VERSE OF THE DAY
Psalm 1:1-2 (New Living Translation)
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Oh, the joys of those who do not follow the advice of the wicked, or stand around with sinners, or join in with mockers. But they delight in the law of the Lord, meditating on it day and night.
VERSE OF THE DAY
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How well God must like you— you don’t walk in the ruts of those blind-as-bats, you don’t stand with the good-for-nothings, you don’t take your seat among the know-it-alls. Instead you thrill to God’s Word, you chew on Scripture day and night. You’re a tree replanted in Eden, bearing fresh fruit every month, Never dropping a leaf, always in blossom.
Psalm 1:1-2
King James Version
1 Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
2 But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.
Blessed is the man who has studied his word and lives in the word and works of the lord for they shall find honor in godly walk
The Righteous and the Wicked: Psalm 1:1-2
Jonathan Brooks – April 22, 2021

“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; 2 but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.” Psalm 1:1-2
Over the next three weeks, we have the privilege of memorizing Psalm 1. This Psalm sets the tone for the rest of the book by distinguishing between the righteous and the wicked. The three sections (of 2 verses each) answer an important question about the lives of the righteous in contrast to the lives of the wicked. What differentiates the righteous from the wicked? What will the fruit of their lives be? What outcome will their lives result in?
Verses 1 and 2 answer the first question: What differentiates the righteous from the wicked? That seems like a simple question. In fact, if we were to poll a group of average people walking down a city street, I can guess answers they would give. Most would say that a righteous person seeks to do good things, while a wicked person does bad things. That answer, of course, is not wrong, but it is incomplete. That answer on it’s own cannot define what is good and what is bad. In other words, who gets to decide what is considered good and what is considered bad?
This is where the wisdom of God in Psalm 1 is on full display. The Psalmist is not addressing the actions of the individual at this point. Instead, the Psalmist begins with what the righteous person will allow to influence his life. From where will he glean the knowledge of what is good and what is bad? To put it another way, the concern of verses 1 and 2 is not our actions, but what is shaping our minds.
Therefore, verse 1 is not a prohibition against spending time with wicked people. It’s a warning against planting your life among them in such a way that they begin to infiltrate your mind with their worldview; with their moral compass. We must not walk in the counsel of the wicked. In other words, we must guard against allowing a godless worldview to shape our hearts and minds. We don’t stand in the way of sinners. This means that we don’t plant ourselves in the ways of the world in such a way that we mimic their practices. Nor, do we sit in the seat of scoffers. The righteous person does not occupy the position of those who scoff. It’s easy to sit with and join in with those who scoff and deride others and complain about all that’s not going our way. We must minister to scoffers, but we don’t sit down and make ourselves at home with them so that we join in their derision.
Instead of allowing the wicked to shape our hearts and minds, the Psalmist reminds us that we must allow the Word of God to transform us. We must delight in the Law of the Lord and meditate on his word day and night. This is a humbling command. In our fallen nature, we must continually fill ourselves with and be sustained by God’s Word or we will fall prey to the wicked wisdom of man. We can’t go one week, one day, not even one part of a day, without needing to meditate on God’s Word. We need it in the morning and then we need it again in the evening. This isn’t a guilt trip about what time of day we should read our Bibles. Instead, it’s a call to make Bible intake a regular part of our day. It’s a call to work hard at hiding God’s Word in our hearts by memorizing Scripture. You can’t meditate on God’s Word day and night if it’s not in your head and heart. In order to fight against temptation and resist the influence of the wicked, we need to continually meditate on the truth of God’s Word.
I love how this Psalm flips our expectations. The difference between the righteous and the wicked doesn’t start with our actions, it starts with what we allow to shape our lives. The reason the Bible has transforming power is not mainly because it makes us better people, but because it points us to an all sufficient Savior. As we meditate on God’s Word, we will see more and more of the evil of our own hearts and we will see more and more the overwhelming grace that has been poured out on us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. As we see Jesus revealed to us in the Word, we will be transformed into the likeness of his character.
Psalm 1 – The Blessed Man Feeds Himself the Word of God
May 15
*This is the first post in a new, ongoing series of blogs from the book of Psalms. We hope that these bless you.
By Bunni Pounds
“Blessed is the man
Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly,
Nor stands in the path of sinners,
Nor sits in the seat of the scornful;
But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
And in His law he meditates day and night.” (Verses 1 and 2)
There is only one important difference between saints and sinners, and that is the blood of Jesus. There is nothing else that separates us. We are Godly for one reason only, because we have been born from above and have taken on the nature of Christ by believing in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus through faith.
Are these verses then instructing us not to associate with sinners? Not really. Jesus hung out with the sinners of His day – the tax collectors and even the “questionable” women, but he did it to redeem them, not to gain their supposed “wisdom”. There is a difference.
These verses are instructing us to not draw wisdom from the “counsel of the ungodly” or hang out with the “scornful” – those who mock God. So many times, we try to gain wisdom from universities, scholars, and leaders in our country that don’t know God. They don’t have any understanding of what is right or wrong, or what is truth. Listening to them can give us knowledge, but they don’t hold ultimate wisdom. We have to pray that we are not led down the wrong path as “knowledge puffs up” (I Corinthians 8:2). That is why who we are listening to and walking within our lives is so important. We need godly wisdom.
True wisdom is only found in one place as it says in verse 2, the “law of the LORD”. The blessed man finds his delight in the “law of the LORD”.
What does that mean?
The law of the Lord is the instructions, teachings, and words of God that are superior to the words of man. That is where the “blessed man” finds his hope, and what we need to cleave to. The blessed man (or woman) knows that above all his earthly wisdom and thoughts, he can run to the words of God and find truth and life.
He (or she) knows above everything that his bread and his food for life are found in one place – the Word of God.
So, what does he do?
The blessed man meditates on the “law” and the teachings of God “day and night”. He cannot get enough. He puts the words of God always before him and chews on them over and over and over again. He doesn’t stop regardless of how difficult the words are [to hear and obey].
Meditation, in the Biblical and Christian sense, is not clearing your mind of everything like in eastern mediation; it is about actually filling the mind with the right things. A good picture of this is like a cow chewing his cud. We eat the food – the Word of God – and then we spit it out and then chew it again.
Did you know that cows have seven stomachs?
Like cows, after about the seventh time we might actually begin to understand what the Word of God is saying. It will start giving nourishment for our souls. In our human nature, we can, at times be hard of hearing and understanding. We have to keep chewing and chewing until it breaks through our hard noggins and we have an understanding of what God is saying to us. That is true Christian meditation – a constant feeding on the Word of God until our minds become renewed and become more like Jesus.
“He shall be like a tree
Planted by the rivers of water,
That brings forth its fruit in its season,
Whose leaf also shall not wither;
And whatever he does shall prosper.” (Verse 3)
The blessed man who is constantly meditating on the Word of God is BLESSED. He is like a tree that grows fruit and is nourished by the waters of God. He doesn’t get weak or sickly; the blessed man is producing life and has vibrancy. This verse says that “whatever he does shall prosper.”
Why is he prospering? Why is he blessed?
Because he has found THE source of life – the Word of God, the teachings of the law, and the teachings of Jesus. He has found stability and freedom and therefore will produce fruit that is eternal because he is focused on eternal things.
I wish that prosperity in our souls and in our families just happened by osmosis. I wish a fairy godmother could just wave a wand and we would prosper. I wish that prosperity where our businesses or jobs just flourished was the result of just a snap of our fingers, but it doesn’t. It takes hard work and being connected to a Source. It takes running to God and staying tied to the Source of Life especially on these days when the enemy is fighting tooth and nail to keep us from the presence of God. If we are planted by the refreshing rivers of the presence of God, we know what we will reap eventually. We will reap prosperity in our souls, our families, our finances, and our lives. We will find the ultimate HOPE and PROSPERITY which is JESUS.
That is God’s desire for us that we would be fully fed and watered, so that we will produce fruit. Isn’t that your desire as well?
Proverbs 5:15 says “Drink water from your own cistern and running water from your own well.”
It is time for the Body of Christ to grow up and learn how to water and feed themselves. That is why the Psalms are such a crucial starting place, because they are easy to digest. We cannot continue to depend on others to feed us – we must learn to feed ourselves the Word of God.
We don’t want to be like the ungodly that are described in the next verses of Psalm 1.
“The ungodly are not so,
But are like the chaff which the wind drives away.
Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment,
Nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.” (Verses 4 and 5)
The “chaff” is the dry bracts enclosing mature grains of wheat which are removed during threshing. As a man threshes out the wheat, hitting it repeatedly and lifting it in the air on the threshing floor, the dry bracts are taken away by the wind. The mature grains of wheat remains for the man to pick up. It is beautiful.
The mature grains of wheat are heavier. They have depth and substance in them and that is similar to what God desires from us. He wants us to have the substance of His life in us. That is Godly maturity.
Luke 3:16-17 says, “John answered, saying to all, “I indeed baptize you with water; but One mightier than I is coming, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to loose. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather the wheat into His barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire.”
We must be born again with his life, filled with His Holy Spirit, and then discipled into His daily food and water – the Word of God. This is the path to maturity, substance, and true prosperity.
“For the LORD knows the way of the righteous,
But the way of the ungodly shall perish.” (Verse 6)
I love the promise in verse 6 that the “LORD knows the way of the righteous.” The Lord is aware of where we are going. He is intimately involved in our lives and he has numbered even the hairs on our heads. (Matthew 10:30) It is so comforting to know that God cares about you and me and that if we call on the Name of the Lord that we will be saved (Acts 2:21). We can rest in those truths.
I don’t read the Message Bible for study, but at times it is fun to refer to their modern-language translation. This particular translation is hilarious, but it makes the point.
Psalm 1 from the Message Bible
“How well God must like you— you don’t hang out at Sin Saloon, you don’t slink along Dead-End Road, you don’t go to Smart-Mouth College.
Instead you thrill to God’s Word,
you chew on Scripture day and night.
You’re a tree replanted in Eden,
bearing fresh fruit every month,
Never dropping a leaf,
always in blossom.
You’re not at all like the wicked,
who are mere windblown dust—
Without defense in court,
unfit company for innocent people.
God charts the road you take.
The road they take is Skid Row.”
Political Corner: For those of us in politics or serving as elected officials, we need to be careful where we get our information, who we are listening to while keeping the eternal perspective of where ultimate wisdom comes from. We can seek a multitude of counselors in many fields of academia and specialties, but we need to pray for discernment and continue to ask God for His thoughts. Many times, when we are not expecting it – God will drop a thought, a piece of wisdom, or a person in front of us – that can lead us down the path we need to go. If we feed ourselves His Word regularly and not abandon it – He is faithful to bring it back to our remembrance when we need it.
Psalm 1 – The Way of the Righteous and the Way of the Ungodly
Verse six presents a key to understanding Psalm 1: “For the LORD knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish.” In this psalm, the way of the righteous and the way of the ungodly are contrasted.
A. The way of the righteous.
1. (1) What the righteous man does not do.
Blessed is the man
Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly,
Nor stands in the path of sinners,
Nor sits in the seat of the scornful;
a. Blessed is the man: The Hebrew word esher is here translated blessed, which has the idea of happiness or contentment. Esher is a form of the Hebrew word ashar, which in its root means “to be straight” or “to be right.” Blessed is the man speaks of the happiness, the blessedness, the contentment in the life of the man or woman who is right or “straight” with God. The righteous man will be a blessed man, a happy man.
i. “Blessed means supremely happy or fulfilled. In fact, in Hebrew the word is actually a plural, which denotes either a multiplicity of blessings or an intensification of them.” (Boice)
ii. “It is not ‘Blessed is the king, blessed is the scholar, blessed is the rich,’ but, ‘Blessed is the man.’ This blessedness is as attainable by the poor, the forgotten and the obscure, as by those whose names figure in history, and are trumpeted by fame.” (Spurgeon)
b. Walks not…nor stands…nor sits: The blessed man does not do certain things. There is a way he will not walk, a path he will not stand in, and a seat he will not sit in.
i. We can say these speak of thinking, behaving, and belonging. The righteous man and the ungodly man are different in how they think, how they behave, and to whom they belong.
ii. Others have also seen in this a progression of sin. “The great lesson to be learned from the whole is, sin is progressive; one evil propensity or act leads to another. He who acts by bad counsel may soon do evil deeds; and he who abandons himself to evil doings may end his life in total apostasy from God.” (Clarke)
c. Walks not in the counsel of the ungodly: The ungodly have counsel, and the righteous man will not walk in it. With all the advice that comes to us, from so many different sources, the righteous man knows how to stay away from the counsel of the ungodly.
i. First, it means the righteous man knows how to discern the counsel of the ungodly. Many fail at this point. They do not even consider if counsel is godly or ungodly. They hear advice, or theories about their problems, and they find themselves agreeing or disagreeing without considering, “Is this godly or ungodly counsel?”
ii. The righteous man is also discerning enough to know the counsel of the ungodly can come from one’s own self. Our own conscience, our own mind, our own heart, can give us ungodly counsel.
iii. The righteous man knows where to find completely godly counsel: Your testimonies also are my delight and my counselors (Psalm 119:24). God’s word is always the best counselor, and godly counselors will always bring the truth of God’s word to help someone who wants counseling.
d. Nor stands in the path of sinners: Sinners have a path where they stand, and the righteous man knows he does not belong on that path. Path speaks of a way, a road, a direction – and the righteous man is not traveling in the same direction as sinners.
i. The righteous man is not afraid to take a less-traveled road, because he knows it leads to blessing, happiness, and eternal life. Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it (Matthew 7:13).
ii. The righteous can have the confidence of Psalm 16:11: You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore. God has a path, and it is a good road to take.
e. Nor sits in the seat of the scornful: The scornful love to sit and criticize the people of God and the things of God. The righteous man will not sit in that seat!
i. When others are putting down Christians, it is easy to sit with them and criticize them. It is easy because there are many things to criticize about Christians. But it is wrong, because we are then sitting in the seat of the scornful.
ii. Instead, we should be proud to follow Jesus Christ. “Be out-and-out for him; unfurl your colours, never hide them, but nail them to the mast, and say to all who ridicule the saints, ‘If you have any ill words for the followers of Christ, pour them out upon me…but know this – ye shall hear it whether you like it or not – ‘I love Christ.’” (Spurgeon)
2. (2) What the righteous man does.
But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
And in His law he meditates day and night.
a. His delight is in the law of the LORD: Throughout Psalms, the phrase law of the LORD is used to describe God’s entire word, not only the “law” portion of the first five books of the Bible. The righteous man is delighted with the word of God!
i. What makes you happy? What gets you excited? This is a good way to see what is important to you. If personal pleasure is the only thing that makes you happy, then you are a selfish, self-centered person. If being with your family or friends delights you, that can be better, but it still falls short. The righteous man finds his delight…in the law of the LORD.
ii. Martin Luther said that he could not live in paradise without the word of God, but he could live well enough in hell with it.
iii. “Man must have some delight, some supreme pleasure. His heart was never meant to be a vacuum. If not filled with the best things, it will be filled with the unworthy and disappointing.” (Spurgeon)
iv. If a person delights in something, you don’t have to beg him to do it or to like it. He will do it all by himself. You can measure your delight for the word of God by how much you hunger for it.
b. In His law he meditates day and night: The righteous man ponders the word of God. He does not just hear it and forget it; he thinks about it. Christians should meditate on God’s word!
i. In eastern meditation, the goal is to empty the mind. This is dangerous, because an empty mind may present an open invitation to deception or a demonic spirit. But in Christian meditation, the goal is to fill your mind with the word of God. This can be done by carefully thinking about each word and phrase, applying it to one’s self, and praying it back to the Lord.
ii. “Meditation chews the cud, and gets the sweetness and nutritive virtue of the Word into the heart and life: this is the way the godly bring forth much fruit.” (Ashwood, cited by Spurgeon)
iii. Many lack because they only read and do not meditate. “It is not only reading that does us good; but the soul inwardly feeding on it, and digesting it. A preacher once told me that he had read the Bible through twenty times on his knees and had never found the doctrine of election there. Very likely not. It is a most uncomfortable position in which to read. If he had sat in an easy chair he would have been better able to understand it.” (Spurgeon)
iv. The righteous man only has God’s word on his mind two times a day: day and night. That about covers it all!
3. (3) How the righteous man is blessed.
He shall be like a tree
Planted by the rivers of water,
That brings forth its fruit in its season,
Whose leaf also shall not wither;
And whatever he does shall prosper.
a. He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water: A tree by a river has a continual source of water. It will never wither away, because it is always getting what it needs. If we are constantly needy, it may be worth examining if we are planted by the rivers of water or not.
i. This would also be a tree that is strong and stable, sinking down deep roots. The life of the righteous man is marked by strength and stability.
b. That brings forth its fruit in its season: The righteous man bears fruit, such as the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23). The fruit comes naturally from this tree, because it is planted by the rivers of water. It is abiding in a life-source. As Jesus spoke of bearing fruit in John 15:5, as we abide in Him. Fruit also has a season. Some get discouraged when they begin to walk as righteous men, and fruit is not immediately evident. They need to wait until they bring forth fruit in its season.
i. “There are no barren trees in God’s orchard, and yet they may have their fits of barrenness, as an apple tree sometimes hath; but they will reflourish with advantage.” (Trapp)
c. Whose leaf also shall not wither: Brown, dead, withered leaves are signs of death and dryness. The righteous man does not have these signs of death and dryness; his “leaves” are green and alive.
d. And whatever he does shall prosper: It isn’t that the righteous man has a “Midas Touch,” and everything he does makes him rich and comfortable. But in the life of the righteous man, God brings forth something good and wonderful out of everything. Even tough circumstances bring forth something that shall prosper.
B. The way of the ungodly.
1. (4) The dangerous place of the ungodly.
The ungodly are not so,
But are like the chaff which the wind drives away.
a. The ungodly are not so: Everything true about the righteous man – stable as a tree, continual life and nourishment, fruitful, alive, and prosperous – is not so regarding the ungodly.
i. It may often seem like the ungodly have these things, and sometimes it seems they have them more than the righteous. But it is not so! Any of these things are fleeting in the life of the ungodly; it can be said that they don’t really have them at all.
b. Are like the chaff which the wind drives away: Chaff is the light “shell” around a kernel of grain, which must be stripped away before the kernel of grain can be ground into flour. Chaff was light enough that it could be separated from the grain by throwing a scoopful into the wind and letting the wind drive away the chaff. This is how unstable, how lacking in substance, the ungodly are.
i. Spurgeon on chaff: “Intrinsically worthless, dead, unserviceable, without substance, and easily carried away.” There is a huge difference between a tree and chaff.
2. (5) The dangerous future of the ungodly.
Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment,
Nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.
a. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment: Because the ungodly have no “weight,” they will be found lacking on the day of judgment. As it was said of King Belshazzar in the book of Daniel, You have been weighed in the balances, and found wanting (Daniel 5:27).
b. Nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous: This is true in the future, because sinners will not share the same glorious future of the righteous. It is also true in the present, because sinners sense they do not belong in the congregation of the righteous if they insist on remaining sinners.
3. (6) Summary: The way of the righteous and the way of the ungodly.
For the LORD knows the way of the righteous,
But the way of the ungodly shall perish.
a. The LORD knows the way of the righteous: The righteous can have peace because a loving God in heaven knows their way, and will protect and preserve them.
i. “Or, as the Hebrew has it yet more fully, ‘The Lord is knowing the way of the righteous.’ He is constantly looking on their way, and though it may be often in mist and darkness, yet the Lord knoweth it.” (Spurgeon)
b. The way of the ungodly shall perish: The way of the ungodly leads to destruction. They are on a broad path that may seem comfortable now and the path gives them lots of company, but in the end they shall perish.
c. At least four times in the Book of Acts, Christianity is called the Way. Certainly, it is the way of the righteous, not the way of the ungodly. Which way are you on?
(c) 2020 The Enduring Word Bible Commentary by David Guzik – ewm@enduringword.com
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Thoughts on Today’s Verse…
So often sin and ungodly lifestyles are portrayed as glamorous. The way of blessing, however, is the way of God. His will is for our good, his commands spring from his mercy and protection, and his way is the path of life. We are blessed when we walk with God and do his will.
My Prayer…
Forgive me, Father, for believing the lies of the world and being deceived and enticed by the temptations of Satan. I know that sin brings heartaches, complications, and problems. I also know that choosing the right things, standing up for truth, and living faithfully for you is sometimes very difficult. Please help my heart believe and my mind see that walking in your will brings me life. In Jesus’ name I ask this. Amen.
The Thoughts and Prayer on Today’s Verse are written by Phil Ware. You can email questions or comments to phil@verseoftheday.com.
What does Psalm 1:2 mean? [⇑ See verse text ⇑]
This verse continues to describe the blessed man. Whereas verse 1 takes a negative tone (Psalm 1:1), this strikes a positive tone. Verse 1 describes what the blessed man does not do, verse 2 describes what he does. As in verse 1, the context here applies to all people, not only males or men.
The blessed person delights in the law of the Lord. The Hebrew word translated “delight” is related to a word that can mean “to bend.” The blessed person “bends” towards God. His or her inclination is to meditate on God’s Word. Instead of letting the words of the ungodly influence one’s thinking, a blessed person wants God’s words to influence his or her life. Reading and obeying the Scripture is extremely important to the blessed person. Such a person doesn’t merely give God’s Word a cursory reading or an occasional reading—he or she digs into it, whether it is daytime or nighttime.
Worthwhile meditation does not require a person to empty his or her mind. Scripture does not support the idea of self-emptying in meditation—godly meditation means filling the mind with Scripture. To meditate on Scripture involves pondering what the Bible teaches about God’s character. It involves thinking deeply about what His Word teaches about ourselves and others. As we meditate, we cherish the promises and precepts we find in the Bible, we heed its commands, we confront our sins and confess them, and we conform our thoughts to God’s thoughts.
The blessed person is not influenced by the words of the ungodly, but is deeply influenced by God’s words.
Context Summary
Psalm 1:1–3 teaches that those who properly respect God’s Word will enjoy spiritual prosperity and spiritual success. This first half of Psalm 1 stands in stark contrast to the second half. These words echo what God promised Joshua, if he would meditate upon God’s Word and obey it (Joshua 1:6–9). Psalm 119 also teaches the importance of devoting oneself to God’s Word and the blessings that accompany that obedience.
Chapter Summary
This psalm begins by describing the man who is blessed. He doesn’t keep company with a bad crowd. Furthermore, the Word of God governs his thought life. Both day and night he thinks about what God has disclosed in His Word. He thoroughly enjoys spending time in reading and pondering God’s Word. His devotion to Scripture produces fruit in his life. In a spiritual sense, he is like a tree whose roots are nourished by a stream. He enjoys vitality and success. His life of blessing and productivity stands in stark contrast to the lives of the wicked. What their lives produce is as worthless as the chaff that the wind blows away. When God separates His people from the wicked, the wicked will fall in the judgment. The Lord is fully aware of the lifestyle of His righteous people as well as the lifestyle of the wicked, so His judgment will be just. The Lord will sentence the wicked to eternal perdition
What Does Psalm 1:1 Mean? ►
Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
Psalm 1:1(KJV)
Verse Thoughts
The book of Psalms opens with a wonderful truth – that the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked shall perish. Godly living which results in blessings from above, contentment within, and hope for the future, stands in stark contrast to the practice of ungodliness and compromise – which produces the fruit of sorrow and destruction and ends in a man’s ruin and death.
The first verse of this opening Psalm gives a precise statement between the two choices every man is given in life. He can choose God’s way and take the path of righteousness and peace-with-God, OR he can follow the downward road of the wicked, the sinners, the scoffers, and those that rebel against the Lord. He can choose life or death: “Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers!”
The man who is identified here is someone who is living in the world but is not enticed by the things of the world. Such a man is not influenced by the mindset of worldly men who live in defiant rebellion against God and hold His anointed Son in contempt. The man in this verse is a godly man – a redeemed man who walks in spirit and truth and does not habitually wander into unwholesome places or involve himself in the worldly exploits of evildoers. Such a man seeks His counsel from the Lord, pays attention to God’s written Word, and keeps his eyes firmly fixed on JESUS.
Such a person is wise in his routines and circumspect in his conversation. Such a one walks in the light of God’s truth, hearkens to the godly counsel of the indwelling Holy Spirit, submits to the voice of his Lord, and sits at the feet of Jesus, day by day. Such a man delights in the law of the Lord and takes time to study the Word of truth. His delight is in the law of the Lord, he meditates on the things of God day and night, and rejoices in God his Saviour. Such a person holds lightly the things of this worldly system and dies to his fleshly desires while trusting in the Father of all mercies.
In one short verse, we see how rapidly a godly man or woman can slide into ungodly ways. Instead of continuing to walk in spirit and truth, they begin to follow the advice of the evil men and slowly become ensnared in the world, the flesh, and the devil. Once a believer takes their eyes off Jesus and allows their ears to be tickled by human wisdom, their spiritual fervour is dampened and they are tempted to loiter in the way of the ungodly until they are willing to stand firm in the company of evil men instead of standing firm on the truth of God’s Word. The longer a believer remains in the company of ungodly men and women, the more rapidly his conscience begins to be seared and the attitude of scoffing sinners taints the truth of the gospel until the Holy Spirit is quenched and grieved.
What a warning to all God’s children on how to live the Christian life and how to avoid falling from grace by being adversely influenced by this fallen world system. We must not walk in the counsel of the wicked or we may find ourselves standing in the path of sinners and even sitting in the seat of scoffers! In a few short verses, we are shown how quickly a believer can leave their first love, lose their heavenly reward, destroy their Christian testimony, and place themselves out of fellowship with their Father in heaven.
May we be careful not to step outside of His will for our lives. May we learn to delight in the law of the Lord and meditate on His Word day and night. May we drink deeply of the living water of life so that we will become like a healthy tree that is firmly planted by streams of water and produces the fruit of righteousness. It is God who plants such a man in the place of His choosing and it is by the waters of God’s unfailing supply that such a man is planted, for it is God that sustains and keeps and God that nourishes and trains. The Lord is the one Who refreshes and renews, guards and guides, helps and heals.
A multiplicity of temporal blessings in the world and eternal blessings in the ages to come are already ours, by faith in Christ, and while our eternal security is assured and God graciously causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous… there are blessings today and rewards to come for the man who chooses not to walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers!
O the joyous happiness of the man who truly walks in God’s ways and does not compromise with the fallen, world system. May we nail our spiritual colours to the mast of our little boats, walk in a manner that is worthy of the calling wherewith we were called, and may we not be ashamed of the gospel of Christ for it is the power of God to all who believe. Blessed, indeed, is the man that walks in the path of righteousness and does not consider in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful.
My Prayer
Loving Father, it is my desire that I too walk in Your ways and keep from foolish compromise with the world system. Keep my heart set on the Lord Jesus so that my thoughts are not influenced by the mindset of this current age. May I be like the man planted by Your many rivers of grace and love, joy and peace. May Your mercy and compassion flow through me to those around me, in the place where you have planted me. In Jesus’ name, AMEN.
Source: https://dailyverse.knowing-jesus.com/psalm-1-1
Source: https://dailyverse.knowing-jesus.com/psalm-1-1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psalm_1
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