March 23, 2023 -- Psalm 2:1-3 -- The Psalm Series: Rebellion and Submission

People loved by the Father, in the Spirit's power: Sh'ma ~ hear and obey Jesus!

Why do the nations rage
    and the peoples plot in vain?
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 burst their bonds apart
    and cast away their cords from us.”
Psalm 2:1-3 ESV

This is an important question: why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? It is the pattern of history. Nations rise up seeking to rebel against the LORD, He Who makes covenant and keeps His oaths. He Who claims all the peoples of the earth. Successively as they rise up and forget Him, they are crushed and forgotten. Even God's own people, Israel, needed to be warned by the words of this Psalm. God’s own people rebelled against Him over and over again. Just two graphic examples:

• The LORD rescued His people out of Egypt. They made a golden calf and worshiped it (see Exodus 32).

• The LORD fed His people manna in the wilderness and gave them water and protected them from their enemies. Many of the men prostituted themselves with women from Moab and rebelled against the commands of the LORD their Protector and God (Numbers 25).

Dear fellow Christian, do not look down your nose at the people of Israel, for it is easy to be more rebellious and lustful and defiant than they ever were. It is worse because you know the Anointed of God, Jesus Christ, His suffering and redeeming work which brings you into the presence of the Holy God. Yet knowing the amazing grace of God how often do you not instead chase after your pleasures: sports instead of church. Gluttony instead of fasting. Gossip instead of prayers. Ignoring the cries of the poor while pursuing travel and cottages. Allowing disputes and arguments to carry on growing ever hotter and more bitter rather than humbling yourself before the throne of Jesus Christ and at the first opportunity making peace through Jesus Christ Who reconciles you to God and to one another?

Repent.


GOD THE SOURCE OF ALL GOOD
O Lord God, Who inhabits eternity,
The heavens declare thy glory, the earth thy riches,
the universe is thy temple; thy presence fills immensity,
Yet thou hast of thy pleasure created life, and communicated happiness;
Thou hast made me what I am, and given me what I have;
In thee I live and move and have my being;
Thy providence has set the bounds of my habitation,
and wisely administers all my affairs.
I thank thee for thy riches to me in Jesus,
for the unclouded revelation of him in thy Word,
where I behold his Person, character, grace, glory, humiliation, sufferings,
death, and resurrection;
Give me to feel a need of his continual saviourhood,
and cry with Job, ‘I am vile’,
with Peter, ‘I perish’, 
with the publican, ‘Be merciful to me, a sinner’.
Subdue in me the love of sin,
Let me know the need of renovation as well as of forgiveness,
in order to serve and enjoy thee for ever.
I come to thee in the all-prevailing name of Jesus,
with nothing of my own to plead,
no works, no worthiness, no promises.
I am often straying, often knowingly opposing thy authority,
often abusing thy goodness;
Much of my guilt arises from my religious privileges,
my low estimation of them, my failure to use them to my advantage,
But I am not careless of thy favour or regardless of thy glory;
Impress me deeply with a sense of thine omnipresence,
that thou art about my path, my ways, my lying down, my end.
From: Valley of Vision

https://youtu.be/4Ccwoj9VKL4
Chris Tomlin -- Lord, I Need You

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