King David and I serve the same God.  I know you are thinking; well duh!  But seriously just think through this with me for a few minutes.  In 2 Samuel 22 David calls God is his refuge, his shield, his rock and fortress, his deliverer.  Reading this passage made me stop and wonder, do I think of God this way?  Would I use any of these words to describe God?  And, if the answer is no, why not?  After all we do serve the same God.

When you read through this passage it’s easy to see that David knew he was in over his head, he knew he needed help.  We see it first in verses 5-6 “The waves of death swirled around me, the torrents of destruction overwhelmed me.  The cords of the grave coiled around me; the snares of death confronted me.”   And again in verse 18 “He rescued me from my powerful enemy, from my foes, who were too strong for me.”  David recognized he was in a battle that he could not win on his own.  He enemies were too strong and too powerful for him.  So what does he do?  Take a look at verse 7 “In my distress I called to the LORD; I called out to my God.”  Once again I was confronted with my own thoughts and actions in times of distress.  Granted my enemies aren’t like those of King David.  Generally speaking no one is hunting me down and trying to kill me.  But I have enemies just the same.  You might know some of them; worry, fear, stress, addiction, pride!  Do I call out to God when those enemies and temptations are strong and fighting against me, or do I just muddle through on my own?  Personally, I usually just try to handle things on my own.  Or I call out to a friend or family member to complain.  When I do get desperate enough to call out to God, I find that I don’t wait on Him to act.

Let’s look back to David, when He called out to God guess what happened?  The second part of verse 7 tells us “from His temple He heard my voice and my cry came to His ears.”  God heard David when He prayed.  Just like He hears you and me when we pray.  Why is It that so often, I (we) assume that He doesn’t hear us, doesn’t care, or is too busy?  When you move on to verse 8, you read that not only did God hear David, but He got angry.  Parents, I’m sure you understand this type of anger.  Someone is mean to my child or has hurt them in some, my immediate response is anger.  We are God’s children, why wouldn’t He get angry when we are being pushed around by our enemies?  Starting with verse 8, we read how God acted on David’s behalf.  I won’t quote it here, but go take a look.  There is some pretty intense stuff in those few verses.  We don’t know how long David had to wait for God’s help.   But I feel like we have to assume that He did wait, we don’t read anything to the contrary.  So often, at least for me, I pray and then almost immediately start trying to figure how to deal with whatever I just prayed about.  I wonder what would happen if I actually waited on God for help?

This passage in 2 Samuel 22 is rich with learning, there are so many different directions and things I could write about.  I want to hit this one last thing though.  Verse 20 says “He brought me out into a broad place; he rescued me, because he delighted in me.”  Do you see that it says God delighted in King David.  David was a child of God, just like you and me.  That means that God delights in us as well.  He desires to help us.  He is waiting for us to call out to Him.

Reading this passage made me think about another passage of scripture in Hebrews, chapter 11.  The writer of Hebrews references several biblical heroes in this chapter.  Beginning with Abel and moving on through Joseph, Abraham and Sarah, Moses, to Rahab who just happened to be a prostitute.  I think the thing that struck me was that all these men and women also serve the same God as King David, the same God I serve.  They were just ordinary men and women who made mistakes, but God used them to do amazing things.

To get back to where we started-I serve the same God as King David, Abraham, Moses, Peter, Paul, etc.. As simple and basic as it seems, sometimes I think it’s important to be reminded and really think about the fact that God loves me, delights in me and is ready and willing to help me.  All I have to do is ask and then wait.