2 Samuel 22:20-30

20 He stood me up on a wide-open field; I stood there saved - surprised to be loved!

21 God made my life complete when I placed all the pieces before him. When I cleaned up my act, he gave me a fresh start.

22 Indeed, I've kept alert to God's ways; I haven't taken God for granted.

23 Every day I review the ways he works, I try not to miss a trick.

24 I feel put back together, and I'm watching my step.

25 God rewrote the text of my life when I opened the book of my heart to his eyes.

26 You stick by people who stick with you, you're straight with people who're straight with you,

27 You're good to good people, you shrewdly work around the bad ones.

28 You take the side of the down-and-out, but the stuck-up you take down a peg.

29 Suddenly, God, your light floods my path, God drives out the darkness.

30 I smash the bands of marauders, I vault the high fences.

2 Samuel 22:20-30 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO SECOND SAMUEL 22

This chapter contains a song or psalm, the same with the eighteenth psalm, and which, according to Jarchi, was composed by David in his old age, and, as Kimchi says, at the end or close of his days; but Abarbinel is of opinion that it was written in his youthful time, in the midst of his troubles, and was sung by him as often as he had a deliverance from any; and which may account for the several variations in it from the eighteenth psalm, which, the same writer observes, are seventy four; and are not to be ascribed to the difference of copies, or neglect of copiers: and very probably, towards the close of his days, he revised it, and made it fit for general use, and sent it with the rest of his psalms to the chief musician; but the particular consideration of it, and of the differences in it from Ps 18:1-50 are referred to the exposition of that book in its course.