Okay, so we're gonna be in Psalm 54. Psalm 54, it's only seven verses. Let's read Psalm 54, we'll start with the superscription. The word of God, it says, to the chief musician which stringed instruments, a contemplation of David when the Ziphites went and said to Saul, is David not hiding with us? Save me, O God, by your name, and vindicate me by your strength. Hear my prayer, O God, give ear to the words of my mouth. For strangers have risen up against me, and oppressors have sought after my life. They have not set God before them, Selah. Behold, God is my helper. The Lord is with those who uphold my life. He will repay my enemies for their evil. Cut them off in your truth. I will freely sacrifice to You. I will praise Your name, O Lord, for it is good. For He has delivered me out of all trouble, and my eye has seen its desire upon my enemies." Well, I want you to know that myself, Pastor Doug and Pastor Bob, we love being your pastors. We love being pastors. It's great being a pastor. I just love being a pastor. I'm not gonna pretend like it's not great, because it is. It's wonderful to be a pastor. And there are a number of reasons as to why it's so great. So we'll just kind of think about some of the reasons. Number one on the top of the list is the fact that we get to preach the word of God, and it's the best. preach the word of God. Number two, a close second, is the people, the members of the church. And we love all the members of the church. And then there are a bunch of other reasons too, but then there are also like these perks that we have that you kind of don't really think about, but they are perks. So for example, when we go to visit someone in the hospital and you go to the front desk and they'll ask who it is that you're here to visit so we'll give someone's name and then they typically respond say oh you know we only allow two people there and there's two people already there so you're gonna have to wait and then we drop the old hey well we're their pastors can you make the exception for us please they always make the exception and it's it's pretty nice it's a nice little it's a nice little perk that you wouldn't think of but it's there well another great perk about being a pastor is that for the most part we are around believers like 97 98 percent of the time We're around faithful believers who love the Lord, and really only pastors can say that. Because for everybody else, it's the exact opposite. For everybody else, it's, well, 97, 98% of the time, I'm around unbelievers. 97, 98% of the time, I'm around all these people who are not believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. And sometimes it's not so bad. So God may bless you in a certain way where you're around all of these unbelievers, 97, 98% unbelievers, but at least like they're nice, at least they're kind and at least they're kind of enjoyable to be around. But how about those instances? when you're around 97, 98% unbelievers, and they're just so wicked, so vile, and you think to yourself, you say, how in the world can I deal with this? How can I deal with these people who are so wicked and so vile? What do I do in that situation? Well, in a broad way, Psalm 54 helps us to answer that question. And I say in a broad way because Psalm 54, what it's really dealing with is dealing with those who would come and want to actually take your life physically. So that's why I'm saying it's in a broad way. So in a general way, we could say, well, this applies to kind of a bunch of us in our various workplaces and so on. But in a more specific way, Psalm 54 is dealing with the threat of those who would physically demand our lives. And that's because when David penned this, by inspiration of God the Holy Spirit, David's life was being sought out. There were those who wanted to murder David. Now, how do we know what's going on here? Well, we know what's going on in Psalm 54 based upon the superscription. And I know this may be annoying because we say it every single time we're in the Psalms, that the superscription is the word of God. But I say it because most people don't know this. So it's rare that people come to the Psalms and they just know that the superscription is the word of God. But it is, that's why we always mention it. But the superscription, it tells us what's going on here. And let's look at the superscription. We'll see what it says. It says, to the chief musician with stringed instruments, a contemplation of David when the Ziphites went and said to Saul, is David not hiding with us? So we know who this is to. This is to the chief musician. We know it's with stringed instruments. Of course, we don't know what it sounded like, but it probably sounded pretty great. But then we get more into what's actually transpiring when he writes this. It says, a contemplation of David, when the Ziphites went and said to Saul, is David not hiding with us? Okay, so who were the Ziphites? Who even are these people from Ziph? Well, these were the guys who betrayed David. They are betrayers. If you were to go in the back of your Bible, you know, there's maps in the back of your Bible, you would go look in the back of your Bible, you would see the Dead Sea and Right to the left of the Dead Sea should be to the left I think it's to the left. To the left of the Dead Sea would be this place called Ziph. And this is where the Ziphites are from. And what happens is David, he goes there, and what do the Ziphites do? Well, they sell him out. The Ziphites, they betrayed David by telling Saul where he's at and what was Saul seeking to do. Well, Saul, as I'm sure we all know, Saul was seeking to murder David. So the Ziphites, they told Saul where David was. What did they do? Well, they betrayed David. And even in this, we see that David was ultimately pointing forward to the Lord Jesus. Because when you hear about David being betrayed by the Ziphites, what do you immediately think of? Well, you should immediately think of the greater David, the Lord Jesus, who was betrayed by Judas Iscariot. So we see even in this how it is that David is pointing forward to the Lord Jesus. And in all of these betrayals, we see that God used every single one of these for good. And it's obvious in the case of Jesus, right? Jesus is betrayed by Judas, such a horrible and evil act. And what did God do? Well, he used that for good. And it eventually led to Jesus going to the cross, bearing the wrath of God for us. And then three days later, rising from the dead. And then 40 days after that, ascending to the father's right hand. So we see how that was used for good. Well here, what happened to David, this is also used for good because here, Psalm 54, we could look at it 3,000 years after it was penned, and we could be encouraged by this. So David, he pens this psalm under inspiration of God, the Holy Spirit, after this happens, after these Ziphites betray him. Let's look at verses one through three. The psalm, it breaks up very nicely into three separate sections. So we'll just take it section by section. First section is verses one through three. It says, Save me, O God, by Your name, and vindicate me by Your strength. Hear my prayer, O God, give ear to the words of my mouth. For strangers have risen up against me, and oppressors have sought after my life. They have not set God before them, Selah. Starts off and he says, save me, oh God, by your name and vindicate me by your strength. AKA, prove me to be innocent. Now, I'm sure we all know this and I hope that we do. It is perfectly okay to pray prayers like this. If somebody comes up against you and says something that is not true about you, it is perfectly reasonable and perfectly acceptable to go before the Lord and say this very thing, say, God, prove me to be innocent. God, would you vindicate me by your strength? That is perfectly acceptable. And it only makes sense that we would do that when something like that were to happen. He also says here in verse three, he talks about these oppressors. who are coming up against him. Who would be the oppressors? Well, the oppressors would be those like Saul and all those with Saul who are seeking to murder him. He was just, think about David, think about from his perspective. He was just ruthlessly betrayed by those who he didn't think would betray him. He was just betrayed by the Ziphites. And now he wants to be vindicated. He wants to be vindicated. And this betrayal by the Ziphites, it shows them, it shows the Ziphites to be strangers who have risen up against David. That's what it says there at the beginning of verse three. It says, for strangers have risen up against me. Why are they strangers? Well, they are strangers because they have proven themselves to be enemies and thus David counts them as strangers. Now, this would just be a good point, good time here to just remind everyone that this is how God sees every single person who does not have their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. God doesn't see them as friends. God doesn't see them as children. No, how is it that he sees them? He sees them as enemies, he sees them as strangers. That's what every single person is who is not in Christ. Every single person not in Christ is a stranger to God. And what does David do here? Well, David, he counts them as strangers. He also counts them, you see it at the end of verse three, he counts them as those who have not set God before them. They have not set God before them. Matthew Poole commenting on this, he says this, that this is what they do. This is what these strangers, what they do. They cast off all regard to God's presence and authority and all fear of his judgments. Is this not what unbelievers do? Is this not what every single one of us did before God saved us by His grace? The answer is yes. We all did this. Before God saved us by His grace, none of us had any regard for His presence, any regard for His authority, any fear of His judgments. Thankfully, now we do because He saved us. But this is the status of the unbeliever. The unbeliever, no regard for God's presence or His authority or His judgments. So that's the first section. Let's look at the second section here, verses 4 and 5. This is the most famous section of this psalm. It says, Behold, God is my helper. The Lord is with those who uphold my life. He will repay my enemies for their evil. Cut them off in your truth. What does David do here? Well, he affirms his faith in the Lord. You see that there. You see that he acknowledges who God is. He says, God is my helper. And the reality is, is that every single one of us who have been born again by the grace of God, every single one of us, we could say this very thing. We could say that God is my helper. This is who he is. He is my helper. We could say this individually. We could also say this collectively as a church. We could say that God is our helper. Every faithful church can say this collectively, that God is our helper. And I think that this is very important that we remind ourselves of this, especially as a church, that God is our help. And I say this because faithful churches go through difficult seasons. Faithful churches go through difficult things that happen, where just difficulties happen, we have to kind of weather the storm, and what a great thing to remind ourselves of this very thing, that God is our helper. When things like that happen, what a great thing to just know this, that He's always with us, which is what we see in the latter half of verse four. If you look in the latter half of verse four, it says, the Lord is with those who uphold my life. Question here, as we talk about this, as we talk about God upholding, and we know that God, He upholds the life of the righteous, those who are righteous. Question here, who are the righteous? Who would be the righteous? Well, hopefully in your mind, you're answering that and you're saying, well, it's only those who are righteous in Christ. That's who the righteous are, only those who are righteous in Christ. So now in saying that, we ask a follow-up question and the question is this, but was David righteous in Christ because Jesus hadn't even come yet? So was David righteous in Christ? And what do you think the answer to that is? The answer to that is yes. Yes, David was righteous in Christ. How so? How could that be? I mean, he didn't even know that the Messiah's name would be Jesus. He didn't know that. We know that, which makes you think of how much even blessed we are, the blessings that we have, that even somebody like King David didn't have. We know specifically the Messiah's name. We know all about what it is that the Lord Jesus Christ did. Well, David, he didn't know All of that, right? But what was he doing? Well, he was still trusting in Christ. He didn't know his name would be Jesus, but he was trusting in the Messiah who would come into the world. That's who he was trusting in, and therefore we can say that David, he was righteous in Christ. Let's look once again in verse five. Verse five, he says this. He says, he will repay my enemies for their evil. Cut them off in your truth. What does David do here? Well, he imprecates. He imprecates the enemies of God. He prays and intercedes against these people. Look at his prayer. He says, God, cut these people off in your truth. There is here an underlying understanding from David that he knows that God does not just simply overlook sin. He knows, David does, that there will be no one who gets away with it. No one will get away with it. He knows that God will render to them what it is that they deserve for their sin. You see, every single sin will be dealt with, and it will either be dealt with on the cross, and thankfully for you and I, believer, all of our sin, past, present and future sins, it's been dealt with. The Lord Jesus, he took all that sin upon himself, upon his shoulders for us. So your sin will either be dealt with on the cross. Thankfully, again, for believers, it is dealt on the cross. But then you're either in that category or you're in the category of having your sin dealt with forever in hell. And we don't want anybody to have their sin dealt with forever in hell. Thus, all the more reason to tell people to repent and believe the gospel. Let's look at the last section here, verses 6 and 7 of Psalm 54. David, he writes this, he says, I will freely sacrifice to you. I will praise your name, O Lord, for it is good. For he has delivered me out of all trouble, and my eye has seen its desire upon my enemies. David is praising God and notice what he says. Notice what he says at the beginning of verse six. He says, I will freely sacrifice to you. I will freely do this, not under compulsion, not in order to try to earn something before you or anything like that. No, I will freely do this. Why will he freely do it? Well, he freely does it because he knows the character of God. He knows how amazing God is. He knows how good the Lord is. And then look in verse 6B and verse 7, I know I just read it, but I'll read it again. It says, I will praise your name, O Lord, for it is good, for he has delivered me out of all trouble, and my eye has seen its desire upon my enemies. I want you to know that when David penned this, this actually hadn't happened yet. When David penned this, he was just betrayed by the Ziphites. And when he penned this, this actually hadn't happened. He actually hadn't yet been delivered yet. And, but what do we see? We see he is so assured. He is so assured of deliverance that he could speak about it in the past because he knew with absolute certainty that God would deliver him. He knew with so much certainty that this would happen. And of course, this reminds us of who? It reminds us of the greater David. It reminds us of the Lord Jesus, where if you just think in John chapter 17, how Jesus in John 17, at the beginning of it, verse four and verse five, where he's talking about how he's finished the mission. He's accomplished what he set out to accomplish. Well, how could Jesus say that, even though he actually hadn't gone to the cross? Well, it's because it was going to happen. absolutely certain that it would happen. And similarly, that's what David is doing here. He knows with absolute certainty that this will happen. And you and I, Christian, we know things with absolute certainty as well. Now, of course, we don't know them down to the specific detail. The Lord Jesus, if you think about him, Jesus knew down to the specific detail, every single thing, even the most minutest detail, he knew what would happen. And we don't know down to the minutest detail what's gonna happen, but we do know what is going to happen. You and I, we know it. How do we know it? Well, because we see what the word of God says. We know that Jesus is the victorious one and he will be victorious. We know that Jesus will come back and make all things right. And we know that God will deliver us out of all of our troubles. Let's pray. God, we thank you for how good you are. We thank you, God, that you are a God who delivers your people out of all their trouble. God, we long for that day when your son, the Lord Jesus, breaks open the sky, comes back, and we are finally fully delivered out of all the troubles of this world. God, we can't wait for that day. We can't wait to behold your son coming on that white horse. Father, we're so thankful for all you do for us. We're so thankful, God, for one another. We're so thankful, God, for this day, the Lord's day, just the best day of the week. We thank you, God, for everything that's already happened here today. Sunday school, we thank you, Lord, for Stephen's message in the morning. We thank you, God, for getting to partake of the Lord's supper together, being able to go to the Lord's table together as a church family. And we thank you, God, for this afternoon worship service. We thank you, God, already for the songs that we've already sung. And we thank you, God, for your word, for these things that we've seen in Psalm 54. And we just, we pray, God, that you would bless these things Father, most of all, we thank You for Your Son, the Lord Jesus. It's in His name we pray. Amen.