Psalm 2 – 150 Days of Purposeful Meditation (Day 2) Remix

God is laughing hysterically at the state of our Union.  We celebrate this day as our independence day.  The day that our nation declared independence from the authority that then ruled over it.  Since then, we have been on an increasing decline drifting farther and farther away from all authority…except our own.

The Kings of Psa 2 “take their stand together against the Lord and His anointed…[so that they may] tear [the Lord’s] fetters…and cast away [His] chords from them.”  They want the right to rule and govern themselves apart from God, their creator.  They want to make their own decisions about what is right and what is wrong.  They want to make their own standards of law and morality.  They want to write their own commandments to live by.  They do not want the Lord or His Anointed sticking their noses into their business.

Sound familiar?  Our own nation, as many freedoms as we boast of (even the fact that I am able to write this without threat of open persecution is indicative of the freedoms we enjoy), as much relative good as we pursue; it is all ultimately for the expressed purpose of pursuing our own standard of “happiness” apart from any outside ruling authority.  This agenda is very clear, though its hard to know where to begin the discussion.  Marriage, abortion, homosexual “rights”, even the blurring of gender and gender roles.  These are among the many issues that our government is in the process of redefining and legislating according to its own agenda (admittedly the agenda of the “people”), apart from the expressed agenda of the Lord and His Anointed.  We quibble about gun control, taxes and privacy while as a nation we collectively thumb our noses at our Creator and His chosen King.  We have nationally rejected His law, His way and His chosen One.  The message of this Psalm is for us, today.

How does the Lord respond to the state of our union today?  Is He worried?  Is He afraid of where we may go next?  Is He concerned that we used to follow a morality consistent with Judeo-Christian values and have in recent days made every attempt to distance ourselves from those values?  No.  This Psalm tells us that as He looks down from Heaven upon the United States of America with its “In God we trusts” and “God bless America’s”, He sits back and laughs hysterically.

4 He who sits in the heavens laughs, The Lord scoffs at them. (Psa 2:4 NAU)

He laughs and He mocks us as we seek to redefine morality in our own image.  Autonomy is the god of our day along with his children, relativism and tolerance.  These have become our championed values, the new morality and anyone who resists this morality is counted as treasonous.  And since the Lord and His Anointed One are decidedly against the gods of our nation; we seek to sever our connection with Him at any costs.  And yet this is the very thing that moves God to hysterical laughter, even mockery.

We love the idea of “free will.”  There is a doctrine in the world of men that speaks of free will as that which is an inalienable right, an innate quality of mankind.  And yet in this we have deceived ourselves.  There is no such thing as absolute freedom among men.  We are created beings and by definition are subject to our creator.  Thus there is no absolute freedom.  And even if there were no creator and we came into being solely on the basis of chance (which the probability of such a theory, though widely held, flings one headlong into insanity); then it would be chance to whom we are subject and not we ourselves.  Thus again, leaving no room for absolute freedom.  Either we are subject to a Creator or we are subject to chance.  Nevertheless, we are created beings and as such are ultimately subject to the divine will.  We may not acknowledge that, but God certainly knows it to be true.  And He no more needs to convince us of that than we need convince an ant that the underside of our boot is able to crush them.  It simply is.  Thus we may mock the futile attempt of an ant to run away in terror as we approach it with the expressed purpose of crushing it knowing that it will never be anything more than a futile attempt.

Clearly that is the nature of the message of this Psalm.  Our attempts to throw away His fetters, to disconnect ourselves from the Sovereign will of God are futile.  We may feel that we do well to run far away from the approach of the iron rod that is coming but it will never be anything more than a futile attempt.  This Psalm is forward looking.  It predicts the time in the future when the Lord’s Anointed will literally reign upon the earth and when the kings of the earth will literally reject and rebel against His authority.  And yet none will escape His Almighty judgments against their rebellion.

 9 ‘You shall break them with a rod of iron, You shall shatter them like earthenware.'” (Psa 2:9 NAU)

Yet while the prediction of this Psalm will ultimately not be fulfilled until that day, we know that the judgments of the Lord may also be given in the present day.  There is no promise in scripture for the United States of America.  There is no promise for its endurance, for its remaining prominence, for its future.  There is really no mention of the United States in any of the prophetic writings, no matter how some bible teachers stretch and twist the words of scripture to attempt to place her on the map.  Either she will fall prior to that day or she will be so greatly diminished that she is not worth mentioning.  Sometimes silence speaks louder than words.

What does that mean for us?  Even as we celebrate the day that our nation took on its own international identity, we should set realistic expectations about our place in His world.  We can either ignore prophecy and assume that it doesn’t apply to us or acknowledge that His word is true and valuable (Psalm 1) and act accordingly.  If you choose to acknowledge the truthfulness and value of God’s word you would do well to consider the following warning:

10 Now therefore, O kings, show discernment; Take warning, O judges of the earth.
11 Worship the LORD with reverence And rejoice with trembling.
12 Do homage to the Son, that He not become angry, and you perish in the way, For His wrath may soon be kindled. How blessed are all who take refuge in Him! (Psa 2:10-12 NAU)

The real issue facing our nation today is a matter of worship…and obedience.  Who will we worship and who will we obey?  Do we continue to worship our independence and seek to obey the god of autonomy?  Or do we return and worship the Lord with reverence and seek to obey His Son, the King whom He has chosen?

The cost is real.  “Do homage to the Son, that He not become angry and you perish in the way, for His wrath may soon be kindled.”  The warning is that this Son, the divinely chosen King, may become angry and cause the rebelling nations to perish.  This is the same perish from Psalm 1, mentioned in an earlier post.  These two Psalms were meant to be taken together as an introduction to the whole book of 150 Psalms.  Thus the identity of the blessed One of Psalm 1 and this One mentioned here as the Son who is installed as King are one and the same.  The reason why He is chosen above all others is clear from Psalm 1, because of His love for and delight in the will of God.  Furthermore this connection to that which will perish is another indication as to His duty as the blessed One, the chosen King.  He is sent forth with a “rod of iron” to “shatter” those who have rebelled against the Lord of Heaven.  His anger is a righteous anger, a holy anger, a God sanctioned divine anger sent down from heaven against ungodly rebellion.  This day is coming.  The King has been chosen.  Indeed scripture testifies elsewhere:

having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent,
31 because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed (Act 17:30-31 NAU)

“Do homage to the Son…”  “Worship the Lord with reverence and rejoice with trembling.”

We seek freedom in the arms of the god of autonomy.  We seek to cast away the sovereignty of our Creator but instead cast ourselves headlong into subjugation to our own devices and the consequences that result.  And yet there is the offer of true freedom remaining.

How blessed are all who take refuge in Him! (Psa 2:12 NAU)

the Lord Jesus Christ,
4 who gave Himself for our sins so that He might rescue us from this present evil age, (Gal 1:3-4 NAU)

It was for freedom that Christ set us free (Gal 5:1 NAU)

True blessing.  True happiness is found in the One who gave Himself up for us to deliver us from the evil of this age (even the evil that we have conceived as a result of our quest for independence).  True freedom is found in the Lord Jesus Christ, the truly blessed and happy One, the chosen King, the Son to whom homage is due.  True freedom is found in Him and in Him alone.

As you celebrate this Independence Day, rejoice in the One who died for you to deliver you, not from political, social or moral oppression, but from the oppression of your own lawlessness.  If you haven’t trusted in Him yet, this can be your independence day.  This can be a day of reverent worship and rejoicing over the One who is truly worthy if you cease striving and humble yourself before His rule.  If you have trusted in Him already then independence day should have a fuller meaning for you.  For you it must go beyond the stars and stripes.  For you it will be a time to remember the stripes and shed blood that He bore on the cross for you…and the resulting freedom from sin that you now enjoy as one who takes refuge in Him.

Maranatha!

Psalm 17 – 150 Days of Purposeful Meditation (Day 17) Part 1

God is Just. Why should we cry out to the Lord in our distress?  Because God is a God of justice.  His eyes are upon the righteous and righteousness.  And His ears attend to their cry.  God desires justice from His creation because He is just.  Justness is a  part of His essential character.  There is no falsehood with God.  There is no partiality.  There is no turning of the eye to oppression.  God is just.  And because He is essentially just in His character the righteous have great reason to come to Him for justice.  This is in fact the great confidence that the righteous have, that their righteousness has not fallen on deaf ears and blind eyes.  That in the end they will be repaid for their righteousness even as the wicked are repaid for their wickedness.  Of course the righteousness of the righteous is not their own for they would have no reason to cry out to God for vindication.  But it is His righteous standard that they uphold.  It cannot be their own righteousness for why would God then fight on their behalf?  Where then would be His glory?  What then would be His praise?  He would be nothing more than a body guard.  One whose job is to protect the glory of another.  Neigh but the righteousness by which the righteous is called is God’s righteousness.  It is His name, it is His glory.  And that is also their confidence and their hope.  that His righteousness shall be in the end vindicated.  That He will pursue the vindication of His own righteous standard.

God’s justness shall prevail and His righteousness shall be vindicated.  This He has made clear in many other ways.  The glory of His name and His holiness is His great passion.  Thus to pursue His glory in our own lives is the wisest course of action.  And it is an action which again will yield great reward.  The righteous may unashamedly pursue God’s righteous standard because He will vindicate it Himself.  And in vindicating His righteous standard, they will be vindicated.

The folly of the wicked is in assuming that their own glory is necessary.  It is assuming that their own standard of righteousness is enough.  However their own standard of righteousness is as transient as their own lives.  It will in the end be cast aside.  God will bring it to nothing.  It cannot stand in comparison to His own holy and righteous Word.  They may have their “portion in this life” but in the next their portion will be to drink the cup of God’s wrath and indignation against those who have scorned His righteousness and His righteous ones.  Thus the wicked are short sighted.  They fail to see past the reality of the moment to the reality of the next.  Consequence has become an illusion to the wicked.  It has dropped out of their vocabulary along with absolute and even God.  For them there is only the moment of pleasure without the thought of consequence.  If there were no consequence, the righteous might fail in heart however the righteousness of God reminds us that it is only His great mercy which has thus with held the flood of His wrath upon this earth.  It is His mercy which has stayed His hand this long in the condemnation of the wicked.  It is not for their glory.  It is not for their cunning or wisdom which has wrought them success.  It is the merciful hand of their creator which ought to lead them to repentance, but which because of their hard hearts has led many to both mock His very existence – by whose mercy they stand – and to mock His holy and righteous ones.

What then is the final hope of the righteous?  The punishment of evildoers?  No.  It is our expectation but it is not our hope that they should meet what demise they are sure to who mock the Almighty.  Do we seek the vindication of our own name or righteousness?  No.  Before God, there are none who have reason to boast in any righteousness of their own doing because before His standard we are all guilty.  What then is our final hope?  Our final hope is that the pursuit of God’s righteousness in this life will not be for naught.  Our final hope is that because of His righteousness, “we shall see His face…[and] we shall be satisfied when we awake in His likeness.”