Psalm 34: Courage, Humility, And God’s Deliverance In The Heat Of Battle

A cave, a crownless warrior, and a praise song that refuses to wait for better circumstances—Psalm 34 hits different when you know where it was written. We walk through David’s flight into enemy territory, the choice to act insane to survive, and the moment humiliation turned into a testimony that still trains souls under pressure today. The result is not a lecture but a field manual: fear God, not man; guard your tongue; turn from evil; do good; seek peace and actually pursue it.

We start with our three-battle framework—humility before God, deliberate pursuit of Christ through Scripture and prayer, and locking shields for one another—then dive into the psalm line by line. You’ll hear why praise is a weapon, how the fear of the Lord disarms every lesser fear, and why righteous character is not “soft” but combat readiness for the soul. We confront the hard truth that the righteous face many afflictions and pair it with the promise that the Lord delivers from them all. Along the way we trace the prophetic thread, “not one of his bones is broken,” and see how Christ fulfills the psalm as the righteous One who redeems His people.

If your week feels like a cave—noisy, tight, and heavy—this study offers a way to stand: disciplined speech, steady pursuit of peace, and a testimony that strengthens the shield wall around you. Expect practical takeaways for your home, habits, body, finances, and fellowship, all anchored in the nearness of God to the brokenhearted. Subscribe, share this with a friend who needs courage, and leave a review to help more people find a field manual of hope under fire.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Three Daily Battles
• 4:44 Opening Prayer Of Humility
• 8:33 Setting The Context For Psalm 34
• 12:09 Reading Psalm 34
• 15:50 Themes Of Fear, Courage, Deliverance
• 21:46 Training In Righteous Living
• 26:01 Suffering And God’s Nearness
• 29:26 Christ Foreshadowed And Warrior Applications

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:54

Welcome to your daily battle Bible study, the Bible study where we fight three battles Monday and Friday. One, we fight ourselves, get a humble and grateful heart aligned unto the Lord. Um, God is holy, holy, holy, and we are not. God is God and we are not. Right? So come to him humbly, understanding that Jesus' bro culture is wrong, and that you know, Jesus is our savior, yes, but our Lord is savior.

SPEAKER_01: 1:29

So uh we also come to him grateful, grateful because our blessings are innumerable. Our blessings are the most blessed nation and blessed people in history, and we take it for granted, has made us a spoiled, soft, entitled people has made us, wow apologize, has made us the weakest Christians to ever exist.

SPEAKER_00: 2:08

Hear that, hear that alpha males. They're the weakest Christians to ever exist. We get depressed if DoorDash doesn't come in time or Instacart slow or you know, never mind like what we see our brothers and sisters have going on in Africa, slaughtered by tens of thousands. World does nothing. World does nothing.

SPEAKER_01: 2:37

You know, if you want to see, want to ask me for once, do I want to do um I think there's only one place in the world right now I'd be willing to send spec ops into smoke some terrorists, and that's guys killing these monsters killing these Christians.

SPEAKER_00: 2:59

I think they kidnapped a bunch of Catholic school kids. And um, God's sake, I would be willing to send good righteous men to wipe out and exterminate vile, you know, care about that more than I care about Ukraine, care about that more than I care about a thousand other things out there, and um I wish the world would the world would come through for that.

SPEAKER_01: 3:39

And um, or there's none left. Or there's none left.

SPEAKER_00: 3:45

You know, the distraction right now is let's talk about Israel until we vomit. Meanwhile, Christians are being butchered. Our our parts of our own body, the body of Christ, are treated like they have no value, but we will praise a secular country against our Lord and Savior more than anything.

SPEAKER_01: 4:09

Just don't so we come with a humble and grateful heart aligned onto the Lord.

SPEAKER_00: 4:17

Two, we deliberately pursue a relationship with our Savior, Lord and Savior by putting Him first, setting aside the beats and the boots, and all the distractions and all the demands in our lives and our overbusyness and our endless entertainment to do one thing, to focus on him this time.

SPEAKER_01: 4:40

Now do that by studying his holy his holy scripture and by um prayer. The last battle is we fight for each other, we lock our shields of faith together and um pray for one another, fight for one another. So um we pray for faith, we pray for wisdom, discernment, strength, courage, protection, and peace.

SPEAKER_00: 5:23

Right. So, without further ado, let's get our first battle one.

SPEAKER_01: 5:29

Dear Heavenly Father, Lord, we thank you.

SPEAKER_00: 5:32

Thank you for waking us up this morning, Lord, for your protections through the night, your countless protections throughout our life, Lord.

SPEAKER_01: 5:40

Help us see those. Trust in you. Thank you for the chance, another chance to get it right. Stop doing life our way and start doing it your way. Die to self and be more like Christ.

SPEAKER_00: 6:04

Your creation. This earth, everything in it. Top of Mount Everest to the bottom of the deepest trench, the ocean.

SPEAKER_01: 6:19

Thank you for it all. All the animals, all the plants, all the environments and trees and fish and everything else, Lord. Thank you for people. Help us to love our neighbor as ourselves. Love each other like you loved us.

SPEAKER_00: 6:44

Help us to be present to those around us and to not be distracted.

SPEAKER_01: 6:50

Look each other in the eye. Truly hear one another. And help us to forgive. We thank you for your common grace. Sorry, for your divine grace.

SPEAKER_00: 7:05

Thank you for choosing us before the foundation of the world. Writing our name into the book of life.

SPEAKER_01: 7:10

You loved us first before we loved us while we were your enemy. Fought for us. We pray that this time would glorify you and only you, serve you and only you. We pray for wisdom and discernment this text. Text of Psalm 34 today.

SPEAKER_00: 7:39

Give us the strength and courage to walk it out in our life. We pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Alright, that is one battle done. Let's go ahead and get to the text.

SPEAKER_01: 7:55

Let's see here. Can I actually read the text with all right? Psalm 34, and again, I'm reading out of the ESV.

SPEAKER_00: 8:11

So I'm gonna read you the setting, and then we'll read it, and then we'll go and we'll look at it deeper. So uh here is the setting in the background of this. Understand what's going on in the world. Because of course, if you just read this cold and you don't know the setting, um you're gonna be lost. Psalm 34, the warrior's praise under pressure, training, courage, fear of God, and righteous living in battle. So Psalm 34 was forged in one of the most chaotic, humiliating, and dangerous moments of David's life. His escape from Saul into Philistines' torred territory. Desperate and alone, David fled to Gaf, the hometown of Goliath, carrying the giant's own sword. It was the last place on earth he should have gone. The Philistines recognized him as Israel's champion. David's life hung by a thread, with no army, no allies, no weapons drawn, and no escape route. David resorted to pretending he was insane, scratching on doors, letting drooling and letting saliva run down his beard, destroying every shred of dignity just to survive.

SPEAKER_01: 9:45

Played the role of crazy man and made himself a wretch.

SPEAKER_00: 9:54

This moment shattered any illusion of self-reliance. The lion slayer and the giant killer was reduced to a desperate fugitive, and it was precisely from that cave after that humiliation that David wrote Psalm 34. The psalm is a testimony that God delivers when we fail. God is near when we are broken. God is faithful when we are terrified. God is worthy of praise even when we are defeat, feel defeated.

SPEAKER_01: 10:30

From that cave of desperation comes a psalm of praise under pressure, fear of God over fear of man, righteous living in hostile territory, God's deliverance of the broken and the haunted. So it is the themes you're going to hear are God hears the cries of the afflicted.

SPEAKER_00: 10:57

True fearlessness flows from fearing God alone. Righteous character is battlefield discipline. God encamps around those who fear him. Suffering is real, God delivers. As warriors, I want you to pay attention to these themes that courage is not bravado, it is dependence on God. The warrior's battlefield is both external and internal. The man who fears God can stand against any threat.

SPEAKER_01: 11:36

So that in mind, let us now dive into Psalm 34, shall we? Morning, Steve Raleigh.

SPEAKER_00: 11:52

34 of David, when he changed his behavior before Abimelech, so that he drove him out and he went away.

SPEAKER_01: 12:01

That's him talking, it's the Bible saying that they pretend to be mad and else. Great story.

SPEAKER_00: 12:21

Let the humble hear and be glad. Oh magnify the Lord with me. Let us exalt his name together. I sought the Lord and He answered me and delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant, their faces shall never be ashamed.

SPEAKER_01: 12:40

This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him, delivers them.

SPEAKER_00: 13:00

Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. O fear the Lord, you his saints. Those who fear him have no lack. The young lions suffer want and hunger. Those who seek the Lord lack no good thing. Verse 11. Come, O children, listen to me. I will teach you the fear of the Lord. A man, what man is there who desires life and loves many days, that he may see good? Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit. Turn away from evil and do good. Seek peace and pursue it. That's so important, the pursuit part. We all seek stuff, but do we deliberately pursue it?

SPEAKER_01: 13:49

It's all Mr.

SPEAKER_00: 13:51

Warrior Way is all about pursuit. The eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous, and his ears towards their cry. Face of the Lord is against those who do evil, to cut off the memory of them from the earth. When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears, delivers them out of their troubles. Lord is near to the brokenhearted, saves the crushing spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous. The Lord delivers him out of them all. Keeps off his bones, not one of them is broken. Affliction will slay the wicked. Those who hate the righteous will be condemned. The Lord deems the life of his servants. None of those who take refuge in him will be condemned.

SPEAKER_01: 14:43

So let's go ahead and dive into this now, shall we?

SPEAKER_00: 14:50

Verses one through three, invitation to praise. Oh do I need a cup of coffee this morning? Two nights less than four hours sleep. I was uh very thankful for my alarm this morning.

SPEAKER_01: 15:05

David calls the faithful to magnify Yahweh with him. Okay.

SPEAKER_00: 15:26

David calls the faithful to magnify Yahweh with him. This is remarkable. A man who escaped by acting insane now leads a worship rally. Praise is not dependent on dignity, on deliverance. As warriors, we know that God, when God delivers you, testify. Your praise strengthens the whole shield wall. Testimonies are it's mandatory that we deliver. Tell those, because it is now more evidence of God coming through to somebody that the people are seeing and right in front of them or have known their whole life. That is true credibility, and why our testimony is so important. Verses four through seven, testimony of deliverance. David sought Yahweh and God answered. God delivered him from all fears, radiated joy through those who looked to him, saved the afflicted man, sent his angelic host to encamp around his warriors.

SPEAKER_01: 16:31

Warriors, fear melts when God becomes your fear and your refuge. Verses eight through fourteen, training in the fear of Yahweh.

SPEAKER_00: 16:45

This section is the warrior's discipleship course. David commands: taste and see the goodness of God, fear Yahweh, seek refuge in Him, listen to instruction, keep your tongue from evil, turn from evil and do good. Seek peace and pursue it. This is battlefield character. Warriors, God trains warriors by shaping their speech, conduct, self-control, and moral courage. Yahweh sees, hears, and draws near. God sees the righteous, hears their cries, is against evildoers, is near the brokenhearted, saves the crushing spirit. David knows firsthand he was broken, hunted, humiliated.

SPEAKER_01: 19:00

God met him there. For his brokenness is not weakness. It is the forge where God forges the heart. God's perfect strength and strong in our weakness. 19 through 22, protection and vindication.

SPEAKER_00: 19:27

David teaches a hard truth. The righteous suffer many afflictions, but Yahweh's delivered, Yahweh delivers from all of them. Not a broken, a bone is broken. That verse, uh, not a bone is broken. That's prophetic of Christ on the cross. The Romans typically they did to the guy, the two people that were crucified with Christ, is when they wanted to speed up the execution of the cross, which they did. Um, you know, Jesus was crucified. Normally, they come up and they break their legs because that's where you would die. You would suffocate. Um, and like you would have to push down on your legs to stand. So they would break their femurs, the hammer, giant sledgehammer, and um, and you wouldn't be able to stand, not to mention that internally from they did that to the other two people, but Jesus they did not, they stabbed him with a spear instead.

SPEAKER_01: 20:45

Again, pointing to this verse, and not a bone would be broken. Evil kills the wicked, God redeems his servant. Warrior suffering is part of the fight, deliverance is the part of the promise. So, themes we'll see here.

SPEAKER_00: 21:09

See here, deliverance comes from God, not self-rescue. Fear of God replaces fear of man.

SPEAKER_01: 21:18

This is pivotal for Christians to understand that we have relationship with God completely twisted, and getting a healthy, awesome fear of the Lord get our lives in balance. We fear the Lord, will we sin as much as we do? Fear the Lord, will we betray him? Unfortunately, too many and due to deliberate efforts to confuse, distort, and erase God from our lives. Not enough people fear God anymore. God trains his warriors in righteousness.

SPEAKER_00: 22:18

Suffer is certain, so is deliverance. Christ fulfills this psalm as the righteous one, whose bones were not broken.

SPEAKER_01: 22:34

So some warhair applications here.

SPEAKER_00: 22:49

How does this how do we take this verse and apply it to our life in our daily or seven battlefields? Faith, fear God, not man, seek his presence when pressure rises. Family, model repentance, praise and righteous speech in the home. Fitness, train your body as you train your spirit. Discipline kills fear. Fundamentals, build habits that reinforce readiness, situational awareness, verbal discipline and self-control. Finances, use money righteously, avoid deceit, greed, and manipulative speech. Fellowship, strengthen the shield wall, testify to God's deliverance.

SPEAKER_01: 23:41

So verse 34.

SPEAKER_00: 23:44

Sorry, Psalm 34 is David's field manual for warriors under pressure. It shows us that godly strength is not forged in comfort, crisis, in caves, in fear, in humiliation, the moments when every earthly support collapses. From that battlefield, David teaches us four crucial realities. One, praise is a weapon, not a mood. David praises God before circumstances change. This trains the warrior's heart to anchor in God's character rather than in shifting conditions. Fear of God kills the fear of man. Every soldier knows that fear is real. But scripture teaches that fear is conquered not by willpower, but by a greater fear. Reverence for Yahweh. When God becomes the supreme authority, no earthly enemy can control your heart. This is why Christians overseas is so much stronger than us. Rather than deny who Jesus is, they would rather die.

SPEAKER_01: 24:57

Die in horrible rays, and they do not renounce Christ. It's disgusting.

SPEAKER_00: 25:18

Three, righteous character is combat readiness. Psalm 34 connects holiness to survival. Guarding your tongue, pursuing peace, turning from evil, and doing good are not soft commands. They're battlefield disciplines that keep your soul sharp and your steps ready. Remember, there is no purpose to winning a fight and losing your soul. There is purpose in say you're a casualty of a fight.

SPEAKER_01: 25:47

Keep eternal soul ever.

SPEAKER_00: 25:53

Or God delivers his warriors not by removing the battle, by standing with them in it. Remember, nothing grows stronger in comfort.

SPEAKER_01: 26:05

Nothing. Everything degrades in comfort.

SPEAKER_00: 26:09

And God is forging you into the man or woman that you're going to be in heaven. As you die to self and become more Christ-like, as you work through your sanctification, God will stand with you, not remove your battles. The righteous suffer many afflictions, but Yahweh delivers from all of them. His nearness to the broken and his promise to redeem his servants guarantees victory, even when the fight is fierce. This psalm shapes warriors who praise boldly, live righteously, endure hardships, and fight with confidence because they know the commander himself camps around them. Christian warriors, fear God, fight evil, speak truth, pursue peace, and trust the commander who encamps around his own and delivers them from every battle. So, warriors, stand up, warrior. Lift your head. The commander of heaven's armies goes with you. You are not fighting alone. The God who hears, sees, and delivers surrounds you like a fortress. Step into this day with righteous speech, disciplined action, and a heart that fears God more than the enemy. Praise boldly, live righteously, stand courageously, lock shields, advance the line, carry the light of Christ into the house. The king is with you. Now fight like it.

SPEAKER_01: 27:54

That is Psalm 34. So let's get our third and final battle one. Hey Victor, good to see you. So let's go ahead and pray now. Dear Heavenly Father, Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you for Psalm 34. Lord, help us to pull wisdom and discernment. Your lessons. Nurture our soul with these words. To change who we are, to help us die to self. Give us the strength and courage to be able to walk out to fear you above all other things. That if we fear you, we cannot fear anything else. But we also pray for protection and peace. This fellowship, the persecuted church all across the world, our troops overseas, our first responders at home, our veterans of yesteryear. Lord help. Help us.

SPEAKER_00: 29:31

Pray that America would turn from her sin, hit her knees, repent and seek your face, that you would see her and heal her, so that we could once again be one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Now I call upon this fellowship to put on the full armor of God, to strap on the shield of the pick up the sword of the spirit, and step forward to join the shield war. Locking our shields of faith to the left and right. We march forward to take ground for your kingdom, your glory forever. All right, everyone. God bless you. Love you, and I will see you tonight at 9 p.m. for Warrior Church.