He said, “The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer. My God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation. My stronghold and my refuge, my savior. You saved me from violence. I call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies.”
– 2 Samuel 22:2–4
Oh, 2 Samuel 22:2–4 is a great picture of who God is, and how God saves, how God delivers, how God helps his people in their time of need. I love these three verses because of all the different descriptions of God that we have here. Instead of just recounting those descriptions, I want to pray according to those descriptions, and for us together to say this to God in our lives. To say this in faith, “Oh God, you are the Lord. Yahweh, the covenant keeping God, the promise keeping God. You are our rock to stand on in the middle of tumult, and challenge, and trial, and uncertainty, and unknown around us.
God, you are our hiding place, our shield, and our refuge in the middle of the storm.
2 Samuel 22:2–4 Reminds Us God is Our Rock
You are our rock. You are our fortress. Oh God, You protect us. And You provide for us. And You are our deliverer. You bring us through trials. Also, You bring us through temptations. We praise you for your deliverance. You are our God, not just the God overall. Yes, You are my God. You are our God who loves us, who we know and have communion with.
You are the rock in whom we take refuge. God, you are our hiding place. Our refuge in the middle of the storm. You are our shield. You protect us from the attempts of the adversary to pull us away from you to destroy us. God, we praise you as our shield. We need you as our shield, you’re the horn of our salvation. You save us from our sins. God, you save us from ourselves. You are our stronghold. You are the place where we find strength.
Our strength is in you. We can do all things through Christ who gives us strength. God, I just pray this over those who feel weak, they would know you are their stronghold right now, their refuge. God, I pray this over those who are walking through challenges, trials, storms. Be their refuge, their rest in the middle of it all. You are our savior. You save us from violence. And You save us from our enemies.
This Verse Leads Us to Praise God
All glory be to your name for your salvation. We call upon you, the Lord, and we say you are worthy to be praised. You’re the Lord, our rock, our fortress, our deliverer, our God, our refuge, our shield, the horn of our salvation, our stronghold, and our savior. We praise your name according to 2 Samuel 22:2–4. And we pray that you’d help us to remember all day long today, tomorrow, and particularly whenever we walk through challenges, trials, attacks, God, we pray that you would help us to remember that you are all these things.
You are the Lord, and you are worthy to be praised. We love you. We worship you God, and we pray that you would make yourself known through our lives as all of these things. God, we pray that you would help us to lead other people to know you as the rock, and the refuge, and the savior in their lives. God, we pray that for the people right around us, we pray that for the people in the Highlands of Laos. This remote people group who has little to no access to the good news of Jesus the savior, the rock, the refuge, the stronghold. God, we pray use our lives, our families, our churches to make the good news of your name, all these descriptions of you known among all the nations. We pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
