Verses 1-12
In this "second psalm" (Acts 13:33), one of the most frequently quoted in the New Testament, David (Acts 4:25) exhorted the pagan nations surrounding Israel to forsake their efforts to oppose the Lord and His anointed king. He urged them to submit to the authority of the Son whom God has ordained to rule them (cf. 2 Samuel 10). The first and second psalms were always united as one in the rabbinical traditions. [Note: See Peter C. Craigie, Psalms 1-50, p. 59.]
This is a royal psalm and, more specifically, a messianic psalm. The New Testament writers quoted from the royal psalms at least 27 times: from Psalms 2, 18 times, from Psalms 18, 45, once each, and from Psalms 110, seven times.
"Obviously many years and various levels of hope intervened between the psalm and the first-century application. The messianic vision, while not complete in the Psalms, develops somewhere in between. We can see this development more clearly in the prophets than in the Psalter. In fact, there is a self-contained messianism in the prophets that we do not find in the Psalms. In contrast, the messianic application of the Psalms develops within the interpretive process of the Jewish and Christian communities, although it is important to recognize that the raw material for the messianic vision is already laid out in the Psalms and is not merely an invention of those communities." [Note: Bullock, p. 183.]
"If you are thinking only of yourself as you read these Psalms you will never see what the book is really taking up, but once you understand something of God’s prophetic counsel, once you enter into His purpose in Christ Jesus for the people of Israel and the Gentile nations, you will realize how marvelously this book fits in with the divine program." [Note: Ironside, p. 16.]
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