When we reflect on these titles, there are really only two reasons for being spiritually unhealthy? Either we are disobedient or lost. Don't we seem to squirm when there is no in-between? It’s either/or, gasp! With titles like this, we automatically are forced to compare what we perceive as spiritually healthy with what the Word has to say about it rather than comparing our spirituality with one another like the carnal Corinthians were doing.
It is wiser not to be wise in our own eyes by comparing our spirituality with the Word of God. The merits of Christianity are based on the birth, life, death, physical resurrection, and physical ascension of Jesus Christ who sits at the right hand of the Father on High and is coming back for us at any moment. More spiritually accurate is the comparison than to base the merits of Christianity on the poor poetry of Christlikeness of mine or yours.
We invariably will disappoint somewhere down the line; Jesus will never let us down. I could write or say a million words, hang the moon according to some, and then one thing cuts against the grain of someone’s narrative on this or that, and out goes the baby with the bathwater! In times like these, you keep going forward. Wounds inflicted by the truth are worth bearing. It’s the stigmata of service to God.
Let me provide a quick definition of the Word-driven life. The Word-driven life is “learning the Word, loving the Word, and living the Word.” I borrowed this phraseology from Warren Wiersbe; whether those are his own words or not, I do not know, but I like them nonetheless. It is the passionate drive of a Biblicist or one who believes that the Bible is the supreme and final authority in all matters of faith and practice akin to what we read concerning the Psalm 1:2 man. A Biblicist is one whose character and conduct are in alignment with the teaching of Scripture. That’s the idea and the ideal. The reality of this is nothing short of challenging and unattainable in the flesh.
On 7-4-1776. the Declaration of Independence was ratified in Philadelphia by the Second Continental Congress with 56 signatories for the express purpose of announcing and explaining to the Brits why the 13 colonies were separating from the British Empire. Remember this famous English sentence?
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” [emphasis mine].
One of the purposes here is to remind us of our declaration of independence from the world, its rules and ways that formerly were our governance until we were spiritually regenerated or born again and declared – we are in the world but not of the world. I didn’t get that concept right away, but it didn’t take long after my conversion to get pushback from an aggressive and hostile world in opposition to all things Christian. I started sticking out like a sore thumb, analogous to a white goose amidst a gaggle of black geese!
Those fancy words about unalienable rights in the TDOI are pleasant, but Jesus indicated a different reality to His disciples (which would include us) in Jn 15:18-19,
“If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you [18]. If you were of the world, the world would love its own, yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you [19].”
Paul’s words to Timothy on the assurance of persecution were these, “Yes, and all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution” (2 Tim 3:12).
So much for unalienable rights. It really doesn’t take very long to discover after being born again that there is a great big hostile world to the things of God who looks at the subject of happiness quite differently than our Creator’s view on happiness. “What do you Christians do for fun?” asked the world. Have you not noticed that the worldly kind of happiness seems to orbit around the physical, tactile, and visual: the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life? It knows and gravitates to only the temporary and fleeting things and is repelled by what might be perceived as eternal in nature or the things of God (cf. 1 Cor 2:14; 2 Cor 4:4).
We will see in Psa 1:1 that this holy expression of being “not of the world” is not an attempt to simply be isolated or hidden from the world or some self-inflicting monastic lifestyle or being a reticent witness kind of thing. Actually, it is quite the opposite! Think of it; we are sent into the world for God’s glory (Jn 17:18, You sent Me I send them), being holy (1 Pet 1:15-16), forsaking not the assembling of the brethren (Heb 10:25), being an overt witness (Acts 1:8), discipling others (Mt 28:19-20), representing and promoting the kingdom of God as an ambassador of Christ (2 Cor 5:20), and last but not least, growing in the faith in the whole process of our service to God (2 Pet 3:18). Actually, v1 below is an expression of Lev 11:45 (1 Pet 1:15-16). Holy is God-like, not ungodly like the counsel, path, and seat of the wicked.
(Psa 1:1) 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;
(Psa 1:2) But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and in His law he meditates day and night.
(Psa 1:3) 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.
(Psa 1:4a) The ungodly are not so… (Psa 1:6b) … the way of the ungodly shall perish.
In this introductory psalm to the remaining 149 Psalms, Psalm 1 begins with the word “blessed” and ends with “perish.” The presentations of the contrasts between the godly and the ungodly can dominate the landscape of this psalm to the point we miss some of the inner workings if that is all we are dwelling on in this psalm: the godly versus the ungodly.
Indeed, Psalm 1 does provide a snapshot of the differences between the blessed man or righteous man and the ungodly, sinners, or mockers. We are immediately confronted by this preface psalm of one race, the human race, with two spiritual classes of humankind (righteous and the ungodly), with two different lifestyles (sacred and secular), that have two different outcomes (the Lord knows the way of the righteous and the way of the ungodly shall perish, Psa 1:6). On a side note, it is abundantly clear that Psalm 1 makes the tenets of universal salvation a farcical notion.
The human author of the preface to the Psalms is unknown; the important thing is this; as with all the psalms, the Author behind the author is the Holy Spirit (2 Tim 3:16-17; 2 Pet 1:20-21) who superintended the writing of God’s special revelation to man. It is always good to be reminded of that truth of the inspired nature of Scripture for our view of God can be no higher than our view of Scripture, right? Let’s unpack verses 1-3 and look at some of the contents.
V1, “Blessed”
(Heb, esher, meaning happy or contentment, a masculine plural, denoting a “multiplicity of blessings or an intensification of them,” Boice). It can be translated as, “Supremely happy or fulfilled is the man” (Ibid). It is a state of well-being ranging from contentment to intense joy.
In its context here, the inference is that happiness is hardwired to holiness. This is the way the Creator God made us that genuine happiness as God intended can only be realized through holiness defined by Him, “for I am holy.” Since Yahweh is the Source of true happiness, happiness is only found in Him, not in the rewiring of a man whose source is confined to people, places, or things other than God. I suppose we could distinguish the two by characterizing one as secular happiness and the other as sacred happiness.
V1, “Man”
The meaning of “man” is not qualified other than being “righteous” (Psa 1:6a) – “Supremely blessed is the righteous man…” Gender, economic status, social status, ethnicity, skin color, bond or free, et cetera are not factors in sacred happiness.
In Psalm 1 we have one who is genuinely happy and the other (ungodly, sinners, scornful) who think happiness is derived by the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life (1 Jn 2:16).
Why is the godly man blessed or supremely happy?
He has realized that sacred happiness cannot be rewired or finagled with because it is hardwired to holiness, that obedience brings a multiplicity of blessings; trouble comes with disobedience. The blessed man is saved and avoids the unholy ways of the world which finally results in death (Psa 1:6b).
In v1 we see the illustration of a believer in the world but not of the world who does not isolate himself from the world but separates himself from the ways of the world (cf. v1). We will see in this psalm that there is something to be gained by being obedient to God while in the world and something to be lost by being of the world in disobedience to God.
Overarching thoughts on the interactions of verses 1-3:
The inner workings of v2 are the behind-the-scenes of the outer workings of v1 in the world where the rubber hits the road by the Psalm 1:2 man, making spiritual application in the world from truth learned from v2. V3 illustrates the benefits or the byproducts of v2 and v1 of passionate intellectual pursuit in v2 and the uncompromising experiential application of God’s Word in the laboratory of the world as seen in v1, “come out from among them and be separate (not isolated)” kind of thing. Isolation is definitely not an effective evangelistic tool or a light on the hill, eh? <><
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