Please open your Bible with me in Psalm 2. Again, to consider this passage tonight. Psalm 2. And as you're doing that, let's go to the Lord in prayer. Heavenly Father, we praise your name. You are such a great God and you are good to us and we thank you for your word and we read in it that The grass withers and the flowers fade but your word endured forever we pray lord that you cause this word to be open to our heart today and We pray that you speak to us help us to see jesus tonight and may he speak to us In his name we pray amen I hope that sometime you take time to reflect upon the work of the church, on the progress of the church in the world today. You maybe have questions about the progress of the gospel in the world. You maybe sometimes ask yourself questions about the persecutions against the church, against the people of God in the world today. Persecution comes from every country, everywhere, from rulers, from governments, and from followers of false gods in the world. I came from a country where a lot of people do not like the progress of the gospel. They do not like the light of the gospel. They were in darkness, and they are in darkness. As a child, I grew up in the villages in Haiti, very far in the mountains, where the gospel in the 60s, there were not much progress of the gospel in these villages. And when the churches from the cities start to send missionaries to those villages, the people did not like that. They hated to see that the church was established in their neighborhood. And they started to attack the missionaries, to persecute them. They did not like the gospel. And it's not so, not only in Haiti, but in other places in the world, people do not like the gospel. You may say that there are quite reasons to be worried about what is happening in the world today against the church, against the people of God. People hate to see the progress of the gospel. David in Psalm 2 was in the same situation of perplexity when he saw what was happening to the church, to the people of God. When the nations around Israel started to attack the king of Israel, started to attack the people of God, there's quite reason for him to ask himself questions about what he saw. But you see that in this psalm David found comfort because he saw the victory. He was confident in the victory of the church and in the king of the church. I hope that tonight in this passage, that you find hope, that you see hope for the church, that you see hope in the victory of the church, in spite of what you might hear, in spite of what you might hear around you, you find hope. You find hope in the victory of the king i would like to consider this passage with you together tonight and we'll see first the rejection of the king and second the imposition of the king and third the exaltation of the king the rejection the imposition and the exaltation of the king let's see first the rejection of the king This psalm starts by showing us how people are against the church. David in that psalm is talking about the rage of men against God and against the promised Messiah. He portrays that as a progressive universal attack against God, against the church. against the people of God. We see first in the psalm that he's talking about an uproar, a plotting against the church of Christ. All the nations, they arise against the king and against the church. First in the psalm, David is talking about his kingdom because around Israel there were all those nations and they did not like Israel, they did not like the people of God. And you see, during the life of David, It was a lot of wars going on against himself, against the king, and against the people of God. So it was an uproar, it was a plotting against the church. What we see in that psalm, it was a big attack against the people of God. I can understand that what is happening in the psalm when it said, why do the nations rage? against God, against the king. When I was in high school, in my last two years of high school, I was in Haiti. And it was the last year also of Duvalier. And my last year of high school was when Duvalier left the country. And in all these years, we did not like that man who run the country, and so we were trying to push him away from the country. So what people were doing around Port-au-Prince We put ourselves together and in such a time, during the day, we were trying to make a big noise in Port-au-Prince so that people can hear that we don't like this man to run over us. We don't like this government to run this country. So we were, all the students, we were trying to hit what we can find to make a big noise. It was an uproar. And we were trying to show that we are against him. This is... about what is happening in the psalm. This is what David is trying to describe to us, that the people, the nations, they are trying to make a big turmoil, a big uproar against the king. It's an attack against the people of God, against the church of Christ. And you'll see that Atax is that big fight against the people of God, against the kingdom of God. It's there since the beginning, since sin entered the world. Remember that God was in the Garden of Eden, God was talking to the serpent and He said that there was going to be a war in the world between God, between the seed of the woman and between the serpent. He said, I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel. so this war started right in the beginning in the garden of eden you see that it's a war against christ against the seed of the woman that don't like him to be king over over them you remember that at the crucifixion and christ was uh there and uh All the people, the Gentiles and the people of Israel, they were saying that we don't want this man to... rule over us we don't want him as our king you see that it's a it's an attack against christ they don't want his domination they don't want him as king they are trying to wipe away the kingdom of god to destroy his domination to overthrow god And the men want satan as the king and they don't want christ As their king we see this fulfillment of this a psalm Uh, you remember that passage that we just read in the book of acts, uh where the apostles were praying uh after their persecution and they were Seeing this psalm as a fulfillment of what was happening. Uh against the Church in the New Testament. And the Book of Acts reports for us what is happening. the King Herod and Pontius Pilate and the Romans and the Israelites, they were against Christ. They were against the kingdom of God. You see, my brothers and sisters, that Satan is not playing with the church. He's not. He's not playing with us. He is not playing with us. And we need to be aware of that. We need to know that. We need to know that we are in a battle. We need to know that our King is in a battle. We need to be subject. of the king and we need to to be in that battle with him are you under the kingship of the king are you his subject are you in that battle everyday it's a battle for the growth of the church it's a battle for the expansion of the kingdom of christ it's a battle for the defeat of satan a battle for submission to christ for the growth of the kingdom a battle for our growth in grace for our sanctification but you see that it's a universal attack against the church of christ but in the psalm we see also that it's vain attack because the church will prevail because the kingdom will continue to grow because the gospel will go forth. The gospel of Christ will continue to go. The Christ will be king forever because God has imposed his king and he will be king forever. Let's see second in that passage the imposition of the king of the church. And we see that in verse 4 to verse 9. We see in the psalm that God is sure of the victory of his son. There is in the psalm the assurance of the victory of the church. This is why in the psalm that God is mocking Satan. You remember Elijah in the Old Testament? and the prophets of bail uh... you remember how they had a contest and elijah was mocking the prophets of bail because he was sure of the victory of of the people of god and this is what we see in this song god is sure of the victory of the church this is why he's mocking satan you know at the cross uh at calvary satan was trying to mock christ uh to his followers when he was thirst and he asked for a drink they offered him vinegar they were trying to mock him but you know God will mock Satan forever. He will be mocked forever because the church will have success. This is why in the psalm that he said that at this universal attack that God laughs. He scoffs them because he's sure of his power. He's sure of the victory of the church. And then he moves to an attack against the kingdom of Satan. He speaks in his anger, his anger against the enemies of the church, his anger against Satan. He terrifies them in his fury and he attacks them with force. And the psalmist moved to show us the dominion of the king and his plan for victory. It is said that God installed his king on Zion, his holy hill. He's talking here about the church. He's talking about the kingdom of christ it's not a a material kingdom but he it's a spiritual kingdom he's reigning and he's reigning over the church he's reigning in the church he's reigning over his people and he's a sovereign king over the church for ever. It said that God sent his king in his church over Zion, his holy hill. And this king is reigning and he is doing our battle. This is what we see in the shorter catechism, that he's doing this battle for us, for the church. And he will surely win this battle. And he said that this battle, the Lord make it known publicly. He published the decrees. It's a public proclamation of the work of his son, of the work of the church in the world. Making it publicly known. that Christ is king in his church, and that the nations will be in submission to him, that the nations are given to him, that the world will know that, that the gospel will be proclaimed, and that the world, the nations, would come to Him. So God is declaring publicly that Christ is His Son. But we know also that this relationship of God and His Son, that Christ is His Son, and that did not begin with His incarnation, when He was born of the Virgin Mary, but His Son eternally. He was there with God at the beginning, at the creation. He was there with God. But there God declares that this is his son and he's going to show that publicly at the cross, at his victory over Satan, over the powers of the world. He's going to show that publicly that he is the son of God. And everybody will see that. And if they want to acknowledge that now, one day, they will bow before the King. They will know Him as the King everywhere in the world. So that you see, my friend, that eternally, Jesus Christ is reigning. And He is working. He is at work. He is conquering the nations. He is building his church. He has dominion over the nations and the work will continue to grow. So he has a present victory now in the work of the church, in the work that we are doing everywhere, in the work of missions. He has victory and he will continue to have victory. He will continue to conquer the world for his glory. You know that many attempts have been made to suppress the kingdom of God, to stop the preaching of the gospel, to stop the progress of the kingdom. But the church has victory and the victory will continue. And he will have a final victory. At the end of this psalm, we see the final victory of the king. We see the exaltation of the king. And there's a call to the nations, a call to be wise, a call to consider the danger of their attack against the church. It's a call to have discernment, to receive the king that the lord has said it's a warning to the rulers of the earth to be wise you see that uh the lord does not uh leave them in the danger of unrepentance so he gives him he gives them his uh his his son he gives them the gospel so that they can hear about the word of God and they can come to him and they can repent. As the apostle Paul says, therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring that all men everywhere should repent because he has fixed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness to a man whom he has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising him from the dead. There's a call in the psalm to be wise and to come to Christ. That's a call to worship the king to bow down before him with reverence And to worship him to come before him with trembling And all need to know that everywhere people need to know that Then into here about the gospel of christ then into here about the power of the king His power to save and then into bar to the King, to King Jesus. So does it call to be wise? Does it call to come to Christ? Does it call to bow to the King? Because his wrath is about to candle against the nations, against the kings of the earth, against Satan, against the followers of Satan. But his love is for those who come to him. So there's a call to flee to Jesus, to take refuge in him and to worship him. Maybe you're here tonight and you are not in Christ. Maybe you don't know Jesus Christ as your King. There's a call for you tonight to take refuge in him, to come to him to bow before him and to worship him, rather than running away from Christ as fallen humanity always does, as they call to come to him. Rather than counseling together and plotting and trying to overthrow the kingdom of God, That's a call to come to him, to take refuge in him and be saved. Where are you tonight? Have you run to Jesus for your refuge, for your salvation? Have you trusted Christ as your Lord and savior? Are you worshiping the king? Are you his subject? Are you under his dominion? He is your king. and you need to come to him, you need to worship him. You see that this passage is very clear tonight, that not to embrace Christ, it's against him. Maybe you're here and you think that you are just fine, that you don't need Jesus, but he wants you to come to him. If you're not against Him, if you're not for Him, you're against Him. In other words, there's no neutral ground. You are for Jesus or you're against Him. It's certainly you can come to Him, look at Him and be saved. No matter what, how evil seems powerful in the world, The attacks against the church may be powerful, but the church of Christ will be victorious. He is in control. He is sovereign. His church will continue to grow. His kingdom will continue to grow. Come to him. and worship Him. Come to Jesus, the everlasting King, and be saved. Amen. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we come to you tonight and we praise your name for your word. Thank you, Lord, that you are giving us this word. And we pray that you continue to apply this word to our life so that we may not be just hearers of the word, but we may be doers of the word. Help us not to embrace the king, to worship him, and to live for Him forevermore. In Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.