(The Man God Blesses) Psalm 1 — Zac Poonen

The Two Themes of Psalms and Proverbs

The man God blesses from... I want to take four of the Psalms in four sessions today. The Psalms and the Proverbs are books you find in the middle of the Bible and they basically deal with two themes.

A number of the Psalms deal with the contrast between the righteous person and the wicked person. And Proverbs, almost the whole book, deals with the contrast between the foolish person and the wise person.

Psalm 1 as a Preview of the Psalms

So, we begin with Psalm 1. And this Psalm is actually, we can say, a preview of what all the Psalms are about. There are two ways in which we can study the Scriptures. One is by studying topics. You take a particular subject like faith or grace or sin or righteousness or love or hatred or jealousy and you could study right through the Scriptures.

Use a concordance and go through the Scriptures and know all that God has to say about it. That's a very good way to do it because you know everything that God says about a subject. Another way to study the Scriptures is to go verse by verse by verse.

Now, most of the time I've spoken here, I've spoken on the basis of topics. But today, I want to go verse by verse through Psalm 1 in this session. It begins with, how blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked nor stand in the path of sinners nor sit in the seat of scoffers.

So, it's speaking about a man who is blessed. That means a man whom God has blessed. And that word's got many meanings. The man who is really happy, not superficially happy with the frothy type of happiness that the world offers, which disappears quickly.

But a deep-rooted, solid happiness that is unaffected by circumstances and what happens around you. This is the type of man and woman, when I use the word man, it applies to both men and women, the type of person God wants all of us to be.

Humanity’s Original Blessing and Fall

You know, when God first made man, He said, let's make man in our image and let him rule. And it says, God blessed him. That was God's desire for man right from the beginning. God wanted to bless man so that man rules over all his circumstances.

So that everything is under his feet. That was God's original purpose for man. And man lost all that when he listened to the devil, instead of listening to what God had said. So, in God's word in the Bible, we have a revelation of how we can come back to that life that God originally planned for man.

The Bible as God’s Word and Guide

Now, I think most Christians would admit that this book is the word of God. The Bible is God's word. But, if they really believed it, if they really believed that there was only one book in this world, written by the creator of this universe, I believe that they'd spend a lot more time studying it.

Why is it so many Christians don't give more time to understand what God is saying in this book? I believe it's because deep down in their heart, they don't really believe this is God's word. And that's the sad thing.

You don't realize how much you've missed. Now, I started studying this book when I was converted at the age of 19 and a half. The first six months I read through the whole book. Because I want to know generally what it says.

And for the next six or seven years, I went into it in detail. And I was working. In the middle of my work, I'd spend time studying this book to understand what God had said. Now, I want to tell you from my own testimony.

I never went to a Bible school. But, what I studied in those years, and I've discovered in the last 44 years, there's never, never, never been a problem that I've ever faced in life for which I've not found an answer in this book.

There's always been an answer in this book. If you know where to find it. You know, when the devil came to Jesus, tempting him, the way he comes to us, tempts us. Every time, Jesus responded with a word from scripture.

He didn't give his own ideas. See, that was the difference between Jesus and Eve in the Garden of Eden. When the devil came to Eve, Eve responded with her ideas. But when the devil came to Jesus, he responded with God's word.

And here it's talking about a man who is blessed. Because, verse 2, his delight is in the law of the Lord. And he meditates on that law day and night. And therefore, he's like a tree firmly planted. You can't shake that tree.

Because, he has firmly established his life on the principles that God has taught in his word. He has gradually come back to that original place that God planned for man in Adam. When he created Adam.

I want to say to you, my dear brothers and sisters. If your life is defeated, if you are frustrated, discouraged, you find life is boring. It's because you haven't given time to read what God has said in his book.

Now, it says here, right in the first verse. That God's word. There's a contrast brought here between sin and God's word. The man God blesses is a man who avoids sin and obeys God's word. You probably heard the saying that this book, the Bible.

Either the Bible will keep you from sin or sin will keep you from the Bible. It's one of the two. This is the contrast you see in the first two verses of this psalm. It's sin in verse 1 and it's God's word in verse 2.

And you're going to make a choice in your life. When the devil tempted Jesus to sin, he chose God's word. When the devil tempted Eve to sin, God had already given her a word. That word was, don't eat from this tree.

But she chose sin. And all the confusion and chaos and wars and sickness and disease that's covered this world in all these thousands of years. Was because way back there, man chose sin instead of God's word.

And that should have taught us a lesson. All these thousands of years. See what is the result. And then in contrast to that, you see the life that Jesus lived. Every time he was tempted, he chose God's word.

So I want to say that to you that this psalm teaches us that we're always going to face this choice. You know, between sin and what God's word says. And the blessed man is the man who has learned to say no to sin and yes to the word of God.

And that choice comes to us many, many times. Now you see, God could have made us like the planets. The planets don't have a free choice. The moon, for example, doesn't have a free choice. It's got to rotate in a certain, go around in a certain orbit.

It's got no choice. The planets don't have a choice. And the result of that is their obedience is absolutely perfect. They've never disobeyed God even once. Not even for a single second. It's perfect obedience.

Now God could have made man like that. God could have made Adam, I mean looking like a man, but with the same absence of free will. So that he'd be like a planet. He'd move about like a robot, just automatically obeying God.

But God didn't do that. Because He wanted sons. And a robot can never be a son. Now, even if it obeys perfectly. And God wanted sons and daughters. And that's why He gave Adam and Eve a free will to choose.

He said, I'll never force you to obey me. You know, that's why there's so much sin in the world. If God forced people to obey Him, everybody would be obedient. Just like the planets, like the beauty there is in creation.

How is it the planets have never collided with each other in all these years? Because they obey God perfectly. How is it men and women collide with each other so frequently? Because they don't obey God, that's all.

It's so simple. All the confusion, the wars at home, between countries. It's all because they exercise their free will in disobedience to God. And yet God doesn't take away that free will. And even after we are converted, even after we've given our life to Christ.

He doesn't take away our free will. Even after we are born again, we become His children. He still says, every day I want you to choose between sin, verse 1, and my word, verse 2. This is what this psalm begins with.

This is the choice that always faces us every day. When Jesus said, if you want to follow me, you must take up your cross every day and follow me. Do you know what that means? The cross is where my will crosses God's will.

That's the cross. And I have a choice there, which way I want to go. And that choice is going to determine what you are going to become in 10 years or 20 years. Every day we are making choices. And the choices between sin and God's word.

And ultimately after 10, 15, 20 years, your choices determine what you become. So, it's God who works in us. He speaks to us. He encourages us. He gives us, He prompts us in our conscience when we are going the wrong way.

But He'll never force us. Because if He forced us, we would become robots. And we can never be holy without having a free will. And that's why God never takes away our free will from us. Because He wants us to be holy.

And so here it speaks about a man who makes a choice. In verse 1, how blessed is the man who does not walk. Now, it's not that God catches him by the neck and pulls him away. No. He makes a choice. That's why He is a blessed man.

And you can be that blessed man or woman. He does not walk according to the advice of ungodly people. He does not stand in the path of sinners. He does not sit in the seat of the scoffers. Now, I want you to notice something.

The Progression of Sin and Ungodly Counsel

See, this is the way to do Bible study. I want you to notice here a progression. You know, if we read through scripture quickly, we don't get this. That's why we need to meditate. And here we see a progression.

First of all, you listen to the advice. Wrong advice. And then, if you listen to that, you go the next step and go and stand where sinners are standing. And then, you continue along that way. You finally sit down with them.

You settle down. This is the progression of sin. And the same way with the words used here. First of all, it speaks about the ungodly person. And that's the person who doesn't want God. I mean, he's not particularly wicked, perhaps, in that sense.

But he doesn't want God. But then, gradually, then it goes on to sinners. People who go on to sin. And then, they do evil. And then, the third word used there is scoffers. That is people who have gone beyond sinning and make a joke of sin.

And crack jokes about hell and things like that. A lot of people like that in the world. I mean, they've lost sensitivity to their consciences. Lost all sensitivity to sin and to God. So, what I want to show you in this verse is, there's a progression.

You're not stationary in this world. You either progress along the way of righteousness. Or you progress along the way of sin. No one is stationary. Let's not fool ourselves. Every single one of us. Whether we realize it or not.

Are either holier than you were last year. At this time. Or more sinful. Closer to God. Or closer to the devil. There is progression. It depends, first of all, on whose advice you listen to. It says here, the man who...

Here's advice coming from an ungodly person. And I tell you, we get plenty of that through television. Through the newspapers. Through the billboards and advertisements. And everywhere. Through the eyes and through the ears.

That's where we get all our advice from. That's why we got to be very careful. About what we see. And what we hear. And how we respond. Everything that we see around us. The information that we get is not all true.

Most of it comes from ungodly people. Who, in a very clever program that Satan has arranged. To bombard us with information. That's in order to lead us away from God. So that we don't listen to God. So that we don't have time to be still.

To hear what God is trying to say. He makes our life so busy. That we don't have time to listen to what God has to say. There are so many clever ways. So, the first way is by giving us advice. Which sounds okay.

But if you don't know God's word. That's the first step to go astray. So here, in the contrast between verse 1 and 2. Here's some advice coming in from people who don't know God. If I don't know God's word.

I'll go astray. Because that advice sounds so right. That I go from there. I move on to stand. Where sinners are standing. Instead of moving on. I stand there. Jesus taught us to pray. Lead us not into temptation.

In other words. We're praying, Lord. I find myself weak. That's why I don't want to stand. Where I fear I'll be tempted. The person who is proud. Is the one who falls. Because he thinks I can stand. We're all weak.

The flesh is so weak. It's so easy to lose our temper. It's so easy to lust with our eyes. It's so easy for a dirty thought to come into our mind. Just by looking at a page on a magazine. We're so weak.

We're not strong. And that's why we don't want to stand. Where sinners stand. We pass on. We move on. And if we don't go along that way of avoiding sin. We'll gradually sit down. With the scoffers. People who make fun of God.

Delighting in God’s Word

Now. We go to verse 2. Where it says. His delight is in the law of the Lord. In contrast to all this. Here's a person who's avoiding. Who said no to sin. No to all this advice that comes from ungodly people.

And he doesn't want to stand where sinners stand. He doesn't want to sit with the scoffers. But you remember what Jesus said about a man. Who had a demon inside him. And who cast it out. And he kept his house empty.

Clean and empty. Seven other demons came and occupied it. What Jesus was saying there was. That when you cleanse out evil from your life. Don't keep that heart empty. Fill it with something good. Otherwise, your latter condition will be worse.

Than what it was in the beginning. So, that's what we read here. That when we get rid of these sinful things. Which you are avoiding. This heart must not be kept empty. It must be filled. And it says here.

With God's word. His delight is in the law of the Lord. In Peter's letter. He says as newborn babes. That means when we are born again. He uses the example of a newborn baby crying out for milk. In 1 Peter chapter 2 he says.

As newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word of God. God's word is compared to milk. And you know that every baby. If it's healthy. Cries out for milk. You don't have to teach it. It automatically cries out for milk.

In fact. That's one of the first things a doctor looks for. When a baby is born. Is it crying or not? And if a baby comes out all calm and quiet. Something is wrong. It cries out for milk. It's thirsty.

And I believe that that is one mark. By which we know. Whether we are really born again. Are you crying out? For the milk of the word of God. A baby that's not thirsty for it's mother's milk. Something is wrong with it.

You know some of these babies that are born premature. Are sick. Or something is wrong with their heart. They didn't get enough oxygen or something like that. And they are sick. There is no strength in them to cry.

A lot of Christians like that. They say they are born again. We hope they are. But they don't seem to have any longing for the milk of God's word. You got to urge them. You got to tell them to read God's word.

Read the Bible. Read the Bible. And they do it. And then they forget about it most days. Something is wrong there. I mean if you had a baby like that. The doctor would say something is wrong. We got to check up on this.

Something is seriously wrong. A really born again Christian. Will have a desire for God's word. Because that's his milk. It's just like hunger. Jesus spoke about God's word like food. He said man shall not live by bread alone.

But by every word that proceeds from God's mouth. I fear that we have today all over the world. Christians who got the right doctrine. But who don't have the right experience. A shallow. There is something seriously wrong.

We are not having healthy robust babies being born into the church. And I believe one of the reasons. Is because the gospel has been cheapened. Evangelists are not proclaiming repentance from sin. There is a lot more teaching about faith today than repentance.

Unfortunately, God joined repentance and faith together. He told his disciples go and preach repentance. And the forgiveness of sins all across the world. The apostles preached repentance and faith. And what God has joined together.

Man has put us under. So, I mean, if you don't believe me. Go to the average Christian book shop. Or you go to the average Christian website. Just, you can test this out. Go and see how many messages you can find.

Or how many books you can find on repentance. You will find a hundred times more books and writings on faith. And I want to tell you. I am not against faith. I believe in faith. You can't get anything from God without faith.

But if you try to have faith without repentance. You are going to be a very shallow Christian. You will be this type of sick premature baby. That always got to be kept in the incubator. And never seems to be fully fit to live.

Now, I am not saying that to condemn anybody. But I am just saying that to encourage you to be a healthy child. His delight is in the law of the Lord. That means, he thinks of God's word like ice cream.

Boy, God's word. You know what delight means. Now, I will tell you honestly. That's how it was for me. When I was born again 44 years ago. I mean, nobody had to tell me to go into God's word. I just lapped it up.

Whenever I got a chance. I found God had done something in me. I hope he has done that in you. This is the only thing that will make you a strong, robust, muscular Christian. Who you can spend your life on earth in a way that will count for God.

So that you have no regret when you come to the end of your life. His delight is in the law of the Lord. You know, I have seen. In India, I live in India. People whose delight is in making money. Business people.

And you know how they are? They work in their stores, in their shops from morning till night. They are always thinking of ways to make more money. I suppose when they night, when they dream, they dream about how to make more money.

And I say, Lord, that man is so devoted to his God. Money. And I am not as devoted to my God. Shame on me. I must be more devoted to the true God than that man is devoted to his false God. And that man, you know, for example, if a man wants to advance in his profession.

Whether it is business or computers or anything, medicine. They study everything possible. And I say, if I want to serve God, I have got to study His word. This must be my delight. And if it isn't, I will tell you what to do.

Will you pray this prayer and say, Holy Spirit of God, please do a work in me. Do a work in me that I will have a longing for your word. The Holy Spirit is the one who creates that desire. We are not born with that desire.

We are born with a desire for earthly things. But Jesus said, you must be born again when Christ comes in through the Holy Spirit. And He puts this desire, as I said, for the milk of the word of God. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from God's mouth.

That's what Jesus said. We can't live without this. And so, it's so very important to meditate, like it says here in verse 2, on His law day and night. That doesn't mean we are reading the Bible the whole day, day and night.

It's just like eating food. The food that you eat in the morning, if it only went into your stomach and stayed there, it would kill you. You know that? It's got to be digested. And there are various organs inside your body that, while you are working throughout the day, are digesting your food.

And that's what makes you strong. Now, if you only ate your food and it never got digested, you wouldn't be strong. And a lot of people, their reading of scripture is like that. They eat it, it's not digested.

They throw it up, and next morning they eat it again, throw it up again, and nothing is digested. No wonder they are not becoming strong. They got a digestion problem. That's called meditation. You see, now we've spent about 20 minutes looking at 2 verses.

That's meditation. I'm just trying to teach you how to meditate on God's word. And I hope it will permanently change the way you study God's word from today onwards. Not to read it, but meditate on it.

Think of this illustration of eating and digesting. If you only eat, it will kill you. Your food accumulates in your stomach. How is that going to help you? It's got to be digested, broken down, and it becomes blood and bone and muscle and makes you strong.

That's how God's word is supposed to do for you. It's bread, food for our body. The Bible also says, God's word is, thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path. You know, this world is a dark place.

It's full of darkness. And the only light, please listen to me, the only light we have is God's word. In a confusing, dark situation, you don't know what to do. Here is a light. I have found that in numerous situations in my life.

And it doesn't matter where you live or what circumstance. There is an answer here for every situation we can ever find ourselves in at any time in our life. A lamp to our feet and a light to our path to give us guidance.

The Bible also says that this word is a sword. The sword of the Holy Spirit with which we can fight the devil. Whenever the devil comes to us, like Jesus spoke a word to him. And it says the devil left him.

He didn't just quote any verse. He quoted an appropriate verse. That's the point. When the devil came to him with a temptation concerning food, Jesus quoted a word from scripture concerning food. When the devil tempted him to commit suicide by jumping off the top of the temple, Jesus quoted a verse appropriate to that saying, You shall not tempt the Lord your God.

That was an appropriate word. When the devil came to him and said, I'll give you all this world, the glory of this world if you fall down and worship me. Jesus quoted another verse from scripture. You shall only worship the Lord your God.

We are not supposed to worship you or this world. So, how did Jesus have that verse to give to the devil? It's because right from the time he was a child, he had heard, memorized, and remember he didn't have a Bible like we have.

He could only hear it when he went to the synagogue during the week and listen and listen and listen. Absorbed it and by the time he was 12 years old, he knew the whole scriptures. That's amazing. It all depends on how interested we are.

You know how a person can be interested in sports, for example, and he knows the names of all the great football players or baseball players or basketball players and all their scores for so many 20, 30 years and the records they broke and all that.

Now, how do they remember all that? I don't know any of those things. It's because I don't have the interest that they have. Now, it's all a matter of interest. Don't you think that knowing some of these scriptures would help you a little more than knowing all those records of all those sports players?

It's all a matter of interest. This is the most important thing in life. God's word is like a sword by which I can drive the devil away every time he comes to me. It's not God's will that the devil should have an advantage over us at any time.

He wants us to live in victory all the time. And it says here that when I respond to God's word like this, meditate on it and think about it, I will gradually become like a tree firmly planted by the streams of water.

Becoming a Stable Christian Through Scripture

This is God's will for us. God doesn't want us to be like plants, the Bible says, tossed about by every wind of doctrine. You know, a lot of Christians are like this. It says in Ephesians 4 about plants.

You know, little plants. The wind blows this way and they are leaning over this way and then the wind blows the other way and they are leaning over that way and the wind blows another way and they are leaning over that way.

And you know, that's not a tree. That's a plant. A little plant. Now that's okay in the beginning because all trees were plants at one stage. But the Bible says we should not be like that forever. In Ephesians 4 it says that.

That means one day you hear some new doctrine somebody comes along with on television or something like that and you are sure. You say, this is it. Boy, this is the great new truth we have got. And then somebody else comes along with some other truth another day and we are leaning over this way and we are tossed to and fro.

And that's exactly what the devil wants to happen to you because you will never be a solid Christian. You will never be useful to God or to man throughout your life. You got to be solid. And how does that happen?

Say no to the advice of the ungodly. Meditate on God's word. Don't swallow everything that you hear from a preacher. You know, I don't have time to show it to you but there is a verse in Acts chapter 17 which says that Paul went to a place called Berea.

And in Berea it says there were some very noble Christians. And you know why they were called noble? Because when the apostle Paul preached they went home and searched the scriptures to see whether Paul was preaching according to scripture.

That's wonderful. That the greatest preacher in the world comes and you say, God bless you, brother. We'd like to check up this week to see whether you spoke according to scripture and then we'll come back to you.

See, they didn't all have a Bible those days. We must never forget that. When Paul preached, he didn't have a Bible. The people who sat there didn't have Bibles either. And so they said, we got to go back and check whether this man is speaking according to the word of God.

Now that's wonderful that even if the apostle Paul came and preached here he said, well, we got to check whether he is speaking according to scripture. You'll never go astray then. And you know, that's the reason why you never find Paul's letter to the Bereans in the Bible.

You find Paul's letter to the Ephesians and the Colossians and the Galatians and the Thessalonians. Why? Because he had to correct so many wrong doctrines that there was in all those places. He had to correct the Corinthians on speaking in tongues.

He got to correct the Galatians on the law. He had to correct the Thessalonians about the second coming of Christ. Because they were just believing anything anybody said. But when it came to the Bereans, they never believed anything anybody said.

They said, we check everything with the scriptures. And so they never went astray. It's wonderful. Like a tree. Firmly planted by the streams of water. The other day I was saying that right in the beginning of scripture, you have God's word.

Seven times it says, on the six days rather, six times, God said, God said, God said, God said. That's how scripture begins in Genesis chapter one. And every time God said, something happened. But it also says there that the Holy Spirit moved.

This is the balance we need in the Christian life. It's not all Holy Spirit. It's not all God's word. It's God's word plus God's Holy Spirit. And that's what we see here. This meditation on God's word makes you like a tree planted by the streams of water.

The streams of water is always a picture of the Holy Spirit. You know, otherwise you'd be a prisoner of the letter. A lot of people like that. The Pharisees were like that. They studied, studied, studied, studied the scripture.

They had no anointing. There was no freshness in their life. There was no touch of the Holy Spirit upon their life. There was something seriously wrong. Something missing. But if you can have the balance of God's word and the fullness of the Holy Spirit, you're a well-rounded Christian.

So that's what we see here. A tree planted by the streams of water. Because that tree needs the constant supply of water from the stream. And what's the result? It yields its fruit in season. That means for us, the application for us in our life is that according to our spiritual growth, we will yield fruit.

You know, you don't expect a 3-year-old to know as much as a 30-year-old. A 3-year-old knows so much. And a 5-year-old, it's like different grades in school. There's a progression. According to the season of spiritual growth we are in, we produce fruit accordingly.

But it is God's will that at every stage, we are fruitful. Jesus once turned around to his disciples and said, I have chosen you and ordained you that you should go and bring forth fruit. It's not God's will that we should be fruitless.

We have to be fruitful. It's God's will that your life should be useful and fruitful before you leave this earth. Before Jesus comes again. Don't be satisfied with a life that just drifts along like a piece of wood on the ocean just glows around here and there, doesn't know where it's going to finally end up.

We're not to be like that. We've got to be fruitful on this earth. Our life has got to accomplish something for God before Jesus comes again. And for that, I need to meditate on God's word. I need to be planted by the streams of water.

Fruit refers to my character and my usefulness in blessing other people. And it also says here, its leaf does not wither. Leaf refers to the external forms of religion. Fruit refers to the inner character.

The external forms are things like Bible reading, coming to meetings, prayer meetings, fasting, giving, many things. These are external forms. It's not as important as fruit. But every tree has got leaves as well.

And its leaf never withers. Leaves are always green. And then, when we're like that, this is a wonderful verse, it says here, this blessed man in verse 3, whatever he does, he prospers. There's a blessing about the way he does everything.

It's wonderful to be a Christian like that. It's not just spiritually in our secular job. There's a blessing upon our life. We're a blessing to people. We prosper. It's not God's will that we should be defeated and spiritually sick.

Now, when I say prosper, I'm not talking about making a lot of money. When John the Apostle speaks about prosperity in the third episode of John, he says, I wish you prosper like your soul prospers. Our soul has to prosper first.

And when it talks about, when the Bible speaks about prosperity in the outside, the word of God says, my God will supply all your needs. Now, what that means is that it doesn't mean that I have a lot of money.

But it means that God meets all my needs. Now, who is the richest person in the universe? That's God. But He doesn't have a wallet. He doesn't have a bank account. There are a lot of things that rich people have which He doesn't have.

But He has everything that He needs. And that's how Jesus was. I believe Jesus walked on this earth to demonstrate how a man should live. He wasn't a very rich man by worldly standards. But He never lacked anything.

And I want to say that that is God's will. That if you seek God's kingdom first, all the other things needed, needed, not all that we want, but all that we need will be added to us. And I believe that's the meaning of prosperity.

The Wicked, Judgment, and Eternal Accountability

And then we go on to verse 4. It says the wicked. Now, this is the blessed man in verses 1 to 3. This is the man whom God is blessing. And He says in contrast to that, you have another type of person whom the Bible calls wicked.

Now, the wicked person is not like this. In other words, all that we considered till now. The wicked person is not interested in all this. So, we can go through all those three verses that we just considered.