Book of Psalms - Psa. 2, Vs. 1-2 (06/26/2022)

Good morning, good to have you there here this morning. We'll be in Psalm chapter two.

Brother Bill, we will miss him. I was really looking forward to his

Psalms study because especially with the first two, three, four chapters, those have been some

Psalms that I have given a lot of thought to. And so I was excited to hear what he was gonna share on it.

It's interesting that it's falling to me to do Psalm chapter two because of the

Psalms that I've been studying, that's the one I've contemplated the most.

I don't know if that's gonna be a good thing or not, we'll see. Sorry, but really appreciate you guys being here.

We're gonna open with a word of prayer and then we'll do a real quick recap and I don't know how much time this will take.

It may end up being a one and done, it may be a two part series, may be a three part series, but I'm gonna encourage you guys to respond.

I think we have it mic'd up a little bit where maybe those who are online can hear you.

I'm so careful what you say. All right, let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, thank you so much for your word.

We thank you for brother Bill who we got to learn from for so many years. Father, we just ask that you bring your word to us today, help it to be encouraging to us and instructive.

It's in your precious son's name we ask these things, amen. Okay, Psalm chapter two.

Now we've finished Psalm chapter one with brother

Bill. He went through Psalm chapter one, that was his last Sunday school lesson that he ever taught.

And in that he contrasted the righteous and the ungodly.

And it showed the differences between what they think on and the outcome of their thoughts, the results.

And we saw that the righteous were well -kept and that they were planted by a river of water, the river being the word of God.

And that ultimately they would flourish. And that this was not the case with the ungodly.

I had one thought I wanted to share because it kind of connects us to Psalm chapter two.

One thought about Psalm chapter one is that it seems to be a conditional promise.

If you're in the word and you are planted in it, then things will go well, but that's not how it's written.

It's not written as if it's a promise, it's written as if it's just a fact of being, which is stronger than a promise.

We can take it as a promise. We can read it and say, if I get in the word and I will meditate on the word daily, like that Psalm chapter one person does, then it stands to reason that logically

I'll have all these great outcomes. So we can take it that way, but I find it interesting that it's written as though it's just a fact.

Blessed is the man who walk, if not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the

Lord and on his laws that he meditate day and night. So he's blessed.

And the fact is he's blessed and in the word. They're just two coexisting facts.

I think the reason why that's so important is that we're gonna see how important it is that facts matter in this next chapter.

We're gonna see that being is a big part of our existence, a big part of God's existence.

It's even a big part of the existence of those who will never believe in God. That's why we're called human beings, right?

Okay, so the division of chapter two, it's broken up into four parts.

And we're gonna try to get through all those four parts. I don't know that we'll get through them all today, but let's go ahead and read

Acts chapter two. So if you would turn there with me. I'm sorry, did

I say Acts? I meant Psalms. We will be in Acts as well. We go to Psalm chapter two. And then we'll actually be in Acts chapter four a little bit later.

It starts off, why do the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing?

Kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his anointed saying, let us break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us.

He that sitteth in the heaven shall laugh. The Lord shall have them in derision. Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath and vex them in his sore displeasure.

Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree the Lord has set unto me.

Thou art my son this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me and I will give unto thee the heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.

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

Be wise now therefore O ye kings. Be instructed ye judges of the earth. Serve the

Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the son lest he be angry and you perish from the way when his wrath is kindled but a little.

Blessed are all they that put their trust in him. So there's the whole chapter. And it starts off with a question.

All right, so the question is why do the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing?

I have a question for you guys. Who's asking the question? Okay, so Mr.

Karpiak says David. Yeah, David is asking the Lord why the people around him are going insane.

Okay, any other thoughts? How about we'll first consider the penman of the psalm.

Then we'll consider the author. And then we may even, if we have time, consider the readers, all right?

So let's look at the penman. Who wrote the psalm?

We're assuming David, right? But do we have proof of that? No, I can't see it.

In this chapter, it does not show that it is David who wrote the psalm.

However, in Acts chapter four, we actually get the proof we need.

So if you'll turn there real quick, it will be in, let's see,

I think it's verse 24. Let's see, 24, okay.

So let me give you a little context for Acts here. Peter and John went to pray.

They passed the lame man on the way. He stuck out his palm and asked for an alm. And this is what Peter did say.

Remember this? Peter tells him, have no silver, have no gold, but I've got something better than that.

And he lifts the man up by his right arm and tells him to walk and performs a miracle right there.

Lots of people see it. And lots of people begin to believe on the

Lord Jesus Christ. Peter preaches to him. The religious leaders get mad.

They bring Peter and John in and they say, don't do this. And they threaten them.

But they have nothing against them because they can't deny the proof of this man's healing.

So they decide the only thing they can do is threaten them. So they threaten them. Peter and John say,

I'm not gonna listen, essentially. And they tell him, we're gonna answer to God, not you.

And they are released with some additional threats. So now here in chapter four, they have come back to the disciples and they are giving testimony of what has happened.

They tell them everything. And so beginning in verse 24, we hear their response.

And when they heard that, they lifted up their voice to God with one accord and said, Lord, thou art

God, which has made heaven and earth and the sea and all that is in them, or all that in them is.

I like how it's written. Who by the mouth of thy servant David, there it is, hath said, why did the heathen rage and the people imagine vain things?

The kings of the earth stood up and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ. Okay, so that right there shows us, because they're quoting

Psalm chapter two, it shows us who wrote Psalm chapter two. They're telling us that it was

David. By the mouth of thy servant David, you said these things. Any questions so far?

That's Acts chapter four. Yeah, so who's asking the question?

Sounds like it's David, right? Okay, now here's the question.

Is it really David? Let's continue reading in Acts chapter four.

Okay. Okay, so now we're getting somewhere. So if we read it carefully, it says, oh,

I lost it. Where was it? Who by the mouth of thy servant David hath said, why did the heathen rage and the people imagine vain things?

So who's really asking the question? He used David's mouth, but God's asking the question, right?

There's the difference between the penman and the author. Obviously, the entire

Bible is written by God. And so I think it's important when we look at this

Psalm in particular, we ask ourselves, who's really asking the question? Well, David is asking the question.

It's coming out of his mouth. David's point of view.

And it's being asked in David's point of view, that's right. But the words are being given to him by the

Holy Spirit, the inspiration of God. Remember, Brother Bill quoted to start this whole study off, he quoted 2

Timothy 3 .16, all scripture is given by inspiration of God, right?

Yes, David. Acts 1 .16. Acts 1 .16.

Men and brethren, the scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which was guide to them that took

Jesus. Again, we have another example of the

Holy Ghost speaking by the mouth of David. That's pretty cool.

Two examples in the same book and later on down in Acts 1 .20,

they quote the book of Psalms again. So they're quoting scripture quite a bit in Acts.

Did you wanna add anything else to that before we move on? Good, fine.

Okay. So we've established it is the

Holy Spirit asking the question, but it is being asked through David's mouth. Okay, so God is asking a question.

Now, when God asks a question, it's not because he doesn't know the answer. All right, he knows the answer.

Actually, all questions have two purposes. Anybody know what they are? To provoke thought, yep.

That's one of the purposes. Provide conclusion, right?

So that would be, yeah, that would be maybe the response you get as a result of the question, right?

So that would be the other side of it, to elicit an answer, right? So those are the two reasons why a question is asked, to provoke thought and to elicit an answer.

And sometimes questions are for both reasons, to provoke thought and to elicit an answer.

But sometimes we aren't really looking for an answer. Sometimes all we're doing is looking to provoke thought.

We call these rhetorical questions, don't we? Okay, so.

Pop's like, I'm not falling for that. Yeah. That's right, if you answer it.

So I believe that this question, why did the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing?

I believe it's an example of God asking a rhetorical question. He doesn't really need the answer.

And he's not even really looking for us to give the answer, but he is looking to provoke thought, which means he wants us to think about that.

Why do the heathen rage? Why do the people imagine a vain thing? Now we have some examples of God asking non -rhetorical questions.

The first that comes to mind is, Adam, where art thou? He was looking for an answer there.

Who told you that thou wast naked? Another example. So those are non -rhetorical questions that God asks.

This is one where he's really just kind of provoking thought because he goes right into additional thoughts afterwards.

But if God wants us to think about it, I think we should. So why do the heathen rage?

Anybody have an idea? Okay. Why don't we look at what the word rage means?

But before we do that, let's look at who the heathen are. I was gonna start this whole study off reading this and say, why do the heathen rage?

But he totally stole my thunder when he was talking about Brother Bill at the memorial service.

But the word heathen here means nation, people. The word is pronounced go -say, go -ay.

I think I pronounced it right. I listened to a bunch of these words, wrote down the entire verse and listened to them on Blue Letter Bible, and I probably won't remember them all.

But nation, people, usually of non -Hebrew people, of descendants of Abraham, of Israel.

And here's the next one that seems interesting to me, of swarm of locusts or other animals.

So it has this connotation of being a lot. It's not just a nation.

Notice that it means nations. It can mean nation, but we're gonna be talking about more than one person.

We're gonna be talking about a lot of people. And so it has this feeling of more than just a single nation raging.

One way we could read this is why do the nations rage? The word rage is ragosh, to be in a tumult or commotion, to conspire or plot.

So we could read this as why are all the nations plotting?

There's their question. Why are they plotting? Why are there a lot of nations plotting?

If you read Spurgeon's commentary on this chapter, he says that they are deliberately and craftily going about their warfare, not with foolish haste.

So this is a meditation. This is a plan.

This is not impulsive. When we hear the word rage, we tend to think impulse.

We tend to think that it's just spur of the moment, like lost control.

That's not the case here. The nations are in control of themselves raging, plotting.

So this is what they're doing. The next part of that says in the people, imagine a vain thing.

Who are the people? And why is that different from nations? Any ideas?

Nations are culture, people are clans. Okay. I think it may be the other way around. People may be cultural, such as old people.

Mm -hmm. So in other words, we're kind of looking at the micro and the macro.

We're looking at the people and the organizations of those people, right?

So we're looking at them individually and as a whole. So a way to read this is that nations are craftily plotting and the people of those nations are imagining vain things.

Good commentary. Thank you, Caleb. Imagine.

The word imagine is haggoth. And here's what it means. To moan, growl, utter, muse, mutter, meditate, devise, plot, speak, to roar, growl, groan, to utter, to speak, to meditate, devise, muse, imagine, utter, to mutter.

So while the nations as a whole are craftily plotting, the people of those nations are muttering, they're growling or groaning a vain thing.

The word vain is reek. That was an easy one to say, reek.

It means emptiness, vanity, or empty. So people are muttering things that will produce no meaningful outcome.

So while the nations are craftily plotting, the people of those nations are muttering nonsense.

Sound familiar? Yeah. Yeah. So now we have a lot of nations plotting and a lot of people devising emptiness.

In other words, whatever it is that they are plotting, whatever it is they devise to do, the plans they mutter under their breaths, the thoughts that they are thinking are all futile.

They are empty and therefore are unable to produce any meaningful result. In other words, this is written in a way that this is just a fact.

This isn't conditional. This is just God telling us that what's happening is factually meaningless.

I think that's important. He wants us to think about it.

He wants us to muse on this for a little bit, that there is a reason why the nations are plotting.

There's a reason why people are imagining vain things. So that's the foundation of this chapter.

That's the start, right? God has set the scene for us. He said, here's what's happening.

And he wants us to think about it. He wants us to contemplate it. So question, why does man plot against his creator?

It's a man plotting against his creator. Okay. I don't know, I think it's more,

I mean, I think it's just the devil plotting and using the nations to take precedence.

So Ben brings up a good point. They use the nations to know who they're plotting against. I think they're plotting against them.

In their minds, they're the creators. But in reality, it's the devil who's plotting against them.

They're the creators, and he's the creator. So Ben brings up, we wrestle not with flesh and blood, right?

But with principalities and powers and rulers of this dark world and spiritual wickedness in high places, right?

So essentially, his thought is that maybe it's not necessarily that the people even know that they are plotting against whoever they're plotting against.

We haven't gotten to that part yet. But they are plotting something. And really it's just spiritual warfare and the devil using them to make this happen.

It's a good thought. Certainly true. But I also do believe that there are some who specifically understand what they're doing.

Well, I mean, yes. I mean, you certainly have people plotting against the institutions derived from the

Bible and stuff. So I guess in that sense, they would eloquently be plotting against their creator.

I want us also to understand that this is quite a digression. Think of man's first sin.

It was in a sense, very impulsive. It started out as being deceived and then impulsively, almost instinctively, though it may be wrong to say it that way at that point in history, they decided to sin against God.

They ate of the fruit. I always get this tongue tied. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

That is not the feeling of this plotting. This isn't impulsive.

We've digressed to the point of we're planning out to be against, later we see the

Lord and his anointed. So we are being very purposeful, the nations. I say we,

I don't really wanna include Christians when I say that, but I want to include people as a whole, nations and the people.

Yes, sir. Photographs, forms of people, shrinks who are angry because they couldn't enforce it.

That's a great picture of people raging against God. Yes. They know, they don't necessarily know

God, but they know that they hate everything he says. I think you and Ben are both right about that.

It's basically, it's that, that they may not even understand fully that it is

God, but they really don't like what it results in. Yeah, they think they know better. They do, they think they know better.

They think they have a better plan. Yeah. Otherwise they wouldn't devise against it. Right. Right? And they, and they all fall back on what they live.

Right, yeah, it's my choice. Yes, and it should be my choice. So we've digressed into a wishful and willful rebellion, a complete rejection of what

Spurgeon called the earth's rightful monarch. Man instead cleaves to its usurper for ruling.

God also makes it a point to direct our thoughts to the futility of these efforts, not just why are they doing it?

But he wants us to think of just how futile these efforts are. That's why he brings our attention to the vanity of their imaginations.

So why would he want us to think of the futility of these efforts? To give us hope, to give us a realization that he knows what he's doing and they just, certainly if we don't like the idea of the heathen raging and the people imagining vain things, we do like the idea that it's going to be futile for them to do so.

Right? Exactly.

Right? That God is in control. They kind of go hand in hand. Thinking that the heathens efforts are futile, give us hope.

And we know that that hope is sure because God is in control. So we know that God is ultimately in charge of it.

And that's not just to say that it will work out. It's not just to say that he is winning because he has won.

Exactly. When you're a Christian, you understand and believe that. It's not that we're going to see it in every little thing, but in the big picture.

We do know that everything works together for the good of those who love the Lord and are called according to his purpose. So from our perspective, he is winning.

Right? But from the author's perspective, he has won. It's done. Again, it's just a statement of fact.

Right? Like he set up in Psalm chapter one, this is just how things are.

It's not unlike him to remind us that he's in control. He tells us in John 15, five, apart from me, you can do nothing.

If John 15, five is true, then certainly being against the Lord can result in even less than nothing.

Right? So apparently it is important at this juncture for the

Lord to remind us that he is absolutely 100 % in control. It's like trying to win a game when the buzzer's already sound.

It's like trying to rewrite history. It's already done. You can't change it.

And that's what we are to think of when we see that they are imagining vain things.

It's over. It's empty. So let's keep going.

We've got a little bit of time left. What time do I need to quit? Five till, okay.

So we got about 10 minutes. Probably won't get through it all. That's okay. Kings of the earth set themselves.

Question, who are the kings? Yeah, and the next part says, and rulers take counsel together.

So what's the difference between the king and the ruler? Ruler. Okay, Pop says the king would be someone who's ruler over a nation, while the rulers may be over provinces or states.

That's one thought. Any other thoughts about who the king is, who the kings are,

I should say, in this scenario, and who the rulers are? Carry out.

Correct. Okay. So this part of the chapter is showing us that it's not just a single nation.

We're seeing kings. So it's gonna be multiple nations, they're arranging. Right. All right.

If you read some other translations of this, you'll see why did the nations rage as opposed to why did the heathen rage?

But here we see kings. And if you look up the word for kings, it means king.

It gets about as clear as it can be, right? It's top dog of these nations. Yes, sir. Heathens is a better translation than nations.

It's always the case. Heathens is better, it doesn't just mean nations.

It means common people. I like that. So David pointed out that - It's the best translation to just talk.

But David points out the importance of knowing that this is a better translation to say, why did the heathen rage as opposed to why did the nations rage?

Because when you say heathen, you're a little more specific. It's a little more accurate. It's talking about non -Hebrew nations, the

Gentiles. Those who are not God's people. It's a little more specific.

So it says the kings of the earth set themselves. So these are the rulers of those nations, but they are setting themselves.

The word for set themselves is yasab. It means to place, to set, to stand, set or station oneself, present oneself, to take one's stand.

In other words, it's to stand ground. You see this when you watch warfare.

When an army stands ground, they are standing ground in order to resist something, usually an attack.

So these are the kings or the rulers of these nations, top dogs, taking a stand.

Who are they taking a stand with? Next part says, the rulers take counsel together.

Now the rulers, if you look up what that word means, the word is razon, people who are weighty, judicious or commanding.

So these are people of influence. They can be judges, they can be politicians, they can be celebrities.

Anyone who has sway over a large group of people, anyone with a platform, it can be nowadays social media influencers.

It can be school administrators, people who have the ability to sway the opinions of other people.

So these are weighty people. So what we're seeing is that the kings of the nations and all the weighty people, the people of influence are unionizing.

We know that because of the next part. It says, they take counsel together. Those are two different words.

The first word is yasod, that's take counsel. It means to found, fix, establish, or lay foundation.

To fix or seat themselves close together so they're grouping themselves. To sit in conclave, to be founded.

The word for together is yakod, which means union, unitedness, together, all together, all together alike.

So we have the nations raging, the rulers of those nations taking a stand, the influential people of those nations grouping together and becoming united in their resistance.

Resistance, resistance to what? But you said the word conclave, they're invited to be a conclave.

Ah, okay, yeah. Because that's what they get together. They actually call it a conclave.

Yes. Interesting, the Catholic church calls it conclave. That is interesting. They're the ones that choose the next code.

But I'm not positive on that. That is interesting. Sure, that's what it is, but.

So they've established a united front and the word against is al, upon the ground of, according to, on account of, on behalf of, concerning, beside, in addition to, together with, beyond, above, over by, onto, towards, to, against, and there's tons more.

If you go through and see where this word al is used throughout scripture,

I'll give you some examples. In Genesis chapter one, verse seven, we see it used to describe the

Holy Spirit hovering above the face of the waters, or the firmament. I'm sorry.

The waters are above the firmament. You see it used to describe the

Holy Spirit moving over the face of the waters. We see it used to describe the waters above the firmament.

The word is above there. The fowl fly above. It's again that word al.

They fly above the earth in Genesis one, two. When men began to multiply on the face of the earth, that's the same word.

So what you see is that this word is, it's used to describe position, on, above, over.

Cain used this same word when he was talking about his curse. With the

Lord. He says in Genesis chapter four, thou hast driven me out this day from, same word, the face of the earth, and from thy face shall

I be hid. So he's showing a loss of his position. This is very clearly a word that describes position.

Cain suggests that his position is being changed by God, but here in Psalm chapter two, the nations, the kings, and the people of those nations are choosing their position.

They are making their position known. Now, choosing may be a bad word for it because apart from him, we can't do nothing.

We don't even have the ability to choose. So again, it is just a fact. It's just the way it is. But in their minds, at least, they have made the choice to stand against, to resist.

In their minds, it is their doing, and they are taking counsel together.

They are raging together. They are muttering together. Who are they muttering against?

The Lord. And his anointed. But for sake of time, because we're almost out,

I think we'll save who is the Lord and who is his anointed for next week.

That's what we'll do. We'll look at who is the Lord and who is the anointed. Because we'll have to remember, these words were uttered by David.

But they're quoted in Acts chapter four by the disciples when talking about someone other than David.

So it's gonna be cool, I think, to explore who the anointed are.

I wish that I had more time to get to it because it gets pretty encouraging when you look at this from all the different points of view.

So for sake of time, we'll stop it there. We now have the scene set. The people, the nations are raging, which means they're plotting.

The kings of those nations are taking a stand. The people of those nations are muttering and unionizing.

Especially the influential people, and they're doing so against, meaning they are, at least in their own mind, setting their own position in opposition to the

Lord and to his anointed. So next week, we'll look at who the Lord is, who the anointed are, and what does that mean?

What does the opposition mean for those anointed? What does it mean for the people who are standing in opposition?

Anybody else wanna add anything, or have any thoughts?

Posturing, yeah? We certainly see a lot of posturing, and you'll see a lot more of it come

November. You'll see a whole lot of the unionizing between kings of the earth and the celebrities and the thought leaders and those who have platforms, you'll see them unionize more and take that stance and make it more obvious to the world.

Because when elections are involved, they definitely try to present a very united front.

A good thing for us to remember when thinking about these things is that it's all empty.

All their efforts are completely in vain, and that will be encouraging to us.

Any other thoughts? I know, we don't like it.

We don't like all that raging. Yeah, all right, well, then let's pray.

Heavenly Father, Lord, we just thank you for your word. We thank you that we can really spend some time on even just a few words in it and get a lot out of it, or we just ask that you help us to think about why the heathen are raging.

Help us to think about why they're imagining vain things and what our role in this world in relation to that should be.

Help us to remember that no matter what they plot or devise, it's completely in vain, and that you are 100 % in control.

It's all been done. It's finished. We thank you, Father, that that is the case.

That's the fact. And Lord, we just ask that as we continue to learn today and throughout the week, that you keep our minds and hearts towards you.