Psalms 18:7

The earth shook. The divine intervention, in answer to David’s prayer, is depicted in a magnificent description of an upheaval of nature, the details of which were doubtless taken from the psalmist’s recollection of many a tempest that he had seen in the dangerous periods of his life. In its wealth of furious imagery, resting heavily upon the imagery of the deliverance at the Red Sea and the giving of the law at Sinai, this description is one of the most sublime in literature. Compare Ex. 19:16–18; Ps. 144:5–7; Hab. 3:3–6, but note that the image is nowhere so fully carried out as in Ps. 18. The description begins with the earthquake, continues with lightning, clouds, wind, and darkness, and concludes with the full outburst of storm, in the midst of which Jehovah is revealed in all His glory and power to discomfit His enemies and save His trusting servant. As God showed the greatness of His power in the cataclysms of nature, so He came down in the fullness of His strength to intervene in the time of His servant’s peril.

Wroth. See on Ps. 2:4.