In this sermon, the preacher introduces a hymn that emphasizes the firm foundation of faith in God's word. He encourages the audience to reflect on the significance of their lives and whether they are bearing fruit for God. The preacher highlights the importance of accepting Jesus as the only way to the Father and emphasizes that eternal life is a gift from God through Jesus' sacrifice. He concludes by inviting the audience to participate in reciting Psalm 1, which speaks about the blessings of delighting in God's law and avoiding the counsel of the ungodly.

How many of you were at the Bristol Conference in 1961, I believe it was? Raise your hand. Way up. Good. Now you know then why we have really prayed and worked so hard to get our speaker for tonight and one of the speakers for the rest of the week back to Bristol. There will be a return engagement for Dr. Karl Armading, now of Dallas, Texas. God really used him that year to bless our hearts and to meet our needs through the minister of the Word of God. We would have liked to have had him back even the next year, but as so many of the servants of the Lord now, they are pressed for time and for so many places to go, and there's so little time to do so much in, we couldn't get him back. But we were thrilled when many, many months ago we wrote and asked if he could return to Bristol as one of our two featured speakers. We were really pleased when we heard that he could. So it's my pleasure to introduce to you the man used mightily of God throughout the United States and many parts of the world, one of a family, a very wonderful servant of the Lord, our brother Dr. Karl Armading. Dr. Armading, good to have you with us. When I arrived here yesterday afternoon, I got quite a shock because I was told that all three of my sermons were already on tape. I just couldn't believe that. The thing that concerns me most is that those who hear the tapes will probably say, well he didn't say it just the same way. But if I can stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance, that'll be something. For our meditation tonight, I'm asking you to turn to the book of the Psalms, and I'd like to consider the first psalm. I wonder how many people in this audience tonight have actually had to, or rather have sometime or other, memorized this first psalm. I wonder if I could ask for a show of hands as to that. Good. All right, now all three of us will get together and show us how it's done. The rest of you can read it with us, but we're going to have this audience participation tonight in repeating the six verses of Psalm one. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor standeth in the way of the wrong. For if he by night is in the law of the Lord, and if he walketh, he meditates day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the river for water, and bringeth forth its fruit in seasons. His leaves also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are not a servant, but a life of charity to the reasoned bride of the way. Therefore the ungodly shall not be banged in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the more I know of the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall not be cursed. You know, of course, that this book of the Psalms is known as the old prayer and praise book of the Hebrews. And it's rather remarkable that the first hymn in this collection of 150 psalms or hymns should be concerning a happy man. Well, that's the way the first words of this psalm have been translated by other translators. Happy is the man. But the fact remains that the word translated blessed or happy happens to be in the plural in the original language. So that literally it would say the happinesses or the blessednesses of the man. But when you say happiness, we are reminded that happiness depends on things that happen. But in the case of a child of God, this is not so. A child of God can be in all kinds of happenings, all kinds of circumstances, and yet be happy. Because his happiness doesn't depend upon his surroundings. But it does depend somewhat on the decisions which he has made. And I think of all the gifts which an almighty creator has given to us as his creatures and his children, there is probably no gift more important than the gift of being able to make a decision. There are certain things that we share with the lower order of creatures. For example, the gift of sight. Many animals have better sight than human beings. There comes the gift of hearing. And again, many animals have the gift of hearing much better than we do. And so I could go on and speak of the other gifts which we have. But there's something which an animal does not have, and that is the power to make decisions, the power to make a choice. And I wonder sometimes in these days whether we've overlooked this fact, that you and I have committed to us a wonderful power, the gift to be able to make a decision and to act according to it. It's evident from the first verse of this psalm that this man of whom we are reading here actually made some decisions. For we read here, blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. He's not simply standing by and admiring somebody else who perhaps doesn't walk in the way of the ungodly. But he's asking himself, why do I walk there or why don't I walk there? There is sometimes, you know, when we make decisions, we yes, we say it's so, I wouldn't like to walk like some people I know. I wouldn't like to walk in the way of the ungodly, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of the scornful. But they say to me, you know, much as I admire all these things, I just simply haven't got the power to do it. And this, of course, is a very honest confession. And one can understand why, now that we are Christians, we understand why men cannot, as it were, implement their decisions. They agree with us that this is wonderful. They agree with us that this is right. And yet they say, I don't know how I can do it. And then they look at some of us and say, how do you do it? And we have to confess that we don't do it in our own strength. We do it in the strength of another. And to every child of God is not only given this wonderful gift of being able to make a decision, but also to implement it. That is, to go according to the decision which you have made. Now why does the Christian go in the way of the ungodly? Why doesn't he stand in the way of sinners? Why doesn't he sit in the seat of the scornful? Not because he has the power to do or not to do these things, but because God has given to him his blessed Holy Spirit. And this is something which, praise God, is true of every child of God. The Word of God teaches us that if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he's none of this. But it follows that if we are born of the Spirit, and if you're not born of the Spirit, you're simply not a Christian. When the Lord Jesus was talking to Nicodemus, or Nicodemus talking with him, the Lord Jesus said to him, except a man be born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. He can't even see the kingdom of God, said the Lord Jesus. This is a great mystery to this man Nicodemus. And yet the Lord Jesus had to say to him, art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? Nicodemus thought it was just simply a repetition of the natural process. Something like a fellow student of mine at university, of which I'm an alumnus, we were standing together one day in the chem lab doing some experiments, and I was preaching the gospel to her while I was waiting for certain things to take place on the desk. I spoke to her about new birth. She said, new birth? She said, I've never heard of it. I said, you mean to say you've never heard of being born again? She said, no sir, I've never heard of such a thing. So I just took out my pocket testament and showed her that the Lord Jesus had been talking about this to Nicodemus, and that Saint Peter had told us how it was done. Because he says in his epistle, the first chapter, we are born again, not of corruptible seed, but of the incorruptible seed by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever. She said, I've never heard of such a thing. Well I said, now why don't you think it over. I'd like for you to think this over. I'd like for you to come back with some decision with regard to it. We had to go on with our work because the professor was watching, and we're not supposed to have conversations while we were doing our work in the chem lab. But you know this is one of those things that you feel is more important than any experiments you could perform in the chemistry lab. Well a week later she came back. She said, you know I think I know what you're talking about. I said, I'm so happy to hear it Lawrence. She said, you know I was listening to a Swami from India the other night, and he told us how we pass from one existence into another. And she said, there's no telling how often I've been here before. Well I said, you simply, you don't remember anything about it? No, she said, I don't remember a thing about it. Well I said, evidently it hasn't done you any good to be here before this. I said, do you remember what sort of an existence you had when you were here before? No, she said, I really don't. She said, I might have even been in some animal for all I know. I said, now what for example would you think you might have been? I might say she was not hard to look at. Well she said, you know, judging from this man that I've heard talking this week, she said, I might have been a bullfrog on the banks of the Ganges in India. Well I said, at any rate you seem to have transformed your sex, because I said the bullfrogs are the gentlemen of the species. How silly can you get? So we just pressed home this question. I said, now you just forget what that man told you and listen to what God has to say. And then if you need an answer for the question, why do I have to be born again? I believe our son answers the question. If for no other reason it's to give us the power to walk in the path that is pleasing to God. Well you say, but preacher, this is all negative in this first verse. So it is. But it doesn't stop there. You notice in the second verse of our psalm, and so many have repeated this so well, you know exactly what it says. But, but his delight, notice not merely his beauty. Oh I can remember the time in my home where I was brought up in a Christian home, and I thank God for that. What a wonderful heritage to have Christian parents. To hear the word of God in the very earliest days of your infancy, of course my memory doesn't go back that far. But being the oldest of ten children, and having seen what the rest of them were getting, I had some idea of what I got when I was just a baby in my mother's arms, 78 years ago. Yes? And I can just imagine her singing to me, Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so. But, for all that I didn't love the word of God. I didn't love it when my father was reading it I would very often sigh even out loud, because he was rather long-winded sometimes. It always stopped when I thought it was a good stopping place. But, I thank God for that early training. And then one night when I was 15 years of age, just a teenager, heard a man preaching the gospel. I didn't want to go to meetings that night. We lived five miles away from the gospel hall, and my folks being poor, we walked the five miles to meetings. And I listened to a man I didn't like the looks of him. I didn't like the length of his sermon. I pulled my watch on him during his closing prayer, and it was one of those old watches that went ka-plink, ka-plink, ka-plink, you'd hear it all over the room. And my dad said to me after we came out, he said, you pulled your watch on the preacher tonight, didn't you? I said, yes sir. He said, don't you do that again. And I didn't. But before that night was over, before that night was over, the man I'd heard preaching that night became to me the most wonderful person I had ever seen. And the word he preached was to me the most wonderful message that I'd ever heard. He was none other than our dear brother, George McKenzie. Now that his Lord, God used him to speak to me that night, I'm wondering if I'm addressing some teenager here tonight, who perhaps like me, you have found it rather worrisome to have to be along in family worship, to hear dad read the scriptures, and to pray and perhaps sing a hymn. But ah, the day is going to come when you're going to be very thankful for that. This is the way God sowed seed in my heart. And from that night on to which I've referred, the second verse of this psalm of to me. His delight. No longer a duty, but a pleasure now. But somebody said to me, yes, but how could you delight in the law of the Lord? And of course, strictly speaking, this law of the Lord would be rather terrifying, wouldn't it? Especially if you limited it to the Ten Commandments, which I had to learn as a boy. We lived next to a Presbyterian church and we went to the Sabbath school, as they called it, in the afternoon. And I as a boy of ten years of age, I learned the Westminster Shore Catechism, which has 40 questions concerning the Ten Commandments. I thank God for that foundation too. But I learned something about those commandments. Nine of the Ten Commandments are negative. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make to thyself any graven image of anything in heaven above or the earth beneath, and so on, to bow down to it. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work, but in the seventh thou shalt not. The only positive commandment in the Ten is the one which Saint Paul has taken over bodily into the Ephesians when he says, Honor thy father and thy mother, that it may be well with thee, that thou mayest live long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. But you know, generally where you have a negative, you have a positive. And the law of Jesus is the positive. And so when this scripture here speaks about the law of the Lord, it speaks of something that regulates my conduct. And that goes beyond the Ten Commandments. This leads me on to a person whom God has set before me in his holy word as the example I'm to follow. In other words, I have before me a living standard in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so he becomes to me the rule of my life. This is what Saint Paul meant when he said, For to me to live is in Christ, and to die is gain. This is it. So your delight is in the law of the Lord. As I said, you may ask me why I delight in the law of the Lord. Well, in the first place, I delight in the law of the Lord because of the authority with which it speaks. You know, this is something which I believe even our generation, and when I say our generation, I'm including my teenager friends here tonight. This is something which even our generation is longing for, is someone who can speak with authority. We don't want any guesswork here. We want something positive, something sure, and it is said of our Lord Jesus Christ that the common people heard him gladly. And in another place it says, he spake with authority and not as described. Secondly, I delight in the word of God because of its faithfulness. Oh, how glad I am that I don't find flattery on its pages. It tells me exactly what's wrong with me. You know, sometimes doctors, in order to avoid telling the truth, will put their statements on negative form. They don't want to be telling lies, but they don't give you all the truth. My dear mother, who was called home to the Lord's presence at the early age of six to seven, she died of cancer. When we suspected cancer, we took her to a clinic in the city in which I was living at the time. Several doctors looked her over for several days. Then they came up with this diagnosis, no malignancy demonstrate. No malignancy demonstrate. Well, at the first when we heard this, we took comfort out of it. But you know, it was a negative diagnosis. And in a little while, our mother began to feel these same pains again. This time she went to a doctor living in the city of Winslow, Arizona, where she was staying with my sister. My father and mother went to stay with my sister who was there in the Indian work. This old doctor was himself a cancer victim, dying of it. And she went to him. After they'd had a visit, the doctor took my sister Minnie off to one side. He said, Miss Amardeen, your mother has cancer and she will be dead in August. This was in January. And she died in August. He was a faithful man. And as sad as it was to hear this verdict, your mother has cancer and she'll be dead in August. We appreciated his frankness. Friends, the word of God is frank. It tells you and me that we're not only sinners, but we're all sinners. And without Christ, we're doomed to a Christ's eternity, as that's in the book. But I thank God also for the good words and comfortable words as we were hearing this morning, as our beloved brother was taking up that first chapter again of Zechariah. He spake to me in good words and comfortable words. Oh, where have you ever heard such words of comfort to a poor, lost, ruined sinner as you'll find in the word of God? Friends, if I had no other reason for delighting in the word of God, it would be for the sweet message of the gospel which I find here. Where have you ever heard words like these when our blessed Lord stood up before a ruined group of people and said, Come unto me, all ye that labor on a heavy laden, and I will give you rest? Friends, those words are simply matchless. They're incomparable. These are good words. These are comfortable words. The word which says to me that if I confess my sins, he is faithful and just to forgive me of my sins and to cleanse me from all unrighteousness. For the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, cleanses from all sin. Thank God for these good words. Yes, I delight in the word of God. I delight in the word of God also for its precious promises. Oh, where could you turn anywhere in other books and find such promises as you find in this book? Oh, as we read through it from Genesis to Revelation, it's amazing how time after time and time after time, God says something to us that I don't know any other book that has this effect on me. If I had no other reason for delighting in the word of God, it would be the effect which it has upon me as I read it from day to day. These last two and a half years have been lonely years in my life. The Lord took home to himself my beloved companion after nearly half a century together. This is not easy as anyone knows who's gone through it. But oh, how wonderful is the companionship of our blessed Lord as he makes it real to us as we read his holy words. Yes, it's just as if he was standing by our sides talking to us and speaking to us these good words and these comfortable words. And I delight in the word of God because of its beauty. Where have you ever found more beautiful language than you find in this book? And this applies not only to those statements to which I've already referred, but even the most tragic things in Scripture, that is, the sufferings of our blessed Lord, how wonderfully they are described. Think of that incomparable 53rd chapter of Isaiah. Do you know this chapter is referred to by an ancient commentator as the golden passion of the Old Testament? That's exactly what it is. Where have you ever found a passage of Scripture more loved than the 23rd Psalm? Again and again in my work as honorary chaplain of a TV sanitarium, a place which I filled for some ten years in the city of Albuquerque, New Mexico, I don't know how many times I've had dying men and dying women ask me if I wouldn't please read Psalm 23. If I wouldn't please read Psalm 14, let not your heart be troubled, you believe in God, believe also in me. Where will you ever find a passage of Scripture, for example, like the 13th chapter of 1 Corinthians, in any other book but the Bible? I could add to that the 17th of John, the 21st chapter of the book of Revelation. These are our classics as Bible lovers. Oh, the beauty of it. And this has made its impress upon me, so that as a young man seeking to enter the university of which I'm now an alumnus, I had never had the privilege of going to high school a day in my life. The only reason I was allowed to study at all in the university was because I was over 21. But the regulations said that I could only do that for two years, and then I would either have to become a candidate for a degree or drop out. Well, I just don't belong to the dropouts. I just don't. And that's before the days of the beatniks and the hippies. I don't. I don't belong to the dropout class, class. So I thought I'd ask some questions as to how I could go on. And the dean of the college, a man by the name of Mitchell, a very dear friend of mine, a lay reader in the Episcopal Church in that city, and I believe a humble believer in the Lord Jesus Christ. I said, Dr. Mitchell, I guess I'll have to say goodbye. And it was then that he said to me, why you ought to pass the entrance examination. You know, this gave me a start. How was I going to do this? But in the course of time, one subject after another was covered, until I was up to within 11 units of the 15 units that I needed to enter. Those last four units had to do with the English language, which of course I speak with a slight accent in Texas, but you understand. I just didn't know how I was going to get around this. But I prayed much about it, took the examination, sat all of one afternoon writing on this English examination. All I got the next morning was that I had passed, and I was admitted to the university of the candidate for the degree of Bachelor of Arts. I was anxious to see this paper, to see what the professor had really done with it. So one day I plucked up enough courage to go up into his office and said, Dr. Hessler, is there any way in which I could see that examination paper of mine, which I worked so hard the other afternoon? Oh yes, she said, my secretary will let you see it. So he called her in, he said, let Miss Armitage see his paper. So she dug it out of the piles and let me see it. And the top of it, red ink says, this paper smacks of Shakespeare or the Bible. You know that gave me an idea. Do you know why, at least my generation, I don't know about the present generation, but my generation could read Shakespeare with appreciation without having to consult a dictionary very often. Why? Because the King James Version of the Bible kept alive the English of Shakespeare. And I don't know anything more beautiful. I've read a lot of these other translations. I've all due respect for the men who make them. But I still believe with the old lady who said that this King James Version was good enough for David and good enough for the Prophet Noah, and it was good enough for her. Now there's something else besides delighting in it. It says here, not only his delight in the law of the Lord, but in his law that he meditates day and night. My dear friends, this is the thing that really counts. It's meditation in the word of God. Oh, but they say to us that meditation is a lost art these days. People don't have time to meditate. Don't you make any mistake, they still meditate. Oh yes. We get a good illustration of that in one of Robert Burns' poems. You ever read Robert Burns? If you've never read Tam O'Shanter or the Totter Saturday Night, you've missed something. In Tam O'Shanter, Burns talks about a woman who was waiting for her drunken husband to come home. And the way he puts it in the She said she was sitting at home, nursing a rock to keep it warm. That's meditation. That's meditation. Turn it over and over and over in your mind, and remember dear friends, this is exactly what every great artist had to do. Aren't you surprised sometimes when you go to a piano recital, or violin recital, or even to a voice recital, and you hear the artist playing and playing away number after number, beautiful compositions, whole concertos without a sheet of music before him. How in the world does he do it? He meditated, he memorized it. And beloved, if you and I are going to really profit from the word of God, this is what we're going to have to do. And how we thank God for the many precious passages which are stirred up in the mind so that we can call them back again to memory. Perhaps when you're not able to sleep at night, how wonderful, instead of counting imaginary sheets, you just go through some scripture that you know, psalm after psalm, the first one, the second one, the third one, the fourth one, you go on, and perhaps before you conclude that fourth one, you're already laying down your head in peace and sleep, and you're off. That's it. And we read that this is going to have certain effects because of the location in which this tree is put. It says he shall be like a tree planted. And the word in the original language really means transplanted. Every one of us here tonight as a Christian is a transplant. God took us out of our natural environment and he put us into this spiritual environment. And notice where he puts this tree. He puts it by the rivers of water which speak to us of the ministries of the Holy Spirit. And we've got scripture for that in the seventh chapter of John's Gospel, where the Lord Jesus said, If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink, and out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water. This spake he of the Spirit, the Holy Spirit. And here God is putting this tree in this wonderful location where it'll have this source of supply. But you know a tree has two parts. There's the part everybody can see, the part which we very often admire. But there's another part of that tree that you don't see. That's down in the ground. And we have learned from the horticulturists that that which you see must balance that which you don't see. And herein lies the parable of the spiritual life. Unless your spiritual life balances your public life, my friend, there's something out of balance in your life. If we pretend to be something in public which we're not in private with our blessed Lord, there's something wrong. Rooted and grounded in love as we have it in the epistles of the Ephesians, in order that that which men see may bring glory to our blessed Lord. This is true. And it brings forth fruit in his seed. And this fruit, as you know from the fifth chapter of Galatians, is in nine different varieties. Love, joy, peace, gentleness, and so on. Nine varieties of precious fruit in Galatians 5. His leaf also shall not wither. And the leaf, as we know from imagery as used in the Word of God, is a type or a picture of our testimony. Why is it that some have to behave if they don't say it like the poet Byron, who in the early 30s of his life had to say, my days are in the seared yellow leaf. Well friends, I refuse to say that even now at 78. I remember how one lady came to me after I preached the sermon on the second coming of Christ. She said to me, I see you're one of those cut and dry premillennialists. I said, no lady, not cut and dry, green and growing. I defy anybody to draw a comparison between a person that's waiting for God's Son in heaven and a tree that's dying from the roots down. No, dear friends, one whose testimony is based on the Word of God is going to have a verdant testimony, a living testimony, a green testimony, whatsoever he does shall prosper. But I must hasten on to a close. I see the hour is gone. I'd just like to dwell for just a few minutes on the contrast. Not because I derive any pleasure out of this, but because I want to be faithful to each and every one in this audience this evening. You notice the contrast? The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff. How different from a tree. How different from a tree that's rooted, planted by the rivers of water, bearing fruit in its season, the leaf is green, and it's very healthy. How different the chaff. Oh, one time it held the grain in its embrace. One time it too was growing out there, but now it's rootless, it's fruitless, it's lifeless. What a picture. The chaff which the wind drives away. Remember some years ago, yes, it goes way back now to about the late twenties. We were living in Dallas then. I was planting some sweet peas in my garden when my young daughter, who's now mother of four, stole with young fellows. She came out to me with a bit of wild oak chaff in her hand. I forgot, I shouldn't have said that Texas grows wild oak, but it does. But anyhow, she came with this bit of wild oak chaff in her hand. She said, Daddy, you're making a garden? I said, yes, darling. She said, Daddy, would you plant my flower in your garden? I looked at this bit of wild oak chaff. I said, honey, that will grow. She looked at me with such a perplexed look. She said, Daddy, if you plant it, I know it will grow. You know, you don't argue with a child that talks that way. So I took my gibble and I made a little hole in the ground and put this bit of chaff in, pressed the dirt around it. And of course, every day when we watered the ground for the seeds, of course, this got watered too. One day she came in quite dressed. She said, oh, Daddy, do you remember that plant, that flower that you didn't want to plant? I said, yes, I think I do. She said, it's growing. Well, I said, honey, if it's growing, it must be a miracle. Well, she said, it is growing, Daddy. I said, how do you know? Well, she said, it's getting green. Well, I said, if it's getting green, maybe it's one of those sweet peas I planted. No, Daddy, she said, it's that flower that I gave you to plant. So I took a bottle of chaff in one hand and went out the garden. And sure enough, there was the piece of wild oak chaff. And it was green, but it was green mold. And in a few days, it turned black and gone. Lifeless, ruthless, ruthless. Friends, what a picture. Therefore, the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish. My dear unsaved friend here tonight, oh, I wish we could just have a little personal word together. I wish we might be by ourselves or we could just talk this thing through. And to have you face this question just in the presence of God, what has my life amounted to up to tonight? Would my life be represented by a growing tree bearing fruit with a verdict testimony? Or is my life after all like it does have been a child? Friend, may God use this parable to speak to you and to drive you to Him who said, I am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me. And remember that this life is a gift from God. The wages of sin is dead. That's the chaff. But the gift of eternal life, the gift of Jesus Christ our Lord, that's it. It's yours for the taking. The Lord Jesus paid for it with His precious blood. A price you and I simply cannot comprehend. It's beyond us. It's incomparable. It's priceless. That's why He says in the prophecy, come and buy wine and milk without money. That will appeal to the bankrupt without price because nobody is able to compute its value. And this is offered to you tonight through simple faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Won't you take a minute's word? I thought I'd like to close this meeting tonight with a hymn that probably sums this up. It's hymn number three in the book, but we're going to sing it to a different music. I've arranged with Mr. Hancock to play it to the tune that the Lord made for this tune, for this hymn. It's hymn number three. It says, How firm a foundation ye saints of the Lord is laid for your faith in His excellent word. What more can He say than to you it is said, to you who for refuge to Jesus have fled. The only thing about this tune that Mr. Hancock is going to play for us is that you don't repeat the last line. Just sing the full line. But this is a hymn, this is a tune rather, which should be known very well south of the Mason and Dixon line. So all you good southerners are going to join in as we sing this grand old hymn to this wonderful tune. Hymn number three, let us stand. Hymn number three.