And I invite you to open your Bibles with me to Psalm 2. Still on page 448 if you're using the Bibles in the seats. And again, as I mentioned this morning, a slight variation from my regular pattern, not that it's a pattern that's demanded, it's just what I've been doing for the most part in my preaching here, preaching from a chapter of God's Word in the morning and then focusing in on one small portion of that chapter in the evening. But I thought with Psalm 1 and 2 really in many ways serving as the introduction to the Psalms, as pillars that enable us to see much of what the Psalms are about that I thought we'd look this evening at Psalm 2. God the Son in Psalm 2 is seen as completely fulfilling the blessed man of Psalm 1. The only begotten beloved son, he's identified as that in Psalm 2 and he is the source of blessing. We're looking for Christ and we expect to see him because he tells us that all of the scripture is about him. And so we might find him in progress and promises, we might find him in types and themes, we might find him as we compare and contrast how God works. In many ways, in this short psalm, we have four acts, acts in which God is working and those who are against or with God are working. And so even though we're considering in that idea, at least in the outline of four acts that are taking place in the psalm, I don't want you to think of them as something that you merely observe. but that you participate along with the psalm as we consider what God says. And particularly, this psalm addresses the question, what do I have to do? What do I have to do? And so let's hear from the word of God, psalm two. This is the word of the living God. Why do the nations rage, and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His anointed, saying, Let us burst their bonds apart and cast their cords away from us. He who sits in the heaven laughs. The Lord holds them in derision. Then He will speak to them in His wrath and terrify them in His fury, saying, As for me, I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill. I will tell of the decree. The Lord said to me, You are my son. Today I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel. Now therefore, O kings, be wise. Be warned, O rulers of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. 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. Having heard from God in his word, let us seek him in prayer. Our Father in heaven, we do ask that you would open our eyes as we come to your word this evening, that you would again reveal to us things about ourselves and things about you, and that you would reveal to us Christ. We pray that we would see him, and having seen him, we would love him more and serve him more. And so we come with thankfulness to the living word of the living God, and we come in Jesus' name, amen. Again, four acts in this short psalm. The first act, verses 1 to 3, is the nation's rebelling. The nation's rebelling. The psalmist asks the question, why do they do it? Why do they do it? There are times that you observe people doing certain things and you're sure that the outcome of the things that they're doing is going to be bad. And you think, why do they do it? Why do they do it? That's the sense in which the psalmist begins here. Why do the nations rage? And we ask as well, why? Why do the nations rage? Why is there evil? The only answer that makes sense is if there is a God who is good. Because if there is no God who is absolutely good, then the measure of good and evil is so subjective that your good and my good, your evil and my good, my evil, are completely personal, whatever I feel like. But the psalmist doesn't speak that way and the word of God doesn't speak that way and it doesn't allow that understanding. There is good and there is evil. And the question that's being addressed is why? And we may not know the answer to the why, but we do understand what the motive is. And the psalmist tells us more about that. They are rebelling against God and against His Christ. They are rebelling against God and against His Christ. Psalm 2 begins the same way that Psalm 1 ends with a description of the wicked. And later in the psalm we'll read of their end condition. But here we have rebellion against God. Spurgeon put it this way, we have in this first three verses a description of the hatred of human nature against the Christ of God. And you may know that hatred in your own experience. You bring God or the Bible to bear in public debate and perhaps even in private conversation, and you'll often be ridiculed and rejected without even considering the arguments. The easiest attack in our day, and it seems to be it was true in the day of the psalmist, the easiest attack on someone's views is to say they're religious, as if that disqualifies or discounts any ability. Kevin Andrews was a 30-year member of parliament in Australia, a leading figure during our time there. He just died last December. And in 2017, he authored a book, One People, One Destiny. And in this book, he was taking advantage of a slogan that really led up to and worked out from the Federation of Australia on January the 1st, 1901. And his point was that we are one people and we have one destiny. And the book was really, a compilation of lectures that he had given, not in parliament, but as a member of parliament that he had given in other settings. And the primary criticisms of that book were that they were religious views. At least what I read, and it's when it came out, it wasn't, well, I disagree with him on this matter, I disagree with him on that matter. It was, well, they're religious views, and he was religious. I'm not sure if he was a believer or not. He was a practicing Roman Catholic, but he certainly wrote from a position of what we would recognize as religious views, and some simply rejected it because of that. A recent survey said that 73% of Americans said that religion should be kept separate from government policies. But isn't it more accurate to say that it's a question of which religion will be part of government policies? In the more details of that survey, I found it fascinating and a bit puzzling to read this. 9% of those who were religiously unaffiliated adults, That is those who describe their religious identity as atheist, agnostic, or nothing in particular. 9% of them say that government policy should support religious values and beliefs. If I do the math, that means that 91% of them say that it shouldn't. And yet, they're declaring their religion as unbelief in God. And I suspect that they would want the government to support that view. And yet only 9% of them made that claim. They are rebelling against God and against His Christ. And much like the righteous and the wicked in Psalm 1, there can be an outward vocal rebellion, and we see it as people clamor for living according to their own rules and not according to the rules of God. But it can also be a quiet rebellion, a rebellion of those who are outwardly moral but say they have no need of Christ, no need of a doctor, no need of a savior, no underlying concern for God or the demands of God. They are rebelling against God and against His Christ. And they are kicking against His restraints. They are kicking against His restraints. When Jesus met Saul on the road to Emmaus, We read in Acts 9 that Saul fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? And he answered, who are you, Lord? I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting, he replied. It is hard for you to kick against the goads. Now, we're not from an agricultural society. Most of you probably haven't used goads in prodding your oxen as they pull the plow across your field, getting ready to plant the wheat so that you can later thresh the wheat and winnow the wheat and harvest the wheat. But a goad was a pointed stick that the driver of these oxen or cattle would prod them with. And if you're prodding someone or something with a pointed stick and they're kicking back, you can imagine the impact is worse. And that's what Jesus was telling Saul, who became Paul after his conversion. It's hard for you to resist the constraints of Christ. And we can read this and think, well, that's them. But we ought to consider, am I kicking against God's restraints in any way? Are you children in any way kicking against the restraints of your moms and dads? And you adults along with me, am I in some way kicking against God's restraints? Even as a Christian, am I finding that God's particular restraints in this matter or that matter are more binding than I prefer and I'm gonna kick against them, I'm gonna resist them? Of course, the more fundamental question is if you are against God ultimately. Are you a Christian? Are you one who is in Christ as we saw this morning? And if not, hear God's response and repent. But if you are, and you see there are ways that even though I'm trusting Christ, I'm resisting his restraints, turn in loving obedience, lest you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. None of us are beyond that being hardened. Remember that God's commands are not burdensome, but be on guard. We see the wicked rebelling against God. We sometimes get angry. We sometimes get afraid. We sometimes get careless. We can be influenced by the nation's raging. But see what God does as we come to act two. God laughs. God laughs. He laughs and scoffs at the wicked. Who laughs? The one who sits in the heaven. And so the kings of the earth are puny in comparison. You've perhaps sometimes seen a child trying to force their will against an adult. And it usually doesn't end well for the child. And sometimes, as you watch that, you might chuckle. It's not gonna work, little one. That's, I think, what's going on here. God sees the nations rebelling, and he laughs. He mocks at them. Two other times in the Psalms, we're told that God laughs at the wicked. Now we might want God to respond differently. We might want God to always stop the wicked in their tracks all the time. And there's nothing wrong with praying that God would do that. And sometimes God does, as He did with Saul on the road to Damascus. It's not always clear why God doesn't always stop the wicked in their tracks. But this is clear, it may not yet be the time of God's punishment of the wicked, but rest assured that he is laughing at their puny efforts to resist his will. God laughs and scoffs at the wicked. He scolds and punishes them as we see in verse 5. He speaks to them in his righteous anger. Now we need to understand God's righteous anger is so different from our anger almost always. We get angry on a whim. We raise our voice just for effect. But God, in his just and righteous anger, punishes and scolds the wicked. He brings distress to them because he is deeply displeased. And again, we can ask that. When we pray for the nations who are rebelling against God and against his Christ, we can ask God to bring distress to them And often we might ask God to bring distress to them so that they might turn, that they might recognize how puny their efforts are, and they might repent and believe the good news that Christ died for rebellious sinners like me and like you. So what is God's message to the wicked as he laughs and scoffs at them? And that brings us to act three in verses six through nine. God says that Jesus is reigning. Jesus is reigning. I wonder if any of you have red letter Bibles. It's hard to get a Bible anymore that's not red letter. And many of us don't particularly like them. because they emphasize wrongly that this is Jesus' words and this other isn't. And yet Jesus said it's all about him and he's the author of it, he is the word. But I wonder how many of your red letter Bibles have verse seven and eight and nine in red letters. Because there's no question about who's speaking in those verses. It's Jesus himself speaking. God has announced, Jesus is my king. And that's what we see, he is God's king. And God has put Jesus, his king, on the throne. And having put his king on the throne, his king is ruling in Zion. And so we can ask the question that we find in Psalm 24, who is this king of glory? Who is this one? Who is this king that God has set on Zion, on His holy hill? Could it be David? Perhaps in part. David pointed to Christ. David in some ways was a type of Christ. And yet the language here, even though David did rule on God's throne, And Solomon and their sons ruled on God's throne. The language here is not used of David. It's used of Jesus even in the Old Testament. Go to Isaiah 24, on that day we read the moon will be put to shame and the sun disgraced because the Lord of armies will reign as king on Mount Zion in Jerusalem and he will display his glory in the presence of his elders. Jesus is God's king. He is also God's begotten son. Interesting that word is translated differently, begotten. Today I have begotten you. Today I have become your father. It really just means that you have brought this one forth normally through the natural progress of reproduction. But God says to his son, and Jesus tells us that in what would be the red letters if our red letter Bibles were completely consistent. He said to me, you are my son. Today, I have begotten you. Today, I have become your father. And we read that declaration from God to Jesus all through Jesus' earthly ministry. At his baptism, a voice from heaven said, this is my son. whom I love, with whom I am well pleased. On the Mount of Transfiguration, while he was speaking, a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from the cloud said, This is my son, with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him. We see that the followers of Jesus in the book of Acts, the Acts of the Holy Spirit through the disciples of Jesus, And in Acts 13 we read this, God raised Him from the dead and He appeared for many days to those who came up with Him from Galilee to Jerusalem, who are now His witnesses to the people. And we ourselves proclaim to you the good news of the promise that was made to our ancestors. God has fulfilled this for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm, You are my son, today I have begotten you. You are my son, today I have become your father. And though those of us who are in Christ can completely legitimately claim God is my father, he is not my father in exactly the same way that he is the father of the eternal son of God. The one who is always God, and yet came to this earth begotten by his father so that he could purchase redemption for his people. For all those who would put their faith in him we can say in him God is my father. but I have been adopted, not begotten. You, if you are in Christ, have been adopted as sons and daughters of the living God. Jesus reigns as God's king, as God's begotten son, and he reigns over all the nations of the earth, ruling over all. And we don't yet see it. The author of Hebrews makes that same point. God subjected everything under Jesus' feet, for in subjecting everything to Him, He left nothing that is not subject to Him. As it is, we do not yet see everything subjected to Him. And so sometimes we look at the wicked and we get scared. Sometimes we look at the wicked rebelling against God and we think, why isn't Jesus in charge? Why are these wicked ones in charge? They're not in charge. Jesus reigns over all the nations of the earth. He reigns over the United States of America. He reigns over Australia. Those are the two nations that I've been most involved with, one more than the other, in my life. And we don't yet see the nations under His authority. We see many still in rebellion. We see many casting off God's restraints. And in my lifetime, in this nation, the increase of the rebellion against God and his Christ, the increase of the casting off of the restraints of Christ have increased many fold. I talked to Christians, sincere Christians, who say, I'm a little nervous about bringing children into this world. And I understand that, and yet we must remember that Christ is reigning, that He is ruling over all the nations of the earth. He is reigning now, and He is even now subduing God's enemies. And so that gives us reason not to fear those rebelling against Christ. It gives us reasons to be confident that the gospel will have an effect. When you go out and proclaim the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ dying for sinners like me and like you, you can go with a confidence. It will have an effect. Will it save this person, that person, people for whom you're praying, people with whom you're talking? We don't know that, but we know that it will have an effect. Some of you know Pastor Harry Metzger, he's been a friend of mine since the beginning of his pastoral ministry. He and his wife were at Southside Indianapolis before he went to seminary. Nancy and I were involved in the early days, going up once a month to help with the fledgling church plant in the northern Chicago area where they were. And I don't think we keep records like this, but as far as I know, Harry Metzger has probably knocked on more doors to share the gospel with people than anyone else I know. And he told me one of the things that gave him confidence, is he would walk up the sidewalk to a door, and he loved to go in the middle of those Chicago winters, because if people invite me in, they don't stand and talk at the doorstep. But the thing that gave him confidence, he said, as he was walking up to the door, he would think, perhaps there's one in this house that God is saving through Jesus Christ. And perhaps God will use the gospel that I want to speak to them to bring them to salvation. And many in the early days of that congregation came to Christ Many of them meeting Harry for the first time as he knocked on their door and said, Can I ask you about your religious beliefs or something like that? His confidence was not in himself, but was in the fact that Jesus is ruling. And so we read in the book of Acts, the disciples were bold, and they preached Christ, and they were willing to suffer, and they shared all things that they had in common, and they did that because they had seen the risen Christ, and they saw him continuing to work even after he had ascended. Act two, Jesus is reigning. Act three. Sorry, act three is Jesus is reigning. Act four, time to choose. This psalm, as do many of the psalms in God's Word, present a choice that you and I must make. And though the instruction is given particularly to the nations, there's value in us considering it as well. It's time to choose. Are you going to be wise? Are you going to be wise? Are you going to be instructed? As I mentioned this morning, the Bible is not just for information. It calls you and me to choose this day whom you will serve. Some of you might have a plaque in your kitchen or in your living room. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. And it's a great phrase. And it's a good thing to mark your house with. And I suspect that most of you understand the context of that phrase. Joshua is talking to the people near the end of his life and ministry. And he says to them, fear the Lord. Worship Him in sincerity and truth. Get rid of the gods of your ancestors that your ancestors worshiped beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt and worship the Lord. He gives them a command, worship God. And then he says, if it doesn't please you to worship the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will worship. What he's saying to them there, after having commanded them to worship God, and God by His Spirit having commanded us to worship God, he's saying if you're not willing to worship God then choose. Choose any of the false gods because it doesn't matter which one you choose. You can have a false god that your ancestors worshiped beyond the Euphrates. You'd be wrong in doing that, but if you're not gonna worship God, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve. The gods your ancestors worshiped beyond the Euphrates are the gods of the Amorites and whose land you're living. If you're not gonna worship God, then it doesn't matter what false god you worship because none of them can help you ultimately. And then he says, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. And that's the confident choice of those who have come to know the Lord Jesus Christ. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. We have a similar kind of question given as Elijah meets with the prophets of Baal. And he says, how long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him. But if Baal, follow him. And then he demonstrated clearly by the power of God that Baal was nothing. That he was either asleep, or he was resting, or he was taking care of business because he couldn't do what the living God, Yahweh, could do. And so it's time to choose, the psalmist says. Be wise and serve Jesus as Lord. Serve Jesus as Lord. And the calling of the scripture, even to the Christian, is to serve Jesus with fear and trembling. Not terror, but a reverential awe. I'm gonna paint a scenario for you, and it's probably hard for us who've not grown up in a monarchy to imagine, but try. Imagine that you're in a setting with a king who has absolute power. And imagine that you have been found guilty of treason against the king, a capital crime, and you know that you deserve to be put to death. And yet, if you will, imagine with me that you are told the king will see you and that he has decided to pardon you and that he calls you to repent of your crime and serve him instead. We can imagine if such a thing happened that we would serve that king with a deep reverence, with a deep affection. aware that we deserve death. And there'd be a sense in which we would approach that king in some measure of fear and trembling. Thankful trembling, but trembling nevertheless. And that's the call here. Serve Jesus as Lord. Approach him with fear and trembling and love him. Kiss him a kiss of affection and respect because if you are in Christ, he has rescued you from death. Far more significantly than that imaginary situation where you'd committed treason against the king, you were born in rebellion against God. From your infancy, in fact, from your conception, you were seeking to cast off his restraints and yet God in his mercy. And for many of you who've grown up as covenant children in covenant homes, you don't ever remember the extent of that rebellion. Your parents probably saw it before you could communicate. And yet, for many of you, God and his mercy have brought you, even in your infancy, to believe the scriptures which are able to make you wise to salvation. And so it's easy for you to say, I will kiss Jesus with affection, with love. The gospels record two kisses given to Jesus. One is from Judas in the garden, where he leads a crowd of soldiers up to Jesus and his disciples, and he betrays Jesus with a kiss, and we don't really understand that. Why didn't they just, you know, look at his photo ID? Because they didn't have those then, and he identified he is the one. This is Jesus of Nazareth, the one you are seeking. The other kiss was the kiss of the woman, the sinful woman. That when Jesus was invited to the Pharisee's house, And this woman heard that he was there, she came in, and she anointed him with precious oil. And she wept, and she washed his feet with her tears as she kissed them in affection and love. And the Pharisee thought if Jesus knew what kind of woman this was, he wouldn't let her be touching him. And Jesus, knowing what he thought, said, if one is forgiven a little, will they love more than one who is forgiven a lot? And the Pharisee said, no, the one who's forgiven much will love much. That woman loved Jesus. She kissed him with an affection and he turned to her and said, woman, your sins are forgiven. If you know Jesus in that way, then serve him as Lord and kiss him with a kiss of affection and respect. And notice the last warning, or you will perish, or you will be destroyed. There's two ways, two ways to live, two destinations. Rebel against the Son and perish. Trust in the Son and be blessed now and forever. Kiss the Son. Blessed are all who put their trust in Him. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, may it be that each one of us can say, yes, I love the Lord Jesus. I have kissed him with a kiss of affection and I will kiss him as long as I live. And we understand that it's not a physical action for us because he's not physically in our presence, but he's spiritually with us. And he has sent us his Holy Spirit to guide us. And he has given us this great good news that we can proclaim to others. Don't rebel. Don't rebel against God and his Christ. Serve him instead. Might it be, Lord, that you would use the witness of Springs Reform Church, of us as people who can say, I was lost but have been found. I was a rebel against the king, but he has saved me and made me his willing subject. Might it be that we would tell others and see some come to believe in him through Jesus Christ the only way. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.