The Nations and God's Annointed
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Introduction:
Introduction:
Good morning. At this time if there are children who would like to go to our kids ministry time they can be dismissed out the back of the sanctuary. I invite the rest of you to open your copy of Scripture to Psalm chapter 2. As you’re doing that I want to read you something.
“ It is painful to contemplate the extent to which the governments of the world are to this day anti-Christian; and those, who conduct them often love to have it so. It was so of old, v. 2. There is no earthly government that has not laws, principles, or usages directly in the teeth of Christianity.
All of them to some extent sanction the desecration of the fourth commandment. It has always been so. It is painful to a pious mind to dwell on such themes. Dickson: "The chief instruments that Satan stirreth up against Christ, to be heads and leaders to heathen and godless people in opposing and persecuting Christ's kingdom and church, are the magistrates, rulers, and statesmen, that he may color his malice with the shadow of authority and law." This is just what is described in this Psalm. Kings and rulers set themselves in array against religion.”
This was written by W.S. Plummer and was first published in 1867. I was shocked because it sounds like it could have been written yesterday by someone on twitter. He wrote this as part of his doctrinal and practical comments about Psalm chapter 2. Let’s turn there and read it ourselves to see what prompted Plummer to write this.
Read Psalm 2
1 Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain?
2 The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord and against his Anointed, saying,
3 “Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us.”
4 He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision.
5 Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying,
6 “As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill.”
7 I will tell of the decree: The Lord said to me, “You are my Son; today I have begotten you.
8 Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession.
9 You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.”
10 Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth.
11 Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling.
12 Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.
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This is the Word of the Lord. Let’s pray and ask God to help us understand and apply it to our lives.
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Last week I preached through Psalm 1 which is a wisdom Psalm. Psalm 2 is a royal psalm. Royal psalms take a high point in the life of the king and focus on it. Within this chapter we see David remembering his coronation but this is psalm isn’t only about David. Even the Jews knew that these royal psalms pointed to the Messiah. As such, they find their fullest meaning in Jesus Christ.
-Written 1040 years before Christ
-also had no title like the first psalm
According to Henry Psalm 1 was moral and Psalm 2 is evangelical. What he means by that is that the first shows us our duty and the second shows us our Savior. So as we gaze on the truth of Jesus in this passage let’s do it earnestly and reverently with humility to see what God says and submit ourselves to His truth. So just remember that this is written by David and David’s line was established as the line from which Messiah would come.
The very first thing we see is a rhetorical question. “Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain?”
I. The Nations Rage and the peoples plot.
I. The Nations Rage and the peoples plot.
The basic design of this passage is to prophesy the hatred that men have for Jesus and His rule and reign, the gloriousness of the Christ, his victorious kingdom, and the outcome for his enemies. All of this lays out a base for exhorting humans to submit to Jesus as His servants.
So you have David talking about this in how the nations react to him but it is fulfilled more fully in how the world reacted to Jesus.
But when presented with the rule and way of Jesus, the nations rage.
This question has been rendered in different ways over the ages in church history.
Why are the peoples disturbed?
Why do the nations rise tumultuously?
Why do the heathen tumultuously bandy together?
Why do the nations make a noise, tummultuate, or rage?
There was an old marginal rendering of the verb here that is tumultuously assemble.
So we have this question about why the nations have gathered up in such a rage. The way the question is asked actually gives a hint to the absurdity of the commotion they are making.
It asks why…
That is to ask:
for what purpose
to what end
for what cause - they act without one like madmen.
It is a why of astonishment because these men are gathered together and making this tumult over not wanting to submit to Christ. They won’t give up their rule and yet the absurdity on their part is that Jesus wasn’t coming to take away their kingdoms but to bring forth the kingdom of God. They were railing against the only way they could be part of the kingdom of God because they would rather have their own way. This is how deep and deceptive our sin nature is.
We don’t want to admit the true depth of our depravity and wickedness in our own hearts. It’s much easier for us to look outward and point out the sin around us. Yes, there is much. But these nations raged because they wouldn’t bend their knee to God or His anointed ruler, in this case, His Son.
A. The voice of the nations
A. The voice of the nations
What they say about God and His anointed
V.3 is their desire to be unbound and yet they will continue in bondage to sin instead of being, in their words, bound to God and His anointed. They are choosing sin over life. They are choosing death over life. And to them it looks like freedom. Such is the deception of the world.
Ironically similar wording to what is used here is found elsewhere in scripture to reference what God has done for His people in freeing them from being oppressed by the wicked.
14 He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and burst their bonds apart.
4 The Lord is righteous; he has cut the cords of the wicked.
Today we see this going on as well. In our culture people would rather do their own thing in some kind of imagined freedom where they can make any choice that suits their flesh and desire. In doing so they are rebelling against the very one who could make them truly free. And they don’t realize in most cases what they are giving up to chase their own autonomy.
The enemies of God fall into two classes or categories.
Some know what they are doing and do so in despite and malice in the face of the light. (commission)
There are those who sin in ignorance and unbelief. They don’t know what they are doing and yet commit heinous sin. (omission)
II. The Lord’s response and rebuke.
II. The Lord’s response and rebuke.
The kings of the earth - those who have supreme power in the government of the world
the rulers - the chief people under kings, the next level of rulers, men in power, senators, governors, etc
If you oppose Jesus, you oppose God. It was not possible for them and is not possible for you to oppose the teachings of Jesus and also serve God. Likewise, you can not oppose the Father or the Spirit’s clear teaching and be following Jesus. They are one. This is made clear throughout scripture.
30 I and the Father are one.”
38 but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.”
40 “Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me.
9 He entered his headquarters again and said to Jesus, “Where are you from?” But Jesus gave him no answer.
God’s response to this gathering and rebelling is:
The Lord holds them in derision.
What the Lord says in His fury to them.
6 “As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill.”
God is the one who installed the king. There is no argument to be had about the legitimacy of this king’s rule.
Moving further into this idea it is sealed with a decree. It’s a royal protocol that signifies the right to rule.
A. The voice of the Son.
A. The voice of the Son.
In verses 7-9 the Davidic king speaks. He remembers what God had said at his coronation. It was grounded in the fact that the line of David would continue on forever before the Lord.
We heard a reference to this when we were in the book of Hebrews many months ago:
5 For to which of the angels did God ever say, “You are my Son, today I have begotten you”? Or again, “I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son”?
The entirety of Hebrews assumes the fact that Jesus Christ is this Messianic King that is spoken of here and throughout the Old Testament.
8 Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession.
Sonship comes with the right of inheritance and possession of what belonged to the father. The ends of the earth would include all of it. The nations would also be his. This must have not set well with the raging nations and yet there is warning and advice given to those who would rebel.
10 Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth.
11 Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling.
III. Advice and Opportunity
III. Advice and Opportunity
1. Be wise
1. Be wise
- Fear the Lord. Hold Him in reverent awe and seek to do the wise thing, live life in the way He has commanded us to live. Submit to Him. It is the wise thing.
2. Receive Instruction
2. Receive Instruction
- Don’t be too proud to believe that you might be wrong. Be willing to receive instruction in the things of God.
As God does, the nations are given the chance to repent of their sin and submit to God’s rule.
They should submit with reverential awe and with trembling. This shows the connection between the fear of the Lord and getting wisdom.
10 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.
- This passage anticipates the rebellion of the world against the message of Christ.
- God was not dismayed by this reaction and so we as His followers need not be dismayed by it either.
The war is unequal. God is more. The way it speaks of breaking them in verse 9 gets at the ease with which they are crushed. Like pieces of broken pottery.
Plummer: “The greatest test of character to which men were ever subjected, is Jesus Christ himself. Nothing so manifests their dispositions towards God.”
Simeon in Luke
34 And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, “Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed
35 (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.”
they must understand that this is not just a human ruler they are rejecting.
Salvation and damnation depend on your relation to the Son, to King Jesus.
36 Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.
The great question is: What will you do with Jesus? You have to make a decision.
Either He is exactly who He said He was or He’s not. Our answer to this question will put us on a path.
Will you believe the gospel.
God - holy and sovereign creator, sin can not be around Him
Man - sin nature, separated from holy God
Jesus - all God, all man, died on the cross as a sacrifice in our place, taking our sins upon Himself. Perfect sacrifice. Risen from the dead three days later.
Repent and Believe this good news. That’s how you start walking with Jesus. He invites you into relationship with Him.