Let God fight your battles
We learn a valuable lesson from King David on how to handle our enemies
Verse of the Day: “They attacked me at a moment when I was in distress, but the Lord supported me. He led me to a place of safety; he rescued me because he delights in me.” - Psalm 18:18-20
“They attacked me at a moment when I was in distress”.....This Psalm comes from David at a time when God gave him one of the greatest days of his life, leading him in victory over his enemies and over Saul, who was actively trying to kill him. How many of us can recall a time when you felt attacked, either physically, mentally, emotionally or spiritually in a time of distress? I certainly can. I have experienced this twice in the last week alone. Jesus tells us that in this world we WILL have trouble, but to be encouraged because He has overcome the world. This leads us to the next part of the text.
“But the Lord supported me”.......if God is for you, who can ever be against you? There is no power anywhere in the universe that is a match for God. If the Lord is for you, that is all you need. The enemy of our souls will do all he can to try and convince us that we are out here alone in the world. That other people, that he tries to convince us are our enemies, are out to get us and that they control our destiny. But this is not true. It is God who is in control and we must turn our eyes to Him in times of distress like David did.
“He led me to a place of safety”.…...God is the ultimate safe place. There is no safer place than in the will of God. The wind and the waves of the day to day may rattle us, they may get our attention, but they do not deserve our devotion. Our devotion belongs to God and God alone. And when we trust in Him and go to Him for safety, He will deliver us. Just eight verses prior to our verse of the day, David says that the name of the Lord “is a strong fortress; the godly run to him and are safe.” Let’s run to Him in times of distress. He will always lead us to safety.
“He rescued me because he delights in me”.........What I love about this verse is how David fully trusted God to deliver him. David had times in his life when he took revenge into his own hands. Those times never ended well for him. One time, however, David let God handle it and the results were better than he could’ve managed on his own (refer to 1 Samuel 25 for this example).
The Apostle Paul tells us in Romans 12 to never take revenge into our own hands. Let’s leave it to the will of God. Not only will God rescue us but He will show us how we “get even” with our enemies. We do it by killing them. Killing them with forgiveness, kindness, grace and mercy. Paul says that we should never pay back evil for evil. Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross destroyed the eye for an eye mentality.
If our enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him something to drink. When we do this, Proverbs 25:22 says that we “will heap burning coals of shame on their heads; and the Lord will reward you.” The burning coals of shame are the fires of conviction. When you are kind to your enemy, it will convict them in their sin and make way for the wrath of God. We must let God handle our enemies.
When we do this, He will delight in us. But in order to react to our enemies in this way, we must sacrifice EVERYTHING to God. Our hurt and pain must be left at the altar. We must leave what’s behind, behind. We must leave those things that have caused us pain under the blood of Jesus.
Jesus is THE model of forgiveness. In our sin, He still took the blame and died for us so that we could be free. We must extend the same kind of mercy, grace and forgiveness to our enemies.
Since God forgives, let us forgive. Your soul will thank you when you do. And like David, God will lead you to a safe place and give you rest for doing it.
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