God's King Rules

God is in the dock. It's the title of a famous article by C.S. Lewis, and the dock here is referring to a trial. God is on trial. See, many people for many years have been judging God. The judgment is about how can God be good with all the evil around us. The typical argument goes, if God cannot give an answer for all the evil, why is he worth believing in? How is He worthy of my life? How is He worthy of my worship? How can He allow all the evil that's all around us? How could He even possibly cause the evil? If He rules with power and goodness, why doesn't He rid the world of evil? A simple way of articulating this, a more popular way of, if God is absolutely good and if God is absolutely powerful, why is there sin and why is there evil? These are good questions because we're starting with what is obvious. We're starting with that universal doctrine that's demonstrable to all people that the world is full of sin. There is a problem of evil. We look around us and we see evil everywhere. We see other people's sin. We may not see our own sin, but we see other people's sin. See, we don't need Scripture to tell us there's sin in this world. We don't need Scripture to tell us there's evil in this world. But we oftentimes need Scripture to help us see our own sin. We oftentimes need Scripture to show us and explain to us why or how do we become sinners. Most of all, we need Scripture to show us what the solution is to the problem, because only Scripture, only God's truth, only God provides a solution to the problem of evil. See, without God, you're left with evil. Without God, you're left with a sin that's all around us. Without God, you're left with the wars and the rumors of wars. You're left with all the injustices done to you, and they will never be judged. They will never be made right. Worst of all, without God, that sinful heart that is corrupt and perverted will never be healed or forgiven. You see, we need to watch our posture with God. We don't stand over God and judge him. God is never on trial. We need to stand underneath his word and be judged by it. Let us first see that we are sinners. in need of God, and then let his word judge us. Our message this morning is this. God's King rules with righteousness and he will be victorious. God will solve the problem of evil. We will see this from Psalm 2. There will be a sure victory. There will be a sure conquering of sin, a judgment of sin. God's King rules with righteousness, and He will be victorious. We're going to be looking at Psalm 2 this morning. Last week we looked at Psalm 1. Psalm 2 is a royal psalm. As you hear it, as we talk about it, you'll see that the focus is on the King. There's the kings of the nations, but the real focus here is the anointed Son, the true King, God's appointed King. God's real eternal King who judges justly, who rules us with righteousness. The psalms were broken down fairly simply and easily. We're going to have four parts to our sermon, and there are four sections to the psalm. Verses one through three describe the rebellion of the world. One through three describe the rebellion of the world. Four through six is how God responds to that rebellion. Verses seven through nine is God's righteous reign, and then ten through twelve is our right response. I'll be repeating those as we continue in a little more detail. Let me read Psalm two. Why do the nations rage? And the people's plot in vain, the kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord. and against his anointed, saying, Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us. He who sits in the heavens laughs. The Lord holds them in derision, then he will speak to them in his wrath and terrify them in his fury, saying, As for me, I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill. I will tell of the decree. The Lord said to me, You are my son today. I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel. Now, therefore, O kings, be wise. Be warned, O rulers of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry and you perish in the way, for His wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in Him. Now, as I said, Psalm 2 is a royal psalm. There are different kinds of psalms. There's psalms of lament, there's psalms of wisdom, as we saw last week with Psalm 1. There's also psalms of ascent that begins in Psalm 120. This is really close to an imprecatory psalm, which is a song of curse. There are psalms that just leave you with a curse and with a judgment. It isn't an imprecatory psalm, it's a real psalm because it talks about the king and the psalm calls forth hope. In that last section, be wise, be warned. Psalm 2 is really, I think, a continuation of Psalm 1. God ordained the organization of the Psalms. Psalm 1 set forth the way of wisdom. There are two ways to live. There's not the good and the bad. There's sinners who delight in God's law and there's sinners who delight in sin. Those are the two categories. And as those sinners live in the world that's surrounded by evil, who delight in the law, they wonder how? How is God ever going to reconcile all things? How is God going to make things right? Well, Psalm 2 answers that question. His King will come. Psalm 2 is how those who delight in the Lord, they will be delivered. Psalm 2 tells us how God is going to finish redemption. Psalm 1 sets the two people apart and Psalm 1 provides the victory. And it's all focused on the king. Let's look at our first section. The world is restless in its rebellion against God. The world is restless in its rebellion against God. Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together. against the Lord and against His anointed, saying, Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us. Now, it starts with a question. Why? Why do they do this? Now, what we're going to look at is the assertions they're making, and we're going to see later the reason he's asking why is because it's futile. There's no reason to be fighting against God because there is no victory. Man fighting against God will lose. But let's look here in verse 1. The nations rage. Here the Hebrew term is goi, that people. Some translations may have heathen there. It's those people who are opposed to God and God's anointed and God's people. So here it's very similar to the way we saw the word world used in the epistle of John. It's that order of the world. It's the order of sinners that's opposed to God. Now, this doesn't mean we have an actual strategy book and a game plan. It's just our hearts are all bent away from Him and towards ourselves. The nations that are opposed to God, they're raging. Now, this is not necessarily referring to an anger disorder. It's not referring to a kind of a roid rage. It's actually language used to refer to the sea. The sea is always raging. The sea is restless. The sea is always turning. It's always in turmoil. See, as Israelites, they had not conquered the sea. They were afraid of the sea. They remembered the flood. They remembered that the sea brought destruction. But they also, they look out into the oceans and they see the waves. They see how unpredictable it is. They see that it's restless. It's always moving. It's dangerous. It's scary. The nations. The people that are rebelling against God, they're like the sea. This is a very popular metaphor, a very well-used metaphor throughout Scripture, Isaiah 5720. But the wicked are like the tossing sea, for it cannot be quiet, and its waters toss up mire and dirt. There is no peace, says my God, for the wicked. Or Jude 13. Waterless clouds, describing the false prophets and the false teachers, the sinners who have crept into the congregation. They're waterless clouds swept along by winds, fruitless trees in late autumn, twice dead, uprooted. Wild waves of the sea, casting up the foam of their own shame. The sinners are restless. They're restless in their sin because it doesn't satisfy. They're always moving, never satisfied. Humankind is wild and restless like the sea, always searching and never satisfied. Let's look at the next phrase. They plot in vain. It shows a commitment, the plotting. Again, there's no official game plan, but the plotting is trying to be precise and making sure I'm doing what I want to do and obeying God. But also, there's a trick of self-righteousness. Doing what I want to do, but not doing it in such a way that makes me realize or helps me realize that I'm doing it against God. The trick of self-righteousness is to make myself feel like I'm doing what's good and right. Even though I know it's what God opposes. See, we don't want to admit a culpability. We don't want to admit wrong, but we also don't want to admit that we need to be submissive and love the Lord with all our hearts. Our second verse, the kings of the earth shall set themselves against the Lord. The rulers will take counsel against the Lord and his anointed. Now, here's the kings of the nations. They're leading the people opposed to God to oppose God and his people. Makes pretty good sense. This clearly could be fulfilled in David and Solomon and every king of Israel. But it's finally and perfectly fulfilled in Christ. Christ is opposed by the kings of the nations. Listen to Acts. Luke quotes this passage after Peter and John are put in prison and they're released because they're proclaiming the gospel and the courts don't know what to do with them. When they come back, this is what Luke records, meditating from Psalm 2. When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them. And when they heard it, They lifted their voices together to God and said, Sovereign Lord, who made the heavens and the earth and the sea and everything in them, who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit, Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his anointing. Continuing Luke's For truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. First and foremost, Christ is seen as the fulfillment of what the Holy Spirit had said long ago in Psalm 2. There were two primary kings that tried to kill Christ, that attacked Christ while he was here on earth. The first was Herod. If you study Herod, he's a fascinating character. I'm not sure if anyone parallels him in wickedness, in power, in manipulation. For his day, what he was able to accomplish on the backs of slaves of Israel is pretty amazing. He's a wicked man and he was threatened by a baby. The most powerful man to ever sit on the throne of that nation was threatened by this baby that was born. He was so threatened that he killed all the children that were reported to be born in Bethlehem. Herod tried to kill him. He failed. Then Pontius Pilate, well, he succeeded. He killed Christ as predestined by God. You see, the true king is attacked by the nations. The true king is attacked and he's openly put to death. The nations hated the king. Sinners resist the king. Sinners resist his polite rule, his great declaration of truth. Do we expect anything different for ourselves? If they sought to kill Jesus, they should seek to kill us. As Christians, if they hated Jesus, should they like what they hear when we proclaim the gospel and all its truth? Now, those who are converted, those who are predestined by God, those who are called to God, they will respond with joy. They'll respond with rejoicing that God has saved them. But those who reject the gospel, they'll hate us. The gospel is a stumbling block for some and a cornerstone for those who believe. If the first church recognized that if Christ was hated, we will be hated. Why do we think we're going to live this world and not be hated? The question is, if we're not being persecuted, are we emulating Christ enough? Are we proclaiming him faithfully enough? Are we seeking the world's acceptance? Are we seeking their salvation? Let's go to verse three. Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us. This is what the nations and the kings are saying. Let's burst apart. His bonds, the God and His anointed. The nation seeks to reject the true King and they rationalize their rejection. They're adamantly opposed to God. Now, this week, a very outspoken atheist died, Christopher Hitchens. We in no way should rejoice over his death. We should mourn his death. We should be sad for his death. Because he is now dead, and if he did not profess Christ on his deathbed, he is judged for his sins. We usually think of folks who would fulfill this verses 1-3 as a Christopher Hitchens kind of person, someone who was so opposed and so antagonistic against the gospel. He was very outspoken and had large rhetoric, had great rhetoric opposed to Christianity and Christians in every way. We need to realize that if you're not a Christian this morning, you may look at Christian and say, well, I'm not that bad. I'm not the person who hates God, I'm not the person who hates Christians. No, you're safer, you think. There's actually a New York Times article this past week that was fairly fascinating. The author said that most Americans do not fit in the Christian category. Or the atheist category. Most, especially young Americans, sit in kind of a middle. What he called the nuns. The N-O-N-E-S. Not the religious Catholic nuns. The nuns. You're neither hot nor cold. You don't really care. It's better to kind of be in the middle. You've found a safe way where you're not completely opposed to God, but you're also not following Him. You feel like this is a safe middle ground. The article concluded that he was looking for religion, he has to find God one day, and that he hopes it's like this. He hopes it's a Steve Jobs kind of religion. One that's hip, cool, and intuitive. He wants a God who allows the celebration of doubt. A God who allows experimentation. A God who is interactive. He wants what we all sinfully want, a God made in our own image. He doesn't want a God who proclaims truth and a truth that's reliable. A truth that declares we are sinners in need of God. No, he wants us to interact with God and experiment and maybe doubt what he says. He doesn't want God to proclaim to him who God really is. He wants to keep this safety net. He's not going to obey God, but he's also not going to completely reject God. He thinks he's on the middle ground, but what he's doing is rejecting the God who has spoken his truth. He is, by definition, rejecting the God who has revealed himself. There is no safe middle ground. There is either delighting in the law of God, or there's delighting in sin. There's keeping yourself from trusting God with your sin, trusting God with your life, and there's trusting yourself. You may not be thinking that you're actively rejecting the bonds of God, but you do not love God. You are not fulfilling what God has created you for, and that is to love Him, to enjoy Him, and to be delighted in Him. Friend, you will be restless until you find your rest in Him. You will be like the sea, ever turning, ever changing, ever raging, ever opposed to God until you finally submit and say, I need God. I need Him to speak. I need to quit wanting to interact. My intuitions are evil and they're wicked. I need to submit and listen and obey and believe. There is no true happiness. apart from the King. Let's go to our next section. God's rule is established. Now, we looked at verse 1. Why do the nations rage? The question was asked, why do they do this? And verse 4 really answers the question. Or states why it's in the form of a question, rather. Why do they fight against God? God is not threatened. He laughs. He who sits in the heavens laughs. The Lord holds them in derision. Then he will speak to them in his wrath and terrify them in his fury, saying, As for me, I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill. The first thing we see here is that God is not threatened. The second is that he's holy. He is separate from evil. He is in the heavens. He is lifted up. He is above this evil world. He is holy and separated out. He created this world good, but it's us who have turned it into the rebellious world that we know of. It is us who have caused the evil. How does God respond? He laughs. Who expected that? Who didn't already know Psalm 2? God laughing at our sin. Let's first ask, how would you respond if you were God? How would you respond if you created this world and then the people who are supposed to be your ambassadors, the people who are supposed to rule it for you? They all rebelled against you. They all said, you know what? I can do it better. I can figure out how to enjoy this my way, in a better way. And then you send your son to put things back in order and they kill him. How do you respond? Martin Luther said this, if I were as our Lord God and had committed the government to my son, as he to his son, and these vile people were as disobedient as now they be, I would knock the world in pieces. We would not be near as patient as God. We're not even patient when we drive, much less if our entire creation were rebellious against us and killing our children. See, he's perfectly righteous as a judge. He would be perfectly righteous to destroy this world, to blow it into pieces. But he doesn't. But he does laugh here. Laughter does not mean God thinks sin is funny. There is nothing funny about sin. God does not delight in sin. It's not humorous. It's gross. It's disgusting to God. The laughing here is simply Him responding, I'm not threatened. Your efforts to overthrow me are futile. There's nothing you can do. God laughs. Not because he thinks we're funny in our sin, but because there's nothing we can do to overthrow him. We continue to look at our verse, verse six. I'm sorry, verse five. Then he will speak to them in his wrath and terrify them in his fury, saying the very word against our sin terrifies us and cripples us. Verse 6 is a sweet declaration. As for me, I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill. This is God's victory plan. He's not threatened by the kings or the nations or the sinners, because he has established his king on Zion, on his holy hill. This is absolute. This is what God said He's going to do. This is what God was going to do. This is what God has done. Now, there's two ways that Christ fulfills this prophecy. There's two ways that Christ has been set on Zion on God's holy hill. The first time Christ was set on the holy hill was when He was placed on a cross. The first time that Christ was established as King was when he died on the cross on the holy hill. While the crowning of Christ was done inappropriately and the declaration, he is the king of the Jews, was completely misguiding. It was the most true declaration of the day. He deserved a crown, not of thorns. He deserved a declaration, this is the king, not just of the Jews, but of all nations. You see, he declared his kingship on the cross of becoming our hero-king, our champion. He was the king that day as our substitute because he conquered our greatest enemy, sin and death. He was the hero-champion-king who defeated our greatest enemies and died in our place. The second way Christ fulfills His promise is that He now sits at the right hand of the Father and the Holy of Holies. He now sits in the greatest place of authority Making intercession for all who believe in him. Sending the Spirit to convert our hearts, hearing our prayers and penetrating the Father's ear with them. And he's waiting to come again. He's waiting as the king on the Holy Hill to descend one more time. In that time, it will be to judge the sinners who have continued to persist in their rebellion. Let's go to our third section. God's anointed King will be victorious. God's anointed King will be victorious. Verses 7 to 9. I will tell of the decree. The Lord said to me, you are my son today. I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel. As we read this, we need to remember the declaration of David in 2 Samuel 7. This is important background for our declaration here that today I have begotten you. Let me read 2 Samuel 7. I'll begin in verse four. But that same night, the word of the Lord came to Nathan, go and tell my servant David, thus says the Lord. Would you build me a house to dwell in? I have not lived in a house since the day I brought you up, brought up the people of Israel from Egypt to this day. But I have been moving around in a tent for my dwelling in all places where I have moved with all the people of Israel. Did I speak a word with any of the judges of Israel, whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel, saying, Why have you not built me a house of cedar? Now, therefore, thus you shall say to my servant David, Thus says the Lord of hosts. I took you from the pasture from following the sheep that you should be prince over my people Israel. And I have been with you wherever you went, and have cut off all your enemies from before you. And I will make for you a great name, like the name of the great ones of the earth. And I will appoint a place for my people Israel, and will plant them so that they may dwell in their own place and be disturbed no more. And violent men shall afflict them no more, as formerly. And from the time that I appointed judges over my people Israel, And I will give you rest from all your enemies. Moreover, the Lord declares to you that the Lord will make you a house. When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you. Who shall come from your body and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name. And I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be to him a father. And he shall be to me a son. When he commits iniquity, I will discipline him with a rod of men, with the stripes of the sons of men, but my steadfast love will not depart from him. As I took it from Saul, whom I put away from before you. And your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me. Your throne shall be established forever." In accordance with all these words, in accordance with all this vision, Nathan spoke to David. Now here, Nathan proclaims to David great promises. Promises not necessarily for David. But for his lineage, which will be very important to David, one of your offspring will be the true final king. He will have a forever kingdom. It will be eternal. The second thing we see here is that a unique declaration comes out here. I will be to him a father. And he will be to me a son. Now, in America, we talk about God as father oftentimes, the secular, the Christian, everyone. Father is kind of the way we want to approach God. But in this age, you didn't call God your father. When Jesus, the true son of God, said God is his father, they picked up stones to blaspheme him. Sonship is something introduced by Christ. And so getting this promise That true king, the next king, the real king, the one that will be born from your line. We know elsewhere in Bethlehem. He'll be my son. I'll be to him a father. This is very unique Christian language, the eternal, unique, only begotten son. John 1.18. 1 John 5.18 is where you can see this in Scripture. Jesus is the unique Son of the Father, and His unique Sonship, His only begottenness, reveals two things about Jesus. One, He's God. He is begotten of the Father. It doesn't mean He has a beginning. He is the eternally begotten Son. He has no beginning, so it's not as if He once did not exist. Like I did as a begotten son of a man. He's very God. He has the same nature as the father. There are two in the Godhead. His only begottenness proves and demonstrates and establishes that Jesus, the true King. He's the son of the father, he's fully God, and yet he's also distinct from the father. Let's keep it fairly simple, though. Jesus proves that he is the perfect son because he doesn't need the lashes. Jesus is the perfect son of the father because he obeys the father perfectly. He demonstrates the perfect righteous reign of God. A son is supposed to reflect the father. That's what a son does. They imitate the father. And Jesus said in the Gospel of John, whatever I see the Father doing, that's what I do. What I hear the Father saying, that's what I'm saying. Jesus came as the King who is perfectly obedient and perfectly submissive, fulfilling the role of the King. And He did it as the one unique Son of God. He is the true Son who was begotten of the Father. Now let's look at verse 8, and this is an interesting verse because we've probably all heard this from a missionary at some point. This verse quoted, ask for me and I will give, I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession. And left alone, it's a fantastic missionary text. Ask God for the nations and he will give them to you. It isn't that great of a missionary text if we look at verse 9. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel." You see, here it's referring to Jesus' final coming, His second coming. Here it's referring to the day when Jesus will come and He will judge sinners and their sin. You see, the evil has to be solved. Evil has to be judged. Wickedness has to be condemned. And Jesus will ultimately come and finally judge every sin and every sinner. He will be just in executing his wrath against all sinners. God, the Father, will send him to execute judgment over sin. There is a future judgment when Christ will come and everyone who has not believed in him, they will have to give an account. And when that account comes up, there will be judgment. There will be an eternal condemnation, an eternal damnation. We all are worthy of that, but. God sent Christ to make a judgment 2000 years ago. We're about to celebrate that at Christmas. We celebrate it every Sunday, actually. You see, in the future judgment, every sinner will be judged for their sin. But there's a judgment that was made 2,000 years ago. Christ was born as a babe, lived as a man, perfectly righteous in every way. God himself took upon our nature and lived the life that we were supposed to live. He did it without sin. so that he could die and bring about a judgment. You see, Christ died to be judged for our sins. There's two judgments. Christ came to be judged for our sins, or Christ is going to come and judge our sins. He will either pour out His wrath on our sins and us with them, or he has poured out his wrath on our sins upon himself. You see, he's perfectly righteous, he's perfectly good, and he will solve the problem of evil. He will end evil. He will destroy wickedness. He will judge sin. The question is, is your sin judged on Christ and in his death? for you, or will your sin be judged when you face him in his holiness when he returns? Our sin will either be judged with us when Christ returns or our sin was judged on Christ when we believe in him. Now, let's turn back to this as a missionary text. I think it's a great missionary text. Because we should see that everyone who does not confess Christ is going to hell. If you're a Christian, that's what we must believe. Everyone who dies without Christ is going to hell. Everyone who dies without Christ will be broken with a rod of iron. That is what should motivate us to do missions. That is what should motivate us to do support, to be involved with, to proactively care for and participate in a ministry that is focused on proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is why we adopt missionaries. This is why we want more missionaries. This is why we give to the Laudy Moon now to support missionaries. It's also why we're supposed to go out and proclaim the gospel to our neighbors. It's easy to send money to the nation so someone else can proclaim the gospel. Are we doing the hard work of proclaiming the gospel to our neighbors. Let the motivation be that they will be in hell for eternity. But the truth of the gospel and the power of the spirit be your motivation to trust God that he will save them. Our final section. Our proper response to God's king and his righteous rule, our proper response to God's king and his righteous rule. Verses 10 through 12. Now therefore, kings, be wise. Be warned, O rulers of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the son, lest he be angry and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him. Well, verse 10, it gives us hope. Be warned. Be warned in your restlessness. Be warned in your sin. Be wise. Wisdom begins with the fear of the Lord. Wisdom recognizes God, His holiness, His righteousness, and our need for Him. Verse 11 really starts introducing a paradox. Serve with fear. Even better, rejoice with trembling. Rejoice with trembling. The reason we must always tremble when we rejoice in God's mercy is we must realize we don't deserve it. We must always be on guard, as we talked about last week, of letting God's goodness and his gospel and his grace be casual to us. Rejoice in what God does for us with trembling. We must be on guard against cheap grace. We must be on guard against what Dietrich Bonhoeffer called cheap grace. Cheap grace is this. Cheap grace is rejoicing in God's forgiveness, but not repenting. Cheap grace is rejoicing in God's forgiveness, but not repenting. It's being baptized without hoping for discipline. Cheap grace is being baptized without hoping for discipline. As God promised David's son, your son will be disciplined. The father loves those he disciplines, and as sinners, we all need discipline. The third definition of cheap grace is taking communion without confessing sin. It's rejoicing in God's forgiveness without repenting, it's being baptized without hoping for discipline, it's taking communion without confession. Jesus paid it all. So that we can have absolute assurance in his love, and then he calls us to be his disciples. He calls us to pick up our cross and follow him. See, true grace, gospel grace, condemns sin, hates wickedness, asks for correction, expects discipline and longs for heaven? Will we submit to Christ in his true gospel? Verse 12, the imperative. Kiss the Son. It's the kiss of homage. It's the kiss of respect, of love, of submission. As you would kiss the ring of a king, which symbolizes his power, his authority over you, his love, your love for him to be submissive to him. I know that doesn't feel good to Virginians, because of what we usually think of kings as tyrants. But this king is good. This king is worthy of our submission. This king will care for us. He is good to us. He's laid down his life for us. The focus here is are we submitting? Are we submitting ourselves? to Christ, submitting ourselves to his law and his love. Here's a Christmas challenge. Is Christmas being on Sunday inconvenient for how you plan on worshiping or how you plan on celebrating Christmas? Is Christmas being on Sunday inconvenient for your Christmas plans? The issue here is that Sunday is a day that we've set aside to worship our risen Lord. The one who was born a babe who then died on the cross and rose again. Christmas is about worshiping Christ. Do we have such busyness or such American ideals painted by Norman Rockwell that Christmas now is made inconvenient because we're supposed to worship Christ on the day that we celebrate his birth. Do your plans focus on worshiping as a body of saints, either here or wherever you're traveling? Does Christmas being on Sunday make your Christmas plans inconvenient? If so, you need to rethink how you should be focusing you and your family on Christmas. Kiss the Son. Submit to Him His love and His law. Our final meditation here. is on another paradox, verse 12, kiss the son lest he be angry and you perish in the way for his wrath is quickly kindled. I found this somewhat challenging, his wrath is quickly kindled. Remember the passages such as Psalm 103, verse 8. Psalm 103, verse 8, the Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger. and abounding in steadfast love. The Holy Spirit inspired both texts, so we have to figure out how is it that his wrath is quickly kindled and yet he is slow to anger? This is letting Scripture interpret Scripture. We have to wrestle with these two ideas because they're both ideas given to us by God and they both have to be upheld perfectly and completely. Really, I think both ideas are in one passage, Nahum 1.3. The Lord is slow to anger, great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked. You see, there we see the slow to anger and his absolute justice that he will pour out his wrath on the wicked. You see, if we look at God's character, we see that he is good. He is loving. He is merciful. And that's why he is slow to anger. He has not burst out in the fits of rage. He is not compelled by his passions. He does not overreact as we react. He's infinite in love, and so he's infinitely caring for us. But being infinite in love does not mean he's infinite in his patience. No, I think the quickness of how His wrath is kindled is referring to how the kings continually provoke Him. As we saw in Genesis, God is faithful. God is patient. Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, they continue to sin and sin and fail and fail. And God continues to pour out grace. God continues to be patient. But that patient that His patience can never be taken for granted. If we continue to provoke God by denying Him, we continue to think that we have forever to accept Him and confess Him. That's provoking His wrath. That is why His wrath or His anger is quickly kindled. Because we continue to provoke Him, we take His patience and His mercy for granted. We see grace as cheap. and always available, whereas God, His patience, isn't forever. He will ultimately judge sin. We have to look at Romans 6 here. Should we keep on sinning so that grace abounds? Absolutely not. That's cheap grace. It's not about His grace. It's about His glory. It's about us recognizing God for who He is and what He's done for us. Let's look at verse 12. Blessed are all who take refuge in him. Remember Psalm 1 began very similar here. Kind of a bookend for Psalm 1 and 2, which I think are the introductory psalms for all of the Psalter. Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, and he delights in the law of the Lord. Blessed is he who does these things. Blessed, in Psalm 2 at the end, are all who take refuge in him. Happy are those who submit to the king. Happy are those who kiss the sun. Happy are those who believe in the gospel. Friends, we conclude that this quote that my wife gave me be our final challenge. We're ready for Christmas. Not when we have all the gifts, but when we are ready for Christ. We were ready to give all of ourselves to Christ. Now, Psalm 2, as I was looking at it, I was looking ahead to how much judgment there was. How much wrath there is in this passage. I thought, that's not very Christmassy. They want to hear about the promises. But this is the perfect Advent text, because Jesus being born is sweetest when we realize the bitterness of our sin and the bitterness of the judgment to come. We will truly worship Christ, the one who came to save us and to reconcile us to God. We realize the judgment we actually deserve. We realize that mercy and grace are not cheap. They cost the son his life. Friends, let the judgment of God that we deserve sink in deep so that when we praise God, that Emmanuel is with us. God is with us. It has a sweetness that it is supposed to have rather than a sentimentality that we so often give it. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Our great king. How you humbled yourself. You deserve to be praised by the angels. You lowered yourself to be looked upon with human eyes. You lowered yourself to be cared for with sinful hands. You who are worthy to be praised and adored by all of creation, you let yourself Be crushed by us. Because we had no other hope. Thank You, King Jesus, for ruling us with such love, for ruling us with such mercy. Lead us to receive that great love from You so that we respond with the proper kiss. That we respond by submitting ourselves to loving you with all of our hearts, with all of our strength, with all of our minds. In your holy name we pray. Amen.