in this case it is hard to disagree. Consider the word-imagery on display, of the Psalmist being sucked down into the watery depths of the underworld; the Lord launching fiery coals from heaven; the great power of God blasting down into those watery depths, pushing them apart; the Psalmist being rescued up from those watery fingers that tried so hard to draw him down: it would make a pretty good movie, to be sure. But the truth is even better.


As our covenant representative, Jesus went down to the grave by crucifixion, and was drawn up and out of it by God just as we read in this Psalm, and we enjoy the benefits of it. The great work that rescued us from eternal death is no less impressive, as it is the same power (Ephesians 1:19-20).


What is your sense of your transformation from death to life by the power of the Holy Spirit? How does the work of Christ’s resurrection appreciate your own more?


Lord, our Rock and our God, the wielder of resurrection power: grant us a deeper sense of the greatness of Christ’s resurrection, that we may understand our own salvation more, and therefore give you greater thanksgiving in our words and deeds.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

For The Sake Of Ten (Genesis 18:32)

Image
  Monday, February 3, 2025 Psalm 78:16-38 Genesis 18:22-19:11 Luke 2:1-7 Observance: First Anglican Service at Sydney Cove, Conducted by Richard Johnson, Sydney, 1788 For The Sake Of Ten (Genesis 18:32) From this wonderfully pastoral tableau, of the old man and his wife entertaining three divine guests, comes a dark shadow. Approaching from the valley below them comes the cries of iniquity of the cities of the plain: Sodom and Gomorrah. Rising from their feast, the three men turn from blessing Abraham and Sarah to executing divine judgement. And the story just gets darker from here. But Abraham, in his boldness, has this immortal conversation with God, a conversation that uncovers for us whispers of Jesus’ words about people who are “salt” and “light”. God desires that none should perish, but that all should turn from their sins and live. And for the sake of just ten righteous people, the disaster about to befall Sodom and Gomorrah could be turned away...
Read more

The LORD will make you a house.

  Friday, July 28, 2023 Psalm 71 2 Samuel 7 John 8:1-11 Observance: Samson, bishop (d. 565) The LORD will make you a house. We learn three things from this conversation between David, Nathan and God. First, it is that we do not invite God into our presence. Rather, God comes alongside us, where we are, hiking through the wilderness. God gets down into the dust with us and puts up a tent. There is a reason why John made so much of this tent language in his first chapter: that the Word became flesh and pitched His tent among us. Whichever part of the Bible we are reading, we see God coming to the people, rather than the people moving towards God. This is of particular comfort when we feel like we haven’t prayed enough, or regularly. We might have been distracted by the dust on our feet, but God has always been there right beside us. We just have to look up. Second, it is that God’s presence among us is not something to be feared. Have you noticed that,...
Read more

Monday, July 25, 2022

  Monday, July 25, 2022 Psalm 62; 63 Hosea 1 Romans 4:1-12 He only is my rock and my salvation: my strong tower, so that I shall not be moved. The prophecies of Hosea are rich with vivid imagery. Look at these names: firstly, “Hosea” means “salvation”. So too do the names Joshua and Jesus. Then Hosea has three children: “God scatters”, “Not pitied”, and “Not my people”. This is because the children are part of the marriage between Hosea and Gomer, which is an image God is showing to the nation. It is to our profit that God has used real-life events to communicate spiritual imagery and divine truths. We find it very easy to understand our relationship with God as being a faithful wife to a loving husband. We can reconcile this message with what Paul has to teach us today in Romans. He makes the very important observation that Abraham was given God's righteousness as a result of his faith before, not after, his circumcision. Again, this is God using real-life events...
Read more