The Bible Study podcast episode 360. Today, the Bible study podcast continues the study of Psalms with Psalm 18.

Welcome to the Bible study podcast. I'm your host, Chris Christensen. We're going to skip over Psalm 17, which is a familiar

theme of David calling out for help to God because he is blameless. But we're going to deal with

Psalm 18, where David talks about God who has come to his aid, who has delivered him.

It's a longer Psalm, so we're going to be reading a little more today.

Starting in verse one, I love you, Lord, my strength.

The Lord is my rock, my fortress, and my deliverer.

My God is my rock in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.

I called to the Lord who is worthy of praise, and I have been saved from my enemies. The cords of death entangled me. The torrents of destruction overwhelmed me.

The cords of the grave coiled around me. The snares of death confronted me.

One thing that I liked about this particular psalm is that David is looking at the situation

that he has been praying for, that he's been praying for in many of the other Psalms,

but he's looking at it from the other side after God has intervened.

And if you look at David's life, the number of times that Saul, for instance,

was trying to kill him, or Absalom was trying to kill him, or the enemies of Israel were trying

to kill David. There were many times that this Psalm would fit in, so we don't know exactly when

it is, or not yet, at least from the words that we've had so far. But we get that David felt

like he was being pulled

down to death. The cords of the grave coiled around me. I thought it was just an evocative phrase here.

He could just feel the grave pulling him down. It's like some bad zombie movie. But he is praising the

God who has saved him. Past tense, I called to God who is worthy

of praise, and I have been saved. My God, my rock, my fortress, my deliverer. Now, those are

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