Psalms 1
McGeePsalms 1THEME: Two men, two ways, two destiniesThis is the psalm which opens the Genesis section. It begins with man instead of the material universe. This psalm talks about the blessed man, or the happy man. The blessed man is contrasted to the ungodly. It is also a picture of Christ, the last Adam, in the midst of ungodly sinners and the scornful. We sometimes think of the Lord as a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and for some strange reason many of the pictures that have been painted of Him reveal Him as a very sad-looking individual.
It is true that Isaiah says He is a Man of Sorrows, but why don’t you read on? In Isaiah you will find that Christ did not have any sorrows and griefs of His own. Isa_53:4 says, “Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.” It was our griefs, not His own, that He was carrying. He was the happy Christ. This is a picture of Him.
Psalms 1:1
PRACTICE OF THE BLESSED MANThis verse states the practice of the blessed man. A little bit further in this psalm we will see the power of the blessed man, and finally his permanency. In this first verse we see the negative side of the practice of the blessed man. We are told what the happy man does not do. Here we see three positions or postures. Blessed is the man, or happy is the man, who does not walk in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of the scornful. The person who does these things is not a happy person. He goes through three stages. First he associates with the ungodly, then he gets in with sinners, and finally he joins in with the scornful. There is definitely regression, deterioration, and degeneration here. The blessed man does not walk in the counsel of the ungodly. Counsel means “advice.” He does not listen to the ungodly. Have you ever noticed that even the Lord Jesus never referred to His own reason or His own mind as the basis for a decision? Whatever He did was based on the will of God. He never said to His disciples, “Fellows, we are going into Galilee again.
I have been thinking this over, and I am smarter than you fellows, and I think this is the best thing to do according to my point of view.” That is not the way He approached His disciples. He always said, “I am going to Jerusalem because it is the will of my Father.” He spent time with His Father and knew what His will was and moved into certain areas on that basis. My friend, it is one thing to listen to counsel, and good counsel is fine, but certainly not the counsel of the ungodly. We are to walk by faith. Listening to the counsel of the ungodly is not walking by faith. Who are the ungodly? They are the people who just leave God out. There is no fear of God before their eyes. They live as though God does not exist. Around us today are multitudes of people like this. They get up in the morning, never turn to God in prayer, never thank Him for the food they eat or for life or health. They just keep moving right along, living it up. They are ungodlythey just leave God out. The ungodly counsels the man, and now we find him standing in the way of sinners. It is the sinner who takes him from there. Sin means to “miss the mark.” They don’t quite live as they should. They are the ones the Scripture speaks of when it says, “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death” (Pro_14:12). Again the Scriptures say, “All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes …” (Pro_16:2). The sinner may think he is all right, but he is a sinner.
God’s Word says, “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts …” (Isa_55:7). Also it says, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isa_53:6). The Father laid on the Lord Jesus all the weight of our guilt. We are sinners. That’s our picture. The next step down from standing in the way of sinners is sitting in the seat of the scornful. The scorners are atheists. Now the sinner gets the young man to sit down. We are told that the third stage is that he sits in the seat of the scornful. The scornful is the atheist. He not only denies God, but he exhibits an antagonism and a hatred of God.
This we see on every hand today. The scornfulthey’re the ones who are absolutely opposed to God. They don’t want the Bible read in the public schools; they don’t want it read anywhere for that matter. They deny the Word of God. May I say to you that there is nothing lower than to deny God. The drunkard in the gutter today is not nearly as low as the man who is denying God.
And if you want to know God’s attitude, here it is: “Surely he scorneth the scorners: but he giveth grace unto the lowly” (Pro_3:34). God is opposed to the scornful, and He will scorn them. That’s a very frightful picture, by the way, presented here. Now this is the negative side. This is what the happy man does not do. In the next verse we see what the happy man does do.
Psalms 1:2
You remember our Lord told about a man possessed with a demon, and when the demon went out of him the man cleaned up his life. He was swept and garnishedhe had a new paint job. He was all cleaned up and he thought he was all right. But that demon still owned him. The demon wandered around, got tired of traveling, and returned. When he came back he brought some friends with himseven other spirits more wicked than himself.
And we’re told that the last estate of the man was worse than the first. Many folk think that if they clean up their lives a little, that is all that is necessary. But notice, “his delight is in the law of the LORD.” The delight of God’s man is in the law of the Lord. In other words, he finds joy in the Word of God. I wish I could get the message over to folk that the Bible is a thrilling Book. It’s not a burden; it’s not boring.
It is real delight to read and study the Word of God. Blessed is the manhappy is the manwhose delight is in the law of the Lord. Today the tragedy that has come to manthe tear, the sigh, the groaning, the heartache, the heartbreak, the broken homes, the ruined and wrecked livesare the result of God’s broken laws. The Word of God makes it very clear. “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous” (1Jn_5:3). His commandments for believers today are not only the Ten Commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome. The idea that being saved by grace means that you can be lawless and live as you please is not the picture given to us in the Word of God. We are not to be lawless. “For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another” (Gal_5:13). Liberty is not license by any means. Of course we don’t keep the Ten Commandments to be saved, but that doesn’t mean we are to break them. It means, my friend, that you cannot measure up to God’s law. He demands perfection, and you and I don’t have it.
We have to come to God by faith. After we are saved by faith, we are to live on a higher plane than the law. We are to have in our lives the fruit of the Spirit, which is: love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, and self-control. We have the discipline and guidance of grace. “His delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate.” Meditate is a very figurative word. It pictures a cow chewing her cud. I’m told that the cow has several compartments in her tummy. She can go out in the morning, graze on the grass when the dew is on it in the cool of the day. Then when it gets hot in the middle of the day, she lies down under a tree and begins to chew the cud. She moves the grass she had in the morning back up and now she masticates it, she goes over it again.
That is what we do when we meditate. We go over what we have read. Thomas a Kempis put it rather quaintly: “I have no rest, but in a nook, with the Book.” Way back in 1688 Bartholomew Ashwood said, “Meditation chews the cud.” My, how that is needed today in the lives of believers. Remember that James spoke of the man who beholds his natural face in a mirror, then “…straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was” (Jas_1:24). We are to meditate on the Word of God (which is God’s mirror that shows us what we really are). We are to allow the Word to shape our lives. “And in his law doth he meditate day and night.” My friend, God has no plan or program by which you are to grow and develop as a believer apart from His Word. You can become as busy as a termite in your church (and possibly with the same effect as a termite), but you won’t grow by means of activity. You will grow by meditating upon the Word of Godthat is, by going over it again and again in your thinking until it becomes a part of your life. This is the practice of the happy man.
Psalms 1:3
POWER OF THE BLESSED MANWhere does he get his power? The happy man shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water. The word rivers is the superlative in the Hebrew; it is a hyperbole for abundance. The blessed man is planted, given plenty of water, and becomes a tree. God’s trees are “planted” trees. They are not wild-growing trees by any means. I think this picture refers to being born again. Isa_61:3 says, “To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified.” God does not use wild-grown trees. His trees are born again, taken up and set out in God’s gardenset out by the rivers of water. What does “rivers of water” mean? That is the Word of God. Somebody asks, “Are you sure about that?” Oh, I know it, because Isa_55:10-11 tells me, “For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.” God wants His Word to come down like rain. The radio is a fine way to do thisit scatters God’s Word everywhere. We are to get out the Word of God. And it will produce somethingit will cause trees to grow. It provides drink and sustenance. It is also cleansing, and you can see this washing of water with the Word expressed by the psalmist in Psa_104:16, which says, “The trees of the LORD are full of sap; the cedars of Lebanon, which he hath planted.” Now the psalmist does not say that God’s trees are saps, he says that they are full of sap. That “sap” is the Word of Godthe trees of Lebanon which He has planted are full of the Word of God. Each tree “bringeth forth his fruit in his season.” It is interesting to note that God’s trees don’t bring forth fruit all of the time. They bring forth in their season, and the power is in the Word of God. I have heard the statement made in this day of activity and nervous action that the primary business of a Christian is soul-winning. I disagree with that. The Word of God does not say it. 2Co_2:14-16 says, “Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place. For we are unto God a sweet savour of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish: To the one we are the savour of death unto death; and to the other the savour of life unto life.
And who is sufficient for these things?” Well, I am not, but I do know this: I am called to give out the Word of God. It is the business of the Holy Spirit to bring people to Christ. We are experiencing multitudes of people coming to Christ through our radio program. I am amazed at it, but we don’t do it. We just give out the Word of God, and when we do, our God causes us to triumph. Suppose nobody accepted Christ?
Then we are a savour of life to those who are saved and a savour of death to those who perish. My responsibility is to give you the Word of God, and it is your responsibility to do something about it. When I was a pastor, I used to tell folk when I gave an invitation to receive Christ, “If you leave here unsaved, it’s too bad because you can’t go into God’s presence saying you had not heard the Gospel. I really have become your enemy because you cannot tell God that you had never heard His Word.” It is your business to give it to him, my friend, and it is his business what he does with it. But he will have to be accountable to God. God tells us to get out the Word of God, and that is what I’ve been trying to do for many years.
Some are saved, and some are not saved. At Dr. George Truett’s fiftieth anniversary as pastor of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas, a very prominent lawyer came up to him after the morning service. He said, “George, you and I came to Dallas in the early days, in the horse-and-buggy days. I want to make a confession to you. As a young lawyer, I used to come in to hear you. You were a young preacher in those days, but you disturbed me. Many a time I went home after a Sunday night service and I couldn’t sleep.” But he said, “George, today you have become the greatest preacher in America, but I can sit and listen to you now, and you don’t bother me at all.” And he laughed and walked away. I’d hate to be that lawyer. As brilliant as he is, he won’t have much of a case to offer when he stands before Christ someday because he happened to have listened to one of the greatest preachers America ever produced. Dr. Truett was called the prince of the pulpit. For fifty years he listened to him. And at the end of fifty years he said, “You don’t bother me at all.” But Dr. Truett had discharged his responsibility. The primary business of a Christian is not soul-winning, but getting out the Word of God, my friend. It “bringeth forth his fruit in his season.” There is a time to get fruit. I have a little tangerine tree that overdid itself one year. It was loaded with tangerines. I know I picked two bushels off that tree, and there still were two more bushels there. But a month later there wasn’t one tangerine on that tree.
It only brings forth its fruit in its season. There is a season for fruitbearing. That is the reason there ought to be a long time of preparation, of sowing seed, of helping it to fructify. Just to hand out a tract here and there may have its value, but, my friend, we are in the business of giving out the living Word of God, and it needs to be tended. It takes time and care because fruit only comes forth at the right season. He also says: “His leaf also shall not wither.” Now the leaf is the outward testimony of the Christian. That is something that should be out all the time. God’s trees are evergreensthey never lose their testimony. A friend of mine, while taking a course at a seminary in New York one summer, went to one of those famous churches in New York City one Sunday. He said, “I walked down on Sunday morning to this great church and saw over the entrance, carved in stone, these words: The Gate of Heaven. Then I saw underneath it a temporary sign: Closed During July and August.” Too often this happens in the lives of individual believers, but it should not, my friend.
You are always an evergreen. Your leaf is the outward testimony that you have in this world for Christ. All God’s children are evergreens. In addition to this he says, “whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.” Back in the Old Testament God promised material blessings to His own. Those blessings are not promised to the believer today. If you have them, you can thank Him for more than He has promised. John Trapp put it like this: “Outward prosperity, if it follows close walking with God, is sweet. As the cipher when it follows a figure adds to the number, though it be nothing by itself.” The important thing is to have Christ. That’s number one. All material blessings are zero. If you don’t have One before your zeroes, you have only a goose egg, friend. But if you put that One, who is Christ, before your material blessings, then you are blessed indeed. But remember that He has not promised material blessings in this age.
Psalms 1:4
PERMANENCY OF THE BLESSED MANNotice the insecurity of the ungodly. Two men, two ways, two destinies. One is a dead-end street; it leads to death. The other leads to life. God says what is right and what is wrong. We are living in a day when folk are not sure what is right or wrong. God is sure. His Word does not change with every philosophy of a new generation.
Psalms 1:6
Perish simply means “lost.” It is a word of finality, if you please. The wicked are going to perish; Pro_10:28 tells us: “The hope of the righteous shall be gladness: but the expectation of the wicked shall perish.” We are admonished: “Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it” (Mat_7:13-14). The wide, broad way is like a funnel in that you enter at the big end and, as you continue, it becomes narrower and narrower and finally leads to death. You enter the narrow way by Christ, who is the way, the truth, and the life. As you continue, the way becomes broader and broader; and this way leads to life. In Joh_10:10 Christ says, “…I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” What a glorious picture of the blessed and happy man is presented in the first psalm!