“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 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 its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. 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; for the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.” –Psalm 1
“You can tell a lot about a man by the company he keeps”. I don’t know where I first heard this saying, but it is so true. By taking a good look at the way a person lives their life and the kind of people they surround themselves with, it is easy to see their true character. The psalmist here opens the door for us to the entire Psalter by teaching us the difference between “the righteous” and “the wicked”. Although Psalm 2 is also attached to Psalm 1, I am going to focus only on Psalm 1 here.
The main difference between the righteous and the wicked in Psalm 1 relates to one’s way of life and what governs it. The righteous have a way of life that “prospers” at all times because it is governed by a delight in the revealed will of the LORD. The wicked have a way of life that will “perish” in the end because it is governed by their selfish desires and scoffs at God’s revealed will. What does all this have to do with Father’s Day? Every father at this very moment is living one of two ways of life: “the way of the righteous” or “the way of the wicked”. There is no fence-riding according to the psalmist. It’s all or nothing. Righteous or wicked. Prospering or perishing. Fathers are men and men are followers, especially those who lead the best. We are either following the trustworthy counsel of God’s word, the Bible, or the foolish counsel of unbelievers who scoff at God’s word. And counsel is only as good as the character of the one who gives it. We see this in the story of King Rehoboam. Rehoboam sought out counsel about how to run his kingdom at the beginning of his reign. He first sought counsel from the elderly men who guided his father Solomon in all his wisdom and it seemed for a moment that his kingdom was off to a good start, until we read the chilling words of the chronicler: “But he abandoned the counsel that the old men gave him, and took counsel with the young men who had grown up with him and stood before him” (2 Chronicles 10:8). These words mark the beginning of the end for Rehoboam according to God’s perspective (which is the most important by the way). So the psalmist is essentially asking us the ultimate question written over Rehoboam’s life: “Whose counsel will you follow? The Lord’s or the world’s?” It is this question I want to impress men to consider.
If you notice, the psalmist says that counsel is not something we simply learn in a classroom or from a book; it is not information that is simply transferred and stored in the recesses of our brains for some future reference. The counsel the psalmist is talking about is the stuff that guides how we live each day, from the way we drive to the way we communicate to the way we spend our money to the way we work. Notice how the psalmist says in verse 1 that this counsel is something we walk in, stand in, and sit in. The man God considers “blessed” chooses not to follow the foolish counsel of the world and it shows up in every area of his life, from where he goes, to who he associates with, and to what he does with his time. This testifies to the power of refraining. Thankfully there are many wonderful gospel teachers and preachers out there today who have made clear that the Christian faith is not simply about avoiding the bad and doing the good (moralism), but is actually God’s making us righteous solely on the basis of Christ’s atoning work on the cross and his victorious resurrection. But salvation aside, there is still a lot of power when a child of God refrains from the counsel of the world. Sometimes the gospel message can become blurred and fuzzy before the world when they see us trumpeting how grace frees us to be forgiven and not how grace frees us to be different. But I think the best way to gain the world’s ears and eyes is not to prove we’re like them, only forgiven, but to prove we’re not like them because we’ve been forgiven. The world can see your faith much more clearly when you avoid R-rated movies or when you don’t go with your co-workers to the bar at night than they can when you ride along with them and hope to someday win them over. We must obviously use caution here against legalism, but let’s not ever let the world think we have license to follow our selfish desires and not God’s will.
The man God considers blessed is the man who is governed not by the counsel of this world, but the council of Another; namely, God. This man not only obeys the Lord when he speaks, but delights in the very words the Lord speaks too. You may think it sounds a little strange for the psalmist to say he delights in the law of the Lord; after all, even though we may obey the speed limit signs, who in their right mind would actually delight in them? The psalmist can say he delights in the law not simply because it is a law, but because it is the law of the Lord, or the law of Yahweh. This explains the attitude genuine believers have toward reading the Bible; not simply an interest in its storyline or commands, but a delight in the Lord’s revelation of himself in the Bible. In my pre-Jesus days, I approached the Bible like another interesting (yet boring) history book with some religious overtones. But upon conversion, the Bible became to me more than any other book, because I had discovered that it was the Author’s revelation of himself to me in every word, sentence, page, and book. The Author of the book had personally revealed himself to me and was continually giving more of himself to me as I read along.
Not only does the righteous man delight in God’s law, but he also meditates upon it. If meditation conjures up images of a yoga instructor sitting cross-legged and humming, you’re on the wrong track. The psalmist is referring not to emptying your mind of all thoughts to eliminate stress and worry, but a filling up of one’s mind with God’s thoughts to properly deal with stress and worry. When Israel demanded a king over them like the other nations, God gave some guidelines about the kind of leader they should choose; he said in Deuteronomy 17 that this king should “write for himself in a book a copy of this law…and it shall be with him, and he shall read in it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statutes and doing them, that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, either to the right hand or to the left”. Also, God’s words to Joshua, the new leader of Israel after Moses died, are vitally important here: “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. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success” (Joshua 1:8).
The psalmist then compares and contrasts the righteous man to the wicked with two illustrations. The righteous, God says, are like lush, green, well-watered trees planted along a stream. No matter the season, these trees will not wither because of the source from which they derive their nourishment; namely, the enlivening stream. The righteous always prosper, even though outwardly they may seem to hardly be surviving at times. Joseph prospered, even when a slave and a prisoner. Daniel prospered, even though exiled to a wicked nation. Now look at the image God gives of the wicked: they are like chaff driven away by the wind. So on the one hand, the righteous are strong and abundant trees, while the wicked are nothing more than dead and dried husks of grain that disappear with a gentle breeze and perish.
The psalmist concludes this psalm by making a certain declaration regarding the future of both parties. The righteous man will prosper because the Lord “knows” his way, whereas the wicked man will perish because of his refusal to heed the counsel of the Almighty, as revealed in his word. What a sobering word for us. We must beware, lest we follow the counsel of this wicked world and not the counsel of the Lord God as revealed in the Bible.
So what is the takeaway for us fathers? How can we let this word from God lead us to treasure the word of God and follow its guidance before the way of the world? Here are some things for us to take into consideration:
- Don’t seek the world’s approval, but live under God’s approval of you in Christ.
- Don’t dry up by following the world’s counsel, but constantly draw your spiritual nourishment from the eternal truth of God’s word.
- Don’t envy unbelievers, but have pity on them and see the terrible future that awaits all who scoff at the word of God.
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