Your Inheritance

The king proclaims the LORD’s decree:

“The LORD said to me, ‘You are my son.

Today I have become your Father.

Only ask, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance,

the whole earth as your possession.’” Psalm 2:7-8

PERHAPS YOU’VE GIVEN some thought to what you intend to pass along to your children as an inheritance. In Psalm 2, we discover that God the Father has told the Son what he intends to give to him as an inheritance —the nations.

Psalm 2 is a psalm David wrote for his own coronation, and it was likely used at the coronation of future kings in the Davidic line. When David was installed as God’s representative to reign over his people, he entered into a new and unique relationship with God, one of royal sonship.

But while this psalm was originally written about David, ultimately it is about his greater son, Jesus. Though he had been eternally the Son of God in the presence of God, he, too, entered into a new relationship with God the Father on the day he was resurrected from the dead —that of royal sonship (Acts 13:33).

In Psalm 2, the Son says that God told him only to ask, and he would give him the nations for his inheritance. And in the Gospel of John, we overhear Jesus making just that request. In his prayer immediately prior to the Crucifixion, Jesus prayed, “Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son so he can give glory back to you. For you have given him authority over everyone. He gives eternal life to each one you have given him” (John 17:1-2). We, as believers, are the inheritance Jesus asked for.

Just as David, the Lord’s anointed, needed only to ask God to grant him power over his enemies and make them part of his own kingdom, so Jesus, the Lord’s Anointed, needed only to ask God to grant him power over those who were his enemies. And in overcoming death, Jesus indeed overcame them.

There is something far more precious than the inheritance you may leave your children. Far more significant is that you and your children are part of the inheritance God has given to his Son.

Lord, Father of King Jesus, thank you for giving such a glorious inheritance to your Son. How we long for the day when he comes back to reign and the whole earth bows to him as King!