Psalm 1: Blessed is the Man "Marinate"

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Good morning again everyone. I'm going to be reading Psalm 1 today. This is page 552 in your pew

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Bible. Blessed is the man who walks, not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers, but his delight is in the law of the

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Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in season, and its leaf does not wither, and all that he does he prospers.

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The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

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For the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish. Let's pray.

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Father in heaven, we pray that we would hear the voice of our Savior loud and clear, that we would recognize the blessings and the curses that you've promised to those who know you.

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We pray, Lord, that if there be anybody here who doesn't know you today, that today would be the day of salvation. So Lord, now

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I just ask that you get me out of the way, that we would hear your Savior's voice loud and clear, and that you would be blessed.

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It's in Jesus' name we pray. Please be seated. So about 23 and a half years ago,

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I went on a date with a beautiful woman. It was a completely blind date, so I didn't know what to expect.

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As it turned out, I was pleasantly surprised, and we had a wonderful dinner together. So wonderful that 23 years later we celebrated 21 years of marriage this last

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Thursday. We're trying to keep up with my parents who celebrated 56 yesterday. Congratulations.

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Now aside from my wife's beauty, she could eat, she could keep up with me. At dinner,

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I ordered a 32 -ounce marinated steak, to which she said, me too. Way before the me too movement, anything

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I ordered from the restaurant, my wife would go, me too, me too. And guess what? An hour or so later, the salad, the appetizer, and 32 ounces of marinated steak, gone.

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No doggie bag necessary. If I brought that bone home, the dog would be like, what are you doing? There's nothing here.

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She killed it. She ate that meal, and it was then that I knew she was the one.

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I got permission first. We still go back to the same steakhouse, we reminisce, we did that on Thursday, and we still order marinated steak.

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A good marinade can make or break the steak, and the one at this place is excellent. We usually compare all the other places to this one particular one.

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But here's what you need to know. When you marinate a steak, what you marinate a steak in can make a big difference for good or for bad.

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So this morning, we're going to take a look at Psalm 1, and we're going to marinate in it for a little while. Psalm 1 is the first psalm in the

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Psalter, the song book of the Old Testament, and it sets the tone for the rest of the psalms.

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It tells us where to start. It tells us where blessing comes from and who gets it.

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Now, Psalm 1 and 2 are thought to have been one psalm that was broken into two pieces.

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So before we read and explain the verses, we need to recognize a feature or a characteristic of Psalm 1 and 2, mainly that we cannot disconnect them.

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Scholars hold that there's good reason to believe that Psalm 1 and 2 were a single psalm at one point in time.

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Psalm 1 begins with, blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked. And Psalm 2 ends with, blessed are all those who take refuge in him.

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It forms what's called an inclusio, a literary device based on a central principle.

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In this case, Psalm 1 begins with a blessing and then ends with a blessing.

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In other words, it frames itself around a main principle, basically God's plan,

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God's king, and God's mountain. That is what the original psalm, the combination of Psalm 1 and 2 point to.

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So before we get into the actual text, I want to take a quick moment to talk about the methodology and the position of the psalms, specifically

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Psalm 1. Now, the word psalm means song, sacred song, melody.

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A psalm is designed to be sung. Psalms are meant to be sung. And I know you're going, deep, that's deep theology.

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Songs are meant to be sung. This is heavy, right? The question is why?

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Two reasons. Number one, so you'll remember them. Number two, so that other people can hear them.

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Sing a good song a few times and you will inevitably remember, recall, and repeat the words in your mind.

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Sometimes songs get stuck in your head and you can't get them out. Sing it out loud and it will be how other people begin to recall, remember, and repeat the words, unless you have a voice like mine when they're trying to forget them.

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This is actually one of the things we're working on in the Amen group. We're learning to sing the psalms because they're meant to be sung.

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In fact, this is how Hebrew boys would remember the Torah for their bar mitzvah. They memorized the

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Torah by singing it. Think about this. God's word is his counsel to us.

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So the psalms are God's counsel sung out loud to you. And this is very important because what you sing will become what you remember.

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This is also very dangerous because what you sing will become what you remember. It cuts both ways.

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What you listen to regularly will get embedded into your head like a marinade for good or for bad.

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What you listen to will become what you sing. What you sing will become what you remember.

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And what you remember will become what you ruminate on. And what you ruminate on will become what you do.

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Alistair Begg says, what shapes your mind shapes your life. And I'm certain most of us can sing some songs from our more youthful days without having to think about the words.

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They're ingrained into our minds. And some of these songs, most of these songs are probably not going to reflect the worldview that we hold today.

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My daughter said Bohemian Rhapsody is one of those types of songs. As soon as you hear a few words, you have to finish the line.

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Once you hear it, the rest of the words just follow. You start singing it in your head. The problem with that song is that it's thought to be a suicide note.

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So you start singing this and it gets embedded into your head. Our enemy is not ignorant to this fact.

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In 1970, some of you might have known, George Harrison released a song called My Sweet Lord. Some of you older folk are like, yeah,

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I know that song. Some of you younger folk are like, what? But he goes on. He starts going through the words, my sweet Lord, my sweet Lord, I really want to see you.

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I really want to know you. And he goes on and on. And he's really serious. And then he slips it in there.

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My sweet Lord, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna. Once he's got your toe tapping, boom, he puts it in there.

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You hear that song, it's difficult to get that thing out of your head. Right? It's the tactic of the enemy to get lies into your head and out through your mouth.

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Now, once you get it into your head, how do you get it out? Here's my question for you. How do you unmarinate a steak?

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You don't. All you can do is take it out of what it's been marinating in and put it in something else to marinate.

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Over time, the new marinade will step in. The same is true of our minds. Whatever shapes your mind shapes your life.

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You have to be transformed by the renewing of your mind. You need a new marinade for your mind.

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It's called the word of God. Your mind, my mind, needs to be sanctified. For 33 years of my life,

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I was marinating in the world. Now, theologically, in justification, God takes you out of the world.

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In sanctification, he takes the world out of you. We need to marinate our minds in God's word and push out what's been marinating in there to begin with.

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This is why singing the Psalms is important. By doing it, we get the word of God, the

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Psalms, into our head and out through our mouth verbally, and others can hear it.

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It's no accident that the Israelites sent out the musicians to the battlefield before the physical fighting began.

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They knew that spiritual warfare, singing, had to precede physical warfare.

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Once again, we see in here that worship, what we say on Sunday and every other day, is warfare.

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Worship, singing Psalms, hymns, spiritual songs, and praying is warfare.

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We talked about Christmas time, why it's the most peaceful time of the year. You have unbelievers singing Christian hymns.

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Of course it's the most peaceful time of the year. So you, the church, are needed on Sundays and Wednesdays, corporately, and then every day in your prayer closet to sing and pray fervently that God would bring conviction to his church.

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Us first. That he would wake his church up, that he would contend with those who contend with us.

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Worship is warfare. It shapes your minds, both yours and the people around you.

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So that's the methodology behind the Psalms. Now on to position. This Psalm, Psalm 1, is positioned first because it sets the tone for all the rest.

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This is ground zero. We begin here. This Psalm is going to have the theme in it that's going to permeate all of the

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Psalms. This Psalm sets up a clear dichotomy between the righteous and the wicked, between the blessed and the cursed, between God's way and man's way.

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It's filled with what's called antithetical parallelism, a contrast of opposites.

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Righteous, wicked. Blessed, cursed. It will explain what each does, what each receives, and then where each goes.

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This is going to be the ongoing theme for the Psalms. God's way versus man's way. The importance of what

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Psalm 1 tells us can't be understated. Psalm 1 starts off with an individual.

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Blessed is the man. It's about individual blessing. But then when we get to the end of Psalm 1,

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Psalm 2 in your Bible, it ends with a collective blessing. Blessed are all those who take refuge in him.

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Again, the early Jews considered these as one Psalm and commentators agree that it was a single

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Psalm and then broken up at a later date. And we'll see how that's going to play out as we go along further. But know this, it's first for a very important reason.

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So let's finally look at verse 1. Blessed is the man who walks, not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers.

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The Psalm starts off with the word blessed or happy. Happy is the man. Actually, it's plural in Hebrew.

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It's happinesses. It's a plural. It's ongoing happiness. You'll see that word about 38 times in the

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Psalms. We're reminded of the same thing in the Beatitudes, right? Blessed are the meek. Happy are the beek.

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They shall inherit the earth. Blessed or happy are the peacemakers. They shall be called sons of God. God is telling us the way to be happy.

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Now, some of you are saying, but I thought God doesn't want us to be happy. He wants us to be holy. I mean, we're reformed.

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We're really not allowed to smile too long. Someone might get the wrong impression. Like God really loves us and called us to be a holy nation and we're a kingdom of priests.

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Some of us look like we ate a lemon sandwich before we came to church. Why? Shouldn't we be the most happy people on the planet?

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God does want us to be happy, blessed, blissful. Happy, not in the things of the world, but in the things of God.

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Happy in Him. Happy in Jesus. Here's what I mean. This is what this looks like.

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Job. Job says, the Lord gives, the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the

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Lord. Job realizes that when God gave him something, it was for his good and an occasion for joy.

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He also realized that when God takes something away from him, it was also for his good and an occasion for joy.

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In other words, when you're a child of God and you trust in your sovereignly heavenly father and that he has you in the palm of his hand, everything you receive or lose is a blessing.

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Do you realize there could be learning through losing? So whatever, whether you gain something or lose something, you are always being blessed by God.

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If you're in Christ, it is always for your good. And it's that it's in that situation that we are blessed, happy, experiencing bliss, because we know that God is working all things together for his glory and our good.

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So what may seem to be a negative in the eyes of the world is a positive for us.

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However, if you find your happiness, bliss in the things of the world, worldly things, your happiness will be short term, fluctuate and unfulfilling.

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Why? Because the things of the world are short term, fluctuate and unfulfilling. They're finite.

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If you find your happiness in your BMW and then your BMW breaks down, what happens to your happiness?

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That breaks down too. To find true happiness, blessing that lasts, you need something that is long term, constant, infinite.

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You need the things found in the kingdom of God. God and his kingdom are long term, eternal.

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They're immutable. They don't change. They're infinite. They're without limit. We read in the catechism,

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God is a spirit, infinite, eternal, unchangeable. In his being, power, wisdom, holiness, justice, goodness and truth.

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That's what we need. As sinful human beings, we have an infinite and internal problem.

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And that can only be remedied by an infinite and eternal solution. And since you and I are image bearers of God, we have eternity stamped on our hearts,

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Ecclesiastes says. Only something eternal and infinite can sustain you.

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The only thing that will satisfy you is God. And that's what the worldly people find miserable.

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It's only when you take your eyes off your short term, fluctuating and unsatisfactory desires and turn them toward God that you recognize you were made for him.

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We were made to depend on God and feed on his word. To meditate on it.

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Notice, I did not say he was made for you. You were made for him.

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You come to him on his terms. You are his creation. He is not yours.

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He's created you to be entirely dependent on him for everything. This is what the

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Psalms contrast for us. God's way, dependence on him. Man's way, dependence on me.

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So when the psalmist starts off with blessed or happy is the man, he begins by telling us where this does not come from.

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Listen, happy is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked. In other words, happiness doesn't come from human wisdom or human counsel.

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Happy is the man who does not stand in the way of sinners. That word way means lifestyle.

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So happy is the man who does not go in the lifestyle of sinners. Happiness does not come from living a sinful lifestyle.

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Happy is the man who does not sit in the seat of scoppers. Happiness does not come from mocking and sitting in judgment of God and trying to redefine everything that he's defined already.

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The blessed man is characterized by what he doesn't follow. He doesn't follow human wisdom.

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He doesn't follow worldly desires. He doesn't follow selfish pride. His blessing isn't found in what most of the world thinks it should be.

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His blessing is from above, transcended from God. Look at the progression of those verbs.

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First, the man starts off by walking. Blessed is the man who doesn't walk. Then standing, and finally sitting.

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J. Adams says, to walk is a biblical expression that means to live day by day in a certain way.

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To speak of the Christian's walk is to designate what has become his lifestyle. And it all begins with adopting the counsel of the wicked, which advises and directs him in all the wrong ways.

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Worldly counsel will get into your mind and meditate and marinate it for the wrong things.

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The wicked start off by walking, strolling, living day by day, operating on worldly and ungodly counsel.

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They listen to and live by the principles of the world. And you've heard all of these. Follow your heart.

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Obey your thirst. That's an ad, right? Just do it. You be you.

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YOLO. You only live once. Do it. We're told twice in the Proverbs that there's a way that seems right to a man, but in the end, it leads to destruction.

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But the process starts off with indifference. Eh, I'll just go with it. By not rejecting the worldly counsel, you just go along to get along.

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Then it progresses into standing in the way of sinners. In other words, you accept the worldly wisdom as valid, good, true.

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You receive it. You've heard it so much that it sinks in and shapes the way you think.

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Now you're marinating. Scripture tells you bad company corrupts good character.

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You don't just go along to get along. You actually buy into it now and stand for what worldly wisdom tells you.

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Love is love. Women do have a choice. Gender's fluid. God doesn't judge anyone.

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He loves everybody the same. God clearly says, my thoughts are not your thoughts.

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Your ways are not my ways. And finally, walking and standing lead to sitting and scoffing.

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You now firmly plant yourself. You sit in the seat of wisdom and the ways of the world. You sit in the seat of scoffers and mock

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God. You sit in judgment and point your finger at Him. You harden your heart against Him and cast off His rule over you.

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Like Nebuchadnezzar. Like last week, Belshazzar. But you're in grave danger if you do that.

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This will lead to ruin and misery. You see the progression? Walking leads to standing.

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Standing leads to sitting. Sitting leads to scoffing. It's a progressive hardening of the heart.

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And what people don't realize is that the infinite wisdom of the world will not solve the infinite problem of our spirit.

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Worldly wisdom solves neither the problems of the world nor the problems of the spirit.

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But godly wisdom solves both. You were made to depend on God and meditate on His word.

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So, look at verse 2. Where does the blessed man's happiness or blessed state come from?

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Verse 2. His delight is in the law of the Lord. And on His law, he meditates day and night.

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Delight is to find great pleasure in something. And here, the blessed man delights in God's law.

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Now, the word law, some people think, oh, that just means the Ten Commandments. But it's much broader than the Ten Commandments.

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The word law means instruction. In the Hebrew understanding of things, it would entail the entire

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Pentateuch. The first five books of the Bible. The word law literally means to thrust your finger out.

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In other words, to point and direct you. So the blessed man delights in God's instruction as found in the first five books of the

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Bible. He delights in it and meditates on it day and night. And it points him in the right direction.

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And then he follows. You were designed, you were created to consume these words.

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Moses says, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word out of the mouth of God.

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The scriptures are God breathed. And every time you read them, you are taking in the breath of God and refreshing and feeding your soul.

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The blessed man meditates. He marinates his mind in the word of God, and then he delights.

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Blessed is the man who delights in the word of God. Happiness, joy, does not come from walking, standing, and sitting in the council way and seat of the world.

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It comes from meditating in the perfect law of God. So here's my question for you.

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What are you delighting in and meditating on regularly? What do you meditate on day and night that may not be

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God's law? Is that feeding your soul or fleecing your soul?

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What we don't realize is that we are always marinating in something. We hear every week, the world is catechizing you.

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And it's true. The world will catechize you. You need to fight against that. Think about social media.

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Think about all these devices. So valuable, yet so dangerous at the same time.

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Because you use that to feed your mind. Now look at verse 3.

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When you meditate on God's law, when you marinate in it, you will be like a tree planted by streams of water.

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That yields its fruit in season, and its leaf does not wither. It says in all that he does, he prospers.

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The scripture likens men to trees in many places. You'll hear in Matthew, a bad tree cannot produce good fruit, meaning a person.

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A good tree cannot produce bad fruit. We, like trees, will be known by our fruit.

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It's a sign of blessing. It's a sign that we're prospering spiritually. And it's why we were created.

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We were created to do good works. To bear good fruit. Here, the man who delights in God's instruction is likened to a tree planted by streams of water.

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In other words, he's planted. He's rooted. Grounded. And because of that, he's not tossed to and fro.

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He's not running after the latest fad, or the latest craze, or the latest political issue. He's satisfied by the word of God, and continually nourished by its water.

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His roots grow deep. The blessed man is fed by God and planted in his word, while the wicked are planted sitting in worldly counsel and the seat of scoffers.

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And this water, the roots that are growing down, this water keeps the tree alive. It provides sustenance.

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Its stream is continual. There is no lack, no dryness, no drought. The blessed man is rooted in the word of God, and when he reads it, he's nourished by it.

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And then he bears fruit. In other words, you will taste like what you marinate in.

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What you marinate in can make a big difference, for good or for bad. And because the tree bears good fruit, it accomplishes what it was designed to do.

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Fruit trees are supposed to bear fruit. Deep, right? In the same way,

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Jesus says his disciples will be known by their fruit. Disciples should be fruit -bearing.

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Notice also that the leaves on the tree do not wither. Wither means to shrivel, caused by lack of water.

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Since the tree is planted by streams of water and potted in the soil of Scripture, and watered by the

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Holy Spirit, its leaves will not wither. In fact, in Revelation 21, we hear that the leaves will be for the healing of the nations.

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God's people are here to bear fruit. Do you realize the fruit is never for the tree?

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The tree never eats the fruit. The tree gives the fruit to someone else. Be a fruit -bearer.

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Be part of the healing of the nations. Bring God's kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. And because of this, the psalmist says, in all that he does, he prospers.

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The result of delighting in the law of God is prospering in all you do. The blessed man will prosper, but the wicked are not so.

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The blessed man receives the blessings promised in Deuteronomy 28. We read verses 1 -8. All these blessings will come upon you.

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Blessed in the city, blessed in the field, blessed is the fruit of your womb. Blessed is your field, your cattle, your basket.

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When you come in, you'll be blessed. When you go out, you'll be blessed. Your enemies will be defeated. You'll abound in prosperity.

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You'll be the head and not the tail. These are all the blessings conditioned on obedience to God's word.

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Then later on, after that, in Joshua 1, Joshua, Moses' successor, tells the people this as they're entering into God's promised land.

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Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to do all the law Moses, my servant, commands you.

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Do not turn from it to the right or to the left. That you may have good success wherever you go.

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Joshua goes on. This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it.

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For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.

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So God commands them to be strong and courageous and then tells them how to be successful. How? By meditating on God's law.

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Their prosperity and success are directly tied to meditating on and obeying on the word of God.

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Why? Because you and I were created to be dependent on God and to feast on his word.

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If you eat God's word, you will become strong and courageous. If you're strong and courageous, you'll be successful and prosperous.

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You are going to bear fruit. But I probably should tell you what meditation is, right? Bill Mounce says meditation is this.

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To meditate is the act of thoughtful deliberation with the implication of speaking to oneself.

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To meditate is the act of thoughtful deliberation with the implication of speaking to oneself.

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Now, some of you might say, I tried to meditate on God's word. I can't. I just can't concentrate.

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I got OCD. It's a real thing, right? I can't concentrate. Well, here's my question for you.

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Do you ever worry? Worry is just meditation on the wrong things.

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It is a profound contemplation of the things that produce fear and anxiety. Worry is a profound contemplation of things that produce fear and anxiety.

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My dear brother Eddie Piero told me that. He's a great friend and a great counselor. I'm indebted to him. Worry is a profound contemplation on things that produce fear and anxiety, while biblical meditation is a profound contemplation of things that produce faith, hope, and love.

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Our issue isn't that we don't know how to meditate. Our issue is what we choose to meditate on.

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Why? Because everybody's marinating in something. On Wednesday, we got covered in the smoke and the residue of the wildfires in Canada, right?

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We all had to go inside because if we breathe that in, we could get very sick. We had to go where the air was clean.

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Is that any different than taking in worldly polluted counsel over God's pure, unadulterated, perfect word?

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We so quickly forget. In fact, in Deuteronomy, we talk about the bronze sky. I'm like, oh my goodness.

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I'm not a prophetic guy like that, but yeah, God could turn the sky bronze in a second. We need to be taking in clean, pure God's word.

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So in verse three, the blessed man prospers because he meditates on the word of God and is watered by the

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Holy Spirit. The word of God shapes his mind and therefore shapes his life. While the wicked walk in ungodly counsel, stand in a sinful lifestyle and scoff at God.

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They will not submit to him. And therefore, verse four, the wicked are like chaff that the wind blows away.

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Chaff are husks, the outer shell of grain or dry grass which are burned and left to blow away in the wind.

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The farmer would go out and harvest the grain and lay it on a threshing floor, which is a large, flat stone.

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Then he would then take a stick and bang the grain and loosen the grain from the husk. Once the grain was loosened from the husk and they were separated, he'd take what's called a winnowing fork, which is like a rake, and he would toss it in the air.

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And the wind would blow the lighter pieces away and leave the heavier pieces, the grain, on the stone.

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That's the fruit. That is the way the wheat and chaff would be separated so that you could use the wheat to make bread.

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So in verse four, the wicked are like unto chaff that blow away. They blow away because they're hollow.

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They contain no fruit. They're light because they're empty on the inside because that's all that the worldly counsel will get you, emptiness on the inside.

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You walk in the counsel of the wicked. They marinate it in the understanding of mankind rather than the wisdom of God.

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They are superficial, empty, hollow in substance. And because of that, verse five tells us, therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

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The wicked man walks in the counsel of the wicked, stands in the way of sinners, but he won't stand in the judgment.

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He'll be blown away. Here's the contrast. Remember Psalm 1 contains antithetical parallelisms.

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The blessed man is planted, rooted, and bears fruit. He's a person of substance. The wicked man is blown away, hollow, empty, superficial.

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One man is faithful and fruitful. The other is wicked and worthless. One is blessed.

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The other is blown away. There's only two paths and only two outcomes. There's only

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God's way or man's way. One prospers. One perishes. The separation at the judgment will divide those who delighted in God's word from those who scoffed at it.

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The blessings that we read in Deuteronomy 28 that are promised to the righteous are not so for the wicked.

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Blessed in the city. Not so for the wicked. Blessed in the field. Not so for the wicked. Blessed is the fruit of your womb.

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Not so for the wicked. Blessed is your field. Blessed is your cattle. Blessed is your basket. Not so for the wicked.

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Blessed when you come in and go out. Not so for the wicked. Blessed that your enemies are defeated.

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Not for the wicked. Blessed with abounding prosperity. Not for the wicked. Blessed by being the head and not the tail.

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Not so for the wicked. The wicked will be separated from all of these blessings and God forever.

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Verse six, the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish. To them belong the curses in Deuteronomy 28.

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Cursed in the city and in the field. Cursed is your basket and your bowl. Cursed is the fruit of your womb and your flock.

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Cursed are you when you come in and when you go out. The Lord will send curses on you, confusion and frustration and all that you undertake to do until you are destroyed and perish quickly on account of the evil of your deeds because you have forsaken me.

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This is the fate of the wicked. Those who don't faithfully obey the voice of the

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Lord and who don't faithfully keep his commandments. Well, if that's for those people who don't faithfully obey the voice of the

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Lord and don't faithfully keep his commandments, where does that leave us? Church, if our blessing is tied to and dependent on our own obedience, on our own righteousness, we all have a problem.

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Is your righteousness what it needs to be? If not, what hope do you have?

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None of us have done this perfectly. All of us have sinned at one time or another, walked in the counsel of the world, stood in the way of sinners, scoffed at God.

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Now what? Here's why Psalm 1 is so important. Psalm 1, the first Psalm in the

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Psalter. Old Testament or New Testament? Old Testament. The original Psalm, Psalm 1 of the

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Old Testament concludes like this. Kiss the son, lest he be angry and you perish in the way.

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Blessed are all who take refuge in him. Remember Psalm 2 is really the end of Psalm 1, their one

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Psalm. The very first Psalm, out of all 150 Psalms, the first Psalm contained in the

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Old Testament songbook concludes with and tells us, blessed are all those who take refuge in the son.

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It points us to Jesus. The first song in the songbook of the Old Testament points us to salvation in Christ.

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He was the hope for them then and he is the hope for us now because Jesus Christ is the only blessed man of Psalm 1.

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And it's in him that we take refuge. We can find refuge in him because we were created to be dependent on him.

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We were not created to be dependent on the law for our righteousness. We were created to be dependent on Christ for our righteousness.

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Our righteousness comes not by keeping the law. The law is a schoolmaster to lead you to Christ and show you your need and dependence for him and his willingness to rescue you.

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All of the law, which means to point, thrust out your finger, points to Christ. We are not made righteous by the law, but by the lawgiver.

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His name in the Old Testament is Jehovah Sikhenu. The Lord is our righteousness.

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His righteousness becomes our righteousness when we trust in him. God sings to them in the

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Old Testament Psalms, I'm coming, help is on the way. And then he actually comes to us in the new covenant.

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So much so that John the Baptist says, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

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Covenantally, you are either in Adam or in Christ. You are marinating in one or the other.

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If you're in Adam, you're walking in the council of the wicked and standing in the way of sinners, the lifestyle.

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And along with that comes all the curses. But if you take refuge in Jesus as Messiah, refuge in Jesus as Savior, you'll be found in Christ, where he absorbs the wrath for your sins and takes all of those curses on himself.

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And then in Christ, all of the promises of God in Deuteronomy are yes and amen.

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So blessed in the city, yes and amen in Christ. Blessed in the field, yes and amen in Christ.

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Blessed is the fruit of your womb, yes and amen in Christ. Blessed is your field, blessed are your cattle, blessed are your baskets, blessed are your dogs and cats, yes and amen in Christ.

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Blessed that your enemies are defeated, yes and amen in Christ. Blessed as the head and not the tail, yes and amen in Christ.

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Blessed in spiritual prosperity, yes and amen in Christ. Blessed with perfect righteousness, yes and amen in Christ.

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Blessed that your sins are paid in full, yes and amen only in Christ.

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You'll be set high above the nations of the earth, yes and amen in Christ.

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Repent, turn, take your refuge in Jesus. Abide in Him.

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Abide, live in Christ. Blessed, happy, joyful, prosperous is the man who loses his life in this world and finds refuge in Christ and the cross.

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Church, Christianity is not just a teaching that we observe and are rewarded for.

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Christianity is a person that we trust in and are saved by. And for those of you who are in Christ already, no more lemon sandwiches for breakfast.

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Recognize the blessings you've received. Recognize the curses that you haven't received.

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Rejoice in those blessings, smile. You've escaped the curses of Deuteronomy 28 that you and I both deserve.

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We should be the most joyful people on the planet coming to church on Sunday, Wednesday, Tuesday, Friday, any day the church is open, we should rejoice and be here.

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Reform your smile by marinating in His Word with His body. Watch the lemon face turn into a joyous and happy face.

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The president may be Joe Biden, but your King and Savior is Jesus Christ.

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He's the King of kings. He's the

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King of kings. The Lord of lords. There is no other. Thank you, Eva.

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Most restaurants serve steak two ways, marinated and unmarinated. Some marinades are good, really good.

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Some not so good. I like steak either way, you can tell. But the right marinade can really enhance the flavor.

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What you marinate a steak in can make a big difference, for good or bad. But what you marinate your life in will make the biggest difference, eternal difference for good or bad.

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Like steak, life is lived in two ways, in Adam or in Christ.

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You are living, you are marinating in one or the other, whether you realize it or not. While I was eating a marinated steak, a pretty girl told me about Jesus.

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And my life has never been the same. I'm in Christ. The blessed man and the wicked man will both be defined by what they marinate in.

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Since it's a psalm, sing it. We sang it this morning. Remember, recall and repeat the words in your mind.

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Blessed are all those who take refuge in Him. Take refuge in the Son. Abide in Christ.

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Let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you, Lord, for your word.

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We thank you, Lord, that we are not to be dependent on the law for our righteousness, but we are to be dependent on your

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Son, Jesus. We thank you for His perfect, finished work at the cross. We thank you for your mercy, your grace, your love.

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Help us, Lord God, to be the most joyful people on the planet. Motivate us, Lord, to tell others about Him, to see your kingdom come, your word, your will be done, and to make much of your name.

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Father, I pray for everyone here, Lord, that this word would resonate in our minds and hearts, and that we would open your word daily, read it, and be blessed by it.