LORD’S DAY, AUGUST 5
Psalm 34:1-22
1 Samuel 21:10-15

“Let all the earth fear the LORD …”

DAVID'S NARROW ESCAPE

The background of this Psalm is found in 1 Samuel 21:10-15. Continuing his flight from Saul after obtaining Goliath’s sword from the priest at Nob, David found shelter with Achish, king of Gath. In the title of this Psalm “Abimelech” is used for “Achish” because “Abimelech” was a dynastic name for Philistine kings (Gen 20; 21:22-34), as Pharaoh was to the Egyptian kings and Caesar to the Roman emperors. No sooner had David entered the city of Gath than it was reported to him that the officers of the Philistine king were hostile to his coming. Out of the frying pan into the fire! David feigned madness. He was unceremoniously expelled, for the king chided his officers in 1 Samuel 21:14-15.

Comments Spurgeon: “Although the gratitude of the psalmist prompted him thankfully to record the goodness of the Lord in vouchsafing an undeserved deliverance, yet he weaves none of the incidents of the escape into the narrative, but dwells only on the grand fact of his being heard in the hour of peril. We may learn from his example not to parade our sins before others, as certain vainglorious professors are wont to do who seem as proud of their sins as old Greenwich pensioners of their battles and their wounds. David played the fool with singular dexterity, but he was not so real a fool as to sing of his own exploits of folly. In the original, the title does not teach us that the psalmist composed this poem at the time of his escape from Achish, the king or Abimelech of Gath, but that it is intended to commemorate that event, and was suggested by it. It is well to mark our mercies with well carved memorials. God deserves our best handiwork. David in view of the special peril from which he was rescued, was at great pains with this Psalm, and wrote it with considerable regularity, in almost exact accordance with the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. This is the second alphabetical Psalm, the twenty-fifth being the first.”

THOUGHT: (Meditate on Psalm 33:8.)
PRAYER: May I see Thy hand in every area of my life, and may I be thankful.