Ghost stories and God’s sovereignty
Last year I was given a truly great present: a large gift certificate to a book store. One of the books I bought was the Oxford collection of famous ghost stories. I steadily made my way through it and read a small portion of secondary literature on what a ghost story actually is. One thing I quickly came to realize was that a successful ghost story sits above a razor. A little too much here, not enough there, and the story will not only fail but it will turn into its opposite (a farce or comedy). The characterization, the scenery, the pacing (especially the pacing), among other things, must be perfectly crafted so as to lead to reader to the “moment of terror”. A misplaced foreshadowing, a picture that reveals just a bit too much, and the edifice begins to crumble. It all leads to this moment when (typically) the reader and the character within the story will experience and (truly) feel fear. At that moment the story becomes the world around you. It encompasses you, or, to use a well worn cliché (yet so appropriate now), it “grabs you”. The fear of the character and the fear of the reader are, of course, not identical. There is an important distance between the reader and the character in the story. Yes, their mutual fears bear many family resemblances, but the reader has been, so to speak, at a certain distance from the character in the story and so experiences fear in a different mode. Not less terrifying, but not identical.
In Psalm 2, I would argue, something similar is at work. The pacing of the Psalm, the question the nations represent, the laughter (especially the laughter; I simply cannot recollect this laughter without a sense of complete amazement), the shout, the designation of the anointed as “son”. All of these details combine to form an impression upon the reader. Arguably, this is not the purpose for many in reading the Psalm. For many a “truth” is attempting to be discovered or some “principle to live by”. For many they want to see “how this applies to me”. I don’t want to sideline the importance of these, but I do want to suggest that if the Psalm is read like a ghost story “all of these blessing” will be given but in a surprising and unlooked for way.
Just one example: this Psalm is certainly pointing to (or showing) something we call God’s ‘sovereignty’. And yet that word, in the context of this Psalm seems, to me, so flat. How can that word adequately convey the sense of perplexity that launches the Psalm? Immediately the reader is put in a certain position. The reader is geographically located, so to speak, within the landscape of this Psalm and it is at a very far remove from these men. The steady question, “Why….; Why….; Why….” only serves to push the reader further and further away. As we have already seen, the reader is not simply being alienated. He is being elevated. He is being taken, vertically, above these men. A chasm is opening up, but it is one of superiority. There is a hidden elation in this question, a hidden presupposition that the reader and the Psalmist have the ability to see the absurdity of these nations. And, as they ascend, the nations become vocal. They are, astonishingly, seeking something like freedom and liberation. This is truly comical. They are like children’s figurines looking for freedom.
And then, just as the reader apparently summits the peak a laughter, from much further up the mountain begins to rain down. Read from one perspective, this laughter may simply be heard for the first time, although it has been gathering in strength, now that the nations’ rabble is quite for a moment. Or, it may erupt like thunder-clap, as if the nations’ words of rebellion are simply too much. Their clamoring had been mildly entertaining until this point but now it is simply too much and the laughter erupts (I like this reading better, by the way). Weapons fall, faces turn pale and the nations begin to look over their shoulder to see how far their retreat might be. The laughter continues. The reader, too, is cowering. The humor is manifestly not coming from a source of levity but of mockery and anger. And it is descending like falling boulders. Nothing could have been more unpredictable, and yet nothing could have been more effective in disarming all pretensions than this horrible laughter.
A momentary pause. One feels the air begin to sway and it seems as if everything is being sucked up the mountain like the pull of the water before the final crashing of a great wave. One doesn’t realize yet but it is the great intake of breathe. And then, a hurricane blast of a shout soars down the mountain almost deafening and cracking the earth. The nations never speak again after this point. And the reader is loathe to lift his head. If the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord, the reader is standing exactly where he should be.
In the calm after the blast the reader lifts up his gaze and it is met by a man who is standing (he is, of course, the only one on his feet at this point). And he tells us (and the nations), “Let me tell you what the Lord has decreed”. The voice of the Lord is now passing through this man. A hidden, intimate, message has been delivered. One that was not in our hearing; and it was not intended to be heard by us. In this secret meeting that terrible voice has been changed, and changed in a profound manner. This voice, in secret, has turned into a delightful plea; “Just ask and I will give…” It speaks of the Lord giving birth to this man; that this man is the Lord’s son. This man is the image of that terrifying laughter and voice and yet that voice, coming from and through his son, has been altered. It is bearable now. Apparently the same absolute nature of the voice, the same definiteness has not been lost. This man is going to shatter the nations in the same manner as the Lord’s voice just rained down upon the reader and the nations. But, one can “get behind” this man. One can serve this man. One can, in a sense, stand in his shadow while he bears the brunt of hearing that terrible voice. It is for this reason that the Psalm will end with, "Blessed are those who seek refuge in him!" This is a new Moses.
To experience this story, to trace the pattern of its development and to be lifted up only to be thrown down and resurrected: this (and this entire story) is God’s “sovereignty”. This is no “truth” or “something to live by”. This is a man, an anointed, a person who stands between us and the Lord and delivers to us protection, justice and the astonishing realization that God seeks out this communion with his select son. We must forget “how this applies to me” and simply gaze upon this anointed in an act of self-abandonment. This story can wash over us and shape us, but we must lose ourselves to it.
This is why, I would argue, this Psalm is “showing us” God’s anointed, not ‘pointing to ’ or ‘teaching us’ about His ‘sovereignty’. Rather than being a type of ‘dictionary’ of God’s sovereign disposing of himself, it is more like a play or a symphony. And, ultimately, I think that this is truly what it means to “delight” in God’s Torah (Psalm 1). Any change that might come over us doesn’t come from our making it change us. The power of it—its beauty—will change us because no one can stand in the face of beauty and not be changed.
Just as the reader of a horror story can set up any infinite number of roadblocks to the moment of horror, so too can we set up roadblocks to truly experiencing this Psalm. Likewise, though, just as the reader who surrenders to the perfectly crafted ghost story will truly feel and be enveloped by the horror the story is attempting to hand us, so too can we, with surrender and without attempting to pillage the Psalm, be moved and enveloped by the glory that is bestowed on this “anointed one”.
And, to realize this: when this Psalm was composed it had in its horizon the figure of David, a "man after God's own heart". In the mind of the Psalmist David stood as this man between us and God who was, also, in his anointing, made a "son of God" and "begotten by the Lord". His anointed encased him in a glory that permeated his entire being. His regnal authority, his beauty, his ability to mediate God's voice and justice to the world. His promise and the beginnint of its fullfillment to bring the nations under the one rule of the Enthroned One. He became and was the Enthroned Ones dialogue with the earth. There is a joy here exploding from the Psalm because of the incredible blessing bestowed on David in his anointing.
This fact must sit with us, and sit deeply within us. Between David and Jesus it is not an "either/or". It is not the case that David must "give way" to Jesus. He is not merely a metaphor of Jesus. Rather, the more we see in this anointed the face of David the more will we come to see the face of Jesus. Here is why I think this is the case:
David was anointed, in the midst of his life, to be the son of the Lord. At that point he became the dialogue of God. All of the beauty in this Psalm came to him at that moment of royal anointing. Because in Jesus, this Word that from all eternity was this anointing, this 'son', this 'begotten one of the Lord', became flesh, this entire span of glory is made, how to put it, identical with the person of Jesus. David was made to be this way: Jesus was this way. This is why (or how) it is that David does not need to be replaced by Jesus. We simply cannot understand what it means for Jesus to be the son of the Lord without having seen David's face. It is, so to speak, too much to bear; it is missing a necessary piece that allows its reality to show forth. The best analogy I can come up with is a prism. Without it the light is simply white, but with the entire spectrum of light is made clear. Because David "came first" he is this spectrum to the light of Jesus. The Psalm does not need to be read as if "all it is doing is pointing to Jesus". Yes, it is, but it is by pointing back to David and forward to the fullfillment of his "son" sitting upon the throne.
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