Psalm 56:1-4
O God, have mercy on me, for people are hounding me. My foes attack me all day long. I am constantly hounded by those who slander me, and many are boldly attacking me. But when I am afraid, I will put my trust in you. I praise God for what he has promised. I trust in God, so why should I be afraid? What can mere mortals do to me?

Psam 56 is not the typical sunday morning worship song. How often do we sing about our enemies hounding us, trying to kill us or spread lies to dethrone us? Not often. Honestly, most of us probably don’t have to deal with that too much in our comfortable american homes. David did though. David wrote this psalm while being chased down by the Philistines. He had a very clear understanding of who his enemy was. They were the guys that wanted him dead. David also had a clear understanding of the weakness of His own strength and the fear that gripped him. However, David also had a firm trust in God to rescue Him and bring him strength.

I think the reason we don’t sing some of these psalms in our worship services is because we don’t have the same imagery to connect these strong verses to. Have you every been taken hostage by a foreign power? Have you ever been at risk of death because some ungrateful son wanted to be king? We just don’t have those kind of examples in our own lives to sing about.

Or do we?

The enemy that david wrote and sung about was a physical enemy; one he could see presently in his life that was effecting him at that moment. We have those enemies in our lives every day. Each of us have “foes” that try to trip us up, keep us from the blessing of God and ultimately destroy our lives. Sin, hate, rebellion, lies, broken relationships, disobedient attitudes. All of these things and more are the enemy’s that would try to bring us down. Lets take a look at Psalm 56 and the boldness that David had, so that we can proclaim the victory of God in our lives. All these enemies, and Satan, the enemy of our soul has no power when our trust is in God.

10 I praise God for what he has promised; Yes, I praise the Lord for what he has promised.
 11 I trust in God, so why should I be afraid? What can mere mortals do to me?