Psalm 2 July 4, 1999

Refuge from God by Refuge in God

A 5-year-old boy became angry with his mother and decided to run away from home. He walked out of his house with a small suitcase and trudged around the block again and again. Finally, when it was beginning to grow dark, a policeman stopped him. "What are you doing?" The little boy answered, "I'm runnin' away." The officer smiled as he said, "Look, I've had my eye on you, and you've been doing nothing but walking around the block. You call that running away?" The little fellow burst into tears, "Well, what do you want me to do? I’m not allowed to cross the street."

We spend our lives trying to be independent. The infant arches his back in his crib refusing the sleep he so desperately needs. The toddler’s oft-repeated "no!" echoes through Wal-Mart. The child whines for more toys. The adolescent wants a later curfew. The young adult wants rid of parental intrusion. Those in mid-life yearn for financial independence and the elderly don’t want to burden their kids.

On this July 4^th, we celebrate our 223 years of independence from Great Britain. For us Americans, independence is not just a concept, it is a way of life. While self-sufficiency and personal accountability are tremendous virtues, there is a frightening cost to independence. Like the five year old who tries running away from home, but can’t get around the block, there are limits to how independent we can ever really become. As created beings, our limits are imposed on us by our Creator, so it is impossible to ever be so independent that we can exist beyond our heavenly Father’s grasp.

The second Psalm offers us an insight into the futility of seeking to rid ourselves of God, to deny His rightful rule in our lives. The psalm reminds us that satisfaction in this life, safety from the wrath of God, comes not in running from Him, but running to Him.

1. Why do the nations conspire and the peoples plot in vain?

2. The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the LORD and against his Anointed One.

3. "Let us break their chains," they say, "and throw off their fetters."

4. The One enthroned in heaven laughs; the Lord scoffs at them.

5. Then he rebukes them in his anger and terrifies them in his wrath, saying,

6. "I have installed my King on Zion, my holy hill."

7. I will proclaim the decree of the LORD: He said to me, "You are my Son ; today I have become your Father.

8. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your inheritance, the ends of the earth your possession.

9. You will rule them with an iron scepter ; you will dash them to pieces like pottery."

10. Therefore, you kings, be wise; be warned, you rulers of the earth.

11. Serve the LORD with fear and rejoice with trembling.

12. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry and you be destroyed in your way, for his wrath can flare up in a moment. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

The psalm is easily divided into four stanzas of three verses each. The first three deal with the rebellion of man; verses 4-6 give the response by God the Father, then in verses 7-9 we see the reign of God the Son and finally in verses 10-12 we are given a reminder by God the Spirit.

The Rebellion of Man - Verses 1-3

There is a peculiarity among Americans that in their quest for independence they have become so obsessed with freedom that they’ve become paranoid about its demise. Conspiracy theories abound today in every sector. Those on the right see a conspiracy by the left in the form of NATO alliances, black helicopters, and one world governments, while those on the left fear a vast right wing conspiracy. But the only conspiracy known in Scripture is that of fallen humanity who desires to rid itself of God’s rule.

Why do we rebel against God? David’s question is left unanswered. Our love of sin, our rejection to be dependent on our Creator, are part of the answer, but at the heart of it, the question is unanswerable because our rebellion is irrational. The people’s "plot" is a word which means to mull over, to repeat under one’s breath. It’s the same word in Psalm 1:2, there translated "meditate." But here, in the negative sense, it is the grumbling of the kid who tromps off to his room for his punishment, mumbling and moaning to himself.

But like the child, the conspiracy, the plotting are futile, empty. This is an important word to remember. If you ever get caught up in the latest conspiracy theory, the fumings of fear mongers that God has somehow lost control of His universe, don’t forget that their plots are in vain.

History is a "noisy riot that seethes in antagonism" against God.

However, the plot to overthrow God is empty. Adam first tried it in the Garden of Eden. Before the Deluge man's heart was only continuously full of rebellion (Genesis 6:5). Even after the flood men plotted in their selfishness (Genesis 11:4) saying, "Come, let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach into heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name; lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth." Pharaoh tried genocide and infanticide to prove he was dependent on no one. Finally, "Jesus came to His own and His own received Him not." But try as they might, their plans never succeed to overthrow God.

Humanity’s empty and irrational plotting is a running theme in literature and philosophy. The futility of a life divorce of God is an understandable conclusion. Shakespeare’s Macbeth said:

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player / That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

and then is heard of no more; it is a tale / Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing (Macbeth V, v,17)

The great historian Edward Gibbon offered an equally dismal view of life and history. His verdict on civilization is that "history is little more than the register of the crimes; follies; and misfortunes of mankind." The Russian philosopher Alexander Ivanovich Herzen likewise gave a futile view of history. "History," Herzen said, "is the autobiography of a madman." Another modern writer summed up civilization this way: "That the state of the world today is nothing but organized insanity." Oh yes, it's very highly organized. But it's insanity!

The stupidity of our rebellion is best understood when we see against whom we are rebelling. We desire to be independent, to be free from the constraints of God.

More specifically the combatant is the Lord, Yahweh, the covenant-making God and the one through whom that covenant is guaranteed - His Anointed One. The common way we pronounce the Hebrew here is: "messiah" and in the New Testament the Greek form is "christ". The object of the world’s hostility is none other than Jesus Christ.

This hatred for God’s rule and reign through His Son Jesus the Messiah is historic and on-going.

The early church understood this Psalm to refer to Christ when, after Peter and John were detained for telling others that Jesus of Nazareth is the Anointed One of God, they gathered with the other believers:

"When they heard this, they raised their voices together in prayer to God. "Sovereign Lord," they said, "you made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and everything in them. You spoke by the Holy Spirit through the mouth of your servant, our father David: "`Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the Lord and against his Anointed One. ' Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness.
Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus." (Acts 4:24-30).

The early Church understood that their suffering was only because of humanity’s rebellion against God, but what is more, their rebellion is certainly not outside His providence.

A medal was struck by the Roman emperor Diocletian that bore the inscription, "The name of Christians being extinguished" for it was his hope that during his reign Christ’s power over his empire would vanish. And in Spain, two monumental pillars were raised, honoring Diocletain, for having extended the Roman Empire in the east and the west, and for having extinguished the name of Christians, who brought the Republic to ruin" and "for having everywhere abolished the superstition of Christ, for having extended the worship of the gods." As a modern writer has elegantly observed: "We have here a monument raised by Paganism, over the grave of its vanquished foe. But in this 'the people imagined a vain thing;' so far from being deceased, Christianity was on the eve of its final and permanent triumph…. Neither in Spain, nor elsewhere, can be pointed out the burial place of Christianity; it is not, for the living have no tomb."

The intention is simple - complete independence from the constraints of God.

The chains and fetters of verse three refers not to a prisoner’s shackles, but the leather thongs which lashed to the yoke-bar to the horns or neck of the animal. As God created us to be free within the boundaries of His own love, in our sinful rebellion we spend our lives trying to rid ourselves from His compassion.

Unfortunately, in our fallen state, the stupidity misses us completely. There is nothing more irrational than irreligion. Like the frustrated child who is unable to understand why ice cream and pizza should not be the menu for every meal, we somehow conceive God’s commands weigh us down, keep us from being truly free. We irrationally imagine that our conscience is a burden we'd best be rid of once and for all. We wish to be free to worship a much smaller, impotent god called "me."

The Response by the Father - Verses 4-6

The immediate response is not one we may imagine: God laughs at them. Just as we found humor in the little boy running away from home, but couldn’t cross the street, so God chuckles at our attempts to run away from His universe. But His laughter is not the sweet smile of a grandfather, but the mocking derision of one offended by the insolent rejection of His creation.

Someone shared with me a talk given by Christian author Frank Peretti about the New Age concept of humans believing that they are God. He described Shirley Maclaine on the beach with her spiritual guru encouraging her to shout into the sky, "I AM GOD! I AM GOD!" Then, he switched the camera up to heaven, as God laughingly said, "Gabriel, Michael, you've gotta come see this!" And as they peer over the clouds, there is the tiniest speck on this little blue marble saying minutely in a flea's voice, "i am god! i am god!"

Perhaps the best philosophical analysis of this phenomena comes from the brilliance of the Warner Brothers. If you haven’t seen Pinky and the Brain, you should, for they epitomize the humor God sees in our attempts: two helpless mice, one a moron, the other with an intellect only surpassed by his ego. The humor of the cartoon is that each episode Brain maniacally sets out to take over the world, but his puny stature and imbecile sidekick spell disaster.

God’s laughter could be heard recently when some biblical scholars attempted to prove a thesis expounded years ago. The thought was that although 14 letters in the New Testament bear Paul’s name some were by different authors. So scholars set up a program which would measure differences in style, vocabulary and syntax and the outcome proved that only four of the 14 were from the pen of Paul. But God’s laughter rang out loud and clear when others entered these supposed scholar’s own literary works into that computer and found that these authors did not write the article disclaiming Pauline authorship.

The divine laughter is a vivid pointer to the sovereignty of God and the Lord’s invulnerability to all human stratagems, even those of the most powerful. In a strange way God’s laughter is one of the most assuring sounds of the whole Psalter as it relativizes even the largest of human claims for ultimate control over the affairs of people and nations. The fiercest terror is made the object of laughter and derision and thus is rendered impotent to frighten those who hear the laughter of God in the background.

But after God’s laughter, He does not strike, but He speaks. Yet His very words bring terror to those who have sought to set aside His reign. God does not stand in need of great armies to repress the rebellion of wicked men, as if this were an arduous task. After the laughter has died down, He speaks.

The angry word that troubles and terrifies the nations is the anointing of the Lord’s agent, the Messiah. There is nothing so terrifying than the realization that there is another whose power far exceeds one’s own. The dominion of the Anointed One over the kings and rulers of the earth is not an exchange of one tyranny for another.

The Reign of the Son  - Verses 7-9

The response by the Father toward the rebellion of creation is in the form of the reign of His Son. The anointed King appears and speaks in verse 7. He reigns not by the will of man (this is not a democracy), but by the gracious decree of God.

But what is meant by "You are my Son, today I have become your Father"?

That Christ is the Son of the Father, the second person of the Godhead is made more clear in Hebrews 1. Christ is the final revelation of the Father, the ultimate representation of what we must know of God, greater than any angel. The author of Hebrews quotes this verse to clarify that Jesus is the eternal Son. Christ holds this title from eternity past since He is the same nature with the Father, has in Him all the fullness of the Godhead, infinite wisdom, power, and holiness.

Acts 13 clarifies what is meant by "today." "...he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm: "`You are my Son; today I have become your Father. '" (Acts 13:33)  It is not that Jesus became the Son of God when before He was not. Rather by the Resurrection it became clear to the world what was always true. Paul says the same thing in Romans 1:4: "...and who through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord." What was obscure before His incarnation, what was alluded to by the Father’s voice in His baptism and on the Mount of Transfiguration is, with His resurrection, certain to all.

From the time of His Resurrection, through this present day until the end of the ages, Christ sits enthroned, reigning supreme. Those nations which have conspired are His inheritance. The people from the ends of the earth who plot in vain are His possession.

His rule is described as with an iron scepter - here is a picture of Christ we often don’t have in mind. We usually think of the shepherd’s crook as His means of dealing with disobedient sheep, but David expresses an important image here. Iron speaks of judgment. Like the dish broken beyond repair, Christ will bring complete destruction to any and all who do not bow to His authority. The shattered vessel cannot be mended, and the tiny fragments are of no use; such will be the fate of the King’s enemies if they continue in their state of rebellion.

This period of Christ’s reign is today. Paul refers to his present kingly rule in 1 Corinthians 15.

Beginning in verse 20 we see the resurrection as the seminal event. The conclusion comes when all His enemies have been placed under His feet, at which time He gives the Kingdom back to His Father. In between His resurrection and return, He must reign. Christ today sits on His throne. We need not wait for some earthly kingdom, for this is the year of our Lord.

So what should we do in the mean time?

The Reminder from the Spirit  - Verses 10-12

Here is wisdom, here is some good advice…stop your fighting against Him. Turn from your self-will and put your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. This is wisdom for each of us. While it is addressed to kings and rulers - and those in power fall prey to pride quickly - it is applicable to each of us.

The petty fiefdoms of our homes may be places where we mistakenly believe God has little authority. We may have others working under us at the job, so we take ourselves far too seriously. We need to learn wisdom just as much as any king or president.

What is the wisdom we need? The answer in verse 11 seems an odd mixture.

Serve with fear, rejoice with trembling. How can there be joy in this kind of life? We love our independence so much we can’t imagine that true freedom is found only in serving the King of kings, that the greatest joy is when we come before Him whose holiness would mean our destruction…but yet He graciously comes to us. If there is no tremble to your joy or no joy to your trembling, you lack wisdom.

The Puritan pastor William Bates said of this verse: "This fear of God qualifies our joy. If you abstract fear from joy, joy will become light and wanton; and if you abstract joy from fear, fear then will become slavish.

For us to serve forgetting the powerfulness of our God, for us to rejoice while ignoring our sinfulness, we will be secure in ourselves, we will be independent. Service of our king must be our passion, joy must be our attitude, but all this never forgetting that He is God and we are His people.

The God who is sovereign over all His creation demands our worship, demands our reverence. The image here is foreign to us, especially in a democratic nation founded on a hatred of kings and tyrants. But while we can rejoice in our human government, we must never imagine that God rules only by our mutual agreement. He takes no polls, cannot be impeached nor voted out of office. What He demands of us is worship.

"Kiss the Son" is a command which calls for our homage, our devotion. While the nations may revolt in giving this honor to God, we see God’s grace extended to us, disobedient though we are, to be reconciled to Him. Because the Son now reigns we have the assurance that peace is secured by God Himself. Though we have been traitors, though we have planned revolt after revolt each and every day by our own sin, as we break His Laws - He calls us to Himself. There is available a covenant of friendship; there is the kiss of allegiance and loyalty. Indeed, the Son must first kiss us by His mercy, before we can kiss Him by our piety. But the invitation, the command is given: Come and worship Him.

There is one final warning: Offer Him your allegiance, receive His love; otherwise you will receive only anger, wrath and destruction. God’s patience is not placidity, anymore than His fierce anger is loss of control, His laughter cruelty or His pity sentimentality.

Don’t spit on God’s grace, don’t trivialize the work of the Son as mediator who propitiated the Father’s wrath, thinking there is a better way to please the Father. If you anger the Son, who will intercede for you then? If you reject His right to rule, how will you ever defend yourself? Unbelief is a sin against the remedy. There is no refuge from Him; but there is a refuge in Him.

Our refuge from the king’s iron scepter is by way of the king’s crown of thorns. Safety from the judgment throne comes when we worship at the Cross. So as not to hear the scoffing laughter of the Father, let us hear the Son’s plea for our forgiveness. You and I may find refuge from the wrath of God only when we acknowledge our need to be saved from God, by God.

On July 4, 1776 the Second Continental Congress signed the Declaration of Independence. But of far greater significance for the Christian, however, is our "Declaration of Dependence " - the resolve to lean on God completely in every circumstance. To cease the futile rebellion against God, come bow in humble worship before Him. Come receive what He has to offer in the bread and wine of the table. Declare your dependence on His grace offered to you from the Cross, signified in this Supper. Trust in Christ, receive the kiss of His grace so that by His grace which gives us strength, we will serve the Lord with fear; we will rejoice with trembling.