This we learn from the words of our text in which we find the peaceful intercourse of the forgiven soul with God. It is that peaceful intercourse which constitutes the real test of forgiveness, Christ died, the just for the unjust, to bring us to God: so those who are made partakers of that atoning work are actually brought to God and made what the Psalmist calls “a people near unto Him.” {7} So it was in the case of David. There was nothing to keep him any longer at a distance, and in the full peace of complete reconciliation he enjoyed the unspeakable privilege of communion with God. The account of this communion is given us in the verses of our text, in the first of which we have the language of the forgiven sinner to God, in the second the reply from God Himself. I. THE LANGUAGE OF THE FORGIVEN SOUL ADDRESSING GOD. He that was afar off without any shelter from the rough storm of an accusing conscience, is now able to look up to the God who has forgiven him and say, “Thou art my hiding-place.” He finds his shelter and his safety in the presence of that very God whose law he had broken. He does not say, “Thou hast provided a hiding-place,” but “Thou _art_ my hiding-place.” He who had been exposed without protection to the sore buffetings of his own conscience, confirmed as it was by the just sentence of God’s holy law, had been so completely restored that he had found in God Himself a hiding-place. In that sacred hiding-place he realized two results, safety and praise. When hidden there he was safe, just as our own life is safe when hidden with Christ in God, and therefore he could say, “Thou shalt preserve me,” and when hidden there he would live in the very atmosphere of thanksgiving, so he said, “Thou shalt compass me about (or surround me) with songs of deliverance.” A song of deliverance is a song of praise from one that has been delivered. The Song of Moses was a song of deliverance when he stood on the shores of the Red Sea after he had seen the hosts of Egypt overwhelmed in the flood. {8a} David’s was a song of deliverance when God had brought him up out of the horrible pit and established his goings, and had put a new song in his mouth. {8b} The song of the great multitude before the throne is a song of deliverance, when, brought out of great tribulation, clothed with white robes and palms in their hands, they sing, “Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.” {8c} Observe the connection between this safety and these songs of deliverance. The songs are not merely the consequence of the safety, but a part of it. Hidden in the Lord, we are compassed, or surrounded, by them. Whichever way we look, whether forward in hope, or backward in memory, or upwards in trust, there is in every direction something to call forth the praise, and the spirit of thanksgiving is in itself a protection against assault.