Psalm 18

³⁷        I pursued my enemies and overtook them,

 I did not turn back until they were destroyed.

³⁸        I defeated them utterly, so that they were unable to rise;

 they fell under my feet.

³⁹        You equipped me with strength for the battle;

You caused my assailants to sink before me.

⁴⁰        You made my enemies turn their backs in flight,

 and those who hated me I destroyed.

⁴¹       They cried for help,

                         but there was none to save;

          They cried to the Lord,

 but He did not answer them.

⁴²        I trampled them fine as dust before the wind;

 I cast them out like the mire of the streets.

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As for Your Enemies

For the Lord’s Day:  the 30^th of May 2004

Introduction:  We live in a day and age that little regards the power of the sword that includes any “life and death” issues to be judicated by the official power brokers of every state worthy of their role in protecting the nation as well as the assorted and varied taxpayers.

 

Delitzsch informs us that this whole section is written “in retrospect … according to the Hebrew syntax.”  Thereby we may understand that David is describing the past events through which he survived by the grace of God.  This is not a celebration of any bloody intentions for the future, of which any biblical student should abhor or ignore.  Wars, as any veterans well know are bloody standoffs with victory sometimes only won in the last battle.  General George Washington himself won very few precious victories – however it was the final capture of a British Army at York town that finally led to the peace talks.

 

Calvin too is sensitive to the concern before us “we are apt to think that David here speaks to much after the manner of a soldier, in declaring that he will not cease from the work of slaughter until he has destroyed all his enemies; … but as he attempted nothing without the command of God, and as his affections were governed and regulated by the Holy Spirit, we may be assured that these are not the words of a man who was cruel, and who took pleasure in shedding blood, but of a man who faithfully executed the judgment which God had committed to him.”

 

We must remember that David held the reins of power in a very violent and pagan Middle Eastern Kingdom surrounded on all sides by enemies.  Sadly, nothing much has changed in that area of the world except that explosives are more effective and destructive now, than the long arm of the bronze and Iron Age swords and spears.

 

We should also note that these are but six verses in this psalm out of a total of fifty.  Further, even as we follow the lead of Delitzsch in assigning these verses to the graces that David received in the course of many battles, thereby we may be confident of God’s strengthening and sustaining hand in every age for those who must by necessity and office wage war: whether it be spiritual or mortal combat.

 

Development:  With that introduction spoken, we can now turn to the specific and individual verses to learn their meaning and purpose.  Verse thirty-seven tells us that David was aggressive in his attacks; he did not stand by idly and await the fearsome intentions of any enemy.  “I pursued my enemies and overtook them, I did not turn back until they were destroyed.”

 

This is an important principle of war – to catch the enemy at your own advantage in a time and place of your choosing.  As we work our way through this brief outline of the principles of warfare, I am reminded of the Chinese and Prussian classics, also on the topic of war.  David, however – in comparison to those historic warlike states is briefer in his report – since as always in the psalms – prayer takes precedence over every other aspect of life.

 

But in addition to his immediate taking of the offensive, he also does not quit until the power of his enemies are destroyed.  When once roused to a fight, any nation must complete the battle and thereby end the matter once and for all rather than wait another decade or more and fight the same old wars again and again.

 

Verse thirty-eight follows on to the principle established in the prior: “I defeated them utterly, so that they were unable to rise; they fell under my feet.”  Here are three more brief statements, by which we may understand the Hebrew verbs to indicate that the original orders given to Joshua and Israel regarding enemies are indeed carried out.  The enemies in question were pierced clear through; they were killed and trampled under the feet of David’s warriors.

 

Now, this sounds unlike the modern rules for war – but these were desperate times.  Indeed the contemporary civilized restrictions of the Geneva Convention seem quaint indeed in comparison to the blood thirsty barbarity of the contemporary crop of terrorists.  We are too familiar with the comparative treatment of prisoners in the last few weeks.  Thus, it is all the more likely that instead of locking up for life those who cut off a contractor’s head; we should act quickly so as to serve notice on how pagan barbarians ought to be treated.

 

We have not fought so extreme an enemy in many, many decades.  Christopher Columbus worked with several tribes of American natives to exterminate the cannibalistic Carib Indians.  Roger’s Rangers most effective campaign was against the St Francis Indians who too were absolutely brutal in their treatment of captives and victims.  In many climes and places down trough the centuries, the biblical warrant to exterminate the exceptionally unregenerate has been shown to be necessary.

 

When the British moved into India, they found one valley of natives who were known far and wide for their propensity to kidnap young boys.  In that one particular valley – the population numbered thousands of males and only seven females.  There were too many to slaughter, so the British simply walled them in to let nature take its deadly course.  Without being able to forcibly recruit new victims, plague and innate diseases finished them all off in less than two decades.

 

Yes, this is gruesome work, but David acknowledges that God not only commended the destruction but also strengthened the king and his warriors for the holy cause: “You equipped me with strength for the battle; You caused my assailants to sink before me.”

 

Mortal fear must have gripped the vile opponents of David the king?  The foul foe is almost reminiscent of the enemies of civilization in Tolkien’s fabled tale.  As we remember the scenes of those enemies rising from the dust of the earth, so too did they thence return by the end of the storied fantastical myth.  The enemies in question here are not like those of Christian kings fighting one another, neither are they philosophically similar like the Trojans and Greeks.  Wars between like-minded people are troubling indeed and even unbiblical if we understand the true definitions of what a just war ought to be.

 

One thing we have to remember is the simple fact that any and every enemy of David was an enemy of the Creator God as well.  And if God’s people are to prosper in the Middle East of antiquity – the most uncivilized brutes must be broken and destroyed.  And so the tyrants sank into oblivion – their heritage and culture totally destroyed.  This we see apparent in verse forty: “You made my enemies turn their backs in flight, and those who hated me I destroyed.”  Remember, these are not God’s people: but gross enemies of God’s goodness, mercy and grace – this kind would not rest until every one of his servants was wasted.  And so God sent David to make Palestine safe for the Covenant king, people and kingdom.

 

Application:  In verse forty-one we learn that these enemies, who had lived and hated without recourse to David’s God – they did mutter on their knees assorted pleas for their lives.  But, their gods and goddesses were powerless, and even in extremis – when they plead to David’s own God, their petitions fell on deaf ears.  It was God’s purpose to cleanse His kingdom of such apostate and wicked sinners.  “They cried for help, but there was none to save; they cried to the Lord, but He did not answer them.”  Calvin is careful to instruct us here that God “not only declares, that when the proud and the cruel cry to him in their affliction, he will shut his ears against their cry; but he also threatens, that, in the course of his retributive providence, they shall be treated in the same manner in which they treat others.”

 

It is well that we understand the in the course of this discourse – we have moved from David’s history to God’s final intentions to all the wicked at the end of the age.  These are people without hope; these are proud pagans who would thumb their nose at grace, redemption and salvation because they presume that every wicked impulse is just as okay as their heart’s desire.  Therefore, David announces God’s final curse in the great spiritual crusade of every time and place.  At long last at the end of the age, just as David treated God’s enemies, so shall God do the same:  “I trampled them fine as dust before the wind; I cast them out like the mire of the streets.”

 

The mire of the streets should be taken in the ancient sense, this is not automobile exhaust, but that of animal traffic, trampled into the dust of the streets only to be dried by repeated traffic and then swept up and dumped unceremoniously into the Valley of Gahanna.  And it is that ancient city dump which Jesus speaks of in the Gospels as a valid image of where the wicked and reprobate must spend eternity in the hell of God’s final wasting place.

 

May we here too be warned that at all costs we must know David’s God and that we must be taught to love Him and learn all the more about Him so that we like David may be counted by grace as one in heart and mind remade in the image of His only Son:  our Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.

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PREACHING RESOURCES

Calvin, John:  Commentary on Book of Psalms.

Delitzsch, F:  Commentary on the Old Testament – Psalms.

Spurgeon, C.H:  Treasury of David.

The Westminster Confession & Catechisms.

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