The Blessing of Godly Fear

The Fear of the Lord as the Root of Blessedness

Well, I have to admit, as we have considered the teaching from Michael Reeves over this weekend, looking now at Psalm 128, I'm tempted to introduce it with a low voice and an English accent. I don't have quite the command that he has, nor do I have the range of vocabulary that he has.

But certainly, what a wonderful introduction and way to consider what Psalm 128 holds as some of the practical outflow, the fruit that comes from this larger vein, this larger soil of the fear of God.

So Psalm 128, beginning with verse 1. We're just going to walk our way through these verses. Psalm 128, beginning with verse 1, blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways. The Puritan Robert Leighton once observed that fear sounds rather contrary to blessedness.

It almost has the air of misery about it, but when we add the fear of the Lord, that touch turns it into gold, and that is what Michael Reeves was saying over the past two.

Days.

Fear, in and of itself, the abject fear, the fear of dread, what Reeves called sinful fear, that does have an air of misery. But when we understand the object of fear, the right fear, the delightful fear that comes with God being the recipient, being the object of our fear, then that touch really does turn our fear into gold.

We see here in verse 1 that the parallel of fearing the Lord is walking in his ways. Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways. To fear the Lord is to walk in his ways. To walk in his ways is to fear him.

The God-fearing seek to do what pleases him. Serving God is the chief delight of the people of God. Serving God is the chief delight of the angels of God, who in perfect purity and holiness delight in their fear of him and fear in their delight of him.

The people of God avoid whatever displeases him. This is what it means to walk in his ways. This is what it looks like to fear God. It means that we will think, we will feel, we will value, we will desire, we will dream, we will plan, we will live according to his word.

And this blesses us because God's commandments are reflected in the way that he has created.

His world.

God had a good intention when he made all that he has made. When he made the world and framed it all with man crowning the act of creation, apart from being alone without his wife, God was able to pronounce, it is very good, very good,.

All the way through.

And once Eve was taken from the side of man, then everything was very good. So God's will, God's commandments accord with that blessing, that pronouncement of very good in the way that he has made the world.

When you're walking in the ways of God the creator, because you've known God the redeemer, then you have a life that's harmonized with what is very good. This is why it's a blessing to walk in his ways.

You, as it were, overcome the obstacle of the curse and return to that paradisiacal blessing from the very beginning. When we obey him, we harmonize our life with his good purpose. This is what it means to be blessed.

For that reason, it's impossible to say, I fear the Lord, when you can live the same way without him. It's impossible to say, I fear the Lord, if the Lord is making no difference in the way that you're walking.

If God is not shaping, directing, or transforming the way that you're living, you really cannot be said to be fearing him. To walk in his ways is to walk apart from your own way. It's to walk apart from the way of the world.

Fearing God causes us to walk in his ways, revealed in his word. This is the root of not only fear, but the root of all blessedness, of happiness in the.

Lord.

Whenever you come across that word blessed, you can just think of the yellow smiley face sticker. It just means happy, blessed, happy, thrilled, delighted, contented. Fearing God gives this happiness that comes only from knowing him.

Now, of course, this is counter to the way of the world. This is not how the world walks. They think they're living in the bliss. They think they have it their own way, and it's so much better to laugh with the sinners than to weep with the saints.

They think we're living the life. We're living the dream. We've thrown off the shackles of guilt and condemnation.

You poor suckers.

You poor Christians that are missing out on the real thrills and happiness in this world because of your faith. We recognize that that way, the way of the world, the way of the flesh, is the way of the sin, the way of the devil.

It's the way that leads astray. We recognize that we, like sheep, have gone astray, turned each one of us to his own way. Turning to your own way is going astray. That's what going astray looks like. Only those who fear God will walk in his ways.

Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways. And so we begin from this banner in verse 1, moving now to consider man. And since we're in this realm of God's blessedness at creation and what it means for the God-fearing to return to that blessing, overcoming the curse, we recognize that now we have something to say about man and his labor.

We're just right back at Genesis 1, 2, and 3. When you eat the labor of your hands, you shall be happy. You shall be blessed, and it shall be well with you. Psalm 127 states that rising up early, staying up late is in vain apart from trusting in the Lord to provide or walking in the blessedness of what he has promised.

Well, here in Psalm 128, we see that promise highlighted again. You will eat from the labor of your hands. You will be happy with what you're eating from the labor of your hands. God is the creator, the sustainer, the provider of all.

And so to walk in his way is to enjoy a life of fruitfulness, even or especially in the things that the world considers unfruitful. The world rarely is satisfied with the labor of their hands. Rarely do they eat in the contentment that God's people ought to know.

They're always slighted. They deserve more than they have. They're vying for more. They're willing to throw their co-workers under the bus for more. They're willing to do anything to get ahead. They can never be content with the things that they sought for five years ago.

Now they have them and they're looking for something that they'll have in the next five years and guess what? Even then they won't be content. There's no satisfaction from their toil under the sun, not so with those who fear God.

When they eat the labor of their hands, they're happy. The psalmist envisions the righteous prospering from their labor. Ecclesiastes 5 puts it in this way. Here's what I've seen. It's good, fitting for one to eat and drink and to enjoy the good of all of his labor in which he toils under the sun.

All the days of his life which God gives him, it is his heritage. As for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth and given him power to eat of it, to receive his heritage, to rejoice in his labor, this is the gift from God.

Here we see again this purpose of God. For man to be a worker in the world that God has made and for man to labor and be satisfied, yes, happy with what he's laboring in. When he eats, when he bears the fruit of that productivity, he's satisfied.

In other words, God blesses his work. God blesses his labor. God gives us work because we need to provide for our families. The outflow of that is providing for all those in need, but more important than either of those things, God calls us to work because we are to serve God.

And in this very way, our labor becomes our service, our calling. All of our identity and dignity becomes bound to it, even unto eternity, the angels serving God. Work wasn't produced by the fall. Work was corrupted by the fall.

There was something so satisfying about the godly man's labor, and it doesn't matter how pejorative or minuscule that labor might be. He's happy when he eats of the fruit of it. There's something so satisfying about a godly man's labor because he's trusting in the Lord's provision.

He's trusting that whatever he's doing, he's seeking to do it in a way that pleases God and furthers his purpose with his life. So he's not running a rat race of anxiety like so many in the world. He knows that God has called him to this very task, to this very labor, and when he works, he directs that labor toward God.

So even the most mundane tasks are replete with dignity. And that's why when he eats, he's satisfied. That's why when he leaves after a long day's work, he finds some fulfillment, some satisfaction. Again, he's overcoming the corruption of the fall.

Though there's still this longing for the consummation, the one who fears God finds that there's less sweat, less thorns, less thistles when it comes to his work in the field. He finds that there's a way that God has made it well with him, even in the midst of a fallen, groaning, and corrupted creation.

And so we see again how wonderfully the curse of Genesis 3 turns to the blessing of Psalm 128. Martin Luther picked this up in his paraphrase. He put Psalm 128 into a metrical arrangement. And in one of the stanzas, he says, Lo, right, this is verse 4, behold, lo, to the man these blessings cleave, who in God's holy fear doth live, from him the ancient curse hath fled.

We see that the man who fears the Lord and walks in his ways eats the labor of his hands. So he overcomes the thorns and the thistles. We'll see in the next verses there's even marital harmony rather than marital disorder.

We see that instead of a curse upon the generations, there's a blessing upon the generations. All of this is overthrowing the curse of Genesis 3. These are the very things that the fall, that sinfulness, had corrupted.

Work, marriage, family life, generational blessing. And so that state of blessedness begins in verse 3. And it goes from the man who's now working, overcoming the effects of the fall, to the woman who's now arranging the paradisical garden that had been corrupted and now was throwing out thorns and thistles with all the abject disharmony of a fallen nature.

But now, what is this wife like? A fruitful vine in the very heart of the house. The fall was the withering, the blight, the rot of the home, of what the home was meant to be. Of how the wife was to be delighted to make that dwelling place something worthy of an image bearer.

But now, because of this blessing from God, she is the fruitful vine. The curse, the darkness, no longer presses and stretches its way into the corridors of the home, but rather, her own fruitfulness, her own faithfulness, begins to push back on that darkness and that curse.

Of course, in scripture, the vine symbolizes fruitfulness. Very literally, since we're in the realm of Genesis 3, we're talking about the vine that bears fruit and fills the earth, right? This is the intention of God.

That's certainly a sentiment here in verse 3. Ezekiel 19, we find the same language in verse 10. And your mother was like a vine in your bloodline, planted by the waters, fruitful, full of branches because of many waters.

So there's fruit and branches, and this whole thing is sprawling out across the centuries. But the vine was not only a symbol of fruitfulness. That's not the only thing that fills a home with blessedness and happiness.

Also, the vine takes on sort of an erotic overtone in the Song of Songs. How fair and how pleasant you are, O love, with your delights. The stature of yours is like a palm tree. Your breasts like its clusters, I said.

I will go up to the palm tree. I will take hold of its branches. So here we see, again, this picture of marital intimacy being part of the fruitfulness, the happiness of God's blessing. We're going back to his intention for man and for woman.

The vine also takes on even further tones, tones of festivity. Why would an ancient Israelite take care to tend to grapevines? So that he could have the joy and the mirth of wine.

So that he could feast.

So that he could attend festivities. And so this was something cultivated and very precious. We see that even in the miracle at Cana. They knew the difference between cheap wine, poor wine, watered-down wine, and the good stuff.

And here, in Psalm 128, the blessing of God is the best stuff. The wife brings forth the best wines, the finest wines. Now when we compact this together, of course, we have to run it through God's way, God's will.

If this is the picture of blessedness coming out of Genesis 1 and 2. It's very striking the way that God calls men and women to himself along these very lines. We know we live in a world where medical conditions, perhaps for other reasons, some are not able to bear children.

And so here in Psalm 128, we need to recognize that the fruitfulness envisioned as God's blessing. Is not mechanically, literally fulfilled through childbearing. But it's something that embraces the whole person.

It's not fruitfulness merely as progeny. It's fruitfulness as a way of walking. Fruitfulness as a way of life. The image is one of absolute abundance in every category. Of joy and fruitfulness overall.

We have to remember this when we think of the faith and the integrity of Sarah. Remember in 1 Peter 3 how he talks about that inner adornment that belonged to Sarah. And then Peter takes Sarah and he uses her as an example, as a paradigm for all of the wives and mothers in the congregation.

He takes barren Sarah and he puts her up in front of all other women and he says, you should be fruitful like her. This is what fruitfulness looks like. It looks like a fear of God that revels and relishes in submission to her husband.

That revels and relishes integrity toward God and trust in His promise. This is the way that the holy women of the past who put their hope in God adorned themselves. And so fruitfulness goes far beyond progeny.

And as we said, it has a lot more to do with the character of the wife. Could it be said that you're a vine in your house? Could it be said that you're a fruitful vine in your house? When the toil and hardship of life is bearing down like a hot sun on your family members, are you that vine that gives shade and respite?

Do your children and your husband come into the home and just go, Finally, a shaded garden, a pleasant, beautiful place. Wherever the submission of wives to their husbands is raised in worldly conversation, what happens?

Eyebrows furrow. Let me tell you something about submission. Let me tell you about the way it works for me, how it's going to work in my house. There's all sorts of disdain, cynicism. This is outmoded.

This is repressive.

This is misogynistic. Bust out the red choir robe and that weird white covering in the fantasy of Margaret Atwood. This is a nightmare to the left. We can't just blame it on the political spectrum. This is the disorder that comes right out of the fall.

This is part of the curse. The wife vying for the place of her husband. The wife seeking to take over and usurp the very way that the husband is to lead the home. Wives coming into Christian teaching and Christian circles can learn how to appear submissive, yet not have the real article.

They might have the sense of being a fruitful vine, but actually be a source of darkness and misery in their home. They may appear to submit, but find all sorts of manipulative ways to make sure that, in the end, they're the ones in charge.

They're the ones running the show. And, of course, the curse on man is the passivity. We see that passivity from the very beginning when Adam stands listless while, instead of guarding and protecting his wife from the serpent, he just watches complacently as she brings ruin into paradise.

And in the household, many men want peace more than anything else. So they'll put up with a bitter, aggressive, unsubmissive wife. They'll do anything to make amends. And rather than a relationship of harmony, there's just sort of a negotiated peace.

But there's no fruitfulness. According to the creation ordinance, husbands really need to come back to being the kind of men that God designed, the kind of men that God blesses, the kind of blessing that overcomes the effects of the fall.

And according to the same creation ordinance, women need to become the kind of women that God blesses, the kind of wives and mothers that overcome the effects of the fall. Because the family begins to break down, especially when wives are not delighting to be the kinds of wives that God intends them to be.

They do far more damage, inflict far more misery in the condition of the home than even an aggressive, aloof, or abusive husband. The wife is the fruitful vine of the house. And of course, when we consider this, the wife being fruitful in the very heart of the home, we understand the significance of the centrality of this picture.

And it's set in high contrast to the promiscuous worldly woman, the woman whose ways are the ways of a harlot who goes chasing after other affections. She has no love for God that orders a love for husband or a love for home.

She wants to chase the ways and the things of the world. She's not satisfied or content with the blessing of God. She wants the counterfeit blessings that are offered by the world. And so we find in Proverbs 7, one like this.

She wears the attire of the harlot. Harlotry has a uniform. It's the very foundation for modesty. Of course, there's a scale. Of course, there's some subjective elements to it. Of course, there's some level of social custom.

But harlotry has a uniform, ladies. She wears the attire of a harlot. She has a crafty heart, loud, rebellious. Her feet would not stay at home. So rather than being at the very heart of the home, that's the only place she's not.

And the husband, like a broken record, is going, where's my wife? Have you seen my wife?

Where are you?

She's never at the heart of the home, the very place where the vine is made fruitful, the very way that God would intend to bless not only her, but her marriage and her children. So the psalmist is drawing our attention to the home.

He's about to go to children next. And he says, in the very center of the home of the man who is blessed, and this man who is blessed is a God-fearing man, he's a man who's satisfied in his calling, who understands all of the right priorities and relationships in his life, that God-fearing man has a home.

And at the very heart of that home is a godly wife. And this godly wife is fruitful in every aspect of her character,.

In all the work of her hands. She bears fruit.

And the very heart of her home is this commitment and dedication. That is a blessed home. That is a blessed family. That is the blessing of God.

It's blessed all the way down,.

From top to bottom. It's core is blessed. It's aorta is blessed. And this blessedness is shown, especially in the fruitfulness of the wife. Others can keep up appearances. Others can look decent enough from the outside.

But if a wife is not faithful in the very heart of her home, that home will never be blessed. That family will never be blessed. But the beauty of that God-fearing woman is just like verse 1, just like verse 2, just like she's walking in the ways of the Lord, just like the man, when she eats the labor of her hands, she also is satisfied.

Proverbs 31 says, Charm is deceitful, beauty is passing, but a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised.

Give her the fruit of her hands.

She's going to eat the labor of her hands and be satisfied.

Why?

Because a woman who fears the Lord.

Shall be praised.

When we live in the fear of the Lord,.

The relationship between husband and wife is transformed. It's liberated from this modern day caricature as the old ball and chain, or as a trap, a burden, some sort of obstacle to happiness in life. We recognize that actually marriage, because it was God's intention for man and woman, is the path of blessedness in life.

I was reading Dietrich Bonhoeffer, actually a letter he wrote from prison before he was executed in 1945. He was writing some advice, writing his sort of brief encouragement in a theological picture of marriage, and he said, marriage is more than your love for each other.

It has a higher dignity and power. It is God's holy ordinance. And through it, he wills to perpetuate the human race. And in your love, you see only your two selves in the world, but in a marriage, you're a link to the chain of generations, which God causes to come and to pass away to His glory and calls many into His kingdom.

In your love, you see only the heaven of your own happiness, but in marriage, you take a post that bears responsibility.

Towards the world.

Your love is your own private possession, but marriage is never merely personal. It's an office. And just as it is the crown and not merely the will to rule that makes the king, so also marriage, not merely your love for one another, joins you in the sight of God and man for His purpose in the world.

Now here we see that link in the chain of generations going from the God-fearing man to the God-fearing mother to the children like olive plants all around their dinner table. Notice that children are not grass to be mowed down.

Notice that children are not dandelion weeds to be pulled up. Children are olive shoots to be cultivated, to be watered, to be nurtured, to be pruned, that they might bear fruits in due time. Olive plants as a symbol of enriching, abundance, wealth.

These are not sort of staple crops like wheat or barley or corn. These are luxury crops. This isn't your subsistence, more gray slop on your bowl. This is you have all of your bases covered. You have your staples.

This is the extra. This is the break out the olive oil, break out the wine. These are the things that make the home so blessed. And of course he says olive plants, not olive trees. We were in Tuscany a few weeks ago and I noticed dotted throughout the landscape little grows of olive trees.

We actually had a few just outside the room we were staying. You could just see the tiny mustard seed size olives that were beginning to branch out. It almost looks like it's arranged around a table the way that they branch out.

It's going to be a long way. We could go back to that same spot for many years to come and they're not going to be that much bigger. It takes a long time for an olive plant to become an olive bearing tree.

And that's part of the point. Children require nurture. They require constant attention, care. They try our patience. That's why marriage is so sanctifying when there's children that are born in the midst of it.

You get to some level of maturity in your own personal sanctification. You think I'm relatively a patient person. We'll throw some kids into the mix. You can go a lot farther and deeper than you think.

There's a long labor involved in taking care of these plants. There's weeding and watering and feeding before there's ever any return,.

Before there's ever hope of fruit.

But when that fruit's there, oh, how marvelous it is. It's not just something that satisfies your own dinner table. It's something that enriches you. You're able to give to others through it. So your children aren't just a blessing to you in your later season in life.

They're a blessing to many others. You're able to bless a nation.

Through your children.

That's the picture. Children being nurtured, being brought into fruitfulness. Olive plants all around the table. And notice it's the table. They're not all around the TV tray while you all eat in different parts of the house.

It's all around your table. How many of you grew up eating dinner around a table? We never had a meal that wasn't at a table when I was growing up. I don't think ever. I used to go to my friends' homes to have a sleepover, and they were having, you know, hot dogs on TV trays.

And I was so jealous. Like, your family's awesome. I wish my family was like this. A plastic Hungryman tray on a TV tray while we're watching the game? What a great family. Well, now I know a lot better.

For all that I didn't appreciate at the time, there is a blessedness in being around the table. And here, these olive shoots go far beyond the immediate children. This is a generational vision. You're going to need a long table.

Children, grandchildren, aunts, uncles, cousins, all surrounding this table. This is what the blessing of God looks like in the home. Again, every home is fraught with challenges, unrealistic expectations, abrasive personality, selfish attitudes, harsh words, long days, sleepless nights, feuding siblings, and so on.

We know that we're dealing with sinful human nature, sinful desire, a sinful way of the world. But this is what the blessing of God is seeking to throw back and overturn. Not perfectly, but increasingly.

Not purely, but consistently. This is what the blessing of God looks like on those who fear the Lord. Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine in the very heart of your house. Your children like olive plants all around your table.

Behold, we read in verse 4, thus shall the man be blessed.

Who fears the Lord.

And so we see really the inclusio between verses 1 and 4. We have a sort of stanza being bracketed off before we come to verses 5 and 6. We began with the blessing that comes on those who fear the Lord, and we conclude with the blessing that comes upon those who fear the Lord.

And we're meant to behold it. Behold! Thus shall those who walk in His ways.

Be blessed.

This is something to behold. We're meant to look at Psalm 128 and really behold what's being communicated here. Look at these blessings.

Behold them.

In other words, consider your own life. Before you do anything else, behold these blessings in your life, however small or partial or fragmentary they may be. Maybe you have 25 of this blessed picture.

Maybe you don't have much of it, but you're longing for it and trusting that God will somehow bless you in these ways. Take stock and be thankful. Be thankful. Give thanks to God for them. If you're like me, I suspect you don't give God thanks enough for these blessings.

God has promised good to you. God has dealt bountifully with you. So the first way we behold is we think, we look, we take stock, we give thanks. Secondly, this is something to behold in the way that we're meant to reflect, to contemplate.

Can it really be said that I've been fearing God when I'm not satisfied with the labor of my hands? I'm discontent and I'm grumbling. And I come home grumbling. And then I'm the source of discontentment in my home.

And maybe, could it be said that I'm fearing God and walking in His ways? I'm not a fruitful vine. I'm not respite to my family. I'm the grizzly bear that they're avoiding.

Half of the week.

I'm the contentious dripping. Could it be that I don't have the right view of how God has blessed me and how these blessings are meant to fulfill His purpose for my life and His purpose in my family's life and His purpose in the world around us?

Have I been fearful of the right thing? Have I been faithful? Have I been fruitful? So you take time to reflect, to behold, to contemplate. And where these things begin to weigh down and convict you,.

You pray, you seek.

Is it absent entirely?

Go to the Lord.

Seek it out. Say, Lord, I want to walk in a fear that will bless me in this very way. Do you find it lacking entirely or in part? Again, bring it to the Lord and say, give me that fear. Unite my heart to fear Your name and bless me in this very way.

And then thirdly, we're meant to behold this in such a way that the world around us beholds it. We don't do it merely for pageantry. We do it for witness. A blessed marriage, a blessed family life is nothing to put under a basket.

It's one of the most powerful lights we can shine into the darkness of the world. Everyone bears under the effects of the fall. And what did the fall completely corrupt from the very beginning? Where is the pinch and the burn and the decay of the fall felt most keenly in man's work, in a marriage, and in the relationship of parents to children?

That's how the curse envelops Genesis 3. And so when we, as those who fear God and walk in His ways, are blessed with these very things that counter and push back on that curse, that is a thing for the world to behold.

Behold, this is how you can be blessed if you would abandon the way you've been walking, this headlong path of destruction, and walk in a fear of Him. God, too, can redeem even your broken marriage. God, too, can make even you satisfied with this menial job that you've long hated.

God can even bless and make fruitful the children that you think are so far gone that they won't even look or speak to you.

Behold,.

Thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord. And now the psalm sort of zooms out. We've gone from the home and even the very heart of the home. Please note that the husband is not the heart of the home.

He may be the head of the home, but he's not its heart. Husbands, take note of that. Wives, take note of that. But we zoom out from the home, from that long rectangular table. Hogan and I were talking last week, wouldn't it be great to have some, like, almost medieval rectangular table?

It's almost awkward, it's so big. It's like you really don't have the space for this. It's going between three rooms, and you had to take out a section of drywall, and it's like, oh, this is amazing. But we've zoomed out from that home, from that heart, from that table, and now we're looking at the city.

We're even going, zooming out further from the city. Now we're looking at the whole kingdom. The Lord bless you out of Zion. And may you see the good of Jerusalem all the days of your life. Of course, the family's still in view.

We haven't left the blessedness of these very things, the marriage, the fruitfulness, the children around the table. Yes, may you see your children's children, but we've zoomed out in such a way that we see that home, that family, that marriage is ultimately about the peace of Israel, the shalom, the goodness of God's people in the city and even in the nation.

Of course, Psalm 128 is part of the Songs of Ascent. Psalms 120 to 134, most likely psalms that were memorized, were sung, celebrated, and recited whenever the Israelites would make a pilgrimage toward the holy city.

And so you can picture the whole family, as it were, with all of that burgeoning excitement coming toward Jerusalem and having these very refrains on their mind and on their heart, if not on their tongues.

And yes, here I am with my children, and there he is, oh, he just fell, my children's children. The Lord has really blessed us out of Zion. That's where we're going. And when we get there with all these other families of God-fearing men and women, all these other children's children, we will really see the good of Jerusalem.

This is what it looks like for a city to be blessed. This is what it looks like for the blessing to come out of Zion to Zion. And so by extension we see here that all of the blessedness of marriage, all of the wonders and delights and fruits of the home, if they're truly being blessed by God, will never, can never, be separated or abstracted from the same fruitfulness and desire in the church or in the city.

The love, the passion, the fruitfulness, the desire, the walking in His ways, if that's blessing the marriage in a God-fearing way, it will be the same in the church, it will be the same in the city, and the nation around it.

In other words, the God-fearing man is as much concerned for the Lord's house as he is for his own house. When he thinks and reflects upon the goodness of God in his own home, he can't help but think of the goodness of God to Jerusalem, to Zion.

His heart is as much at home as it is in the dwelling place of God, in the church of God. He knows that it's vital to the purpose of God. He knows that the family and the marriage that is so blessed is not merely His to be used for His utter disposal, but it's for God's purpose, that this family has to be brought into Jerusalem, as it were, so that God can fulfill His purpose through that family for the sake of the city.