I. The Language of the Forgiven Soul addressing God.
He that was afar off without any shelter from the rough storm of an accusing conscience, is now able to look up to the God who has forgiven him and say, “Thou art my hiding-place.” He finds his shelter and his safety in the presence of that very God whose law he had broken. He does not say, “Thou hast provided a hiding-place,” but “Thou art my hiding-place.” He who had been exposed without protection to the sore buffetings of his own conscience, confirmed as it was by the just sentence of God’s holy law, had been so completely restored that he had found in God Himself a hiding-place.
In that sacred hiding-place he realized two results, safety and praise. When hidden there he was safe, just as our own life is safe when hidden with Christ in God, and therefore he could say, “Thou shalt preserve me,” and when hidden there he would live in the very atmosphere of thanksgiving, so he said, “Thou shalt compass me about (or surround me) with songs of deliverance.” A song of deliverance is a song of praise from one that has been delivered. The Song of Moses was a song of deliverance when he stood on the shores of the Red Sea after he had seen the hosts of Egypt overwhelmed in the flood. [8a] David’s was a song of deliverance when God had brought him up out of the horrible pit and established his goings, and had put a new song in his mouth. [8b] The song of the great multitude before the throne is a song of deliverance, when, brought out of great tribulation, clothed with white robes and palms in their hands, they sing, “Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.” [8c]
Observe the connection between this safety and these songs of deliverance. The songs are not merely the consequence of the safety, but a part of it. Hidden in the Lord, we are compassed, or surrounded, by them. Whichever way we look, whether forward in hope, or backward in memory, or upwards in trust, there is in every direction something to call forth the praise, and the spirit of thanksgiving is in itself a protection against assault.
There is just the same connection between praise and safety in the description of the restored Zion: “Thou shalt call thy walls Salvation, and thy gates Praise.” [8d] Praise is there represented as part of the defence. The enemy cannot enter because the gateway is filled by praise. The song of deliverance is so hearty and so loud that the voice of the tempter is not heard. And thus it is that the forgiven man, hidden in Christ Jesus, praises God, because he has been saved, and confirms his safety by the very act of praising Him. Does not this teach us a lesson as to our own communion with God? Whatever it is that weighs on the heart and disturbs the spirit, whatever the storm be that beats upon us, whether it be care from without or conscience within, whether it be the pain of trouble or the still greater pain of the sense of sin, the forgiven man may go straight to Him and say, “I flee unto Thee to hide me.” [9a] And if hidden in Him, can anything really hurt us? Is not His salvation a sufficient wall? Shall anything that can really hurt us enter in by those gates which He has closed with praise? In holy peace, then let the songs of deliverance rise before Him. Let the unspeakable blessedness of the divine safety call forth the notes of thanksgiving. If the sweet note of praise was heard by the prisoners from the inner dungeon at Philippi, [9b] shall it not be heard by the whole church of God from those who have found a hiding-place in their Lord?