The Setup in the Stronghold (elevation)

Psalm 142:1-7

1 Sam 22: 5 (backstory)

1 I cry aloud to the Lord; I lift up my voice to the Lord for mercy.

2 I pour out before him my complaint; before him I tell my trouble.

3 When my spirit grows faint with me, it is you who watch over my way.In the path where I walk people have hidden a snare for me.

4 Look and see, there is no one at my right hand; no one is concerned for me. I have no refuge; no one cares for my life.

5 I cry to you, Lord; I say, “You are my refuge, my portion in the land of the living.”

6 Listen to my cry, for I am in desperate need; rescue me from those who pursue me, for they are too strong for me.

7 Set me free from my prison, that I may praise your name. Then the righteous will gather about me because of your goodness to me.

Sometimes before my mouth can pour out praise to bless the Lord, i have to pour out something else. Is it difficult for me to tell God how I am feeling even though He already knows it. I’m scared if I say what I really want to say, God might give me something to cry about. I don’t dare to complain, so I rather not pray.

God is the only safe place where I can pour out my complain. If I don’t pour out to God my complaints, they’ll spill out somewhere else.

The presence of God is not a place to bypass your emotions; it’s a place to process them.

Pour out my complaint in His presence (v1-2)

• Sometimes before my mouth can pour out praise to bless the Lord, i have to pour out something else. Is it difficult for me to tell God how I am feeling even though He already knows it. I’m scared if I say what I really want to say, God might give me something to cry about. I don’t dare to complain, so I rather not pray.

• God is the only safe place where I can pour out my complain. If I don’t pour out to God my complaints, they’ll spill out somewhere else. David did it, so can I.

• David was hiding in a cave when he wrote this Psalm. Some of the best expressions of your relationship with God will be born not when you are crowned in victory but when you are hiding in despair.

• The presence of God is not a place to bypass your emotions; it’s a place to process them.

• Don't fight what’s in my mind, in my mind. It’s enemy held territory, because i have strongholds in my mind. My mind may not keep up with my Spirit. Pray aloud. I can only pray one thing at a time. But when I close my eyes and worry and ‘pray’, i’m thinking a thousand things at a time.

• “I see how you’re going to act tomorrow, and I decided to send my Son to die for you with complete foreknowledge of all of your faults”.

1. Alone in the cave?

• David is in a safe place, a cave. Gath is where Goliath was from. (1 Sam 22:1),

• Do I feel like I don’t fit where I came from, dont fit where I’m going. Too church to my worldly, to worldly to fit into some churches.

• David escapes, everyone has a way to escapes. For a little while, get out of my circumstances. The principle is: The way that you escape could lead to greater captivity. It is important where you go when you run, cause sometimes where you run to will end up running you. David escapes to a cave and he is stucked.

• David was not surprised by the enemies that surrounded me but the friends who didn’t. He was not expecting to ascend to the thrones without any battles. But he was expecting that the people God called him to serve would have his back. “I’m not surprised by those who is surrounding me to kill me; I’m surprised nobody is surrounding me who cares about me.” Where are the people I helped, where are the people I prayed for. IT must have been lonely for David in the cave. David was in despair not because he was surrounded by troubles but because he can’t find his support. He was in a stronghold looking for a support system, looking for somebody to be there for him.

• V4 he wrote he looked to his right nobody was there. But in Sam, his brothers and father’s household heard about it, they went down to him there. Surrounded but not feeling supported. Everybody in that cave needed something from David. (1 Sam 22:2), It wasn’t that David wasn’t getting any texts; it’s just that they’re all transactional. It’s not that he didn’t know anybody, but nobody knew him. He didn’t say ‘Nobody came” but “nobody cares”. If I couldn’t provide for them, would they care? (1 Sam 22:2.) “All those who were in distress or in debt or discontented gathered around him”. Really, this is my team?

• David didn’t know that these complaining men, were the same men that would bring him to the throne.

2) The Setup

• David didn’t know that these complaining men, were the same men that would bring him to the throne.

• If David hadn’t been in a cave, they wouldn’t have come to him. There are somethings that can only come together in the cave. Get real with God, stop pretending. Those complaining men, were David’s mighty men in disguise. You’re not alone.

• David leaves the cave with those folks and asked the king of Moab to take care of his parents who didn’t care for him, who demeaned him. Moab was a place where they worshipped other gods. Do we sometimes go to places to survive that end up imprisoning us in the process? I’m in this cave of confusion. WHat I know God has promised me does not take away the confusion of how He will bring it to pass.

• David and Jesus had one thing in common. They did it for others who wouldn’t do it for them.

3) The Stronghold

• A stronghold that protects you from one enemy might imprison you to another one.

• Get out of the stronghold. Usually what I ran to to protect me.

• Being a pessimist is a defense mechanism. It protects me from disappointment. “I got let down and I didn’t lke how that felt. So now I just expect people to suck, cause when they do, I’m not surprised.” When I hide in that stronghold, it protects me but it also traps me. You now create the reality that you projected through your expectation. You are not surprised that life sucks but life sucks because you’re not prepared to be surprised by anything other than the fallen condition of sinful man. When God wants to show me, I can’t see cause I’m in the stronghold.

• What am i addicted to? (problems? Drama - protects me from having to be productive and steady. Cause if you create drama, you’ll have something to blame. If I blame you, I don’t have to deal with the shame of me. )

• “David if you stay in the cave, you won't be able to save the people of Keilah” David had a battle to fight that he didn’t know about. He had an army God was forming that he couldn’t see them for what they were because he was in the stronghold. There are thing sthat God has surrounded you with that you can’t see in the stronghold. “Go to Judah”

• “Get to Judah as quick as you can”. Judah is the place that represents praise. Judah means praise. I’m leaving this stronghold. I’m stepping out of myself, out of my feelings, out of my circumstance. You won’t see what God can do for you if you stay in this cave. Get back to the place where God will crown you as king.

• David starts Psalm 142 stucked in a cave, but he ends Psalm 142 coming out of prison. He started with complaints but by the time he got done, he was filled with praise.