New Year: Setting a Course for the New Year

Setting a Course for the New Year

Psalm 1

“Blessed is the man – the person”.

Psalm 1 is the entrance to the 150 Psalms that make up this book. And it wastes no time confronting us with a choice and an invitation.

This is the path to the blessed life.

Everyone who has ever gone on a hike in unfamiliar territory, knows what it is to come to a fork in the road – the one pathway you have been merrily walking along, suddenly splits into 2 – and if you are going to continue the journey, you have to make a choice. You have no choice but to make a choice. So how do you choose? Well, you don’t want the path that leads you off a cliff, or leads you up the mountain to a flaming volcano where Sauron rules. You don’t want the pathway that take you to Mordor and will kill you.

No, you want to choose the pathway that will lead you to the breathtaking views and soft meadows covered with a blanket of wildflowers – and then that will take you safely back home to your shire.

Psalm 1 tells us that, in the journey of life – we all come to a fork in the road. There are two and only two pathways to choose for your life and you have a decision to make: Which pathway will I choose?

ROBERT FROST:

Psalm 1 introduces us to the doctrine of the two ways, which is a very common concept. Most Americans are acquainted with Robert Frost’s use of the idea in the poem “The Road Not Taken.”

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference

Psalms, Volume 1: (Psalms 1–41): An Expositional Commentary Divergent Ways

Jesus toward the end of the Sermon on the Mount as recorded by Matthew. The last section of the sermon lists a series of contrasts, between which choices must be made: two gates and two roads, two trees and their two types of fruit, two houses and two foundations. The part regarding the two ways says, “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it” (Matt. 7:13–14). Psalm 1 is the clearest, most carefully developed, and first full expression of this idea in the Bible.

Recently visited with a man who had no Christian background - not a Christian and had spent no time in church. In fact, until recently, he was pretty dismissive of Christianity – you may have considered him a ‘mocker’. But he’s paying attention to the world and what’s going on in our society

Here we are at the beginning of a new year and whether you have made a list of New Year’s resolutions or whether you have made none – one thing I know for sure – is that you do have one overarching goal for the coming year: You want to be happy. We ALL want to be happy - to enjoy life to the fullest.

“Blessed is the man”. So let me ask you, ‘Do you feel blessed, as this year begins?”

What does that even mean? Before we go any further, we need to be clear about what we mean when we use the word, ‘blessed’. There are a couple of words in the Old Testament that are translated ‘blessed’ in our English Bibles. One word is ‘barak’ - means favored or ‘blessed’ by God. This is not that Hebrew word. Psalm 1 uses the word, ‘Ashrei’ - which points to a delight that flows from a sense of ‘well-being’ … someone to be envied.

Some people want to define this kind of blessed as 'happy' - That is not a good translation. "Happy" reaches for what blessing describes, but it doesn't quite get the job done. For so many of us, 'happiness' carries way too much of the wrong kind of baggage.

'Happiness' carries the idea of that good feeling you get when your circumstances work out just right - kids on Christmas morning, peel away the wrapping paper on the gift - to find that it is exactly what they wanted ....

Someone made the wise point:

"Ever notice that when your cup of happiness is full, somebody always bumps your elbow?"

The word ‘blessed’ means to be satisfied with joy– whether everything in your life is turning to gold, or whether you are walking through the valley of the shadow of death - - you are satisfied because you are living in harmony with God’s design for your life. You are in communion with Him and you know His peace. “Blessed is the man”

So, do you feel ‘blessed’, this morning – more than you did at this time last year? Or do you find yourself on the threshold of a new year, already fighting just to hang on? So what is your plan to know the Blessedness that God intends for you?

Psalm 1 tells us that stretching out before us all in the coming year are two separate pathways. One leads to blessed satisfaction that you long for, from the very core of your being – and the other pathway leads to a very different place. This morning – I want to invite you to the pathway of blessedness. Psalm 1 falls into three parts:

1 THE BLESSED WAY OF THE RIGHTEOUS, vv. 1-3

2 THE TRAGIC WAY OF THE WICKED, vv. 4-5

3 THE LORD’S VERDICT ON BOTH, v. 6

1. THE BLESSED WAY OF THE RIGHTEOUS, vv. 1-3

Let’s look first at the blessed way of the righteous person. The psalmist describes this person in vv. 1-3. The first description we read about the righteous person is a negative one: what he or she does NOT do. Look at v. 1, “Blessed is the man (the person) who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers …”. Now, the psalmist tells us about 3 different groups of people here: the wicked, the sinners and the scoffers – These are not 3 different classes of people – these are three different ways of describing the same people. All three descriptions point to the same person – it’s the person that verse 4 calls, ‘the WICKED’.

The psalmist is talking about people who are without God in this world. Everyone who doesn’t belong to God, whether it’s someone like a Richard Dawkins, Bill Maher or Ricky Gervais, who loudly laugh at Christians for their faith - anyone who trumpets himself to be an atheist… or whether it is the people who just live out their lives as if there is no God in heaven – but it also refers to the friendly neighbor who lives with the person they are not married to, or the co-worker who’s God is clearly the almighty dollar … practical atheists. It’s all the same here: their authority goes no higher than the human race.

They are the wicked - the opposite of the Blessed person in our text.

There is a progression of wickedness here. Sin isn’t a stagnant pond. Psalm 1 leads us down a ladder, deeper and deeper into sin –

See the progressive hardening into sin here. Progression in Two directions: A building up and a slowing down. Let me explain. Look at v. 1 again: “Blessed is the one who does not WALK in the COUNSEL of the wicked, nor stand in the WAY of sinners, nor sits in the SEAT of scoffers."

It starts with a way of THINKING; ‘the COUNSEL of the wicked’ - and that leads to a WAY of behavior - ‘walking’; and that, in turn, leads to a place of leadership - ‘sitting in the seat’ - that's the place of authority. It starts with keeping the wrong company ... getting infected with a way of thinking ... that leads to a way of living, which leads to a character.

There is another progression at work in v. 1, as well - did you notice it? It is a slowing down. "Blessed is the man who WALKS not .... nor STANDS in the way of sinners, nor SITS in the seat of scoffers." So, we go from walking along a road, and slowing until you are standing still, and then becoming fully stationary and comfortable: from walking to standing to sitting down

The second line, “Stand in the way of sinners,” is literally true – it’s exactly how the Hebrew read, but it’s a bad translation, because to stand in someone’s way in English gives images of Robin Hood and Little John on the bridge. They stand in each other’s way, and one of them ends in the drink.

But to stand in someone’s way in Hebrew means something like to walk in their moccasins, to be in their life, to follow their lifestyle so that you end up being impossible to tell apart from them. So you begin by ‘walking in the counsel’ listening to the advice of ungodly people, of ‘the wicked’, and pretty soon you have slowed down and you are standing in their way - the way you conduct yourself is indistinguishable from wicked people. Then sooner or later, you end up sitting in the seat of mockers. The picture is of someone sitting in a La-Z-Boy.

You pull the lever, your feet go up in the air, and you look down your long self-righteous nose at those stupid, narrow, right-wing, ignorant, bigoted Christians.

At this point, Spurgeon used to say, a person has received his master’s in worthlessness and his doctorate in damnation.

Don’t miss what the psalmist is telling us here, friend: You don’t wake up enslaved by sin and miserable … When you look at hardened criminals, or you see the guy on the streetcorner - who exudes a life devoid of joy - None of them woke up one day, decided, “I’m going to choose against God” - and flipped the switch from innocence to evil .... They ended up where they are today, through a series of choices.

There is a progressive hardening into sin - And it all begins with the mind – with what we feed into it.

Remember the story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. At the beginning of the story, we are introduced to the kindly Dr. Jeckyll. Now Dr. Jeckyll felt within him another force - a dark force - the evil, hideous Mr. Hyde. The problems began when Dr. Jeckyll voluntarily drinks a potion he concocted. He drank the potion one evening and became the evil, terrifying Mr. Hyde. Thankfully, that’s not the end for him. The effects of the potion wear off and by the next morning, he’s back to kindly Dr. Jeckyll.

Oh, but he was intrigued by this 'dark person' that he became ... the experience was quite a rush for him - so he drinks the potion again. Again he turns into evil Mr. Hyde and again the effects wear off and he’s back to Dr. Jekyll. Then he does it again … and again .. and again. Over and over, he drank the potion - entered into the evil existence of Mr. Hyde and always returns to Dr. Jeckyll by morning. Until one evening, to his horror, Dr. Jeckyll was just sitting, thinking about his potion, and he felt himself turn into Mr. Hyde ... without drinking a drop. Mr. Hyde had taken over! What begins as an experiment, with the Dr. in full control, ended up with his personality completely overcome by the sinister force that was once only a curiosity to him.

We all know people - you have friends or family members - and you remember a time in their lives when they seemed to be 'on fire' for the Lord. Jesus Christ was Lord - worship with the church family was their priority … they were constantly looking for ways to minister and to share the good news of Jesus - and their lives just radiated joy.

But you see them now - you see what they post on social media … they have completely turned their backs on the God they once praised .... and you know that they didn't just go to sleep one night, in prayer - and then wake up the next morning, deciding - I'm chucking my faith.

There is a Progressive hardening to sin.

In Greek mythology, there’s the story of the MEDUSA - She’s the female with venomous snakes in place of hair. Her face was terrifying, yet beautiful and the story was that if you look full on in the face of the Medusa, you would turn to stone. You wouldn't feel anymore.

There are Medusa boxes in our living rooms and in our hands - smartphones and computer monitors ... and we are looking at sex and violence full force and so many hearts have become hard … hard … hard.

The kind of things you read, the things you watch online - what you entertain yourself with - it’s not values-free - it all shapes us. Takes us from the seemingly harmless walking along the road, to standing still and ultimately to the place where we are sitting in the lazy-boy, with feet up, popcorn in our lap, feasting in the seat of scoffers.

NOW, does that mean the Bible is telling us to live our Christian lives in isolation - treat non Christians like a plague to be avoided? Is God’s word here telling us that we need to gather our church together, move up into the wilds of northern BC and live as a commune - away from the danger of the wicked?

Of course not! Otherwise, how can we ever fulfill the Great Comission to 'go and MAKE disciples?" Jesus Himself couldn't have been considered righteous or wise. He was criticized, called 'friend of sinners' - because He loved the very ones who were considered 'unsaveable' by the religious leaders of his day.

Oh, but it does mean SOMETHING. It means, at the very least, that you need to be careful. How can your best friends be people who do not share your faith - who do not worship the Lord of your life? And marriage - How can you join yourself to another person in the closest voluntary relationship two humans can make - how can you join yourself to someone who looks at the world in a completely opposite way?

The Blessed person AVOIDS these things. “Blessed is the man who does NOT …”.

POSITIVELY

But the blessed person is not defined simply by what he or she does NOT do. In v. 2, the psalmist describes POSITIVELY, what characterizes this person who knows the satisfaction in life that they were designed for.

Look at v. 2, “… but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.”

The ‘LAW of the LORD’ – you probably think – Moses – yes, it’s the first 5 books of the Bible, that Moses wrote – but it is more than that – it is the WHOLE Bible. Jesus said, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by EVERY WORD that proceeds from the mouth of God.” “His delight is in every word of the 66 books of the Old And New Testaments”.

So, the blessed life is directly related to God’s Word. I know that many of you here, this morning, understand that. On the list of your new year’s resolutions - many of you have an item that goes something like this: “This year, I am going to read the Bible - ALL the way through.” Others aren’t quite so ambitious: “I’m going to read the Bible for at least 15 minutes every day.” And if you have resolved this year to be diligent in spending time with the Lord, reading his word - then I applaud you. That is a critically important habit to make a part of your daily routine. But our text makes it clear that if you want to be blessed - READING the Bible alone is not enough. Verse 2 gives us TWO WORDS that need to mark your approach: TWO words that you need to grab hold of: 1)Delight and 2)Meditate.

FIRST, “DELIGHT”. Verse 2: ‘His DELIGHT is in the law of the LORD’. If you come to God’s Word out of a sense of obligation – if you come to the Bible like you come to the vegetables that mom puts on your plate: “I know I have to eat my broccoli and cauliflower - I don’t like broccoli and cauliflower, because they don’t taste good to me - but I want to be healthy.”

“I know that this is God’s Word – and if I don’t read it, then I’m a bad Christian” – if you approach the Bible begrudgingly – then you are missing God’s intention for you. The Sovereign God of the universe doesn’t need you to read His Word to prove anything to Him! This is His love letter to you - - and He wants to bless you with it.

Recently visited with a man who had no Christian background - not a Christian and had spent no time in church. In fact, until recently, he was pretty dismissive of Christianity and

His good plan for you is that you would approach His word with the passion that you would when running to meet the one you love.

JOHN PIPER: I love the Bible the way I love my eyes—not because my eyes are lovely, but because without them I can't see what's lovely. Without the Bible I could not see “the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.” Without the Bible I could not know “the unsearchable riches of Christ.” Without the Bible I would not know that I am a great sinner and that Christ is a great Savior. I love the Bible because it gives the wisdom that leads to salvation, and shows me that this salvation is nothing less than seeing and savoring the glory of Christ forever, and then provides for me inexhaustible ways of seeing and knowing and enjoying Christ.

The blessed life comes from delighting in this book.

The SECOND word we need to look at here is “MEDITATES”: v. 2, “… on his law he meditates day and night.” That word ‘meditate’ carries lots of baggage and gets misused all the time. This is NOT the kind of Eastern religious practice that so often gets associated with meditation - - where someone with a shaved head sits, cross-legged on the floor, wearing a gown and no pants – or maybe yoga pants – and the goal is to empty the mind of all thoughts – until there is nothing upstairs.

This meditation is quite opposite. The Hebrew word is ‘hagah’ and it points to an audible, bodily action. It is the word used in Isaiah 31:4, to describe the purring, growling sound that a lion makes over its prey, once it has been caught. It is the sound of savouring something. Taking your time over it.

When our family dog, was still alive – she loved food. I’ve heard people tell me about their pets being picky eaters – and if you don’t buy them exactly the right food, they won’t eat it. You put the food in their bowl; they take a sniff, turn up their noses and walk away – and they’ll leave it there for hours, untouched – passively aggressively demanding something better. Our dog was not that kind of dog. She would eat anything. And no matter how much you gave her – she would look for more. Give you those eyes that s, ‘please feed me’ eyes. But you could give her a dry, crust of bread at the bottom of the bag – or you could give her a 25 dollar steak – her reaction would be exactly the same - - ‘GULP’ – one gulp and it was gone.

That’s not what the word ‘meditate’ means here. The word here is like a cow, chewing its cud – or to bring it closer to home – it’s the way that most of us here would approach a 50 dollar steak. You are NOT going to gulp it … you look at it, you purr over it, as much as a human can purr – press your fork onto the top and see the juices flow – look at the marbling of the meat and then you chew it ever so slowly - - savoring every delicious bite.

BLESSED IS THE PERSON WHO DELIGHTS TO CHEW ON GOD’S WORD.

Over and over, internalizing it, getting it into your mind and heart so that when life hits you with a trial – as it will this year - of that, I can guarantee you- or you are face to face with a decision to make – you don’t know which way to turn … And that’s when God’s Word flows up and into your mind.

Oh, how easy it is for us to take God’s revelation of himself for granted – and let it be crowded out to the margin of our lives … content to put up with hearing it read in church on a Sunday. It is a treasure that we have been blessed with, a treasure beyond our ability to even understand.

VISHAL MANGALWADI – “THE BOOK THAT MADE OUR WORLD” - - Indian scholar … traces through history to argue that it is the Bible that shaped our civilization and our culture - It’s the Bible that is responsible for such things as our ‘eyeglasses’, sailing ships that have two sails: one fore and one aft - they were invented for the purpose of freeing the slaves from the bottom of the ships. It’s the Bible alone, of all the religions of man and every religious book - It is the BIble alone that teaches all humans, male and female, from every different race and language - every single one of us is created in the image of God and created to be treated with dignity.

So people come up with inventions to alleviate some of the burdens of work and concentrate on worship and

Education, literacy, hospitals … the Bible is at the root of so much that we take for granted as a given.

Verse 3 gives us the consequence of this blessed lifestyle: “He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither”. The Israelites lived in a hostile climate, with blistering heat and weeks and weeks without a drop of rain – dry dust everywhere.

Trees are treasured in that kind of climate – and they are fragile. The word translated ‘streams’ in v. 3, points to irrigation canals that were dug in farmer’s fields. The righteous person is a carefully planted tree, planted not beside a wadi – or a gulch, that floods in the rainy season and dries up in the summer. The blessed person is not planted beside a river, that can swell and break over its banks, causing destruction and flood.

No, the blessed person who delights in meditating on God’s Word – is like a tree planted by ‘streams’ – carefully constructed irrigation canals, nourished by the water and naturally, surely, bearing fruit.

2. THE TRAGIC WAY OF THE WICKED, vv. 4-5

If the righteous person, delighting in God’s word, meditating it - if he’s like a tree, solidly rooted and covered in radiant, lush green leaves … the unrighteous person is anything but that. Verses 4-5 give us the alternative to the righteous person who is blessed.

Verse 4, “The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away.”

“… Like ‘chaff’. This is the language of the farm. When the farmer harvests his wheat, he takes it to the threshing floor and dumps it out. He has to get the valuable grain out from the outer husk that has kept it safe until now. So he takes the grain with a winnowing fork – like a pitchfork - and he throws the grain into the air. The breeze separates the thin, almost weightless husk from the grain – and the grain falls back down to the ground, while the husk – the chaff, flies away in the breeze.

The wicked strive and toil and run after pleasure and fame and fortune – but at the end of the day, their lives carry no more weight than the useless chaff.

Now, ultimately, the Psalmist is looking forward to judgment day, when every single human being will have to stand before God. That’s what he says in Verse 5: ‘… the wicked will not stand in the judgment nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.’ The wicked will not stand on that Day. It is a terrifying thought.

But the futility – the emptiness of trying to live life without God is not reserved ONLY for that last Day.

3 GOD’S VERDICT ON BOTH WAYS, v. 6

In verse 6, our psalm concludes with God’s ultimate verdict on both pathways: “For the LORD knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.”

“… the way of the wicked will perish” - There is an emptiness that shows up over and over, in history. You see it on the individual level – You see it on the international level too. Kingdoms and Empires have come - - and, one by one, they have all gone, too.

The World Junior Hockey Championships just finished this weekend – and it reminded me of the transformation in the last few decades. Do you remember, as a kid, watching hockey games between Canada and the vast Soviet Empire – the USSR – the contests always seemed so much more than just hockey games … more like a mini battle of civilizations – the summit series in 1972 or the Canada Cups – it was a face off between the Canada, ‘the Free’ - that valued the individual and paid lip service to trusting God … against the vast Soviet empire that rose to prominence by suppressing its people and proudly setting itself up against God. For 75 years, it looked as though the iron grip of that tyrannical system would never loosen.

The Soviet Cosmonauts who were sent into space – the first manned space flight to orbit the earth. With a mocking tone, the Soviets reported, ‘We looked all around, but we did not find God.”

And then, suddenly, in the late ‘80s – the powerful communist party lost power, not only in some of the satellite countries, but in the huge nation of Russia itself. And despite the concerted attempts to stamp out Christianity within its borders, for almost 8 decades ... when the dust settled in what had been the Soviet Union, there was the Church of Jesus Christ – the congregation of the righteous, still growing, as more and more people realized the emptiness of Communism’s atheistic philosophy.

I had the privilege of going to teach at a Bible College in the Ukraine, after the fall of the USSR – and do you know the great hunger of God’s People? They were desperate for more of God’s Word. The Christians I met would tell stories of how, during the communist era, a whole church would have to share 2 or 3 Bibles, if they were fortunate. Everyone would get a turn with a Bible, for a week or two and then they would pass the Bible on to someone else.

Finally, when I was there, they were free to have Bibles of their own … And let me tell you, they weren’t content to have their Bible collect dust on a shelf … they couldn’t get enough of God’s Word. They poured over the Scriptures - in the classes I taught - and in church - the people would pour over their Bibles - and pay rapt attention to the messages. And you know - their lives bore the fruit - they were blessed - these people, most of whom had next to nothing … they radiated pure joy - more than I have ever seen on the face of any multi-millionaire I’ve seen on tv.

I’ve seen the same thing here. Some of the most radiant people I have ever met - are individuals fighting terminal diseases, on their deathbeds even … who have found their righteousness in Christ … and have delighted in His word.

Verse 6 tells us why the two paths end the way they do. It is because, in the shadows, God is there. Verse 6 starts with the camera focused on the righteous: “The LORD knows the way of the righteous ...”. This isn’t the knowledge of mental recognition: “The Lord understands what the righteous person is doing ...”. This is so much more than that. He watches over the righteous – intimately concerned with those who belong to Him.

… “But the way of the wicked perish”. Notice that the text doesn’t say that God “CRUSHES” the way of the wicked? He doesn’t have to – He just leaves them to their own devices and they are faced with the consequences of trying to live without God. That road leads to death.

CONCLUSION

So let me ask you again – what’s your personal goal for the year ahead? You want to be happy/ SATISFIED – we all do. Now how are you going to plan for that. NOBODY accidentally falls into spiritual delight – satisfaction. You have to plan for it.

“His delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.”

The Bible says that the voices you listen to will end up shaping your life: friends and family, news and entertainment, self-improvement articles …even your own thoughts as you process the things you are bombarded with in this age of incessant electronic noise. The pathway you choose to walk along te company you choose to listen to as you walk, will turn into the place where you take your stand, which will end up in the place where you sit and put up your feet

So, this year, what do you think would happen, in your life, if you made God’s voice the one you hear the most?

Kids, when you wake up in the morning, what’s the first thing you do? Check Instagram? TikTok? Facebook? Snapchat? It isn’t just the kids, either, is it – so many of us older folk do the same thing …

…. Wake up, first thing you grab? You get out of bed and your phone is in your hand before your feet hit the floor.

STOP and ask yourself … how can you be the blessed person, planted by streams of life-giving water in this electronic age? How do you pursue God first in an electronic age?

Let me invite you to try an experiment, at the head of this year. Let me invite you to consciously make a decision today – and commit to the discipline of daily meditating on and delighting in the Bible.

This year, before you jump into social media – before you start dealing, on the horizontal level with anyone …. As you wake up and roll out of bed and go to grab your phone … STOP. Take a breath … turn your eyes and heart to heaven, and get, prayerfully, into God’s Word.

It can be overwhelming, even when you want to grow in your discipline to read God’s Word – where do you start? How do you start? How much should you read? So many questions – so many things the enemy of your joy will do to derail you before your train of devotions even leaves the station. I know how it is. So to help you out – there are so many resources out there to give you some guidance - - too many to be able to point you to, on a Sunday morning – If you have a study Bible, chances are, there will be a reading plan in the back. If you use the Daily Bread devotional - there is a plan to get you through the Bible, through daily readings. You can buy a subscription to TableTalk devotional. There are apps like the YouVersion Bible app (which can be helpful - as long as you can use it for the Bible - and not get distracted

There are so, so many resources that can help you. Ask a trusted, spiritually growing friend what they do. It all starts with a single step.

At the very beginning of the book of Psalms, we are called to attention. If we want to enjoy success – blessedness in life. If we want to experience the communion with God that the psalms invite us into – then we MUST choose the appropriate path. We must choose to reject the world’s way of thinking and intentionally choose to ‘delight’ in God’s Word – and internalize it: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed, by the renewing of your minds, that you may test and approve what God’s will is – His perfect and pleasing will.”

So will you join me – and commit right now – to choose a time in your day, right now, when you will commit to feed yourself with the life-giving Word?

If you do – then I can offer you the promise, not my own, but God’s – that you will be rewarded. You will be that firmly planted and nourished tree that DOES bear fruit – and in all that you do – you will prosper.

O for more fruitful people! You know them. They are refreshing and nourishing to be around. You go away from them fed. You go away strengthened. You go away with your taste for spiritual things awakened. Their mouth is a fountain of life. Their words are healing and convicting and encouraging and deepening and enlightening. Being around them is like a meal. This is the effect of delighting in the Word of God and meditating on it day and night. You will yield fruit in season.