Okay, we will go to Psalm 2, Psalm 2 this evening. Trust that you had a good prayer time. We'll continue to take our requests before the Lord. Thank you for praying for one another. I'll send out the list by email in the next 24 hours, hopefully, and people can also access the list by phone. or on your tablet, as well as a hard copy. But it's important that we do pray for one another. It's important that we have a time set aside each week. There's just so much in the turmoil around the world. We are in the midst of a a very tumultuous political election. I don't know if any of you stayed up and watched the debate last night. I'm a bit of a political news junkie to some degree, so I stayed up and I watched it, and I watched an hour of commentary afterward, so I get a little too much into it sometimes, but there's a lot, a lot to depend upon the Lord for, to trust the Lord with, and we need to be faithful. I know we need to be informed and educated, At the same time, we can't become anxious and paralyzed by fear, right? And so we're going to talk about Psalm 2. And I believe this psalm is apropos for where we're at in our culture, in society, where we're at in history. And we see the psalmist dealing with some of the same things centuries ago that we are dealing with right now. Psalm 2 is a relevant psalm, probably throughout human history, but there are specific times where Psalm 2 just seems to be especially relevant, and Psalm 2 is one of my favorite psalms. It is a royal psalm, and that means that, of course, it has specific references to the Messiah as king, or references to, of course, that would be Christ as the second person of the Trinity, as king. So it'd be a reference prophetically to King Jesus, to God in his kingly reign, his royal reign. Psalms 2, 18, 20, and 21. Psalms 45, 72, 89. 101, 110, 132. and 144 would all be considered royal psalms. The title for this psalm is not, as some psalms would have a subtitle or a title. For instance, in your Bible, you might have under Psalm 3, you might have a psalm of David when he fled from Absalom, his son. Well, Psalm 2 doesn't have any particular subtitle, but we still would believe that probably David wrote this psalm, obviously by the inspiration of God. We put it in the group of psalms known as Royal Psalms, but we're entitling the psalm, or for our purposes, for tonight and, Lord willing, even next Wednesday night, Serve the Lord, with fear, serve the Lord with fear. A simple outline that helps us to break up this psalm, to divide this psalm would be four scenes. We have the first scene, that of human rebellion, verses one through three. Scene number two is divine reaction in verses four through six. And then scene three would be divine rule, verses seven through nine. And then scene four would be human responsibility, verses 10 through 12. Years ago, I was doing an internship at Faith Baptist Church in Avon, which is now more in Danville than it is Avon. They sold their building. moved out to a new facility in Danville, Indiana, but I was doing an internship at Faith Baptist in Avon, and I got to hear Dr. David Cummins preach a message on Psalm 2. It was the best sermon I have ever heard on Psalm 2. David Cummins was the director for for Baptist World Mission for many years before Fred Moritz, and then Bud Stedman, and then I think Ben Sinclair might be the director of Baptist World now. But David Cummins was a man of God, missions-oriented, and then became the director of Baptist World, and he preached on Psalm 2, and I think we were all glued to our seats. It was a riveting message, and I walked away that night, and I think that Psalm 2 has impacted me, meant more to me since that sermon than it ever has, and I have found myself often going to Psalm 2 during times like what we're dealing with in the world today. Where we see rebellion on, it seems, every side. Where we see defiant dictators shaking their fist in God's face and committing all sorts of gross acts of evil and aggression. And they think that they're gonna get away with it. And sometimes it seems like they are. But we come to Psalm 2 and we are reminded they are not gonna get away with it. God calls each and every one of us to repentance, but he also makes us responsible. As sinners, we are responsible before a holy God for what we do with Jesus Christ, whether we accept him or we reject him. In Psalm 2 is a reminder that those who rebel against God Those who live in defiance, those who are in leadership, in a royal position, in a place of leadership, who rule, or in a place of elite influence, they are held even to a greater degree of responsibility because they are also leaders. They are also influencing and impacting others. And entire nations can be affected. And we see that. We see that in various places around the world right now. Well, the psalmist saw that. And by the inspiration of God, he penned these words. And we see these four scenes. And we see, first of all, human rebellion. Two questions. First one, why do the heathen rage? The second question, why do the people imagine a vain thing? We could maybe consider these rhetorical questions in the sense that they have an obvious answer. Why? Why would the heathen rage against a holy, almighty God? Why would the nations, the people, imagine a vain thing? Why would they put so much time and effort and energy and money and influence into what is worthless, what is not going to accomplish anything except for their own condemnation and damnation? That's essentially what the psalmist is saying. Why do the heathen rage? What are they going to accomplish against an almighty, sovereign, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent God? Why do the heathen rage? Rage is to make a tumult. It's actually quoted. John, Peter and John in Acts 4, In praying to God, they have been now persecuted by the civil authorities, told to not preach the gospel anymore. And Peter and John counted it joy. They considered it a privilege to be persecuted for Jesus' sake, to be ambassadors of the gospel. And they cried out to God in Acts 4, and they quoted from Psalm 2 in their prayer. And they were literally saying in their prayer that the civil authorities that were persecuting them, that just the short time before had also sent Jesus Christ, their savior, whom Peter and John were preaching. They had been responsible. Some of those same leaders, civil authorities and religious leaders were responsible for condemning Jesus Christ to the cross. And they quoted from Psalm 2 equating those religious leaders, those civil authorities, with the condemnations of Psalm 2 upon the heathen and the people who rage against the Lord, who imagine a vain thing. So this word rage, we would think of it in the terms of a riot. The gathering together for the purpose of creating turmoil. Literally, literally the root word means to snort like a horse. The root word would actually be the word that would be used to describe the snorting of a horse when it is angry. When it is stomping its feet, I've not been around horses a whole lot. I may have to lean on the Newtons a little bit to help me out here. Maybe Roxanne would be the expert, right? I've been around them a little bit, seen a little bit on TV and such, but I understand a colt's a horse, especially one that's not broken and it can get angry, it can get mad, it can snort and stomp its feet and basically throw a tantrum. That is the root word from which the Hebrew word rage that is then translated in the Greek in Acts 4, and they mean the same thing, to create turmoil, to create a tumult. We would refer to it today as a riot where people gather together for no good purpose. but to break windows, and loot, and burn things, and throw objects at authorities, et cetera, murder, kill, create other forms of violence. We've seen it too much even here in America, haven't we? In the last four years, especially, and other times in American history. That's basically what the word rage means. So the second question is, why do the people imagine a vain thing? Vain means empty, foolish. It means wasteful. This is a futile thing that they're doing. This rioting, this raging, this tumultuous activity against God and his people and his word is foolish. It is vain. It is empty. It is worthless. It is wasting time, energy, money, life, resources. And we would say that, wouldn't we? What does it accomplish? Destruction, mayhem, I mean, I was broken hearted when I drove downtown Indianapolis after the riots in 2020. We sat in our bedroom that night after being told by the policeman who sends his kids to our Christian school that we have been told by the illustrious mayor of Indianapolis, Mayor Joe, that we have to stand down. We can't do anything. We've been told by the mayor that we cannot intervene. And we sat in our bedroom that night, and we watched the news as the rioters descended upon the streets of Indianapolis. And we drove down weeks later, and there were buildings boarded up, windows shattered, homeless people living in some of the nicest lobbies of some of the nicest theaters in downtown Indianapolis. What did it accomplish? People dead on the streets? What was accomplished? You know what I'm saying? We see the rioting, we see the mob mentality, and what does it accomplish? Destruction. Mayhem. But they rage against the Lord, they riot against the Lord, they riot against all that God has set in place for His authority, for design, for order of society. Mom and Dad. police, all the various authorities, they can rebel and riot and defy against all of those, and it's all in vain. It's all worthless. It is all foolish, because it does nothing but accomplish the devil's work, which is condemned and damned and defeated by an almighty God, a holy God who will bring his judgment. He is saying in the Psalm, why are you setting yourselves up, heaping up to yourselves judgment from a holy God who will not tolerate this thing, who will put you down, who will defeat you, who will silence your rioting, that will put an end to your tumult. It will not accomplish anything against God's kingdom, against God's work in the world, His providence. Psalm 38 and verse 12, they also that seek after my life lay snares for me and they that seek my hurt speak mischievous things and imagine deceits all the day long. There are people like that, aren't there? They just seem to just spend all their time imagining deceits. They're in the dark web. They're in the deep, dark recesses of places on the internet and society, and all they seem to do all day long is just mischievous things. If you've ever been in any kind of a classroom setting, there are sometimes kids that you seem to think that all they ever do all day long is just look for a way to cause the teacher trouble and they are always it seems trying to do something to stir up an issue in the classroom or in the school or whatever. Maybe you have a co-worker like that. Maybe you have someone on your team like that or in a particular area where they just always seem to be stirring up trouble. They just seem to always have something negative to say or they're always pushing buttons or instigating and it's That kind of attitude that these people, these heathen, these people, the heathen and the people that imagine a vain thing that rage against the Lord, there's just this mischievous spirit and deceits and snares. in seeking hurts on God's people. Proverbs 24 and verse 2, their hearts studieth destruction and their lips talk of mischief. Isaiah 59 and verse 1, behold the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save, neither His ear heavy that it cannot hear, but your iniquities have separated between you and your God and your sins have hid His face from you. that he will not hear. For your hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity. Your lips have spoken lies, your tongue hath muttered perverseness. None calleth for justice, nor any pleadeth for truth. They trust in vanity and speak lies. They conceive mischief and bring forth iniquity." What did God say in Isaiah 59, verses 1 and 2? He says, the Lord's hand is not shortened. that it cannot save, neither is ear heavy that it cannot hear." What is he saying? I don't want the heathen to rage. I don't want the people to imagine a vain thing. I want them to be saved. My hand is reaching out to them. This is Proverbs 1. I reached out to you. I extended my arm to you, but you would not. You refused. You bite the hand that feeds you, so to speak. He's saying God wants these heathen. He wants these people in rage and rebellion and rioting in vanity. He wants them to be saved. He wants them to repent. He says it's your iniquities that have separated me from you. And you refuse to hear, even though I have extended my hands out to you. So we see the compassion of the Lord and we'll see it in verses 10 through 12 of this Psalm as well. Who are these kings of the earth that are referenced in verse two? These are the leaders, the nobility, the rulers. We see them everywhere we go. People who have political influence, political leadership, political authority and power. We see them in different political areas. We also see them in the influential area of the world. They have the most likes and follows and the most whatever, clicks. And many times, those who have such great fame and fortune are living in rebellion against God. We've seen headlines recently. Some of those people that made lots of money were known as celebrities and superstars. And it's very few and far between that there are moral people with upright There are some, but there's not very many. It's a very small minority of those superstars and celebrities that have the fame and fortune that are actually moral people, that are actually good examples. And we see some of them fall. We see some of the headlines. And we knew that they were living immorally, but they've even taken it to the point now where there's justice being served. There's prosecutions and jail time and court cases and prosecutions, because even as wicked as they were already, they've crossed even lines that are still left in our culture. Thankfully, there are still some lines of justice, right? Some still lines of right and wrong that are upheld. It seems like there are fewer and fewer. But there are leaders, there are nobility, there are rulers, they might be considered among the elite, very influential. And he says, the kings of the earth, they have set themselves. This is the idea of direct defiance and rebellion, a willful disobedience. They have set themselves, they know what they're doing. in their humanism, in their Marxism, in their evolution, in their whatever, naturalism, all of their isms, all their ideologies, are set in defiance and in opposition to God, his word, and his people. They are deliberately attacking God's people, God's word, and defiant to God's authority. We go on and we see that they take counsel This means that they plot together, they plan, they have a strategy. We know that Satan himself is influential in a spiritual sense, because he has principalities, powers, spiritual wickedness in high places. So as people believe lies, get involved in false religion and buy into false ideologies and sinful thought patterns and practice certain types of sinful behaviors and actions and activities, they find themselves under the influence, not just of the flesh and the world, but also of the devil. We have seen an increase in our culture of spiritism and new age type of stuff. And again, I've mentioned already, there's a store in the mall where you can go. And sometimes you walk by there, and you get a sniff of what's going on in that store, and you begin to wonder. It gives you the heebie-jeebies just walking by it. And all the different trinkets and rocks and stones and the signs saying, well, read your palm. Makes you wonder what kind of spiritistic kind of stuff is going on there. It's not always that overt. There's various deceptions and lies But it's the idea of a plan, a plot, and a strategy, taking counsel together. They even get together in their groups, in their confederacies, so to speak, in their ideologies. Can I just say, you wonder sometimes what the World Economic Forum is up to? and some of these other groups. I forget, I mean, even the United Nations. Billions and billions and billions of dollars is poured into that, and I don't know what they actually accomplish that is of any good. It seems like everywhere that they go, they just seem to either harbor wickedness or they accelerate it. or they don't really make for peace, like they supposedly say. I mean, we can go into other groups and things, but it's ultimately against the Lord. It's against the Anointed One. This is obviously a reference to God, and God, of course, in the person of Jesus Christ, the second person of the Trinity. Because we see here the phrase, the title, His Anointed. Who is that? That's the Messiah. His anointed, that is the Messiah. That is a prophetic reference to the Messiah. And we'll see in the New Testament, there are places in the New Testament that clearly reference this passage. We already talked about Acts 4, but two other passages, also one in Hebrews, and then I need to check my notes for the other one, but two other places where there is a reference to or to this passage referencing that the Messiah is Jesus Christ, of course, who is being referred to in Psalm 2 in a prophetic way. The anointed is Jesus Christ. This is a reference to the Messiah to come. In verse number three, what do they want to do? Break their bands asunder, cast away their cords from us. The bands and the cords. They see God's word, they see his law, they see God's moral orders as restrictive, as binding, as cords. Instead of seeing them as cords of love, instead of seeing them as God's loving yoke, they see God's word as anti-progress, as exclusive, as intolerant, all the different ways in which they describe and try to describe what they see as restricting man's autonomy and his expressive individualism. In the debate last night, a certain candidate referred to a certain murderous activity as personal autonomy. He said it right there last night on the debate stage. He said the truth out loud, right there, very clearly on national television. This is about personal autonomy, because that's what the heathen rage and the people imagined, that they can just have freedom of all kinds, in every way, however they want, particularly in the area of sexuality. And man will never be truly free until he can throw off all of the sexual inhibitions and do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, however he wants, with whomever he wants. It's foolishness, it's vanity. But they see God's word, they see God's moral order, even God's design for the world and natural law and biological realities, they see that as binding, as cords. But Jesus said, come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you what? Rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Oh, that the heathen, that the peoples that rage and imagine a vain thing would repent, and find the yoke of Jesus Christ, a place of rest that is easy, that is not burdensome, but is a place of peace, of rest, of joy. We'll have just enough time, I think, tonight just to touch on this last slide here. I think it might be in the notes in the prayer bulletin. We'll finish up with this slide tonight, and then we'll come back to scenes three and four, Lord willing, next week. But I went too far there, and there we go. But he who sits, this is the divine reaction, we've seen human rebellion. Secondly, divine reaction. He who sits, this is God's throne. He who sits, enthroned in the heavens. God is on his throne. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh, the Lord shall have them in derision. Laugh and derision speak to divine contempt, even to a mocking and a scorning. of the sinful, the rebellious, of the defiant. God is not mocked, we read in Galatians. Wrath, sore displeasure, this is the holy wrath of God, righteous anger, divine judgment. Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath and vex them in his sore displeasure. We see in verse six, yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. They, what did we read earlier? In verse number two, they set themselves against the Lord. And then what does verse six say? I have set my king. I have installed, I have authorized, I have placed my king upon my holy hill of Zion. Zion, of course, is the city of Jerusalem in general, but it specifically, of course, references also the Holy of Holies, the Temple Mount, where the Ark of the Covenant, I think the picture on the top is the current Temple Mount. You see the Dome of the Rock, that is What the Muslims claim, my understanding is that no Jew can be found in the temple mounts. My understanding is the Jews are forbidden from being on the temple mount. All they can go to is the exterior and the wailing wall. And then this is another drawing where the dome of the rock is. That's where the Ark of the Covenant on that rock. This is a reference to the Holy of Holies, the place of God's presence. Now, of course, we are the temple of God, the Holy Spirit, and dwells all those who believe. But the reference is to Zion, Jerusalem, to God's eternal kingdom. I've set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. This is God's throne. This is God's world. Yes, there's the Prince of the Power of the Air, the God of this age, who has a little bit of time and a little bit of freedom, so to speak, but God is still sovereign, God is still in full control, and He is in full authority, and He is sovereign over this universe, and He has set His King, the Anointed One, Jesus Christ, the Messiah, on His holy hill. And we'll get into some of the prophetic references of that in future weeks, but that is all that we have time for this evening. So let's close in a word of prayer. Thank you, Lord, for these truths. Thank you for this wonderful psalm that reminds us that as an anchor of the soul, help us, Lord, to claim your word and your promises, to be faithful to your word and obedience and sharing the gospel with others and loving others and loving you first. And we pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you for being here tonight. Look forward to being back together on Sunday.