Divine Sonship and Priesthood: Exploring Psalm 2:7 and 2 Samuel 7:14 in Hebrews 1

Don Carson examines how Hebrews 1 uses Psalm 2 and 2 Samuel 7 to demonstrate Jesus Christ’s divine sonship, superiority to angels, and his role as high priest, connecting Old Testament prophecy with New Testament fulfillment. This interpretation underscores Jesus’ integral position in Christian theology as both priest and king.

What I am going to do in these three talks is look at three passages in Hebrews that quote the Old Testament, but let me set the stage a bit. I studied under a man at Cambridge University whose first significant book was called New Testament Apologetic. The thesis of that book was the way the New Testament writers defend the gospel by quoting the Old Testament was to abuse the Old Testament text. That was the New Testament apologetic.

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The defense of the gospel by the New Testament writers was so to quote the Old Testament as proof texts, ripping things out of context, that the New Testament apologetic from any rigorous exegetical position in today’s perspective was deeply flawed, and we cannot imitate what they did. We should not imitate what they did, and we shouldn’t excuse what they did. It’s not a very edifying stance, but there are some problems there, one has to recognize.

Somewhere along the line, I was asked to write a commentary on Matthew. When I wrote that commentary on Matthew in 1980 and 1981 (it came out in 1984), there were not a lot of commentaries on Matthew that were absolutely first class and written in English. I read a whole lot of other ones, and I read some old ones. One of the better ones was John Broadus, 1886, which I went all the way through.

I had long since come to the conclusion that the two most challenging New Testament books with respect to their use of the Old Testament were Matthew and Hebrews. So here I was working on Matthew. As I read Broadus right through, I was always interested to see what he did with the Old Testament. Do you know what he does for every really tough one? It’s a great commentary, but on this point …

Well, there’s one part of what he does that’s really good. There’s another part that leaves something to be desired. What he does for almost all of the tough places where Matthew quotes the Old Testament and it really is a bit hard to understand what’s going on, is basically he says, to use more colloquial jargon, “I don’t have a clue what Matthew is doing, but it’s the Word of God, so we’d better believe it.” He put it in more sophisticated ways than that, but that’s basically what he was saying.

I have to say that’s a good step up over the other book. At least he wasn’t claiming that the New Testament writers were a bunch of twits. He was actually seeing that there had to be some sort of connection there, and he wanted to be reverent and respectful to the Word of God. That’s a big step up, as far as I’m concerned. After all, the Bible still quotes God as saying, “To this man will I look: he who is of a contrite spirit and who trembles at my word.”

Even from a historical point of view, to argue that the New Testament writers were really thick and stupid is not historically all that likely. Even if you were pretty cynical and didn’t believe in inerrancy, you ought to accord them at least some sort of respect for imagining that they’re reasonably intelligent people or doing their best to understand what the texts say. It seems like a reasonable assumption. So one does not appreciate too much sneering condescension.

Still, after we’ve compared Broadus and Lindars, do we not have to say that there are times when we read the New Testament for ourselves and we decide to take the time to actually look up the Old Testament context and we find ourselves with some sympathy for John Broadus? “Lord, it’s your Word. I’m sure there’s a connection here somewhere, but quite frankly, I don’t see it.”

That’s much better, as I said, than Lindars’ perspective. Let me put it this way. If you’ve never been troubled by the way the New Testament quotes the Old you’ve never read the New Testament and looked up the Old Testament texts it actually quotes. It’s as blunt as that. There are a lot of them that are really quite hard to understand.

What I want to do is take three such texts, because I’m convinced that if you focused on 20 to 40 of the tougher texts and really worked through them and probed them and figured out what’s going on, you could probably handle just about all the rest of them. I don’t have time for 30 or 40, but I’m going to take three, one tonight and two tomorrow. I’ll tell you what the two are for tomorrow so that if you want to read them overnight it won’t be bad.

One of them tomorrow is Psalm 95 quoted in Hebrews 3 and 4. If you want to look that up, feel free. The second is Genesis 14 and Psalm 110 about Melchizedek, referred to several times but developed especially in Hebrews 7. That’s where we’re going tomorrow. In this first session, I want to refer you to just one verse: Hebrews, chapter 1, verse 5. Hebrews 1:5 quotes two Old Testament passages. Those two Old Testament passages are Psalm 2:7 and 2 Samuel 7:14. I’m going to take the time to read the whole chapter. Hear the Word of the Lord.

“In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.

After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs. For to which of the angels did God ever say, ‘You are my Son; today I have become your Father’? Or again, ‘I will be his Father, and he will be my Son’?

And again, when God brings his firstborn into the world, he says, ‘Let all God’s angels worship him.’ In speaking of the angels he says, ‘He makes his angels spirits, and his servants flames of fire.’ But about the Son he says, ‘Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever; a scepter of justice will be the scepter of your kingdom. You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness; therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions by anointing you with the oil of joy.’

He also says, ‘In the beginning, Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed. But you remain the same, and your years will never end.’ To which of the angels did God ever say, ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet’? Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?”

Before we look at these two quotations in 1:5, two preliminary remarks, one contextual and one pastoral. I don’t have time to run through the whole flow of the passage, not even to work through the introductory paragraph, except to draw your attention to the fact that as that paragraph comes to the close and the glory of Christ as the focal point of God’s self-disclosure comes to an end, angels are introduced.

So we’re told, “After Christ had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs.” That’s the first time angels are introduced. Clearly, the implication is that there are two approaches to the Son’s superiority. He became superior because of his purification of sins in exactly the same way as the name he has is already superior to theirs.

What that is referring to is his actual status. The name reflects who he is. He already was superior to the angels, but then because of his death and resurrection, vindicated now by God such that he sits at God’s right hand, he became superior to the angels in another sense. In his incarnate humiliation, as he hangs in agony on the cross bearing our sins, it’s very difficult to think of Jesus being superior to the angels.

Oh, he still is in his very name, but now he’s vindicated at the Father’s right hand. All authority is his. He sustains all things by his powerful word, and thus he has become superior to the angels in the wake of his vindication. Death, burial, resurrection, exaltation, session at the right hand of the Majesty on high. He has become as superior to the angels, as he already was intrinsically, we would say, ontologically.

That brings us to the pastoral point. It becomes clear when you read through the rest of the chapter that all of these quotations, this catena of Old Testament quotations, are designed to show that Jesus is superior to the angels. Okay, now you’re going to preach Hebrews 1 on a Sunday morning. What are you going to do with it?

Are there a lot of people in your church who are struggling over whether Jesus is really superior to angels or not? “You know, Pastor, I woke up in the middle of the night and broke into a sweat. I couldn’t figure out whether Jesus is superior to Gabriel.” Have you ever had that problem? Then what are you going to do when it comes to preaching this passage?

Except … Touched by an Angel or Medium. We live in an age of resuscitating ancient spookiness, a return of astrology, confidence in a vague kind of spirituality with angels and spooks and people coming back from the dead and people still loving you even though their body can’t quite hit your body, and where the revelation comes in is not quite clear, and in any case, an angel will sort it all out.

They’re a mostly amoral bunch, but people so much want some sort of connection with another world or with something that will give meaning that’s a bit transcendent. Somewhere along the line, Christians have to come up and say, “This is rubbish. It’s dangerous rubbish.” You cannot find your self-identity there, because Jesus is better than all of them. He has triumphed over the rotten ones, and the best ones fall down before him and worship him, one with God.

You want to trust your future to the intonations of a spooky half-man, half-angel digital figure on a flickering tube? Somewhere along the line, this preaches. We have to get back to the exclusive sufficiency of Jesus. But you weren’t paying me to come and preach at you like that, so let me get back to the text and try to figure out what these two texts are doing here.

First, let me say what you cannot do with chapter 1, verse 5. You cannot say that the author is claiming that Jesus is superior to angels because he is called son and they are not. A superficial reading might lead you to think that. “For to which of the angels did God ever say, ‘You are my Son …’?” He’s the Son; they’re not. The trouble is when you read through the Old Testament and the New Testament you discover that sometimes angels are called sons of God. Remember how Job opens up?

What you have to remember is that son language in the Bible is incredibly diverse. Sometimes son refers to more or less what we mean by son: a biological son. In fact, we’ve just about gotten to the place where that’s the only kind of sonship we can think of because we watch so much CSI. You can always prove it with the DNA to several parts per billion of probability. But the son language in the Bible is astonishingly diverse in its referentiality.

This is partly because in the ancient world sons ended up doing what their fathers did. Daughters ended up doing what their mothers did. Let me try an experiment. Just the men now for a moment. How many of you men are doing vocationally what your fathers did? Stick up your hands. Look around, folks. Those are not big numbers. Now you women, how many of you are doing vocationally what your mothers did? Look around, folks.

In the ancient world, if your father was a baker and you were the son, you became a baker. If your father was a farmer, you became a farmer … 90, 95, 97, 98 percent. Thus, your identity was not just biological; it was vocational. It was clannish. It was functional. It was what you did. You see that in the New Testament too. Jesus is understood to be the son of the carpenter. Then in one passage he himself is the carpenter. He was trained by the carpenter.

That means that maybe a Jewish boy in the first century would have gotten his three R’s in a little synagogue school (the girls weren’t normally sent, but boys were, up to a young age), but his formation, as the French say.… I was brought up in French … his education as that which formed him and shaped him was usually secured from his dad. Peter and John learned to fish from dear ol’ Dad.

So out of this tight connection between sonship and function come a whole lot of biblical metaphors. Son of Belial means son of worthlessness. That doesn’t necessarily mean that your dad is worthless. What it means is that you are so disgustingly worthless the only explanation is that you belong to the worthless family.

Consider the Beatitudes. “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God.” That’s not telling you how you become a Christian. What it’s saying is that God is the supreme peacemaker, so insofar as you make peace you are acting like God. You show yourself, that far at least, to belong to the God family. That’s all it means. It’s not saying anything about new birth or ontology or DNA. It’s a functional category. “Sons of thunder.” Or in John 8, Jesus is having a confrontation with some Jews. “I don’t really think you’re sons of Abraham.”

“What do you mean? How can you talk like that? You’re not even 50 years old. You can’t talk about who’s a child of Abraham.”

“Listen. Abraham rejoiced to see my day. He rejoiced in it and was glad.”

“You can’t talk like that. You’re just a young man. We’re the true sons of Abraham.”

“No, you’re not. If you were really sons of Abraham, you’d recognize me.”

“Well, actually, we’re sons of God.”

“Oh no, you’re not. I come from God. He knows me; I know him. Since you don’t know me, you can’t possibly be sons of God. Let me tell you who your daddy is. You’re of your father the Devil, and the lusts of your father you will do. He was a liar from the beginning; you’re not telling the truth about me. He was a murderer from the beginning; you’re trying to bump me off.”

Jesus is not saying that somehow the Devil came down and copulated with their mother so that they were half-breeds. He’s not talking ontologically. It’s functional. He’s not even saying they’re demonic or demon-possessed or any such thing. It’s a functional category. They have to belong to the Devil because they’re acting like him.

You find that sort of language with respect to Israel in a corporate sense as early as Exodus 4. “Israel is my firstborn son, and I say, ‘Let my son go, that he may worship me.’ ” Israel was, in some sense, supposed to reflect Yahweh. He was supposed to reflect God. Israel is the son. Then in the ancient world, even in the ancient pagan world, when a human being became the king, he was often thought to be, in effect, the son of one of the local gods. He thus rules like God.

He stands in for God. He’s God’s representative, as it were. Thus, he’s the son of God. It’s not necessarily claiming anything about ontological status, as if he really has been divinized. That did sometimes happen, but not always. Sometimes it was purely a functional category. You have the right of the gods to rule. That’s actually picked up with respect to the Davidic line as well.

So when you read these quotations here, you mustn’t come at the text thinking, “All the text is saying is Jesus is called the Son of God and angels aren’t; therefore, Jesus is better.” Transparently, angels themselves are called sons of God, even the demonic ones, even Satan himself in Job 1. What you really have to do is look up the Old Testament context and try to figure out what’s going on in those contexts first. Let me take one more step before we look at the Old Testament. It’s going to get worse.

This first passage, Psalm 2:7, is quoted three times in the New Testament. In this context, clearly, it is being used to prove that Jesus is better than the angels. A second place where it’s quoted is also in this book: Hebrews, chapter 5, verse 5. In this context, the author is showing that the ancient Levitical high priest didn’t volunteer for the job. He was chosen by God. He was chosen as part of the genetic insistence that it be from Aaron.

So we’re told in Hebrews 5:4, “No one takes this honor on himself, but he receives it when called by God, just as Aaron was.” Verse 5: “In the same way, Christ did not take on himself the glory of becoming a high priest. But God said to him, ‘You are my Son; today I have become your Father.’ ” In this passage, Psalm 2:7 is being quoted to prove that Jesus did not take on for himself the glory of being high priest.

Third passage. This is Acts, chapter 13. Paul is preaching in the synagogue in Pisidian Antioch. He is now preaching to Jews and proselytes, people who do know their Old Testament, so he doesn’t have to start proving monotheism and God as Creator, the kinds of things he has to prove in pagan Athens. He’s dealing with people who know all of that. What he has to do is prove that the promised Messiah really would rise from the dead. He would have to suffer and rise from the dead, and the Old Testament says so.

So we get halfway through the sermon, and we read in Acts 13:32, “We tell you the good news [the gospel]: What God promised our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus.” That by itself could mean raising from the dead or raising into his status as Messiah. You can only find out exactly what it means from the context. We’ll see in a moment that it really does mean raising from the dead.

“What God promised our ancestors he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm …” Now we’re back to Psalm 2. “ ‘You are my son; today I have become your father.’ God raised him from the dead …” There’s the evidence that that’s what raising means. “… so that he will never be subject to decay.” So in this case, Psalm 2:7 is being used to prove that Jesus rises from the dead.

So Psalm 2:7 is quoted three times in the New Testament. Psalm 2 is quoted more often than that, but just verse 7 is quoted three times in the New Testament and taken to prove, first, that Jesus is superior to the angels; second, that he does not volunteer to become high priest by himself; and third, that he would be raised from the dead.

But when you look up Psalm 2, with all due respect, it’s hard to find any one of those themes there. That’s the problem. What I’m going to suggest we do methodologically, then, is first of all to look at 2 Samuel 7:14. That’s the second quotation in Hebrews 1. We’ll look at that passage first, then we’re going to look at Psalm 2, and then we’re going to come back to Hebrews 1:5 and try to begin to put it together.

First, then, 2 Samuel 7. Let me remind you of the context. David has become king. For seven years he reigned from Hebron over the southern tribes, and then he became king over the entire nation, all 12 tribes. About the same time, he captures Jerusalem, and Jerusalem is made his capital city. In the immediately preceding chapter, we’re told that the ark of the covenant is brought to Jerusalem.

So for the first time in one city you have the priesthood and the royal office. In one city you have the temple and you have the Davidic king. Just stuff that into the back of your mind. We’ll come back to that one. That stands behind Psalm 110, as we’ll see tomorrow. Then we read in chapter 7, verse 1, “After the king was settled in his palace and the Lord had given him rest from all his enemies around him …” That’s another biblical theological theme I’d love to unpack for you. In fact, I’m going to say a wee bit about it tomorrow. This rest theme. These things get intertwined.

“… he said to Nathan the prophet, ‘Here I am, living in a house of cedar, while the ark of God remains in a tent.’ ” By this time a bit of a ratty tent. You have several centuries between the exodus. I’m sure some parts of it had been replaced, but, you know, it’s a tent. It wasn’t even a big one. That’s the ark of God’s habitat. That’s where God meets with his people at the three great festivals a year. This is where Yom Kippur takes place, the Day of Atonement. It’s a bit of a ratty tent.

“Nathan replied to the king, ‘Whatever you have in mind, go ahead and do it, for the Lord is with you.’ ” It’s possible David thought here that he was fulfilling promises made in Deuteronomy that in due course the Lord would establish one central sanctuary in the land. Nathan doesn’t even question this. “God is blessing David. This seems to be in line with Scripture. Let’s go.”

“But that night the word of the Lord came to Nathan, saying: ‘Go and tell my servant David, “This is what the Lord says …” ’ ” Not what Nathan says. This is what the Lord says. “Are you the one to build me a house to dwell in? I have not dwelt in a house from the day I brought the Israelites up out of Egypt to this day. I have been moving from place to place with a tent as my dwelling. Wherever I have moved with all the Israelites, did I ever say to any of their rulers whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel, ‘Why have you not built me a house of cedar?’ ”

That’s the first of his reasons. There are a couple more, but it’s worth pausing for a moment to understand this first reason that God gives why David can’t build this temple. The first reason is at all the great turning points in redemptive history, God and God alone takes the initiative. Do you hear what he says? “To which of these shepherds did I ever command, ‘Why have you not built me a house of cedar?’ ”

“If this is going to happen, I’m the one who gives the commands.” It’s always like that. There’s Abraham in Ur of the Chaldees. How does he get called? Is he having his devotions one day, feeling very spiritual, and he begins to pray, “Dear heavenly Father, this world is still one rotten place, isn’t it? The Tower of Babel is the latest downgrade. I think it might be a good idea if we started a whole new humanity

I’m willing to be the great-granddaddy. You just bless my seed and make them as numerous as the stars of the heavens. You’re the boss. You’re God. You give me the commands, and I’ll go wherever you want, and I’ll start a whole new people, a covenant people. We’ll enter into a covenant. Wouldn’t that be a good idea, God?” Is that what happens? At all of the great turning points in redemptive history, God and God alone takes the initiative. That’s the truth.

Moses thought a little differently earlier on, but when he thought he would become a hero for his people, it didn’t work out too well. As a result, he ended up on the back side of a desert for 40 years. So here also, even if a sanctuary is to be built in line with the promises of God in Deuteronomy, it’s going to happen on God’s command, on God’s initiative, because God will not share his glory with another.

I suspect that what God is detecting in David is at least a wee bit of an edge of hinting, of at least suggesting that David is almost doing God a favor, and you never, ever, ever make growth and spiritual progress by thinking you’re doing God a favor. You are always a debtor to grace. Always.

Second reason. “Now then, tell my servant David, ‘This is what the Lord Almighty says: I took you from the pasture, from tending the flock, and appointed you ruler over my people Israel. I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have cut off all your enemies from before you. Now I will make your name great, like the names of the greatest men on earth.’ ”

Clearly, there is some part of David that’s thinking by building a whopping big temple David will make God’s name great. God says, “That’s not the way it works either. I make your name great.” This is part of a bigger doctrine in Scripture. The Puritans called it the doctrine of the aseity of God. It’s an old English word that nobody uses much anymore. It’s from the Latin a se, which means from himself.

What it means is that God is so much from himself he’s not dependent on anybody. I’m not from myself. I’m from my mummy and daddy. In fact, in broader senses than biological, I’m from all of the people who have shaped me and all of the influences upon me and my heritage and where I was born and how I was brought up and the experiences that have befallen me and the number of times I’ve been in hospital and to whom I’m married.

I’m not from myself, but God is so much from himself he doesn’t need us. That’s what the doctrine of aseity is. He doesn’t need us. That’s made explicit in many passages. It’s one of the doctrines Paul expounds when he’s preaching to pagans in Acts 17 in Athens. Pagan religion has all of these finite gods, and they have their own passions and their own corruptions and their own needs.

Pagan religion is essentially a matter of swapping. You scratch the god’s back, and then the god pleases you somehow. He blesses you. You want a safe sea voyage, so you try and do something nice for Neptune, and then maybe you’ll have a nice sea voyage. You’re going to give a speech, so you want to scratch the back of Mercury in the Roman system or Hermes in the Greek system, because he’s the god of communication. “You scratch my back; I scratch your back.” That’s the way religion works.

God help us. There are some Christians who think that’s the way religion works too. “I’ll just have my devotions, and then maybe God will give me a really good day. I won’t get fired.” “God, I’ve witnessed to at least 15 people in the last six months. Why should I get cancer?” It’s bizarre. God doesn’t need you. He certainly doesn’t need me. Do you know what? God doesn’t need our worship. In eternity past, he was perfectly happy.

You mustn’t picture God coming to Thursday afternoon rather late, saying, “Boy, I can hardly wait till Sunday. I wish they’d break out those guitars. Singing had better be good this week. I’m a bit down.” He doesn’t need our worship. He doesn’t need us. He’s the God of aseity. So how are you going to go to God and do something that makes him great? He is what he is. He’s perfectly great. He’s perfectly happy. He’s perfectly content.

Now don’t misunderstand. I am not saying that God is impersonal. I am not saying that God does not interact with us. I am not saying that God may get angry with us. I am not saying that God may pour out his love on people from the foundation of the earth. I’m not saying any of those things. God is personal and interacts with us but never, ever because he has some deep needs he has to meet. He doesn’t need us.

If he does these things, it’s because of his choice out of the perfection of all of his attributes, not because he’s needy like the pagan gods and has to be swapped with various things in order to meet his needs. So if you begin to approach God with a kind of stance that says, “Well, you’ve made me king. I’m so grateful. Now I’m going to do you a favor. I’ll build you a temple,” you’re already diminishing God.

If you have a lot of money, and you say, “Well, God, you’ve blessed me with a lot of money. That’s a good thing. Now I’m going to do you a favor too,” God have mercy on your soul. After all, God owns it all anyway. It’s true that God has enabled you to get the money, but you can’t give it to him as if you’re doing him a favor.

Rather, you’re doing it because he’s God, you’re thankful for redemption, you want to help his people, you want to prosper the gospel, it’s a privilege to serve, and it’s all his in any case, but never because you’re doing God a favor. That’s paganism. At that point, then, God says, “You want to build a house for me?”

There are another couple of reasons in here and a couple of reasons elsewhere where God gives further reasons why he doesn’t want David to build the temple. I don’t have time to go down that route any further. Now what the Lord says is this. Verse 11b: “The Lord declares to you that the Lord himself will establish a house for you.” “You thought you were going to build a house for me. No, I’m going to build a house for you.”

There’s a pun going on here. David wanted to build a house, a temple, for God. God says he’s going to build a house, a household, a dynasty, for David. There’s a pun in the word house. Everybody sees that. “When your days are over and you rest with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom.”

He’s going to build a dynasty, a household, for David. You can understand why David was a little nervous on this point. After all, he had just succeeded King Saul. King Saul never actually managed to establish a dynasty. Jonathan should have had the throne. In fact, Jonathan died with his father. They were both killed at the same time. Why?

He started well. Tall, dark, and handsome. Meek, not even wanting the job. So much promise. But he ends up defying almighty God, thinking that he can be king and priest at the same time, disobeying God, not listening to the prophets, and eventually, before his dynasty can actually be established, before the second generation even can come to the throne, God shuts him down.

Now David is there. Suppose David is perfectly faithful all his life. How about David’s son? How about David’s grandson? How about David’s great-grandson? How about his great-great-grandson? How do you establish a dynasty? You can’t control yourself and your passions. Just ask David. How are you going to control those of your son? What’s to stop you from getting bumped off like Saul?

But God in his mercy, by his own sovereign choice, not because David has earned it, says, “When your days are over and you rest with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you; he will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.”

To whom is that referring? Do not say “Jesus” too quickly, because you have to read the next line. “I will be his father, and he will be my son.” There’s the quotation. “When he does wrong, I will punish him with a rod wielded by human beings, with floggings inflicted by human hands.” He’s still not referring directly to Jesus. He’s referring to Solomon. Solomon will build a temple, and Solomon will do wrong, but God promises that unlike what happened to Saul …

When Saul did enough wrong, God said, “That’s the end of the dynasty” before it actually got going. “What I promise in your case, David, is not that this son of yours is going to be sinlessly perfect, but that when he does wrong I will punish him with temporal punishments, the floggings of human beings, rather than the kind of absolute judgment that cuts him off.” It’s in that context that God says, “I will be his father, and he will be my son.”

Clearly, in this context, sonship is like the usage we’ve already seen in parts of the ancient world, where what this means is not ontology, not an incarnation like the power of God coming on Mary. Not yet. It’s function. This person in becoming king now exercises something of God’s authority, of God’s reigning rule. He’s now reflecting God the King, with God the King’s interest in righteousness and integrity and ruling the people well and keeping them in the covenant.

So whenever a son of David comes to the throne, he becomes the son of God. It’s a functional category. It’s not the only use of son of God, but it’s one of the uses of son of God in the Scripture. In the first instance, it’s applied to Solomon, a sinful Solomon, who is nevertheless going to be afflicted with punishment.

Then God goes on to say, “My love will never be taken away from him, as I took it away from Saul,” which shows that that really is what David has been frightened of and what kind of encouragement God is graciously giving to David. In fact, a little farther on, when David responds to all of this, he realizes what a huge grace it is.

I wish I had time to work through verses 18 and following. “Who am I, Sovereign Lord, and what is my family, that you have brought me this far?” The whole rest of the psalm is given over to adoration, as David, instead of now thinking he’s doing God a favor, realizes he’s the recipient of grace. That’s the whole rest of the chapter.

Before we get there, there’s one more little point to observe. “ ‘My love will never be taken away from him, as I took it away from Saul, whom I removed from before you. Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever.’ Nathan reported to David all the words of this entire revelation.”

Logically, if this dynasty is going to be established forever, there are only two ways it could happen. One way is to keep renewing it. One king dies, and another one comes along still in the same genealogical succession, and then again and again and again and again and again, world without end. That’s one way. The only other way is that eventually you have a king who actually lives forever. There’s no hint of it here yet.

This is the foundation text for all of the Old Testament texts that establish the primacy of the Davidic dynasty, and some of those texts become stunning. This is just over 1,000 BC. By the time you have the prophet Isaiah toward the end of the eighth century, there we’re told in words that we recite every Christmas from Isaiah 9, “Unto us a son is given, unto us a child is born. He will sit on the throne of his father David. Of the increase of his kingdom there will be no end, and he shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

Now you have a Davidic king who begins to sound as if he has some potential for reigning forever. “Of the increase of his kingdom there will be no end.” He might be a son of David, but he’s also called Mighty God, Everlasting Father. It’s not just this passage. In the sixth century you have Ezekiel quoting words from God.

In Ezekiel 34, Yahweh says he’s disgusted with the shepherds of Israel. They all want the mutton, and they fleece the flock, but they don’t care for the sheep. So God will destroy these shepherds, and he means the leaders, the temporal kings, the priests, the prophets. They all seem to be in it for themselves. “I will destroy them, and I will shepherd my people Israel.”

About 25 times in the next 25 verses or so, Yahweh himself, God himself, says something like, “I will shepherd my people. I will lead them by streams of clearing water. I will lead them where there’s good grass. I will separate sheep and goat. I will be their shepherd. I will be the one who shepherds them. I will do this. I will do this.” You come to the end of it, and he says, “I will send my David to do it.”

Out of such matrixes of texts arises this anticipation of an anointed one, an anointed king who is spectacular, in David’s line, bringing these promises to pass. A son, God’s Son, a Davidic king. Have we made sense of this passage so far? We haven’t gotten into angels yet, but give me a few more minutes. Now we come to Psalm 2. This one we’ll handle a little more quickly.

“Why do the nations conspire and the peoples plot in vain?” This part is quoted by Christians under the first whiff of persecution in Acts 4. “Why do the nations conspire and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth rise up and the rulers band together against the Lord and against his anointed [his messiah] …” That is not always a term for the ultimate Messiah. The anointed one. The king was anointed. The priest was anointed. In one or two passages the prophet was anointed.

Clearly, what this is is a description of surrounding kings against Yahweh and the Davidic king. You’ll see that there is no way to take it any other way as we read on. The kings of the earth or of the land, the same Hebrew word. It can mean either. You have to decide as you press on in the passage. It sounds like a Davidic monarch who exercises authority and a kind of hegemony over the whole area, and now they’re in a conspiracy to overthrow the Davidic monarchy and take control again.

They conspire against Yahweh and against his anointed. “ ‘Let us break their chains and throw off their shackles.’ The One enthroned in heaven laughs; the Lord scoffs at them. He rebukes them in his anger and terrifies them in his wrath, saying, ‘I have installed my king on Zion, my holy mountain.’ ” It’s the Davidic monarchy that is at stake. Jerusalem, Zion. That’s where we find David receiving the initial promise in 2 Samuel 7.

The point is it’s not just David or a Davidic heir, a Davidide. It’s Yahweh himself. If God wants to defend his Davidide, who on earth is going to tell him no? Take on God Almighty? God laughs. He holds them in derision. What a joke. For God himself has said, “I have installed my king on Zion.”

Then in verse 7, it’s the king who speaks. He looks at this installation from his point of view. “I will proclaim the Lord’s decree,” the decree that has just been mentioned. God has decreed, “I have installed my king on Zion, my holy mountain.” “So I will proclaim the Lord’s decree from my perspective. What does this look like from my perspective?” “He said to me, ‘You are my son; today I have become your father.’ ”

That’s exactly the language, give or take word order and a few things, of 2 Samuel 7:14. When the Davidide, the heir of David, actually becomes king, that is the time when Yahweh himself, when God Almighty has said, “You are my son; today I have become your father.” “You have entered into sonship to God Almighty because you have become my king, and functionally now you are ruling as my emissary. You represent me. You exercise justice. You reign and you preserve the covenant. You’re now my son.” It’s a functional category. That’s the decree.

“Ask me, and I will make the nations your inheritance, the ends of the earth your possession. You will break them with a rod of iron; you will dash them to pieces like pottery. Therefore, you kings, be wise; be warned, you rulers of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and celebrate his rule with trembling. Kiss the son, or he will be angry and you and your ways will be destroyed, for his wrath can flare up in a moment. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.”

Yes, I know there are nasty textual variants and questions about Aramaic words. The main thrust, though, is pretty clear. What is not so clear is whether this is talking about just an ordinary son of David in David’s line in the years that the dynasty is on the throne or if this is beginning to anticipate something pretty big. Did you hear this? Verse 8: “Ask me, and I will make the nations your inheritance.”

Does that just mean the local little nations, the Amorites and the Amalekites and the Moabites and all of the other “-ites” that are around the nation? “I will make the ends of the earth your possession.” If you want to be really cynical, it could be the ends of the land, I suppose. But the language is pretty generous. You start anticipating maybe this Davidic king is really going to have one whopping rule. The anticipations are building.

Now we go back to chapter 1 of Hebrews. If we have understood these two Old Testament texts aright so far in their context.… At the end of the day, you and I must both submit to what the context says. A text without a context becomes a pretext for a proof text. Have we handled the Old Testament texts aright? Now what must they mean here? There are some more steps to take, but they must mean something like this.

“For to which of the angels did God ever say, ‘You are my Son; today I have become your Father’? Or again, ‘I will be his Father, and he will be my Son’?” No angel was ever appointed to reign in the Davidic line. No angel was ever appointed to be the Davidic messiah. It means something like that so far. There’s more, but doesn’t that make sense so far without twisting the Old Testament context at all?

So it’s not just the word sonship, because as we’ve seen, son in some contexts can refer to angels. In these Old Testament contexts, son has a certain kind of overtone. It’s connected with the appointment to the Davidic throne, with some anticipation of a pretty spectacular Davidic line when you take into account passages like Isaiah 9 and Ezekiel 34 and hints in Psalm 2 of an ultimate Davidide who is not just a King Hezekiah but something much bigger, something much greater, but in line with this promise. No angel was ever tied to that kind of promise.

Let me bring in one more piece from the outside before we try to tie together the three passages where this verse is quoted in the New Testament. For those of you who have studied theology in a seminary somewhere.… Liberal or orthodox; it doesn’t really make much difference on this point. For those of you who have studied for an MDiv or a good BA in Bible somewhere along the line, you’re aware that a lot of people who study Christology, the doctrine of Christ, like to work through elements of the doctrine of Christ by looking at the titles of Christ.

So Jesus is the Son of Man. He’s the Son of God. He’s the King of Israel. He’s the Prince of Peace, and so on. You look through all of these various titles, and then you look at how Son of Man works in Matthew. Then you look at how Son of Man works in John. Then you write a doctoral dissertation. “A Contrast Between the ‘Son of Man’ Theme in Matthew and in John.” You get a PhD for that, for sure.

Then you break these things up, and you notice that we call John 17 the high priestly prayer, but the word priest isn’t used there. It’s not really a high priestly prayer at all. No, you have to go to Hebrews. Hebrews does not have a big Son of Man Christology. It uses the expression once or twice. John really doesn’t have a great big high priestly prayer Christology when you look at the language closely, so you talk about the Christology of John and the Christology of Hebrews.

Now there is an element of truth in all of that. It’s a small element, but it’s an important element. The element of truth in it is that transparently, the books of the New Testament do emphasize certain aspects of who Christ is more than others. That’s true. There are some shadings, and it should be acknowledged.

Close reverent study of biblical books, seeing how Christ is explained in those books, will show you how there are differences. You work right through the whole Christology of Hebrews, and you discover there are insights as to who Jesus is in Hebrews that you don’t really find in Galatians and some insights in Galatians that you don’t really find in Hebrews. That’s true. That’s the element of truth in this sort of study.

The danger of it is that it is often taken so far, especially in the more liberal camps, that people assume there are whole Christian communities bound up with each of these Christologies, as if there were in the first century some Christians who went around saying, “Well, actually I’m a ‘Son of Man’ Christian myself. Down the road there are some ‘Son of God’ Christians. My understanding of ‘Son of Man’ is sort of in line with Matthew. The ‘Son of Man’ stuff you find in John is a bit out. I’m a ‘Son of Man in the Matthew sense’ Christian myself.”

So we have these separate communities that are all functioning out there connected with this Christology or the other, and you’re not supposed to stick them together. I want to argue as strongly as I possibly can that that is not only theological rubbish; it is international class historical rubbish. We really have to get rid of it. To show you how it comes together, let me ask you a question. It’s a very hard question.

It’s a question that any teacher of the New Testament asks students in Bible colleges, Christian universities, and seminaries. Let me ask you the question. When does Jesus become king? Boy, that’s a toughie. It’s related to what we’re doing, because if son of God is related to a king of Israel, and it’s the king of Israel in the Davidic line who was Son of God, then surely we have the right to ask the question.… When does he become King? It’s equivalent to asking, in this sense of son of God, “When does he become Son of God?”

Well, in one sense, he’s born a king. The magi come and ask, “Where is he who is born king of the Jews?” Of course, in other uses of son of God there is more ontology to it. It’s bound up with eternity. God sends his Son into the world. There are other uses to son of God, so I don’t want to confuse you and deny that there are some uses of son of God outside the uses of the Davidic dynasty, but just ask the question.… When does he become King?

In one sense, he’s born a king. In another sense, it’s bound up, to some extent, with the dawning of his ministry. The Spirit of God falls upon him. A voice from heaven says, “This is my Son,” and Jesus begins to preach the dawning of the kingdom. Then the kingdom is clearly dawning, in some sense, as Jesus has his trainee mission exercises, as, for example, in Luke 10, where he sends out his disciples, and they come back with wonderful stories about how the demons are subject to them, and they preach the gospel in the Gospels. It’s all very wonderful.

Jesus says, “I saw Satan fall from heaven. The kingdom is dawning.” Then, of course, he stands before Pilate. “Are you the king of the Jews?” Jesus uses an expression that means “Yes, but not quite the way you think.” “It is as you say.” As he hangs on the cross, writhing in agony, over his head are the words, “This is Jesus, the king of the Jews.” Jesus, reigning from a bloody cross. Then he rises from the dead, and when he ascends he declares, “All authority is given to me in heaven and on earth.” Oh, he’s King. Make no mistake. He’s King. All authority.

Paul picks up on the same point. In 1 Corinthians 15, he says, “Christ must reign …” He’s talking about right now. “… until he has put his last enemy under his feet.” He’s reigning now, but it’s still a contested reign. All authority is his. All of God’s sovereignty is mediated right now through King Jesus. All of it. He must do this and reign now until he has crushed the last enemy under his feet, and the last enemy to be destroyed is death itself. That’s what 1 Corinthians 15 says.

At the end, eventually, he will show this transformed, consummated, perfected, no-more-contended kingdom to his Father and hand it all over to him. That’s what 1 Corinthians 15 ultimately says. Eventually, in the consummated kingdom, whatever the details of your eschatology to get there, there will be no more contesting anywhere.

In this complicated way of talking about when the kingdom comes, you cannot help but see that the focal point is in the death and resurrection. The miracles Jesus performs are done in anticipation of his triumph in the wake of the death and resurrection. He rises from the dead and is about to return to the Father’s glory, and he reigns. All authority is his in heaven and earth. It’s all there. That becomes, in one sense, when he becomes the great Davidic King.

In another sense, he’s born the King. I know that. In yet another sense, the Spirit comes upon him at a certain point. I know that. In another sense, his reign, his authority, is already being demonstrated in the miracles. I know that. But in the wake of the cross and resurrection and session at the Father’s right hand, which is what was mentioned in the prologue here in Hebrews …

He says, thundering from heaven, “All authority is given to me in heaven and on earth.” He is the great Davidic King, the last one, whose reign knows no end, and he will be called the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. That’s also when he became Great High Priest. Unless you’re falling into the modern traps of thinking, “This is ‘king of David’ Christology over here. Now we’re going to deal with priesthood Christology over here.”

The cross and the resurrection are the center for everything. This is the great turning point in all of redemptive history. That is when he becomes High Priest. The temple veil is rent. We have access into the presence of the living God. The sacrifice has been paid. He now intercedes before the Father on my behalf because of what he has already done. So his death, resurrection, and ascension also mark his entrance into his high priestly ministry.

When he’s lying in the grave, he doesn’t say, “Oh, I’ll volunteer.” God raises him from the dead. In that sense, God appoints him to this role. Now suddenly these texts.… Psalm 2:7: “You are my son; today I have become your father.” You begin to see how they’re linked to the resurrection, to his superiority over the angels (no angel has ever entered into this royal line), and to his appointment as High Priest.

In other words, the reason the author can tie all of these texts together is not because he is pretending that Psalm 2:7 explains all of these connections. Behind all of this is something even bigger yet. It’s called Davidic typology. Now I know typology is a nasty term, because it’s subject to so much abuse.

How many are scared of typology? We’ve all heard about somebody who’s preaching the Old Testament and sees in Rahab’s red cord a mark of the blood of Jesus because of the color red. Stupid things like that that have no exegetical warrant and ultimately make typology look ridiculous. But a lot of the Bible prophecies that are fulfilled in the New Testament are, in fact, one of several kinds of typology.

Let me explain what a typology is. In one sense, we’re ready for it all the time, because we know that we have the Passover lamb, for example. If you take the blood of the Passover lamb and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel, the angel of wrath passes over and you’re saved. So Paul comes along in 1 Corinthians and says Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us, so the wrath passes over us because he has died in our place.

We’re familiar with things like that, where you have an institution or a person or a thing, a place even, that takes on a certain kind of symbol-laden significance as it recurs and recurs and recurs until there’s a pattern, a trajectory following that ultimately is pointing toward something. You get this trajectory pointing forward, and the fulfillment of that trajectory is the fulfillment of a typological prophecy.

What you have in the Old Testament are various typologies, one of which is the Davidic typology. You have this initial hard prophecy in 2 Samuel 7:14, and then some of the Davidic references I’ve mentioned.… Isaiah 9 and Ezekiel 34. There are a lot of other ones. So you have an anticipation of a great David who’s ultimately coming.

So when there’s a passage that describes the old David, like 2 Samuel 7, its ultimate fulfillment is in the final David in exactly the same way that when you have a passage that describes that first Passover lamb, ultimately it’s establishing a trajectory that finds its ultimate fulfillment in the final Passover Lamb.

In that sense, 2 Samuel 7:14 can be taken out of the Old Testament, assuming there is a Davidic typology that’s carrying the whole Bible together, and now we say these passages point to the ultimate Davidic King, who is the Son, and by his death and resurrection he becomes the King. He becomes the Priest.

He is superior to all, including any angel, because no angel will ever reign over the new heaven and the new earth. Of no angel will it ever be said that all authority is his in heaven and on earth. To no angel was such promises given. They were given to King Jesus. That’s what you must preach.

Does the text then not make sense? It’s not ripped out of context. It reflects a deep theological reading of the Old Testament. It’s tying it together. That’s what you must see. Never let your confidence in Scripture be robbed, be diminished, because you don’t see how it’s there. Probe. Ask questions. Find a Guthrie or somebody who will be able to explain it to you. That’s what he’s here for.

One last somewhat parenthetical thought. At this point, some of you who are preachers, whether you’re lay preachers or Sunday school teachers or pastors, you’re going to say, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you really expect me to take two whole sermons to get through this stuff on half a verse or so?” Well … maybe, maybe not. I have preached through Hebrews in one sermon, because I think it’s important sometimes to give an overview of a book.

Do you know what my sermon title was? Jesus is Better. In chapter 1, he’s better than the angels. In chapter 3, he’s better than Moses. In chapter 4, he’s better than Joshua. In chapter 5, he’s better than Aaron. In chapter 7, he’s better than the Old Testament priests. In chapter 9, his new covenant is better than the old covenant. That’s the theme all the way through, and it’s important to see how the theme works.

Sometimes I’ve preached through Hebrews and taken about a chapter at a time. You can go through chapter 1 and show how Jesus is better than the angels without quoting all the Old Testament background. You might have a couple of senior saints who come and say, “Yeah, but how does this …? I don’t really see how this works.” Then you have a separate seminar just for them.

You must never think that the only place you’re ever allowed to teach the Bible is Sunday morning at 11:00. There might be some special times for doing more advanced stuff with your elders or deacons, or whatever you call them in your particular local church, or the other pastors. There are a lot of junior pastors in some of your churches who need some help in how to put their Bibles together.

Or it may be that you’re dealing with a congregation that has a lot of senior saints, and you might want to take two or three chapters of Hebrews and go through it very slowly, because isn’t it a shame if Christians read their Bibles for 30 years and don’t figure out how typology works? At some point you have to explain it, don’t you? So you don’t have to try and explain everything every time, but sometimes you do have to slow down enough to figure out how it works. Just don’t try and do it all next Sunday. Let’s pray.

In truth, Lord God, we want to be like the scribes that Jesus described, able to take things new and old out of your most Holy Word. Make it our aim, we pray, much less to be masters of the Word than to be mastered by it. So open our eyes and our hearts and our wills, that the more we see of Jesus, the more we are drawn to him in worship and adoration and faith. For Jesus’ sake, amen.