Political Rebellion
Dear Sutton and Savannah,
Did you see the news today? Without exception, I always find I am better for having heard news from you about you and your family than anything that comes across the airwaves. Thanks for the periodic updates.
-Dad
Inside Out Lectionary Letters
Year A - Transfiguration Sunday (Texts, Art, Hymns)
Readings for February 15, 2026
Exodus 24:12-18 / Psalm 2 or Psalm 99 / 2 Peter 1:16-21 / Matthew 17:1-9
One view is that the 2nd Psalm is a powerful hymn that depicts God’s sovereignty over all earthly powers. Those who oppose God are in trouble and those who trust in God will be rewarded. Taken from this viewpoint it feels like a textbook case of toxic dynamic masculinity. The language is of battles and war, breaking the chains, conspiring against the enemy, rebuking in anger, terrifying in wrath, ruling with an iron scepter, and dashing the opposition to pieces. Allegiance is coerced not earned, and defection is threatened with short-fused anger and wrath. The language feels like the ridiculous (and extremely dangerous) saber-rattling (and saber-swinging) of the 2026 political environment.
There is a dynamic-masculine part in all of us. This is not a male or female issue. Rather it is an energy and attitude within everyone. It is the aggressive, action-oriented energy that brings about movement and change. It stands up to aggression and fights in conflict. However, out of balance, it ignores consequences, dismisses harm, disregards opposition, scoffs at inconvenient facts and destroys relationships. At its best it leads others through the fires of chaos. At its worst it creates the fires of chaos.
You might wonder who is the author of Psalm 2? Though there is no inscription indicating authorship, Luke, in Acts 4:25, tells us that the early followers of Jesus attribute this Psalm to David. They also provide an interesting contrast to David in how to respond to feelings of powerlessness. Once again, the journey must take us inward if we hope to ever change what is happening outwardly.
David is praying from a place of being threatened and attacked. The outward circumstances trigger fear, anxiety, and anger. The survival instinct is ignited and the masculine-dynamic energy springs forth. David calls on God to crush them all. In Acts 4 we listen in on the small band of Jesus-followers discussing the imprisonment and release of Peter and John over the healing of the man who couldn’t walk. Peter and John described the healing as simply an act of kindness. They were threatened with further punishment by the authorities and then released.
The believers used Psalm 2 as a basis for their prayer that God would help them (just like David was praying). As a result, God’s Spirit filled them and enabled them to do three things: they healed others, shared their possessions, and spoke the message of love with boldness. There was an internal realignment. They didn’t meet aggression with greater aggression, but with greater love. They met toxic power with healing power. They met the concentration of wealth and power with the distribution of wealth and power. They met the fires of chaos with the waters of faith. And this is possible because of an internal shift.
This shift enables us to see that the “kings” and “rulers” of Psalm 2 represent the reactive parts within us. Those particular inner parts respond to fear and anxiety with thrusts of power, aggression and attack. But there is a more spacious center rooted in belonging rather than force. From the inner perspective, this psalm becomes less about conquest and more about alignment—inviting us to notice which voices inside us bring order, compassion, and life, and which ones exhaust or fragment us. The Divine spirit leads the dynamic-masculine within all of us to move the world with love because love has realigned our inner world. Thus, transformation does not come by suppressing power, but by integrating it—so that strength serves healing, authority serves connection, and action flows from an inner center that is no longer ruled by fear.
Prayer
Lord, I get so ticked off at the idiocy I see depicted in the news all the time. Help me to begin and end this day acknowledging that there is plenty of idiocy in me that could use a good dose of your Spirit, before I call down fire on anyone else. Amen