The Psalms 2b: The Reign of the Lord's Anointed

So let’s be honest with ourselves, it took longer than expected to get through those first 4 verses. I can’t say whether or not every psalm will be this way, but at least now you know a little bit of what we’re doing here. We may go down some rabbit trails when we see something interesting. I hope that’s OK with you. 😊

Since we’re still pretty close to the beginning of this psalm why don’t we do a quick once over on the whole thing again, and then we’ll pick back up in verse 5.

The Reign of the Lord's Anointed

1  Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? 

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 break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us. 

4  He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision. 

5  Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure. 

6  Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. 

7  I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee. 

8  Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. 

9  Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel. 

10  Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth. 

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

12  Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him. 

Let’s switch it up and go to a different translation for this verse. When I see lines like “vex them in His sore displeasure” I start to get a little confused. The ISV renders this verse as follows:

5 In his anger he rebukes them,

                         and in his wrath he terrifies them:

In other words, God ain’t playing around anymore. What do we know about the wrath of God? Well, we know that we, the commonwealth of Israel (Eph 2:12 –“remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.”) , aren’t appointed to God’s wrath (1 Thes 5:9 – “For God has not destined us to receive wrath but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus, the Messiah,”) but there are some very real promises of wrath in the book of Revelation (Rev 16 – the whole chapter). So, in verse 5, who is it that’s seeing this wrath of God? At the very least, it’s those who are out of covenant (remember our study on the word ‘goyim’ from last time) and who are outside of the commonwealth of Israel. And if we're looking at eschatological prophecy is in view then we’re talking about, basically, anyone who has taken the mark of the beast.

6 “I have set my king on Zion,

                         my holy mountain.”

Time for some more questions! Let’s start with the easy question: where is Zion? The quick and easy answer is that it’s a mountain in Jerusalem. If you want to dig deeper, it stops being quite so easy, but that’s an entirely different topic…

The second question would have to be, who is His king? Actually, let’s first talk about why God would be saying that He placed a king on Zion. In ancient Near Eastern (ANE) society it was almost always claimed by the king that they had been installed as king by their god(s). So for Israel to not be able to make the same claim – even though the Israelite religion would deny that the gods in question from those other kingdoms were actually God, and that they were actually devils (we went over this a bit last time but the a verse reference would be Deut 32:16-17) – would be, in essence, weakening the claim of the Israelite king to the surrounding nations.

Ok, now back to who God’s king is…

We need to first recognize that our God, Himself, is the actual King over all the earth (Ps 47:7, Ps 22:28, Ps 98:6). But there’s something different happening here, as well. There is a hint, an allusion of the sonship of Messiah at play here. In Zecheriah 14:9 we read, “The LORD will be king over all the earth at that time. There will be one LORD, and his name the only one.” The language here dictates that we’re talking about a future event. If the LORD is already king over the earth (as we’ve just shown), why is it that we’re looking at this with a future fulfillment in view? It’s possible that this was a reference to a future time when God would reinstate His dominance over the earth. That’s a perfectly valid interpretation. But, it’s also possible that this is reference to Jesus being God, because He is also described as King over the earth.

In 1 Timothy 6:15 God the Father is described as “King of kings and Lord of lords” but in Revelation 19:16 we see this very same title being applied to Jesus. In fact, in the verse before (Rev 19:15) we have a reference to this very description of God’s king sitting on the holy mountain of Zion. It says, “And out of his mouth comes a sharp sword with which  to strike own nations – ‘He will rule them with a staff of iron.’ It is he who treads the winepress from which flows the wind of the furious rage of ADONAI, God of heaven’s armies. (CJB). That brings us to our next few verses…

7 Let me announce the decree of the LORD

                         that he told me:

                         “You are my son,

                         today I have become your father.

8 Ask of me, and I will give you

                         the nations as your inheritance,

                         the ends of the earth as your possession.

9 You will break them with an iron rod,

                         you will shatter them like pottery.”

The same iron rod (staff) is in view here. We’re already drawing the connections between Psalm 2 and Messianic end times fulfillment, and verse 9 is connected to Revelation 19, when Jesus is enthroned over all the earth.

If there’s still any questions over whether it’s Jesus who is in view here, Hebrews 1:5 clears this up, “For to which of the angels did He ever say, ‘You are My Son, Today I have begotten you’? And again: ‘I will be to Him a Father, And He shall be to Me a Son’?” And in Acts 13:33 we read, “God has fulfilled this for us their children, in that He has raised up Jesus. As it is also written in the second Psalm: ‘You are My Son, Today I have begotten You.’”

So, who is this king who God has installed on His holy mountain? It is none other than King Yeshua, King Jesus.

Before we move on I feel that we should at least bring something up for verse 8. (I know we’re going slow here, but I promise we’re getting through the rest of this psalm today. Just something real quick…)

When Jesus was fasting in the wilderness and Satan tempted Him, one of the things Satan offered Jesus was “all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.” (Mat 4:8). We can assume that Satan actually had the authority to make the offer since Jesus didn’t deny the validity of the claim but, through Scripture, told him, “You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.” But I’d like to point out that Jesus knew that because He worshipped the Father, and Him only did He serve, He was going to receive the nations after Satan lost his claim upon the earth. You can go into this little study a lot deeper than I’m doing here (and I think you’ll have a good time if you do) but I just wanted to touch on it before we moved on to the next verses.

10 Therefore, kings, act wisely!

                         Earthly rulers, be warned!

11 Serve the LORD with fear,

                         and rejoice with trembling.

12 Kiss the son before he becomes angry,

                         and you die where you stand.

                         Indeed, his wrath can flare up quickly.

                         How blessed are those who take refuge in him.

I think this part here is pretty self-explanatory, but let’s look at it just a little bit. The most surprising – and almost out of place – is plea for repentance. Repentance is always something that we should be focusing on when we’re viewing ourselves. And we should always be praying for the repentance and restoration of those who would stand against our King, but it seems a little bit strange coming directly after we’re told of their coming judgment of being broken like pottery. But I think that this is important for us to remember. No man is so far removed from the Father that he is beyond the grasp of the Father. Our heart’s cry should be for the salvation of every man, no matter how we view their current actions.

In reading 2 Peter 3:9 we see that God is “not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” Our most adamant prayers, greater than my pleas for health or relief, should be for the salvation of every man, even my enemies. It’s sometimes difficult to prayer for the salvation of our enemies but it’s a selfish thing to want to win an argument more than we want to see those around us come to know the Father’s love. I’m just as guilty as anyone else here, but I’m trying.

I’ll repeat the last line of the last verse one last time in closing:

How blessed are those who take refuge in HIM!

Shalom!

The Psalms 2a: The Reign of the Lord's Anointed (verses 1-4)

This is one of those Psalms that I’ve always been attracted to. It’s no secret to anyone who knows me that I don’t turn away from discussions on the New World Order, or on the conspiracies of those in power. This psalm lends itself to those discussions! Same as the last time, we’ll read through the entire psalm, and then we’ll dig a little deeper by looking at individual verses. This time we’re going to start out with the KJV and then we may use other translations when we take a closer look. Let’s get started!

The Reign of the Lord's Anointed

1  Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? 

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 break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us. 

4  He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision. 

5  Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure. 

6  Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. 

7  I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee. 

8  Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. 

9  Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel. 

10  Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth. 

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

12  Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him. 

So, much like when we looked into Psalm 1, the translation I used is because I like the way it treats one specific thing. One of the things people like about the old King James text is the high-brow language it uses, and how it’s almost Shakespearean when read for effect. Sometimes I think that this actually hurts the KJV but, in this instance, the effect it has on an audible reading of the text is second to none.

Read it out loud, like you’re on stage performing Hamlet:

1  Why do the heathen rage,
    And the people imagine a vain thing?

Here the word translated ‘heathen’ is the Hebrew word goyim (גוים). Most of us have heard the word ‘goy’ before, if only in passing. Most Christians have a decent understanding that goy, to some extent, means ‘gentile’. The NKJV uses the word ‘nations’ here, which is actually how ‘goy’ is most often translated.

But one of the most basic translations for ‘goy’ (or, gentile) is ‘out of covenant’. So what this verse is saying is that all of those who are not in covenant, everyone who is out of covenant with God, are the ones who are plotting against the Creator of the universe. Unrelated to this verse but related to the word ‘goy’ and its translation as gentile, is that we should keep this covenant thing in mind when we think about being gentile believers. I can’t really understand the concept of being an out of covenant believer of the new covenant. But that’s just me...

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 break their bands asunder,
     And cast away their cords from us.” 

This, to me, is one of the most outrageous thoughts you could possibly think. Think about it in an eschatological mindset. If this psalm is talking about the coming of Messiah, which it certainly appears that way, then we have to accept that this verse should be looked at in an ‘end-times’ view. In fact, when the KJV was retranslated into the NKJV there are quite a few words here which are capitalized, which weren’t capitalized in the original KJV, including the word both instances of ‘their’ in verse 3. This shouldn’t be given too great of authority, since there were no capital letters in the original Hebrew. What we can take this to mean is that, at least in the eyes of the NKJV translators, this was viewed as prophetic of Messiah. It should also be mentioned that, according to the Hebrew way of thought, prophecy is pattern. So this being about an end-time Messiah doesn’t preclude it from also being about a king of ancient Israel, whether that be David or any of the other kings. Kings were anointed by God to lead the nation. But we should also remember that Messiah (and Christ) means ‘Anointed’.

How crazy is this? The rulers of the world are planning a war against the Creator of the universe. The words here seem to indicate that they know that they’re plotting against God, and against His Messiah, against His Son. You can look around at the world today and you can see this happening. You can see, more and more, people on TV openly blaspheming God. People are less and less scared of making fun of the Lord of creation. But, usually, they’re making fun of Him because they believe He doesn’t exist. So is that what’s in view in this verse?

Or… are the kings and rulers in this piece of Scripture actually making plans for war against a God who they believe exists? This is why I find these verses so amazing. If a straight forward interpretation of this passage is the correct one, then you have kings and rulers who are planning against a God who they believes actually exists, and they think they can win! At the time that this psalm would’ve been written, this is exactly what would’ve been happening. The only difference is that the kings and rulers would’ve been fighting on behalf of their own gods.

I guess we shouldn’t automatically assume that today’s elite aren’t fighting on behalf of gods of their own. In Deuteronomy 32:17 we read in Moses’s song about Israel seeking after other gods (“They sacrificed unto devils, not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not.”). This verse indicates that the other gods that people put up for themselves are not only constructs, but they have personality behind them. They are the devils, the shedim (שֵּׁדִים). This word can simply mean what we think of as ‘demon’, but it can go further to even having a relation to the word which we get the title ‘satan’ from. Adam Clarke’s commentary on the Bible says this:

“The original word שדים  shedim has been variously understood. The Syriac, Chaldee, Targums of Jerusalem and Jonathan, and the Samaritan, retain the original word: the Vulgate, Septuagint, Arabic, Persic, Coptic, and Anglo-Saxon, have devils or demons. The Septuagint has εθυσαν δαιμονιοις, they sacrificed to demons: the Vulgate copies the Septuagint: the Arabic has sheeateen, the plural of Sheetan, Satan, by which the rebellious angels appear to be intended, as the word comes from the root shatana, he was obstinate, proud, refractory, went far away. And it is likely that these fallen spirits, having utterly lost the empire at which they aimed, got themselves worshipped under various forms and names in different places. The Anglo-Saxon has devils.”

So we see that other entities exist behind the scenes of world affairs. We get an even better picture of this in the tenth chapter of the book of Daniel where an angel (probably Gabriel, since the message he brought was heralding the coming of Messiah) talks throughout the chapter about territorial spirits waging war with the angels of God (“Then he said, "Do you know why I have come to you? And now I must return to fight with the prince of Persia; and when I have gone forth, indeed the prince of Greece will come.” Dan 10:20).

But what does this all mean when we put it in the context of how it should affect us? Are there real gods behind the powers of this world? Well, Ephesians 6:12 is pretty straight-forward on this one, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” So, yes, there are real entities that we’re struggling against! And, no, these are not the villains that you can see right in front of you! Should we be scared? Well, I guess it depends on who you’re putting your faith in. If you’re trusting in the spiritual host of wickedness then you should probably be very frightened. Very, very frightened.

But…

If your faith is in the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob then you should have no fear whatsoever. That doesn’t mean that you should take your enemies lightly. For sure, put on the whole armor of God before entering into your day, but our Father and our King who sits on the throne in heaven takes them lightly. How lightly? He laughs at them in derision. In case you don’t believe me let me close this section by looking at one more verse in our second psalm.

4  He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh:
     the Lord shall have them in derision. 

That’s how much fear these spiritual hosts of wickedness cause in our Father and King. He literally is laughing at them while sitting on His throne.

OK, we’ve only made it through 4 verses, but we’ve also made it through 4 pages so we’re going to call this part one of psalm 2, and get to work on the part 2. Hey, I never promised that these are gonna be short. Just wait ‘til we get to Psalm 119…

But the important part here is… what do you think? Do you think that we’re living out this psalm right now? Are we watching the kings and rulers plotting against the LORD and His Messiah?

What are your thoughts?

Until next time…
Shalom!

The Psalms 1: The Way of the Righteous and the End of the Wicked

I don't know how long this is going to take, and I don't know how frequently it's going to come out, but I feel the need to work my way through the Psalms with you and let ourselves reflect and be uplifted.

We'll read through the Psalms and we'll look at what each verse means and what the whole thought of the Psalm means. And I'm sure I'll miss things. Maybe others can bring up their own revelations.

We'll read through the verses that we'll be looking at so that we can get the whole scope of the writing. Then we can go over each individual verse, and see what we can gather. After that, we'll step back and look at the overall, larger meaning.

This will probably evolve over time, but this is what it's going to look like at the start. So... let's start!

1 Blessed is the man
    Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly,
     Nor stands in the path of the sinners,
     Nor sits in the seat of the scornful;
2 But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
     And in His law he meditates day and night.
3 He shall be like a tree
     Planted by the rivers of water,
     That brings forth its fruit in its season,
     Whose leaf also shall not wither;
    And whatever he does shall prosper.
4 The ungodly are not so,
   But are like the chaff which the wind drives away.
5 Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment,
   Nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.  
6 For the LORD knows the way of the righteous,
   But the way of the ungodly shall perish.

The Psalms are amazing, and full of so much knowledge. This, at first, can seem so basic. This, at first, can seem like empty words on the page. But... look a little deeper.

The translation used above is the New King James Version. As we look a little bit closer at each verse I'm going to switch over to the Complete Jewish Bible (CJB) translation.

1 How blessed are those
   who reject the advice of the wicked,
   don't stand on the way of sinners
   or sit where scoffers sit!

I'll be honest, the reason I chose the CJB here is because the way it starts reminds me of the movie The Life of Brian (admittedly, this movie can be viewed as blasphemous this shouldn't necessarily be viewed as an endorsement of the movie), and how when Jesus is shown delivering the Sermon on the Mount he starts every blessing by saying "How blessed are those..." instead of the more prevelant "Blessed are the...". OK, onto what the verse is actually saying!

This all seems pretty clear but how often do we actual pay attention to this as we go about our life? How often do we actively reject the advice of the wicked, and get out of the way of sinners. This second part is an active choice. If you've taken a stance and sinners are coming to your position, make sure the world know that you are not associated with them. Don't give people the opportunity to confuse you with the wicked. Sometimes this can be a painful choice to make. I mean, you were there first, right? But we are to be a shining light, so when we go into the world we are to bring the Light of the world with us, not have Him dimmed because we try to fit in with the wickedness around us.

And when we read "or sit where scoffers sit," we need to make sure that we're not using this to justify never interacting with those outside of covenant. If we're seeking to mimic our walk after that of Jesus then we need to see that it's OK to spend time with sinners. We just need to make sure that we're not becoming the world while we're in it.

2 Their delight
   is in ADONAI's Torah;
   on his Torah they meditate
   day and night.

As Christians we're often led to believe that the Torah is bondage so we should probably unpack this a little bit. First of all, yes, the word translated in the NKJV a law is the Hebrew word Torah (תּורה). And, yes, the all caps words LORD and ADONAI both come from Hebrew word YHVH (Yehovah, Yahweh, Yahuah..., but most traditions just don't want to pronounce the actual name of God in heaven - not to mention that there's really no consensus on how to actually pronounce the name of God -  so the capitalize the word "lord"). So this verse, describing the person who steps aside from sinners, and won't take advice from the wicked, is saying that the flip-side of this coin is someone who delight's in the law of the Father and meditates on it constantly.

If you're like me you may be thinking about how little you actually think about the Torah. But this is what the verse says, and I can't change it. Maybe we should dig into the word Torah a little bit. Though it is usually translated as "law" a more accurate translation according to a modern understanding of the words would be "instructions". It is true that the first five books of the Bible are traditionally called The Torah, but I'll leave it between you and God as to whether this verse is talking strictly about the first five books of the Bible, or if it's simply saying that the blessed man will meditate on the instructions of the Father. Now, it should be noted that, either way, it still has to be talking about the Old Testament instructions of the Father. That doesn't sound like "bondage", does it. Frankly, I'm still trying to find the place in the Bible where the Torah is ever called bondage. But we're often told that it's bondage. My suggestion is that maybe we need to start to think differently about what "the Law" is, and what it isn't. If "the Law" is something that we're supposed to delight in, maybe the answer is a little bit deeper than we're often led to believe.

This subject deserves a much bigger unpacking and going into it too much further while looking at the first Psalm isn't really going to do it justice, so let's move on to the next verse. But if anyone wants a deeper exploration, maybe we can do that later.

3 They are like trees planted by streams -
   they bear their fruit in season,
   their leaves never whither,
   everything they do succeeds.

So those who focus on the instructions of the Father are like a tree planted by a stream. How often do we just feel spiritually parched? How often does it feel like chaos is happening all around us? Is it possible that it feels like this because we're hanging out around chaos?

4 Not so the wicked,
   who are like chaff driven by the wind

Here's the time for honesty: does your life feel more like verse 3 or verse 4? Too often, my life is more verse 4 than it is verse 3. But the more I ground myself in the instructions of God, the more I'm able to feel calm and fruitful, even though chaos may be raging all around me.

5 For this reason the wicked
   won't stand up to the judgment,
   nor will sinners
   at the gathering of the righteous.

This translation here brings a thought to mind. Most translations for this verse use the word "congregation" instead of "gathering". There are a few translations that use the word "assembly" instead of "congregation" and I think that assembly is probably a better choice. (Not that I'm a Hebrew scholar, or anything...) The issue is that, to our modern brain, the word "congregation" isn't really thought of anymore as anything other than "the church". Whereas, "assembly" can be the people in the church, but it's also an active descriptive term. So when you're reading a verse about the wicked being judged it may make sense to relate that to the actual judgment of sinners during the end times. I'll admit that this is mostly speculation but I think that the assembly or gathering spoken of here may be referring to the same gathering we read about in the New Testament (Matt 24:31,2 Thes 2:1...). The "gathering" in the New Testament is another name for what is commonly referred to as 'the rapture'. I won't go into the different viewpoints on the timing of the rapture (though if anyone talks to me about it they'll certainly get the idea that I'm fairly passionate about it) but I do want to open the discussion on whether this verse should be viewed in an eschatological context.

6 For ADONAI watches over
   the way of the righteous,
   but the way of the wicked
   is doomed.

If, as we discussed pertaining to the previous verse, this is actually talking about an end-times judgment, this verse a little more significant than it may at first appear. As we get closer every day to the great and terrible Day of the LORD, it should be comforting to know that the very same LORD who will be divvying out judgment is the same LORD who is watching over the righteous. And while we know that there is no righteous man alive (Rom 3:10, Ecc 7:20), we also know that we have been made righteous through the Justification given to us upon entering into covenant with God through the sacrifice of Jesus. And by the power of the Holy Spirit we are able to walk in right standing with God and keep His commands (Rom 8:4). Talk about a 'comforter'...

And there you have it, we finally made it through six verses. Now I get to start diving into the second psalm. I'll meet you back here soon and we can dig in all over again.

Shalom!