Psalm two is an unlikely story about hope. It begins with an enclave of powerful kings, warlords and captains of industry plotting to take over the world. It’s the universal dream of powerful leaders and it’s the oldest game in the world, the survival of the fittest.   Power tends to corrupt, but powerful people don’t get it.  They’re not just self-serving, they are actually defying God. 

But on this psalm, this rebel plot is met by a counter-plot. There is a higher throne and the One enthroned in heaven finds the rebel plot laughable. God has an alternate strategy for world domination, one that will result in freedom, peace, prosperity, joy and healing for all nations.

God intends to install his own king on earth to carry out his plan to bring blessing to all the world. God will honor this king by adopting him as a son, and the king wilexercise God’s authority like a son mirroring his father. 

This is a royal psalm, composed for the coronation of Israel’s kings, to remind them that they ruled under God’s authority, to extend God’s justice to all.  Even kings need a higher king or power will go to their heads.  Sadly, that’s what happened to many of Israel’s kings. And eventually God allowed pagan kings to defeat them and drive them into exile and Israel’s royal dynasty virtually disappeared.

But wait, that’s exactly what the rebel plot at the start of the psalm threatened to do.  What about heaven’s counter-plot?  That’s the question Israel’s finest had to wrestle with for centuries – just as we have to today when bad things happen to good people or helpless people.  Where is God in all of this?

Eventually the truth at the heart of this psalm began to reveal itself.  Out of the ashes of Israel’s failure grew a hope that God would one day raise up a King who will be true to his God-anointed role. The word for anointed is meshiyach – Messiah. He would be truly righteous and hold dominion over the nations as God had designed. Israel began to yearn for such a Messiah.

When Jesus began his public life he said that he was establishing such a kingdom and being such a king.  And it wasn’t long before his followers noticed how well this ancient psalm fit with the kind of influence Jesus had. 

Here at last was a king that did not oppress others, but actually endured the worst of human oppression himself.  He stood with the oppressed and absorbed their shame and powerlessness. He knelt down and washed the feet of his disciples.

The final stanza of the song unveils a new possibility for our war-mongering world. The rebels are not obliterated, they are offered amnesty.  They are invited to lay down their resistance and learn the ways of this God-anointed model king. 

They are invited to kiss him in reverence and to join with him to use their power not for personal privilege, but as service for God and others and to extend his kingdom of self-giving love. And the final line of the psalm promises refuge and blessing for everyone who choose this way of life.

There is a lesson here for leaders in every area of life – in families, in classrooms, in the church, in business and industry, in government.  Beware of the temptations of power and find your example of leadership in one who mirrors the self-giving love of God.

So, despite the unnerving circumstances of our world, this psalm reminds us that God is on this throne and that his Messiah is building a kingdom of love and grace that offers refuge to us all.  The rebel plot in all its menacing forms may continue to conspire against Life, but nothing will derail our King from his purpose and plan to bring blessing to the whole world.

Give him your allegiance – and follow his lead.

Take care.

To see the video of this post, see the Downstream from Eden Facebook page